M Shadows interview (excerpt)

As for Mike Portnoy becoming the new drummer for the band... Who called who? 

Basically, Mike was in contact with us all the time when he knew about Jimmy. Before that, we had maintained a friendship for years and talked regularly. He was a fan of ours and we are fans of him and after Jimmy died he would always be in touch with us. A couple of weeks later I talked to the others to see if we could make the record with someone who Jimmy respected and honored. I automatically thought of Mike. We called him, we said yes right away, and said he would be delighted. We met at NAMM in Los Angeles, we gave him a demo and he called us and said he could not wait to play this material. Then we caught a studio and recorded it.

I think Mike respected the parts of the demo that Jimmy had recorded. Was it his or your decision? 

No, we told him how it had to be. We wanted it to be like Jimmy had imagined. We love progressive music and we love Dream Theater, but we have a very clear vision of what we want. If Jimmy would’ve wanted to play more of the account in the songs, he would have done it, but we like the 1-2 tempo, we have been influenced a lot by Pantera. We told Mike to focus on what was in the demo and when he played it, he was super conscious and then he added something of his own.

I’ve never seen Mike more happy on stage than at today’s show. Two months ago I saw him playing with Dream Theater in Canada along with Iron Maiden and he looked bored. Today he was very motivated. Do you feel responsible for his departure from Dream Theater? 

He told us that that was something we had been thinking since some time ago. It would have happened anyway. I know he likes to be on stage, he likes what is around us, we have a number one... he is enjoying all that. We will tour around the world and we are selling a lot of tickets.

I think what happened is that he realized that not everyone in a band is supposed to hate each-other. In his band he doesn’t get along very well with the rest, and they do what they do for business. We are good friends, we go out, we love each-other a lot ... we don’t hide in our hotel rooms... Tomorrow we will be all day hanging around with our wives and friends. I think he saw it and thought “this is what I want and if I want to leave Dream Theater I’ll do it because I’ve found something that makes me happy.”

Is he going to be a permanent member of the band? 

We are taking baby steps. At the moment all we will do is record and tour and nothing more. We’re not looking for our Jason Newsted. We have one of the best drummers in the world playing with us and we are grateful. But it is too early for us and we don’t want to capitalize the death of Jimmy. When the time comes to think about what we will do with the future of the band we will see. But we are not yet ready for a new member.