Mike Portnoy’s Drum Theater

I doubt very much if there is anyone who has heard Mike Portnoy’s playing that hasn’t been amazed by his incredible technique and originality on the drum set, whether it be drummers, other musicians, DT fans or not – this guy is a genius!

We DT fans know Mike to be a driving force behind the band, whether it be behind his kit or not, and we really support his great enthusiasm for the band and what they give us ‘the fans’ from their music. I thought it might be interesting to note down what I have picked up in Mike’s set-up, and how it has changed in over five years of following the band – this shows (I hope) that as fans, we really get into the specifics of what they do...

It is not my intention to go through each set-up in detail, as this has been done many times before. What we have here is a detailed ‘bullet point’ breakdown of things that Mike has added or changed, including some things that maybe only very few people might have noticed, but the rest might be interested in! Here goes...

• There have been 3 kits that we have seen since ‘Images And Words’ – I don’t have any details of what he used prior to this, as the material available is very limited.

• On the “Live In Tokyo” studio video footage, we see Mike using his black Tama Imperial Star kit, prior to it being adorned with the DT ‘Majesty’ logo (which he had done sometime after recording ‘I&W’). We also see Mike with a set of Remo Rototoms to his left – these were to be pensioned off by the time the studio videos of “Another Day” and “Take The Time” were shot. I don’t believe that up to ‘I&W’ he had any full endorsement deals except maybe with his stick supplier, Hot Sticks.

• On the “Pull Me Under” video, Mike still has the Rototoms (but they were definitely soon to go!), the black kit now has the ‘Majesty’ logo and you can also see that he is using at least one Zildjian cymbal (the right hand 18” crash bears the Zildjian logo) so no Sabian endorsement at this point.

• The “Another Day” and “Take The Time” studio videos reveal the woodblock with “HO” (his drum tech’s nickname on) to Mike’s left, there are no Rototoms anymore (just his LP Timbalitos) and he now has full Sabian cymbals, so by this point his endorsement deal was done. There may also have been a Remo head endorsement in place by this time, too, though I believe Mike has always used Remo regardless... including a Remo “CS” black dot on his snare.

• Mike used this same set-up right up to the end of the ‘Music In Progress’ tour at the end of 1993, so it definitely saw some action! On the “Tokyo” video, you can see he added an 18” crash cymbal to his far left with a 10” China Splash on top – this was the only real addition to the kit during the whole ‘I&W’ touring schedule. I cannot confirm whether Mike had a Tama endorsement during this time – I feel that he did not, but I could be wrong. One strange thing to note from the “Tokyo” video is that for some reason, there are no “Sabian” logos on the cymbals – why this should have been, I do not know – maybe Mike can throw some light on this?

• Prior to the rehearsal/recording of ‘Awake’, Mike was approached by Mapex and took on a major deal with them, having a custom black maple shell kit constructed, which saw some major additions/changes.

• A rack system now supported the majority of the drums/hardware. An 8” power tom was added and the drum sizes alter slightly from the original Tama kit across the top (although the kick drums and floor toms stayed the same). The 14” x 61/2” metal Tama snare was replaced by a 14” x 51/2” Mapex (brass?) shell version. Four ‘Octoban’ style toms were replaced to Mike’s left (though these were actually smaller in shell depth than the Tama versions and also had brackets added to allow for freer placement as the Tama holders don’t allow much movement of position) – I don’t believe that these were standard Mapex items at all, but they sound FANTASTIC!

• The first publicity shots of this kit (one of which appeared on the cover of issue 6 of ‘I&W’) showed that Mike had not yet added the additional 16” crash to his left, and had not secured his endorsement deal with Latin Percussion. He still had in place his bar chimes and tambourine from the Tama kit and there was no other percussion visible – he was still using Remo Pinstripe heads on the toms. The 18” crash, which used to be on his far left, had now gone.

• By the time of recording ‘Awake’, Mike temporarily changed his heads on the toms and snare to Remo ‘coated’ (white) versions though the octobans retained clear Remo’s). I assume that this head set-up was in place for the recording of the whole album? The coated heads were still in place for the recording of the “Lie” video, too – though Mike went back to clear pinstripes for the following tour (though he kept a coated Remo head for his snare – something that remains up to now). The 16” crash had been added to Mike’s front left and the 10” China Splash which used to be mounted on top of the 18” crash to his far left, now had its own boom arm to sit on. The Latin Percussion deal had been sorted as Mike changed his tambourine above his 14” tom and added another to his left under the octobans – he also added loads more bar chimes. Mike also firmed up a deal with Drum Workshop for his kick drum and hi-hat pedals (though I believe that for his two extra right hand side hi-hats, he used Mapex hardware)?

Another interesting point from the liner photo with ‘Awake’, is how Mike had to reposition his 8” and 10” splashes and the 6” Cymbal Disk over his front toms. I presume this was to get better separation for recording as you can see they are way higher than he normally has them.

• The “Lie” video saw the kit in all its glory – what a set-up it now was! He had ALL of his percussion gear set up around him and it looked supercool! He still had the front kick drum heads with the large Mapex logo on and large holes cut in. One change was that for the “Lie” video, there were blue ‘backing heads’ attached inside the front kick heads, with smaller holes cut in – not sure why, but they added that extra something to the look of the kit in that video.

• By the time the ‘Awake’ tour started, Mike had amazing new full front kick drum heads of the album cover images, with smaller microphone ‘portholes’ cut in – also the Mapex logo had now shrunk and had the letters M and P made to stand out!

• The Mapex kit stayed really unchanged through the tour until the rehearsal and recording of ‘ACOS’, for which a set of Sabian crotales (mini tuned disks) and a 6” splash cymbal (mounted above his right hand tambourine) were added. I think that a 10” Sabian Bell Disk replaced the 10” China Splash to his left (but not certain!).

• ‘ACOS’ was recorded and Mike went out and started a load of drum clinic appearances. Not much changed in the kit set-up for these dates – he retained the DT ‘Awake’ front heads all the way through I believe, and some of the Remo clear heads on his octobans were replaced with Remo CD black dot heads.

• Right up to the “Home For The Holidays” shows, Mike stayed with Mapex, but changes were already afoot – a major deal with Tama had been organized...

• the Tama deal saw Mike using their top of the line ‘Starclassic’ maple shell drums. He went over to ‘power’ depths for his front toms (and replaced the 14” tom with a 13” so he had 8, 10, 12, and 13-inch toms across the top and he also replaced the 16 and 18 inch floor toms with 14 and 16 inch mounted power toms. His snare changed, too; it was now mounted using Tama’s patented ‘air-ride mounting and was sprayed the same color as the rest of the drums (white with purple ‘rings’). He was now using freely available Tama Octobans, but had the four on his left mounted in a line and two more octobans now appeared on his right hand side. This meant he had to change the position of his ride cymbal and right hand tambourine, as well as replacing the two hi-hats with a foot pedal controlled DW pedal.

The 6” Cymbal Disk which had been a feature since ‘I&W’ (at least) was removed (this used to be between his 8 and 10 inch splashes at the front), but extra Sabian Bell Disks were added to his far left and he also added a Sabian ‘Thunder Sheet’ to his rear set-up. A Sabian 10” China Kang was added above the left-hand octobans.

Interestingly, the first promo shots for the new kit must have shown it in its very early days of delivery. It showed Evans heads fitted (standard Tama fitment) instead of Mike’s Remo’s. Recent shots of the same kit show he has fitted Remo heads. Also, in the Remo promo ads, it states he used Powerstroke 3 kick drum heads, but as far as I can tell from shots I’ve seen, he is still using Remo Pinstripes on his kicks – maybe he varies these?

The new kit has changed again recently (remember I am writing this in August 1997, so it may have changed again!) Mike has replaced the 16” mounted floor tom with a 20” Tama Gong Bass Drum, and I think his cymbal effects may have been upgraded, too (more bells?). A Gong bass drum is a mounted shell with an oversize head – it is a drum rather than a metallic sounding instrument implied by the name – these were used extensively by Neil Peart from ‘Moving Pictures’ up to ‘Roll The Bones’ (and maybe even ‘Counterparts’?).

• Mike came to Europe during March ’96 to do some Tama clinics, and for these he used locally supplied Starclassic kit(s) of natural finish and standard black octobans. But at this point, I believe he was still setting the left hand octobans up in stacked formation much like the Mapex set-up – from the pictures that appeared in Images And Words, he had yet to finalize his full set-up, but you could see what he was working towards.

• Interestingly, the newly available ‘Progressive Drum Concepts’ video, which Mike originally recorded for the Japanese market, was done when he was with Mapex, but you’ll notice that the Mapex logo is cleverly ‘blurred’ out on his front heads! It also makes it clear in the booklet that Mike now plays Tama Starclassic!

• Current Latin Percussion adverts show Mike with the original ‘I&W’ Tama kit – this is strange in that I don’t believe he had a deal with LP at that time – you would think they would use a current shot of him with what he currently uses from LP.

• For the ‘Fix for ‘96’ shows, Mike aired the new white/purple Tama kit in public for the first time. He kept the standard black kick drum heads with the large Tama logo and the customary portholes for the mics – as far as I know, the Gong bass drum was not part of the kit then, but found its way in sometime during early ’97...

• From the recent shows in Europe (April ’97), Mike did not bring his white Tama kit; instead he used a superb looking hit with sunburst finish, but with normal black octobans and black gong bass drum – no rack, and minus some of his percussion.

• Finally, the sticks. He used ‘Hot Sticks’ with his signature, the Majesty logo, and Dream Theater on them, but has now changed to ‘Promark’ – and even has his own autograph model which is available for public use. They are regarded as being as good as you can get.

So there it is! I hope this has proved an interesting read. I hope even those that weren’t interested in the detailed parts of his set-up are now a bit more aware of how much has developed in his kit. Mike, I hope that if/when you read this, I got the details correct and that I didn’t miss too much! And can I have a close up look of your kit when you come to the UK?