I’ll start this post by saying overall I am a big Mike fan. I have seen him many times with DT, but also with his Who tribute, Beatles tribute, Transatlantic, Neal Morse, Adrenaline Mob, and I currently have Winery Dogs tickets.
But my biggest complaint with him live is he ruins the flow of some of his live shows by yapping like he is in a bar band. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes it works and it’s entertaining. Other times however its completely self-indulgent and disrupts the flow of the show. A Neal Morse show is the perfect example of that. Neal has a spiritual tone to his shows, but Mike tramples all over it at times. Also, to add a song like “Crazy Horses” to a Neal Morse set list is well…crazy. It totally disrupted what Neal was doing that night. Now Neal loves Mike, and needs him to help draw so he lets Mike do what he pleases. I think its up to Mike to have a clue in certain situations and police his actions. But because he is a total attention whore he doesn’t seem to be able to do that at times.
This is just my opinion, but I can tell others at that show seemed bothered a bit as well.
Trying to be respectfully honest.