Peter Wildoer interview (excerpts)

Nick Andreas: Obviously want to talk about the Dream Theater audition – that’s what people are very excited about right now. First I’d like to step back and have you tell us a little bit about yourself: how you started drumming, what your early influences are and what bands you’ve been in.

Peter Wildoer: I started quite early around the age of six or eight. I started playing and I grew up with listening to Kiss, Motley Crüe, Accept and all those classic hard rock bands. Later on in my late teens, I got into more a bit more extreme music like thrash bands and get some death metal bands later on. I just grew up listening to quite extreme music and just felt natural to me. In ‘91, I heard the album Human with a group Death of Chuck Schuldiner, and I was just blown away by Sean Reinert’s drumming on that record. That was like a huge turning point for me, just hearing that kind of level of musicianship. That kind of music was like all new and just turn my head around and just made me realize that you can be really creative and musical also in that kind of extreme music.

NA: Now most people know you – Dream Theater fans at least – from your work on James LaBrie’s Static Impulse. How was doing that?

PW: That was just awesome. I got in contact through some mutual friends of ours, and one day like a bit more than a year ago this guy Matt Guillory calls me up and he said “I’m the keyboard player and I’m working on new songs together with James LaBrie for a solo record and we wondered if you want to play drums on that record.” And I was like “Welllll, OK I’ll do it!” [laughs] It’s like no hard choice at all to do that, so it was just an amazing honor to be able to do it, and really I felt it was like a great opportunity now to reach some kind of different audience to you for me because I’ve been very much closely connected with Darkane – with the more extreme music – and I’ve been playing with Pestilence and Old Man’s Child and all these bands. I’ve been playing with more melodic rock bands too, but never really got out, so that was a great opportunity for me of course.

NA: One of the bands that I found that you were in I had overlooked it back when I originally got the CD but in Dream Theater’s general style there was a band called Time Requiem that you had played on about a decade ago that reminded me a lot of what you would have been doing in DT.

PW: Definitely! I mean that band was very much inspired by Dream Theater, Yngwie Malmsteen and Symphony X I would say. The guy that wrote the music was very much into those three bands and then some stuff you almost copied. [laughs] I mean I like playing that music because sometimes playing really extreme music – it’s always on the edge what your physical abilities are – it’s not always about thinking about the groove or playing some cool stuff. You just have to nail whatever you do and try to play as precisely as you can in those speeds in that kind of music. So I really enjoy playing that kind of music – more progressive kind of hard rock/heavy metal music.

NA: For a drummer especially I have to imagine a lot of the stuff you do is just a big endurance test.

PW: Yeah, it’s an endurance test and I’m not the guy either that’s using triggers to put stuff together. There are some guys out there today that have an amazing speed, but most of them today almost don’t sweat it or they’re just using whatever. You have to do that today to be able to play that fast, but I guess I’m just more old-school playing with my legs and stuff, so it could be a struggle. You have that sometimes when you’re playing long sets.

NA: Yeah of course. And you of course didn’t get the job in Dream Theater but we can only imagine that you would have been playing some pretty long sets had you been getting that gig.

PW: [laughs] Yeah we’d probably do that, but it would have been so much fun! But that’s the way it is!

NA: Getting back to Static Impulse for a second, how much free reign did you have on that record? Were the drums given to you – what they wanted to do – or did you really make it up?

PW: I made up my personality, but Marco Sfogli (the guitar player) and Matt Guillory (the keyboard player) had been programming the drums so well using the Drumkit From Hell samples and stuff like that, and they just sounded real. I could get a very clear picture what they wanted and I just put my flavor to it and some of my kind of trademark drum fills and stuff like that, and just added some more personality to it, and probably also a little bit more metal-ish kind of way of drumming into it. Matt is like a huge fan of Swedish metal like Soilwork and stuff like that and more melodic bands.

NA: Now working with James of course you end up getting a call from him to audition for Dream Theater – when did you learn about who your competition was going to be, and what was it like learning about who those other six guys were?

PW: [laughs] I was on tour with Darkane in France. I got a mail from James asking if I was interested in auditioning for Dream Theater. I mean – foof – of course! [laughs] I called my wife – I could hardly speak and I was almost falling into tears like, [speaking overly dramatically] “Ah! They asked me to audition!” or whatever, and then a few weeks later I got all the information, what songs to play. And then I got the schedule – when the different drummers were supposed to audition, and I saw the other names. I was like so intimidated by that list, because those are my drum heroes! I learned – still learning – lots from those guys of course. I got their drum books, I got their instructional DVDs, I got the live stuff with them, I’ve got their records and all that. I guess just being on that list was itself a huge thing for me of course and then a great honor to be on the list. I actually emailed all the guys, too, when we got that list just tell them that, yeah, it’s just such an honor to be on the list, no matter what happens.

NA: Not only have you been learning from them during your career, I understand that you actually had one of Mike Portnoy’s drum DVDs to help you study for this audition.

PW: Definitely! Yeah, yeah! The Liquid Drum Theater DVD – I got that one already – and so when I got to know that we were doing ‘The Dance Of Eternity’ song, I knew it was on that DVD, so I loaded the DVD and there you can see very clearly what the drum fills are. And my approach was very much to keep it true to what Mike did, because no matter what I would do, I knew that my personality and my style would probably shine through even though trying to do what Mike did originally. So my approach was very much to keep it to what it is and keep it like the fans know the songs and how they wanna hear them, and on that DVD I could very much catch what Mike was doing on the original version.

NA: Well if you watch The Spirit Carries On documentary – and I know you have now – it seemed that the downfall of guys like Lang and Donati was actually that they did interpret too much.

PW: Yeah, exactly. That was very much their approach and I totally understand it because they’re totally drummer’s drummers – they’re like top elite in the world of drummers. Of course, they wanna put their flavor to it. And I know that Virgil has said “this is how I sound and this is what I’m gonna present. If it’s not fitting, it’s not fitting. This is me and this is what I do.” So I totally respect that point of view, of course.

NA: Yeah, it worked out for you – you did get down to the final three. You unfortunately didn’t get the job, but you really seem to come through quite well in the documentary.

PW: Yeah, very well and we had such a good time! I think the guys were kind of surprised – they had heard Static Impulse, I know that – but they probably hear a lot of music when they aren’t on tour or whatever with Dream Theater. So I knew they heard the record, but probably not more than that they knew about me – except for James, of course – but they were kind of surprised I guess. We went through ‘A Nightmare To Remember’ – after that song said “Wow! That was really like we could have went onstage and do that!” I think they kind of were a bit surprised. It was also very stressful for the guys in Dream Theater cuz they had never been playing those songs with another drummer; they’ve been playing with Mr. Portnoy for so many years, and suddenly playing these songs with the different drummers... They already knew all these guys already performed their best, but like Petrucci says in the end: “What a way to conclude,” and I think he was actually quite honestly saying that.

NA: As far as the auditions are concerned, that they were filmed, how much did going in about it? Did everything was going to be filmed and used for a documentary from the start?

PW: I knew that everything was going to be filmed for the documentary. What I knew was that it was going to be released as some kind of bonus DVD for the next Dream Theater album – like the auditions, how they went on and stuff. I didn’t know that it was going to be a documentary or the build-up to the announcement of Mangini. But I’m totally fine with it. I mean, for me, it’s been great exposure and I think it was a very cool idea. And I just love watching the other drummers playing. As a drummer and fan of Dream Theater, I just love to see those videos. So I was totally happy with how everything turned out with this video.

NA: Yeah, I think it was Petrucci – it might have been someone else – that did post that there will be a DVD available either with the album or in some form in the future, so it looks like that still will hold true.

PW: Yeah hopefully. there is so much more film, because we all were sent the video cameras you like Mr. Mangini said. He’s got his Zoom Q3 video recorder with him. So we were sent those just to be able to film at home and when practicing all that. And the auditions went on for almost three hours for each guy. So there’s a lot of film stuff.

NA: There’s a question I was going to get onto later but asking now: with the three hours it was pretty much edited down to about five minutes – do you think everyone was represented or yourself at least pretty fairly in that five minutes? Do you think they did a good job of getting the gist of the audition?

PW: I can only speak for myself of course, because I didn’t see the other drummers’ auditions and stuff in real life, but for me, it feels like that’s the way it kind of was. It’s as you said: it’s quite hard to edit three hours – small talk and playing and all that – into just four or five minutes, but it’s pretty much that that’s the way my audition went down. I’m happy with how the footage turned out. There are some parts they should have shown instead of the stuff they did, but whatever. I’m very, very happy with how it turned out and that’s the vibe I’m getting from the video clip; it’s the vibe I got when I was there actually.

NA: When you were told about the auditions, were you privy to what would be expected of you if you got the job? What kind of touring would be done, or was that something that they were waiting to discuss with the person after they got the job?

PW: I think they were going to discuss that after the job – whoever got it – because the only stuff I actually knew what’s the flight times, what hotel and what time I was going to audition. And of course the three songs. We really didn’t get much more information than that. Of course there’s like 50 emails or something prior to the auditions, but as a whole we didn’t know much more than that – at least I didn’t. But I’m quite analytical – I like to be in control, so I checked everything; I checked Mr. Portnoy’s webpage where he’s got all the old tours and stuff. So I pretty much realized that they were they were going to record in the studio for quite a while and then be on tour for like 18, 20 months or something. Like being away four or five weeks, and then be at home for three or four weeks, doing that all the time when touring. I was well aware of what was waiting if I was able to be in the band.

NA: So you got sent these three MP3s and you had vague travel instructions. How intimidating was it walking into the room and really not knowing too much of what was going on?

PW: [laughs] As I said in my clip on the documentary, I knew that was coming – those tests – but I just knew we were going to do those three songs, and that’s pretty much it. I did my audition on Wednesday – I was the last one at 6pm. And the day before, I met Virgil after his audition, and he said “there are some parts that are really hard.” And that really didn’t make me less nervous, I can tell you that! [laughs] If Virgil thinks it’s a bit tricky, then it’s very, very, extremely tricky! [laughs] But I felt very comfortable. I was welcomed so well when I entered the room by all the guys in the band and their management and all the guys that were there. I just felt very, very comfortable right away entering that room, actually.

NA: For those three songs that you got sent, of course we had ‘A Nightmare To Remember’, ‘The Spirit Carries On’, ‘The Dance Of Eternity’ – how much time did you spend learning them and which one would you say you had the most difficulty with?

PW: We had quite a lot of time. I would say we had something around five or six weeks – something like that. So I started right away by learning the song. I attacked ‘The Dance Of Eternity’ first because that was probably the song that was the hardest to get into, because the arrangement of that song is actually quite weird; just a lot of riffs and like Mike Portnoy says in his drumming DVD, they were kind of leftover riffs from different songs or different ideas they had and they just made a song out of it. So the structure of the song and the arrangement is quite weird. So I started off with that one. Up until the audition I just listened to those songs; nothing else in my iPod. I just had that going whenever I was able to hear it, to memorize everything. So I did ‘The Dance Of Eternity’ first, and then I did ‘Nightmare’ and after that ‘The Spirit Carries On’. I just felt it was the right way of attacking it because I knew if I was going to learn ‘The Dance Of Eternity’, the other songs I would also be able to learn.

NA: Of the three phases of the audition, you of course had the part where you played through the songs, and then there was the riff test, and one other section – which did you find the most and least difficult?

PW: By far, the riff test where they presented the new ideas that Jordan had written, because it was like weird meters. For me playing through the songs, I had practiced them so hard and so much so I knew I would be able to play them even though I was going to be nervous, because they would be kind of stuck in my muscle memory. But after that, when Jordan said that we’re going to do the test, I’m frightened and when he started playing it, he just played once through, I really didn’t catch what was going on, because he didn’t count or anything. I just figured out it was like lots of different meters and they also changed from like 3/4 time and there were some at 5/8, and then there was also 11/16. So the meters were different. There were quarter notes, there were eighth notes and there were sixteenth note subdivisions. It’s not easy of course, but I got my head around it and finally I was able to play through it actually, and they seem to be very happy with it, and I was very, very happy with it. But of course, I couldn’t have gone on stage playing that stuff – that wouldn’t have sounded too great though. [laughs]

NA: I think with all those crazy numbers, a math teacher would have been perfect for the band!

PW: Yeah! But I know Mike Mangini actually is also very good at math too, so I think they made the right choice right there! [laughs]

NA: I didn’t mention earlier, but I think it’s funny that you took his spot in James LaBrie’s band! Mike Mangini had been on his previous three album, so now it’s kind of a coming full circle as we say in Dream Theater world!

PW: [laughs] Definitely! That’s very much true! That was also you a very cool thing, because I knew when Mangini wasn’t able to do the last James LaBrie album, and I was asked, I knew that was him playing on the other three albums. So for me that was already like big shoes to fill, after Mangini to play on that record, so it’s full circle for sure! [laughs]

NA: So [with] all the preparations for those three songs, did you manage to make it through all three without any big mistakes?

PW: Actually I did. As I said, I had practiced those songs so hard, they were just stuck in my muscle memory and I think Jordan is quite honest in the documentary after my audition when he just said, “Yeah, we could have went on stage and just play those songs.” That was very much the vibe I got out of it too, because it felt right at home. When I set up the kit, after that I just warmed up, and then we started off jamming and I think we were jamming for almost 20 minutes. And then after that, it felt really relaxed because they’re amazing musicians and it just felt very comfortable playing with those guys. So after that, going into the songs, I felt pretty warmed up. For the songs, I can’t remember doing some mistakes. I was just happy with that! [laughs]

NA: Yes, at least you have a part that you can study for. If you can ace that, you feel good going through the rest of it.

PW: [laughs] Yeah definitely!

NA: Portnoy had been seen, not only as a drummer, but as a figurehead and director of the band. During the auditions, did you notice any particular guy stepping up and kind of taking the lead in the band or did it seem like a group effort now?

PW: I don’t really know about the chemistry prior because I’ve never met them before, but I know that Mr. Portnoy was very much keeping it all together, kind of almost like a manager I would say. That’s the feeling I got. But I would say everybody was really, really into it. Jordan and Petrucci and James LaBrie – they were really talking a lot. Myung was not talking that much, but he’s like a super cool guy. They were very much like a band for me at least. So no one actually stepping up. Musically, I would say that Jordan and Petrucci probably were the guys saying the most – what they wanted with the different riffs and stuff like that. So musically, I was talking a lot to them about it. Afterwards, I was talking to Myung about the jam we had in the beginning, because we were having some cool bass stuff going on, and I was trying to lock in and I asked him, “I was trying to figure out what you were doing in the beginning,” and he said, “Yeah, I had nothing planned – that was just improvised!” And I was like, “No wonder I had a hard time locking in with my kick drum with your bass then!” [laughs]

NA: The documentary was quite positive in response to each drummer and you, but of course it was brief. Were you getting immediate feedback on the other sections aside from your amazing playing of the songs? like what was the kind of things they were saying to you after the riff tests and the jams?

PW: Everybody was really happy with the jams. I remember how it all started. We were setting the inner ear levels with the keyboards and guitars, and then Petrucci just started playing some cool stuff, and I just started jamming along with that. And then everybody kind of fell in, just started jamming. After that, everybody was like, “Wow! That was cool!” Some great ideas... Everything just felt natural.

NA: I understand that every drummer had a call on November fifth to find it if they got the position – is that correct?

PW: Yep, that’s true.

NA: How far in advance did you find out about that date, November fifth, and how hard of a time was that on you?

PW: Dude, I can’t tell you that because it was like every night, “We’re going to call you as soon as possible. But of course, we have a lot of material...” because they wanted to go through all the material on that was filmed and I knew how much was filmed, and going through all that would take a while. But I think it was like almost two weeks – it was something like 10 or 12 days until I got an email. I was like, “Soooooo what’s happening?” I don’t hear from them, so I was like, “Well they’re probably not gonna call me anyway,” but then I got this email that “we’re gonna call you, and we have this specific time for each drummer.” I think they had something like 40 minutes for each drummer set up. So during that time I was like, “So what’s happening there? Are they going to call or not?” because I was kind of left in the dark there for a while.

NA: It sounds like almost a first date gone wrong! [laughs]

PW: Exactly! That was almost the vibe of it! Yeah! [laughs] “Why didn’t I take her number? I just gave her mine!” [laughs]

NA: So November comes and you have your time to call in. Were you calling around any of the other drummers that day? Did you call any of the other guys to find out if they had gotten it or not?

PW: No. I’ve been trying to keep contact with all of them, and I know that some guys said they were doing clinics or whatever – if you’re on their level – and people are going to ask you all the time if you were auditioning for Dream Theater. I know some of them actually said, “Well I did audition, but I didn’t get to play with the band.” I sent an email to all the other drummers like two days after I got back home in Sweden, before we did a call or whatever and getting to know what happened. I just said to everybody that I was just happy; like I said, it’s an honor to be on the list with those drummers, and it was such a huge honor to play with Dream Theater. And Mike wrote me back that he was very happy with his audition. And then I kind of thought, “Well he lives in Boston” – it’s like two hours or something by train from New York, and he’s around the same age as the guys in the band, he grew up listening to Rush like the other guys in the band and all that. So I would say everything pointed quite fast to him – at least how I felt. And I also kind of feel that he’s got that kind of drumming style that would fit Dream Theater very well, like a very natural direction from Mike Portnoy to Mangini. I on [the other] hand, I’m a few years younger than him, and I grew up listening to Dream Theater than actually growing up with Yes or Rush.

NA: When it comes right down to it, I think a lot of guys had everything needed musically but it seemed Mangini handled more of the non-musical intangibles that helped him.

PW: Exactly. And he’s very, very charismatic, and that was something I actually thought about when I was doing the audition, because normally when playing with Darkane, it’s a bit more extreme and we do a lot of head banging and stuff like that. Trying to do the windmill while playing drums with the hair. So it kinda felt a bit weird coming in there, but I figured afterwards Mangini did the totally right thing, and Marco, too. You can really see those guys playing their heart out, and I guess I was like a little nervous of course, and I also kind of felt since the other guys were just kind of standing around and playing the song, for me it would personally feel a bit weird just sitting there and head banging while the other guys didn’t move. [laughs] But I think Mangini is the perfect fit for the band.

NA: I’m glad that even though you didn’t get it, you seem to be very happy with the fact that you got to audition and happy for Mangini, and that’s very nice to see.

PW: Definitely. Like you said, I’m just happy with how everything turned out actually.

NA: You got a free trip to New York City – how much can you complain?

PW: Exactly! And I love New York City, and my wife actually follow me there, too. So we had a whole week in New York, so we were very, very happy with it. [laughs]

NA: Was she able to be in there with you when you auditioned?

PW: We were told in the beginning that she was not allowed to be in there, in the room, because it was too small. But then when we got to the audition – because the first day, they had a smaller room, just like a normal rehearsal room, more or less – and then they changed for the second. But they had so much gear! [laughs] Petrucci, with all his gear, and Jordan, and those guys. So they were moved to a bigger a rehearsal room. We had actually been very close contact with them– with Frank and Marjorie, the management of Dream Theater – so they just they already felt like they almost knew us before the audition, because we were so close in contact with them, emailing about hotels and flight times and stuff. So she was just asking to come in. They had this is huge catering going on and some sofas in there, so she was there during the whole time. That was great fun, because I would feel like if she was left in the dark wandering around in New York for three or four hours, not knowing what’s happening with me... it felt great having her there actually.

NA: As for all of New York’s splendors, it’s not a place you want to wander alone and dark for three or four hours. I understand that you have a full diary of the audition process that would be published in a Swedish magazine, but you’re working on having a translated into English; do we have any idea when that’ll be available?

PW: I think the magazine will be released like in a couple of weeks hopefully, and I’m going to ask the magazine if it’s possible to be able to release the English version prior to the magazine in a way, because I think now everybody has interest in the audition, how it went on and stuff. And I believe in a month or two people will be more interested in how the new CD sounds and what’s going on with the new album for Dream Theater. So the sooner I can publish it would be way better, because that’s really my personal thoughts about the whole situation from day one until the audition, and until I got the call and all that. It’s probably more for the more diehard Dream Theater fans, but it really shows how the whole thing went on, and my thoughts about it. So hopefully it won’t be that long until I can at publish it.