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Raise a Glass to the Mountain: Hunter's Guitar Journey Part 2 (Slash, Don Felder, Joe Walsh, Jeff Beck)
21 Plays10 days ago
Hunter shares how he is attempting to get off his mountain's plateau, and how he discovered Jeff Beck.
Correction: the lick Jeff Beck uses to pay tribute to Jimi is from Little Wing, not Wind Cries Mary.
My favorite guitar solos:
Be My Friend Live (Paul Kossof): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P00-KBLqPwI
Sweet Child O Mine (Slash): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1w7OgIMMRc4
Little Wing (Jimi Hendrix): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35luFxHO5E0
Further on Up the Road (Clapton and Robbie Robertson): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78gR3Dlj7l0
Hotel California (Don Felder and Joe Walsh): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09839DpTctU
Johnny B. Goode (Chuck Berry): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKCt8ssC7cs
Shine On you Crazy Diamond (David Gilmour): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWGE9Gi0bB0&list=RDcWGE9Gi0bB0&start_radio=1
Turn Blue (Dan Auerbach): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5a1Cl_JOJM&list=RDC5a1Cl_JOJM&start_radio=1
Scared for the Children (Jeff Beck): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88mb6yDeQoI
Where Were You (the whammy bar song): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPgtreCwk8A
Please go watch Jeff Beck Live at Ronnie Scott's, thank you.
Mark Knopfler's Guitar Heroes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBGm7gJtSZE
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Context Setting
00:00:00
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to Raise a Glass, the podcast where we talk about the stories and storytellers that shape us. My name is Eric Lintela. And I am Hunter Danson. And normally at this point we talk about what's in our glass and what we're raising one out for and what we're pouring one out for this week.
00:00:19
Speaker
But if you want to know the answer to those questions, listen to the previous episode.
Hunter's Guitar Journey Begins
00:00:24
Speaker
Because what we're doing right now is a part two about Hunter's musical journey with the guitar.
00:00:31
Speaker
And the guitarists, the style, the instruments, the sounds that have and continue to shape him.
00:00:43
Speaker
And let me once again highly, highly encourage you to check out the previous episode. We talked about people like Tommy Shaw and and Paul Kossoff and Robert Johnson and Jimi Hendrix among others.
00:00:56
Speaker
And that was the proving ground or the maybe maybe the the the beginning stages. um for Hunter and his journey. Obviously, he still listens to them. They still continue to impact him and shape him.
00:01:08
Speaker
But in this episode, we're going to be leaning more into the last few years as as Hunter's made that decision as he's climbing this mountain, as he'd hit that plateau for a few years to take this step up, um put in the time, put in the the passion, the energy, the the grit to to pursue the next part of his blues journey, which at this point, as you shared with us in last episode, um has to do with Jeff Beck.
00:01:40
Speaker
And I know we're going to talk about him in this episode. I know Eric Clapton's going to come up, Jimmy Page. Anybody else that you you think we might get to hear a little bit about? Yeah, yeah so
00:01:54
Speaker
I think I'd like to talk about like certain songs, maybe.
Influential Guitarists and Styles
00:01:58
Speaker
Specifically about some songs that I've been trying use to teach myself. um Don Felder and and Joe Walsh of the Eagles in the the Hotel California solo.
00:02:11
Speaker
Slash, I think, was is has also been...
00:02:21
Speaker
Influential. i As I play more, I tend to veer actually less hard rock than I started out aspiring to. But, and and you know, I still can't really stay away from the hard rock and the distortion and the fuzz and stuff.
00:02:41
Speaker
I'm really quite enamored with fuzz right now. just trying to learn how to play with it, make it sound good. um You know, but...
00:02:53
Speaker
there's lots of other guitarists that I absolutely, I adore, but, you know, in terms of guitarists that have really shaped my playing in particular, you know, I could talk, I could listen to almost any accomplished guitarist talk about playing just because, and even if I don't particularly love their playing, you know, they're still devoted to the instrument and,
00:03:19
Speaker
And I think, you know, anyone who practices something and suffers with it, you know, you you feel a certain come camaraderie. Yeah. Even if you don't particularly love with what they do or it's not to your taste, you know, you're still practicing the same art.
00:03:38
Speaker
Co-sufferers. Co-sufferers, yeah.
Mentorship and Encouragement
00:03:41
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Well, where we're at now, we are we are past young, middle school, high school, even college hunter.
00:03:55
Speaker
um We have now entered...
00:04:00
Speaker
post-college, husband, soon-to-be parent hunter, I think, when this journey started? Or was it even after become a father? Oh, yeah. It was after, you know, I i plateaued for, like, for very long time.
00:04:17
Speaker
I could have started learning more many, many years ago, but... Okay, so when the first gray hair started to appear, the the shoulders and the back started to go a little bit. Yeah.
00:04:32
Speaker
You realize you need to sit down a little bit more, take some time. Yeah, you know. Blues more deeply entered your soul. Yeah, I mean...
00:04:44
Speaker
I think i just I just wanted more tools, more musical tools. And i really have to shout out um an older gentleman at my church who did a lot of playing in his younger years with with band played out, gigged out, very accomplished guitarist, lot of knowledge.
00:05:07
Speaker
and
00:05:09
Speaker
He like just came up to me out of his own accord and had had seen me playing at church. And just started asking me about guitar and stuff.
00:05:24
Speaker
And was able to get together with him a couple times and know showed me to some things. And and really just just encouraged me. you know Which was like...
00:05:37
Speaker
hugely validating for me because the, I didn't, I didn't ask for any He just, he just saw me playing and heard me and just came up to me and was like, you know, you've got something, but you, you have more to learn, you know, and I still have so much to learn, but that was one of the, you know, i really have to thank him for that. And I, and I do when I see him, um,
00:06:06
Speaker
and it encouraged me to just kind of learn because you know when you learn enough of the blues scale like i said in the first episode you can sort of transpose it on to other you know genres even on on happy sounding music um You know, you can you can transpose you can you can use the same patterns and licks and things and make it sound good and know enough of chords and stuff to to just be able to play with it.
00:06:43
Speaker
And
00:06:47
Speaker
practice, I would generally just kind noodle....
00:07:01
Speaker
So, you know, but you you can practice and not learn anything. Yeah. And so I just decided I was going to try and learn some new things. And so I started really just with with actually going back to Paul Kossoff and just saying like, okay, I'm just going to try and learn my favorite solo of his by ear.
Challenges of Learning by Ear
00:07:25
Speaker
Because i was really inspired by... you know, reading about Eric Clapton and um most of our favorite legendary guitarists who learn just by ear.
00:07:39
Speaker
um And I was just like, okay, I'm just going to try and learn the the Be My Friend solo by my ear.
00:08:09
Speaker
That's sort of the progression, you know, he was playing over. And I found that the notes were not that hard to learn. Um...
00:08:30
Speaker
But being able to make them sound like him was so much harder. And the way I approached it was i don't want to sound exactly like him. I just want to get ideas.
00:08:41
Speaker
And um it was really... Honestly, i think... That has been one of the biggest things is trying to learn things by ear has been so helpful to me because in order to do it, you have to like try and get inside the guitarist's head, you know, because you can look up a tab or a YouTube tutorial or something that can tell you what notes to play.
00:09:07
Speaker
But when you're listening by ear, you know, you you have to use your ear, which trains... your sense for pitch and things. Um, but you also have to look at the fretboard and sort of try and figure out what they're seeing and what they're thinking when they're playing the solo. You have like get in their head.
00:09:27
Speaker
Um, And it's so rewarding when you can figure it out. Yeah. Because you're like, oh my gosh, I'm playing along with Slash.
00:09:40
Speaker
Yeah. As he's doing the Sweet Child of Mine solo. You know, I was able to figure out the slow stuff. Not the really crazy wild things, but the...
00:10:06
Speaker
And again, i couldn't make it sound like Slash because
00:10:11
Speaker
you No, you can't make it sound like such. But you can figure out the notes and sort of get in the scales that are using. and And, you know, i would be i would be like, wow, i just I would never think of using that note in a song.
Admiration for Hotel California Solo
00:10:27
Speaker
um And i also then I went to the Hotel California solo, which to me, the Hotel California solo is...
00:10:40
Speaker
for me personally, it's like the greatest solo of all time. Guitar solo. Not necessarily because it's the hardest to play or because it's the most impressive or sounds the nicest or whatever, but just because it tells a story.
00:10:56
Speaker
And so many people that I talk to and like when they can, even if they're not guitars or interested in guitar at all, they listen to Hocal California and you're just totally entranced.
00:11:12
Speaker
And you're not waiting for the the words to come back. You're just totally entranced by what they're playing. And you're not it's not because you're so impressed with their super amazing guitar skills.
00:11:25
Speaker
It's just because they're they're telling a story and being emotional. And the notes, you know, it's not super... difficult to play it's difficult to play it like exactly in time and all that kind of stuff but you know the notes and and the scales and things it's not super complicated but so
00:12:17
Speaker
walt comes in it just keeps going, you know. You can keep playing it in your head and you know, hear it in the correct way, not the butchered way that I played it. But, um, I remember when I was, when I was playing it, I remember very specifically the note, um, where he goes, well, at the beginning, you know, like bending here.
00:12:40
Speaker
I just wouldn't have thought of bending here. Because it doesn't usually sound good. Yeah. Over that chord.
00:12:50
Speaker
Right here. But, Don Felder is following chords in the notes of the chords. And when you follow notes of the chords, you can bend on things that you just, you wouldn't normally think of bending on if you were playing in a normal blues progression or something like that.
00:13:05
Speaker
And maybe I'm just a novice blues player and I wouldn't figure that out. But, um, so that was one thing, but this note, the note here, that note,
00:13:23
Speaker
this This is like forbidden. I would never put my finger here. Like it just doesn't, you know, because the the scale would be.
00:13:34
Speaker
And that note is.
00:13:37
Speaker
Right there. It sounds wrong. Yeah.
00:13:46
Speaker
And then he he plays it again. He goes here and he bends up to it.
00:13:54
Speaker
But it works because it's part of the chord. And it just, the solo would not be the same without it.
00:14:04
Speaker
So, you know, little things like that where you just, that's where I am right now, is trying to learn things by ear and just and and it And it's helped. Like a lot of my playing, I play notes that I would never have played before.
00:14:18
Speaker
Or i do i do the thing where I bend up to the note. You know?
00:14:29
Speaker
Never would have done that before. Yeah. Several years ago. Makes sense. You brought up the Hotel California solo last night to me. And I couldn't fall asleep because I was just hearing it in my head. But you didn't even play it. didn't even play it. It's a note of it. Yeah.
00:14:51
Speaker
um Every time I hear it from now I'm going to be thinking about the note bending, which I've never thought about before. Never. Never once have I thought about, oh, at that point he's bending a note.
00:15:02
Speaker
Just, no. Bass players, you know, the strings are so thick. ah You know, you can't bend. You can't. I mean, there are some bass players that can do things that I still can't.
00:15:18
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Conceptualized. I mean, yeah. So. It's never-ending journey. Oh, yeah.
00:15:29
Speaker
Hotel California solo.
Jeff Beck's Unique Style
00:15:31
Speaker
Yeah. so and another part of this is, uh, eventually I, I settle on Jeff Beck. I just...
00:15:42
Speaker
Yeah, tell me about Jeff Beck. Why Jeff Beck? What makes him unique? Or, you know, what makes him stand out to you? Why why is he at the top of a mountain? Yeah, so I never really listened to Jeff Beck before, like, several years ago.
00:16:03
Speaker
And... I don't really know why. He's not quite as popular. He was basically kicked out of the Yardbirds when jamie and kate Jimmy Page came in and was really kind of overshadowed by Led Zeppelin, even though Led Zeppelin was sort of inspired by some of the stuff that Jeff Beck was doing with luther Rod Stewart and his group.
00:16:25
Speaker
But I just decided to listen to him because he was... I'd heard his name. I'd heard guitarists talk about him, guitarists that I really respected. Clapton talked about him. and um And Mark Knopfler did this, I think it was nearing COVID,
00:16:45
Speaker
It was... i'll I'll link it in the show notes. It's this song where he invited... I've listened to that so many times. Basically, you know, every famous guitarist you've ever heard of who's still alive to collaborate on this... over this... one of his chord progressions from one of his songs.
00:17:05
Speaker
And Jeff Beck does the opening lick on it. And it is such a distinctive opening lick. And it's just like... it sort of reconfigured my brain in a similar way, you know, listening to Jimi Hendrix, just listening to the lick.
00:17:21
Speaker
And yet, you know, the way Jeff Beck plays, he's not really... He's experimental, you know, he does a lot of things with with Gain and Fuzz and Wah and whatnot. But, you know, not quite in the same super aggressive or, like, crazy way that Jimmy did.
00:17:43
Speaker
But it's it's so emotional and pure. and And yet, you know, it's sort of in a similar way that Paul Koseff is. And yet, Jeff Beck's playing, you can tell, is really influenced by a lot more than the blues.
00:17:58
Speaker
And he's using a lot... more notes that I would never, ever think of using in a million years. And yet he just makes it work and speak. And part of my problem, i mean, i like the right jazz and certain jazz.
00:18:15
Speaker
Um... I think maybe partly the rate we have a radio station I listen to and sometimes the jazz sort of devolves into like the saxophone player like bludgeoning the audience with scales um which the right saxophone player can be absolutely amazing.
00:18:35
Speaker
But Jeff Beck you know he's kind of jazzy and he was influenced more I think by rock ability than blues initially. It's sort of like country playing like less ball.
00:18:46
Speaker
unless Paul, but the important thing to me about Jetpack is that
00:18:53
Speaker
he he lived, because Paul Kasev died probably at 25, think. Stevie Ray Vaughan died in a helicopter crash in his 20s.
00:19:08
Speaker
Jimi Hendrix died in his 20s. I think he was sort sort drug related, but, and tragedies, it's awful. you know yeah and But you know apart from that,
00:19:30
Speaker
i just, I think of you know what they would be doing now if they had kept playing. And Jeff Becker kept playing.
00:19:41
Speaker
and he stayed alive, and he kept experimenting. You know, you listen to what he was doing in the Yardbirds, and you listen to his career, and he just keeps learning. He keeps changing and learning, and gets influenced by new things, and he just keeps practicing. And when you listen to him play, one of my favorite, absolute favorite songs that he does is he did this live performance at the Hollywood Bowl.
00:20:08
Speaker
And he does this song called Scare for the Children. And he, you know, he he starts out with these, like, volumes swells.
00:20:36
Speaker
And then, you know, he he he turns on the wah and then he goes totally in the in the solo section.
00:20:47
Speaker
That's just, that's a very too good impression. But, you know. it's It's filled with so much emotion. um And if you listen to the lyrics of the song, you knowll and you'll understand it's about you know kind of what we...
00:21:09
Speaker
what our children inherit from us in the world that we've left them. yeah And in the solo, he actually pays a tribute to Jimi Hendrix where he does the
Legacy of Guitar Legends
00:21:24
Speaker
breakdown. And I think it's from...
00:21:27
Speaker
The Wind Cries Mary,
00:21:36
Speaker
um which is a pain tribute to Jimi Hendrix. And so to me, it's sort of like Jeff Beck, he's absorbing everything.
00:21:48
Speaker
And you could say that he was behind Jimi Hendrix when Jimi Hendrix was alive. and yet Jeff Beck kept playing and he incorporates it and you know one of the things I love to my knowledge he never tried to like directly cover one of Jimmy's songs or anything like that you know Steve Ray Vaughn did Little Wing um you know Steve Ray Vaughn is another one of those like virtuoso guitarists that people talk about a lot but um he Jeff Beck had so much respect for Jimmy.
00:22:24
Speaker
And, you know, that... that using that lick feels so much like a tribute to him. Yeah. And it makes me emotional, you know. just And the theme of the song and thinking about the way that our notes that we play can echo through time, past our lives.
00:22:47
Speaker
Jeff Beck's no longer with us now.
00:22:51
Speaker
And so, along with that, I guess...
00:22:58
Speaker
Do you have any questions? You said to me once, Hunter, that one of the beautiful things about guitarists is that they age like wine as they grow older.
Evolution of Aging Musicians
00:23:10
Speaker
You shared a little bit about that, that type of thing, just talking about Jeff Beck right now. I wonder if you could maybe speak a little bit more to what mean. Yeah.
00:23:20
Speaker
yeah So I i saw um ah saw The Who. was it fortunate enough to see The Who on like their, I think it was their 50th anniversary or something. Okay.
00:23:33
Speaker
Great experience. Roger Daltrey was still going, vocalist.
00:23:39
Speaker
And of course they did Won't Get Fooled Again and the big, you know, Roger Daltrey has a big like, you know, note, rock and roll note. And Vocalists, the vocal cords get old and I usually find, you know, older rock and roll gentlemen, you know, they they lived a pretty hard rock and roll life and was not kind to their vocal cords.
00:24:06
Speaker
Yeah. So... But guitarists, you know, if they can keep it together and if they don't, the tinnitus doesn't totally take them over because they're playing at such loud volumes and stuff. And actually, Pete Townsend and Jeff Beck both had tinnitus because they would just, you know, when they were younger, they just damaged their ears.
00:24:31
Speaker
But Pete Townsend was amazing. Just like... I think they they did Eminence Front and he was just all over the fretboard and just incredible to listen to.
00:24:45
Speaker
and and I was fortunate enough to see the Eagles later. Joe Walsh was there and it was just like... It was amazing. I loved i loved Joe Walsh too. he' I haven't gotten into him quite as much, but the way that he bends notes, he'll bring up notes...
00:25:03
Speaker
you know he'll bring of notes you know His part in Hoto, California starts with...
00:25:33
Speaker
a
00:25:42
Speaker
And the way that he can shake it up here. Yeah.
00:25:50
Speaker
You know, I can't do it like he does. And I'm trying to play... I'm like self-conscious because it's late and I don't want to wake the kids. But, you know, the amount of... don't know, I can't do it. Also, my wrist hurts because I strained my wrist opening a jar of salsa.
00:26:11
Speaker
Life is harsh he's hard. hard. and Again, you were just bending strings to show, in my mind... the guitarist would just continue to play the next note, not keep their fingers on the same note and bend the strings.
00:26:27
Speaker
Yeah. Like to get them... Just increasing tension, right? That's what you're doing. Yeah, you're making it shorter.
00:26:39
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Which raises a... Does it matter which way direction you go No. Okay. Yeah.
00:26:51
Speaker
yeah And actually, ah albert Albert King, one of the Kings, I i really should have mentioned B.B. King and Albert King and and Freddie King, some of the most in influenceentd influential electric guitarists of all time. um they Albert King, think, was left-handed, but when he learned, he he learned it upside he learned upside down. Because if you flip a guitar over...
00:27:18
Speaker
yeah the strings are upside down unless you decide to string it upside down. Yeah. You know, they didn't they weren't really making left-handed guitarists when he was learning to play.
00:27:30
Speaker
So he played upside down and a lot of his bends were... He would bend down instead of pushing up. Usually, know, most people learn to push up. But i do I do it both ways.
00:27:41
Speaker
Yeah. Depending on, you know, how I feel. And...
Jeff Beck's Whammy Bar Technique
00:27:48
Speaker
Segwaying to Jeff Beck, Jeff Beck is really known for his use of the whammy bar.
00:27:55
Speaker
Okay. Or the tremolo. um And the particular sound that you can get with it. um I don't have my guitar set up quite in the way that he could. He he had it set up so that he could bend up.
00:28:08
Speaker
I have it set up so that like I only go down. Really? Yeah.
00:28:16
Speaker
But it's very hard to use the whammy the way that he did because he used it so precisely. he would bend down maybe two or three notes with it and he would be able to hit them precisely. I generally, I'm trying to incorporate it a little more into my playing just because it's a really...
00:28:46
Speaker
It has a really unique...
00:28:57
Speaker
Beautiful. A lot of people just use it for, you know, like, it's called a dive bomb if you're playing something really well.
00:29:20
Speaker
When you go down like that. Sounds cool. But, you know, Jeff Beck would use it lyrically. And he he would have a whole... He had a whole song that was built around like a whammy bar
00:29:36
Speaker
composition. Like like a a melody. Like a riff. and It was it's so beautiful. I think it's... I'm going to link it in the show notes. I don't think it's cause we's because we've ended as lovers, but...
00:29:52
Speaker
something else. But, you know, he would do things like he would hit a harmonic, which is when you just lay your finger across the 12th fret, and it just rings out.
00:30:03
Speaker
But he would hit the harmonic,
00:30:07
Speaker
and then he would use the whammy bar....
00:30:20
Speaker
And I just, it's just so hard to use this precisely. Yeah. You know, it takes a whole nother level of practice and similar to kind of, you know, learning to use the slide. I have a little bit more experience with the slide because I used to do some open tuning.
00:30:37
Speaker
But when you're using a slide, because you're not anchored with your pitch on the frets, you really have to use your ear to make it sound on tune.
00:30:49
Speaker
um Because there's so much more variation. It's like, you know, if you just remove the frets from your guitar, which there are fretless basses in guitars, you know, violins are fretless and whatnot, but...
00:31:10
Speaker
So the only thing I can really approximate with Jetpack's whammy bar sound is is with a slide, trying to sort of make something like...
00:31:30
Speaker
Not even close to what his sound is, but, you know, it just... The whammy just has a whole different quality of note, and that's... I don't think anyone will ever be able to replicate it, honestly, just because it's so hard to use the tremolo bar in the way that
00:31:58
Speaker
the tone that he did. And...
00:32:09
Speaker
and That to me just demonstrates like the guitar is and an incredibly fiddly instrument. um You know, when you first pick it up, it's really discouraging because if you don't place your finger in the right place, you know, depending on where you place your finger, even behind a fret, it can sound a little bit off or out of tune.
00:32:45
Speaker
yeah And, you know, people are really impressed by fast guitar playing, but fast guitar playing just requires, like, so much fiddling with so many minute details, you know?
00:32:59
Speaker
So this the sound of it is, like, so much different than, like, what it seems to require to me is just, like, intense discipline and trying to get really fast and and that kind of thing. And Jeff Beck...
00:33:14
Speaker
He just experimented because, you know, if there's no one else to show you crazy things to do with the guitar, how do you figure it out? you just You just play the instrument all the freaking time and try to you know, figure out what what sounds to make.
00:33:33
Speaker
Like, one of my favorite, I watched a live performance of his, it's live at Ronnie Scott's, where it's this really interesting, he plays with like a drummer and a bassist, and there's actually Imogen, he comes up and sings couple songs, and some other people, but it's really, the camera work is really good, it's very intimate performance, and there's this one part where he, he takes the slide off, and he, he starts doing this over the pickups, and
00:34:10
Speaker
but it's in tune with the bass and with the melody of what he's been playing.
00:34:32
Speaker
So, so much, takes so much,
00:34:38
Speaker
So much practice and like just messing around to make different sounds. yeah and And Jeff Beck was a a big user of the Stratocaster, which is the guitar I'm playing.
Inspiration from the Stratocaster
00:34:53
Speaker
And that you know that's why he's at the top of the mountain for me. yeah Because he just makes sounds you know in a similar way to Jimi Hendrix. He makes sounds that... would never occur to anyone, to me or to anyone.
00:35:07
Speaker
And, you know, there's, there's shredders and really great guitarists who use, you know, metal guitars and and guitars that are more set up for playing really fast.
00:35:19
Speaker
But in my opinion, they just, they don't play with the tone that Jeff Beck does. Because he still retains the, like, the honesty and the, the, like, width of tone and the weight of tone that, like, Paul Kossoff has.
00:35:34
Speaker
And yet he's also doing these really intricate things and you watch him do his the thing that he does with the Wayman bar and it's almost like he's performing surgery on the guitar. It's amazing.
00:35:46
Speaker
It's amazing. Hunter would you take a minute or two and play us something in the style of Jeff Beck? Something that comes to you? Maybe something that he loved to play? I'll try.
00:36:01
Speaker
um'll try
00:37:31
Speaker
Thank you.
Improvisation Tribute to Jeff Beck
00:38:03
Speaker
guitar solo
00:38:59
Speaker
oh
00:41:27
Speaker
Mesmerizing. That was incredible. And Hunter, do you memorize that? Or is that the cuff? Where is that going from? No, that was improv-ing
00:41:41
Speaker
chord progression. I mean, I've been sort of messing around with the open chords.
00:41:55
Speaker
But the rest of it, you know, the licks and things are mostly just trying to improv around the scale. Lose notes. so I was trying to throw some bends in and use the whammy bar a bit. Yeah.
00:42:09
Speaker
So hard to to replicate the Jeff Beck. Yeah. That was incredible. I'll say one of the the greatest jazz bass player I've ever known.
00:42:21
Speaker
personally,
00:42:25
Speaker
shared with me that even his 60s, 70s, he's playing and preparing for a solo. If it was a 10 bar solo,
00:42:37
Speaker
um he would practice it 40 times, at least before. So means he's played 400
00:42:49
Speaker
for a 10 bar solo. Yeah. Which, you know, hopefully he's normally the playing 32, 40, you more bars. like And
00:43:02
Speaker
so much of, I mean, he was, he was the type of musician that he could, he could play anything he hummed. Yeah. He could just hum and just play those notes. He played a seven string bass. It was phenomenal. You've met him. was incredible.
00:43:15
Speaker
Um, But the the amount of blood, sweat, and tears, the amount of time, amount of depth of passion that goes into it.
Instruments as a Voice for Musicians
00:43:25
Speaker
And so in many ways, and this is what you've shared with us, your instrument becomes your voice yeah in ways that words can't communicate. Yeah.
00:43:41
Speaker
Yeah.
00:43:48
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, i think that's the other piece of Jeff Beck, because I discovered him at a time when I was sort of changing my amp setup. I wasn't super happy with my sound.
00:44:01
Speaker
I was using a ah modeling amp for a while. You know, I'll just say it wasn't the amp that was holding me back. um But it was a time when I was sort of...
00:44:17
Speaker
Social media, YouTube, gear reviews and things. You go on the internet and look for good amps, whatever. Very good at making you want more things. And more fancy pedals to make you sound better.
00:44:28
Speaker
More guitars, more amps, different speakers, whatever. What was really inspiring to me about Jeff Beck is that he used so little effects.
00:44:43
Speaker
You know, you watch him play... he's doing almost everything on his guitar in the way that the sound changes. You know, you can change, you have a, on a Strat, you have five different pickup positions.
00:44:59
Speaker
Les Pauli, you have like three, you know. He would change pickup positions. You have a tone knob, which makes the sound more bassy.
00:45:10
Speaker
Rolls off the top end.
00:45:25
Speaker
can and And so you can change shape the sound that way. You have a volume knob. You know, you can fade in notes so that you don't hear the picking.
00:45:37
Speaker
You can also do that with the pedals.
00:45:42
Speaker
like a volume pedal. Mark Knopfler would do that. Jeff Beck would mostly just use his his volume noms, his tone noms. You have different pickup positions. So like the neck pickup is
00:45:59
Speaker
Probably like my favorite sound. But when you're playing in a band, you want a little more bite.
00:46:09
Speaker
a this The bridge pickup drives it a little bit more. and I have an HSS stretch, but I have a humbucker here, which Jeff Beck didn't have a humbucker there. but You can do similar things. and Part of it coming to Jeff Beck after sort of having this...
00:46:34
Speaker
called gas gear acquisition syndrome, where you just want gear gassing for all this gear that you wanted. ah Sounds like you're in a video game.
00:46:45
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, oh it's a very... Music is the original video game. But
00:46:53
Speaker
I came to Jeff Beck, and I was like, he uses ah wa you know, to to get the wah sound occasionally, yeah no to make it talk.
00:47:07
Speaker
He... he basically has like one overdrive pedal or he like channel switches on his amp to go from clean to dirty. Or he just uses the volume because you can really control the amount of distortion with the volume knob if you set it up right, you know, and just the way that you play in the pickup positions that you use.
00:47:29
Speaker
Some drive it more than others.
00:47:38
Speaker
just all in playing. ye And he would use some reverb and some delay to just make fill out the space a little bit more, depending on where he was playing and how big the venue was.
00:47:53
Speaker
But, you know, it just totally, i won't say cured me of my gasp, but it just made me realize that, you know, Brought the point home because I think everyone knows that buying another pedal is not going to make you a better guitarist.
00:48:10
Speaker
Sometimes you just need to have it demonstrated and Jeff Beck really typifies that.
00:48:18
Speaker
they They had a... His wife like auctioned his guitars off. I think it was several years after his passing, and she said you know it was time to share his guitars.
Jeff Beck's Practical Approach to Guitars
00:48:33
Speaker
Clapton and Gilmore both did a huge guitar auction prior to that, and they had just huge collections. you know They're rock stars, of course. many guitars.
00:48:44
Speaker
Yeah. so many guitars yeah And i think, especially, i know that Clapton, I'm pretty sure he donated most of it to charity, but, I don't know, Gilmore probably did the same thing, but they were well kept, you know, they had people who, it was a collection.
00:49:03
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. but You have your money and what you know. Right. And they they did Jeff Beck's guitars, and... I don't know if the quant... I think there were less of them, but they were all just played in, like heavily used.
00:49:20
Speaker
Whereas, you know, Clapton Gilmore's, they had had a guitar that was played a few times. Most of Beck's guitars were just totally used. Like he would just buy them and just and just play them. He was just playing all the time.
00:49:33
Speaker
You know, um And that's that was really inspiring to me. And it's funny because I, for the longest time, ah really wanted it a Les Paul.
00:49:44
Speaker
Because my heroes, Paul Kossoff, Tommy Shaw, Slash, and Clapton played Strat. But i you know Paul Kossoff was like my guy for such a long time. I wanted a Les Paul.
00:50:01
Speaker
But this guitar was actually my wife's guitar that was gifted to her by her dad when my wife was learning some guitar as a teenager. And, you know, she she kept it and we got married and I ended up using this guitar.
00:50:16
Speaker
That's a Mexican Strat from like 2008.
00:50:22
Speaker
Not a super expensive guitar. Not like, not a super cheap one, but, you know, mid-range. And ah
00:50:33
Speaker
I just never really could justify the expense of buying a new guitar. And this guitar was so, so just good enough that I just never really, I never bought another guitar.
00:50:44
Speaker
And, but over time i just like, but I still wanted a Les Paul. And so I look at this guitar and be like, Oh, it's a good guitar, but I really want a Les Paul. And then over time, like you look at a Strat and the,
00:50:58
Speaker
You know, it has this, like, cutout on the back. It's thin. equal ah You could just... I just could just play it for hours because it's so comfortable. The neck is, like...
00:51:11
Speaker
Beautiful, beautiful to play. It's so comfortable, but it's not too thin or too short for me. it just it just feels like a part of my arm putting it on. yep and over time, i've just you know i got into Jeff Beckett. He played a Strat, was like his main guitar, because you could get such a diversity of sound from it with the tone and the different pickup positions and the tremolo bar.
00:51:38
Speaker
Most Les Pauls don't have ah whammy bar. and And so now I'm like, really, i love this Strat. You know, I don't need... Of course, if if I had the money and I could justify it and I had the space, of course I'd love to get other your guitars and play them, but but I don't need them.
00:51:59
Speaker
You know, you can get... the The entry point now for good sounding amp is, you know, it's not really about money as much as it's about how much time you want to put in and and experiment with it. And I've really tried to be inspired by Jeff Beck in not, you know, using pedals to shape my sound so much as the guitar. And part of that is, you know, letting go of the pick and in using fingers and
00:52:32
Speaker
So that's where I am. Amazing.
00:52:44
Speaker
Well, this has been incredibly inspiring and a great learning experience for me. i mean, I've known you for many years.
00:52:55
Speaker
I've played a lot of music with you. We've talked about music, we've talked about guitars, talked about the blues many times. We've never gotten a chance to dive into
00:53:12
Speaker
what's made you the musician, or the musicians that have made you the musician. You are the storytellers that have shaped you and continue to I'm sure... the five years, ten years from now...
00:53:33
Speaker
You'll probably have a different top of the mountain. that your Your story will continue with... Your continued growth and the more listen.
00:53:44
Speaker
Hunter, is there anything you want to leave us with? Is there any any last bit of...
00:53:52
Speaker
Story you want to share... before you close us out with something that is is can communicate more deeply than words?
00:54:05
Speaker
I'll try.
00:54:26
Speaker
I guess something I'm realizing now and maybe this is an excuse for never being happy with my playing, you know, and not being quite accomplished enough to demonstrate with but covers and things exactly what I want it, how want
Emotional Impact of Music vs. Technical Prowess
00:54:49
Speaker
it to sound. But um something I'm realizing is that what I value when I'm playing guitar or listening is not how technically good or knowledgeable the guitarist is,
00:55:10
Speaker
but what they're able to say with the tools that they have. um
00:55:18
Speaker
And great playing to me is playing that moves you. And if you look at musicians and artists...
00:55:25
Speaker
you know, people who who who don't play music, you know. Music is not just for musicians. In a way, we're sort of all musicians when we listen. Because music is about what you hear and about what you feel.
00:55:40
Speaker
it's it's It's spirit, you know.
00:55:45
Speaker
And maybe... you think I'm an amateur or you think you would never be able to do something like something I've done, uh, but, and what you've heard, but you don't have to do that.
00:56:01
Speaker
You know, it, it, it's, when I listen to a song and I try to learn it, learn it, I'm really just trying to figure out more tools to have and more notes that I might be able to throw in when I'm playing or something to, to have more tools to express what I want to say.
00:56:17
Speaker
But, um, All that really matters is if you can write a song that makes you feel something, or words that make you feel something. And I think some of the the greatest bands that we know of, like, you know, the Beatles or Bruce Springsteen, very popular artists who wrote music that means a lot to people, lots of other examples.
00:56:42
Speaker
Blues musicians did not, were not educated in a music school You know, they had probably one guitar and maybe like three sets of strings throughout their whole life.
00:56:56
Speaker
And yet they were able to create the music that this inspired rock legends, you know, because they used their ears and their heart.
00:57:09
Speaker
So, you know, with the electric guitar in particular...
Blues as Redemption of Pain
00:57:16
Speaker
There's this sort of like samurai aspect to it, typified by like, you know, the Steve Ray Vaughan approach where you're sort of a slinger, you know, guitar duels and whatnot, which very entertaining, takes a lot of skill and stuff.
00:57:32
Speaker
But at the end of the day, for me, that's not what it's about. And staying focused on saying something... beautiful and when that moves somebody or can
00:57:50
Speaker
give them relief for a little bit from this this world. I like to think of the blues as redeeming your pain.
00:58:03
Speaker
Not just voicing it. Yeah.
00:58:35
Speaker
a
00:59:02
Speaker
Amen.
00:59:48
Speaker
I'm sorry.
01:00:47
Speaker
I'm sorry.