Dream Theater – Mike Mangini

Progressive music titans Dream Theater mark their return this year with the release of their eagerly anticipated 15th studio album ‘A View From The Top’.

The group’s latest offering is the band’s first album since ‘Black Clouds and Silver Linings’ to feature fewer than nine tracks. It’s a seven-track album spanning 70 mins. Subsequently, the title track itself is an impressive 20 mins long. In that way, it makes you think of those classic progressive rock albums of the seventies like ‘Tales From Topographic Oceans’ or ‘Close to the Edge’ by Yes, which were predominantly made up of large development based musical pieces.

Like many artists, Dream Theater were in the middle of a global tour when the pandemic struck, side-lining the band over the last eighteen months. This period of downtime helped to catalyse the band’s new album, although drummer Mike Mangini has some strong feelings on how the lockdown impacted the artist. “It felt like somebody pretty much raped my soul, and not only took a large part of my life away but took the lives of most of the people in this world, and they took it by force,” said Mike. “When you get forced into things, there’s nothing worse and nothing that makes you want to fight twice as hard back – it’s just debilitating. We probably had three continents of touring taken away from us. We had put a lot of work into that show.”

Dream Theater took a slightly different approach with their creative process during ‘A View From The Top’. “As for my time in the band, this was the first one that was 100% five people contributing, chiming in on everything,” explains Mangini. “As far as the music is concerned, when you have five people able to chime in on absolutely anything and everything, it develops a filter. And when you have a filter, nothing weak can get through. In other words, the filter prevents [just] anything from making the final cut that someone wants to put on.”

By and large, the composition of the album came together organically. “We went in after discussing different approaches to this album,” said Mangini. “We just walked in that room saying let’s go play music, let’s go play our instruments. And someone plays something, and someone else likes it. Let’s go with the flow and develop it.” However, the title track itself was intended to be a centrepiece on the album. “I will say with the title track, we did intend to stretch that one,” confirms Mike.

From the drummer’s perspective, there is one track that he is particularly proud of on the new Dream Theater album, that being ‘Answering the Call’. “It’s the first time that people can hear all of my step pedals and my different high hats. I’ve been doing this since I joined the band, but you can’t really hear it on the other albums – but you can hear it on this album. I’m simply proud that it’s able to be heard and that people can finally hear what I’m doing back there in between all the notes. And so that’s so important to me,” explains Mangini. “However, there are sections in ‘A View From The Top of The World’ where I get to use my polyrhythmic skills that I’ve not pushed as far as this. So, that’s personal for me because it’s about communicating my soul to people through the album.”

The band’s latest offering also happens to be their first album recorded at the newly developed Dream Theater HQ. Speaking of the benefit of the band’s new studio, Mangini states that: “It’s comforting to have all of your stuff in one space. And to go to a place where you really get to know the room and get to know the routine – it just feels very comfortable. So, you can spend your time being completely productive. You’re not wasting your time trying to get gear that you wish you had there because you couldn’t carry everything into the studio or where you’re going to eat in all these new places – and what time you’re going to get there and where to park – any of that stuff. It’s just comforting to have everything there.” As the old saying goes, there is no place like home.

There is continuity and flow to the new Dream Theater album. It’s the kind of album you listen to from start to finish without interruption, rather than selecting tracks. However, at present, the band wouldn’t consider playing the release in its entirety but rather performing key compositions from the album. Speaking on the topic, Mangini said that: ‘‘It’s a matter of picking particular pieces from the album because the catalogue is so deep that we realise fans have their favourites.”

Mike Mangini joined Dream Theater back in 2010 following the departure of Mike Portnoy. But when on tour, how does Mike approach performing Portnoy’s drum parts? “I keep it as close to the original as possible,” confirms Mangini. “When I go back to the older material, I operate under some boundaries. First of all, nobody can sound like anybody else. So, I accept that; I don’t worry about it because I can’t do anything about it. The next thing is that no matter what I play, no matter what anyone plays, it will never satisfy a small group of people. So, I accept that right out of the gate no matter what. It’s okay, whatever, and it doesn’t affect me. There’s not only nothing I can do about it, but I don’t even care. The next thing is that I have to address that the band is used to hearing the parts played a certain way for a couple of decades. I can’t change what they’re used to, so I’ve got to stick to it there. The fans are used to it – if I change too much, they literally will say well that’s wrong, or you can’t play it, or you don’t play it. It’s all these boundaries that literally leave so little room for me, that I have to accept that and say well this is my job to go and play that and stay within these boundaries. So that’s my approach. I’m just trying to respect things that are out of my control, that’s all.”

Dream Theater will be returning to the UK for a select number of dates in April 2022. But have the band thought about how their set list might look this time around? “We finished it – we were ready to go. We never rehearsed, but our setlist was set. And so, we all learned that” confirms Mangini. “The way that our production has evolved since my era is that we have evolved very technically. Once you do certain work with that kind of production, it’s a bit less work the next time to a point. But then there’s still other work that is massively time-consuming, that has to be done every tour with respect to the actual production. It’s basically all about video – so it’s a massive undertaking. But the bottom line is that set was set, and we learned the songs for it. So, we already know what we’re going to play.”

Before you know it, Dream Theater will be back on our UK shores. The group will perform at Belfast SSE Arena (Wednesday 20th April), Newcastle Utilita Arena (Thursday 21st April) before wrapping up their UK run at the London SSE Arena Wembley (Saturday 23rd April). For further details and ticket information, head to www.dreamtheater.net.