You will be able to see former Dream Theater bandmates John Petrucci and Mike Portnoy tour together… eventually. That's what Petrucci noted in a recent interview talking about his new solo record, his first in 15 years, Terminal Velocity.
Speaking to Metal Wani, Petrucci was asked since Portnoy plays on the record, if when an eventual solo tour happens, would Portnoy come out on the road to play the material with Petrucci. Petrucci responded in kind:
“Yeah, I would play it together; I don’t think that’s going to be the focus once the world gets back to a place where live performances are possible and touring comes back, the focus will be with Dream Theater for me.
“But sometime down the road, something’s gonna come up – whether it’s a G3 tour, whether I decide, ‘Hey, I have a little bit of time, I’m gonna do a little solo run’ or whatever…
“Yeah, I would love to play with Mike and Dave live, I think that’d be fantastic.”
That's pretty exciting. Petrucci also discussed the unique way his solo album was recorded.
“Well, it’s a miracle how this turned out the way it did because I wrote and recorded the entire album before anybody played on it. So yeah, I recorded all the guitars, the final guitars, and the songs were done and programmed some drums and played bass.
“So they were in a format that people could learn, but you know, the recorded guitars weren’t going anywhere.
“I wasn’t re-tracking them, they weren’t being moved or tempos change or anything, so the challenge, and I think it’s more of a challenge for a drummer – with Mike in this case – was to play to that and have it sound interactive and have it sound like there is some kind of feeling that we’re playing together, even though we weren’t, and that there is some sort of ebb and flow of feel and tempo even though there isn’t.
“So that’s a testament to Mike’s playing. He played to my tracks, he came up to my studio, and we recorded drums in the studio, but he was playing to tracks that were already recorded.
“I think that the interaction you’re hearing is probably due to the history that we have together. When he hears what I’m playing, he instinctually knows how to respond and react, and the things that I like that he plays and gravitate to.
“I’m like, ‘Yeah, whatever you did there, it’s great. It’s awesome.’ But the way Mike recorded it, I mean, he tracked each song maybe two times, three the most, and the tracks were built from that.
“So it’s coming very instinctually for him, and it’s probably due to the history that we’ve had together because it seemed very, very natural.”
You can watch the entire interview below, and make sure to check out our chat with John, where he offers a timetable on when to expect new Dream Theater music, as the band plans on writing later this year.
