For the first time ever, a guitar player from Central America on show, please meet Hedras Ramos from Guatemala!
This musician is only 19 but is showing a musical maturity way beyond his age. His latest album (no, it is not his first CD, it’s the third one!) “Atoms And Space” is a great CD I took a lot of pleasure to discover. For sure Hedras is only getting started.
For this episode #107 I have very happy to have Jon Herington with me on the show. I really enjoyed his album Shine (Shine Shine) which is an excellent mix of Rock, Soul and Blues at the same time.
For the second time I had the great pleasure to interview the very tall Paul Gilbert while he was in Paris finishing his 40 date solo tour to promote his own album “Fuzz Universe”.
Last time I met the guy was last year when he was touring with MrBig, the interview is on episode #26.
During the interview I asked questions on “Fuzz Universe” but also on “What If…” the next MrBig record which will be released in Europe early 2011.
Great shot of Paul by Nidhal Marzouk (www.yog-photography.com) during the Trabendo show in Paris on December 19th:
On a glorious 2011 january morning, here it was, the parcel coming from Florida with the precious Rittenhouse Telecaster inside!
First impressions:
The guitar is very light, I need to weight it precisely but I am pretty sure it is the lightest guitar I have
The relicing job is very well done. It looks and feels old. All my colleagues at work (where I got it shipped) asked me how old was the guitar!
Acoustically it is loud and very resonant.
The neck is huge, when Abe Rittenhouse says chunky, he MEANS chunky!! You need time to get used to it but I love it.
Here are some pictures of this baby:
Stay tuned for an upcoming video and audio review of what is now my very personnal Micawber Telecaster replica (even though there is no humbucker in the neck position, it is still the inspiration).
Popa Chubby is a New-York born guitar player which is pretty famous in France, I had the pleasure to interview him just before he played the Cabaret Sauvage in Paris.
As usual, before the intervie you will hear some extracts from his latest album “The Fight Is On”:
Here is a great acoustic norwegian guitar player in this episode. I had the pleasure to meet Bjorn Berge while he was in Paris for a couple of shows.
I saw him play for the Dixiefrog label party in Le Bataclan, it is quite something to see and hear this giant play for a packed house, he knows how to set the audience on fire.
For the second time I had the opportunity to talk with Dave Weiner. The first time was in episode 32 to talk with Dave about his life as the guitar player for Steve Vaï (whom you can hear the interview in episode 25), this time the occasion was to talk about his solo album called “On Revolute”.
I had the pleasure this quiet but VERY intense bluesman, believe me, he has a DEEP voice and it is quite a feat to interview such a nice gentleman with such an articulate way to express himself.
His album “Booker’s Guitar” is a pure joy and if Eric plays near you, go check him out!
I am sure you heard at least once the hit “Do You Kiss On The First Date?”, the song is great, the guitars are juicy and the opening riff is massive! Well, this gem comes from the Toronto based trio called Danko Jones. The band was in Paris to do some promo for their latest album “Below The Belt” and I had the pleasure to talk to Danko, their singer and guitar player.
I had the great pleasure to interview Philip Sayce, a superb guitar player, while he was in Paris to do some promo for his latest album “Innerevolution”.
He will be back in Paris to play at Le Réservoir on May 26th, don’t miss him!!
You will find plenty of great videos of Philip on YouTube, but I like this one a lot as you can check him out playing all alone:
None other than Nuno Bettencourt in this episode!! I just had today the opportunity to meet and interview this incredible musician I have been a fan of since the early days of Extreme. He was in Paris to play Bercy with Rihanna.
So still hot from my Zoom H2 digital recorder, here it is unedited and unabridged, the Nuno interview.
Here is a blurry picture I took just before the interview (see how proud I am on my face??):
A true rock icon in this episode with Matthias Jabs from Scorpions, super-nice guy and very talktative. It was a real pleasure to meet and have a little guitar chat with the Scorpions lead guitar player.
This is the ONE YEAR anniversary episode of The Guitar Channel!!
Let me tell you it was quite a ride the past 12 months. Even in my wildest dreams when I started I did not think about being able to meet so many great musicians, from Steve Vaï to Pierre Bensusan??? No Way!! And here we are, 50 episodes later with many interviews and guitar soundseeings, one year later, going stronger than ever.
Back in december I had the honor to interview Vernon Reid, a great musician and an incredible guitar player, when he was in Paris on tour with Living Colour. I think it is pretty appropriate to publish his interview for this episode #50 AND the one year anniversary.
An iPhone picture taken during the soundcheck:
The VERY impressive equiment Vernon uses on stage:
As an added bonus for this special episode, I am VERY proud to debut a new music for the intro with a beautiful instrumental “Der aKtivist” piece from Jean-Michel Kajdan (a french guitar player you can hear in episodes #15, #42 and #43 in french). THANKS a ton Jean-Michel for allowing me to use your music.
If you want to hear “Der aKtivist” in its entirety, you have to install the free iPhone/iPod Touch app JMK to stream it. I encourage you to do so as this instrumental is really great from the first second until the very last.
