“In The Listening Room” with Blind Melon

“Pull Me Under”
Dream Theater

Christopher: This could be metal at any moment – I’m just warning everybody.

Rogers: Either that or it could build up into a power ballad.

Christopher: I feel like we might have to excuse ourselves here for a second. We might have to leave.

Rogers: This is one of those guitar sounds that when he hits a note, about a million lights jump up on his guitar rig.

Christopher: Any minute now there is going to be a squealy.

Rogers: Is this like Queensryche?

Christopher: If it is, let’s turn it off right away because I hate that band.

Rogers: Hate it. This is the kind of music you listen to right when you start to get your pubic hairs.

Christopher: I can’t even be fair to this music because I hate it so bad. I can’t even sit through one song. I know I’m not being fair but I think it is complete garbage. That sort of guitar playing is just stupid.

Rogers: If I want to hear a metal band I really like old Black Sabbath and Soundgarden; heavy bands with brains. If I were listening to an angry metal band I would be more into Rage Against The Machine or Sugar. I like the Sugar record a lot, I like Sonic Youth a lot. That’s heavy, guitar based music that I listen to.

Christopher: Playing fast for the sake of fast is hideous. I hate that whole mentality of sitting around playing scales and cock-rock crap.

Rogers: I heard some squealies. I don’t really like that sound either. I’m not into those guitar sounds. When I hear that stuff I get squeamish.

Guitar: That was Dream Theater.

Christopher: We’ll remember not to buy that record. I bet they have really nice hair though....Now I’m being mean

Rogers: This is just our opinion. There’s a lot of people that like Dream Theater and that’s fine. They get off on it – good for them. They probably hate us, maybe they won’t.

Christopher: They probably do because we sound like were playing sloppy. But that’s alright, it’s just a different thing. We’re just coming from a different space.

Rogers: In no way do we condemn this sort of music. These people have the right to exist.

Christopher: Just keep them the hell away from us.

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JP’s response (not sure what issue of GftPM it was published in)

“In a recent ‘Listening Room’ [GftPM, Jan ‘94], Blind Melon guitarist Christopher Thorn reacted to the Dream Theater single “Pull Me Under” and its musicianship with pure vitriol, starting a tirade that culminated in the blanket statement, “That sort of guitar playing is just stupid!” Considering the bluntness of his statements, we thought we’d relate the incident to Petrucci and ask for any response he might care to give to his six-string colleague’s comments. Here goes:

“I find it really weird that somebody would say that about me or Dream Theater because a couple of guys in the band are into Smashing Pumpkin, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and the like. It’s just the same crap I heard at Berklee, where you had the jazzers versus the rockers, who always argued and fought with each other. Without sounding too idealistic, it’s all music and hopefully there is a quality in all styles that can reach you. Condemning another genre is something that I would never do. And for the record, the members of Dream Theater are definitely not stuffy prog-rockers who condemn songs if they’re not in 9/8 time. That’s ridiculous! We’re into all different styles. I listen to a lot of different things myself: classical music from Beethoven, Bartok, and Ravel, jazz from cats like pianist Billy Taylor and non-traditional jazz from John Scofield and Mike Stern, who’s a monster. And then I dig metal, too – Rage Against the Machine, Metallica, Alice in Chains, and so on. Of course, I’m not going to say that I listen to everything; I don’t particularly care for rap or country-pop. Then again, I really try to have a diverse listening palette. It helps me keep an open mind to music.”

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https://blindmelons.proboards.com/thread/1335/blind-melon-critiques-dream-theater

(post from Rogers in May 2006)

I’ve gotten countless emails over the years about this interview...

We did this for a guitar magazine. The journalist brought in a bunch of tapes and played snippets for us and asked us for humorous comments on them, and being somewhat young, drunk, and stupid, we complied. I think Dream theater fans look forward to pissing on my grave.

One of those moments you’d like to take back, but I’ve got plenty of those....