{"id":7271,"date":"2012-09-11T00:00:21","date_gmt":"2012-09-11T00:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=7271"},"modified":"2015-06-18T13:36:47","modified_gmt":"2015-06-18T13:36:47","slug":"feature-neal-morse-09-12","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/feature-neal-morse-09-12\/","title":{"rendered":"NEAL MORSE – Smoke And Mirrors (September 2012) | Features \/ Interviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEAL MORSE – Smoke And Mirrors<\/strong><\/span>
\nAnthony Morgan<\/span>
\nSeptember 2012<\/span><\/p>\n

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Neal Morse<\/b><\/em><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n
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Nashville, Tennessee-based progressive musician Neal Morse organised studio time to occur towards the end of January 2012. Neal, drummer Mike Portnoy (Adrenaline Mob \/ Flying Colors \/ OSI \/ Liquid Tension Experiment \/ ex-Dream Theater \/ ex-Avenged Sevenfold), and bassist Randy George (Ajalon) grouped together at The Morse House in Nashville to cut September 2012 Neal Morse solo full-length Momentum<\/em>, the resultant effort consisting of six compositions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI talk about that a little bit in the liner notes on the album,\u201d Neal augments. \u201cIn January 2012 I was back from holidays, and tried to figure out what to do next. I don\u2019t like to just be on the music business spinning wheel so to speak, where you make a record, you go out, you tour, you wait awhile, you go out to do another record, and you tour. I wanna make sure that I\u2019m really inspired to do the things that I\u2019m doing. I sat around, prayed, and just really sought… I turned on the TV, and this guy talked about momentum. It was Brian Houston from the Hillsong Church in Australia. He gave a talk on momentum, and that\u2019s what the first verse is about lyrically. He said \u2018If you\u2019ve come to a change of a season of life, keep going.\u2019 He told a story about this woman being on a pedestrian walkway like they have at the airport, and how she was afraid to get off. All these people were behind her, and so all these businessmen piled into her. He used that as an example of if you have some momentum then keep going, because otherwise you might be getting in somebody else\u2019s way (laughs).<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel some momentum really from God. I don\u2019t know what\u2019s gonna happen in my career, because nobody has a crystal ball. I hope for good things, but I mainly just wanna do God\u2019s will. That doesn\u2019t necessarily mean your career\u2019s gonna go really great. I felt like we had some really good momentum from 2011 though; Testimony 2<\/em> (May 2011) and my book came out (August 2011\u2019s Testimony<\/em>), and a lot of good things happened like Transatlantic live (October 2011\u2019s More Never Is Enough: Live In Manchester & Tilburg 2010<\/em>). We had a lot of good things happen in 2011, and I began to feel like I should make a solo album. That\u2019s how we started the Momentum<\/em> album. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was written very quickly, and then we changed it a lot when we got together. I think I wrote it really in two weeks, and then we did all of the tracking in five days. For a lot of my albums, I spent much more than that writing and recording. So yeah, it was pretty quick. I think that\u2019s what gives it a real freshness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Commercial success isn\u2019t a concern for the vocalist. \u201cWe do what we can to try to get the music out there to as many people as we can,\u201d he muses. \u201cAfter that though, you kinda just have to give it away, hope for the best, and just trust the Lord. I\u2019m very happy and very blessed with all of the good things in my life, my family and everything. Music is just such a wonderful thing; to be able to work in music is a total blessing. It\u2019s great.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the early 2000s, Neal adopted the Christian faith. \u201cI had an experience in God,\u201d he recalls. \u201cIt was a bunch of different things. It wasn\u2019t like one thing; it was like a series of events, really. My daughter was healed of a heart condition when she was born, and that was \u201998. In \u201999 I prayed and asked the Lord to help get me off the road with Eric Burdon, and I felt like he answered that prayer. A lot of things happened that made me feel like it was the thing to do. I had this experience in church one day where I just felt like God was really calling me. I just felt like it was real, it was for me, and he wanted me to come to him. Jesus was a reality and so I gave my life over to it, but it took me some time (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

Faith oriented material forms part of the mainman\u2019s discography, though he doesn\u2019t feel his overall work occupies separate strands. \u201cIt\u2019s generally all together,\u201d he reckons. \u201cEverything that I do, I pray about. I feel like it\u2019s what God wants me to do. They\u2019re different kinds of music; sometimes I make worship albums, sometimes I make concept albums, and sometimes I make other kinds of albums. I write different kinds of music, but my faith is the same.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Mike Portnoy<\/em><\/b><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n
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Neal\u2019s musical relationship with Mike Portnoy spans across a multitude of records. \u201cI don\u2019t know how many albums we\u2019ve made together now…,\u201d he confesses. \u201cLike ten or something? I don\u2019t know (laughs). It\u2019s crazy. We\u2019ve made a lot of records together, and it\u2019s great. It\u2019s better than ever. We have such a good time. He just played drums on this Christmas album that I\u2019ve been working on, which is going to be called A Proggy Christmas<\/em> by The Prog World Orchestra. It\u2019s coming out in November. Mike was here doing drums on that… We just have the best time.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a producer though, really. A producer, an arranger, and a writer. He hears chord changes… There were some chords on \u2018Smoke And Mirrors\u2019 on Momentum<\/em> that he didn\u2019t like. He said \u2018Can we change some of these chords?,\u2019 and he started to sing bass notes to me. I tried to figure out what chords he was hearing. The thing that\u2019s great about working with Mike is that I don\u2019t really have to produce him; I don\u2019t really have to worry about it, because he\u2019ll listen to everything and make sure it\u2019s happening.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Proggy Christmas<\/em> undergoes issue on November 6th via Radiant Records. \u201cIt\u2019s mostly instrumental Christmas music,\u201d the guitarist discloses. \u201cSome of it\u2019s kind of funny; it\u2019s progressive rock Christmas stuff mostly, but I did some straight ahead songs as well. There was a lot of writing outside of the actual songs, so some of it isn\u2019t very recognisable (laughs). It\u2019s really cool though \u2013 I think you\u2019ll like it. It\u2019s got some crazy, good stuff on it. Variations on \u2018Joy To The World\u2019, and \u2018Hark! The Herald Angels Sing\u2019. There\u2019s \u2018The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)\u2019 with a very nice fretless bass solo. We did \u2018Silent Night\u2019 with \u2018We All Need Some Light\u2019, and Roine Stolt (The Flower Kings) and Pete Trewavas (Marillion \/ Transatlantic \/ Edison\u2019s Children) are both playing on it.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany people got involved in it; Roine, Steve Hackett (ex-Genesis), Pete, Steve Morse (Deep Purple \/ Dixie Dregs), Paul Bielatowicz, Mike Portnoy, and Bill Hubauer (ApologetiX). Bill actually had a great idea for… We actually did some of his arrangements and things too, so… Yeah, it comes out in November and it\u2019s called A Proggy Christmas<\/em> by The Prog World Orchestra.\u201d<\/p>\n

Momentum<\/em>\u2019s liner notes accredit Neal as producer. \u201cProducer really means overseer,\u201d he explains. \u201cIt means that you have the final decisions, and you\u2019re overseeing everything. It doesn\u2019t mean you\u2019re actually doing everything yourself. It means you\u2019re like the director of a film, that you\u2019re in charge of it and you\u2019re making decisions but all the other people are doing all of their work as well. That\u2019s what it is. I\u2019m the one who makes the final decisions on everything. One of the things that you do is you decide who\u2019s going to work on it, what parts you need, who you\u2019re going to get to play them, and all that kind of stuff. You make decisions about the songs, and the arrangements. Producing can be very deep or very light; some producers are very involved with every aspect and some just show up for the mix, so it just depends. But yeah, I\u2019m a pretty hands-on producer.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI had never worked with a real producer until Flying Colors when I worked with Peter Collins. It was very interesting, very different. It was very interesting to have this English bloke on the other side of the glass making comments about your take and stuff, because I\u2019ve never had that before. It\u2019s a whole different kettle of fish.\u201d<\/p>\n

Flying Colors is a progressive rock supergroup consisting of the keyboardist, Mike Portnoy, vocalist Casey McPherson (Alpha Rev), guitarist Steve Morse, and bassist Dave LaRue. \u201cYears ago someone suggested that I get together with Steve Morse, and I always remembered that,\u201d he recounts. \u201cWhen my friend Bill Evans then suggested that Steve and I work together, I jumped at the chance. For me it started with that, with me wanting to write with Steve. Steve and I got together and wrote the music. I went down to his house in Florida many years ago now. I suppose it\u2019d be three or four years ago now, and we wrote some songs and some music that actually became the framework for some of the songs on the Flying Colors<\/em> album (March 2012). Bill had this idea to have this muso, progressive kind of band but more commercial with more regular songs, and so that is what we set out to do. Mike came onboard, and then of course Dave LaRue is Steve\u2019s main bass player. Mike then found Casey McPherson, and we just felt like it was the right thing. We booked dates, got together, hashed it out, and made an album.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Neal Morse band (l-r): Randy George, Neal Morse and Mike Portnoy<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n
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At the time of writing, a second Flying Colors outing isn\u2019t in the pipeline. \u201cNothing is planned at this time, but anything\u2019s possible,\u201d Neal stresses.<\/p>\n

Momentum<\/em> is inaugurated via its title number, the track featuring Mr. Big \/ Racer X guitarist Paul Gilbert. \u201cWe did a project with Mike Portnoy several years ago called Yellow Matter Custard, a Beatles tribute,\u201d the frontman remembers. \u201cThat\u2019s when I met him. I emailed Paul. I wanted to have Paul play on a bunch of stuff on the album but he was too busy, so that was the only one he got to. I asked him if he would do some solos. I sent him some music, and he sent me back the solos. After I picked my jaw up off of the floor, I commenced to tell him \u2018Nice work\u2019 and put it on there. I think he did a great job.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Thoughts Part 5\u2019 includes a notable contribution courtesy of Randy George, meanwhile. \u201cHe brings a lot,\u201d Neal enthuses. \u201cRandy brings a lot to the table, man. He\u2019s not just a great bass player; he\u2019s got a lot of great musical ideas, and he\u2019s a multi-instrumentalist as well. He just knows a lot about music, and what\u2019s cool to do in prog. He really understands prog really well. In fact, the whole outro to \u2018Thoughts Part 5\u2019 was all Randy\u2019s baby completely. Randy came out a few days early in January to write with me, and we sat down to write. \u2018Thoughts Part 5\u2019 is what came out. The \u2018Thoughts\u2019 series of tracks just have more to do with thoughts in your head while you\u2019re dealing with life and dealing with people. How your thoughts are going, and thinking all of these crazy things. It\u2019s kind of more of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

A slower pace denotes \u2018Smoke And Mirrors\u2019. \u201cMy friend Chris Thompson gave me some words and it took me quite a long time to get around to looking at them, like about eight months actually,\u201d the singer admits. \u201cI took a look at them, sat down with a nylon string guitar, and started to play that riff and sing the song. It just blossomed \u2013 it happened very quickly. I think I wrote \u2018Smoke And Mirrors\u2019 because most of the words were already written, so I think I wrote it in about 45 minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Weathering Sky\u2019 occupies fourth position on Momentum<\/em>\u2019s track listing. \u201c\u2018Weathering Sky\u2019 is a really cool, pretty simple kind of rock song with a good, strong kind of power pop chorus,\u201d Neal critiques. \u201cIts lyrics are about somebody who\u2019s on a spiritual search and wants all that God has for him.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Freak\u2019 occupies position five. \u201c\u2018Freak\u2019 is different \u2013 it\u2019s rather freaky,\u201d the axeman describes. \u201cIt starts off with this string quartet and vocal thing, almost like \u2018Eleanor Rigby\u2019 (from The Beatles\u2019 August 1966 album Revolver<\/em>) or something. It goes to places no man has gone before. Lyrically and musically, I think it\u2019s a little bit of an unexpected track. I think it\u2019s really good for the album. I was on a journey when I started writing it, but I didn\u2019t really know where it was going. I didn\u2019t really know what it was about, and then it all kind of came together and made some kind of sense to me. When I came up with that thing about this crazy, homeless guy and about how he\u2019s possibly Jesus, I thought that was a really interesting kind of thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clocking in at 33:38, \u2018World Without End\u2019 concludes Momentum<\/em>. \u201cThis album reminds me of Lifeline<\/em> (October 2008), or Spock\u2019s Beard\u2019s V<\/em> (August 2000),\u201d Neal judges. \u201cIt has a lot of shorter songs, and then one big, long piece at the end. I think \u2018World Without End\u2019 is one of the better big, long prog epics that I\u2019ve done in my life. I\u2019m really excited about people getting to hear that. I think we spent two days arranging that and tracking the drums for that, whereas we cut drums on \u2018Weathering Sky\u2019, \u2018Momentum\u2019, and \u2018Smoke And Mirrors\u2019 all in one day. So yeah, it takes a lot longer because really a 34-minute song is like seven songs all strung together or something. It takes a lot longer to sort it all out.\u201d<\/p>\n

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As well as the bass of Randy George, Momentum<\/em> sports contributions from other members of the pianist\u2019s live outfit. \u201cBill Hubauer played the clarinet stuff and the whole flute things on \u2018The Mystery\u2019, which is the fourth section of \u2018World Without End\u2019,\u201d he divulges. \u201cAdson played solos on that; I sent him some of the music, and he did some killer solos on there man. The guy\u2019s amazing. What a find. Eric Gillette sang the high part on \u2018Thoughts Part 5\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

In certain instances, Neal doubles his vocal parts. \u201cI usually double my vocals, but not all the time,\u201d he observes. \u201cI think all of the vocals in \u2018Thoughts Part 5\u2019 are doubled. A lot of times I use one main one, and then another one just to thicken it up a little bit. You don\u2019t put them at the same level, but mix them up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Where guitar work is concerned, the mainman feels he has \u201cmore of a bluesy feel or something. I play slower than some of these other guys (laughs), but hopefully with feeling. That\u2019s cool. I\u2019m more of a melodic player. I have lots of influences. Who was I influenced by on guitar a lot?… There are so many different people. I mean, I used to listen to a lot of blues guitar players like Johnny Winter and I liked Humble Pie a lot. I used to listen to Humble Pie when I was young, plus guys like Pete Townshend (The Who), The Beatles. As far as guitar players go though, Johnny Winter was always one of my favourites.\u201d<\/p>\n

The usual progressive suspects figure in Neal\u2019s list of keyboard influences. \u201cI\u2019m influenced by all the big prog player guys,\u201d he confirms. \u201cTony Banks (Genesis), Rick Wakeman (ex-Yes), and Keith Emerson (Emerson, Lake & Palmer). I really like Chick Corea too. I like some of the jazz players \u2013 I hear some of that. Every once in awhile you\u2019ll hear that, like in \u2018World Without End\u2019. There are some parts that sound sort of like Return To Forever, which I think is totally cool. I love that stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Three music videos were filmed to support Momentum<\/em>\u2019s release, the tunes in question being the title cut, \u2018Thoughts Part 5\u2019, and \u2018Weathering Sky\u2019. \u201cThe band shots are just footage of us in the studio when we were tracking, and then the stuff in town was my son Chad,\u201d the vocalist downplays. \u201cI just went downtown, walked around, and looked for cool places to shoot. We had a great time, so I really enjoyed that. It was just really fun. We did it in about an hour and a half I think or something, and it turned out really good.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a prog artist. We don\u2019t have budgets for anything like a professional shoot (laughs). Record companies don\u2019t give us any money for stuff like that. Chad has this really nice camera and he does a lot of editing though, so that makes it look cool.\u201d<\/p>\n

Progressive rock supergroup Transatlantic planned to cut a fourth studio platter during January 2012, but schedules wouldn\u2019t permit. \u201cPete\u2019s and Mike\u2019s schedules just wouldn\u2019t meet,\u201d Neal laments. \u201cWe had been talking about January but it wasn\u2019t to be, so we\u2019re still waiting for that. I\u2019ve got some things. I do have some things that I\u2019ve been saving for Transatlantic, and I\u2019m sure there\u2019ll be plenty. There always seems to be plenty of ideas; we\u2019ve yet to have not enough ideas. It\u2019s almost like we have too many ideas (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

Other musical endeavours inevitably lie in the pipeline. \u201cI have something called The Inner Circle, which is a fanclub thing,\u201d the guitarist mentions. \u201cI make products for them, CDs, DVDs, and things. I have some Inner Circle projects in the works; Live In Finland<\/em> is coming out in September, and then I\u2019m not sure what we\u2019re gonna do in November. Probably something live from the Momentum<\/em> tour in October.\u201d<\/p>\n

Momentum<\/em> was released on September 7th, 2012 in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Norway, on the 10th in the United Kingdom, Benelux, France, Greece, Denmark and Portugal, on the 11th in Spain and Italy, and subsequently on the 12th in Sweden, Finland and Hungary, all through Inside Out Music.<\/p>\n

Interview published in September 2012. All promotional photographs by Joey Pippin.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NEAL MORSE – Smoke And Mirrors Anthony Morgan September 2012 Neal Morse Nashville, Tennessee-based progressive musician Neal Morse organised studio time to occur towards the end of January 2012. Neal, drummer Mike Portnoy (Adrenaline Mob \/ Flying Colors \/ OSI \/ Liquid Tension Experiment \/ ex-Dream Theater \/ ex-Avenged Sevenfold), and bassist Randy George (Ajalon) […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,386],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","category-neal-morse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7271"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7271\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7334,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7271\/revisions\/7334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}