History
The band originally formed in 1985 by founding members John Myung, Mike Portnoy, and John Petrucci under the name Majesty, which was inspired by Portnoy's commentary on the ending of "Bastille Day" by Rush. After the band found a keyboardist in schoolmate Kevin Moore, the band hosted auditions and settled on Chris Collins as the lead vocalist. While touring around New York, Collins left the band, and the band went through many lead singers before settling on the experienced lead vocalist Charlie Dominici.
The band, still titled Majesty, recorded The Majesty Demos between 1985 and 1986, and shortly after was forced to change their name after another band threatened legal action if they did not change their name. Unable to come up with a replacement name for their band, Portnoy's father suggested the name Dream Theater, which was the title of a nearby movie theater for the name of the band. They adopted the name, and eventually signed their first contract to Mechanic Records.
With the relatively warm reception of their original demos, the band expected their debut album to be received with much fanfare and buzz, but the album went largely unnoticed by the music scene, and eventually led to Mechanic Records cutting their contract ties with the band, resulting in a small, club tour for the album only in the New York area. Due to tensions within the band and creative differences, Dominici was fired from the band and they were without a lead singer for the next few years.
Read more about this topic: When Dream And Day Unite
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“Only the history of free peoples is worth our attention; the history of men under a despotism is merely a collection of anecdotes.”
—Sébastien-Roch Nicolas De Chamfort (1741–1794)
“The history of the genesis or the old mythology repeats itself in the experience of every child. He too is a demon or god thrown into a particular chaos, where he strives ever to lead things from disorder into order.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Yet poetry, though the last and finest result, is a natural fruit. As naturally as the oak bears an acorn, and the vine a gourd, man bears a poem, either spoken or done. It is the chief and most memorable success, for history is but a prose narrative of poetic deeds.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)