Mike Portnoy interview (excerpts)

Really, though, the whole week in Los Angeles is a footnote in a globe-circling jaunt of special appearances, substitutions, and other drum-related activity that’s earning Portnoy enough frequent-flyer miles to accompany Richard Branson to the moon and back. He’ll play with no less than four bands in the ten-day span including a few one-off dates in Latin America for the Rock In Rio tour with underground prog-metal legends Fates Warning. “My head is ready to explode,” he says. “You can’t imagine the amount of music I’m holding in my head and trying to learn and remember. It’s f__king insane.”

There’s a real temptation to think the ex-Dream Theater drummer is down on his luck now that he’s no longer attached to the prog-rock superstars, but Portnoy seems more like a kid out of school for the summer: “Right now I’m kind of like a newly single guy that’s just enjoying the bachelor life,” he says. “After 25 years of being married to one band I want to get out there and spread my wings.”

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In both Flying Colors and Adrenaline Mob, Portnoy for the first time in his career can concentrate almost exclusively on the music — a luxury he has never had before. “Nothing went through the Dream Theater system without going through me first,” he says. “But I don’t think anything I am doing now is like that at all. I am definitely enjoying different roles and lesser weight in everything that’s going on. These guys are all used to having full control in their respective careers and bands. So when we come together in Flying Colors it’s all about collaboration and compromise and working together. It’s a very, very different kind of chemistry than what I had at Dream Theater, and I could say the same about Adrenaline Mob as well. They are both very different animals.”

Inner Metal Child

All appearances to the contrary, Portnoy’s hard-rock makeover is not a sudden thing but a gradual metamorphosis. The last album he cowrote for Dream Theater, 2009’s Black Clouds And Silver Linings, was the band’s most aggressive.

The major catalyst came in 2010 when he was tapped to fill in for Jimmy “The Rev” Sullivan after the Avenged Sevenfold drummer died of an overdose. After cutting the drum tracks for Nightmare and the subsequent Uproar Tour in 2010 with Disturbed, Hellyeah!, and Stone Sour (in which he stepped in for Ray Mayorga for a few dates), Portnoy was never quite the same. “After that experience with Avenged I realized how much fun I was having, not having to sit there with a calculator to play drums,” he says. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I did that for all those years with Dream Theater and I loved that too, but, man, my brain just needed a break, and I really enjoyed that vibe with Avenged. So when I was approached with the music for Adrenaline Mob it was the right music at the right time, like, ‘I want to do this, man.'”

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Portnoy’s biggest concern during the A7X gig was not whether he was good enough to fill The Rev’s shoes, but the lifestyle clash. With 12 years of sobriety under his belt, to be constantly exposed to the hard-partying ways of the band during the tour was a concern. (“The Glass Prison,” from Dream Theater’s Six Degrees Of Inner Turbulence, was the first to address the drummer’s battle with alcohol, a theme that would continue on subsequent albums). Dream Theater had a strictly alcohol-free tour rider backstage but in the Avenged Sevenfold camp, Portnoy could not enforce such a policy. To his surprise, witnessing all the carousing and partying backstage night after night did not turn out to be the temptation he feared it would. “It had the opposite effect,” he says. “I was like, ‘I sure don’t miss being hung over all the time.'”

Perchance To Dream

Leaving the band that he had been so closely associated with for so long was a huge risk money-wise. Touring is a lucrative game when you have a rabid fan base, even for a band with modest sales (the band wryly named its 2008 best-of collection Greatest Hit … And 21 Other Pretty Cool Songs). “If you compare Dream Theater to Metallica and Guns N Roses, yeah, we don’t make that kind of money.”

But with homes in two states, it’s clear he created a comfortable living thanks to a devoted fan base that not only attended shows but would buy merchandise too. “I’ve seen absolutely ridiculous accusations online where people think I left Dream Theater to make money with Avenged Sevenfold or to make more money doing more commercial music,” he says. “That could not be further from the truth. I was very secure with the world I had in Dream Theater and I could have just rode that out and been secure probably the rest of my career. But I walked away from that because music and relationships and inspiration are way more important to me than money.”

Besides, his endorsement deals remain fully intact. With few exceptions, it’s more effective for gear makers to hitch their brand to a popular band than a middling one, no matter how stellar its drummer. Portnoy is that rare exception. “When I left Dream Theater, every one of those endorsement companies was fully supportive of Mike Portnoy. They weren’t in the Dream Theater business, they were in the Mike Portnoy business, and were behind whatever I chose to do.”

More than material things, it’s family ties that Portnoy attributes to his longevity as a musician. Rock and roll is a jealous mistress, and musicians’ long spells from home have a way of driving families apart. “I don’t think it’s been a challenge as much as it’s been a godsend,” he says. “Especially after I left Dream Theater, there were a couple of months of just a lot of negativity online that was very hard to me to endure, and you realize that the most important thing you have in your life and the only thing that is really consistent and forever is family.” And to prove it, his signature Sabian MaxStax and Tama Melody Master signature snare drum are named after son Max and daughter Melody.

With all the excitement in Portnoy’s world, it seemed crass for us to ask whether he would consider reuniting with the band he founded. But our wanton curiosity won out. Half expecting a bitch-slap from the drummer’s gold-finger knuckle, the response was cool and measured: “Well, in the hypothetical scenario you are laying out, I would never step in as a drummer for hire or go on board in any sort of lesser capacity than I ever had in the band.” (He did, however, decline to offer an opinion on his successor, Mike Mangini). “And I never wanted to walk away from the band,” he continues. “That was never my intention or my goal. I just needed a break and hoped that they would share that same feeling and respect that feeling and that we would take a break together. I never, ever wanted the lineup to change or for me to leave the band — that’s just the way that the cards played out. So if the opportunity ever arose to come back I would absolutely welcome it but I am not waiting for it and I am not counting on it. I have a million other things going on in my life that keep me very happy and very busy.”

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Listing all these absurdly accomplished players leads to talk of music theory and other pointy-headed stuff taught at places like North Texas State, Julliard, and of course, Portnoy’s alma mater, Berklee College Of Music, where Dream Theater was hatched with classmates John Petrucci and John Myung in 1985. Like so many of that school’s once and future stars, the men weren’t long for the classroom, but Portnoy does not regret a single a minute spent there. “I wanted to learn about music theory and harmony and all that stuff,” he says. “And it ended up helping me immensely in working with other musicians and collaborating in songwriting. It became a huge asset to what I do. However, it’s not mandatory — there’s millions of great musicians out there that can’t read or write or don’t know scales or theory. It’s really about personal goals and interest.”

We couldn’t let MP escape without squeezing some career advice out of him. Yet the drummer was hesitant to play the role of battle-hardened vet or dole out cautionary tales. “Regardless of the fact that I have a name and a career and a history and a reputation, Adrenaline Mob is a new band. Flying Colors is a new band. So I’ve had to kind of relearn how to market and sell yourself.”