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Studio Log II: Tribute To A Master
(01 May 02)
The recordings
The first thing we did was to record the rhythm guitars. I wanted to go for a lush, warm background sound, so we did 3 tracks of rhythm guitar: a 6 string-acoustic, a 12 String-acoustic and a Strat, played through a chorus pedal and a clean amp, with each chord "whammied" a bit with the whammy bar. The Strat I used is equipped with two Seymour Duncan Antiquity Singlecoils and a Bill Lawrence L500 humbucker, so it really was perfect for both the clean rhythm and the leads.
OK, letīs talk about those leads. I really felt an opportunity to pay tribute to the amazing Jeff Beck, so I listened to his version a lot and tried to emulate his playing a bit, copy his phrasing some for my version of the leads.
The solos in his version are based on the re-occuring vocal melody, so I based my solos on that too, starting from a close rendition of his solos on his version and adding some of my own little ideas.
You might ask yourself "Why copy Jeff Beck ?". Well, I just felt that he really did an amazing job on his solos, those are really melodic and vocal-like. I wanted to capture that and pay tribute to Jeff by taking his leads as a guide-line. Also, it was quite a new thing for me to play like that... the phrasing I used on these solos is way different from my usual style of playing. Same goes for the sound I used.
And that was lot of fun. Plus, you CANīT really copy Jeff Beck. He might not be a speed-shredder or something, but his voice on the guitar is so unique that you wonīt be able to copy it 100%. And I didnīt try to really copy that. Instead, I thought of it as a "tip to the hat", a tribute to Jeff Beck.
I used a crunch sound and went for the intro-solo. As I said, itīs based on what Beck did on his version. I concentrated on the vibrato both a bit, achieved by both my fingers and the whammy bar (a vintage-style one). I often used something I hear a lot in Jeffīs playing... his "dip-dive up-technique", where he presses down the bar, hits a note, lets the bar come up (kinda diving into the note), then bending farther with his hands while pushing down the bar again. That is that "drunk guitar" effect you hear in the first solo. It almost sounds like played with a slide...
I also went for a real twangy sound by playing with my fingers instead of using a pick, and by snapping some of the notes against the frets.
click this LINK to hear an MP3 of the intro-solo ( taken from the early production phase)
For the main solo I switched to the neck pickup and again based the solo on Jeffīs original solo while including some of my own ideas too. The melody at the very end is the main theme melody of the song (in case you donīt know the song...)
click this LINK to hear an MP3 of the īmain-solo (taken from the early production phase)
At the end of the song, Jeff in his version played lots of fills and melodies, and then concluded the song with muted repeating patterns while Rod sang some short lines on top of it. I went for a variation of the intro solo, played with a pick for a change. Then, I threw the pick away, switched to a different pickup-combination and played with my fingers and the bar again, pretty much the same melody I used in the intro.
Finally I play a variation on the muted lines Jeff played, but doubled it an octave higher at the very end...
click this LINK to hear an MP3 of the outro-solo (taken from the early production phase)
Buh-bye (for now)
To conclude this studio-log I would like to point out that I really enjoyed that session. The song is a beautiful one, it was a pleasure to work on it and create a lot of textures with different acoustic guitars.
And it was fun to pay homage to one of my heroes, Mr. Jeff Beck. I donīt consider it a rip-off but a tribute, and it was interesting to stray away from my usual style and to try to use a phrasing similar to the one of Jeff...
Can ya hear me, Jeff? This one is for you! And thank you!
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Eric started playing the guitar at age 10. He attended GIT and studied with Scott Henderson, Brett Garsed, Dan Gilbert amo. Eric is involved in several bands and recording projects and his instrumental debut - Hidden Creek - plus his instructional book Talking Hands - A Guide To Contemporary Lead Guitar Techniques is available HERE
Visit his website at www.ericvandenberg.net
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