Twenty years since the release of their debut album, When Dream And Day Unite, American prog metallers Dream Theater have survived through the good times and the bad. With the release of their tenth studio album, Black Clouds & Silver Linings set for late June, drummer Mike Portnoy is coming towards the end of a whirlwind press tour which has taken in Germany, Holland, Italy and France. Blistering.com caught up with “The Port” by phone in London just as he’s “sitting in my hotel room where I can rest for a couple of minutes” after a long day of radio and face to face interviews. It’s a big change from a few years ago when Dream Theater were signed to Atlantic and pretty much had to get by on their existing fans.
Mike Portnoy: It’s nice to have a label that actually gives a shit, that actually gets behind the band. In the past we spent, you know, fifteen years with another label on our own for the most part. Once in a while they might do something, but for the most part they were a bank and then a way to release the record, but then they just counted on our fanbase to buy ‘em. It’s nice to work with a label [Roadrunner Records] that gets behind the band and promotes the record. That’s what the record company’s supposed to do.
Blistering.com: It must be good to see that when you’re given the opportunity and are publicised, that you’ve come into your own. After a few years where you weren’t fashionable…
Portnoy: [interrupting] We’ve never been fashionable, but I think we’ve stood the test of time. if you do anything long enough people can’t ignore you anymore. Love us or hate us we’re not going to go away.
Blistering.com: And you’ve stuck by your guns. You’ve been in the game for how long, 20-odd years?
Portnoy: Coming up on 25 next year, so it’s been almost a quarter of a century, man. It’s sticking to your guns like you just said. A lot of bands they’ll try to jump on the bandwagon, or the fad, or the fashion and they’ll skyrocket, have this quick overnight fame. But as soon as that fad or fashion changes, they’ll go out with it. We’ve never been part of a fad or a fashion, we’ve always done what we’ve done, stuck to our guns and even though it’s taken longer it’s lasted longer. We do what we do and even if this kind of music is never really popular or in fashion we’ve built up this base that’s slowly accumulated. It’s kind of weird because now it’s kind of becoming in fashion to play progressive, everyone from Mastodon, to Mars Volta, to Tool, they all have long songs. It’s kind of become cool to play your instruments and have these long songs, so now it’s a little scary, because it becomes fashionable, we might get sucked away when the times change. I don’t know. But up until now, we’ve always stood on our own.
Blistering.com: Do you think that these bands are bringing progressive elements in and challenging listeners with something more than the three-minute song?
Portnoy: Well I can relate to that because that’s the way Dream Theater’s always been and this album’s (Black Clouds & Silver Linings) is no exception. This album’s only got six songs on it, four of which are over the 12-minute mark, so yeah, Dream Theater’s always been that type of a band and we still do it that way. You know to sit down and listen to our album’s it’s like sitting to watch a movie. It’s not the type of music you just throw on in the background and hang out and party, with it casually in the background. It’s like seeing a good movie or reading a good book if you want to get everything out of it, you want to sit down with some headphones and get into it. There’s a lot there to dig into if you’re willing to put in the time.
Blistering.com: How was the writing and recording of Black Clouds & Silver Linings?
Portnoy: You know, it was the same old process. We’ve been doing this for a while now, we know what works and what doesn’t work. The last two albums (Octavarium and Systematic Chaos) have felt really good and really smooth. We kept the same team, me and John [Petrucci, guitar] producing and we worked with Paul Northfield who’s a great engineer and mixer, we basically move into the studio and record and write as one giant process. We don’t come in with songs or demos, we just do it together. It’s the way it’s always worked man. If it’s not broken don’t fix it. Just go with it and that’s what we do.
Blistering.com: For those who haven’t heard it yet, what does it sound like?
Portnoy: It’s what you’d expect from Dream Theater, if you know Systematic Chaos, our last album, it’s the next natural step from there. It’s kept a lot of dark and heavy elements, I think it sounds likes a modern band and modern album in 2009. We never want to sound like some band from the 70s or 80s. I don’t think we do. I think this album could sit side by side sonically with anything out there today, whether it be Slipknot or Trivium. But at the same time it’s got all those classic Dream Theater elements that were laid down in the foundation 20 years ago. We haven’t really changed the style, we just kind of rolled with the times, with the sounds.
Blistering.com: Do you think some of your previous stuff is dated?
Portnoy: I think some of the really early stuff is hard for me to listen to because it does sound [dated] but late 80s.
Blistering.com: Is that down to the production?
Portnoy: You know what? To be honest with you, those are the albums that we had outside producers. Maybe they kind of pigeon-holed us into that. Any of our last albums from the last 10 years or so I can listen to any of them and I think they all sound strong. That’s easy for me to say because I was the co-producer on all of them, but honestly I think they really do stand the test of time.
Blistering.com: For Black Clouds & Silver Linings, where did the title come from and is it a theme that runs through the album?
Portnoy: I guess it comes from an expression, with every cloud comes a silver lining, anytime you have a bad situation something good could still come out of it, like making lemonade out of lemons. That’s what all the lyrics on this album are heavy dark subjects, but in all cases we treat them with an optimism. The music too, the music is heavy and dark like a dark cloud, but it’s also got this silver lining with this progressive, melodic elements thrown in.
Blistering.com: Would you say it’s a trademark of Dream Theater, that you take dark elements but rather than sinking with it you try to lift it or find something positive?
Portnoy: Yeah, I think so. I think it’s always been that way with us for sure.
Blistering.com: Any particular reason or are you just happy guys?
Portnoy: [laughs] I mean we’re probably just normal, middle class American guys. None of us are full-blown drug addicts and waste products that can’t get our shit together. We’re just normal people, so any time we get a bad situation we try to work it out and make it alright. I guess for so many years, maybe that’s why we’ve endured so well, ‘cause in this industry, man, being in a band you go through a lot of ups and downs and unless you can endure them they’ll kill you. So I think we’ve learned to endure anything that’s thrown at us and once again it’s another expression, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.
