Dream Theater – One-Hit Wonders Continue To Progress

Story: Roger Lotring

Greatest Shit. That’s the subliminal impression Mike Portnoy hopes fans will derive from the subtle color scheme and cover painting adorning the band’s new two-CD anthology, Greatest Hit (..And 21 Other Pretty Cool Songs).

Drummer Portnoy, who formed the band with fellow Berklee College of Music students John Petrucci and John Myung, jokes that he’s becoming the elder statesman of prog metal. The 2008 Progressive Nation tour – featuring Opeth, Between The Buried And Me, and 3 – is an idea he’s been pitching to management and booking agents for the better part of a decade. His hope is that it will become an annual event anticipated by both fans and bands.

Dream Theater basks in the adulation of a fan base so devoted to their highly evolved style, the word “passionate” is an understatement. Recalling a lifetime spent fanatically following his own favorite artists, Mike has a real affinity for Dream Theater fans that’s translated into a lengthy, if somewhat improbable, career. Discussing the winding road of their history, plus the unlikely bands that influenced his personal musical evolution, the master drummer spent time talking to Metal Edge just before taking the stage in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Dream Theater has managed to sustain a successful career without mainstream media coverage or hit singles. Is Greatest Hit meant as a middle finger to the music industry?

I think we definitely can serve as an example that you can have a long, sustained career without a hit – or maybe just one hit. [laughs] We needed that one hit to sustain us, but we kind of took it from there on our own. The album title and artwork, it’s all very tongue-in-cheek, kind of making a mockery out of the whole idea of a greatest hits album. They’re just commercials to lure somebody in, to hopefully go deeper and look at the bigger picture, which would be the catalog of albums.

Live albums aside, Dream Theater really isn’t a compilation type of band.

No, we’re not, and that’s kind of the irony of it. That’s why we’re making fun of ourselves with the title and artwork. But, inevitably, when your contract ends with a record company, they’re going to take advantage of the back catalog. Frankly, it’s fine with me because I was able to have total control over it. If an album like this is going to exist, I’m glad that I was able to be hands-on with it. The tracklisting I picked was really to serve as a nice introduction for somebody that doesn’t know who Dream Theater is, but there was also a big emphasis on making it interesting for the existing fan, as well. There’s alternate mixes and alternate versions and three remixes. At least half the material offers different versions that you couldn’t find in our catalog. In the age of the iPod, I wanted to make the CD something you couldn’t make from our existing albums.

How much of a catch-22 was the success of ‘Pull Me Under,’ and did that popularity create future constrictions on the band?

On the one hand, it was the opening door that let us continue. If we didn’t have a hit with Images And Words, we probably would have been dropped, and destined for obscurity, and probably broken up. But that single enabled us to continue from that point forward. It was a great thing in that respect, because it launched our career. But for many years after that, the label tried to kind of reproduce that success, which we were probably never supposed to have to begin with. Those years throughout the ‘90s almost crushed us. We were living in the shadow of having a hit, and we knew that we were never going to be that type of band.

Even bands that Dream Theater counted as influences had a certain level of radio play and mainstream success. Was there an anxiety that came with having to create the paradigm for your own career?

No, because we didn’t put this band together to become rich and famous. If we did, we probably would have never taken this road or chosen this style of music. [laughs] We were kids that liked Rush, and liked Iron Maiden, and wanted to do something that met in the middle. By the time it became a business to us, that was when all the shit hit the fan in this band, and it’s probably like that with a lot of bands. Sometimes success is the worst thing that can happen, and it’s not until you get swallowed up by the music business that you realize the difference between those two words, “music” and “business.” Luckily, we withstood the pressure and came out on the other side, where music is really all that matters and the business follows.

Do other bands wanting to do something outside the mainstream now look to Dream Theater for a blueprint?

Other bands that are labeled “progressive” in 2008, like Tool, the Mars Volta, Coheed And Cambria – those bands are selling millions of records and getting covered by Rolling Stone and MTV. Even the “progressive” bands of today aren’t necessarily following the Dream Theater blueprint to success. I don’t know if I would necessarily recommend this road, because it’s a long, tough road. It’s taken a long time, and it’s been a slow-building grind, because that’s the only way we could do it on our own terms.

Is there a misconception that it’s a lot easier than it has really been?

Oh man, it’s not easy at all! I mean, if we wanted the easy route, when we formed this band in 1985, we would have either been a glam metal band like Ratt, or a thrash band like Megadeth. That’s what was in style in the world of metal, and we went down neither of those roads. And you know what? Thank God we didn’t go down those normal avenues, because if you look at the way those normal avenues are in 2008, it’s a tough business.

You obviously pay a lot of attention to the way Dream Theater is presented, to keep a connection with the fans. What’s the most extreme thing you remember doing, in relation to one of your favorite bands?

I went through a Kiss phase and a Ramones phase, so those were the two bands that I was the most obsessive about. My nickname in school was Ace. Even though I was a drummer, Ace [Frehley] was my hero. All my teachers always called me Ace, and I dressed up like Kiss constantly – I was in the Kiss Army. The early ‘80s was the Ramones. I have a great picture of me and the Ramones, meeting them when I was around 12 years old. I had the denim jacket covered with Ramones pins, and “Ramones” painted on the back, and all four of them autographed it for me. I can’t really think of a specific incident where I did anything crazy, but I was that fan who would drive [from New York] to Maryland to see Roger Waters because the show was so intense. That’s the type of kid I was, and I’m still like that. I’m still totally a fan of bands and artists that I love.

Listening to people after Dream Theater shows, either hanging around for meet & greets or making their way out of the venue, it’s a community that really dissects a lot of aspects of the band, a lot like the old days of waiting overnight outside a Ticketron to buy tickets, discussing nuances of imagery and albums.

I miss that. When I was a kid, if I wanted to get concert tickets, I had to sleep outside. I slept outside the Beacon Theater for Frank Zappa tickets; I slept outside for Rush tickets. I cut school and took the bus to the local mall to buy Van Halen tickets. These days you just wake up at 10 o’clock on a Saturday and go to your computer, sitting in your underwear with a cup of coffee. Eddie Trunk said something similar when we did the Score DVD shoot. He said the feeling outside Radio City Music Hall was electric amongst our fans, like he hadn’t felt since he was a kid. And that’s the thing about Dream Theater, you don’t really get us until you come to one of our shows and feel the vibe of the audience. A big part of our thing is the fans. It’s not just us and our music, it’s the whole kind of community.

So in that sense, there really is a Progressive Nation.

Absolutely, and now it’s going to let a lot of other bands join our little club. The word “progressive” in the ‘70s and ‘80s had a completely different meaning than it does in 2008, and that’s what this tour is all about. A band like Mastodon is a progressive band in one way, and Opeth is progressive in another way. I could give you a list of 50 bands that have progressive qualities to them, but those bands could be lumped into 20 different subgenres. With this lineup, and with future lineups, I’m going to absolutely choose bands based on daringness, creativity, and their ability to go many” different places musically. And, probably above all, the characteristic of not really fitting in. Dream Theater never really fit in with other festivals. If we did, like, a Download Festival or something, we always felt like the outcasts. There’s a lot of bands like that, in every subgenre, that never get that mainstream exposure or acceptance, bands that would be completely shunned on an Ozzfest tour. This is giving a home to people that want to play their instruments, and people who aren’t afraid to show their love for bands as extreme as Yes to Opeth. There are fans who really do like everything in between – I know, I’m one of them.

Inset

Mike Portnoy’s Guide To Modern Prog

This is a general list of some of the bands and subgenres that have spawned in progressive music through the years. Of course in many cases, many of the bands and their influences easily blur the lines and cross over into each of the other different subgenres.

Opeth

Type Of Prog: Death Metal, Psychedelic, Goth

Our tour-mates on Progressive Nation 08, Sweden’s Opeth are carrying the torch for daring & experimental music in modern death metal. Guitarist/vocalist/leader Mikael Åkerfeldt’s death growls may be something to get used to for the Yes-loving prog purist, but when he sings clean, his voice and melodies bring back memories of Justin Hayward and John Wetton in their heyday, and can send shivers down your spine. Their combination of brutal death riffs and beautiful, haunting moods have inspired me to coin a whole new phrase to describe their sound: brutiful!

Trace Their Roots To: Black Sabbath, King Crimson, Camel, Judas Priest, Tool

Also Check Out: Cynic, Death, Mastodon, Isis, Baroness

Between The Buried And Me

Type Of Prog: Avant-garde, Technical, Mathcore

BTBAM are part of a whole new wave of extreme, over-the-top metalcore progressive music. Their latest CD, Colors, is a 60-minute masterpiece of moods, technique and amazing musicianship. I love this album so much, it immediately earned them a spot on our inaugural Prog Nation tour. And although they are way more extreme than DT, their acrobatic musicianship makes them the most similar to Dream Theater of all the bands on the PN08 bill.

Trace Their Roots To: Rush, Watchtower, Meshuggah, Mr. Bungle, Naked City

Also Check Out: Unexpect, Dillinger Escape Plan, The Number 12 Looks Like You, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, Hella

Symphony X

Type Of Prog: Hard Rock, Symphonic, Neo-Classical

Symphony X are leading the way for the more “traditional” progressive metal bands that have naturally followed in the wake of Dream Theater’s success in the early ‘90s. A combination of virtuoso musicianship led by guitarist Michael Romeo (think Yngwie) and the incredibly powerful voice of Russell Allen (think Dio meets Steve Walsh), Symphony X were hand-picked by yours truly to join the Gigantour bill in 2005 (Dave Mustaine asked me to pick a band for that tour) as well as to join DT as our special guests for our entire European tour in 2007.

Trace Their Roots To: Rainbow, Yngwie Malmsteen, Iron Maiden, Queensrÿche, Fates Warning

Also Check Out: Protest The Hero, DragonForce, Avenged Sevenfold, Pain Of Salvation, Into Eternity

Porcupine Tree

Type Of Prog: Alternative, Ambient, Pop

Drawing from the more pop, alternative and ambient elements of progressive music and less from the bombastic and metal side, Porcupine Tree are leading the way for creating music that is moody and experimental while still being incredibly melodic and musical. Having opened for DT in Europe during our Metropolis 2000 tour, I am happy to see their career continue to grow and develop with each release.

Trace Their Roots To: Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Marillion, Radiohead, Muse

Also Check Out: Oceansize, Riverside, Anathema, The Dear Hunter, OSI

Beard Fish

Type Of Prog: Traditional, Retro, Classic Prog

Sweden’s Beardfish are my favorite “new” band with an “old” sound. Utilizing all of the classic styles and sounds of the original progressive rock bands of the ‘70s (Mellotron, Hammond organ, Leslies, clean guitars, dry organic drums, etc.), these guys are making music for the folks who truly miss the classic bands that started this whole genre. Check out their latest releases Sleeping In Traffic – Parts 1 & 2 and you’ll swear it’s 1973 all over again!

Trace Their Roots To: Yes, Genesis, Gentle Giant, Frank Zappa

Also Check Out: Magic Pie, The Flower Kings, Anekdoten, Spock’s Beard, Transatlantic