DISTURBED Frontman DAVID DRAIMAN: 'I Like The Finer Things'

DISTURBED frontman David Draiman told the Associated Press that his band recently took a helicopter to a winery on an island off the coast of New Zealand, had a private cruise in a $8 million yacht and the singer then took a solo scuba-diving jaunt to the Great Barrier Reef in Australia.

"The fans who know us, and me in particular, know the type of people we are. I like the finer things," Draiman said. "We've gone through our McDonald's and Burger King phase. (Now we) hit cities across the world and want to experience what they have to offer."

On the subject of his childhood, Draiman said, "(I was) just troubled in the respect of being forced into living in a way I wasn’t prepared to live. You go to these schools and you have to abstain from just about everything that a normal teenage boy would normally indulge in. Everything was very regimented. I just wanted to do the things that all normal teenagers wanted to do. So I did become quite rebellious.”

On DISTURBED's recent tour Down Under, they played before 10,000 people in Sydney, many of them first-time show goers since this was only the band's second visit to Australia. Draiman said that out of the crowd maybe 1,000 people had seen them before, but they left Sydney selling more than $60,000 in T-shirts and hats.

"It kind of gives you an idea the impression we left with people," he boasted.

"It's gratifying and intoxicating," he said of performing in front of large crowds. "You are affecting that many people simultaneously. To be able to inject that much energy into that many people, it's the ultimate drug."