dream theater's tracking process?

[teddyastuffed]

hey everyone! i was listening to dream theater recently and was quite curious on how they recorded their music (on cd's such as images and words, awake, and a change of seasons). i tried to do some searching on the internet but couldnt find any definitive answers. i was just wondering if anyone had any info on the process they went through to track their recordings (from what equipment they used to how their sessions actually progressed, no pun intended -_-). if anyone knows anything, id be glad to be indulged! and im sorry if this is the wrong forum to post in.

 

[Timothy]

I can tell you that Jordan Rudess (or is it Ruddess) the keyboard player,whom I greatly admire in ability, is a spokesman for Korg and has been for years. I would imagine some of that sound comes from Korg and more specifically the oasis.
Jordan has his own web site,I would do a search under his name and that should direct you to it. You can probably find out more there.

 

[drummerdude666]

I belive that Mike Portnoy (the drummer) was the engineer for all their CDs, and they tracked a lot of them at Beartracks Studio.

I can tell you alot about how they got that drum sounds, what mics they used etc. If you want to see how they progressed in the studio buy a DVD called 'liquid drum theatre'.

It's a Drummers DVD of Mike Portnoy in the studio - retracking the drums from both Dream Theatre, and also Liquid Tension Experiment. For the second band they use actually the original footage of them jamming and composing the tracks. Don't know if thats what your looking for or not..

 

[fweyd]

They record Live...

In seperate Rooms AFAIK. So the "feel" is there.. Thats why they do/did Octavarium and other songs which are really hard to reproduce live so pristine and good.

and Drummerdude666 : Does Mike use his Melody Master snares during Recording ?? and what Tom Mics did he use ?? I really like the sound of his toms..

Do you think its full of Effects ?? Or its really like that in real life ?

 

[Alexbt]

I can tell you that Jordan Rudess (or is it Ruddess) the keyboard player,whom I greatly admire in ability, is a spokesman for Korg and has been for years. I would imagine some of that sound comes from Korg and more specifically the oasis.
Jordan has his own web site,I would do a search under his name and that should direct you to it. You can probably find out more there.

I actually got to ask him about this. He used to be a huge Kurzweil player, as well as a former employee of Kurzweil, but he told me that he recently switched to Korg because of the difficult period Kurzweil was going through. He was afraid his keyboards would break down and he would be unable to get a replacement.

As far as I know, the Oasis is a recent acquisition. On the other side, apparently Kurzweil's getting back on its feet (thank goodness! I love their stuff).

As for tracking, I couldn't tell you.

 

[Thunder33]

I belive that Mike Portnoy (the drummer) was the engineer for all their CDs, and they tracked a lot of them at Beartracks Studio.

I can tell you alot about how they got that drum sounds, what mics they used etc. If you want to see how they progressed in the studio buy a DVD called 'liquid drum theatre'.

It's a Drummers DVD of Mike Portnoy in the studio - retracking the drums from both Dream Theatre, and also Liquid Tension Experiment. For the second band they use actually the original footage of them jamming and composing the tracks. Don't know if thats what your looking for or not..

everytime I listen to Images and Words, the drum sounds make me cringe. To me, they sound like old electronic drum triggers or something.

 

[Farview]

everytime I listen to Images and Words, the drum sounds make me cringe. To me, they sound like old electronic drum triggers or something.

That album was obviously an old Ddrum unit making the sounds.

 

[mrface2112]

I can tell you that Jordan Rudess (or is it Ruddess)

that's good and all.......except that jordan wasn't in the band when Images and Words and Awake were written and recorded. Kevin Moore was the keyboardist then, and honestly, i think he was one of the stronger songwriters in the band--and when he left, IMO, DT's songwriting took a nosedive.

sure, they got a lot more technical, but they lost a lot of soul.

i never really minded the drum sounds on I&W.....although they DO sound like early forays into triggering/sample replacement at times. the drums on Awake are FAR better sounding. i remember seeing a pic of mike's kit all mic'd up from the Awake (or maybe ACOS) sessions and the toms were all MD421's.

and while i'm at it, i don't like how they changed A Change of Seasons for the studio version. The live (aka "please don't go") version (the one you can hear on the infamous Long Island showcase gig bootlegs) is FAR superior IMO. the studio version doesn't even hold a candle to it.

on a personal note, Awake helped me through a really rough time when it came out, so i'll always be partial to that album.....


cheers,
wade