James LaBrie

Kevin James LaBrie (born May 5, 1963) is a Canadian singer, best known as the lead singer of American progressive metal band Dream Theater, which he has been fronting since 1991.

Kevin James LaBrie was born in Penetanguishene, Ontario, Canada and started playing drums at age five.

By his mid-teens, he was a member of several bands as a front man that attempted singing and/or drumming.

He stopped playing drums at age 17 and in 1981, at age 18, he moved to Toronto.

LaBrie joined Coney Hatch in 1986 when they were attempting a new lineup.

The band recorded a number of demonstration tapes in their rehearsal studio and performed live in Ontario clubs for several months.

When their record company (Anthem) expressed their disapproval of the lineup, the band replaced LaBrie with Phil Naro in one last ditched attempt at forging ahead without Carl Dixon.

That lineup was to be short lived as well.

Soon after parting ways with Coney Hatch, LaBrie became the vocalist for the glam metal band Winter Rose.

The group also included Richard Chycki on guitar and bass, Randy Cooke on drums, and (in an earlier incarnation), Sebastian Bach on vocals.

Chycki had also worked with Bach under the band names 'Hope', and later 'Sebastian', before settling on 'Winter Rose'.

The band recorded a series of demos through 1988 and 1989 with supporting musicians Bruce Dies and Rob Laidlaw.

Their track "I'll Never Fall In Love Again" was released with a promo video in 1989 and would later be included on the album.

All songs on the album were written by Richard Chycki and James LaBrie, save two which were written in whole by Richard Chycki.

In 1990, LaBrie learned that American progressive metal band Dream Theater was looking for a new singer, so he submitted a tape and was quickly flown to New York for a full audition.

The tryout went well, and he was chosen ahead of 200 other hopefuls to fill the full-time vocalist position in that band.

In 1991, not long after joining Dream Theater (and before ever appearing on a Dream Theater recording), he sang background vocals on the song "Life in Still Water" on Fates Warning's Parallels album.

He has appeared on many Trent Gardner releases (including Leonardo: The Absolute Man and Explorer's Club), as well as appearing on albums by such artists as Shadow Gallery, Tim Donahue and Frameshift.

Most tracks weren't commercially released until 1997 when a self-titled album was released by Inside Out Music, a full 7 years after the group had disbanded.

Since 2004, LaBrie has been working with the True Symphonic Rockestra project, along with Thomas Dewald, Vladimir Grishko, Dirk Ulrich, Christoph Wansleben, Sandro Martinez, Paul Mayland, Marvin Philippi, and Igor Marin.

LaBrie is also a featured vocalist on Henning Pauly's "Babysteps" project released in 2006; LaBrie plays the role of the arrogant doctor.

Their album, Concerto in True Minor - 3 Rock Tenors was released on iTunes and for download on Amazon on March 28, 2008, by Brainworx and Marinsound.

In an interview from Beyond The Dark Horizon on June 12, 2010, James LaBrie stated that his next solo album entitled Static Impulse, is in the mixing stages and will contain 12 tracks.

James stated "It's very heavy and I'm really excited."

On July 27, 2010 it was announced on Dream Theater's website that Static Impulse would be released on September 27, 2010 through Inside Out Music.

It features longtime collaborator Matt Guillory on keyboards, Marco Sfogli (who also played on LaBrie's earlier album Elements of Persuasion) on guitars, Peter Wildoer of the Swedish melodic death metal band Darkane on drums and screaming vocals, and Ray Riendeau on bass.

James LaBrie stated "The release of Static Impulse is one that the whole band is psyched about. This is modern metal and as heavy and relevant as any other band out there going in a similar musical direction. There are riffs that will blow your head off and melodies both musically and vocally that are hypnotic. Get in the driver's seat and let the ears bleed. Enjoy and see you out there with a tour to follow up and support this release."

LaBrie has since had a significant impact on the vocal melodies on each Dream Theater album, but until recently has had little input on the instrumentation of Dream Theater's music; 2011's A Dramatic Turn of Events features LaBrie in the music credits on three songs.

To date he has written or co-written lyrics for at least one song on ten of the fifteen albums Dream Theater has released with him in the band, Images and Words, Black Clouds & Silver Linings, Dream Theater and The Astonishing containing none of them.

Asked by Prog-Sphere.com what is his favorite Dream Theater song to play live, James says "The favorite song for me is Scarred, I love performing that live. And... well, Octavarium, that whole freakin’ thing."

With Matt Guillory, LaBrie has released five solo albums under various names (Mullmuzzler, James LaBrie's Mullmuzzler, and simply James LaBrie).

In 2011's interview for Prog-Sphere.com, LaBrie stated that the US tour got cancelled, saying "Because it was so disorganized last time. That's why I basically said, 'You don't have the visas yet. Where we're at this point, by the time you get the visas processed, we're gonna have one rehearsal and then we're gonna go out.' And I said, 'I'm not doing that.'"

In July 2013, LaBrie's album Impermanent Resonance was released by Inside Out Music.

Throughout his career with Dream Theater, LaBrie has lent his voice to many other artists' records as well as tribute albums.

LaBrie provided the lead vocals for the main character in the rock opera album The Human Equation by Ayreon; in 2015, he reprised his role for a live version, The Theater Equation.

He was also featured as the character "The Historian" in the album The Source.

In 2016 LaBrie was the special guest on the Last Union debut album firstly meant to be named "Most Beautiful Day".

He sang in three songs: "President Evil", "Taken" and "A Place In Heaven".

Eventually the album was called "Twelve" and finally released on December 21, 2018.

"Twelve" was written and pieced together over a 2 1⁄2-year period.