Colin Legerton sat down to lunch in NYC with ex-Dream Theater, current O.S.I.

member Kevin Moore to discuss the new O.S.I. album, the possibility of a tour and
what\'s next for Kevin Moore.

Colin Legerton: So, background on OSI, how did it come together?

Kevin Moore: Jim Matheos was working on material for the next Fates
Warning album, I think. It originally was going to be material for
Fates Warning stuff. So, and then at some point he realized that
it wasn’t a good time to start a Fates record because the other guys were
busy with other projects and stuff like that. He had always wanted to do
something with Mike, so I think they were talking about doing something.
And then he emailed me. This is when I was in well, I live in Costa Rica,
so he was emailing me. And then, before we made any decisions, he
sent me an MP3 of some of his guitar tracks and asked me to do some keyboards
to it. And my approach to it was more like trying to make a song
out of it. So, I sent it back. He was expecting sort of like what
I did with Fates Warning, which was add keyboard tracks to it. But instead
I took a different approach, because I’ve been working differently, you
know. I don’t really think in terms of keyboard tracks as separate from
bass, as separate from guitar. I don’t write like that anymore as
much as I’m composing a whole song. So I just messed with his tracks
and switched things around and put vocals to it and stuff like that and
sent it back to him. And he wasn’t expecting that, but I think he liked
it. I think it was a little strange. And this was “Hello, Helicopter,”
I think, the first one. So, I think he wanted it to be a heavy album,
so he’s like, “Well, that sounds cool, but you know, I don’t know if it’s
going to be what I have in mind, as far as heaviness.” And then the
next one we did was “OSI.” So after I did “OSI,” then that was obviously
a heavy track, he was pretty much comfortable with whatever I wanted to
do.

CL: So, when he sent it to you to put on the keyboards, was

it, he already was thinking of it as a project with Mike? He had already
abandoned the Fates warning album idea?

KM: Yeah. It’s a little fuzzy area there about when he decided
that Mike was going to do it, because I think he was worried about asking
Mike to invite me into the project. He was worried about how Mike was going
to feel about that. And then he was worried about how I would feel
about working with Mike. So I don’t know exactly what happened still. He
mentioned Mike as an afterthought. After he told me about the
project and did I want to work on the project, and I was like, “Yeah, let’s
do something together.” He’s like, “Well this is who I have in mind for
a drummer?”

CL: So he basically had both you guys lined up without telling

each other?

KM: Yeah. There was something a little bit strange with that. And I was like, “Yeah,
that’ll be fine.”

CL: Were you guys not on good terms after you left the band?

KM: It wasn’t like bad terms, we just weren’t in touch.

CL: Speaking of Costa Rica, when did you move there? And for
any particular reason?

KM: Yeah, after the last Chroma Key record, just as soon as I
finished that, I moved down there, I think.

CL: So it was just two or three years ago?

KM: I think it was three years ago. Well, I’ve been there before. My cousin moved
down there to study Spanish, and I visited her for several weeks one summer. And
then, my younger brother visited her and ended up living there. This was like six
years ago that he visited and then started living there. And now he has a Peruvian
wife and I have a nephew and they live in Monteverde, which is by the forest in the
mountains of Costa Rica. So they were established there, I was finishing my
record and I was going out of my mind because I was in the studio all the
time. I always wanted to live outside of the country, and I wanted
to learn Spanish, it just fit in a lot of senses, to go down there.

CL: So I imagine you speak Spanish fluently now?

KM: Well, I’m getting better.

CL: So, down there, you do some shows on this Radio for Peace
International? What’s that about?

KM: Well, last year, before I started the OSI project and I knew I was
going to be leaving I wanted to decide what I was going to do, if I was
going to go back to Costa Rica or what. And I wanted to do something in radio, and
knew that eventually I’d like to have a radio program, a weekly radio program with
music and samples and stuff like that. And so I was looking if there were any radio
stations in Costa Rica, and I went on the net thinking, what could there possibly be?
And I found this Radio for Peace International short-wave station, broadcast in
English, broadcast all around the world. And they have volunteer opportunities and it
sounded good. So I didn’t even visit it, I just went and did the OSI thing and still was
like, what am I going to do with my life? I’m like, alright, I’m gonna go down to
this town, Ciudad Colón, outside of the capital, and I’m going to go volunteer at
this radio station for a couple of months. And it’s been really great, I mean, there’s
really great people working there. I’ve made a lot of really great friends. I’ve been
learning so much. I mean, I was pretty politically naive, before September 11th for
example. I’m just trying to learn as much as possible to figure out what’s going on.
That and it’s just a really great place to be to learn it. And also I’ve had an
opportunity to start a show, a half-hour show every week. They’ve been really open
with doing your own programming and broadcasting it. So that’s been a really, really
good opportunity doing that. That’s what I’m focusing on now really.

CL: It’s your main project?

KM: Yeah. I’ve been putting off Chroma Key because of it, a little bit. I have a
feeling it might all come together. Like, material that I write for that show might be
on Chroma Key.

CL: Are you doing a lot of new material for that?

KM: Yeah. I do a half-hour of music underneath it. And I use contributions from my
friends, like my friend in Turkey, who I went to school with in Los Angeles. He
sends me loops and stuff like that, sound bits, by the internet. There’s another guy I
met at the video station. He does music, he does loops and stuff like that. So I do
incorporate them, and I edit them and I do my own stuff. And then once in a while I
use someone else’s song, the whole song, always putting samples over it. Mostly
stuff that we play, programs that we play at Radio for Peace International.

When you’re there, the day is like six hours long, and then they play it on a loop.
You’re sitting there and listening to six hours of programming. Mostly talk radio
about the war and about media and stuff like that. And there’s some questionable stuff
that I don’t really like, like spiritual stuff. There’s like a New Thought program. New
Thought is a religion that tries to incorporate all religions, and just, you know, be very
general and vague about things. But I really hate that programming. And I’m able
to use samples of her, and set it up against samples of Bush talking about things that
really sound similar to what she’s saying, or really far right media or racists and how
that sorta sounds like what she’s saying as well. And so I’m able to use that stuff, and
they’re really cool about it, they never say anything like you can’t use that. It’s a
good way of reacting to and digesting it. Putting it up to talk back to it.

CL: Going back to the samples? You do use a lot of samples. More than anyone
else, really, that I listen to. Is it trying to make a point within the song? What’s
the main purpose of the samples?

KM: I think it’s always just trying to set a mood. Somebody just asked me this
question before. I don’t think I answered it really well that time either. A lot of times
I have samples sitting around. Most of the time I hear something or I’m able to get a
recording of something. I sample it and I have it there on my computer. And I think
all spoken-word stuff has tempo to it, and words have certain voice or certain beats
or certain grooves or certain tempos, and sometimes it just doesn’t work. Even
though the concept of what they’re speaking about might be appropriate to the music.
But, you know, once you have it on your computer, it’s very easy to audition stuff and
play it. See if it works there, if it doesn’t you don’t need it. But it’s just trial and
error. I don’t know if there’s any real purpose to it.

CL: You use it more for the beat than in terms of what they’re actually saying
then?

KM: Not more, but I’m just saying that you?

CL: Both have to fit?

KM: Yeah, exactly. I mean, it always has to fit as far as context, meaning. But
sometimes it gets disqualified because it just doesn’t work. It just doesn’t sit in the
beat. You can just hear it doesn’t work. But, for the first song – uh, what’s it called?
“What He Said?”

CL: “The New Math?” With the Dan Rather samples?

KM: Yeah. I got half of those samples and I knew that I wanted to use them on the
record. And on that song, I don’t think changed any of the structure of the song.
That’s almost all Jim, and me playing and programming and doing the keyboard parts
sort of like if I did the bass; a little more over the top, but that approach. But what I
did do to it was to throw all those samples in there.
CL: So, you took a lot of his demo and changed it around. Did you guys actually
sit down and write together at all? Or was it more separate? He sent you
something and you altered it to what it finally became?

KM: That’s right.

CL: Alright. I was curious, you know, when it lists two authors, how exactly?

KM: Yeah. I’m trying to think if there’s any exceptions to this, but I think in all cases,
Jim wrote his guitar parts, you know, wrote the songs or whatever they were: guitar,
keyboards, bass, and sometimes drums, and I took them after the fact. Either, like in
that first example (“The New Math (What He Said)”), left it the way it is and put
keyboards over it, or like in “Head” or a couple other songs, I just completely made
a song out of it, also “OSI.” I just completely chopped it up and changed it, but we
never really sat down and wrote a song together.

CL: Speaking of “OSI: The Office of Strategic Influence,” who chose that title?

KM: I did.

CL: Why?

KM: I keep a running list of good band names, song names, album titles, just
whenever I come up with something good. The Office of Strategic Influence was a
Pentagon office that was established after September 11th to put out propaganda to,
not just enemy countries which is really open and everyone knows we do it: we’re real
proud of it, but also to friendly countries, France, Spain, stuff like that. Just to give
stuff to the media in other countries to get support for the “War on Terrorism.” The
New York Times did a story on it and they were really embarrassed about it and shut
it down. I mean, it lasted five months or something like that. The funny thing about it
was the government and administration was saying it’s so embarrassing that they had
to name it the “Office of Strategic Influence,” we couldn’t just put it in a room in the
Pentagon and name it whatever the room number is, B29 or something like that.
That’s how they usually do these operations. Someone decided to be really creative
about it and name it what it really is.

CL: Yeah, it sounds like something out of 1984.

KM: Exactly. I’m actually re-reading that. It’s just a comically funny name for a
Pentagon office.
CL: Yeah, it’s a little redundant, but it gets the point across. So, with that (the
name OSI) and your Dan Rather sound clips, was there a political point to the
album at all?

KM: Yeah, but it isn’t a political analysis or anything like I’m trying to get my left-
wing views across. Because, like I said before, I’d been politically naive. I’m just
learning it, and just like Chroma Key, it’s just a reaction to what’s going on in my life.
And that’s what’s been going on. I’ve been learning more and more about what’s
going on in the Middle East, and what’s going on with our policies, and what’s our
history, and how are we supporting these revolutions going on, and I’m just sort of
reacting to it. It’s not like a “Rage Against The Machine,” I don’t have to think of
things that rhyme with “Zapatista.” It’s more of just a reaction. It’s still really
personal. Yeah, it’s political, but it’s not too dogmatic.

CL: You’re not trying to make a point or make a big stand? It’s just how you
personally react?

KM: It’s not that I want to make a point. But when you watch Dan Rather on TV, or
you see him the time he was on David Letterman, where that sample was from, and
I’m watching him and he says “Whatever the president wants me to say, I’ll say it.”
And I was thinking like, “Wait a minute.” It’s just a reaction. I don’t know that I
want to make a point, but sometimes you just point at things, and that’s enough.

CL: You saw something wrong with it, and you’re just putting it there for
everyone else to look at.

KM: Yeah. Exactly.

CL: So how was it working with Mike again after Jim set it up?

KM: It was hell. (laughter) He’s an asshole? I’m stalling?

(He was trying to get a few bites of his lunch in between the barrage
of questions.)

It was pretty uneventful. We worked together for a week.

CL: Was that it?

KM: Yeah, because we had worked on so much of the project before. We recorded
the drums when 60 or 70% of the parts were finished, or my parts and a lot of the
arrangements. Then we went to Connecticut to record the drums. We spent a couple
days just altering and listening to the material and talking about arrangements. Then
four days, I think, recording the drums. That was it. And then I continued arranging
and recording keyboard parts and sequencing. Jim did his guitar parts over and I did
vocals. It was six or seven months, or eight months, and I was only really working
with Mike for a weekend of that. I was working with his parts, but he wasn’t there.

CL: No interesting anecdotes from the studio?

KM: Interesting anecdotes? No, I think one thing that Mike was talking about was
that it was different for him because he had to take direction: just taking input. I was
talking to him about what I heard as far as drum parts when we were recording in the
studio. You know, try this, try this? And we actually tried it, not really tried, but
recorded different parts, different drum parts for the same section of a song so
I’d have something to choose from later on. A lot of the stuff I wanted him to do was
very simple, without the triplet fills in between each beat. I think that day was sort of
tense, because he’s not used to working like that. He’s used to just playing the stroke
once, the way he wants to. He said that day was sort of hard, but he was happy. He
even said that day, at the end of the day, that he realized that the record was going to
be completely different. It was something new for him and he was excited about it, it
was just very frustrating.

CL: Now, you haven’t been touring with Chroma Key at all, right?

KM: Right.

CL: Are there any plans to do so with OSI?

KM: Not yet.

CL: It’s on the table though? Maybe?

KM: Well, it’s not on the table. We just got here yesterday, and we’re supposed to
talk about it. I guess it’s possible, but it’ll be a huge deal, because we’ve never played
the songs together. It’s going to be almost as big a deal as making the record was, to
actually put it together as a live show. So it’s going be a lot of money, and be up to
the label and Mike’s time constraints, and my fear of singing live.

CL: Really?

KM: Well, I don’t know, there’s just a lot of stuff.

CL: And you never even saw Sean Malone at all, who did the bass parts, right?
Was that by mail or something?

KM: With Jim, yeah. I didn’t even communicate with him by mail.

CL: Wow. The way they can make albums these days? It’s amazing.

KM: Yeah.

CL: So, you said Chroma Key is on hold right now, with your radio show?

KM: Yeah, and with the OSI stuff. I think I’ll do that maybe into the spring. I’d like
to keep on doing a weekly radio show. It’s a huge amount of work, but it’s really fun.
As opposed to doing forty-five minutes of material every two years, I get to do a half-
hour every week. It’s really hard, and it takes an enormous amount of time, but it’s
also fun, because you don’t have to care about it so incredibly much. It’s like, okay.
I’m gonna get this done by Friday, and I’m going to start a new one.

CL: There must be a lot more freedom too. Unlike releasing something on CD,
you don’t have to get the label’s approval?

KM: Well, I don’t have to do that with Chroma Key either, because it’s my own label.
There’s more freedom just because it’s not going to be an album, it’s not something
you’re going to have to live with for the rest of your life. It’s just out there for a
week. I think I’d like to release CDs sometime, maybe two programs per CD or
something like that.

CL: Any big influences on your songwriting, the way you play the keys, or your
vocals?

KM: Well, vocals I can’t think of anything. Musically, I really don’t think in terms of
playing the keyboards anymore, like I was telling you before, it’ s more arranging the
song. If I have to touch a keyboard, it’s just part of it, just another way to get into the
computer. I listen to a lot of minimalist techno kind of stuff, like Pole, and other
experimental electronic musicians. And then I like bands that sort of chop up their
stuff after they record it. Bands that play live and then chop it up, like Gordons, or
Japanese bands like Acid Undertones. I think that’s been an influence on this record.

CL: Through the wonder of the Internet, I’ve heard the “Space-Dye
Vest” demo and I have to say that I wasn’t so impressed by the vocals on
that one, but you’re improved incredibly over the past few years. Did you
go to a vocal coach or just work on it a lot or what?
KM: No, I got a software plugin. (laughter) I don’t know if it improved. Maybe I just
felt the same way you did after I listened to it, and just cared and spent more time on
it. It’s really hard for me to do vocals. It takes a long time.

CL: And that’s why you don’t want to do them live?

KM: That’s why I’m leery about it. Yeah.

CL: I think it would be worth giving it a shot though, because a lot of people will
want to see it.

KM: Yeah. Well, what do they want to see? They don’t want to see me howling. But
yeah, I do want to do it. I’d like to give it a try. If not with OSI, then with Chroma
Key.

CL: You had different guys on both (Chroma Key) albums, didn’t you?

KM: Yeah. So I’d find some other guys.

CL: Find whoever’s available?

KM: Yeah. Try to keep it minimal too. Find a guitar player, drummer, bassist, who
knows.

CL: And you play bass as well, right?

KM: Yeah.

CL: Any other instruments? Besides all the computer stuff? Mostly bass and
keys?

KM: And vocals, yeah.

CL: Alright, if you don’t want to answer this one?

KM: Dream Theater?

CL: Yeah. Actually, this is my only one, I promise.

KM: That’s fine. Go ahead.

CL: Back when they were doing the CD, the “Live Scenes from New York,” I
think Mike had asked you if you wanted to do “Space-Dye Vest” live and do two
keyboards on “Learning to Live,” I think. At least that’s the word that got to me.
Why did you not want to do that? And if he (Mike) asked in the future, now that
you’ve worked in a kind of prog metal thing again, would you be interested?

KM: Well, the specifics of that I don’t really know about, but he did ask me to play a
show with them. I know what you’re talking about. I don’t know, it just doesn’t
sound like fun to play a 10-year-old song to a bunch of people that already know it.
For what? Just a cameo appearance? I don’t even like it when I see other bands do it.
“And now our old guitar player!” For one song. From Costa Rica to play that one
song. It just seems silly. I really don’t have anything musical to offer. It’s not
creative. It’s not fun.

CL: Well, I think a lot of people see it as their favorite Dream Theater songs.
And it’s one of the only ones that has never been performed live.

KM: Well, from that point of view? But from my point of view, think about it. Would
you really want to do it?

CL: So, it just wasn’t any sort of musical disagreement? It just was not worth all
the effort?

KM: It’s not about the effort, the traveling. I don’t mind stuff like that. It’s just
gratuitous. There’s nothing creative about it. There’s nothing I’m going to learn.
There’s nothing I haven’t experienced before. I’ve played that song millions of times
for people. It’s just going to be another time, and it doesn’t sound like an interesting
project. This (OSI) was an interesting project, to do something and have a lot of fun
with it. I’m not interested in just going up on stage and doing the reunion, just for old
time’s sake.

CL: Basically, you’re more excited about moving forward than

nostalgia?

KM: Yeah.

CL: That’s understandable. Well, that exhausted my questions. Anything else

you wanted to tell your adoring fans?

KM: (laughs) I can never really think of any answers to that last
question?

CL: Yeah. It’s too broad.

After that I let him finally finish his lunch. Big thanks to Koggie for setting up the
interview. Thanks to Kevin for all his time and answers, and to Jim and Eric from
Inside Out Music America and Jim and Mike from OSI for being so friendly and
putting up with me for the afternoon.