Latest / Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast / PODCAST: Episode 903 - Alex Skolnick (Testament) Previews Metal Allegiance Live in Concert, and Talks "Black Horizon"

Transcript

PODCAST: Episode 903 - Alex Skolnick (Testament) Previews Metal Allegiance Live in Concert, and Talks "Black Horizon" · Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast

• 0:00
  Yeah, one of the fun things about the project is that we get
• 0:03
  everybody together and it doesn't matter how big the band
• 0:06
  is, it doesn't matter how many records anybody has sold or the
• 0:10
  draw that they've played for. We just get in the room and it's
• 0:16
  just a bunch of friends. It's a big hang.
• 0:25
  What's up everybody? It's Kefi.
• 0:26
  It goes cold. mag.com. I am joined once again by Alex
• 0:29
  Skolnick of Testament. But today we're talking mostly
• 0:32
  about metal allegiance. How are you doing?
• 0:34
  I'm good. Dan, how you doing?
• 0:36
  I'm so good, I am so good. Great to catch up with you on
• 0:39
  this weekend. I also talked to Chuck on the
• 0:41
  weekend, by the way. It was pretty funny.
• 0:42
  Chuck. Billy was fresh from the golf
• 0:44
  course in his golf, adorable giant and adorable in his golf
• 0:48
  outfit. I'm sure he doesn't want to
• 0:49
  refer to himself as adorable, but big House of Blues metal
• 0:53
  allegiance anniversary show around the NAMM show Anaheim
• 0:58
  House of Blues in January I'm we're ghost cult will be there
• 1:02
  in some way shape or form. I might make an appearance.
• 1:05
  We'll see. And I'm so just so, so pleased
• 1:08
  to talk to you. And my funny anecdote is that so
• 1:11
  we're approaching like our 900th podcast and probably thousands
• 1:15
  of interviews over 13 years at Ghost Call.
• 1:17
  But our first podcast interview was with you for Metal
• 1:20
  Allegiance at Duff's Alcohol Abuse Center in Brooklyn.
• 1:23
  And of course, that was with our buddy Trevor Sternod.
• 1:26
  Rest in power. But so great to has very nice
• 1:29
  bookend for me on this anniversary event for Metal
• 1:33
  Allegiance. Man, how's it feel?
• 1:34
  Oh, it's, you know, it's great. I mean, it's obviously very
• 1:38
  still hard about Trevor. You know, we didn't know him
• 1:43
  well. I never had met him before.
• 1:45
  We worked with him in Metal Allegiance and then that started
• 1:49
  and they very quickly just became like family with us.
• 1:53
  And then as quickly as he came in, he was gone.
• 1:55
  So we miss him a lot, but as far as the current state of
• 2:02
  Medallegiance and the upcoming shows, we're we're definitely
• 2:05
  feeling good about that. It's going to be an exciting
• 2:08
  night. It's always fun, it's always a
• 2:09
  different set, it's always a different group of players and
• 2:13
  this year is going to be no different.
• 2:15
  Right on. I'm so pumped.
• 2:16
  I did. I distinctly remember those
• 2:18
  amazing New York shows and and I'm a big power Drunk Majesty
• 2:23
  fan also. Like, I still listen to that
• 2:24
  record every so often and, and, you know, it gives me a boost.
• 2:28
  I love the old school, the thrash metal, the heavy metal
• 2:31
  and I love all the things the assorted players can come
• 2:34
  together and combine with. It's got to be, you know, also
• 2:39
  super. You know, I know that you're a
• 2:42
  person, you like to keep challenging yourself and your
• 2:44
  art. And I love that.
• 2:45
  You know, it's always, like you said, new collaborators, new
• 2:48
  challenges, new songs. So I'm really pumped about that
• 2:51
  as well. Like, you know, beside the core
• 2:54
  group, the the guests are, you know, huge luminaries of the
• 2:58
  business, not just for not just your friends too, but like huge,
• 3:01
  you know, huge names, huge talents.
• 3:03
  Absolutely. And yeah, one of the fun things
• 3:07
  about the project is that we get everybody together and it
• 3:10
  doesn't matter how big the band is.
• 3:12
  It doesn't matter how many records anybody has sold or the
• 3:16
  draw that they've played for. We just get in the room and it's
• 3:22
  just a bunch of friends. It's a big hang.
• 3:24
  We we go out there and we play. And I think that the audience
• 3:29
  feels the enthusiasm. It doesn't matter.
• 3:32
  You know, we've had musicians that are sort of on their way
• 3:36
  up, young up, up and comers jumping in every now and then.
• 3:39
  Last year we had somebody as big as Robert Trujillo joined us on
• 3:45
  War Pigs, which was epic. I wish we could do that this
• 3:49
  year, especially in in light of the the Great Oz having having
• 3:53
  left us. But maybe that was a an early
• 3:57
  tribute and and yeah, I guess also at that time we knew that
• 4:02
  the Black Sabbath final show was going to happen.
• 4:06
  So that was partly in tribute to that.
• 4:07
  But it but the point, the point being that whatever level
• 4:11
  anybody is on as far as you know, being well known or
• 4:15
  probably it all goes out the window and it's just a bunch of
• 4:19
  brothers and sisters. We got some great lady musicians
• 4:23
  that have been part of the thing as well.
• 4:25
  And that's I don't want to give away everything about the
• 4:28
  upcoming show, but that's going to that would be the case coming
• 4:31
  up as well. We definitely don't want to
• 4:33
  spoil surprises. This interview will run before
• 4:35
  the show. And yeah, I'm.
• 4:38
  I'm particularly pumped. You know, I think it's going to
• 4:41
  be super neat. They're always so fun, these
• 4:44
  shows. And I think there's a little
• 4:45
  something for everybody. You know, obviously guitar nerds
• 4:49
  love coming to these things because, you know, it's always
• 4:52
  like a cavalcade of axe slingers.
• 4:55
  But yeah, the, the, I imagine like, you know, most, you know,
• 4:59
  most ego falls away when it comes to something like this.
• 5:02
  And you know, everybody said, you know, you hope everyone's a
• 5:06
  professional. And but you know, I feel like in
• 5:09
  general, especially for metal, a lot of people are just a good
• 5:13
  family vibe and love to come together for something like
• 5:16
  this. So you go back to the time when
• 5:18
  collabs were not as commonplace as they are now.
• 5:21
  Features and collabs were not a thing as much.
• 5:24
  It had to really be arranged with lawyers and labels and
• 5:27
  permissions and things. And now it's a lot more loosey
• 5:29
  goosey. Everybody can get together and
• 5:30
  jam live or maybe jump on a record and do some a guest spot
• 5:34
  or guest solo. It's a lot of fun these days.
• 5:36
  Yeah, you're right. It was a lot more complicated
• 5:39
  some time ago. And it also could be scandalous,
• 5:44
  you know, somebody from one band playing with another band or me,
• 5:48
  God forbid, you know, playing a different genre of music, you
• 5:52
  know, what is he doing playing with these sort of jazz, jazz,
• 5:56
  rock, virtuoso play, you know, and now it's totally accepted.
• 6:01
  I think there's something called the the Overton Window, which is
• 6:07
  this, this theory that, you know, what's accepted completely
• 6:12
  changes and and what's forbidden becomes the norm.
• 6:17
  And now it's normal. You know, it's normal to play in
• 6:20
  multiple bands and even more than one genre of music.
• 6:24
  I'm all for it. I'm glad that others have caught
• 6:28
  on to it and it's it's not. I don't feel so alone in wanting
• 6:33
  to be a diverse musician as well as committed when I'm playing
• 6:37
  heavy metal. Right on.
• 6:38
  I know people have their, you know, especially some gatekeeper
• 6:43
  vibes in the metal community, but I think it's, you know, well
• 6:46
  established that, you know, obviously you have your your
• 6:48
  other musical endeavors and I'm a huge fan of your jazz work.
• 6:51
  I've gotten to see you trio play, and I'm a big jazz nerd.
• 6:55
  I was raised by two jazz, you know, super fans basically who
• 6:59
  used to go to like the Big Apple in Harlem and stuff like that
• 7:02
  and Iridium and Blue Note and the original, the OG stuff.
• 7:06
  And so I grew up around a lot of jazz.
• 7:09
  So when I heard you were first getting into that, I was so
• 7:11
  pumped. You know, my mom used to rattle
• 7:13
  off jazz guitarists and singers to me.
• 7:15
  So it's kind of second nature to me, on top of being a weird
• 7:18
  meddler and a progressive rock nerd and things like that.
• 7:21
  And then you find out a lot of your heroes also love jazz.
• 7:24
  Like, you go back through, like, Pink Floyd's catalog and like,
• 7:27
  Rick Wright is just channeling Thelonious Monk half the time,
• 7:30
  you know, beautiful nods to him and Horace Silver and people
• 7:34
  like that. And, you know, do you still get
• 7:36
  people who are weirded out by your jazz stuff like, or just
• 7:40
  that the fact that you have a separate career?
• 7:42
  I'll just add John Lord to that as well.
• 7:44
  Huge. Yeah, I mean John Lord.
• 7:46
  Yeah, playing Morgan especially, you know, just listen to the
• 7:51
  Deep Purple made in Japan. You know, you can tell he's
• 7:55
  coming from like, you know, Jimmy Smith and Doctor Lonnie
• 7:58
  Smith and you can tell he's put in his time listening to those
• 8:02
  guys. I mean, there's, there's so much
• 8:04
  overlap. So the yeah, the idea that, you
• 8:08
  know, jazz, jazz music is something you shouldn't listen
• 8:11
  to is, is insane. And even all the drummers, all
• 8:15
  the classic metal drummers from, you know, Ian Pace, he talks
• 8:20
  about Gene Krupa. Bonham was a big, I believe he
• 8:26
  was a buddy rich man. I know Neil Kurt was certainly a
• 8:31
  buddy rich man. He put it together this whole
• 8:33
  event and tribute to Buddy. So yeah, a bunch of knucklehead
• 8:37
  gatekeepers that really have no contribution to the music post
• 8:43
  throwing out a bunch of comments, which is yeah, OK,
• 8:49
  fine. If that makes you feel better,
• 8:53
  I'm sorry, what was the questioning?
• 8:54
  No, you're good because I was going to say my, my segue to
• 8:57
  that was, you know, they love you and they want to keep you
• 9:00
  for them. And I respect that because like
• 9:02
  what you put down over, you know, 35 plus, you know, more
• 9:06
  than 35 years with testament from your teenagehood to now,
• 9:10
  you know, is obviously huge. But you know, people, they get
• 9:13
  passionate about what they love, but hopefully they're they're
• 9:16
  more, you know, lenient and forgiving and not so most.
• 9:21
  Most people are now, yeah. But yeah, some, some, yeah, some
• 9:27
  people. It's not, it's not just that
• 9:29
  they're protective of what, what they love.
• 9:31
  They they kind of interfere with it in a way by, you know, saying
• 9:35
  you should, you shouldn't be doing this, you shouldn't be.
• 9:38
  And yeah, who, who are these people?
• 9:40
  Like what, what purpose do you serve?
• 9:44
  So, yeah, obviously I've been through that.
• 9:46
  But it it's great to be on the other side where for the most
• 9:51
  part those those people are ratioed and told to shut the
• 9:54
  hell up as they should be. These days, damn it.
• 9:59
  Yeah, yeah. And then of course, yeah, some,
• 10:02
  you know, young, younger ones, you know, become of age, you
• 10:05
  know, guys who were like little kids back then.
• 10:09
  Suddenly they become, you know teens and angry 20 somethings
• 10:14
  and they have computers and spout their their opinions.
• 10:19
  Get out and touch grass, people. No, no.
• 10:23
  Of course, you know, maybe also. Do what I do.
• 10:26
  Yeah, I think also maybe the prevalence of bands like
• 10:30
  Polyphia and Animals As Leaders, and Between the Buried and Me
• 10:33
  also kind of flying the banner for different kinds of music,
• 10:37
  different genres, and mixing that with metal and heavy music
• 10:41
  definitely has helped educate people.
• 10:44
  Yes and yeah, those are. That's a great example, Animals
• 10:48
  As Leaders. I know, you know, Tosun Abbasi
• 10:50
  is a huge jazz fan and I see him commenting on the accounts of,
• 10:56
  you know, jazz musicians I follow that we both appreciate.
• 10:59
  Like, you know, Julian Lodge, for example, amazing, amazing
• 11:03
  guitar player. Even Dave Davidson of the band
• 11:09
  Revocation, who plays jazz well and like really knows what he's
• 11:14
  doing. And so it's great to, you know,
• 11:17
  this is, this is okay, this can be a thing.
• 11:19
  It exists. And I think there will be more
• 11:22
  of us in the future. Right on, right on.
• 11:25
  I, I love that, you know, the metal allegiance, just Nam is a
• 11:28
  good excuse to bring everybody together.
• 11:30
  It brings people down to Southern California.
• 11:32
  The Nam show has been a thing for a very long time.
• 11:35
  And I know it's kind of changed over the years, you know, do
• 11:38
  you, is it affect your participation now that it's much
• 11:42
  more of a fan event than business to business?
• 11:45
  Not necessarily. I think I think it's good.
• 11:49
  I think it's good that it's opened up and you know, fans can
• 11:52
  attend. You don't have to exclusively be
• 11:56
  connected to a music manufacturer or a music store or
• 12:00
  music education program. Obviously they should take
• 12:04
  precedence. That's really what it's about.
• 12:06
  It's about the the other people that keep the music industry
• 12:11
  humming as far as the equipment goes.
• 12:15
  And yeah, music sales, retail and education.
• 12:20
  But there's, you know, there, there's room.
• 12:22
  I mean, it's, I think it's good to open it up to the public.
• 12:24
  I think it's good to expose emerging musicians to it.
• 12:29
  And it's, it's fun to meet fans. It's fun to be walking around
• 12:33
  and just meet so many people that I can't believe you're
• 12:36
  walking around. And it's such an opportunity for
• 12:39
  them to say hello. You know, they don't really get
• 12:41
  the opportunity at a big metal concert when there's over 1000
• 12:45
  people. And I'd love to go out and hang
• 12:48
  out with the crowd, but it would be a bit too much of A zoo.
• 12:51
  But I also tell people go come see me and we got one of my
• 12:53
  instrumental shows and and they do.
• 12:55
  And that's, you know, usually, you know, maybe, you know, in
• 13:01
  the hundreds or less, it's a much more manageable crowd.
• 13:05
  And I, I come out, I can say hi to everybody and it's a great,
• 13:09
  it's a great hang. Yeah, it's great that you can
• 13:11
  still have that intimacy with the fans.
• 13:14
  I I had a great. Quote am is, is a good, you
• 13:17
  know, a good opportunity for folks to come and say hello to
• 13:21
  us. Right on.
• 13:21
  Speaking of the gear side for a quick second, I got a great
• 13:24
  quote a couple of years ago from Misha Mansour of Periphery as
• 13:28
  pedals and plug insurance and things and other other stuff.
• 13:31
  And he was saying like the that Nam separates the wheat from the
• 13:35
  chaff in terms of a their equipment brands, in terms of
• 13:39
  like who's a really good work, like a managed dwell brand.
• 13:43
  So he was like, if you need Nam to kind of make your whole year
• 13:46
  like a Black Friday used to be in retail, maybe it's not the
• 13:49
  best for you. But he has said that, like, he
• 13:52
  likes the idea that a product can emerge from Nam and become
• 13:58
  like a big, you know, well, you know, loved and embraced and
• 14:01
  bought product like a pedal or a guitar.
• 14:03
  So I think that's really, really cool. 100%, yeah, I've seen that
• 14:07
  happen. I've seen total upstarts develop
• 14:11
  into, you know, widely respected brands.
• 14:14
  Right on. In terms of your own playing,
• 14:16
  obviously you're working nonstop.
• 14:18
  You have all these different things.
• 14:19
  You're just having the New Testament record.
• 14:20
  Parabellum is out now, a nuclear blast.
• 14:22
  Like, what is your daily playing routine like these days?
• 14:25
  I always try to return to that question and see if it's changed
• 14:29
  over the years. I really depends on what I'm
• 14:31
  working on, what's coming up. This week I'm doing a tour with
• 14:36
  a group called Pact, which stands for Percy Alex, Kenny
• 14:41
  Tim. That's Percy Jones from the
• 14:43
  great 70s jazz rock band Brand X that has featured great drummers
• 14:49
  including Phil Collins, pre pop star Phil Collins and Kenwood
• 14:53
  Dennard. So I'm working on most of it's
• 14:58
  improvised, so I'm working on a lot of my improvisation.
• 15:02
  There's a lot of gear involved with that, so I'm looking at my
• 15:06
  sound effects. But last night I played a solo
• 15:10
  gig for somebody in the entertainment industry and there
• 15:16
  were a bunch of well known entertainment names there,
• 15:21
  including some several in the metal world.
• 15:25
  I don't, I don't know if this will be public knowledge or
• 15:28
  whatever, but there were, there were members of Mastodon and
• 15:31
  Lamb of God and they asked me to play solo acoustic guitar and
• 15:38
  sort of the stuff I do with my trio, which is like arrangements
• 15:42
  where I play the melody and, and, and so I, I did that, but I
• 15:46
  put together a whole bunch of new arrangements.
• 15:48
  And this week, yeah, I've mostly been playing what I guess you'd
• 15:51
  call it chord melody, acoustic guitar.
• 15:54
  And it's been a real workout because when you have to be the
• 15:57
  band just forces you to drill down on your accuracy, your time
• 16:02
  and everything. So that's a whole other thing.
• 16:04
  In March of Testaments got some activity coming up.
• 16:08
  I don't think it's announced, so I can't really talk about it.
• 16:10
  But let's, it's just say my calendar.
• 16:13
  We have a, a group calendar and there is something on there and
• 16:18
  I we're going to be rehearsing. So as that approaches, I'll
• 16:22
  definitely be working on whatever Testament songs are
• 16:28
  going to be rehearsed. Some of them we've played for
• 16:31
  years. I could probably play them
• 16:34
  blindfolded and strung upside down.
• 16:37
  I don't need to rehearse those. But then you've got the newer
• 16:39
  ones and then occasional songs that may be old that we haven't
• 16:42
  played in a long time. So that determines what I
• 16:45
  practice as well. But I also, I have a collection
• 16:49
  of favorite players, favorite tracks that I like to warm up
• 16:55
  to, and it includes everyone from Alan Holdsworth to W
• 17:00
  Montgomery to John Schofield to Eddie Van Halen.
• 17:07
  Maybe I'll sneak a little bit of Ingvae in there.
• 17:09
  Just really, all really challenging guitar stuff in
• 17:13
  challenging in different ways. And I'll often warm up to this
• 17:18
  music no matter what the gig is. And I know what you know, when I
• 17:22
  can play along and sort of feel like it's not embarrassing, then
• 17:26
  I know I'm warmed up. Well, I hate to see what you
• 17:28
  think is embarrassing. That's awesome.
• 17:32
  And I imagine for the Metal Allegiance gig, it's not just
• 17:35
  running through some of that original material from that band
• 17:38
  and those albums, but also like a whole collection of covers,
• 17:42
  some that are probably very familiar with to you and some
• 17:44
  that are maybe, you know, out of your, you know, element and you
• 17:47
  have to learn or relearn in some cases.
• 17:49
  I bet that's a lot of fun. It is, it's fun.
• 17:52
  It's it's a bit of a challenge. These are songs we grew up with.
• 17:56
  A lot of them are very easy to hum or they're very easy to play
• 18:01
  a basic version of the riff. But to play them accurately,
• 18:05
  when you get in there and you realize the, you know, the, the
• 18:09
  fine details and how the note starts and how it stops and, and
• 18:15
  then the arrangements of the tunes.
• 18:17
  How many times does this Part A happen?
• 18:19
  How many times does Part B happening?
• 18:21
  OK, there's a slight variation between Part A when it's played
• 18:26
  the third time around, you know, all that stuff that, that then
• 18:31
  it becomes a challenge. Even with music you think you
• 18:34
  know and that you think is relatively simple.
• 18:37
  And the same is true of the Medal of Allegiance of
• 18:39
  Originals. Even though this is music that
• 18:42
  I've recorded and most, in many cases written, it's still, it's
• 18:48
  like, it's like hearing somebody else because it's not played
• 18:51
  often. It's not like Testament where
• 18:53
  I'm, you know, playing dozens upon dozens, maybe hundreds of
• 18:58
  shows within a year or two, a couple years.
• 19:01
  You know, this battle allegiance.
• 19:03
  Yeah, we have. We just have occasional shows.
• 19:05
  So yeah, I have to get back in there and get my feet wet and,
• 19:10
  you know, get to the point where I can play through a whole set
• 19:14
  list and that. Yeah, it's definitely easier
• 19:16
  said than done, but it's fun. Right on, I love that.
• 19:18
  Do you have any specific gear that you bring out for something
• 19:23
  like metal allegiance A1 off? It's not you don't need your
• 19:25
  whole tour case of gear, right? Do you have like a, you know, a
• 19:30
  travel set basically? Yeah, I mostly do use one guitar
• 19:33
  for that. I can switch from drop D tuning
• 19:38
  on certain songs. And yeah, it's, it's different.
• 19:42
  It's I, I'll also, I, I bring my, my little it's called the
• 19:48
  Quad Cortex. It's an amp modeler that I've
• 19:51
  been using with assessment for, for a few years.
• 19:53
  But I also have pedals that I don't normally use with
• 19:58
  assessment that I do use with all my instrumental rock
• 20:02
  project. So I I bring this extra pedal
• 20:04
  board that you know has. Extra sounds and I I play
• 20:09
  through a rig that it's, it's by Orange amps, a great company and
• 20:16
  outside of Testament and I think, you know, even with
• 20:19
  Testament, I'm. I'm going to start using these
• 20:21
  amps soon. It's just been working out
• 20:23
  really well. But yeah, for Medal Allegiance,
• 20:25
  it's like I I need many more sounds than I have with
• 20:29
  Testament where it's yeah, it's basically a very specific sound
• 20:32
  for that band. But if I'm, you know, if I'm
• 20:34
  going to be playing a song by Black Sabbath or, you know, UFO
• 20:39
  especially, you have some of these 70s songs.
• 20:41
  Yeah, you can't really. I'm, I'm not a huge Waath player
• 20:44
  with Testament, but with, you know, if I'm going to play Lick
• 20:49
  by Michael Shanker, I need that Waath.
• 20:52
  You know, I've always respected that about you.
• 20:54
  You know, you're you're very self reliant player and of
• 20:57
  course we all love effects, everything that, you know, Tom
• 21:01
  Schatz and Jimi Hendrix and Eddie gave us and everybody
• 21:03
  else. And but I've always respected
• 21:06
  that. You're mostly like, to me,
• 21:07
  you're like the most like Jimmy Page of any metal guitarist
• 21:10
  where you play Mason, you know, just mainly right into the rig
• 21:13
  and and not a lot of effects in the signal chain.
• 21:16
  So I've always respected that about you.
• 21:17
  Like really tremendous. Everything comes from you and
• 21:20
  your fingers and your brain, which is, you know, amazing.
• 21:23
  I think it's easy to get lost in the effect.
• 21:26
  Yeah, it's weird to me that Jimmy Page is also just to talk
• 21:28
  about Zeppelin for a second. It's always weird to me that
• 21:31
  people just, like, compartmentalize him to the guy
• 21:34
  with the bow and the E bow and the slide.
• 21:36
  But he was so much more than that.
• 21:37
  He was trying to do so much, you know, like almost orchestrating
• 21:41
  the guitar in so many ways beyond just a bunch of tracks.
• 21:44
  And they get it wrong, and they get a lot of things about
• 21:46
  Zeppelin wrong. But like I always marvel that
• 21:48
  people are just like, oh, the guy with the bow and confused
• 21:51
  was the second record bro. Like I saw many more times and
• 21:55
  things like that. That's early.
• 21:57
  You forget to also he there was so much experience going into
• 22:01
  that. Paige had already been a studio
• 22:03
  guitarist and recorded for pop artists and just really, you
• 22:08
  know, had a leg up. He knew how records were made.
• 22:11
  He saw the process. He toured with The Yardbirds.
• 22:15
  So he was really this season pro when he so yes.
• 22:20
  And not to take anything away of how great he was with Led
• 22:24
  Zeppelin and how great Led Zeppelin was, but it also it
• 22:27
  wasn't a case of, you know, these guys got to get and they
• 22:30
  just found this magic. I mean, there was it was it was
• 22:33
  magic, but a lot of experience predated that in the 60s.
• 22:38
  So it just converged at the right time.
• 22:40
  Right on. Did you see the Becoming Led
• 22:42
  Zeppelin documentary? I thought it was amazing that.
• 22:44
  Was amazing. Yeah.
• 22:45
  I love that. I'm behind.
• 22:46
  They need to catch up on The Beatles doc that the Anthology
• 22:49
  series that came out. It's all interviews from the
• 22:52
  band. There's a scene in that movie
• 22:54
  where they show a poster for a concert and one of the groups
• 22:58
  they're playing with, it's called the Liverpool Scene and
• 23:00
  it's got their names on it and one of the names is Percy Jones,
• 23:04
  who I'm I'm working with. It was so cool to see that.
• 23:07
  Amazing. Nice.
• 23:08
  I love how things come full circle.
• 23:10
  As always, just a few more questions for you man.
• 23:13
  I really appreciate your time on this weekend morning.
• 23:16
  I'm sure you know, I bet you were an early riser.
• 23:18
  I'm not, but I've I've been getting up early this week
• 23:21
  personal stuff, but you know, do you like at what point in your
• 23:25
  day do you get up and play a little guitar to start the day?
• 23:27
  Do you have like rehearsal time book later?
• 23:30
  I know I'm returning to that again but just curious it.
• 23:34
  Really. Yeah, it really depends on the
• 23:35
  day. Yeah.
• 23:37
  Last night I had a show, this one I was telling you about, and
• 23:41
  it went late. So I got up a little closer to 9
• 23:46
  because I needed sleep that, but that's late for me.
• 23:48
  Usually during the week I can be up at, I'm often up at 6:00 or
• 23:52
  7:00 just because there's so much to do.
• 23:55
  It's not just guitar playing. I mean, there's booking flights.
• 23:59
  Yeah, with my own band, because I have, I have a tour coming up
• 24:02
  with my trio right around right before NAMM.
• 24:06
  So I'm also making arrangements for that and playing, you know,
• 24:10
  flights, hotels, backline gear and tons of other stuff.
• 24:15
  So yeah, I got you gotta gotta probably get get that stuff out
• 24:18
  of the way. Once I feel sort of under
• 24:19
  control on the business side and emails and stuff, then at some
• 24:24
  point in the morning I'll, I'll play guitar It, I don't know if
• 24:28
  it's, it's usually not that early.
• 24:31
  That's usually. But yeah, maybe around, I don't
• 24:33
  know, 9 or 10 and I start very slow.
• 24:36
  I allow myself time to ease into it.
• 24:38
  I I find that helps a lot. I'm, I'm not the fastest sight
• 24:43
  reader. I've gotten better at it and I
• 24:45
  can do it, but it's also something I need.
• 24:49
  I can, I can always use work on and it causes me to focus and
• 24:53
  not play too much and just go slow.
• 24:55
  And I find that's really helpful.
• 24:57
  So I, I often start with that and then in between reading
• 25:02
  notes, I play a little bit and those that little bit warms me
• 25:06
  up. And usually after, I don't know,
• 25:09
  certainly by half hour, but often earlier, even like 10 or
• 25:12
  15 minutes. I'm really starting to feel more
• 25:15
  like myself. And yeah, once I've done that
• 25:18
  initial early in the day, easing into things, then then I'm, I'm
• 25:23
  good to go. Then I can work on, you know,
• 25:25
  more challenging music. But I also try to allow space
• 25:30
  for composition, which often happens by accident.
• 25:33
  Sometimes during my morning warm up, I just catch myself playing
• 25:37
  something that sounds interesting and worth saving.
• 25:40
  And now I'm off on this other tangent.
• 25:42
  And then I have to make a decision.
• 25:43
  OK, Do I want to arrange now? Do I want to work on this song
• 25:47
  or do I want to put it in the drawer and come back to it
• 25:50
  another time? So every day is completely
• 25:52
  different. And some days you snuff out
• 25:55
  morons on social media over politics because they think they
• 25:58
  can come for you and they didn't know how smart you were.
• 26:02
  That's true too. That's that's always fun too.
• 26:05
  Yeah, well, we have to maintain a united front in general these
• 26:09
  days because it just seems like the world has gone crazy and.
• 26:12
  It's gone a little crazy. Yeah.
• 26:14
  And there's I just I have a problem with selective outrage.
• 26:21
  And what about ISM is also terrible?
• 26:23
  Not for me, yeah. Absolutely.
• 26:26
  For real, but I'm I'm proud of you for clapping back on people
• 26:30
  who didn't think you were going to be smart and articulate and
• 26:32
  well researched and and an in depth responder, not just a guy
• 26:37
  with memes and. I've always enjoyed that.
• 26:41
  I've, I've enjoyed, I've enjoyed, you know, surprising
• 26:43
  that used to happen even with interviews early on.
• 26:47
  Obviously they're a bright interviewer.
• 26:49
  A lot of them are bright. But I used to, I used to have
• 26:51
  ones early on that I think they assumed, OK, this guy.
• 26:55
  Yeah, this kid plays metal. They assume you're gonna have
• 26:58
  sort of be this stereotype of like a Sunset Strip musician
• 27:04
  and, you know, use dude every word.
• 27:07
  And, And more often than not, I was smarter than than them.
• 27:12
  And I would just love calling them out and just subtly putting
• 27:15
  them in their place. I don't know.
• 27:16
  There you go. Online today.
• 27:18
  Unfortunately, there's not a lot of subtlety on social media, so
• 27:21
  we have to just so. Yeah, it's given license.
• 27:25
  Social, social media has given license for people to be very
• 27:28
  unsubtle. Yeah, for real.
• 27:29
  And an automat softened. Yeah, well, a lot of keyboard
• 27:32
  warriors who would never be able to hold a conversation in person
• 27:35
  with you. Exactly.
• 27:37
  Yeah, and. Speaking of and Speaking of for
• 27:39
  the last question, I always like to end these with a wild card
• 27:41
  question. And so the one I have for you is
• 27:43
  what is the last good book you read that you can recommend?
• 27:46
  Oh, I am on the last pages of a book.
• 27:52
  If I have, I might even have it here.
• 27:56
  This book I I have 20 pages left.
• 27:59
  It's not it's, it's a bit. Of a job.
• 28:03
  Vineland and I got inspired to read it because the this movie
• 28:09
  that's getting all these great reviews by Paul Thomas Anderson
• 28:14
  is loosely based on this book. He's done a few Pinchon inspired
• 28:20
  movies before. Apparently he's the only
• 28:23
  filmmaker that Pinchon allows to play do films based on his
• 28:28
  books. And it's it's it's the one I've
• 28:32
  most enjoyed of Pinch because he can be really challenging.
• 28:35
  I read his most challenging book, which is Gravity's
• 28:38
  Rainbow, and it's over the top. I mean, it's like the modern
• 28:43
  classical or avant-garde of writing, but this, you know, he
• 28:49
  it's great. He uses great technique, but the
• 28:50
  the story is amazing. And you get to the end of the
• 28:53
  book. It almost feels like you're
• 28:54
  reading the beginning of the book, like it unfolds as he's
• 28:59
  telling the story like the pension is famous for, like
• 29:02
  people, readers having no idea what's going on for a while.
• 29:07
  And then hopefully at some point you do, you get and that's
• 29:10
  definitely the case with this book.
• 29:12
  So I'm, I'm gonna try to see the movie and it came back to IMAX
• 29:17
  for one week and the movie's getting great reviews.
• 29:20
  It's supposed to be the best film of the year, possibly the
• 29:23
  decade. And anyway, 20 pages left I have
• 29:27
  of it. So the yeah, the book is called
• 29:29
  Vineland and the film based on it is called 1 Battle After
• 29:33
  Another, which I'm going. To be, of course.
• 29:34
  Yeah. Right on.
• 29:35
  Alice Kolnik, man. Always a pleasure and an honor
• 29:37
  to talk to you. Congrats on Metal Legion's
• 29:40
  upcoming show for the 10th anniversary, and Congrats on the
• 29:43
  New Testament record, Parabellum and everything else you're
• 29:45
  working on with you. Trio will link everything in the
• 29:48
  description with people. You're not a robot.
• 29:49
  It's my trio album. Yes, Keller, we're looking
• 29:53
  forward. To it brand new.
• 29:54
  So, all right, Alex, thank you so much for your time, buddy.
• 29:57
  We'll see you soon. Take care.
• 29:58
  See you again. Thanks.
• 30:00
  You fighting them?