If Derek said his "office" is that studio for 10 days, that tells me with such a short window, everything is already written.
Logical assumption, but not
necessarily so. I know you wouldn't know this, as someone who doesn't actively follow Transatlantic or Neal Morse, but the typical MO for songwriting for those two bands has often been along the lines of: Some band members have some ideas for songs, but not full songs written. They come together in Neal's studio for 7-10 days, throw those ideas on the table, and then spend the first half of that time writing the album together when they are all in the same place. Mike then usually lays down the drum tracks. And then they all leave and go back home, where they record their own parts to Mike's drum track, and they email files back and forth until everything is tracked. It may seem like an odd way to write for us old fogies, but it has worked in a few projects Mike is involved with and has produced some EXCELLENT music, so it can definitely work.
As for whether this is a "band" or just a project, I think this is another area where looking to Mike's past is relevant. As I mentioned in our conversation offline, he has done quite a few things that started off essentially as "projects" that turned into full-fledged entities of their own over time and as the members became comfortable that it was something they wanted to invest in long-term after getting their feet wet and testing the waters together. And that make sense with something like this (Transatlantic, Flying Colors, etc.). As I mentioned, when it comes right down to it, there is a relatively small number of “known” prog metal musicians out there. When you start factoring in who might be a “right fit” to work with Portnoy and then also start factoring in scheduling and availability, the pickings start looking VERY slim. I think he may likely have had feelers out there for a long time trying to get something going, and they either turned into other things or didn’t come to fruition (working with Russell Allen turned into AMob, which failed; PSMS was only really a niche LTE-type project; the Akerfeldt/Wilson project fell through). I guess we'll see. But if it turns out that it is just a "project," I wouldn't worry too much about it not becoming a full-fledged ongoing band at some point down the road, because it has been shown that that can often happen with things Mike is involved in if they end up being proven to work. And if this proves to NOT work so well, then even better that it wasn't (hypothetically) set up to be a "band" from the getgo.
Poll
Topic: MP's Shattered Fortress Tour (Read 212936 times)