“We were all over radio and MTV with an eight-minute song. That hadn’t happened since the days of Yes and ELP”: Dream Theater, Voivod, Watchtower and the explosion of prog metal

“We were all over radio and MTV with an eight-minute song. That hadn’t happened since the days of Yes and ELP”: Dream Theater, Voivod, Watchtower and the explosion of prog metal

It’s often assumed that progressive music was going through something of a lull in the 1980s. But over in the US and Canada, a new, exciting scene was bubbling into existence, and it survives and thrives to this day. In 2018 Prog dug deep into the history of progressive metal.Voivod drummer Michel ‘Away’ Langevin remembers the first night his band opened for Rush. It was March 20, 1990, in Edmonton, Alberta, and the iconic Canadian trio were tou…