The Dream Team

Progressive rockers John Petrucci and John Myung flex their Olympic-sized chops and go for the gold on Dream Theater’s latest eye-popping release, Awake.

By E.D. Menasche

“In the so-called ‘pop’ climate,” says Dream Theater guitarist John Petrucci, “there’s always been a battle between what’s popular and what’s progressive.”

Petrucci is one of the few musicians who knows what it means to rush headlong into this battle and emerge victorious. For Dream Theater has managed to defy the odds by being both progressive and popular. Their 1992 release, Images And Words (Atco), went gold “despite” the complexity of its music and virtuosity of the instrumentalists. Like classic prog rockers Yes and Rush, Petrucci and his Dream Theater bandmates have learned to harness their technical expertise and an almost academic approach to music and place both squarely in the service of accessible songs.

On Awake, the long-awaited followup to Images And Words, Dream Theater have again managed to effect this unlikely union. Throughout Awake, melody, structure and a solid sense of song cut across genre boundaries. These simple virtues often present problems for players of great skill, who must learn to not let their chops get in the way of the music. As it happens, Dream Theater has four such players: Petrucci, bassist John Myung, keyboardist Kevin Moore and drummer Mike Portnoy. (Moore left the band after recording Awake.) This quartet spins complex textures and interlocking, multi-layered compositions under vocalist James LaBrie’s soaring voice. Often, they take the music in unexpected directions, jumping on a seemingly innocent groove only to twist it into a kitchen-sink barrage of ideas that pays tribute to three generations of progressive music.

Yet on Awake – and on their previous work – they rely on disciplined focus to prevent healthy musical exploration from degenerating into introverted, self-indulgent rambling.

That focus has also helped in some extra-musical ways. Dream Theater, which was formed at Boston’s Berklee College of Music in the mid-1980’s, endured a slew of name changes, mind-numbing singer-searches, and one unhappy record deal before their businesslike approach and relentless work ethic paid off with Images. Now Awake finds them poised to reach a new, broader level of appeal.

Whether or not Dream Theater’s commercial success suggests a revival of prog-rock’s early-Seventies’ golden age remains to be seen. But the pyrotechnic guitar solo that closes Awake’s ‘Mirror’ might be enough on its own to turn a new generation of fret-bashers onto the dangerous and alluring pleasures of progress.

Guitar World: The kind of elaborate, technically proficient music associated with Dream Theater isn’t exactly the “flavor of the month.” Nevertheless, many people are tagging you as a sort of “great white hope” of progressive music.

John Myung: We’re definitely different – grunge is totally in right now. But I think that just by maintaining your own writing standards, you come across to people as genuine. A prime example is a band like Rush. They do what they do and they do it well, and if you can accomplish that...

John Petrucci: It’s contagious to the listener...

JM: It’s more about creating your own path than trying to follow in the wake of somebody. If you’re just honest about who you are, that reaches people on an emotional level.

GW: Has your perception of your own playing changed as you’ve achieved success?

JP: I think my perception of the impact of my playing has changed. You look at where you’ve come to in your professional career, like, for example, my writing a Guitar World column, or all the attention paid to our band, or financial success, or success on the Billboard charts, or whatever. And people look at you way differently than you look at yourself.

At the same time, though, my perception of my actual playing has remained the same. I still feel like I’m just a kid playing guitar, and why is everybody taking me so seriously?

JM: Success brings you to another level of understanding, another stage of self-realization. Sometimes it can be tough because you can psych yourself out just by not experiencing things positively, but it makes you understand what your capacity is and what you’ve done. And that’s one aspect of my playing that I totally appreciate – this need to be constantly growing.

GW: Do you think there is hostility towards the “the guitar hero” concept in the music world right now?

JP: There are two ways of looking at it. First of all, the center that we try to maintain is that we’re influenced by the bands that gave us that feeling of something bigger than the sum of its parts – a kind of synergy. When we were younger and listening to a Rush album, or Yes, we’d get so into it, it was like watching a movie. Not just the individual players, but the songs and the mood – the whole thing – inspired us to get into music. So that’s what John was talking about; that sort of honesty comes across, and that will be acceptable at any period of time. Whether it’s Pink Floyd or Metallica, that sort of attitude and approach is always going to be trendy.

But in so far as there is any “anti-technique” environment, it’s only in a pop sense. Because musicians, and guitarists in particular, who are interested in expanding the boundaries of their instrument and playing to the best of their abilities have always been there, and always will be. And there’ll always be forms of music that speak to that, whether it’s classical or jazz or fusion or industrial.

GW: I recently was talking with Alex Skolnick about the same thing [GW, Oct ‘94], and he was a little bit cheesed about the fact that some musicians criticize players who are technically proficient.

JP: Was he talking about the Blind Melon guys?

GW: Yeah. They were making fun of you guys, and actually, Alex’s feeling was, “Well, that’s stupid, because it shouldn’t be a bad thing to know how to play.” Do you ever feel you have to defend your technique?

JP: It’s not an issue. I mean it’s kind of ironic. I think most musicians who are really into music and studying and expanding are probably way more openminded than people who are defensive and unwilling to accept other kinds of music.

GW: What are the important building blocks to achieving technique?

JP: Besides all the typical stuff that I usually talk about and everyone else usually talks about – practicing, using a metronome, etc. – I think one of the ways to make major leaps, instead of taking little steps, is to use the recording process. When you record, you can do whatever it takes to get a part down. You can create whatever you hear in your mind because you can always get it down somehow, whether it’s by punching things in or by standing on your head while you’re drinking a glass of water. So what comes out on a record can be far beyond your normal, everyday abilities. You totally raise the level. And then when you go practice the stuff, you panic and go, “How the hell am I going to do that? I did it in the studio, but damn, I need another hand or something.” But then there is a way to do it. You learn it by rote and then practice it. You go out and play it in front of an audience and get all your anxiety out. Next thing you know, you’re playing it every night consistently and you’ve moved on to the next level.

You can even do that by recording yourself at home, and demoing. It’s almost like learning a solo that you know is really difficult, but this time you created it. So you’re pushing your own envelope.

GW: Do you both follow a strict practice regimen?

JP: Mine changes depending on what I have to do. I used to take a more general approach, practicing everything I possibly could get my hands on. But I took a few lessons from this classical teacher before I went to Berklee who told me something that really stuck out: practice depends on what your goal is, and sometimes those goals change. So when we’re recording, the goal is to make the best record we possibly can. I personally concentrate on all the technique involved in performing what we’re recording, and I might ignore other techniques and other sources of information in order to do so. If we’re writing a record, I go into research mode and start going through all my books and listening to a lot of music, trying to get new ideas. Or you might get into songwriting mode, where you’re not really playing too much guitar at all, but you’re trying to write lyrics and create melodies and chord progressions.

JM: My approach is wide open. Every day I try to do something different. I try to work on my weaknesses, which are definitely rhythm and sight reading. I concentrate on internal rhythm a lot. I also really work on developing different ways of putting together chord tones, inverting them up and down the neck, being able to go vertically and horizontally, and applying rhythmic exercises. It’s weird, but I don’t spend as much time on scales as I do just on chord tones. To me, when you connect chord tones, it just automatically evolves into a scale.

I also like working on Bach cello pieces, and out of this Charlie Parker book I have which has his solos written in the bass clef, or listening to musicians who really inspire me, like Peter Gabriel.

GW: How do you reconcile being an adventurous bass player with maintaining the fundamental role of the bass?

JM: Hopefully, I’m always holding on to the bottom end. It takes me a while to find a bass part, and I have to play it for a while before I think it’s any good, before it gains my interest. Occasionally, I trade roles with Kevin, where he takes the low end on the keys and lets me stretch out a bit, like on ‘Voices.’ I sometimes compare the bass to the piano. Playing with Kevin has taught me a lot as far as chord progressions go. Sometimes the bass part will already be written based on the chord progressions because of the way the voicings relate to the melody. Most importantly, it’s taught me how important melody is, which is also a major part of my approach to playing.

GW: So you keep pushing yourself to new technical heights. But how do you control yourself enough not to overuse all that firepower?

JP: One of the ways to control your desire to play all over the place is to think back to the bands that inspired you in the first place. Whether it’s the Dregs or U2, there’s always a sense of song and composition that’s not out of control. The musical ideals, the values that exist in those bands, are still strong, and I try to emulate them. The desire to create the same effect, not only for ourselves but for our listeners, keeps us in check, from getting out of control. Unless, of course, we’re trying to create that feeling of out of control.

GW: Does your technique ever get in your way?

JP: I don’t think I’m objective enough to think that. That’s up to other people to say – which they do. [laughs] Sometimes you just have to defer to people – other band members and producers and whatnot – big time. That’s difficult, but I think that’s part of being mature and growing.

GW: What would you say is the area where you’ve experienced the most growth?

JM: I think it’s the fact that we’re getting older.

JP: We’re old men. [laughs]

JM: Not that we’re totally established: we’re still like a baby band as far as our label is concerned. We’re definitely developing. It comes from the experience we’ve gained over the last two years, going to 19 different countries, visiting all these different cities, meeting all these different people. Just seeing where our music went and what it’s doing. That whole set of experiences will bring you to a higher level, and I think it has forced us to dig deeper into what got us here and to appreciate what’s happened and not stray off the path. It helps us grow and prevents us from getting stale.

GW: Can you cite any specific experiences that’ve made their way into your music?

JP: Our love for fish. [laughs]

GW: The band or the food?

JP: I hate fish the food, actually, but we had a couple of songs with working titles like Squid and Blowfish. Kind of a theme working there... In reality, you sort of accumulate inspiration. And time off is when you cultivate that. I always seem to come away with something every time we have a break. So the process of recording this album was a better experience for us because we had a year and a half of touring behind us, which helped us develop our style. Just being out there and reaching new audiences has a huge effect on the way you approach your music.

GW: And that becomes part of the writing process?

JM: Writing for me is sort of therapeutic. It helps me come to terms with a situation and express what I’m feeling. It definitely gives you a different angle. So those experiences are important.

Also, we worked with different producers this time: John Purdell and Duane Baron.

JP: And they let us be more ourselves – they didn’t try to push us into any particular direction. Another thing about growth is that it comes out in the instrumentation and orchestration. As you start to get ideas you start to think; “This would sound good with this type of instrument. this guitar, this percussion.” We really took advantage of that this time. There was such an array of different instruments for each guy, and we had the time and freedom to develop our personal sounds.

GW: Is it a challenge to write for a band with four virtuosos?

JP: For the most part, all four of us are in on each composition. Once in a while one guy will bring in a demo, and we’ll just add a little of our own flavor, but it’ll exist in pretty much its original form in terms of the arrangement and orchestration. Other times, we’ll bring in sections of songs. Like I might sequence a section and say, “check this out, maybe we can use this for a verse or instrumental section.” Something like that will get completely reworked, re-orchestrated and rearranged. And then other things are just completely created on the spot, with all four of us mentally there.

JM: I think it comes down to chemistry. We all complement each other. The relationship we have lets us pull things out of each other that we normally wouldn’t be able to do individually. On this record, some ideas were a little more difficult than others to work with, and it helped to have collaboration. A perfect example would be ‘Lifting Shadows Off A Dream.’ I had lyrics written, and the whole mindset of the lyrics was musically mellow. I had this intro theme that was sort of what I was looking for...

JP: John also had a bass theme using harmonics that opened the song. From there, though, he wasn’t really sure where he wanted it to go. I remember jamming on that song for the longest time. We turned the lights down and got this vibe going with this digital delay pattern you hear at the beginning of the song. We captured a direction.

That brings up an important point: sometimes we can be unsure about a song after writing it, but after taking a day off, we come back, listen to it fresh and reevaluate. And we’ll be like, “Man, that’s really cool,” which is something you really have to do every once in a while. Otherwise, you’re too close and start chasing your own tail.

GW: Don’t you find it difficult to leave room for each other?

JP: Sometimes we do get into that “stepping on each other’s feet” realm, especially as we grow as musicians and everyone gets into different things. When we first started as a trio at Berklee, John had a normal “everyday” bass, and I had a normal “everyday” guitar. And now it’s developed to the point where we not only have keyboards, but John plays a six-string bass, and on some songs I play a 7-string guitar, and Mike has a huge drum kit with multiple percussion.

GW: So you’re all covering more territory.

JP: I think we’re getting better about it though. An objective ear, like a producer, can really help solve the problem, either with a musical suggestion, involving orchestration or with mixing techniques like eq, just to find sonic space for each voice. Another way we get around it is by concentrating on the focal theme of particular section, whether it’s the vocal, guitar, percussion or bass. No matter what, that theme has to stand out and predominate. Hopefully, we’ll hear if anything is taking away from that...

GW: How do you work together when constructing a solo?

JM: Well, take something like the solo coming into the outro section of ‘Mirror.’ I had this really cool rhythmic groove that I’d always wanted to use, and it seemed to fit there. It was like pulling ideas out of a hat. Over the course of rehearsing, or a whole writing period, you develop various bits and pieces of things. By the end of our last tour, we had a tape full of ideas we’d developed in soundchecks that we ended up using on this record. You have to know your inventory and pull out what best suits the situation, and let it grow from there.

JP: That’s the key: it has to suit the situation. John’s talking about where ‘Lie’ is stuck right in the middle of ‘Mirror,’ and the guitar solo at the end is where ‘Mirror’ takes over again, into the thrash part and the ending solo. I remember thinking it would be cool to have a breakdown based on the theme comprising some other section, and then once that theme is over, exploding into this train-wreck solo. And John’s theme did that. But it’s not like he would just pull anything out randomly. Everything has to kind of work with the mood we’re trying to evoke.

GW: Dissect that solo for us.

JP: That was done on the 7-string guitar, and I wanted to get the feeling of a weaving solo. The whole run at the beginning is legato, starting on the low b-string, as low as you can go. It’s only being picked when I’m changing to the next highest string. And after the legato run and a flurry of right-hand taps, it kicks into a series of unison bends with the wah pedal. Then the band picks up into this double-time thing, and I play a barrage of notes, lines that go rhythmically between triplets and 16th notes to get that weaving quality. Some blues notes at the beginning of the line move into diatonic, then chromatic passing notes.

GW: Do you improvise your solos?

JP: For the most part I write the solos, but then, seven times out of 10, they end up changing a little bit. But I don’t generally write them on paper. I mostly like just playing along and improvising – stumbling across things, making mistakes. There might be a tinge of a conscious analysis, like [in official tones] “I hear this mode here!” But that almost happens as I’m playing, as opposed to my going in with a preconception.

Solo sections don’t necessarily happen in the order we write the songs. A lot of the way we write is to just jam. Sometimes the feel that John or Mike comes up with will cause me to say, “Man, that feels so good to play over, that’s such a cool groove, that should be a solo section.” Other times, we specifically decide to do a solo in a certain section, and then the question becomes, “What should we do?” And, for the most part, the background of the solo is pretty different from the rest of the song.

GW: Do you ever play something, then think, “This came too easily?”

JP: Sometimes you do that. [laughs] But the way to stay out of habits and clichés is to ask yourself: “What sounds interesting to me? Is this something I’ve done a million times or does it hold my attention?’’ Usually, if it keeps my attention, I know it’s at least a little different and I wanted to make sure people weren’t yawning during the solos! Ideally, a solo contributes to the composition and takes it in a new direction. If I were to compare the guitar to any other instrument, it would be the voice. Good playing incorporates melody, expression and message.

GW: Do a song’s lyrics influence your instrumental approach?

JP: Not much. On the songs that I write the lyrics to, I’m really in tune with the inspiration of the subject matter and where the melodies came from and I’m probably a little closer to evoking those emotions in my solo. But I don’t think I go in and analyze what the lyrics are and try to emulate that feeling.

GW: You employ an impressive array of sonic textures.

JP: I like to orchestrate the guitars. I go through a song and figure out what types of guitars I want to use on various sections, then divide the guitar part into a series of simpler parts that collectively makes a whole one – which makes it a little hard to reproduce live.

Take a song like ‘Caught In A Web.’ You’re just hearing one guitar sound, but it’s made up of six different guitar tracks. We recorded two tracks of the 7-string through a Boogie Mark IIC with a very tight, not heavily distorted sound. Then we did two more tracks of 7-string through a Rectifier, with a lot more distortion and more of a spread, creamy sound. And then we took the recorded tracks back out through my amplifier and speaker, set the mikes out of phase, and only recorded the high end. You just get the “bite” of the guitar sound. If you were to hear it by itself, it would sound really horrible. But blended together it integrates really well into one composite sound.

I really wanted to do that on the last album, but I didn’t get a full chance to. This time, I played a 6-string, a 7-string, a standard acoustic, a Nashville-tuned acoustic, a Talman guitar, which is this new Ibanez with Danelectro-type pickups... all sorts of things. ‘Six O’Clock’ has twangy, Strat-like tones. I also used an E-Bow for some melodies.

GW: How important is your equipment to your sound?

JP: Well, it’s everything. As for how the actual sound of somebody’ s hands and technique goes – that does play a big role, because two guys can play on the same rig and sound totally different. But my equipment is an extension of what I’m hearing and what I want to hear; it’s the physical means of getting the sounds produced. I don’t have an original thing in my head that nobody’ sever heard before – it’s more a conglomeration of the best parts of hundreds of sounds I’ve liked over the years, and trying to get that to come out of one amp.

In the past, because of the way we toured with all the different types of equipment and rigs, I never had a real grip on why I liked things. This last break I had three months to focus on developing a basic guitar sound. The guys from Mesa/Boogie and Ibanez were sending me gear, and Steve Blucher at DiMarzio was actually kind enough to come into our Manhattan rehearsal space and put pickups in for me, and we would listen to them and comment on them. We concentrated on developing a fatter sound, but with a less harsh midrange. I’m using custom DiMarzio humbuckers that are mounted directly into the guitar and wired to a 3-way toggle switch. The center position uses the middle two coils in a hum-cancelling configuration giving you this scooped-out sound.

I also like to interact directly with my effects when recording, mainly the t.c. electronic 2290 and Lexicon PCM 70, which is also what I use live. That and a Mesa/Boogie Triaxis, which is capable of emulating all the different amplifiers I used in the studio. I run it in stereo with Boogie 4 x 12 Rectifier cabs.

GW: John, tell me a little about your equipment and how it’s evolved.

JM: We really didn’t have too much time working on a good bass tone. I recorded this album using Tung basses, a new line from California. They give me a lot more bottom end than the Spector I used on the last record. I used a combination of miking my Mesa/Boogie – through both an Ampeg B15-10 bottom, and a Mesa/Boogie Powerhouse cabinet – and going direct to the console.

GW: You’ve been able to reach a wider audience by editing your album cuts into MTV and “radio-friendly” versions. How do you turn an eight-minute opus into a pop song?

JM: The label plays a big part in that, as far as controlling what they feel is going to be a strong single for us. We aren’t really directly involved. On the edits we did for the last record, ‘Pull Me Under’ and ‘Take The Time,’ it came down to our A&R man getting together with our producer, David, Prater, and patching the songs together the way they thought best represented the strongest sense of the song.

GW: And did those patches truly represent the strongest sense of the songs?

JM: Uh... [long pause] I think so. Creatively, it’s not the best situation. But if you look at what it does for you... I think it has its benefits. The media exposure brought the band to a whole new set of listeners. And you couldn’t get that kind exposure even if you spent six months touring – once you start getting serious airplay and onto MTV, it’s a whole other level.

GW: I would think having somebody come in and edit your stuff – no matter how artfully they go about it – would be rough on the ego.

JP: It’s not the easiest thing in the world. If we’re talking about being close to a song and someone just comes in and rips it up, I mean, that sucks. Maybe that is an ego thing, I don’t know. Maybe creativity is all an ego thing. But I kind of relate more to the concept of “That’s the full expression of the song, and that’s the way it should be presented.” So it hurts when somebody does that. As far as keeping egos in check, that’s a personal thing. It goes back to who you model yourself after, who you respect, and to whether the people around you make you feel a quiet confidence where you don’t need to be an egomaniac.

If you start to meet a lot of people, especially in this business, you find that ego is what runs this whole thing. All you gotta do is open your eyes. That can really turn you off. So you make a decision: “I don’t want to be like that. I want people to treat me like I treat them.” On the other hand, when you meet people you’ve looked up to for years and they’re the epitome of cool and humility, it makes you want to emulate that.

GW: What are you listening to these days for inspiration?

JM: I’m really inspired by Pat Metheny, Joe Satriani, and I listen to a lot of jazz stuff like Miles Davis and John Coltrane. Also the Yellowjackets and, believe it or not, the Sundays. For me, inspiration doesn’t have to come from bass players anymore. As I’ve progressed, I’ve become more diversified. You know, if something captures your imagination and really inspires you, then it’s influenced you. It could be anything.

JP: Whenever I get asked this question, I always feel uncomfortable because I feel like I should rattle off a bunch of bands... I don’t really immerse myself in listening to music. I like Soundgarden, Rage Against The Machine, and the bands I’ve always liked – Yes, Rush and U2. No matter how many times I hear those songs, they’ll always be close to my heart.

I’m also going to be producing a demo for my wife Rena’s band, which is called Wish. I think a lot of that stuff is really cool.

GW: What’s it like being married to a musician?

JP: It’s great. Music brought us together. We met at a Concrete Foundation convention in LA. My wife is totally able to look at situations and be analytical. Which has been great, as far as making decisions and approaching things that come along in the right way. And it’s like, everything that I’ve done since meeting her, including my playing and my songwriting, has totally taken a step in the upward direction. Things have more meaning and make more sense. Usually, you can’t relate musically to a spouse or mate if they’re not a musician. So it’s cool to be able to relate on a professional level within your relationship with your spouse. It’s really unusual. I can get all excited about a new Boogie amp or something and most people wouldn’t understand, but she totally knows, because she plays guitar too.

Our drummer, Mike, is getting married tomorrow. John’s getting married next year, right John?

JM: [in a small voice] Yeah...

GW: Such fine upstanding fellows. You must have a message for the musical youth of America.

JM: Eat your vegetables.

JP: Seriously, one thing I always find when I do clinics and hear demo tapes is a lack of understanding of phrasing and melody , and of how to be expressive. It’s really hard to teach that, but I think musicians – guitarists specifically – should concentrate on it because there are so many players who are incredible technically, but who lack expression – the ability to communicate to people other than musicians. Music is another form of communication, and you don’t want to only communicate to your peers – you want to communicate to other people that don’t necessarily play, or aren’t necessarily big music lovers, but who you can reach on another level. And to me, the only way to do that is with expression, melody, and composition. I think people should really lock in on and listen to musicians who do that really well. That’s the common element of the really great players. Satriani, Steve Morse, Neal Schon, David Gilmour – all of them do it. So much of what you learn has more to do with your head than your hands.