Mike Portnoy Interview 11/23/1997

Capitol Ballroom, Washington D.C.

By Jason Fordney

Beginning with their 1989 release, When Dream and Day Unite, Dream Theater has distinguished themselves as musicians of considerable technical proficiency, as well as gut-level emotional impact.
On the band’s initial release, songs like “A Fortune in Lies,” “Status Seeker,” and “The Killing Hand” reflect lyrics with a passionate, intense perspective, and music that features mind-spinning changes and instrumental virtuosity.

Their subsequent albums, Images and Words, Awake, A Change of Seasons and the brand-new Falling Into Infinity, maintain this approach, but also present a band that does not let a display of chops get in the way of good song writing.

Despite the extended arrangements and surgical tightness of many Dream Theater songs, this band knows the essence of a good groove or power-metal interlude. The influence of such progressive rockers as Yes, Rush, ELP, Jethro Tull, and Metallica show through in the music of Dream Theater, as well as artists as diverse as Pantera and Frank Zappa.

The three original members of Dream Theater are Mike Portnoy (drums), John Myung (bass), and John Petrucci (guitar). They have since been joined by James LaBrie on vocals and Derek Sherinian on keyboards. Mike Portnoy has a range of skills that includes songwriting, doing vocals and penning lyrics. A consistent winner of Modern Drummer readers’ polls, Mike also conducts clinics on drumming and has released an instructional video called Progressive Drum Concepts.

In person, Mike is highly intelligent, affable and candid. I did not realize the deep emotional terrain I was plumbing with some of my questions. Still, Mike did not hesitate to discuss any topic that came up. Our discussion ran the gamut from Dream Theater’s music to the state of the music business and the drummers that influenced him. Mike’s viewpoint shows that he has much more to offer besides being a drummer:

MW: A lot of people are saying on the Internet and on the street that Falling Into Infinity reflects a more straightforward, stripped-down approach than Dream Theater’s previous albums. Do you agree with that, and if so, was this a conscious decision on the part of the band?

Mike Portnoy: I could see why people would think that, because songs like “Anna Lee,” “Hollow Years,” and “You Not Me” are as straight ahead as it gets. But to completely generalize the whole album with that statement- no I don’t think that is true at all. Actually, if you listen to “New Millenium,” “Trial of Tears” or “Hell’s Kitchen,” it’s rounded like any of our other albums. Every album that we have made has straight ahead moments and its left field moments. A big problem with us was that we wrote Metropolis Part II during the making of this album and we really put all our progressive eggs in that basket. Then, when it didn’t make the album because it was too long, we lost a little bit of that balance. That song would have really given that progressive punch to the people that were looking for it.

MW: Well, it still sounds like a Dream Theater album.

MP: Right. Unlike Queensrÿche or Metallica, who changed styles for an entire album, we try different things for different songs, but we will never change the whole style of the band for a whole album. It might just be for a song here or a song there. There’s got to be a balance for everything.

MW: Have you gotten a lot of feedback from the fans about the new album compared to the older stuff?

MP: Yeah, but when I meet them in person at the gigs they just pay us lip service and tell us how great it is. The only way to find out what they really think is to get on the Internet, because they let their true feelings show. In person they always tell us that they love it, which I appreciate. It’s a compliment. But, when I check out the Dream Theater boards on the Internet, I see the real critique. I like to see what the fans are saying because to me the fans are very, very important. I’m a fan and I want to make sure they’re happy.

MW: And in a sense, wasn’t the release of A Change of Seasons [1995 Atlantic] kind of driven by that Internet fan base?

MP: Totally, yeah. They knew we had that song sitting on a shelf and were trying to talk the label into releasing it and they were the ones who put together this whole big petition [to get it released]. I could picture that happening again with Metropolis Part II because it’s something we want to do as a pet project [ed. note: this music was eventually used for the 1999 release Scenes From A Memory]. The labels aren’t really interested in pet projects, though. They just want to get the singles out. So we need that little instigation from the fans, which is good. The fans are great.

MW: Speaking of A Change of Seasons, that song was developed over something like six years, right?

MP: We wrote it in 1989 when we were writing the Images and Words album, and it didn’t make it because it was too long. We redid it again when James joined the band. It was part of his audition. Then it went through some changes again, when we played it live in 1993. By the time we actually recorded it in ‘95, it had already gone through three of four incarnations.

MW: The lyrics to A Change of Seasons are very interesting and were your first major lyrical contribution to a Dream Theater album. They depict a man who begins in innocence, goes through a dark winter, realizes he was blinded by paradise and returns a wiser man to seize the day. Is that a correct summation of the album’s themes?

MP: Yeah, it’s about the cycle of life. Basically, I took a lot of personal incidents, like losing my mother and a couple of things that happened in my life, and I wrote them into the lyrics. Like, on a smaller scale, I wouldn’t try to compare it wit this, but when I listen to Pink Floyd’s the Wall, there are a lot of emotions there- just a lot of frustrations and anger. He goes full circle, the character. He has a child and just as he’s about to pass on and die, now his son is going to have to live the life he did and go through those same experiences.

MW: So that is the meaning of the child on the front of the album in winter and the old man wearing a coat on the beach on the back of the album?

MP: Yeah, the child is naked and completely vulnerable in the middle of winter, and then he grows up into this old man who is now completely prepared and overdressed to sit in the sun.

MW: Did you come up with the concepts together with your artist for this album?

MP: Being that the album was based on that one song, I pretty much came up with the entire concept. In the past, like with Images and Words, we all would do it together because it was all of our lyrics, and we would just take the ideas and images from the lyrics and create the cover. This time around [on Falling Into Infinity] we worked with Storm Thorgerson, who did all the Floyd covers and some for Led Zeppelin. He’s somebody we all wanted to work with, so when given the opportunity, we just let him do his thing. That’s the way he worked with Pink Floyd, so who are we to tell him what to do?

MW: Is there a significance to the dates on the calendar flying through the air on the back of the Change of Seasons album cover?

MP: Yeah. November 16th. Actually, that’s the day my Mom died. [He points to a date tattooed on his arm underneath CARPE DIEM in large letters]. A lot of the lyrics and Carpe Diem and all that stems from what happened with my Mom.

MW: A Change of Seasons includes audio samples from the Dead Poet’s Society. Did that influence the song?

MP: No. The whole Carpe Diem thing I wrote didn’t come from the movie. Just like it says in the lyrics: I was in school the day my mom died and the teacher was giving a lesson on how you should appreciate life, and gave us a whole thing about Carpe Diem and then I went home and gave my mom a big kiss and a hug goodbye, and then she ended up getting killed that night. Anyway, it’s a very, long, in-depth, pretty intense story. When I saw Dead Poet’s Society I wanted to just pull a lot of those quotes and use them as samples. Actually, the main inspiration for the lyrics was another Robin Williams movie, The World According to Garp. That’s totally dealing with the cycles of life.

MW: On the new album, the song “Just Let Me Breathe,” which you wrote, is also pretty interesting. Can I ask you about a couple of lines?: “Step right up and you will find, an epidemic spread with Zen and hypodermics.” Followed by a re-write of a lyric from the song “Take The Time”: “Just close your mind you will find all you need with your eyes.” Could you shed some light on what you were saying with that?

MP: It should be obvious that the whole thing is a sarcastic twist, every line. I saw people saying on the Internet: ‘why are they saying this now,’ but it’s a joke. It’s more a look at how the music industry is today and how close-minded and backward it is. With “Take The Time,” we were writing that bands should take the time to do the right thing and write music based on musical purposes and not based on image purposes. Restating that line backwards is just stating how the current state of the industry is so backwards from where we would like it to be.

MW: We feel the same way. The song is sarcastic, because Dream Theater is probably the premiere progressive band around right now and if you have to worry about selling records, what kind of light does that shed for any type of interesting music?

MP: It’s a tough time, and a tough genre. If you take away bands like Rush and Yes, although even Yes doesn’t even have a deal anymore, as far as modern progressive bands, we’re the only ones with a major label deal. Queensryche doesn’t have their deal anymore, Marillion hasn’t had a deal in American for years and bands like Fate’s Warning are on smaller labels. I consider us fortunate, but it’s also scary because it shows that labels aren’t really interested in developing bands’ careers anymore. They’re more about cashing in on the latest trend. We are carrying a torch because we are trying to keep music alive that isn’t based on trends. We are trying to keep that philosophy alive, but it’s a risky flight.

MW: Were you influenced by Neil Peart’s lyrics as well as his drumming?

MP: I always admired Neil’s lyrics but was never able to utilize them into my own style. I think John Petrucci always admired Neil’s writing and utilized them as part of his style: very poetic, very metaphoric. Mine are very straight ahead and from the gut. Mine are more influenced by Fish from Marillion or Roger Waters.

MW: Do you get tired of being compared to Neil Peart as a drummer?

MP: Now I do. At first it was the ultimate compliment, but now it’s like “enough already.” There have been a lot of things that Neil has done in the last four years that have given me a negative opinion of him. I don’t know him personally, so me judging him that way probably isn’t fair, but my interpretation of him is that he has a personality totally opposite from mine. I’m a very outgoing person, I love giving and sharing with the fans, and he seems to be just very self-indulgent and introspective and doesn’t seem to give the time of day to his fans. I just don’t respect people like that, never mind the fact that it’s Neil Peart.

MW: On Falling Into Infinity, did you try and play the drums more melodically?

MP: On this album more than any other I tried to play what was right for the song. On “Anna Lee” or “Take Away My Pain,” I was thinking “Oh my God, this is basic.” But if I was to play anything else it just wouldn’t fit. I don’t know if it was a matter of growing up or what, but it just was what was appropriate. But on “New Millennium,” or “Lines in the Sand” I was able to experiment with weird metric modulation and stuff. But it’s only there when it’s called for.

MW:Do you ever plan on doing solo work on your own?

MP: I have enough influence in Dream Theater and lots of control in this band. I guess every artist would love to have complete control, but that is just ego. I can get my ideas out there 90% of the time. John and I just did an instrumental side project recently that was fun and will be released next year. John Petrucci, myself, Tony Levin on bass and Jordan Rudess from the Dregs on keyboards. That was sort of an outlet for us to blow our loads in another sort of world.

MW: For someone trying to improve as a player, what is most important: practicing on technique at home, jamming out with bands or taking lessons on your own?

MP: It’s a mixture of all those things. Playing with other people is very important. I saw drummers at Berklee that had chops like you wouldn’t believe but couldn’t even lay down a groove with a band. It’s important to practice with a metronome and get your time solid, and it’s important to play along with a lot of different records, not just one style.

MW: Do you recommend a school like Berklee?

MP: Yeah, if that’s what interests you. At Berklee I learned more about other things than playing the drums: music theory, harmony, arranging, sight-singing, ear training. Those were all the classes that rounded me as a musician so that I could write with the band beyond being just a drummer. It’s not necessary, but it’s great to help you grow. I mean, there are a lot of great musicians that can’t read or write music.

At that point we were out of time and Mike had to get ready to take the stage. Meeting him proved that the band’s reasons for doing what they do run as deep as their pools of ability. If you are a fan of progressive, quality music, check out Dream Theater.