James LaBrie appearance (excerpts)

Tim Henderson: Let’s talk about [new album Live at Luna Park]. Tell us about how came together, what the feeling was on stage, why South America. You always hear about the fans down there, just like that’s the place to be.

James LaBrie: Well, we’ve been talking about doing a DVD down in South America for quite some time, and it just so happened that the schedule allowed for it. Actually before we even confirmed with Buenos Aires, everybody was hoping that their city would be the one that would get it. We knew we could have done it anywhere in South America. It’s just unbelievable when we go down there; the fans, the crowds, the enthusiasm, they’re unbelievably animated, they’re putting up more energy I think than the band some nights. It just came to that we thought that would be a perfect venue. We’ve played Luna Park before; we loved the room, we loved the acoustics, we thought that it had the perfect kind of setting for shooting a DVD. We went in there with I think it was 17 cameras, and you’ll see that throughout the movie that you have the aerial views going around and they’re flashing and editing from camera-to-camera, and that’s how it came down. One of the places I actually wanted to play – and it almost happened – was Montreal, so hopefully maybe next time we’ll do the DVD in Canada.

TH: Speaking of Canada you’ve already rolled up some dates in early 2014. When are you going to be coming back home?

JL: Not until the spring. We start in Portugal January 15th, and we’re over there until the end of February, and they were coming home. I would imagine probably the beginning of April that we’ll start in North America.

TH: We’ve had a contest at bravewords.com to ask James a question, so I’m here to pass the mic to those that would like to ask the singer from Dream Theater.

Q: I’ve got a question in terms of setlists. I know that now you’ve got 12 albums to choose from and I know there’s a certain thought process when you put together setlists for tours. What’s the mindset that you’re going to use, let’s say on this next tour?

JL: Obviously you’re trying to include each and every album – you have to – and you’re hoping that the songs that you’re picking are what the fans are gonna be wanting to hear. It’s really difficult, but some of the guidelines are: what did we play on the last tour, and what haven’t we played in the last five years or so; let’s bring them back. So we’re doing some of that; we’re bringing back songs that we haven’t done for quite some time, so I think that in itself is exciting. Also, we have anniversaries coming up, so without saying what we’re playing, there’s Awake and then there’s Scenes that have anniversaries, so we’re gonna try and touch on some of those aspects as well. But it’s already together. We’re really excited about doing the Evening With because we haven’t done that for quite some time as well. It’s our night with our fans, we can just go out and have a blast.

Q: Last time we talked, you were just starting to work [with] Roadrunner Records. How has your experience been the Roadrunner now, have they include you and they really supported Dream Theater?

JL: Absolutely. They’ve been fabulous. I mean we knew that before going into the label Roadrunner, just because they’ve been a label that really gets behind music that they believe in. It’s not just a product, it’s not a profit margin, it’s “We believe in you guys, we appreciate your music,” and with us they have many albums to pick from as to what kind of a band we are and what we’re trying to do, so they’re the perfect vehicle for a band especially like ourselves. They’ve been incredible.