2009 Progressive Nation

Dweezil Zappa from Zappa Plays Zappa

US leg

It was great seeing Mike Portnoy at the side of the stage enjoying the show every night as well the few special times he joined us on stage. His enthusiasm for Frank’s music is infectious. I would also like to say that it was a pleasure getting to know everyone else in Dream Theater as well. Thanks to John Petrucci for showing me those alternate picking “5” patterns, I’m going to put them to good use!

Thanks also to DT’s crew and the other bands on the tour Bigelf and Scale The Summit. Everyone was really kind to all of us in Zappa Plays Zappa and this tour was a great experience.

Dream Theater’s audience was very kind to us as well – many standing ovations during our shows – thank you very much! We’ve had a lot of fun playing for all of you on this tour.

It has been my experience that great musicians in any style of music can easily entertain an audience. The grace and skill that they demonstrate translates even when language doesn’t. It’s great to see that the collective audiences of this tour were so open minded about my father’s music.

My ultimate goal with Zappa Plays Zappa is for younger generations to discover this music and for it to resonate with them. When I was growing up, hearing this music really opened my mind up to the larger scale of possibilities within music. It was truly inspiring and it shaped my entire musical world. I’ve seen it have a similar effect on others... Mike Portnoy can attest to that.

Once again thanks to all of you for your rousing support on the Progressive Nation tour. We hope to see you all again soon.

Ace Mark from Bigelf

US leg

We arrived at the Beacon Theatre in New York well on time. Actually way too early, which is totally unheard of in the Bigelf camp. People were really into the show, and it was one of the best in the tour so far. Mike Portnoy came onstage for the jam part in ‘Blackball’, and the crowd just went completely apesh*t, giving us a standing ovation in the end. After the show, it was time to hit the bars with the Zappa band and crew, before returning to the venue to see Dweezil play ‘3rd Stone From The Sun’ with Dream Theater. It was an awesome night and an awesome city.

The Bell Center in Montreal, Quebec is a huge arena, and amazingly it sounds great too. The crowd was very welcoming from the very start, and the band sounded good. After the signing at the merch desk it was time to hit the bars. We started off in a pub called Madhatter (of course!), and hit a pub called Ziggy’s just around the corner. After that, we went somewhere else but from then on it’s all a big blur. I wasted all my money, but it was worth it. That’s what people tell me anyway.

When we played the Molson Amphitheater in Toronto there was a welcoming crowd. Not one of the best shows on the tour (technical difficulties), but nevertheless the audience was really into it. Mike Portnoy sang ‘Bobby Brown’ with Dweezil, and Dream Theater covered ‘The Camera Eye’ by Rush as an encore.

In Edmonton, Alberta, Mike Portnoy came to hang on our bus for a while and played some new songs by his side project Transatlantic, really good stuff. The venue was nice, it had showers and better catering, and a whole lot of amped-up Dream Theater and Zappa fans. It was a great show with an amazing reception from the crowd. A bunch of people came to see the show both in Calgary and in Edmonton, hats off for the dedication guys! Right before Dream Theater went onstage, James LaBrie shook my hand and told me how much he loved the show and our band. That made me feel really good, what a great bunch of guys. Even though they’re huge rock stars they’ve managed to remain down to earth and totally cool.

We played a good show at the legendary Chicago Theater, received a standing ovation and did some signing. After the show, Portnoy introduced me to Charlie Benante from Anthrax, a really cool guy. I hit him up with some CDs and let Mike and him continue their drummer talk. After watching Zappa’s set (which featured Portnoy playing drums on ‘Peaches En Regalia’) we went to the House Of Blues with the boys.

The last show of the tour was at the legendary Greek Theater, a dream come true for us. Before the show we did some interviews and a quick photo session which went great. During our set Matt, John Petrucci’s guitar tech, jumped on the stage in a rabbit suit, and Mike Portnoy sat in for ‘Blackball’. Zappa Plays Zappa were totally on fire and played an amazing set. Portnoy got on stage with them to play ‘Broken Hearts Are For Assholes’. During Dream Theater’s set, Portnoy got all the drummers from the bands one by one for a drum battle. After that, they did an amazing guitar jam with Petrucci, Dweezil Zappa and Mr. Steve Vai himself. I was kind of hoping that Vai would jam with Dweezil’s band too, after all he played in Frank’s band for years. Nevertheless, he’s an amazing guitarist and a cool guy. Dream Theater performed a funny Star Wars lightsaber battle, which was guaranteed to make Damon and all the other Star Wars geeks wet themselves! All in all, the tour was great and by far the most fun I’ve ever had on the road. Everybody in the bands and the crew were totally cool and great at what they do. Thank you Dream Theater, ZPZ and Scale The Summit, it was an absolute pleasure to tour with you guys.

European leg

The Ice Hall in Helsinki, Finland is a very special venue for me. This is where I’ve seen so many shows that I’ll remember for the rest of my life. Although I do have a confession to make: I absolutely hate hometown shows. Knowing that your friends and family are there in the audience is not good for the nerves. Thankfully we had time for a long soundcheck. For some reason, the Mellotron was acting up, and on top of that, the guitar amp blew up all of a sudden. Our excellent techs got it fixed in no time, but the Mellotron was still sounding weird. The show had some technical problems, but went well otherwise.

Having never played in France before we were totally taken by surprise by how the Paris crowd was totally rocking. It was definitely one of the better shows on the tour. Let me tell you: the rumours of people there having stiff upper lips and not speaking any English are absolute rubbish. Everybody there was so nice and friendly. Luckily the next day was a day off, so we did the tourist thing and saw Notre Dame, Pere Lachaise and Montmartre district with the guys from Unexpect, tons of fun.

It was about time for us to get to play in Great Britain, our musical influences being almost entirely British. It was quite fitting that the big show of the tour at Wembley Arena in London was on none other than David Lee Roth’s birthday. The show was really good, and the crowd was awesome. I’ve heard so many horror stories about how tough the British audiences are, but once again those rumours got proven wrong. After the show, the Opeth guys and The Elves hit a local pub around the corner, and the party continued by the buses after they threw us out!

In the middle of the tour, we had a few shows on our own. Dream Theater was taking a few days break, so we booked our own headlining shows and Opeth went to Ireland to play on their own. The Academy is a nice little venue located at the campus of Manchester University. After some confusion with the US/European/British power compatibility we finally got to the show, which was quite OK actually. The next night, we went to Big Hands near the venue and got totally wasted. While we were walking back to the hotel some local thugs jumped out of their car and wanted to beat us up. Like real peace-loving hippies we ran instead of fighting, those guys being probably twice our size. One guy came after me with a metal bar, and somehow I got separated from the rest of the Elves. When I made it back to the hotel I tried calling everybody’s rooms to make sure they were all right. No answer... I didn’t know the tour manager’s room number, nor was there anybody at the reception... At this point, I was starting to get really worried, having seen Duffy getting hit straight in the face. What had happened to them? Were they at a hospital? Or even worse, lying bleeding in some dark alley? Where’s the police? Ambulance? Anybody? Finally, after a long nerve-wrecking wait, they finally showed up. They had gone out to get Indian food. Long live curry!

After our own little club tour, it was back to playing venues on the Progressive Nation Tour again. Opeth had had the misfortune of being in a crash during the break. Some car had hit their bus in Belgium; thank God everybody in the band was okay. Their second driver had some severe scars from broken glass and had to take a sick leave. Everybody else was physically healthy, but understandably still shaken by the incident. As Mikael introduced the band at the show, “Good evening. We’re Opeth and we just almost got killed.” Like the true professionals they are, they played an amazing set, as always. Our show went fine as well, despite the not-so-rare technical problems. After getting the Hammond fixed in London, a new problem with the volume pedal presented itself. Duffy’s bass amp was making weird noises as well. On top of everything, Froth’s kick mic dropped inside the kick drum, and the kick pedal got totally loose in the middle of the set. Miraculously, the guitar gear was working just fine when everything else was falling apart. I thought we played well though. Despite some frustrated Elves backstage, I don’t think too many people in the audience noticed anything being wrong. After the show, it was time for a happy reunion with Unexpect at the buses, both bands had been missing our nightly parties during the break.

Hours before the show in Milan, Italy, we saw an endless line of stands selling bootleg concert tees outside the arena. Those guys must have had every Dream Theater and Opeth merch item ever made, some of them good, some of them horrible crap. Froth just had to get one Prog Nation shirt for himself, with the names ‘BIGHELF’ and ‘UNESPECT’ on the back. Well, at least they got Opeth and Dream Theater right(!) The show went great. We played to 9,000 people, and they were all going crazy. Bigelf chants echoed in the hall, and when Portnoy came onstage to play with us they totally lost it. The crowd was really rocking, there’s something about those Italians. They were singing, chanting and putting up lighters and cell phones on ‘Money It’s Pure Evil.’ Being on Progressive Nation really doesn’t suck too much.

After the show in Conegliano, Italy, Mikael and Portnoy were leading a music quiz and Pete whipped out his Firebird mandolin and the Fender mini-amp and started wailing. All in all our Italian experience was absolutely amazing, one of the best crowds in the world for sure. Viva Italia!

It was Halloween when we got to Ljubljana, Slovenia, so a lot of people from the crew dressed up and were acting even wackier than usual. It was also the last show on the tour, so everybody was scheming their pranks for other bands. All the people on the bands and crew were looking really suspicious, trying to figure out one way or the other what the other guys had in store for them. The show was tons of fun, with little pranks going on all the time. Froth was dressed up as Portnoy, his outfit was so good that I think some people actually thought he was Mike at first. Portnoy came to duet with Damon on ‘Money It’s Pure Evil,’ while Unexpect was talking nonsense in French and Finnish through the in-ear monitors. We played ‘Counting Sheep’ live for the first time ever. Mikael from Opeth got his water replaced by a banana and Unexpect kept throwing sugar and food at them. We put a Swedish radio DJ in their in-ears. Our sound engineer Ian was dressed up as Petrucci and made his brief, but impressive debut on stage. During Dream Theater’s set, the techs put the Cookie Monster on the video screen during Portnoy’s grunt on ‘Nightmare to Remember.’ We replaced Portnoy’s vocal mic with a vibrating giant dildo, the Opeth boys had a remote-controlled fart machine going in their in-ear monitors, leaving them wondering what was going on. Before they started ‘Voices,’ all the other bands and crew got onstage for a little disco dance. Ljubljana was a very funny show, and luckily all the bands had a good sense of humour about everything. The European leg of Progressive Nation was totally awesome, an absolute pleasure. Everybody in the bands and the crew was so cool, I know I’ll miss them a lot. Thanks again Mike and the whole DT gang, bless you for having us on the bill in Europe as well. Unexpect and Opeth, it was great touring with you, wish you guys all the best.

Thank you for reading, Ace Mark signing out. Take care and see you next time. Rock on!