I agree with him bosk. Sure, we don't have the data to back any of these opinions up. That said, however, there is a lot of logic to the argument that it came down to money. Personally, I always thought MP splitting from A7X was due to three things:
1. The drama he brought to a low drama band (remember the timeframe for MP and what he was going through).
2. His big mouth and inability to close it. (That's just who he is, we all get it.)
3. Money.
My gut feeling was that A7X absolutely would have given him the drum throne. At the time, DT was at an all time popularity level, Mike was well known, he was the Rev's biggest influence (I could be wrong here, but I remember hearing how huge of a fan the Rev was of MP in particular), and it was a natural fit. And all was going as well as can be...at least from the outside looking in. UNTIL, of course, MP said something (I can't remember off the top of my head what it was) that was inflammatory, and again, if my cloudy memory has it right, A7X had to step in and set the record straight, publicly. And then from that point on, months later, then MP was just fulfilling dates and moving on.
If pressed, I'd say THAT was the deciding factor of why MP wasn't in A7X permanently. But the argument regarding money makes a ton of sense. Mike is one of the premier drummers in rock/metal. He would command, particularly for a full time band, a lot of MP's time, and a lot of money to keep MP there and financially secure in the way that he is accustomed to being (I don't know what he pulls down before taxes, but I am sure through everything he does, he's probably making 200k+ per year). As was illustrated above, when A7X sat down to decide, money was probably thrown out there. You gotta pay MP. You don't disrespect the man by offering something low.
Again, I don't think money was the primary reason A7X went a different direction. But I do think it was a consideration.
Hey, you could be right. I'm not going to pound the table and insist that my opinion is the right one. And I agree with the vast majority of what you said with regard to your reasons 1 and 2. But there is a slight inaccuracy in the facts, which causes me to somewhat disagree with the bolded paragraph.
Yes, from the outside, things were going well. And it is obvious that Mike thought things were going well too. It may even be that the A7X guys thought it was going well. I would guess that they probably were
mostly fine with it.
But Mike's public statements where they had to step in weren't "months" before, unless I am misremembering. It was right before the end. And that is important, for this reason: (1) VERY shortly after Mike made his statements, his fixed term contract was nearing its end. (2)
At that time, he was told by A7X that they already has finished auditions and made a decision about who they were bringing in as a full member. That's key. Mike was a contract member for a fixed term. When he ran his mouth publicly, he was told
right afterward that they had their guy already in place. The timeframe doesn't really add up to them pulling the trigger
because of him running his mouth. The process of finding their guy would likely have taken months. I'm not discounting at all that they are very private guys and that Mike's conduct rubbed them the wrong way. But I think it had little to do with the decision simply because the timing suggests that the decision had already been made before he publicly said anything. So I don't think there's any reason to doubt what they said publicly about the reasons, which is that, just as they told Mike from day 1, he was coming in as a temp on a fixed term contract. I know that, as the tour went on, Mike felt like it could be a great long-term fit, and he talked himself into thinking it could be a permanent gig. But I think that is just a case of him failing to read the room.
So going back to the money, I just don't know. I hear what you are saying. But I'm not persuaded. And the main reason is because, again, the way everything unfolded is COMPLETELY consistent with what everybody agrees that Mike was told from day 1 when he was initially brought in. I just don't feel the need to look for other reasons when the original party line before he was even in the band fits exactly what unfolded in the ensuing months. Now maybe money was one of the factors that they were looking at right up front, and that was one of the many factors that led to him being brought in as a hired gun in the first place. But I don't see it as something that would have come up later and been a big obstacle if they had any intent whatsoever of bringing him in full-time but for the money. I could be wrong on that, but I just don't see it. And while there's nothing wrong with the
theory behind it (it makes perfect sense and certainly isn't unreasonable), my way of thinking is to not put much credence into it because there isn't really any evidence to make me lean toward thinking it is anything
more than just a theory. So, that's my thought process. Not trying to justify it as necessarily having to be correct, but just wanted to further explain why I think what I think.