The regular edition of the album contains eight tracks, including two duets, one "on-the-fly jam" and one "meticulously arranged cover"; the bonus disc comes with almost one hour of improvisations. It was released in digital, CD, LP and Blu-ray formats, including a limited 2CD+Blu-ray artbook edition and a limited deluxe hot pink box set.[7]
A video for the song "The Passage of Time", their first composition in 22 years, was released on January 22, 2021.[7][8] This was followed up by a video for "Beating the Odds" on February 26, 2021,[9][10] and then by a video for "Hypersonic" on March 24, 2021.[11]
Background and writing
On December 14, 2020, band members Tony Levin (bass), John Petrucci (guitars), Jordan Rudess (keyboards) and Mike Portnoy (drums) released a series of posts on social media (pictures of themselves wearing surgical masks spelling out "LTE 3") teasing a third Liquid Tension Experiment album; a picture of the four of them together with the same masks was posted the following day.[12] On December 17, 2020, it was formally announced that Liquid Tension Experiment 3 would be released by Inside Out Music in the second quarter of 2021.[13] The date, later announced to be March 26, has since been delayed to April 16, 2021, due to printing errors by the manufacturer.[1]
The album had been recorded secretly in August 2020,[14] at the Dream Theater studio named DTHQ.[15] Portnoy had previously recorded drums for Petrucci's solo album Terminal Velocity at the studio, their first release together since 2009's Black Clouds & Silver Linings (with Dream Theater);[16] the band would re-use the studio for the LTE sessions. Portnoy and Rudess also had performed together during a Cruise to the Edge a few years before.[17] The drummer said that the "insanity of 2020" allowed them some time to reunite.[17]
Also according to Portnoy, all members plus two studio professionals quarantined and took COVID-19 tests before the album's sessions.[17]
The track "Chris & Kevin's Amazing Odyssey" is a follow-up to "Chris and Kevin's Excellent Adventure" (from Liquid Tension Experiment) and "Chris & Kevin's Bogus Journey" (from Spontaneous Combustion); Chris and Kevin is how a photographer mistakenly called Mike and Tony during photo sessions for the first album, and that has since remained a recurring internal joke and is used to title duets between the drummer and the bassist.[17] It is a drum-and-bass duet featuring Levin on the electric upright bass.[18]
"Rhapsody in Blue", composed by George Gershwin, was arranged and performed by the band during their 2008 tour; the band would record a studio version of the arrangement for the album.[18] The middle section of the band's 2008 arrangement was inspiration for the middle section of "The Count of Tuscany" off Black Clouds & Silver Linings; also, the standard clarinet introduction was played by Levin on the Chapman Stick.[19]
