John Myung

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John Myung
John Myung with Dream Theater in Berlin 2007
John Myung with Dream Theater in Berlin 2007
Background information
Birth name John Ro Myung
Born January 24, 1967 (1967-01-24) (age 41)
Origin Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Genre(s) Progressive metal, progressive rock, jazz fusion
Occupation(s) Musician
Instrument(s) Bass, Chapman Stick
Years active 1985 - Present
Associated acts Dream Theater, Platypus, The Jelly Jam, Explorers Club, Gordian Knot

John Ro Myung (IPA: /ˈmaɪəŋ/) (born on January 24, 1967 in Chicago, Illinois) is a bassist and a founding member of the progressive metal group Dream Theater.

Contents

[edit] Background

Born in Chicago to Korean parents, Myung grew up in Kings Park, Long Island, New York. He played the violin from the age of five until he was asked to play electric bass in a local band when he was fifteen. After graduating from high school he and his high school friend John Petrucci enrolled at the Berklee College of Music, where they met future band mate Mike Portnoy. The three of them formed the band Majesty with another friend from high school, keyboardist Kevin Moore and vocalist Chris Collins. The band would later change its name to Dream Theater.

Though Dream Theater is his primary focus musically, he has appeared in a number of other projects through his career. His first non-Dream Theater venture was in the pop-prog band Platypus with Rod Morgenstein, Ty Tabor and ex-Dream Theater bandmate Derek Sherinian. He is also a member of The Jelly Jam, which consists of the same line-up as Platypus, but without Sherinian. Apart from his membership in these bands, he has appeared as a guest on numerous records.

Myung's main influences include Chris Squire, Steve Harris, Geddy Lee and Cliff Burton, and their respective bands Yes, Iron Maiden, Rush, and Metallica.

John is married to Lisa Martens Pace, the bass player in the defunct all-female heavy metal band Meanstreak. Two other members of the band, Rena Sands and Marlene Apuzzo are married to Dream Theater members: John Petrucci and Mike Portnoy, respectively.

John is a Christian and open about his religion in interviews - Jordan Rudess confirmed this in a post on his forum. [1]

[edit] Personality

Myung has a reputation as the mysterious member of Dream Theater, as he is very quiet (particularly in comparison to bandmate Mike Portnoy) and seldom draws attention to himself in videos or concerts. This has led some fans jokingly to wonder if anyone has ever seen him speak. (Of course, he does speak in DVD commentaries and, obviously, on his instructional video, as well as to fans he meets at live shows. If given the right topic, such as bass playing techniques, he will converse for long periods of time.) [2] His mysterious persona was emphasized when, at a show in Germany, he tackled Dream Theater singer James LaBrie, much to the confusion and amazement of both the audience and the rest of the band; this move later became known as the "Myung Tackle." It would later be revealed in the band's biography Lifting Shadows that he was dared to do it with "a couple hundred dollars and nobody thought that he would do it."[3]

Myung is also famous for his practicing principles. Both Kevin Shirley (on the Metropolis 2000: Scenes From New York DVD) as well as former keyboardist Derek Sherinian (on his website [4]) have said that Myung is the only musician they know who warms down after a show. In a forum post, John Petrucci said that, when he and Myung were at Berklee, the two had an agreement to practice at least six hours every day. [5]

[edit] Songwriting

Dream Theater has long been known for its group writing process, so it is sometimes difficult to identify which member of the band authored a particular song or song section (although, on some DVD commentaries, the band members have identified certain parts as, e.g., "a John Myung riff"). With respect to lyrics, Myung wrote the lyrics to at least one song per album from "Images and Words" to "Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory." Since the release of "Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence," however, Myung has not contributed any lyrics. Mike Portnoy once commented in a chat session that this is probably because Myung's lyrics usually needed some work by the rest of the band to fit to the song. As a result, the band eventually imposed an unwritten lyric rule that required lyrics to be "properly formed, phrased, constructed, etc. to go with the melodies," and, "since then, John has kind of backed off." [6]

[edit] Equipment

Myung began playing bass at the age of 15 after having played violin for a number of years. His first bass was a "Memphis" brand Precision bass copy, but he quickly upgraded to a salmon-colored four-string Fender Jazz bass. He also began to develop a unique playing style high on the neck, adding counterpoint lines and melodies to the band's material which are not typically heard in traditional "rock" music. He was also a heavy user of effects not typically heard on the bass guitar to better bring out his distinctive style.

For Dream Theater's debut album "When Dream and Day Unite," Myung played a heavily-modified Ernie Ball/MusicMan Stingray four-string bass, as well as his four-string Fender Jazz Bass, with the Stingray seeing the vast majority of local New York City-area live performances in this period (1988-1992). The Ernie Ball/MusicMan Stingray four-string was customized with an added front pickup sending a traditional clean bass sound to a clean amp, while the bridge signal was sent to a full-time "effected" amplifier, much like his influences Chris Squire and Geddy Lee).

Myung used a 4-string Spector NS-2 for most of the recording of "Images and Words" in 1992 (although he may have used a 5-string or 6-string bass for songs such as "Take the Time," which features a low-C#). He made the technically challenging switch to 6-string basses for Dream Theater's subsequent tour of America, Europe, and Japan, using several high-end Tobias "Basic" basses. At least two, a red-stained and "cherry sunburst" can be seen and heard on various Dream Theater music videos and on the "Live At The Marquee" EP released in 1993. Myung continued to use Tobias basses throughout the "Images And Tour" and "Music In Progress" tours from 1992 to late 1993.

For Dream Theater's "Awake" album, Myung became the primary endorser of Tung basses, which were produced by a small company formed by ex-Tobias luthier Nicholas Tung. Myung owned at least three of the only 100 instruments constructed, two "Wingbass II Bolt-on" six-strings (one natural and one sunburst, both with maple tops, ash bodies and maple necks with rosewood fretboards), and one "Wingbass II Hybrid (a "half neck-through" with spalted maple top, ash body, and maple neck and fretboard). The natural-finish Wingbass II bolt-on became his main live instrument for the "Waking Up The World" and "A Change of Seasons" tours, although he used the other two in his "Progressive Bass Concepts" instructional video. During this period, Myung also used a Hamer acoustic bass for "unplugged" radio shows and live performances. For amplification, he was using Mesa Boogie Strategy 400 power amps, a Mesa Boogie Bass 400+, and a modified Mesa Boogie Triaxis guitar preamp with several transistors swapped out for ones that would support the lower range of a bass guitar.

After the Tung company ceased production, Myung began endorsing Yamaha instruments, using its TRB and John Patitucci six-string fretted and fretless basses live for Dream Theater's The Fix For '96 & An Evening of New Music with Dream Theater while working with Yamaha's Artist Custom Shop on what would become his signature instrument. Based on the more "rock"-oriented RBX body style, prototypes of the RBX6JM along with his TRB basses were used for the recording of 1997's "Falling Into Infinity." A bolt-on bass with alder body with flame-maple top available in either "Ruby Red" or "Turquoise Blue" with a maple neck, ebony fretboard, gold hardware, 35" scale, and "Infinity" dot inlay on the fretboard, various Red and Blue RBX6JM models were his main studio and live instruments along with his TRB fretless from 1997-1998's Touring Into Infinity, 1998's "Once In A LIVEtime" double-disc live CD and "5 Years In A LIVEtime" video, 1999's "Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory," following tour and 2001's "Metropolis 2000: Scenes From New York" DVD and "Live Scenes From New York" three CD live set. Myung's ampflication and speaker endorsement changed at this time to SWR Sound Corporation, as can be seen on the "Metropolis 2000" DVD. However, Internet-released "Webisodes" of the making of 2002's "Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence" double album showed an expansion of Myung's studio gear with the use of a Hamer 8-string bass, as well as a Music Man Stingray 5 five-string bass. The usage of this bass on the entirety of disc 2 of "Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence" would lead to changes to his Yamaha signature bass.

In 2002 John Myung and Yamaha unveiled the RBX-JM2, an updated version of his signature bass that echoed the redesign of Yamaha's entire RBX-series of basses. Changes included a modified body shape with more "modern" lines and carvings, finishes in either "Inca Silver" or "Plum Purple" in flat as opposed to glossy paint, slightly tighter string-spacing, a maple neck/rosewood fretboard with "Yin-Yang" inlay at the 12th fret, 34" scale as opposed to the 35" scale that the RBX6JM had, and most importantly a single Seymour Duncan Music Man-type Humbucking pickup, by all accounts an influence from his usage of a Music Man Stingray to record a good portion of Dream Theater's last album as well as the Stingray that was his primary bass on the band's first album. This was used on Dream Theater's "Train of Thought" and "Octavarium" albums, the tours supporting them, as well as the vast majority of the "Six Degrees Of Inner Turbulence" tour (the prototypes for the second version arrived for him to test early in the tour), the Summer 2002 tour co-headlining with Joe Satriani, the Summer 2003 tour co-headlined with Queensrÿche, and the Gigantour heavy metal festival Dream Theater co-headlined with Megadeth.

During the recording of "Systematic Chaos" in 2006, Myung was seen using various MusicMan basses (most notably an Egyptian Smoke Bongo 5 HH as well as a Sterling H/SC, which can be seen a few times during in-studio videos and the EPK for this new album). At the beginning of the 2007 "Chaos in Motion" tour, he was spotted playing a MusicMan Bongo 5 HS in his signature "Inca Silver" (Flat Gray) finish on stage as opposed to his signature Yamaha instrument. This was the first time since before "Images and Words" that Myung had toured with MusicMan instruments. On July 23rd, 2007, a posting on the Music Man online forum by the owner of Music Man, Sterling Ball, [1] stated with certainty that "I am speaking for both myself and the entire Music Man family in welcoming a wonderfully talented bassist and good guy, John Myung of Dream Theater. John has fallen in love with the prototypes that we made of the Bongo 6 and is now playing them exclusively. He is so in love with them that he wont let me tweak them. He is playing the first proto and has two others from the same batch. This is historic for us to have hit the nail on the head for an artist without any input, visit, or promise." He also stated that, for the first time since John was endorsed by Yamaha over 10 years ago, "It is not a signature bass it is part of the regular line." However, several years ago, Sterling Ball had stated that there was no chance of a six-string Bongo unless a "high-profile artist asked for one," so John Myung's desire for a six-string Music Man can be seen as the genesis of the six-string Bongo. Myung is currently (as of May 2008) playing the 2 original six-string prototypes on Dream Theater's "Progressive Nation 2008" tour, a Flat Silver model very close the "Inca Silver" color on his signature Yamaha and a Black model both with Humbucker/Single Coil pickup combinations, as well as a single humbucker Flat Silver. On July 26, 2007, both he and John Petrucci visited the Music Man factory to test some new instruments that were being made for them - in this visit Myung can be [2] seen with an Egyptian Smoke six-string with a H/SC pickup configuration.

Myung also has used a 12 string Grand Chapman Stick, an instrument primarily intended to be played by "tapping" the strings much as a pianist plays a keyboard, as well as strumming them or fingerpicking. To date, Myung has only used the Stick on four Dream Theater songs: "New Millennium" (in which he uses fingerpicking technique along with the Stick's traditional tapping), "Trial Of Tears," and "Take Away My Pain" from "Falling Into Infinity," and "Misunderstood" from "Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence (although it has be brought into the studio for every recording session since and was the original instrument that the "Home" bassline was performed on until being switched to bass). He did, however, use the Stick on several tracks on Sean Malone's first "Gordian Knot," including "Srikara Tal" and "Redemption's Way."

Currently (as of May 2008) onstage, Myung uses all rackmount units for his sounds. As of the August 2005 issue of Bass Player magazine detailing his on-stage equipment, he used two Demeter HBP-1 preamps, a Demeter VTDB-2B mono tube direct box, Demeter HXC-1 optical compressor, Ashdown ABM RPM-1 EVO II preamp and ABM APM 1000 Evo II power amp, a Pearce BC-1 preamp, Framptone 3-Banger (for switching between preamps and their different settings) and Mesa Big Block 750 amplifier. Myung does not use speaker cabinets onstage. Instead, he uses direct boxes that feed the signal from his instruments into the front-of-house mixing board.

Apart from the various preamps that he uses for overdrive and distortion, the only "effect" Myung uses is an Eventide DSP4000 Ultra-Harmonizer for chorus, harmonization, and time-based effects: "I dig the Hyper Quad setting on the Eventide. It makes for a great wide, spatial effect that really brings my bass sound to life, especially live."[7]

[edit] Discography

[edit] Videography

[edit] References

  1. ^ faq.dtnorway.com | Are the band members religious?
  2. ^ faq.dtnorway.com | Does John M speak?
  3. ^ Wilson, Rich (2007). Lifting Shadows: Words. London, England: Essential Works, page275. ISBN 978-0-9545493-7-4. 
  4. ^ Untitled Document
  5. ^ John Petrucci, Practicing. John Petrucci Forums. (March 2002)
  6. ^ dtfaq.com
  7. ^ Bass Player, John Myung on Revisiting Your Roots. Bass Player. (August 2005)

[edit] External links

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Dream Theater
James LaBrie · John Myung · John Petrucci · Mike Portnoy · Jordan Rudess
Chris Collins · Charlie Dominici · Kevin Moore · Derek Sherinian
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