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Artist News
Portnoy booted out of Avenged Sevenfold, turned away from Dream Theater
By CMU Editorial | Published on Tuesday 21 December 2010
Poor old Mike Portnoy, it’s not been going so well for the drummer lately. He announced in September that he was leaving Dream Theater, the band he founded and was the main creative force of for 25 years, but said he would continue performing with metallers Avenged Sevenfold.
He joined the latter earlier this year after their drummer, James ‘The Rev’ Sullivan, died. In one of various statements about his departure from Dream Theater, Portnoy wrote: “I am proud to always be part of the Avenged Sevenfold family and history”.
But this, it seems, was news to the rest of Avenged Sevenfold, who seemingly thought of Portnoy as the fill-in guy while they got themselves back together following Sullivan’s sudden death. And, according to their frontman M Shadows, Portnoy dragging them into his ongoing dispute with Dream Theater was not something they were comfortable with. So, they have apparently sent him packing, too.
Shadows told The Pulse Of Radio last week: “We were actually a little more shocked. We felt that maybe both parties [Portnoy and his former Dream Theater bandmates] could have handled it a little more internally without being so press release-happy about what had happened between them. Because we’re a band that, really, when it comes to news all over websites or this or that about bands, you know, we don’t tweet much, we don’t try to put ourselves out that much, and all the drama and controversy wasn’t something that we wanted at all”.
Having seemingly learned no lesson from this whatsoever, Portnoy this week issued a new statement, revealing that he’d recently attempted to rejoin Dream Theater, but to no avail.
Portnoy wrote on his website’s forum: “Fairly recently, I reached out to the guys to try and make amends and offered to reconcile for the sake of having peace back in our lives (plus I know how much it meant to a lot of the fans). I figured it was still possible to try and save us because they hadn’t made any announcements yet or begun any public activity with another drummer. But sadly, they declined my offer (well, actually their lawyer did, they didn’t even tell me themselves)”.
He continued: “Sorry gang, I honestly gave it my all… So now the fans on my Twitter and Facebook can please stop asking me to go back to DT. I tried, and the door is now shut, the ball is now in their court, not mine…”
Pre-empting this statement’s likely backlash, he wrote: “I’m not crying or looking for mercy by posting this. I am merely trying to set the record straight as that is always the most important thing about my relationship with you guys. No BS, no spins, nothing to hide… and for better or for worse, I tell it like it is”.
He added: “I’ve also recently seen some people accuse my online activity of ‘looking for attention or media coverage’, or ‘looking for sympathy’, but it’s honestly none of the above. I merely value having an open and active communication with my fans, always have, always will. It is the cornerstone of everything I’ve done since day one with DT”.
