John Petrucci

Previously unpublished interview by Andrew Field of Anthem Magazine

The ‘Awake’ album’s good. Duane Baron and John Purdell produced it?

Yeah. We were turned on to them by Ozzy’s “No More Tears” album, the last part especially. They are from LA, done a lot of Mötley Crüe stuff. We were listening to a whole bunch of CDs to try and find a producer, and the Ozzy one sonically blew us away.

The album’s a grower. It sounds a lot more confident; and James in particular sounds better.

Great. Part of that had to do with the recording technique as well. He didn’t double any of his vocals; there’s just the single vocal whereas the last album, David Prater had him double and triple vocals, and they were also massively compressed – that takes away some personality.

There’s some gravel in his voice now.

Oh yeah, he’s singing pretty rough now. He’s got some attitude from somewhere!

James is no longer the new boy. How do you, and he, look back on the last two albums?

The first one was, like... the producer’s job was just to get the record out in a short space of time. We didn’t have a lot of experience, we were making our first contacts as far as gear and guitars and everything were concerned. It was a new experience for us, and I don’t think we’d matured as a band at that point so far as writing is concerned. Y’know, it’s a first album and I think it lacks in a lot of ways.

Were you ever tempted to go back and remix it?

Oh, I’d love to hear it remixed, I think that’s the major problem with it.

Mike told me that there’s a lot of stuff you recorded which you can’t hear in the final mix!

Exactly. It’s a horrible mix. Then “Images And Words,” that was kind of the next point: we were a little more familiar with the gear, and what we wanted; but basically having a producer who took over – well, even though I really respect his work, I love his production, there wasn’t a lot of personality so far as we’re concerned – whether its Mike’s drums or James’ voice or the guitar sounds, they were the producers personality represented and not ours. He served the purpose – the album did really well for us and it sounded great.

Were you amazed when “Images And Words” sold so well? ‘Pull Me Under’ must be the most bizarre hit of all time?

Yeah! I don’t get it either! The album’s almost gold in the States, so when “Awake” comes out hopefully it will push it over and we’ll have a gold record.

Did you enjoy the rather huge tour which followed it? I ask because when I saw you in Manchester at the end of it you looked knackered!

At points. That was like THE END. We had been through the States several times, and Europe twice and Japan twice. We were shot, and on top of that we had pent up creative forces in us. We wanted to write, we missed home, we were sick of playing the same material after a while and you have to give it all you have because you might be playing to someone who hasn’t seen you before, so you have to try and maintain that level whatever.

On “Awake,” ‘6:00’ and ‘Caught In A Web’ make for an amazing opening shot. How old are those songs?

They’re totally recent. ‘6:00’ was written primarily by Kevin, a lot of it in between tour legs. ‘Caught In A Web’ is brand new, we wrote that just a few months ago.

So where’s Kevin gone?

I haven’t talked to him in a few weeks, he just left. I think he’s driving across country or something.

So who’s going to replace him?

Well, we have a little bit of time before the tour, it doesn’t start until the end of October. But before then we have a one-off show in LA on September 9th, and we’ve hired a guy called Jordan Rudess who’s a monster keyboard player, unbelievable. We’re not sure yet whether or not he’s going to do the tour or be a band member, I think we’re keeping that open.

The odds always seem to come up against you. You lost Charlie then the Mechanic deal, and now Kevin.

Yeah, but we’re stronger as a result. The bad times are sent to test us and we always seem to come through. I’m confident that we’ll ride this one out, too.

And finally, whatever happened to Meanstreak? (The band that included John and Mike’s wives – now since defunct – Ed.)

Oh they’re still about. They got a gig as a house band on a TV station in the States. Mike paid for them to do a demo recently, which was cool.

And are they still heavier than their husbands?

(Laughs) Oh yeah, totally.