DREAM THEATER Begins Work On New Album

 

Progressive metal giants DREAM THEATER are preparing to begin work on the follow-up to 2011's "A Dramatic Turn Of Events". The band's guitarist, John Petrucci, has posted several photos of the DREAM THEATER studio along with the caption, "Let the fun begin…"

In an interview with Metal Insider conducted early last month, Petrucci stated about the progress of the songwriting sessions for the next DREAM THEATER CD: "So far it's not very developed at all. We're scheduled to go into
the studio in January… We have a handful of ideas we compiled while we
were on the road, and we have those archived. And since I got back from
the road, and have had some time off, I've been spending more time
compiling, writing and demoing some things. There are a bunch of seeds, a bunch of ideas, and a definite direction. Everybody is hired, the
studio is locked, and the vision for the type of album has been talked
about and secured. The only thing that's not there is the main material, but we'll go in January full force."

He added: "Before we go
into an album, I like to sit down and think about what we're going to do
instead of just going in and winging it. I'll usually come up with some
sort of proposal, and we'll talk about it a bunch of times over the
course of the month, and get everyone on the same page. This way, people
can start to think about musical ideas in that direction, and get in
the right headspace. For me, it makes everything so much clearer when
you're in the studio. If you have a direction and a goal, you get better
results."

Asked if drummer Mike Mangini — who replaced Mike Portnoy in 2010 — will be more involved in the making of the new record than he was in "A Dramatic Turn Of Events", Petruci said: "Yes. For the last album, he wasn't involved in the writing. We
wrote it without him for 2 ½ months, and he came in and tracked. This
time, he's going to be in from day one, so we'll write together as a
full group. The tapes that we have from doing that a bit on the road
have been incredible. At soundcheck, if I'd come in with an idea and
we'd start jamming on it, he was really quick and had great creative
concepts. I think it's going to be a very cool experience."

Regarding a possible release date for the new DREAM THEATER album, the guitarist said: "I'm not sure. We're on the same schedule as 'A Dramatic Turn Of Events', meaning that we entered the studio at the same time to work on that
album, and it didn't come out until September. It's too early to tell if it will follow the same release schedule. By the time we're done,
writing, recording, mixing, mastering, it could be May-ish, and then we
hit the summer festival season in Europe around July or so, it'll
probably be a similar schedule."

DREAM THEATER's next CD will be released through te Roadrunner, with whom the band re-signed last fall. DREAM THEATER first joined forces with Roadrunner in January 2007 and has so far released three critically acclaimed albums with the label. Roadrunner issued DREAM THEATER's ninth studio LP, "Systematic Chaos", in 2007 and went on to release "Black Clouds & Silver Linings" in 2009 as well as "A Dramatic Turn Of Events".