Jordan Rudess interview (excerpts)

Asked about performing with Deep Purple (filling in for Don Airey) in Mexico City just before the pandemic, Jordan replied:

Yeah, that was a big deal for me because not only was it a lot of music to learn, but you know, we grew up with those songs, and I remember being 17 and 18 years old and having the radio on and just hearing that. ‘Oh my god, what is this music?’ That was like the first progressive rock that I had ever heard, it really had an influence on me. So to play with Deep Purple was, you know, it was a pretty big deal, especially because it was a huge show. It was 40,000 people. So I walked on stage with them for the first time ever, and just like – bam! It was a big rush of energy, it was really intense.

I know Jon Lord was one of the reasons you really got into rock music...

Yeah, he was an incredible keyboard player. The reality is, the reason why I went into playing rock keyboards was really more about Keith Emerson and Rick Wakeman. But Jon Lord, as I said, that was some of the first rock music I’ve heard, and it definitely had an influence.

Had you done some work with Mike Portnoy since he left Dream Theater before this [Liquid Tension Experiment reunion]?

The only thing I did with Mike was, we did a progressive rock cruise, Cruise to the Edge, he invited me to do a song called ‘Instrumedley,’ which is a big, progressive, crazy song. So I joined him there, and it’s a tune we did with Dream Theater back in the day, and so yeah, we reunited with that, and then this was the next part of it, so that was cool. I mean, Mike and I had stayed in touch through all the years anyway, it was never like a big separation between us, so it was awesome to finally get this to happen again.

There is new Dream Theater music in the works too, right? Will we get a new release maybe this fall?

We don’t have a definite release date, but we’ve been in the studio, and we recorded all the tracks for the new album that we’re very, very excited about. I think fans are going to freak out, and right now we’re going through the whole mixing-mastering-production-promotion and all that kind of stuff to get ready for the release in the fall.

Would there ever be any live dates with the Liquid Tension Experiment?

I would hope so, I would love to do that because of the time period, it’s hard to talk about anything but Dream Theater. we all need Dream Theater to get back, it’s our livelihood. Even our tour manager, production manager, they’re like, ‘When are we going on tour again?’ So we can’t really give much thought to the Liquid Tension touring at the moment. But as soon as things start to roll again, then we’ll be able to do that, figure it out. But we’ll love to do that at some point, for sure.