In the Studio With Dream Theater: The Story Behind Scenes From a Memory

For the better part of this decade, Dream Theater has been acknowledged as the leaders of the progressive-metal genre, breaking onto the scene in the early ‘90s and carving a hard rock niche that combines the spirit of classic rock with skilled play in the tradition of Rush and Marillion. Though they remain untouchable in their field, garnishing breakthrough radio airplay with early hit “Pull Me Under,” they’ve never been able to make the transition to a full-fledged mainstream success. With new release Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory, they stop trying. Focusing instead on the adept play and stellar songwriting that have made their fans amongst music’s most faithful, the result is the band’s most breathtaking release to date, an epic concept album that weaves the interplay of vocalist James LaBrie, guitarist John Petrucci, drummer Mike Portnoy, bassist John Myung and new addition Jordon Rudess – who replaced Derek Sherinian on keyboards earlier this year – into a captivating plot and magical musical web. “We had a whole rack of concept CDs in the studio, so we could constantly draw inspiration,” explains Portnoy, who holed up with his band in a New York City practice studio as they prepared for the band’s first tour in more than a year, and the road debut of Rudess. “We had The Wall, Misplaced Childhood by Marillion, Operation: Mindcrime, Tommy, Quadrophenia, Roger Waters’ Radio KAOS and The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking, and The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, from Genesis... Every concept record made was there for us to draw from.” And the results are smashing, as Scenes from a Memory clearly establishes itself as the crowning achievement of Dream Theater’s catalog. LaBrie, Portnoy and Petrucci took a break from their rehearsal grind to provide all the details...

Metal Edge: A concept album from Dream Theater isn’t a complete surprise. When did you get the idea for Scenes from a Memory?

Mike Portnoy: During the second Liquid Tension [Experiment] album, actually. We were in the studio back in Nov. ‘98, and John [Petrucci] and I had a lengthy discussion about where we wanted to take the record. We had the embryo for “Metropolis Pt. 2” written in ‘96, and all the fans wanted to hear that, and we’d always wanted to do a concept album, so we figured why not combine both ideas and do both. The funny thing is, we had a whole lengthy discussion about the direction, the concept, and even some of the musical ideas, and Jordan was sitting there with us through the entire conversation, having no idea he’d be in the band doing the record! We made the keyboard change in January, and we immediately went in the studio.

ME: Why’d you make the change at keyboard?

John Petrucci: The Liquid Tension album was our second album with Jordan, and there was a total connection, one of those musical things that you can’t explain, a chemistry that we all have.

James Labrie: He just fits better with this band.

MP: It was more about what was right about Jordan, as opposed to what was wrong about Derek. After doing those two [LTE] albums with Jordan we knew that he was the most phenomenal talent out there. We thought, “Why are we only working with him part time, when we have the potential to be working with him full time?” The potential was endless.

JP: Like Mike said, it’s nothing personal against Derek. Actually, it was very difficult to tell Derek, because it wasn’t like we were having problems. He was totally surprised. But after doing that second LTE record, we saw what the possibilities were, and we saw what types of music we could write.

MP: We didn’t want to shortchange the potential of the band.

ME: I was amazed to see that all of you wrote different songs and lyrics on the album, but they all fit together in the story.

JP: It was a well calculated risk, in some ways! The way we did this was a little bit backwards. Usually you write the story first, but we only had a basic concept. We wrote the music first, pretty much from start to finish – just what see med to feel good, not really knowing what the lyrics were going to be. Once we had that written, we solidified the story and all the characters, from beginning to end. Then we, very methodically, applied what part of the story would be to what song and decided who would write that section. Each of us had pretty specific guidelines – what character to write about and what would be introduced.

MP: From February to May was just the music. Then, once we had the music done, we sat down with each song and mapped out the melodies and developed a story line. We broke it down to chapters, everyone was assigned their chapters, then we took a break to write and reconvened in June to apply the lyrics and have James do the vocals. There was a lot of talking involved, to make sure we didn’t overlap lyrically. In the past, we’d just go off and write whatever we wanted, but this time we had to be very unified and focused. I think that’s why we’ve never done a concept album in the past, because all of us write lyrics. In the beginning we questioned how we could write a concept album with more than one lyricist, because in the past it was always Roger Waters, Pete Townshend, whoever. There had to be a lot of discussion to keep us all on the same page.

ME: Is the story based on anyone’s reality, or is it completely fictitious?

JP: It’s totally fictitious.

MP: There are two levels to the story. One is the fictitious story dealing with reincarnation, murder and a love triangle, but then, the same time, we had to tie it all into “Metropolis,” so there was this whole aspect of trying to work the lyrics from that song in, as well. It became an issue of combining two stories into one.

ME: Why the decision to make it part two of “Metropolis?”

MP: That was the initial discussion we had back in November, doing the Liquid Tension album. We knew that we wanted to expand the “Metropolis Part Two” that we had already written in ‘96 into a full album.

JP: It made sense. We were expected to put “Metropolis Part Two” on the next album, but if we did that, it would have taken up most of the new album with material we’d already wrote.

MP: To explain that further, the version we originally wrote in ‘96 – for the Falling Into Infinity record – was 25 minutes, and it was already in the can. When talk of a concept album began, we decided to blow it up to a full album.

JP: The excitement of a new album is going in to write, and especially with Jordan in the band, that would have been a big chunk of the album already done.

ME: With the addition of Jordan, I expected the album to sound a lot closer to Liquid Tension Experiment than traditional Dream Theater. But that’s not the case at all.

MP: I think Jordan takes more of a backseat on the Dream Theater album because he’s been very respectful of the role he has to play in this band, as opposed to his role in Liquid Tension. With Liquid Tension, he’s very much in the forefront, because he and John are basically singing the melodies between the guitars and keyboards. But in Dream Theater, he knew that there was a style that has already been established through the years, and he was respectful not to try and change that while bringing his own sound and style to the band. He knew that the band is very guitar heavy, and the songs are obviously very vocal oriented. It’s a whole different mentality writing for Dream Theater and Liquid Tension.

ME: Did your various side projects Liquid Tension and Mullmuzzler help you prepare for the new Dream Theater record?

JL: Personally, I think it really kept us in shape both technically, and as a unit – three-fifths of the bands is in Liquid Tension. Myself, it really helped me hone in and stay in shape vocally and in the creative sense. When we got together, it wasn’t like we had to get the wheels turning again.

MP: It was good, too, because we all got it out of our system at the same time. It wasn’t like there was one this year and another next year. We all did it at one time, and when it came time to come back together, we knew we had to make the best Dream Theater record possible, so we just put our heads together. And the best thing that came of the side projects was bringing Jordan into Dream Theater.

JP: It definitely cleared the smoke. There was a period by the end of last year where we were touring a lot and we were really in a fog about what we were doing. Even in our organization, all the red tape was getting tangled. For me, Liquid Tension brought back that experimental excitement of going in without anything and recording. We brought that back into Dream Theater.

ME: Dream Theater has never been in-style musically. Especially now, with rap-rock all the rage, do you guys feel like you stand out more?

MP: We stand out more than ever!

ME: Are you writing more for your own audience now, or are you still conscious of trying to be as accessible as possible?

MP: I have a definite opinion on this. I feel that more so than ever, with this album, we wrote for ourselves and for our audience. This is the first time in the history of the band that we produced our own record and worked in the studio without any interference from the record company. In the past, especially with Falling Into Infinity, there was a lot of influence from the record company and an outside producer. This time around, we were lucky enough to be given the green light by Elektra to go in the studio in February, work through the year, and not have them hear a single note until we delivered the album in August. On those terms, this album, more than any of our albums, is written especially for the fans. We wrote this knowing what they would want. And it’s also what we want. It’s the biggest artistic statement we’ve ever made from our own hearts.

ME: So the farthest thing from your mind was whether there were singles for radio?

MP: More than ever, we got away from that.

JP: All you have to do is listen to the radio, we can’t join it!

MP: With Falling Into Infinity, we delivered the most radio-friendly, crossover potential record that we ever could have delivered. Once the reality of that record not being a radio hit set in, I think we realized that we should go in the complete extreme other direction and just go back to what the fans love about Dream Theater, the long epic songs. There are four songs on this record over 10 minutes.

JL: Look at the album that introduced people worldwide to Dream Theater, Images and Words. It just, by a fluke, had a song on there – “Pull Me Under” – that went through the roof. We weren’t expecting that. When it came time for this album, we just wanted to write what we love to write, instead of worrying about what everyone else wants us to do. If we did that, we knew the fans would love it, and I think that’s why this is our best album.

MP: It was also nice that the label finally came around to that mentality. “Let’s just let these guys do their thing.”

JL: I think they’re slowly, but surely, actually starting to understand this band. I don’t think they ever got us, but I think they’re realizing now that we do have a strong following worldwide.

MP: Last time around, we were open to suggestion – we wrote with Desmond Child on a song, we worked Kevin Shirley – who we loved – and we were open-minded to making that kind of record. We’re willing to try anything once, but this time around, we did things completely by our terms.

ME: Were the high expectations placed on Falling Into Infinity a big let down to the band?

JL: It goes a little deeper than that for me, personally. There was a lot of lack of communication with the label, there were a lot of personnel changes at the label, and we were dealing with our management dilemma. I think Falling Into Infinity was really just a low time for Dream Theater, overall. When we were writing it and recording it there was a lot of tension on each of us individually, and then collectively as a band. Personally, I’d just like to move on. That album is what it is, but I think this is the way it used to feel in Dream Theater, when we did Images and Words and Awake.

MP: Everybody gets caught up with radio this and MTV that, but we’re not that type of band. In 1999, like you said, we stick out like a sore thumb, and the only way we’re going to succeed is by doing our own thing. When we try to fit in with trends and radio formats, that’s when we’re going to start losing our fan base. We have our audience, and we do the best we can with our thing. Last album we tried to really be too much to too many people.

ME: In that regard, do you think “Pull Me Under” may have been deceiving to a lot of people?

MP: That was a great thing for our career, but it also may have been one of the worst things that ever happened to us. Suddenly it put these radio expectations into the record company’s minds, and those were never there before. But surely, it was a great thing and it opened a lot of doors for us and opened a lot of doors for this genre. The fact of the matter is, that song was not written to be a single. It was eight-and-a-half minutes long and we had no expectations, it just fell into our lap.

JP: That’s the great thing about that song. It’s the total style of the band, and it represents us. It’s not a trick, and it has all the elements that make up this band’s sound. If it only happens once, it’s very cool to have it happen with that song.

ME: Yet for all the liberty you had on this record, the album does a good job of treading the fine line between being virtuoso, and remaining accessible to those of us that don’t play.

MP: There’s no question that it’s an absolutely demanding record. This record, more than ever, demands attention because of the storyline. It’s like watching a movie or reading a novel. To really understand it, you have to be there from start to finish. It’s definitely demanding.

ME: Were there any fears heading into the album?

JP: The scariest part about making this album was the story. How can we come up with something that’s going to be interesting? Not just the story, but the concept.

MP: Look at the name of the band, though – Dream Theater, we’re custom made for this.

ME: This album seems custom made for a huge production, is that going to happen?

MP: We won’t present it live – from start to finish – until January. The two legs of dates in November and December are just going to be done to get some dates under our belts, get comfortable with the new lineup and get the audience comfortable with the new album. Come January, we’ll take this album to the next level.

ME: Do you envision a production to go along with the music?

JL: That would be the ultimate, yes.

MP: The story is very confusing and detailed. Having the lyric sheet will help, but also, seeing it on stage with it being brought to life theatrically will really help.