If someone is feeling out of sorts or detached it's a great time to bring them in and restate why we are here and what we are trying to do.

Usually we're all comfortable playing the songs, but during the song there might be one part where you're like „oh, this part's coming up, I have to really focus", a lot of songs have those moments in them.

When I first started, it was the real basic stuff that was being played on the radio, so I was into Zeppelin, and Sabbath, and AC/DC, and all stuff like that. I grew up in New York, on Long Island, so the local radio stations played all that kind of thing.

In Japan they're definitely more over the top. They had four Boogie stacks and 20 guitars. But otherwise it's pretty much the same thing, except there's a translator. It's really nice.

Jordan Ruddes does [have a home studio], but it's all self-contained. I'll be the only guy with a fully built recording studio. So they'll have to come to me.

Jordan [Ruddes], he learned that way, and that's what he knows how to do. That's how he kind of approaches all music, whether it's to learn a cover song that we're going to play, or to review Dream Theater music - he always uses charts. That's what he knows. I really rely a lot more on memory.

There were some initial instruments I had when I was young and made some trade-offs. Maybe a guitar I bought in a flea market. They weren't the greatest guitar but they would be cool to still have them. Other than that, not as a professional.