John Myung: Quiet Thunder

I had heard reports of interviews done with the very private John Myung, bassiste-extraordinaire of Dream Theatre. Comments that he was a very very quiet person abound. In fact, even as I was directed to the interview room the tour manager told me to not take John’s distant manner as a rebuff.

We were ushered into a room that would pass for any middle level hotel room. John met us at the door, polite and with a smile. His famed Yamaha 6 string propped up on a sofa nearby. More on this bass and others later.

I confess that I was full of preconceived notions that this interview could end up like pulling teeth. More than once in the past I have encountered artists that were brilliant as players but crushingly shy or pedantically self-absorbed. This happens to every interviewer, it is just part of the business.

So with this preconceived notion in full gear, I dove right into trying to ‘put John at ease’, thinking I was going to have to ‘lead’ the interview if I was to get anything noteworthy.

And I was wrong...

Yes, he was quiet, but for a reason. John proved to be thoughtful, carefully considering his answers and not once giving me the feeling I was being ‘handled’. What he says is just what he means, so he chooses those words carefully. No rambling here, nothing grandiose, just a measured series of answers to my questions.

So we settled in for our promised 15 to 20 minute interview. A rhetorical question first however...what on earth can you possibly discuss to any degree of reward for a mere fifteen to twenty minutes? Especially considering the long history of Dream Theater and the huge talent that is John Myung?!?! Just getting the ball rolling sometimes takes longer than that...but I put on my Game Face and dove in.

Directly, in fact, to an issue I had actually been told to NOT discuss. John’s quiet nature. No one could ever accuse me of being particularly bright! But as you will see, I survived, mostly I suspect, because of John’s civil and gentlemanly behavior. I have been tossed out by others for less.

Bass Inside: When I was a lot younger, I was a lot quieter. Some thought of me as shy, some thought I was ‘standoff-ish’. For me it was music that brought me out of my shell. It appears to me that you have a quiet side as well.

With that in mind, is it difficult some nights to go out there on that stage, with tens of thousands of people watching your every move? And as someone who is thought of in bass circles as a virtuoso, is it difficult to know that there are many many bassists out there as well, all watching what you do in the band?

John Myung: Well, I guess I am kinda used to it by now. When you go out there, you have to go into a ‘touring mode’. You just have to prepare yourself for what it is gonna be like. It’s such a different lifestyle. When I am not on stage, I take as much time as is possible to practice and play my instrument. This compensates for the down time when you go home. It’s kinda like balancing that with my life when I am home, being a husband, being a father.

BI: Have you reached the point in your career where you have lost some of your privacy, where you are recognized when you are out in public? Or are you able to live the quiet life sometimes?

JM: Oh, yeah absolutely! (laughs) No, we’re not that big! It’s not like we’re U2. We do have a great fan base, but it’s not like where it’s to the degree where it’s hard to get out there.

BI: Do you do many interviews these days at all?

JM: You know, I am not an interview guy, but if I have to do it, I will do it.

BI: I have read that when you are recording a song, either with Dream Theater or with your own music, you have used an approach where you work a song from beginning to end, from the click track to the final touches, instead of laying out all the bass tracks, all the guitar tracks and so forth on all the songs on a particular album.

JM: It was pretty well the same approach (one song at a time, from beginning to end). Just writing it out in the studio, laying it down while it was still fresh in our minds. Developing the song as it went to tape, recording it, playing it back and adding things or taking them out. We would pretty much lay down enough to give Mike a direction of what he wanted to do rhythmically.

BI: From this newest album Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence, Disc Two is one song, the title track. How did you approach an epic piece like this one?

JM: That was done in sections.

BI: How did it come to be that this was a double LP?

JM: It just seemed to happen that once we had written the first CD, it just wasn’t enough. I mean there was just this desire to continue. It just evolved that way.

BI: Although SDOIT is a 2002 release, are you even now working on the next album or are you just taking the time to work through the natural life of this current set of songs?

JM: Well, we do create while working out our sound checks. We record them and see what comes out. That’s really all so far as far as any new material.

BI: Your bio says that your connection with Dream Theater is from very earliest days.

JM: Well, I was in the same high school with John, we were even in a band in high school together. We went to the same music college in Boston. There we met Mike, we just stuck it out for a year up there. We decided then to become a full time band.

BI: When you are off the road, are you ‘off the road’, a private person?

JM: Well, it kinda has to be that way. So many things get put on hold, you just get swamped with all the day-to-day stuff you have to do. I have been working with a G4 at home, building a little virtual studio.

BI: Other than DT, are you still working with Jelly Jam and Platypus?

JM: Yeah, Jelly Jam. Platypus was one thing that just naturally turned into Jelly Jam. That is just the current side project now.

BI: Have you had the time to do any touring with that so far?

JM: No, not yet, but I don’t think we have ruled out the idea of playing out `cos the songs are really cool. When you hear them there is something that tells us that it would be really a good idea to play this for people.

BI: Is it much different than DT?

JM: Yeah, it is very different.

BI: I came across one fan web site that says that DT lyrics have Christian undertones. Is there any truth in this at all?

JM: That is actually the first time I have ever heard that.

BI: How about comments to the effect that critics and fans think of you and your band mates as being “some of the most technically proficient musicians alive”?

JM: Well, that’s a great compliment, but we don’t feel that way at all. There is so much I don’t know. I think for what we do, we are really good at it, but at the same time I am not blind to the fact that there are so many other styles of music. There are many things going on that I am not proficient at.

BI: When we saw you earlier this year in Zurich, Switzerland, we noticed that in the audience we could see members of every Prog band from the region. Do you find these musicians show up at gigs a lot?

JM: Yeah, we do get a lot of musicians that go to shows.

BI: Have you noticed if all the keyboardists are watching the keyboards, the guitarists are watching the guitarist and you of course, with your legion of bassists as well?

JM: Yeah, after the show we usually find there are gatherings of these people.

BI: Have you ever thought of being a teacher at some point?

JM: Umm, you know I really haven’t. It is a nice idea being able to teach but I don’t think that what I do is really something I could teach. Playing for me has really been just a process of learning then doing.

BI: Are you self-taught?

JM: Yeah, just from playing other records. Just branching out that way, by playing stuff from other bands.

BI: Are there bands out there that you currently admire?

JM: I really like TOOL, I think they are a great band.

BI: Ty Tabor of King’s X is with this current tour of DT, Joe Satriani and King’s X. With the common ground you two share, having worked with Jelly Jam, is there ever any temptation to bring different combinations on stage, outside of the usual lines of the three bands?

JM: Well, it’s not really even an option at this point! (laughs)

BI: You have been with Yamaha for quite some time now, do you still get hit by manufacturers looking to endorse you?

JM: There are not too many at this point.

BI: How many basses do you take with you on a tour?

JM: I have three or four different basses that I take with me. Regarding these basses, there is actually soon gonna be a different retail version of my Yamaha bass, probably released in about a year.

BI: What changes will be made with these basses?

JM: You will see it tonight. It’s the purple one...it’s basically a lighter and easier to play version of the current bass. The current one I have been using, I like playing something that has substance to it, but at the same time I wanted something that was a bit easier to play. That was what I asked them to do. To make a more user-friendly ergonomic and lighter bass. Also the pickups are different too. I have two of these prototypes now.

BI: Ever wanted to move beyond 6-string, to even more string configurations?

JM: That would be something I would be into checking out. There is just really something cool about chords played on a bass. Different than a guitar, it just draws you in more.

BI: After the North American part of this tour, where next?

JM: Well, we are gonna be off for a while, and then in October we go back to Europe to finish the final leg of the tour.

BI: Then some time off?

JM: Yeah, then we will break down for the holidays. Then in the new year start working on the next record.

BI: Do you ever see yourself releasing instructional books or CD-ROMS?

JM: You know, I did one a while ago, but right now I can’t even think about something like that. I mean, maybe, sometime in the far future. You know what, in order for me to do something like that, I would really have to quantify what it is that I really do. So much of it is really just from playing and coming up with those ideas. It’s not so much “how to play this style”. I think the only thing that I could do is to teach them what I do and that’s not really something that could be fleshed out onto pages in a book. It’s more just a lifestyle. One of the reasons I like to play a lot is that sometimes you need to play just for the sake of playing. Every once in a while something truly meaningful comes your way. I will record that to try to capture that something special that’s in there. You know there are so many aspects of playing. Sometimes just playing to maintain strong hands, sometimes playing to exercise the intuitive side of your mind. To develop that and see where it is going. It’s a full time job! It’s like mining for creativity.

BI: In that pursuit of creativity, have you ever encountered writers block?

JM: You can’t force a good idea. You can’t just sit down and tell yourself, “All right, I want to write something really good!’ It’s not something you can force. Forcing it is what I feel creates writers block. You just have to give yourself some slack.