Living the Dream

Rock Candy Mag boss Derek Oliver signed Dream Theater to Atco Records back in 1991 and worked closely with them for many years, helping to turn the band into prog metal legends. Here he goes back to the partnership of those early days and talks to guitarist John Petrucci and vocalist James LaBrie about the trials and tribulations behind the band’s rise to the top.

It’s late afternoon, Tuesday 2 June 1992. I’m working in A&R at Atco Records in New York, and I find myself in a sleek, chauffeur-driven Lincoln town car sitting next to Iron Maiden manager Rod Smallwood. I’ve just collected the rambunctious Yorkshireman from an apartment he uses on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. We’re on our way to Elmont, Long Island, to a club called Hammerheads to see Atco Records’ latest signing, Dream Theater. Rod is in chipper mood, chuckling loudly and regaling tales of Maiden’s unstoppable conquest of Planet Earth. I listen attentively before taking advantage of an intake of air to switch the subject to DT.

The band had recently finished recording their first album for Atco, Images And Words, so we had started a campaign to hook them up with managers befitting their enormous potential. This gig was extra important, as was the upcoming Iron Maiden support slot that Rod had graciously arranged for Dream Theater at The Ritz in New York City on 8 June.

Rod’s bonhomie at the Hammerheads show went down well with everyone as he back-slapped and hugged one and all, irrespective of whether they were in the band or not. Everything was feeling good and the show at The Ritz the following week was equally successful. Sadly, however, the coupling was not to be. Various tricky conversations ensued and business issues eventually sank this particular ship, but that wasn’t Rod’s fault and a good relationship was maintained that still exists to this day.

“We were on cloud nine that Rod Smallwood was interested in managing the band,” remembers Dream Theater guitarist John Petrucci. “We hung out in a Manhattan bar playing darts and it looked like it was all heading in the right direction. Then two weeks before the album release Rod bailed. It was a shock, and we were left wondering what to do as we had no fall-back position. Fortunately, though, we’re still friends and have toured with Maiden since, so there are no hard feelings.”

By the time I got involved with Dream Theater they’d already walked a long and winding road. The trio of Petrucci, bassist John Myung and keyboardist Kevin Moore were childhood friends. When Petrucci and Myung attended the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston in 1985, they formed a band with fellow Berklee student, drummer Mike Portnoy, drafting Moore in to augment the line-up.

Then in a brave and audacious move, they decided to ditch their studies and focus on forming a band, initially called Majesty. It was a group where the players would fully utilise their music school skills, while also drawing from the great progressive rock movement of the 1970s.

Progress in the early days was slow, but that’s unsurprising considering the task the band had set themselves. Instrumentally the music was already in a league of its own, but to really grab attention they needed a suitable permanent singer. That position was initially filled by Charlie Dominici, a man with considerable experience after already recording and releasing an album for an independent label in 1970 and contributing backing vocals to the eponymous Franke & The Knockouts debut album from 1981. Charlie was older than the rest of the group, but having already worked their way through other unsuitable singers, the band members believed his voice and experience were a perfect fit. With all the pieces in place the group – now renamed Dream Theater – set about looking for a record deal. A new East Coast label, Mechanic Records, had recently been set up as an MCA spin-off and was looking for new acts. The label’s managing director Steve Sinclair heard a DT demo and fell in love with the music.

“Steve Sinclair was an important person for us,” recalls John Petrucci. “He helped kick-start our professional career and believed in us, which meant a lot back then.”

Mechanic was restricted to the budgets they could wangle out of their paymasters at MCA. A $30,000 deal was struck for Dream Theater, with a small advance. Casting around for producers, the band’s manager at the time, Derek Simon, suggested a guy called Terry Date, who was pretty much unknown then. Terry had been building a reputation working with metal acts including Fifth Angel and Metal Church. When he heard Dream Theater he was convinced that he could harness their potential.

Date produced and mixed the debut Dream Theater album in just three weeks. The finished record, When Dream And Day Unite, was released in 1989 and left a lot to be desired. But it did show incredible promise. So much promise, in fact, that when I received an advance tape of the album for Kerrang! magazine I gave it a glowing review, pointing out that this band sounded like no one else in the scene at that time. The musicianship was jaw dropping. You just couldn’t fault it and I became an instant convert to the Dream Theater cause.

While I was working as a journalist for Kerrang! I was also moonlighting as an A&R scout for Atlantic Records. Eventually I was hired to work full time by their new sister label, Atco, and moved from London to Manhattan. One day, out of the blue, I got a call from Derek Simon. He told me that DT might be available to sign as they were in the process of leaving Mechanic and were looking for a new home. Derek came into the office brandishing a demo cassette of some very rough tracks. The tape was almost unlistenable. It was all-instrumental and had been recorded in what sounded like a shoebox. But to be honest Simon needn’t have brought me the tape at all. The fact that Dream Theater were potentially available to sign was music to my ears. I was already sold on the band and told Simon that I’d try to help get them a deal with Atco. The ace up my sleeve was the fact that Atco’s label president was a fellow Brit, Derek Shulman, the former lead vocalist of Gentle Giant, one of the most formidable progressive rock bands of the ‘70s.

I decided that if Derek Simon could guarantee that Mechanic had dropped the band, then I’d give it everything I had to get them signed to Atco. The task of freeing them from Mechanic, though, took many months. Mechanic had signed Dream Theater to a seven-album deal and the label was reluctant to cut the band loose without appropriate compensation. Eventually, though, an agreement was reached with Mechanic, opening up the way for Atco to officially sign the band.

I had an idea about a producer. Around this time an album by a five-piece band from Boston called Diving For Pearls had really impressed me. David Prater had recorded it extremely well and I wanted to get to know this young producer more. David arrived at my office and it was like a force 10 gale had blown in. His enormous personality and enthusiasm swept me away and we spent two hours shooting the breeze before I pulled out the Dream Theater demo. David had started out as a drummer and had played in both Santana and Nektar, so he had good progressive rock credentials. We shook hands, agreeing that David would cut some Dream Theater demos.

There was, however, a spanner in the works. The band had dispensed with Charlie Dominici and were looking for a new vocalist. Fortunately it wasn’t long before they found a demo tape from a Canadian singer called Kevin James LaBrie. He’d been singing in Winter Rose, a melodic hard rock outfit that had once featured vocalist Sebastian Bach. An audition was arranged and the band quickly reached a unanimous decision to recruit him. It helped that LaBrie was a warm, personable individual with a top of the range voice, a good look and a calm demeanour that would fit perfectly with the group’s vision.

Dream Theater had a real mix of personalities. Drummer Mike Portnoy had quickly established himself as the group’s central character. Mike gave the interviews and was nothing less than a human billboard for the band. He has a compulsive and perfectionist personality, especially where his three passions of music, film and sport are concerned. Mike’s film collection was- and probably still is – humongous. His appetite for the band was equally as obsessive.

Guitarist John Petrucci was a mirror image of LaBrie’s laid-back persona. Nothing could shake John’s tree of calmness, but it was clear to me that beneath his placid exterior he had a rock solid commitment not only to the band, but also to his instrument. John has never boasted to me of his own musical ability and has always been modest when I’ve handed out compliments. As one of the world’s greatest guitarists he has the ability to scale musical heights and soothe the soul. The fact that he still manages to get even better is quite remarkable.

John Myung is an enigma. Deathly quiet in a very studious way, he’s happy to inhabit the corner of a room or studio, giving little away about his mood. As a wizard of the five-string bass guitar he is, like Petrucci, a master craftsman reaching out to another musical planet.

The final link in early Dream Theater was keyboardist Kevin Moore. Kevin was no class clown, but he did possess a very humorous streak, one that owed a debt to the British sarcasm of Monty Python. Kevin was clearly a determined and extremely talented individual.

I decided to organise a demo deal for the band with Atco. We would give Dream Theater a chunk of change to record songs and they would trigger a full recording contract if everything worked out well. This was an ideal way to see if the band and Prater could whip up some musical magic. In May 1991 we sent Dream Theater to Prater’s studio of choice – BearTracks, located in leafy Suffern, New York, about 90 minutes’ drive from Manhattan. It was a world-class facility owned by Spyro Gyra’s saxophonist Jay Beckenstein. Here Prater cut three tracks, ‘Metropolis Part 1: The Miracle And The Sleeper’, ‘Take The Time’ and ‘Learning To Live’, all of which would be re-recorded for the band’s debut Atco album. David then took the tracks back to his home studio in New Jersey for overdubs and final tweaks. Once Derek Shulman and I heard the completed tracks we were very excited and moved to the next stage of the deal.

Before settling into recording a full album, though, other business needed to be addressed. The band argued that they had all the material for an album fully mapped out. I wasn’t so sure. The length of the tracks they had in mind was almost enough to fill a double album and that was never going to fly, so we looked at ways to trim the record. That meant ditching the band’s magnum opus, ‘A Change Of Seasons’. We also felt we needed some more accessible material. By that I meant tracks that got to the point faster and connected Dream Theater with the harder rock market. I made this suggestion to the band and, not unexpectedly, they resisted strongly, feeling that this was an unnecessary creative intrusion. Mike Portnoy was most vocal about this issue, but he was also the most driven to deliver, cajoling the band into action and supplying more material.

Talking to me recently James LaBrie remembered: “Mike was initially resistant and I understood where he was coming from. They’d spent two years of their life writing that record, so being asked to change things was a tough pill to swallow.”

Nevertheless, the band came back with three new tracks. All of them would appear on the debut album, including the rather oddly titled ‘Oliver’s Twist’. This was a cheeky reference to my suggestion that they go away and write more material. The song would later be renamed ‘Pull Me Under’, and it became the band’s breakthrough single in 1992.

Right from the start, though, dark clouds were looming over the band’s relationship with David Prater. The group felt the producer had been thrust on them and in many respects they were right. But in both my view and the label’s, Prater was the man for the job. So he was kept on board and in October of 1991, Prater and the band started work at BearTracks recording what would become the Images And Words album.

However, it soon became apparent that the sessions were becoming adversarial. Prater was an alpha male and he immediately put various people’s backs up, not least the equally dominant Mike Portnoy. David was not only critical of Mike’s playing, but also of the drummer’s sound. Other band members were also being critiqued. Prater’s meddling resulted in animosity and verbal confrontation with Portnoy. Kevin Moore, meanwhile, dealt with the issue by becoming passive aggressive.

“Personally I got along with Prater really well,” says James LaBrie. “He complimented me on my voice, really encouraged me and we even hung out in Manhattan a couple of times. But there was tension with Mike and Kevin. David would tell me that Mike and Kevin were obstinate and weren’t listening to him. At times it looked like he was going to knock the sh*t out of them. David’s incredibly talented, but he hears and sees things at a very advanced level.”

“There were big, contentious moments,” says John Petrucci. “But David was a positive energy and he gave us the feeling that the record was going to be successful. He was like a whirlwind of creativity coming in and making things happen. It was a very exciting time. And let’s not overlook his engineer, Doug Oberkircher, who really mixed the record. His personality was totally opposite to David’s. He was really easy going and we ended up working with him several times after that album.”

While the recording was happening, I was fielding calls from both parties. Prater bemoaned the fact that the band were wilfully interfering with his production. The band complained that Prater’s bullyboy tactics were intolerable. In an atmosphere of shuttle diplomacy I would visit the studio several times a week purely to mediate and get everybody back on track. It was an uncomfortable, yet necessary job. But as I began to hear the basic tracks it was clear that the record would be spectacular, despite all the problems.

“Everyone had a different type of interaction with David,” says Petrucci. “For some reason he would always confide in me if he was having a problem with one of the guys. Certainly he was a harsh producer at times, with a strong personality and a lot of opinions. I remember him recording things and being very critical. We were young and he was forceful about it and sometimes that meant things got contentious. But I thought the album came out great. Looking back those little things mean nothing now.”

That is undoubtedly true, but when the album recording was finished at the end of 1991 Mike Portnoy was deeply unhappy with the sound of his drum tracks. They’d been recorded with what’s known as triggers, a common electronic technique from the time that gave the drums a uniform sound and volume. We all loved the overall effect, except for Mike who immediately disowned that part of the recording.

Nevertheless, when it was released in July of 1992 Images And Words set the standard for what was effectively a brand new genre; progressive metal. The opening track, ‘Pull Me Under’, was selected as the first single. It was an audacious statement, given that the song lasted in excess of eight minutes in its unedited form. Yet most radio stations in the States were so blown away that they played ‘Pull Me Under’ in spite of its length. The commercial success was phenomenal, showing that great music could succeed on merit alone, regardless of prevailing trends.

“At the end of the day we got an amazing result,” states James. “I remember bumping into Neal Schon in a hotel bar and he raved to me about the album. He was genuinely blown away and loved the production.”

The band travelled to Europe where they were treated like gods. In the UK, a performance at London’s Marquee club in April1993 was recorded and released as a way of proving that the band could reproduce their incredibly complex music live. That release also featured a previously unrecorded instrumental track that had no title. John Petrucci called me from the departure lounge at JFK airport in New York before the band flew to Japan asking for me to suggest something. He asked for the names of the curries I’d suggested the band try in London during a meal we ate together after the Marquee show. The name we settled on for the song was ‘Bombay Vindaloo’.

With new management in place Dream Theater gradually turned their attention to their next studio album. It became clear from initial discussions that David Prater wouldn’t be invited back. I had two suggestions. The first person was a little-known character from San Francisco by the name of John Cuniberti, who’d arrived on my radar via his groundbreaking production and engineering work on Joe Satriani’s Surfing With The Alien album. Next up for consideration was the production team of Duane Baron and John Purdell. They’d successfully crafted Ozzy Osbourne’s No More Tears album in 1991. The duo’s track record and musical skills were undeniable, so it was an easy task to convince the band that they were right for the job. Recording for what would become 1994’s Awake album took place at two Los Angeles studios, One On One and Devonshire. There was none of the friction that had been a feature during the recording sessions for ‘Images And Words’ and the result was an album that was full of dynamics and intrigue. All the performances were perfectly on point, with no single band member showboating.

There was, however, a small hiccup when the tracks were being mixed in New York. I received a concerned telephone call from the two producers saying that the session was turning into a free-for-all. The band were all present, meaning there were seven opinions flying around the room and that wasn’t helping. I was sent some of the mixes and it was clear we had a problem. They sounded dull, flat and lifeless compared to the previous album. This collaborative mixing method definitely wasn’t working, so I reluctantly insisted that Duane and John should be allowed to finish the mixing alone. The band protested, but once the new mixes started to filter through it became clear that this was the correct decision.

At the end of the recording sessions in LA, keyboardist Kevin Moore surprisingly announced he was leaving the band. It came as a complete shock to everyone. There had been little indication that Moore was about to jump ship, though later it was obvious that there had been some clues that were missed. In many ways the final, rather maudlin minor key track on the Awake album, ‘Space-Dye Vest’, written by Moore alone, was a requiem for his departure.

“We had a drink one night and he was talking in riddles,” remembers James. “There was something on his mind, but he didn’t actually come out with it. Two days later he sat us down in one of the condos we were staying in and said he was going to leave the band. I remember him saying somewhat cryptically ‘You’ve gotta feel right with the people you surround yourself with.’ Kevin was a little distant during the writing sessions for Awake. He wasn’t exactly standoffish, but he wasn’t nearly as involved as he’d been in the past. Was it a shock? We were sensing something and there were signs leading up to it. Musically I think he was changing direction. I think he wanted to do things on his own terms and not have to answer to the band.”

For John Petrucci it was a bitter pill to swallow. “Kevin and I grew up together. He lived around the corner from me and our parents were friends. We went to school together. In LA while recording Awake, Kevin rented a car. We went out for a drive and that’s where he told me. I was very shocked and it really upset me. I knew he was getting interested in other types of music – electronic stuff – but to my mind that and Dream Theater weren’t mutually exclusive. You can always have side projects. It just didn’t make sense to me.

“We had a dream as kids and as young adults it became a reality – a gold record and sell-out concerts. Having him throw that away made no logical sense. It’s still a sort of mystery.

“We don’t keep in touch now. There was contact for a little bit, but then Kevin kind of fell off the map and I didn’t really hear from him. The only contact I have now is through my family, who occasionally bump into his mother locally. I get reports, but nothing other than that. He doesn’t come to shows or reach out. It’s pretty sad having a close friend like that just disappear from your life.”

Sales for Awake were healthy, but they didn’t eclipse the great success of the previous Dream Theater album. A replacement for Moore was needed and highly respected keyboardist Jordan Rudess was asked to play an industry showcase in Los Angeles. At that point, Rudess wouldn’t commit to joining the band, though he eventually came on board in 1999. The search continued, and Derek Sherinian, a fellow alumnus of Berklee College, was eventually recruited. Sherinian had previously worked with more mainstream acts including Kiss and Alice Cooper.

The world tour in support of Awake took in a number of territories, with the band’s popularity still growing and live shows selling out in every country. In the UK the band played a special one-off show at Ronnie Scott’s jazz club in January 1995. It was a 300-capacity venue in London where Dream Theater recorded a number of cover songs that would be heard on their next release.

The immediate concern was to keep the band in the public eye. I thought it would be a good time to finally sanction the postponed recording of ‘A Change Of Seasons’ for an EP. I longed to get Dream Theater back together with ‘Images And Words’ producer David Prater, but I knew that it had the potential to be a volatile reunion.

I tabled the suggestion and a series of difficult, animated conversations took place. I set out my stall upfront and encouraged the band to revisit this relationship with the benefit of experience and hindsight. In a brave move they eventually agreed to the idea and Prater was in an equally conciliatory frame of mind. Unsurprisingly, Mike Portnoy laid down some ground rules concerning his drum tracks and Prater agreed to these stipulations. That in itself was amazing, but it also signalled a thawing of tension in both camps. I thought, at last, that the two parties would be able to work harmoniously together.

Plans were made to return to BearTracks in May of 1995. There was a problem, though. A few days before recording was due to start I received a phone call from Prater’s lawyer informing me that David had been ‘detained’ by the recording of another record and wouldn’t be able to make the Dream Theater start date as arranged. This caused enormous ructions. The studio had been pre-booked and would cost money to delay. James LaBrie was flying in from Canada and I had to explain to the label that matters would be fine, that this was just a small routine hiccup, nothing to worry about. Of course, I was f*cking furious. It had taken a lot of negotiating to get this project lined up. One Sunday evening I called Prater from my home and told him that we had a production agreement he was about to break. It wasn’t because of illness or some other legitimate reason. It was simply because he was working on another album. With David unwilling to put the other project on hold, though, we were forced to reschedule, risking another fracturing of the relationship.

After a week’s delay Prater finally arrived at the studio. I decided to make an appearance to put out any potential fires. Inevitably there was tension, notably between Prater and the normally docile James LaBrie.

“Surprisingly, Prater and Mike got along just fine during those sessions,” confirms James. “But I definitely clashed with him. He wanted me to record line by line, but I prefer to sing the entire song as I’d done on previous albums. Then he started intimidating me, saying he’d been brought in to get our career back on track. Just before we were about to punch each other David backed off and left the studio, telling Doug Oberkircher [the engineer] to record my vocals. Back at the hotel we bumped into each other and the atmosphere was pretty tense. A few days later, though, he capitulated and apologised.”

Despite this awkward encounter, ‘A Change Of Seasons’ was eventually finished to everyone’s satisfaction. The EP, bolstered by the live tracks that had been recorded at the Ronnie Scott’s show in London earlier that year, was a fine package. Issued in September of 1995, the record was ecstatically received by fans, who heaped praise on the crisp, clean production as much as the content.

By now, the band’s position at EastWest, a label Atco had been merged with, was looking shaky. EastWest had in turn merged with Elektra Records, which was headed by a president who was more interested in R&B, pop, electronica and modern rock. There appeared to be a distinct cooling toward anything that was hard rock, despite the fact that the label’s biggest-selling acts were Pantera, Metallica, Mötley Crüe and AC/DC. I was called into the lady’s office to discuss Dream Theater’s future. She indicated that we needed to get them to come up with more accessible material, more hits. I explained that Dream Theater wasn’t a hit-making act like Bon Jovi or Def Leppard.

Nevertheless, it seemed like the only solution would be to get the band to write more songs in the hope that they would come up with another rock anthem. What was needed was a track that had the progressive power of ‘Pull Me Under’, yet also the kind of melodic muscle that could take the band into the mainstream, the same way Metallica had with ‘Enter Sandman’. I could see no reason why Dream Theater couldn’t do exactly the same. I asked John Petrucci to go back to the drawing board several times with instructions to conjure up riffs we could hang the band’s future on.

At this point we started to look around for a hotshot producer who could inject some fire and gasoline into the situation. Step forward Kevin Shirley, a likeable and highly accomplished South African who’d recently made a name for himself producing Australian teenage rock band Silverchair. I felt Shirley would be the answer to our prayers, someone who had the chops to handle such technical musicianship.

“It was the opposite of Prater’s methodology,” James LaBrie reveals. “Kevin was light and easy-going. He was all about fun, yet was also extremely focussed.”

“I love Kevin and I really became good friends with him,” adds John. “I loved every second of the sessions for the Falling Into Infinity album that came out in 1997. We did it in New York City, I experimented with my guitar sounds and we recorded every song completely differently. There was nothing cookie cutter about it, even if Kevin did some editing that drove some of the band crazy. The process was such fun for a change. It was very satisfying musically and creatively.”

Sadly for me, though, I’d had one discussion too many with the label over the band’s direction. Plus there were other factors that didn’t help concerning label machinations with some of the other bands I was working with, including Pantera and Mötley Crüe. Both groups were embroiled in serious disputes and by the late summer of 1997 I’d left Elektra, leaving Dream Theater to navigate some difficult waters.

In 2006 I reunited with the band, managing to persuade them to sign with Roadrunner Records. The resulting album, 2007’s Systematic Chaos, was recorded without outside commercial pressure. Dream Theater had earned respect and the right to deliver music that had no undue external influence. That they had come through the major label system and remained incredibly focused on their art is a minor miracle in itself.

That self-belief has continued to pay dividends, as the recent release of Dream Theater’s 14th studio album, Distance Over Time, amply proves. Listening to it today I hear a band that’s still motivated by the desire to move forward, pushing the boundaries of a musical style they gave birth to nearly 35 years ago. And for that reason alone Dream Theater deserve unreserved appreciation and respect.