John Petrucci interview

Face Culture: Your last name Petrucci, what part from Italy is it from?

John Petrucci: It’s from Naples. My father’s family’s from Naples and my mom’s family’s from Sicily.

FC: When did they move here – both families?

JP: A few generations ago. My parents grew up in Brooklyn and their parents – like my mom’s father – was from Italy. On my father’s side, they also lived in Brooklyn and then their parents came over from Italy, so I guess a few generations back.

FC: Was it important while growing up, your Italian ancestry?

JP: Uh yeah. It’s funny, on my mom’s side they were Sicilian fishermen and they brought that business to America, and her brother had a fish shop at the fish market on Fulton Street in New York City and that was a big part of their lives. Even during holidays and Christmas, they’d bring all the fish in on Christmas Eve and stuff like that. Them being Brooklyn Italians and that whole thing was a very big part of our upbringing and our traditions and culture, for sure.

FC: What language did you speak at home?

JP: English. I never learned Italian.

FC: Music-wise, what sort of music did your mom and dad play for you while you were growing up?

JP: It wasn’t like a huge music house – that’s the irony. I remember having records and then the 8-track player, and my father was into Paul McCartney and Wings and Elvis and stuff like that. Things that didn’t really end up being a huge musical influence on me until I became a teenager and started hanging out with my friends and they start to turn me on to things. Older cousins, older brothers, or friends – that’s how I first found out about Yes and Rush and things like that. Where I grew up in New York, the local radio station played a lot of rock n’ roll, and it was like a Sunday night metal station, and I got a lot of from that. In the household there wasn’t a ton of music going on.

FC: But did they play Italian music?

JP: No they didn’t. One album I remember that they had in their collection was called Petrucci, and it was the first printer of music back a long time ago. So they had the album with all this music and I’m not sure if I ever listened to. [laughs]

FC: Was it some sort of family maybe? What sort of album was it?

JP: I assume it was classical; I’m not really sure. I never listened to it. Just I remember the cover and it said Petrucci and it said “the first printer of music” and I’m not sure what the actual content was. I don’t remember listening to it. [laughs]

FC: What was the first album that you bought yourself to get to know what you were really into?

JP: The first time I remember actually going to the mall to a record store and buying an album was Zeppelin In Through The Out Door.

FC: Was it special buying the album?

JP: Yeah. I felt powerful that I bought my own album. It’s always a nice experience, but before that I had other things given to me or things as gifts or I’d borrow friends or whatever. I was never a huge record collector per se. Certain bands that I kind of drifted towards and got really in tune. And of course I got really into guitar playing, so that sort of took over.

FC: What was first riff that you actually could play?

JP: The first riff I ever played was “Hey Hey, My My” [by] Neil Young; very simple guitar part. I was hanging out at my friend’s house – actually at Kevin Moore’s, our first keyboard player – his house, and there was a bunch of guys jamming and they didn’t really play. I was pretty young, and they were like, “Hey, play this riff. It’s really easy,” and I played that.

FC: You started out with him and then with John and Mike. How good were you back then? Even before your first album.

JP: Well, myself, Kevin and John grew up together in our hometown on Long Island, and we were amongst a large community of musicians. A lot of kids played. I don’t know what it was, for some reason there were tons of bands. There were always parties to go to and play and jam sessions; it was a big part of how I developed my skills as a guitar player. Even with all those bands and all those people, myself and Kevin and John, slowly we rose up as being like the known guys, the known band.

FC: How come?

JP: Because we were totally into it. We’d practice for six hours a day. We were just completely obsessed. There were a lot of guys that were really good, but I don’t think they were as hardcore obsessed about it as we were.

FC: So you became a bit more well-known?

JP: Yeah we did. Then John and I applied to Berklee College and we ended up getting in and going there straight out of high school. That’s where we met Mike, so we were like 18 years old.

FC: What did you want to do at the school? What were your goals?

JP: I wanted to be a professional musician; I wanted to be a performer. I went there because I heard that Steve Vai went there and certain guys that I looked up to, and that’s the career path I wanted to take. I wanted to a professional musician, performer.

FC: But were you also actually writing your own songs back then?

JP: Yeah we were. We had our own songs, I was writing lyrics. It all started pretty early.

FC: It could be that maybe you were saying, “Well I’d like to be more of a performer than maybe a creator of music,” but always both ways?

JP: Yeah. You know I just looked up to certain bands at that age, when I was 17, 18. I was big Rush fan, Iron Maiden fan, and I just wanted to do that. I wanted to play rock n’ roll and make music my career and be in a band and that was what I end up doing. [laughs] So it worked out.

FC: It’s been many albums since 1989, your first album; will you be doing something special 25 years after your first album?

JP: On this tour we’re doing a few special things to make this experience in the set something really unique for our fans and for ourselves as well. So the set kind of pays tribute to some albums that are receiving anniversaries this year: the Awake album the Scenes From a Memory album. The first album, When Dream and Day Unite, was 25 years ago as well. We’re not really featuring that record so much on this tour. I’m sure we’ll do something in the future, but we have a very unique and special set design and people seem to be really enjoying it. The European tour we’re currently on is the first leg of the tour, and the feedback that we’ve gotten so far has been really positive.

FC: What do you hear when you listen to the first album?

JP: I hear young guys that didn’t know what they were doing. [laughs] We went into the studio; we’re really young. It was the first album. We had like no time to do it, no experience. That amp that I used wasn’t even mine, the guitars I borrowed. [But] we had fun.

FC: ...and the songwriting for you?

JP: It just seems like that of youth – not as developed I think as it is now. I mean I think there’s some good moments in the songs, and I think that we certainly established the style that would take us through the rest of our career – that sort of progressive metal sound was absolutely established on the first record – but you could definitely hear the immaturity as musicians, as players, as writers. Personally, I think it’s gotten better throughout the years.

FC: It’s gotten better? What would be the first album that you can listen to and say, “Well this is how I wanted it to sound,” with the knowledge you now have? What’s the first album in hindsight you are satisfied with?

JP: The next one after that, Images and Words. I feel like we made a major leap.

FC: How come?

JP: We had a different vocalist. James really ended up being the big sound of the band vocally, and he’s been with us ever since. So that was a huge difference. Just the time that we spent preparing for that album and writing and auditioning singers and kind of being in this sort of limbo stage made us really hungry to want to do well and get another shot at it. So I think it has a bit more maturity, and I think it was produced well and it sounds better; it was mixed better.

FC: ...and the songwriting?

JP: I think the songwriting is better. We just spent more time. [With] When Dream and Day Unite, we’re very young; the songs are fun, they’re kind of cool. It reminds me of us in that early stage, but after a couple years and just spending more time with it and working together as writers, I think we got better.

FC: Well now fast-forward to 2011. A Dramatic Turn of Events – how hard was this album to make?

JP: It wasn’t hard at all. It was a very relaxed atmosphere. As far as the expectations of the album and the importance of the album, that was something that we all knew was at a really, really high level.

FC: Because of Mike leaving?

JP: Yeah, sure. And people wondering what we were gonna do next. But as far as actually writing it and the spirit behind the creative process and being in the studio, it was awesome and it was very bonding experience for the band. It wasn’t difficult at all, it was actually very – I don’t know – it was just felt really natural and satisfying.

FC: How do you look back on Mike leaving?

JP: How do I look back? I don’t know. I look forward actually. I look forward in that, since then, we’ve had two great albums that we’re very proud of, this is our second world tour as well with Mike Mangini, two Grammy nominations and two top-ten charting albums. I look forward with a real positive attitude.

FC: What I was thinking – do you still speak to him?

JP: I just look forward to the future; everything is doing great. I have a little bit of contact with Mike via email. I haven’t seen him since he left, and I know he’s doing great with all his projects and stuff, so I’m happy for him.

FC: So no hard feelings then?

JP: No, no hard feelings.

FC: Why I was saying the album [is] because it was the first time you had a new drummer, but you programmed some beats. When did you pick up after the Dramatic album for this album? How did it fall into place now for this creative process?

JP: Like you said, [with] A Dramatic Turn of Events, I was programming the drums and then Mike... We wrote the album without him, and then a couple months later he came in and played the drums and interpreted the songs in his way. This one, he was in the studio with us and we were playing together as a band, and there’s a lot more spontaneity to this album. There’s obviously a lot more creative input from Mike as a drummer and as a writer. I think there’s a lot more energy because of it. It’s a little bit more unleashed. It takes a chances I think in a bigger way.

FC: What did he bring to you all? I mean it’s some sort of social process once you pick someone out and you put someone else in and the other people change, too. What did he do to the to the booth to the band feel?

JP: Well like you said, as soon as somebody different is in, you have somebody else’s ideas and thoughts and personality, and he brought a lot of energy, a lot of knowledge, a lot of complex rhythmical ability and again spontaneity to the writing process and the recording process. A lot of power, a lot of passion and enthusiasm.

FC: But are there certain songs that you say, “Well this is definitely a song that’s unique for the way we are now,” because of this new dynamic?

JP: I look at all of them, I guess. It’s hard to just pick one. They all reflect the way that the band sounds, and again the way that we are moving forward. It’s why the album’s called Dream Theater, it’s why its self-titled, because it kind of felt the whole album as a landscape illustrates our creative thoughts and ideas now, and how we feel about the band, our commitment to writing and playing this kind of music, our commitment to our fans all around the world who have supported us for so many years. We just wanted to restate that, “This is Dream Theater and we’re moving forward.”

FC: When did you come up with this album title?

JP: It was a few months before we went into the studio.

FC: Pretty early on then.

JP: Yeah, I had suggested it as an idea going in when we were talking about when to do the album ,where to do it, the kind of songs we wanted to do, who was going to engineer it, who’s gonna mix it, everything like that. One of the ideas I had is maybe it’s time to self-title, maybe it’s time to make that statement. And so everybody was really into it.

FC: But why did you have this feeling now this time?

JP: I don’t know. It’s a good question. It just felt really right. Because obviously we didn’t do it on the first album – that would have been one of the best times. And then all the other albums after that, it never felt right; it’s kind of felt weird. We’d talk about it, “Nah, it doesn’t sound like a good idea.” This one just felt like, “You know what? Let’s do it. Let’s make a statement. Let’s bring attention to it, and at the same time, let’s let people develop their own sort of ideas about what this album is gonna be, instead of having a title kind of give it all away. Let’s make it more of a mystery.” That’s why the cover is so understated; we wanted to do this sort of quiet confidence type of thing. Then when you get into the album, even artistically, then you see the pages unfold and you see the complexity of the artwork and everything. And the same thing with the music: keep it Dream Theater, keep everybody guessing, make a statement, bring attention to it. Then when you listen to it, that’s when it’s all revealed.

FC: If you compare this album to another album, what sort of feeling do have?

JP: It’s hard to say.

FC: Maybe the second album?

JP: Yeah, maybe it is. We’ve had member changes before, but Mike leaving was a bit different because we had started this group together and we were doing it together for so long, so it was more of a crucial departure. So in some ways A Dramatic Turn of Events almost becomes like another first album, and then this becomes like a follow-up. So I guess, taking your lead on what you’re saying, this is almost like an Images and Words kind of feeling surrounding this album.

FC: With Mike being the new James.

JP: Right, yeah. It’s exciting. The great thing about being able to do this is all the album’s have their own identities; all the albums remind me of where we were at that time. I remember the studios, I remember the people we worked with, I remember the bands that we listened to. They’re all like little chapters in a diary so it’s interesting to go back, but at the same time they’re all unique and they make up the bigger picture – not to take a title from our own album – but they make up the bigger picture of what we’re all about.

FC: What did the band bring you...

JP: On this album?

FC: No the last 25 years – what did the band give to you?

JP: Everything. It became not only my creative outlet as a creative person, as a musician; it’s just something I love to do as a guitar player. It realized my dreams of wanting to be a performer and in a band, and it ended up being the career that I was able to be successful at. So it’s just unbelievably satisfying in so many ways.

FC: Do you feel bound to it in any way?

JP: I feel like it’s something I love. I love to do it, I love producing, I love writing, I love playing guitar, love performing. I could spend all day in the studio, love being on stage and interacting with the audience, and also where it’s taken me as a guitar player professionally in all the relationships that I have with the musical instrument companies that I endorse and all the great products we’ve come up with. It’s an amazing thing. It’s something I’m very grateful for.

FC: Still 25 years of albums in the making.

JP: Absolutely! That’s again why that album’s called Dream Theater: it’s moving forward, it’s positivity for the future.