Mike Portnoy: “Would I play with Dream Theater again? Sure…”

Dream Theater founding member and drummer Mike Portnoy has said he’d be open to the idea of rejoining his old bandmates for a live show to celebrate the band’s 40th anniversary.

Speaking on Ollie Winiberg’s Heavy Hooks YouTube show, Portnoy, who has just released a new album, III, with his classic rock trio The Winery Dogs, discusses the myriad of projects that he’d worked with, before host Winiberg broaches the hypothetical idea of Portnoy reuniting with Dream Theater, who celebrate their 40th anniversary in 2025.

“In 2025 Dream Theater are going to be 40 years old,” says Winiberg. “If they were to phone you and say ‘Do you want to come and do a live show for our 40th anniversary?’ is that something you would do, as a hired gun for a one of show, for their 40th birthday, or is that something you have now put to bed? As you have said many times before?

Portnoy responds: “Um…. I would surely welcome the idea, absolutely and I’ve told the guys such, depending on the circumstances, because obviously there’s a lot of hypothetical circumstances. I don’t know if I’d necessarily want to be a hired gun for a band that I formed, you know… But if you’re asking would I ever play with the guys again? Sure, if the right hypothetical situation came about, yeah, of course, I’m always open to that.”

Portnoy formed Dream Theater, originally known as Majesty, with guitarist John Petrucci and bassist John Myung in 1985 while they attended Berklee Music College in Boston. Portnoy left the band inn 201o to pursue other musical endeavours.

Portnoy played drums on John Petrucci’s 2020 solo album Terminal Velocity and hooked up with his former band mate for the subsequent live dates last year.

The pair also released a third album with prog fusion supergroup Liquid Tension Experiment, LTEIII (opens in new tab) in 2021, also featuring Dream Theater keyboard player Jordan Rudess and King Crimson bassist Tony Levin.

You can watch the whole Heavy Hooks Portnoy interview here.

Source: loudersound.com