Major Influences as a Musician

Hey guys, it's Reed again, and I just want to make some lists of my major influences as a musician and why they are my influences.

Bands:
Dream Theater/LTE: Dream Theater is arguably overall the most talented band of all time, in competition with others such as Rush. The pure essence of musicality goes straight to these guys. Crazy time signatures, rhythms, and outstanding musicians make it this way. 90% of guitarists, bassists, drummers, and keyboardists with over 2 years of experience have heard of Dream Theater.

Rush: A threepiece who blew everyone away. Neil, Alex, and Geddy can really put up a show even now when they are clear out of their prime. Rush is also very influential to bands like Dream Theater, so they definitely deserve credit for that.

U2: My all time favorite band. I grew up with these guys, and I'll never forget it. I saw them on May 24, 2011 during their 360 tour, which totally blew me away. They were my beginning inspiration for music.

Symphony X: A newer progressive metal band influenced mainly by Dream Theater and Apocolyptica. The great orchestration of Apocolyptica matched with the extreme talent and instrumentation by Dream Theater makes for one great sounding band.

Progressive Metal: In my opinion the overall best solid genre ever, even though it is completely underground. Even though all of the bands aren't super famous, they get my vote for making genuine instruments sound so good.

Drummers:

Gavin Harrison: My favorite drummer, mainly because of his outstanding techniques and playing styles, matched with one of the best sounding setups of all time.

Marco Minnemann: An extreme drummer, not in the spectrum of blasting and speed, but insane techniques incorporated with his creativity.

Mike Portnoy: Dream Theater's old drummer. He did so much for the band and wrote great drum parts to songs. Most people would be happy being half as good as him.

Buddy Rich: In my opinion the greatest drummer of all time. He was the pioneer of drumming. As a jazz drummer who played traditional style, he did more on three drums what most people today do one 7+.

So those are my main influences, and if I forgot any, I'll definitely post them later on.