Interview by: DJ
Savatage: The Return of Metal Icons
An exclusive interview with Chris Caffery and Johnny Lee Middleton
For countless fans across the globe, the news of Savatage’s return to the stage after a two-decade absence from touring represents more than just another band reunion. As guitarist Chris Caffery and bassist Johnny Lee Middleton reveal in this exclusive interview, Savatage never actually broke up – they simply “unplugged the television set” for a while.
Now, with sold-out European dates already on the books and a new album in the works, the pioneering American heavy metal band is discovering that their legacy has only grown stronger during their time away. From dedicated fans in Lebanon to cover bands in Egypt, Savatage’s influence has spread far beyond their Florida roots.
In this candid conversation, Caffery and Middleton discuss everything from the early raw days of “alligator metal” to the profound influence of late producer Paul O’Neill, while offering insights into what fans can expect from their highly anticipated return to the stage. With founding vocalist Jon Oliva’s blessing (“Just go play this fucking music”) and a treasure trove of material spanning multiple eras, Savatage is ready to introduce their timeless sound to a whole new generation of fans while rewarding the devotion of those who never stopped believing.
MGM: Okay, cool. So I wanted to get started with this because first of all, as you’ve probably seen, I’m a huge Savatage fan. I’ve been a fan for at least 20 years, right? When I started listening to Rock and Metal. I mean, Savatage has always been one of my favorite bands. I’ll put this out there. Amongst others, like the ones you see on the shirt here, Queensrÿche. I’m a big fan of Rock and Metal, period. So I’m like a lot of fans on social media, especially the ones on Facebook. I don’t—I’m sure you’re aware, right? There’s like all these gazillion Savatage Facebook groups. And for years, they’ve been praying and ranting about can we please get some new Savatage music, please. So it’s been a long time. I mean, it’s been a good 20 years since since you guys did a headline tour. First of all, it’s been a long time since we had a new record, which is being worked on, which we’re going to talk about. So I want to kind of get into how is this happening now because you’re back and this is kind of a big deal for longtime fans. You know, that’s that’s the first question that I want to ask.
Chris Caffery: We were looking for the impact of 20 years and you couldn’t do it without 20. Johnny, you go.
Johnny Lee Middleton: I mean, it’s—we decided after talking that we wanted to do another tour and we wanted to tour again and everything kind of got messed up with, you know, things in life. And we have a lot of music. Jon has a lot of music that’s he’s been working on. And it’s never really stopped since Poets and Madmen. So we have gathered quite a bit of music and it’s really pretty strong. The problem is we keep—Jon keeps coming up with more stuff. So yes, we plan on releasing something, but we’re not really—we don’t have a deadline because it’s just the way it is. We own a studio, which is good. So to be honest with you, these days, you’re a t-shirt salesman, you know, back when I started doing this, we sold records. So the market’s different. Everything’s kind of changed. But right now, what we’re focused on is basically getting this band on the road and seeing where it goes from there. But yeah, there will be a new record. We just don’t know when.
MGM: Right. Yeah. And Jon’s talked about this. Obviously, that’s, you know, when news came out, he’s been writing for years. We’ve interviewed actually, John, I think it was—it’s been a long time as we spoke to just like 2012, 2013. He was promoting, I think it was Raise The Curtain, his solo record. He went into a lot of great detail about history of Savatage and he talked about Paul O’Neill, of course, his late brother Criss and all these things that were extremely entertaining and interesting for fans like me, longtime fans like me. But he was, you know, he wrote all the Jon Oliva’s Pain stuff. He’s been writing for years. So I knew there’s—there’s a lot of music there. I think, you know, if you’re saying life happens, TSO happens, that’s another bit to this. Like I’m sure that keeps you guys plenty of busy when that tour rolls around. But I mean, there’s some generally excited people in the industry, I think that are excited that you guys are back. I wonder if you’re getting that kind of reception.
Chris Caffery: I mean, I’m not going to give too many details on something, but I was just in in a hospital before with with a family member and the doctor there was a younger gentleman from Lebanon. And he found out who I was and he was like, “Oh, I’m—Savatage is my favorite band” and he’s telling me he might fly to Athens to Greece. I mean, this is a doctor at my local hospital is from Lebanon. And he’s—and he says, “You have no idea how many Savatage fans are in my country.” And I was just like, it’s crazy because that’s the whole thing. We always heard that like we were told when we were doing one of the festivals that there was a Savatage cover band in Egypt that used to play in front of thousands of people, you know, and it’s just a lot of these places we had not gotten a chance to go to has those kind of following.
So we’re seeing now that when the 20 years since we’ve been on the road, the even the places we used to go have 20 years of new fans, you have all the places we never went plus 20 years of new fans and then so it’s just kind of like snowballing. And I think it’s kind of like Johnny said to an interview he did yesterday—when we released the tickets for the headline shows, we had no idea what to expect. And all of a sudden in a couple of weeks that like Oberhausen had sold out and like, wow, people missed us and or they want to see us. And it’s really exciting that that’s the thing that gets me the most is like, there’s going to be so many people that have never had a chance to see us that are going to get a chance along with the ones that did. And I think the unknown about it is the most exciting part because it’s going to really seem like, you know, like we’re starting over for real with this one just because of how long it’s been since we’ve—we’ve been able to see the whole new audience.
MGM: Well, that’s what I was—where I was going with this is, you know, so you’re going all over the place, you’re going to South America here soon. Then you go into Europe. We have a brass of folks that do stuff for us in Europe and we hope to hopefully cover one of the shows over there in London, Shepard’s Bush Empire, which is a great venue. But it’s a global thing, right? So if you know, I find with—with—with bands, I say legacy bands, but I don’t want to say Savatage is legacy because you’ve said before Chris and interviews and people were saying it’s a comeback. It’s not a comeback. It’s Savatage never left. You guys never say we’re done. I mean, you know, we never did that—
Chris Caffery: That was the funny thing. We never ever made any kind of announcement about anything. We just, you know, we just unplugged the television set. Even the red, the red light wasn’t even blinking. It’s just—we were completely out of a wall. So the TV sets plugged back in and now we put it on and we hit the remote and we’re going back. It’s like we never broke up. That’s why when they say reunion, it’s kind of like I looked at that one 48 Hours movie when that guy comes to get the car that’s been—Luther goes to get the car. It’s been at storage for like 40 years and it’s like, this has been a long time. It’s like, I’ve been busy. It’s like we just had a lot that had happened. And like Johnny said, with 2015, we were trying to—to make the move then and you blink your eyes. Boom. It’s 10 years later and we don’t want that to happen again.
You know, and it’s just a really big part of all of our lives. It always has been and it always will be. So we’re just ready to make it a part of the active part of our lives again, which is just going to really, I know it’s just—it’s coming natural to all of us when we all walked in the room and started playing music for the first time a few weeks ago. It was just, you know, it’s like it’s almost like you never stopped. It’s weird. It’s a long time, but it doesn’t, it doesn’t seem like it. I mean, maybe that has something to do with the fact that a lot of us have played together with the TSO, you know, Johnny and Al are on the road and me, Johnny and Al were together with the spring tours and we’ve all, me and Jeff and Zak have been on the East Coast. So we’re all working together, but there was just something about when we got in the room as Savatage and started playing. It’s like, it’s a different look on everybody’s faces. There’s a big smile on everybody. It just seems really excited about it for, for like a little kids that are going to their favorite amusement park or something like that. Like we’re getting to go to Disneyland. The parents will let us go to Disneyland.
MGM: Listen, there’s a smile on my face. I’m just thinking about listening to this live. I hope that we’ll get to that because I know you’ve been asked, “Hey, is there going to be any North American tours?” And like you said, we’re taking it, you know, a step at a time. Let’s, let’s see what happens first with that. But the lineup, like let’s talk about the lineup. Al Pitrelli, of course. You know, he’s been around a long time. He’s been in a bunch of other bands, but you know, he, the tremendous guitar player as well as yourself, Chris, of course, Johnny yourself, Jeff Plate played on drums and Zak Stevens on vocals. So there’s different fans that think of Savatage, right? Like there’s different eras of Savatage fans like me. You know, I like all the eras. The music has always been great to me. It didn’t matter if Zak was singing with Jon or, or just Jon. There’s so much great material there going back to the, you know, the early 80s. Now you have this combination of the later stuff, like the Wake of Magellan, for instance, right? I mean, I’m a big progressive guy. I like that kind of music. There’s a lot of great stories built into the, you know, some of the themes of that record.
Dead Winter Dead, you know, we talked about that, another great record that I have. By the way, I was going to show you guys this. So I have the LP I got this not that long ago and it has the limited edition poster. I don’t know if you’ve seen this. Yeah. Yeah. This is from, from 96. Yeah.
Chris Caffery: Yeah. That was the, that was the poster we had on that, on that tour. And the funny thing about that poster is we had a bunch of them to go to the Legion members and we brought some of them on the road. And the ones we brought on the road, we had signed already. So we had them at the merch booth, signed Savatage posters and the people, they didn’t see us sign them.
Chris Caffery: So these fans were coming backstage or meeting us on the street somewhere. And I think Johnny was there when this girl came up to us. She turned the poster over and wanted us to sign the back. And we said, well, we signed it already. She goes, how do I know? So we were signing the back of the sign poster in the clear white spot. So her wall at home probably as like Savatage written by her and our signature on the back.
MGM: That’s cool. But where I was going with this is the, the set list. This is where I’m going with this. I’m sure it’s going to feature, and I’ve heard you speak about this, not specific songs. I think Zak was talking about this. It’s going to feature a lot of different eras of the band. I would think, right? Because it’s just, you know, there’s so much material there. Without saying anything specific, because I know you’re probably still working on that, but is it going to be something to that effect? Just a mix of a lot of different records?
Johnny Lee Middleton: Yeah, absolutely. It’s going to be a mix. Everything. I mean, when Jon was in the band, Zak was singing some of Jon’s songs. So it’s not like it can’t be done. And yeah, it’ll be a mix. You’ll hear basically a lot of different stuff. But of course, a lot of stuff’s going to be the Zak songs. We have four albums with him singing. So we have a lot of material. We have a lot of instrumental stuff. And we, we have Jon’s actually writing the sets. You know, you have a festival set, then you have a headline set, and we’ll mix them up. But you know, it’s not going to be the same festival sets, not going to be same headline set. But yeah, Jon’s actually the guy who’s, he’s our music director. He’s writing every—writing set list for us. And it’s going to be a mix of everything.
MGM: So and then I’ve heard you guys speak about that. Jon, so you know, Jon with his, he’s been dealing obviously with the health issues the last few years. And I know he—he’s wanted to be out there on the road. And I’m sure he had—he wanted to be out there. You know, he’s beloved. The fans just absolutely love Jon over the years. His voice is just, it’s just unique, you know, uniquely Jon, the Mountain King, right? So kind of speak about the, and you spoken about this Chris before, when, when you guys were still kind of talking about, you know, should we get back out there on the road? And I remember you said something about he told you, just get out there and do it already, you know, or something to that effect. Because he wanted you guys to get back on the road.
Chris Caffery: The whole thing, I mean, Jon was the one who had opened the can of worms in the first place a few years ago talking about doing a record. And you know, we had spoken about playing shows with that, or he had spoken about that when he was—he was talking about that. So, you know, when these offers came to us, it actually a lot of that sprung out of the fact that he had mentioned that—I started getting emails and messages from people all over the world—festivals and other things. And I was sending them to management. I know management was getting contacted, or labels were getting contacted.
So, all of a sudden, last year, our management called us up and said, we want to talk to you guys. And they’re like, we got, you know, some really good offers for you guys to play. And, you know, Jon, you know, he was the one that said, go do it. And when I spoke to him, I said, you know, I had never done anything Savatage without you. And that’s when he said the quote, “Just go play this, would you just go play this fucking music.” He wants us to go do it. And I said it to somebody in the interview I was doing with Johnny the other day, I think the fact that we’re doing it and he’s not is gonna motivate him to get to do it. Because it, you know, he wants to be there, like you said, and he knows what—what he is to the fans, he knows how much they love the Mountain King, I mean, it’s like you have your different versions of Black Sabbath, there’s only one Ozzy, you know, it’s like, and that’s the way it is with—with Jon, Jon is, you know, he’s the Mountain King, he is like that, he’s like Lemmy and Doro and Ozzy. It’s like he’s one of those figures that goes into that list of people that are identifiable by that, you know, just them, they’re that important on their own. And that—that’s Jon.
So, you know, we’re listening to him and we’re gonna make him proud when we get out there and hopefully in the near future, he’s gonna be able to join us out there as well.
MGM: Yeah, absolutely. And this interview with it—with Jon in 2012, we interviewed Zak too I did in 2013. This is a long time ago. Like I said, I’m a fan, I’m a big fan of the band, but he spoke about and it kind of seemed like he knew he was kind of on borrowed time even then. So he—he was trying to get all this music that Criss had left over or music that he developed after Criss Oliva passed —and then he put some of that stuff into his solo records. But he told us back then he said, I want to get this music out because it’s important to me, it’s personal. And, you know, I felt that when I—when I read that when we talked to him, you know, so I can imagine now, you know, years later, and I’m sure it’s the same for you guys, especially with—with that, you know, the passing of Criss and Paul O’Neill and—and Jon dealing with the health issues, like you want to get on the road because, you know, as you can say, I don’t know if it’s more of a tribute thing, but you know, the music has stood the test of time. People want to hear it. Like you’re saying you’re getting great reception because the music is still there for a lot of the fans, even after all this time. So what better time to do it than now? Right? It’s kind of like times running out, I guess, in a certain way. Right? I mean, we’re all get older. I mean, you know, it’s—it’s part of life, right? So it’s what better time than now to get out there, you know, get back on the road and just, you know, just go kill it live.
Photo Credit: William Hames
Chris Caffery: Absolutely. I mean, you look at the tours that are going on out there. I mean, I’m—I’m still as much younger than Mick Jagger than it was when I was a kid and he’s still flying. So it’s like, you know, if Mick can be up there and if Keith Richards can be up there, we can be up there. People, you watch the way people go to see those shows, they enjoy that music and they celebrate their career with them. And we’re going to celebrate what the Olivas and Paul did with—with Savatage in the last 40 years. There’s been a lot of music. It’s a really great catalog. It’s like, you can’t really pick any one era of Black Sabbath that, you know, some people have their specific favorites. But I mean, I liked all of them, you know, I liked the Tony Martin years a lot. I really liked—I thought Seven Star was really awesome, but it was different, but it was a really cool record. And the thing that Ian Gillan did, it’s like all the—all the music that’s in that catalog is all really special.
And it’s just one of these things where you get a chance to celebrate what happened through all the years of Savatage with—with us in this stuff. And like I said to everybody when they asked me about the setlist, I tell them that you don’t want me to pick because we would have a four and a half hour show that wouldn’t be able to happen.
MGM: And fans would love that. The singers wont… hah
Chris Caffery: Exactly. It’s like, we can’t do that.
Johnny Lee Middleton: Yes, you can.
MGM: Yeah, right. I was going to ask you, Johnny, because you were around a little before Chris came with the band and he started touring with the band. I’m just curious because I know fans have asked about it. And of course, you know, with Criss Oliva, when he was still alive and on those early records, the way he, you know, there’s an interesting dynamic between him and his brother, right? Obviously, you have these power vocals from Jon and the way that Criss played the guitar. I know Chris, you have said how he influenced you. But Johnny, from your perspective, when you guys were playing live in those early years, and I’ve seen some of the footage online, it ain’t great (video quality)from the 80s. It kind of sucks. But just to hear Savatage playing live in the early 90s and the late 80s, kind of talk about some of that chemistry with—with that lineup specifically.
Johnny Lee Middleton: Oh, yeah, that was pretty much raw, Palm Harbor, Florida metal, like alligator metal, man. It was—we rehearsed in this warehouse that was—it held—it was called Cage Made. So like it caught bird poop out of bird cages. Well, this guy named Reggie had all these plastic things that went under bird cages, just stored in this facility. And we set up a little stage in there. And like all the early records that we did, we basically took one of those ghetto blasters that they call them back in the early 80s. And we would tape a piece of like a napkin over the microphone. And then we would find a spot somewhere in the rehearsal studio and put the cassette in to where it would actually make a recordable demo. And that’s kind of how we did everything. We were on our own. Everything was raw. There was never a discussion about what key the song was in, because none of us fucking knew. And it was like, we just went.
I mean, Criss was—I was the most educated musician in the room. And I had a high school education in jazz band. I could read music and I still read music today. But I mean, I was the new guy and I was just doing what they told me to do. And the way it worked was Criss was a fabulous guitar player. He was total natural at it. He just—it just flowed. And typically when we wrote stuff like Criss would have a riff and like half a song and then Jon would come up with the other half of the song or vice versa. And then we all kind of pitched in and you know, added our two cents worth, you know, got a basic song structure together. But yeah, it was raw, man. I mean, none of us really—it was—thinking on it now. I mean, I’m way more musically educated than I was when I was—this was an 85 man, I was in 22 years old, 21, 22, whatever.
So we were kids and we didn’t really know what we were doing. But we knew it sounded good. And when it sounded good, we stuck with it. And when I joined these guys, they tuned down. They were in drop D tuning. And I had—I came from a cover bar band and I’ve never done that before. So we had DGCF tunings. And then we would even drop the D—what would be your E string to C. And that was something that nobody was doing at the time. It was—they didn’t even make strings—now they make strings for that. But they didn’t make strings for that for the bass guitar. But it was pretty raw, man. I mean, me and Doc would go bass, fishing in his brook. And I’d come walking in with a bass in one hand and a tall boy, Budweiser on the other hand, man, we’d rehearse, I’d go home clean my fish, you know, it was raw.
MGM: Doc Wacholz was a great drummer, by the way. A lot of—a lot of fans are big fans of Doc. But I can see that. Listen to some of the early stuff is insane, man. You can tell.
Johnny Lee Middleton: Yeah. Doc’s my neighbor. Right over there. Yeah. That keeps the beehives over at his place.
MGM: Chris, talk a little bit about because you’ve spoken before about, you know, how much Criss Oliva influenced your guitar playing things that you’ve learned from him over the years when he was still around.
Chris Caffery: Well, the crazy thing is, I’m able to remember the times he was showing and telling me things and watching him. And when I went back this time to play the music on playing live, there was a lot of things that happened a little bit more naturally than ever. And I don’t know exactly how or why that is. But songs and solos of his that I played 20 years ago, I picked up my guitar and all of a sudden my hand was in a different spot playing the solo perfect. And I’m just like, all right, this is weird. I was playing the Edge of Thorns record. And there were songs I never played. And I knew the solo. And I messaged Zak and I said, “Zak, there’s something really fucking bizarre going on right now” because it’s just, I think maybe it’s because as all the influences of him went into me as I got older and I got better, I started to catch up to where he was 30 years ago. And it’s just as I started playing my hands and myself considering how similar influences were, just naturally went to where he was playing it. And it’s just, it’s happening now. And it’s, and it’s a lot, I think it’s a lot more powerful because I’m not really thinking about them. I’m just playing them and the notes are coming out and the feel is there.
And, you know, I cherish the time that I have with him, I always kicked myself in the ass for the time I didn’t. So it’s very important for me to go up there and to utilize that influence. He was so good. You know, I was a 19 year old kid when I first played with him. I, you know, it’s like, you think, you know, the world then, but you don’t really know too much of anything. But at the same time, I was playing with Eddie Van Halen. And, you know, I didn’t even really know it or because he never really let anybody, he didn’t say it. He knew he was, he had the confidence of his playing, but he never, he never lived on that. It wasn’t what would got him going. He just liked playing music with us and his brother. And, you know, he enjoyed going up there and doing what he did. And I was fortunate enough to be able to study him, you know, and he would take things apart. He was doing some of these new little runs in, in like Summer’s Rain and other things. And he would show me, he would say, “I invented this lick and here it is.” And, you know, this is why when I, when I get a chance to play this stuff, I feel really blessed with the fact that, you know, I’m not just figuring out Savatage songs. I would show it how to play it.
When I first played with these guys, I was really close on a lot of the rhythm things because me and Criss’s rhythm styles were really, really almost identical. That’s what made the band like me, you know, was the fact that when I played it was like he was in stereo when the rhythms were going on. We had a really similar feel. And, you know, he would sit there and he would stop songs like 24 Hours Ago. There was a little trill in the lick and that, that, that, that, that you can’t really hear on the record unless you dug into it. And he would stop and, you know, I would get all the little things and little parts and, and, you know, he would show me the things that he did and, you know, how he got his tone. And he taught me a lot about the usage of overdrive. You know, he, he came up to me one day and asked me, I went into the little practice amp I had in my bedroom and I had a distortion pedal on it. And he was playing and he was like, “You always use this much distortion.” And he turned it down. He says, “You don’t need it.” You know, so he is the reason why like pretty much most of my rhythm and lead sounds are just my volume knob on my guitar down and up, you know, because it’s like the tones coming from your hands.
And it was a lot of other little things like that. You know, it’s like crazy things like being brothers to you turn around and say, you know, you’d be out on a road and people are going to use showers like you go, “So you don’t shave in the shower.” And like, “No.” It goes, “Dude, you got to shave the shower. It’s so easy.” You know, it’s like little things like that that you’re hearing from them. And you remember, you remember those things because that’s what it was at that age. We were growing up together, you know, and I hung out with him a lot on the road when, when, you know, we went out on gutter during the day, I spent a lot of time with him a lot of the day times mean him would roam around and cause trouble and have fun when his—when his wife wasn’t around. He had, you know, I spent a ton of time with him at those times. So it was—he was a really, really special guy.
And I like I said, I’m privileged to be able to have learned from him. And I have a lot of that in my heart and soul, but I spent a lot of years working on it. And now recently, it’s, I think it’s all come together where I feel really, really comfortable going out there and playing it again for everybody, especially like I said, for the people that have never heard it, I think I can do some good justice this time of representing what it is they—they never got a chance to see him do.
MGM: Yeah. And you said in the interviews and I agree that, you know, the new generation of fans, whether they’re coming from, you know, maybe their parents took them to a TSO show. And then they found out, oh, hey, you know, you should listen to Savatage that they play some of those songs in—in the TSO sets or—or just, you know, older fans that have kids now and they’re shown them listen to these guys, you know, just listen to the stuff and how, you know, the orchestration in the music and, you know, some of the—When the Crowds Are Gone, I’ll use that as an example, there’s so many of them. But, you know, I get goosebumps when I listen to these songs now, I still do to this day. I don’t know if you guys feel the same way when you play live. I guess, well when you get on the road again, do you guys ever get goosebumps to say, man, we’re still playing this music years later for thousands of fans, whether you’re at a festival or, you know, your own headline tour. I mean, you guys get emotional when you play some of these songs after all these years?
Johnny Lee Middleton: You know, it’s been 10 years. So yeah, I think it’s—in our first shows in front of 50,000 people. So no pressure.
Yeah, there’s no pressure. I think they’ll be a little more shit in the pants than goosebumps going on. But after the first song, it’s all, it’s all game on after that.
Chris Caffery: There were some times like on this last TSO tour on the East Coast tour, we had an acoustic version of When the Crowds Are Gone. And you stand there and you look and you see 12,000 cell phone lights waving around to, you know, that song that I was in a theater for three days in Illinois in 1990, making a video with these guys for. And you think back to that, that video session and how we were trying to make that song and how Paul was saying, you know, that—that song is just going to get everybody into arena. You know, see, Paul was always really confident about, you know, what it is that the music would get to large groups of people and I watched that music.
And I think that’s what when I’m doing that song, the crowd may see me playing that song. But really a lot of my head is picturing me and Johnny and Criss filming that video. I’m thinking of Paul watching us out there staring at us in the dark with sunglasses on wondering what he’s thinking.
Chris Caffery: Yeah, it’s just like, yeah, that’s what the thoughts that come to me when that stuff happens. So, you know, I definitely have had a lot of moments, especially recently in the last few years when those songs are there. And not only do we have Criss that was lost, but also Paul. So there’s definitely a ton of emotion that comes out when you play some of those songs in particular.
MGM: Yeah, and I was going to, I’m going to get to Paul. I’m a big fan of the work he did through the years. But when we talked to Jon in 2012, the last question he was asked was regarding the Hall of the Mountain King. And he said, you know, the question was, how did you know that that song was going to be a hit or it was going to be successful, you know, after all these years? And Paul O’Neill came to—what he told us was Paul O’Neill came to him, to the brothers, and he said, “There’s this rock opera from Edvard Grieg. Have you heard it?” And he said, you know, they laugh. They’re like, “No, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” And of course, he turned out to be right when he said, “If you guys play this as Savatage, it’s going to be a great hit. It’s going to be—just trust me, you know.”
And I always think about that because you go back to TSO, the same thing, right? The mastermind behind TSO and he was heavily influenced by a lot of music, different kinds of music from what I’ve read in interviews, Paul O’Neill. And, you know, he mentioned how he wanted to create this rock opera that had all these different, you know, tastes of music that he had listened to when he was younger. You know, like he mentioned The Who, for instance, right? Tommy, that was, that was, that was important to him and Pink Floyd and a few other ones that he mentioned. But, you know, he believed in that—that this was going to be a long, everlasting thing, with Trans-Siberian Orchestra and he was right. I mean, this has been a big, big deal for all you guys for years now. And people love TSO shows. I mean, every place you go to is packed house. Every arena seems like, I mean, kind of speak a little bit, either of you guys, because I know both he’s meant a lot to you guys personally. How important Paul was instrumental, because he was instrumental in the songwriting of early Savatage. The, the Oliva Brothers have said that before, but to you guys personally, how much he meant.
Johnny Lee Middleton: We met Paul. We were basically on the verge of losing our deal with Atlantic. We had some pretty shitty management and they kind of, I just joined the band. I didn’t really, I was like, okay, which way do you go coach? You know, I was one of those guys. I’ll do what—what do you want me to do? And I knew when I got involved with the guys, we had some really strong material. But when we got into the studio, the producer basically, I don’t know, it was the Fight for the Rock record. And it didn’t, none of us were there for the mix. Some of the songs that were on the record weren’t even supposed to be on the record. And we were, I was blindsided, but like I was new to the band. And we were basically on the verge of getting our asses booted…
Johnny Lee Middleton: We were basically on the verge of getting our asses booted from Atlantic. And I remember meeting Paul at the Brooklyn LaMoure, and we did a show there. We actually, we actually played with Poison. I think we opened for Poison. And at the end of the show, I met Paul. And he basically saved Savatage because Jason Flom kind of sent him our way. And it was like, we needed direction, we needed a savior, we were about ready to, you know, go under basically. And he took us under his wing. And he, I learned so much from that guy, as far as just music production and life in general. But he basically took us under his wing and it wasn’t easy.
But basically we, he told us, you know, on this Mountain King record, we were eating Campbell soup and pizza. Four of us were in the, it was a really nasty hotel, the Times Square Motor Lodge in Midtown Manhattan. And we basically paid ourselves no money, did the Mountain King record, and then Paul took money out of his pocket and dumped in what we needed to actually make it a great record. So we were starving. He came in and basically saved our butts. And we had a great working relationship after that. I mean, we went on and did, you know, the Gutter record and it was like he was, he was part of a band. And he was our mentor, our leader. He financed things for us. He took his own money and put it into our videos. He actually was, to be honest with you, directed our first video, Hall of the Mountain King with Mick Rock. And I don’t know if you know who Mick Rock is. He’s a famous photographer.
But I mean, he was, he was our everything. And then TSO came about. And it’s, you know, it’s kind of like losing your father. He was a father figure to me and just a musical genius. And I learned just so much from just hanging out with a guy. And on top of that, he was the nicest guy you would ever meet. I don’t ever recall him saying a bad thing about anybody. I never seen him take a drink. I never seen him smoke a cigarette. I’ve never seen him take any kind of drugs. He was just a super nice guy. And basically our boss and our mentor and our father and missing bad man. That was a tough one.
Chris Caffery: Yeah, he says the thing about the drink. I remember once our Japanese record company was in town and in New York City when we were doing something with, I think it was at the Dead Winter Dead. I can’t even remember exactly what it was. Paul was out at the dinner table. And these, some of these Japanese business guys, they like to, you know, it’s like cheers. They asked Paul if he wanted a drink and Paul didn’t want to insult them. So he totally whispered and he goes, “Watch what you want to do.” So he got vodka on the rocks in a cup. And then he had a next to him, he had a water glass that had nothing in it. And then he had a water glass that just had some ice in it. And when they turned their head and were looking, he picked up the glass with the vodka, poured the glass, the vodka over the ice till it ran out, then took the glass with the water and no ice and poured it to the exact amount of vodka that was in that glass and put it down. And then the Japanese businessmen went to do cheers. Paul like chugged the glass and they’re like, “Oh, yeah, he chugged the glass of water.”
Yeah, that, he never let us worry when we were on the road. And I don’t know if you’ve ever been on the road with the rock and roll band. A lot of shit happens. Not everybody has money all the time, expenses and problems and things come up that you never expect. You might not be able to afford to travel and have the bus sometimes to do this or that or whatever. Paul always wanted us to be safe and to be comfortable on the road and to be professional and to be at a certain level. So he really, like Johnny said, he would take his own money to make sure that we were always okay. And it was something that I don’t think I’ve ever seen anybody else in this business do ever, which is sacrifice their own money for somebody else in this business. It’s a crazy great thing.
You get involved with that and that mentality he brought into TSO. And we’ve had that for a quarter of a century with that band on the road. And now when we’re going back to do Savatage, all the people that worked with him and for him with TSO are putting this together. And for some reason, it’s just like, I feel that same comfort zone now with him being gone because it’s like that whole ability for us to be able to be feeling that way was generated from like Johnny said, all the stuff that he did for us that got us to where we are right now. So it’s kind of like he was that father figure and he always did kind of, he had our backs and no matter what, he had such a huge variety of experience in the jobs that he had working for the management company that he had come from.
And he just learned so much about the business and on top of that, his talents as an artist. And then, like I said, the things that happened to bands business wise and other things, he had our back, man. That guy, he taught me a lot as a person. He taught me how to treat people, lots of ways to ruin your career in this business. And Paul was a person that I was a person that made sure that you always tried to go out of your way to make sure you kept respected and you didn’t do or say the wrong things because especially now, when the internet is the way it is, it got very small. And like Johnny said, man, I miss the guy. I can only imagine how proud and happy he would be if he was around when we were doing these Savatage shows. He’d probably be taking money out to make sure we had more lights than we needed.
MGM: That was actually one of the questions. Go ahead, Johnny. Go ahead.
Johnny Lee Middleton: Yeah, he would. I mean, we’re the only band that got paid a million dollars to do a show and it cost us two million dollars to do it. So that was Paul’s. That doesn’t matter. I don’t care about money. I want it to be epic.
MGM: Yeah, I was actually one of the questions. I know I’m going over time, so I’ll wrap up here short. I have a lot of questions. I’ve been looking forward to this interview for a long time, but I don’t want to go crazy over time because I know you guys have other things, but that was one of my questions. Chris, I was going to say, I wonder what Paul would think now that you guys are going back on the road and playing these songs and TSO has been incredibly successful.
Chris Caffery: That’s funny. We were looking at the people because we’re taking a couple keyboard players with us. The way the things I wanted them to do and the way they wanted to be, like their credentials to be in the band, is I was looking at them like, which ones would Paul like? That’s how I was looking at these keyboard players. I’m like, Paul would like that one. Paul would love this one. That’s kind of weird, but that was the guideline where I was using to make my choice when they asked me who you liked. I’m like, well, Paul would like that one and Paul would like that one. That was my answer on which ones I liked. It was crazy.
I think he would be happy. He’d be out there by the sound board. We’re bringing a lighting guy from TSO’s coming. I don’t exactly know what he’s doing yet, but they’ll be some cool things there always is. I know Paul would be right there next to him. He was our biggest fan. It’s funny with Paul because you get into an arena and Paul did not pay attention to anything else that was going on other than what he was doing until we were on stage. It was Paul’s most in his world, but even when we got on stage, you turn around and all of a sudden Paul would be on the side of the stage and he’d be talking to people. I’m like, what is he doing? Because he would have things that he wanted to focus on and he would walk around and he would be talking about specific lights and specific tempos and he’d go from the front of the arena to the back of the arena.
Whenever he was there, it was like this really controlled chaos that happened every time Paul was in the building. The days he was in the arena were always completely different and you had no idea what to expect. He would wind up on stage with a guitar playing a song because you never really knew which one. He would come out to talk on stage and introduce a song or our special guests and other things, but I never exactly knew when he was going to be taking the mic. It was just funny. Like I said, you didn’t really know exactly what was going on, but there was always something really special happening when Paul was there. We’d get up on that stage and he’d be throwing sunglasses and gloves and things to people. He really was so proud of what it is that we did for him. He had so much fun being able to go and be a part of it when he did. I know that these shows and these places that were going, he definitely would be just like us, I think. Like a kid in a candy shop watching. It’s a lot of his baby too, going back out and playing his music. He would be really, really happy and he would have a lot of fun.
MGM: Yeah, absolutely. I think you said it best. He was a creative genius. There’s so much talent from all the guys that have been involved with the band and currently in and the past and Paul as well. I’m excited for you guys.
Chris Caffery: We would show up in Sao Paulo and it would be like a giant 50-foot fire-breathing gargoyle that we had no idea was showing up. It would be like coming out and it would be spinning around the stage. It’s like that’s the kind of thing that he would get these visions of things that he wanted to have this giant clock that had fire on it that was swinging across the stage and when we played Bach and there was two of them on each side of the stage. We would hear about these things and we’d see him drawing a little picture in the studio and he’s like, “I’m gonna have this giant thing.” And all of a sudden it would be there.
One year he said, “I’m gonna build the entire stage. It’s gonna be a castle.” And we got to rehearsal for TSO and the whole stage was a castle. We took an elevator up the back and we’re on the top of it on a riser playing guitar at the top of this giant castle. That’s just how he was when we did the Christmas Attic record. He’s like, “I’m gonna have a giant toy box.” And he was a visionary and no one I’ve ever met in my life was he able to make—he was the only one able to make his ideas happen. As crazy as there were he was laser focused on it going on and he was a magician in that way. They always seem to happen one way or another.
MGM: There’s going to be plenty of chances for that kind of staging at some of these Euro festivals. And I know you guys have played Wacken before the last time you played there but there’s Hellfest and there’s a few other ones that you guys are playing. Masters of Rock in South America. There’s going to be crazy amount of fans down there so I know you’re going to get a great reception. I believe that. The music of Savatage still lives. I mean after all this time and we have new music on the way so that’s going to be even better. So I know I’m over time but I want to thank you guys for your time and I hope that we get a chance to check out one of the shows especially the one in London. I think we’ll be able to cover that. That would be great.
Chris Caffery: Yeah, London’s really cool because you see a lot like New York City in London where if I go to see like a Maiden concert in New York City you’ll see all the little flags come up from the different countries and when we played London with Judas Priest on the Poets and Madmen I just remember that looking out at the crowd and you saw all these flags from Greece from here and there all over Europe and even South America. I guess it comes from being a really popular tourist spot but a lot of people go to school there or travel there and it’s definitely one of those cities that has that kind of impact.
MGM: And I’m excited too. The other thing that you said in other interviews are quick that there’s a new fan base, the younger generation that are now discovering the band and now you’re going to get to play these songs again for them as well, not just the older generation. So that’s how you know the music stood the test of time. That’s what I’m most interested to see is hearing those songs live again. But again, thank you guys. You’re going on tour pretty soon here next month I believe. You’re going down to South America so I wish you guys the best and hopefully we’ll get the new record soon. Jon hopefully get that done soon because everybody wants to hear the new Savatage music but if you haven’t heard it any of the past records or you’re a new fan of Savatage I’ve always said they’re one of the most vastly underrated bands in rock and metal. They were great for a long time and they’re still there. They never left and now they’re back so you know it’s all good in the Savatage camp and if you’re a TSO fan, you know I like TSO stuff too.
By the way, Johnny I was going to say right quick before we wrap up, I was in the show in Birmingham. Not the last one this December, the past one, the year before that. I was down there, the nice PR folks for TSO set us up with guest list and I thought it was funny. There was a gentleman who came up to me and my wife, me and my wife went down there. She never seen a TSO show. I hadn’t neither. I was the first time I ever saw one. Fantastic production. Great show. This was the lineup with yourself and Al Pitrelli. Chris you were up north doing the other leg of the tour somewhere in the north but so I missed you there but I saw this gentleman came up to me and said, “Hey, do you know where the ticket box office is to get the guest list tickets?” And I said, “Yeah, yeah just follow me. It’s this other box office. You have to walk around the arena.” And we started talking and I said, “Who are you here with?” He said, “Oh, I’m with one of the band members.” And he said, “Oh cool. Who’s that?” He said, “Johnny Middleton.” I said Johnny from Savatage?. I was like, “Oh wow. It was your step-dad and your mom.” So we sat down for a while before the show and we were talking about Savatage and they were like, “I can’t believe you. Do you know that these guys whole discography? I thought you were just a TSO fan.” I was like, “No, no, not even close. Super nice couple. They’re fantastic and they’re telling me about how they try to go to your shows, the TSO shows as much as they can and I thought it was great.”
Johnny Lee Middleton: Yeah, they live in Tennessee and that’s the closest I get. It’s about a four and a half hour drive so they come every year.
MGM: Loyal fans. Yeah, they were loyal. They’re fantastic and they enjoyed the show. You guys put on a great show that night. It was amazing.
Johnny Lee Middleton: Yeah, my mom bought me my first bass, $35 at a garage sale. There you go. I’ve been at it ever since.
MGM: Well, thank you guys. I want to thank you again and I hope the tour is a success and we get this new music soon and that we can all enjoy. So thank you for your time. I appreciate it. Nice chatting with you.
Chris Caffery: And we will chat again when we can talk about what happened when we got out there. Be safe and we will speak again soon. Thank you.
Chris Caffery: Take care. Bye.
Johnny Lee Middleton: Thank you very much. Bye.
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