In 1985 the students guitarist John Petrucci and bassist John Myung saw Mike Portnoy jamming in one of the practice rooms at the Berklee School of Music, Boston. They decided to involve Mike in the high school band called Centurion (where the John's played together with keybordist Kevin Moore and the vocalist Chris Collins). Later this band was called Majesty. They recorded a demo-tape soon. The music was, even back then, progressive and complex with Rush-influences. 'Majesty' signed a new label called Mechanic Records, and the name had to be changed. Mike's father suggested the name 'Dream Theater', taken from a movie house in Monterey, California.
Not long after signing it became evident that Chris didn't have the vocal range they needed for the album. A new vocalist had to be searched and was founded in Charlie Dominici. This lineup recorded 'When Dream And Day Unite' at the Kajem/Victory Studios in Gladwyne, Pennsylvania in the summer of 1988.
After awhile it became evident that Charlie wasn't the right singer, and he was fired in 1990. The search for a new front man took almost two years. In the meantime the other members kept themselves bust writing and performing new material. A new singer was founded in Kevin LaBrie, then the singer of 'Winter Rose'. Upon joining, Kevin LaBrie decided to use his middle name, 'James', as his first, because there allready was a 'Kevin' (two John's was confusing enough). Having signed a deal with Atco/East West Records, the band recorded their second album 'Images And Words', with producer David Prater at the end of 1991.
At the 'Marquee' in London, during the 'Music In Progress' tour Dream Theater recorded the EP 'Live At The Marquee'. A video of a show in Tokyo, Japan was released at the end of 1993.
In March 1994, Dream Theater started working on the third album. At first they planned to include some of the unreleased songs that were included in their live set, yet ended up they had written so much new material (more than 75 minutes) the older songs didn't sound fresh enough to fit in. The only bit of old material they kept was a jam called 'Puppies On Acid' which turned into the song 'The Mirror'. 'To Live Forever' has since been released as the b-side to 'Lie' and the instrumental 'Eve' can be found on the 'Silent Man' single. The band moved to Los Angeles in May for a few months to work with producers John Purdell and Duane Baron. Halfway through the recording of 'Awake', Kevin Moore decided to leave the band due to musical differences. Jordan Rudess (Jan Hammer, Dixie Dreggs) performed with Dream Theater when they debuted material from their release at the Foundations Forum, September 9th 1994. After some auditions Dream Theater decided to bring in Derek Sherinian.
'Awake' was released worldwide on October 4th and did very well. It debuted at 32 on the American Billboard Chart and sold over 43,000 copies in Germany the first week alone. 1995 kicked off with a major tour of Japan where 'Awake' has gone platinum.
In April 1995, Dream Theater entered the studio to record their 23-minute epic 'A Change Of Seasons' with 'Images And Words'-producer David Prater. The EP entitled 'A Change Of Seasons' was released on September 19th, 1995. On a live show in 1996 Dream Theater played some new songs which would be on their fourth album. This album was called 'Falling Into Infinity' and was released on September 23, 1997.

Latest News!! (end January 1999): Derek Sherinian left Dream Theater. The new man on keys will be Jordan Rudess (who already worked with Mike Portnoy and John Petrucci with Liquid Tension Experiment -together with Tony Levin-)

Lineup: (Click on their heads for info)

Discography: (Click on the cover for info)

When Dream And Day Unite ('89)	Images And Words ('92)	Live At The Marquee ('93)
Awake ('94)	A Change Of Seasons ('95)	Falling Into Infinity ('97)
Once In A LIVEtime ('98)

Links:
Official Dream Theater Homepage
Dream Theater Webring

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since August 2nd 1998.

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