Inner Vision

On Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence, Dream Theater’s progressive rock giant John Petrucci does what he does best – progress.

by Alan Paul

Over the course of 13 years and 15 albums, John Petrucci and his group Dream Theater have established themselves as America’s premier progressive rock band. Few groups in any genre have had Dream Theater’s staying power or capacity to spin out consistently excellent material. What’s more, guitarist Petrucci’s proficiency on the instrument has secured his status as contemporary guitar’s king of shred.

Though 21st century mainstream rock, with its antisolo trend, may not be as welcoming toward prog rock, Petrucci and his Dream Theater mates—singer James LaBrie, keyboardist Jordan Rudess, bassist John Myung and drummer Mike Portnoy—still thrive: while other virtuoso players languish on tiny labels, Dream Theater continue to record for Elektra. Their following in America may be somewhat smaller than it used to be, but it is no less fervent.

The band’s new release, the sprawling double album Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence, is the logical culmination of Dream Theater’s ever-expanding vision. It’s an elaborate project, featuring sounds both heavy and gently melodic. It’s also ambitious: the entire second disc is composed of the 42-minute title track, an eight-part song cycle in which the track’s narrator explores his own descent into insanity. And even though Six Degrees abounds in finger-shredding, mind-bending passages from Petrucci, the guitarist never resorts to mere showing off. Everything he plays serves the song.

“This is a very different album,” says Petrucci. “We used some strange production techniques, and there’s less stand-out soloing and more musical interplay. We didn’t exactly set out to do something intentionally different, however. We just wanted to capture where we are right now, and I think we did that. It sounds like Dream Theater.”

Guitar World: The solos on Six Degrees feature more interplay, particularly between you and Jordan Rudess.

John Petrucci: That’s a direct result of the way this album was written. Mike, Jordan, John and I all sat together in the studio ready to record and started tossing things back and forth. Most of the music was written right then, with ideas flying really fast. Then James came in and did the vocals.

It’s a great way to record and very different than the long demo process we used to go through. We never would have gotten here if not for the two Liquid Tension Experiment albums [a side project featuring Petrucci, Rudess and Portnoy along with King Crimson bassist Tony Levin], which were completely written and recorded in long jam sessions. We took the same basic approach back to DT, though we gave ourselves a lot more time.

GW: You play with more tonal variation on this album. Was that conscious?

JP: Yes. I’ve often tended to stick with my live rig while recording, but this time I tried to match the sounds to the songs and the gear actually ended up influencing the writing a great deal. I played my Ernie Ball Music Man signature guitar throughout the album, but in the heavier places I used the seven-string model instead of my usual six-string.

Mike and I actually wrote [Six Degrees’] “The Glass Prison” after seeing Pantera and becoming inspired to write something really heavy. Then I realized that my normal, tight, articulated sound just wouldn’t work on something so heavy, so I played a seven-string through a Mesa/Boogie Dual Rectifier, which has a more contemporary sound.

Also, on “Blind Faith” and the middle portion of “Misunderstood,” I used an Ernie Ball Silhouette six-string bass strung like a baritone guitar, from A to A, which made me completely rethink everything I played. I also played a Tacoma acoustic.

GW: What is in your live rig?

JP: Four Mark II C-plus heads and preamps. The basic concept is to run one dry cabinet, then left and right wet ones, each powered by separate heads. Effects-wise, I’m using the Eventide Eclipse, the TC Electronic 2290 I’ve had for years, a Korg delay and an Eventide GTR4000. I used to have a rack that was the equivalent of an entire music store, but I simplified it because it got so cumbersome and I realized I was only using a few things anyhow.

GW: Your playing continues to improve. How do you keep raising the stakes? It must be difficult to put in the hours you once did.

JP: It’s definitely hard to practice as much as I used to. My purpose in life isn’t to only play guitar, as it was when I was 18 and going to the Berklee College of Music. Now I’m a husband, a homeowner, a father of three and a full-time professional musician. The way I challenge myself to grow and stay fresh is by intentionally constructing things that I can’t play when we do an album. Then I build it in sections, and when it’s time to perform I have to master it, which necessitates learning new techniques.

I think it’s even more important to make the solos really, really good in this day and age when you don’t really hear guitar solos. It can’t sound boring or contrived or be filler where the song stops for a solo. It’s almost like classical music, where each section grabs the listener because it has a purpose and point and a great melody.

GW: You mentioned the lack of soloing in contemporary rock. A lot of your fans are consumed with hatred for nu-metal bands like Korn and Limp Bizkit. Do you relate to that anger?

JP: Not really. Of course it would be great if the style of music we played was really popular. I look at the Seventies heyday of progressive rock with a certain feeling of regret that I missed it. But what’s popular in rock music changes so fast that it’s hard to get pissed about. It’s the nature of the beast. It seems like only yesterday everything was being swept aside by grunge, which is already long past.

As far as the quality of nu-metal goes, as with all music, there’s some that’s really good and some that sucks. It’s like that with flamenco and classical music and anything else.

GW: When performing, how would you rate your approach on a scale with the complete improvisation of a John Coltrane or Jerry Garcia on one end and a classical musician playing a written piece of music on the other?

JP: I’m not at either extreme but probably closer to the classical musician. People expect our music to be duplicated live, including the solo sections, but there are moments in every show that we dedicate to improvising, and it’s always one of the highlights for me. A few years ago, Jordan and I did a duet show that was complete improvisation, which we recorded and released ourselves as An Evening with John Petrucci and Jordan Rudess. It is only available through my web site [www.johnpetrucci.com].

GW: You debuted as a solo artist on the G3 tour. Do you have any plans to release an album of that material?

JP: As a matter of fact, as we speak I am in the studio recording a solo album. Originally, I hesitated when I was offered the G3 tour because I’m not really a solo artist, but my wife said, “Don’t be dumb. You have to do this.” So I went to work writing material. It went over well and people started asking where they could hear more, which inspired me to keep writing and begin recording this straight-ahead guitar trio album, which I will put out myself, hopefully by this spring or summer. My web site will have more information as it becomes available.