John Petrucci interview

Chris Akin: It is your Classic Metal Show right here on theclassicmetalshow.com. Now, of course, it’s Dream Theater with ‘The Enemy Inside.’ It’s a brand new one from – I guess not a brand new song, but a brand new version of the song – from their new live uber DVD collection, Breaking The Fourth Wall. And breaking the fourth wall with us right now, it’s the one and the only guitarist, John Petrucci.

John Petrucci: I like that explanation. That was good – uber DVD.

CA: It’s definitely not 40 minutes compacted into one DVD with bonus material. My God, man, I don’t think that there’s any more material you could put on from a show, or two, or three, or five, is there?

JP: We wanted to present the whole show as it is on this tour, and it’s a long show. It’s ‘An Evening with’ – with the intermission, it’s three hours. There are a lot of music, and we wanted to make sure that it was all on there from beginning to end, so there you have it.

Jon Drake: You mentioned the ‘Evening with’ format. In the past, you guys had done that before, and you said it was very physically taxing with the meet and greets and all that. What led to the decision to go back to the ‘Evening with’ format?

JP: A few things. One of them is that we wanted to be able to play more music. It’s very difficult to, with the amount of albums that we have and the catalog, to try to squeeze everything into an hour-and-a-half headlining show with an opening band. So we wanted to be able to play more music, get a fuller show. And quite frankly, we got a lot of requests – that’s what fans wanted to see. They seem to enjoy that more rather than going and seeing a bunch of bands, or even one opener. They just wanted to see more Dream Theater, and we’re happy to deliver it.

Our fans are unbelievable because they’re the type of audience who really appreciates what we do, and they’re so attentive. So if they want more, we’ll give them more, and we’re happy to do it. Yeah, it’s a lot of music, a lot of notes, but it’s definitely worth it.

JD: Definitely. And another thing I wanted to ask – I mean, this is basically, since you guys put out Once In A LIVEtime back in ‘98, you guys have done a live record basically for every album except for two of them, Six Degrees and Black Clouds. Why so many live releases?

JP: I think there’s a couple of reasons. One of them is that I think that our band really shines live. It’s one thing to record music, but there’s something about the live interaction with the band and the audience in the types of places that we play all over the world. I mean, we’re in Brazil right now – the audiences are just absolutely nuts – and I think that there’s a [palpable] energy that comes across and turns the band into a whole different thing. So I think it’s a really good side of us to showcase, so we like to put that forth.

And the other reason is sometimes there’s just a special event which really you can’t pass up the opportunity to record it, and such is the case with Breaking The Fourth Wall, because we had this whole plan to get together with the students of Berklee College of Music and play in the beautiful Opera House in Boston, and it would have been a major dropping of the ball if we didn’t record that and present it. So yeah, it came quickly on the heels of Live At Luna Park – it’s like less than a year later – but it just had to be done.

JD: That leads to an interesting question that I had: on Breaking The Fourth Wall, you are playing with Berklee College of Music, and it is with the orchestra. You guys did Score, but you guys did use the orchestra with Jamshied Sharifi and whatnot. What sets Breaking The Fourth Wall apart from Score?

JP: There’s a couple of things. First of all, it’s the kind of coming full circle with the school, Berklee, because that’s where the band really formed. It’s where John and I went – we met Mike there – it was really our beginnings. We were students, we were 18 years old, young students at the school. Then fast forward, we end up with the drummer Mike Mangini, who was a professor there for 10 years. And as it turns out, because of our success, many, many students have gone to Berklee citing our name as their reason. So our relevance there at the school over the years became more and more special.

So we thought it was a great coming back to those roots. So that, on an emotional level and as far as having a deeper meaning, sets it apart just for that reason alone. And then on this one, we also had a choir, which was really interesting, which we didn’t have on Score. So I guess those are the differences.

In some ways, there are some similarities in playing such an iconic venue, from Radio City on Score to the Boston Opera House, and having that beautiful setting and the strings and all these brass instruments and stuff – it’s pretty amazing. It really is a unique event, I think, not only for the band but for the audience.

CA: Right on, man. Well, John, I want to step back just a little bit from the new release, and I just want to go back to the last two records for a minute. Certainly, the last two records have pretty firmly planted Mike Mangini in the band. He really stabilized things when, obviously, there was a lot of turbulence going on within the band. Now that you’ve got some distance between it and everything settled, and you are where you are, what went well with that transition, and what do you wish you would have done differently?

JP: There’s not many situations in life where you can say you wouldn’t have done anything differently, but this is one of them. I think that, looking back, I wouldn’t have done anything differently. Mike Mangini really helped us to get through a major band member change, and in a way that was probably as smooth as any band member change could have gone.

The way that he came in – his personality, his skills as a drummer, his background, his history – it clicked to the point where it was like if we would have met Mike 20 years ago, we would have been playing with this guy. If I would have grown up with him, I would have been friends with him, jamming. And that’s rare. It’s rare to do that one time around.

So many musicians and bands are having trouble finding people to play with and who click, and so the fact that this happened with Mike was really just amazing to us. And since he’s been in the band, we’ve done two albums, two world tours, and thankfully have had a lot of success with it and a lot of support from our fans through all of it. And again, I wouldn’t have done anything differently. It’s really amazing.

CA: Sure, and somehow you guys avoided the Van Halen III syndrome of bringing in an ex-Extreme member and having it go to s***.

JP: [laughs] I suppose that was a risk we took. [lots of laughs]

CA: Nice. Well, let me ask you one more, John. It didn’t happen this way, but when you came out with A Dramatic Turn Of Events, did you guys, in your planning or in your discussions or when you were just thinking about that project, did you expect any kind of an initial drop-off or backlash from fans? Because outside looking in, it really looked like that just flat-out didn’t happen. And I’ll be honest, I was surprised it didn’t. I mean, you know as well as I do, Portnoy is a polarizing guy, and it just seemed like you guys didn’t really get a lot of backlash for that. Is that your take, and were you surprised by that?

JP: Yeah, that’s always a risk. Of course, people generally don’t like change, and in this situation Mike was a major member and a major voice in the band, and people really loved him. So that kind of change is something that could potentially be dangerous for a band’s future. But I think the way that we embraced it – and it ended up paying off – was that we moved forward in a very positive way, saying, “Listen, the best way to deal with this situation is move forward in such a way where we make, in our minds, an undeniable musical statement.” Because at the end of the day, it’s about the music.

We’ve had other band members before, we’ve had people leave, we’ve let people go, we’ve had changes, but if the music is always strong and it’s true and it’s genuine, then that’s what it’s all about. And we kept that right in the forefront from the get-go, from before we went into the studio, into the studio, when it was being mixed and everything else. And at that point, you just put your faith in the music. Thankfully, and as you said surprisingly in a pleasant way, our fans showed us a level of support that you could only dream of, and that helped us through the whole thing, and we’re so appreciative of that.

I’ll never forget not only the album coming out and getting a great reaction, but playing the first shows – literally the first ones – with Mike. I remember playing in Italy and such, and the response and reaction from the crowd was so welcoming, it was really overwhelming. And as you said, it could have gone the other way easily. But I think with all those things in mind, and our attitude, and our fans’ acceptance, it proved to be a positive way to move on.

JD: Yeah. Now, you were talking about the strength of the music and speaking for itself. I know in the past the writing relationship – Mike Portnoy was a big driving force along with yourself. How does Mike Mangini fit in there? It’s obviously going to be different, but how does he fit into the writing now that a lot of that burden is shifted over to you?

JP: Sure. I mean, it’s a different thing. From the beginning, the way that the core of the band worked, Mike and I were always doing most of the work, and Mike was more of a driving-force kind of guy. We started producing together. He had a lot of ideas and was always putting ideas forward and whatnot. But as far as the writing and the compositional strength, I mean, I’ve always looked at myself as that’s one of my strong points as a guitar player, writing on a compositional instrument.

The relationships that I had in the past with the keyboard players, and especially for the last 15 years with Jordan, and having that great writing chemistry going on, I knew that that strength and that core would be intact and always be there. But as you said, some of the responsibility would shift, because then I moved as the sole producer and didn’t have that sort of partnership with Mike anymore.

So Mike Mangini comes in – now he’s somebody who’s new and who didn’t start the band as we did when we were younger, so he’s not just going to fill that sort of role from the get-go as Mike had. But he came in more as an unbelievable drummer, unbelievable personality, and as we came to find out, a great composer and a great contributor to the songwriting and the structure and what we can do as a band.

So when he came in, especially for the latest album, the self-titled album, and he was in the studio with us from the get-go, and we were playing live as a band and jamming, exchanging ideas, it was magical. It was that chemistry, it was that great camaraderie and writing experience that you hope for. So that’s what he contributes. He contributes immense talent as a drummer, being able to do things that I don’t think really any other drummers could do physically on the instrument, having a vast musical knowledge, a great musical personality, the ability to improvise and jam and bring forth tons and tons of energy and power and conviction in the band. He’s been stellar, he’s been a star with us.

JD: Definitely. And last question I had for you was, I know in the past, in reading the biography that Rich Wilson wrote, Lifting Shadows, with the writing of each album Mike Portnoy would come in with a concept – Octavarium was a musical octave, and Train Of Thought was the classic heavy metal Dream Theater album. Now that he’s not there, how has that shifted? Are you guys writing a little bit more organically, or do you now come in and say, “Well, I’ve got this idea for a direction for the new record”? How does that work out now?

JP: Conceptually, those things were always discussed and talked about as a group, especially between Mike and I, and presented forth that way. So that was something that I was always a part of from the beginning and very used to presenting. So without him in the band, I guess it became more up to me by myself to present that, and that’s what I’ve done.

Taking on the role of sole producer, I feel that one of the descriptions of that role is to set the tone for what the next album is going to be and really think about it and think about what we can do differently, who we can bring in to make it special and make it happen. And that’s a process that I’ll do several months before the album starts and present it as a proposal and try to get everybody on the same page as a ringleader. And so this way, when we get into the studio, we know exactly what we’re trying to do.

Having said that, there is an organic process that happens even with a set plan. But yeah, that definitely is a role that I take on, and I think it’s good because it connects us, and the guys give me that freedom and that authority to do that in a respectful way. And we always have a lot of respect for each other and each other’s ideas, and not only does it bring us all together, but it brings the engineer together, and it’s like we’re all working towards this common goal.

And I think that focuses in on the type of album that we want. In fact, I wrote a song about that called ‘The Bigger Picture’ on the last album that touches on the idea of being able to see what you’re doing before you do it and following the path to get there. And I love it. It’s a role I’m happy and love to be in.

CA: Right. Well, John, I want to wrap this up with having you settle a debate that my friend Jon and I always have about you guys. And I’m going to ask this question, and it’s going to come off s*****, and I know it, and it’s going to make me look bad, so I’ll just tell you up front – the title of your Greatest Hit (...and 21 Other Pretty Cool Songs) is very appropriate in my ears, personally.

Where Jon, meanwhile, travels from Cleveland to New York to go see you perform Score, so that’s where we are as fans. So here’s the question that we have, and I can tell you honestly, we probably have a hundred hours in the middle of the night debating this. I always argue that the reason you guys have such long songs is that you guys are not disciplined enough writers to fit it all into a short burst, where Jon argues back to me all the time that you have to have the length because you have to have those individual parts that come into each song to make the song right—

JD: I say you have to be disciplined to be able to write things of that length, but keep the listener interest and to keep those melodic anchors that you guys have in those lengthy songs.

CA: So what we wanted to do is get it straight from the source. Please solve our argument so that we can actually sleep some nights.

JP: That’s a great argument. I don’t know if this answer is gonna help, but I’ll do my best. I think either way it takes discipline. We have sometimes tried to write shorter songs, and it’s difficult – it’s really difficult. I think because of the nature of the style of the music that we play, being that the core compositional style is prog, it comes from us listening to Yes and Rush and all these extended songs and stuff. We feel that the song needs to go through certain parts of it, certain developmental phases, in order to be a complete piece, and I think that’s why they end up being long.

We don’t really put a limit on it, we don’t really say there’s a certain format, so we write from the gut, and some of those sections just need to develop. We need to come back to themes and repeat them. It’s a hard question to answer because there is a discipline either way.

One of the things that I would say, if there’s a mistake in some of the stuff that we’ve done in the past, is not having the discipline to say, “You know what, this part’s going on for a little bit too long,” or “This really is not contributing to the song.” And you mentioned something before – whether the song is short or long, the song always needs to be moving forward in a way that engages the listener and the musician. If it’s just like bulls***, it’s not gonna capture your attention, you’re gonna get bored.

So whether it’s short or long, every part needs to have a meaning. And that’s not something we always nail. Sometimes we’ve meandered too long on things like that, but I think it’s something that we’ve gotten better at as we’ve moved on. So I don’t know if that answers your question.

CA: I was gonna say, so ultimately what you’re saying is we get to keep arguing this point. [laughs]

JP: I think you guys are going to be arguing that for a long time. [laughs] I was gonna say, the best we can do is invite you into a writing session, and then you can see it firsthand. You can make your conclusion that way.

CA: Well, for now, John, the new DVDs – and they are plural, because there’s plenty of music and a lot of long songs on these – it’s called Breaking The Fourth Wall. It is Dream Theater, of course. And John has a tradition on the show – we always let the artist pick a closing track from the release. So what would you like us to end with, and maybe tell us a quick story about it?

JP: Sure. Well, how much time do you have?

CA: We have a six-hour show. We have no discipline either.

JP: All right. Well, since you have no discipline, I have no discipline. I think a centerpiece of Breaking The Fourth Wall, and it was so much fun to do, was when we played ‘Illumination Theory’ live with the orchestra and choir. It is like a 20-minute-or-so piece, so make sure you go to the bathroom and make some popcorn. But it’s a very dramatic piece. I think it really came across great. I think the Berklee students, including Eren, the conductor, did such an awesome job, and it’s so much fun to play live. So I would pick that one to close out the show.