More details revealed by James LaBrie about Dream Theater’s reunion with Mike Portnoy

James LaBrie, the singer of Dream Theater, talked on the band’s plan to get back together with Mike Portnoy in October 2023, 13 years after the drummer initially departed the progressive metal giants, in a recent interview with This Day In Metal. He was questioned about whether it’s accurate to state that his in-person encounter with Portnoy in March 2022 was perhaps the final domino to fall before the original Dream Theater lineup got back together.

Yeah, for sure. When Mike and I met — you’re referring to our initial meeting at the Beacon Theatre [in New York City] when we were playing there and he came out to the show. But, yeah, that was somewhat the catalyst that really kind of busted the door wide open with the possibility that we could all start really thinking about. Is this something that we should be seriously considering, a reunion? And things inevitably did lead to that, but I think there were some precursors, like Mike had already done John Petrucci’s solo album, then he did his solo tour, then he also worked with John and Jordan on the latest Liquid Tension album. So all these things were kind of just slowly but surely ensuring that he was walking through the door of being back in the fold. Coming back in, though, when it actually did happen, it was very natural. There was no — I don’t know — feelings of whether or not, ‘Hey, is this really gonna work? Is this gonna be what we remember the band as?’ And if there were any apprehensive feelings, that just definitely was never a part of it. To be quite honest with you, I joke around, in some of the interviews I’ve said it felt like Mike went out for a coffee and he came back and we just started writing. But it was very smooth, seamless. And we were joking a few times, saying stuff like, ‘Oh my God…’ Because once you actually get into that environment and you start writing the album, you start remembering the chemistry that was almost palpable. And it was within the first day or two days of starting to write ‘Parasomnia‘, we were joking around, we were laughing, it was, like, ‘Oh my god. I remember that, that whole interaction, that whole analytical approach to the songs and how they slowly but surely evolve into a complete composition.’ So it was all this familiarity going on, going, ‘Oh my god. That’s exactly the way it used to be. This is where we are today, but it doesn’t seem that we’ve missed a step.’ So it was extremely effortless, so to speak. It was just doing what we know how to do when the five of us get into the studio.