Samus Paulicelli of Decrepit Birth Covers “Dance of Eternity” by Dream Theater

Decrepit Birth and Dream Theater are two bands I never expected to see in the same sentence. But drum nerds are gonna be drum nerds, and drum nerds universally love Mike Portnoy. So it is with Samus Paulicelli of Decrepit Birth, who recorded a video of himself playing “Dance of Eternity” from Dream Theater’s 1999 magnum opus Scenes From a Memory. Not only does he completely nail it — with 1/4 size the drumset of Portnoy’s infamous behemoth megatron set — but he does it in typically Portnoyian fashion, with tons of silly faces along the way.

“Dance of Eternity” is widely regarded as one of the most difficult songs to play in all of DT’s catalogue — there’s a reason the band asked prospective new drummers to learn it for their auditions to replace Portnoy — with 108 (!) time signature changes. One guy remarkably beatboxed the entire thing while showing flash cards of each time signature change, no less! That one wins at the Internet forever. But Samus’s cover is pretty killer too. Watch below.

Further watching: Samus playing through a Decrepit Birth song. Also awesome!