Rich Wilson Lifts The Shadows

In his own words, Rich gives an insight to the inspiration behind and a taster of the content in his forthcoming Dream Theater biography.

To the outsider, a book on Dream Theater may well have been a bit of a cryptic choice but to me it all made perfect sense. To spend over two years of my life working on a book project, it had to be on a band I at least liked. Fortunately with Dream Theater, I’ll openly admit to being a huge fan – which, of course, can be a double-edged sword. Having a love of a band’s music provides the impetus to write – especially on those days when staring at a screen praying for inspiration is like wading through treacle – but it opens you up to potential criticism of the finished article being labelled a “fan book”. Which in this industry (believe me) is the last thing you want to be writing.

For me, writing this in late 2006, it’s hard to think that I actually began work on ‘Lifting Shadows’ in May 2004. Around six-months earlier, when conducting an interview with Mike Portnoy for Classic Rock magazine, I had slipped the idea into the conversation. With Mike being enthusiastic and receptive to the idea, it sloshed around my subconscious until I had a suitable break in my work schedule to actually start writing. I’ve no idea how other writers approach these things, but for me, I broke the book into twelve Word documents – each covering a specific timeframe – and then filled each one with masses of research material. This ranged from archive interviews (a fortune spent on eBay buying back-issues), internet interviews and press album and live reviews. Then it was time to begin to start contemplating the interview process.

For the record, the first person I approached was David Prater, who had produced both Images and Words and A Change of Seasons. Knowing that he and DT were no longer on friendly terms (and this is putting it mildly), I figured he would be able to point me in the right direction for any previously untold stories. The huge document he subsequently sent me, which detailed the admirable facets or foibles of each member of the band, was incredibly thorough, stingingly honest and gave me a certain amount of what is technically known as “dirt”. Such material, as long as it is true, is priceless when penning a biography. Without it, a book simply reads like a press release, or heaven forbid, one of those God-awful fan books. To give a brief example, when I asked David what his first impressions of the band were, he replied “They were aloof, arrogant, ungrateful and rude. Other than that, I liked them fine.” This set the tone nicely and the remainder of his contributions included such gems as the moment when he and James LaBrie virtually came to blows in the studio and his claim that Kevin Moore was deliberately playing the wrong chords just to wind him up.

A few more months elapsed before I began a series of interviews with the band. As you might expect, Mike bore the brunt of most of those, and looking at the tapes now, he spoke to me for an astonishing twelve hours. All of these were done over the phone and for the most part took place while the band were writing and recording Octavarium. The other members also took part around that time, although scheduling problems meant I was unable to interview the ever-elusive John Myung until October 2005. Tracking down those people who played a part in DT-history was also a task. Thanks to the joys of Google, I managed to locate most of these, including the likes of Eric Gandras who played in John Petrucci’s school-band, Chris Cintron and Steve Stone who had brief tenures with DT before James joined, as well as all the cover artists and producers. To give you an idea of the work involved, the e-mail file marked “DT Book” currently contains over 8oo e-mails. One of the more surprising aspects of the project was the number of people who were only distantly related to DT but were all too eager to give up their time to be interviewed. Their willingness demonstrated the high regard that DT are rightly held in the industry. The one exception was Kevin Moore, who replied to my interview request by saying “Sorry, but I really wouldn’t be interested in contributing to a book on DT but wish you the best of luck with it.” Of course that was a shame, but it’s clear that Kevin has moved on with his life and doesn’t enjoy – for whatever reason – re-visiting his past. Nobody should ever really hold that against him.

The fan clubs and forum members throughout the world have also been extremely supportive. I’d publicly like to single out ‘Setlist Scotty’ Hansen who has been extraordinary helpful – in terms of fact-checking, answering my peculiar questions and pointing me in the right direction. So much so that I propose a nickname change to ‘Scotty Invaluable to Biographers’ Hansen. Though it probably isn’t quite as catchy...

Currently, all the details of the book are being finalised with the publishers but what I will say is that this is going to be an extremely high-quality product. Until they are all “signed off” I’m not going to commit to revealing the features, but keep checking www.dreamtheaterbook.com for regular updates.

To whet your appetites, here are a few quotes lifted from ‘Lifting Shadows’

Original Majesty vocalist Chris Collins on an early gig:

“I remember we were playing L’Amours, and of course this was a time when everyone was wearing Spandex pants. So I figured I’d wear some too. But halfway through the set, they ripped open right in my crotch. So I was there, on stage, trying to sing with my balls hanging out of my pants!”

Then manager Derek Simon on the sacking of Charlie Dominici:

“We knew a fair amount of time before we actually did it that it was going to happen. But there never seemed to be the right time to do it. Then one day Charlie shows up with the Majesty logo tattooed on his arm. And it was like, ‘Oh f*ck!’”

Derek Sherinian on his sacking:

“When I got fired, I knew it had nothing to do with my ability, talent or work ethic. It really came down to some personality issues and other business issues as well where there was conflict.”

James LaBrie on low points in his relationship with Mike:

“There were some very hot moments and some confrontations which could have blown up and where Mike and I could have been throwing fists at one another. In fact, there were a few times where it was as close as you could possibly get. But we didn’t actually get there. And it was as simple as I didn’t like being around him and he didn’t like being around me.”