WEBVTT - Alex Skolnick 0:00:08.600 --> 0:00:12.360 Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast. 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:19.599 My guest today is guitarist Alex Colnick. Alex explain jazz 0:00:19.640 --> 0:00:19.960 to the. 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:26.960 Rocker A nice easy question to begin with, right, First 0:00:26.960 --> 0:00:28.840 of all, thanks for having me on, Bob. I'm a 0:00:28.880 --> 0:00:33.760 longtime reader, loyal reader. The occasional times I pop up 0:00:33.800 --> 0:00:37.480 in the mail bag newsletters is always a big thrill, 0:00:37.840 --> 0:00:39.239 So thanks for having me on. 0:00:39.880 --> 0:00:43.240 So no, but really, I listen, jazz came along and 0:00:43.280 --> 0:00:45.720 people say jazz is dead. It's funny you're playing jazz 0:00:45.800 --> 0:00:49.239 now because the rock is dead. But you were, you know, 0:00:49.360 --> 0:00:54.280 guitarist in Testament, and now you have the Alex Golnick trio, 0:00:55.160 --> 0:01:00.520 which is jazz. Their two things. There's a lot How 0:01:00.520 --> 0:01:04.040 did you get into jazz and how does the average 0:01:04.160 --> 0:01:06.760 rocker come to understand jazz? 0:01:07.920 --> 0:01:12.759 It was a very interesting journey for me because, yes, 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:16.399 as you mentioned, I'm sort of best known for being 0:01:16.480 --> 0:01:20.600 the guitarist for Testament, which is from the San Francisco 0:01:20.680 --> 0:01:26.040 Bay area music scene. We followed in the footsteps of Metallica. 0:01:26.480 --> 0:01:29.400 I was very young when I joined the band and 0:01:29.760 --> 0:01:32.520 I did my first record with the band. Way was eighteen, 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:38.160 shortly after high school, and I'd gone through this period 0:01:38.240 --> 0:01:42.399 of just being in the post van Halen Revolution. You know, 0:01:42.480 --> 0:01:45.600 it was all about Eddie van Halen and virtueoso guitar 0:01:45.640 --> 0:01:50.280 players Rany Rhodes from the Ozzy Osbourne's band, the late 0:01:50.360 --> 0:01:57.760 great guitarists like Joe Satriani who was actually a teacher 0:01:57.800 --> 0:01:59.960 of mine, and I know, you know you've had him 0:02:00.040 --> 0:02:05.160 on And by the time I was doing my first record, 0:02:05.680 --> 0:02:08.680 I was still developing, you know. So at eighteen years old, 0:02:08.800 --> 0:02:12.760 you know, I'm still discovering things musically, and I guess 0:02:12.960 --> 0:02:16.320 you know, the way I found my way to it 0:02:16.360 --> 0:02:22.520 was music that is arguably jazz. So an example would 0:02:22.560 --> 0:02:26.920 be the music that Miles Davis recorded in the eighties, 0:02:27.639 --> 0:02:31.720 where he had like screaming guitarists like Mike Stern and 0:02:31.800 --> 0:02:38.480 John Schofield. And also, you know what's considered jazz rock. 0:02:38.960 --> 0:02:43.360 So al Damiola is a name a lot of rock 0:02:43.400 --> 0:02:46.560 guitar players would know. He inspired a lot of rock 0:02:46.560 --> 0:02:50.520 guitar players. You could talk to Zach Wilde about Aldamiola 0:02:50.919 --> 0:02:55.640 and he would not stop talking. John Patucci from Dream 0:02:55.760 --> 0:03:00.799 Theater was very inspired by al Damiola, and Aldemia sort 0:03:00.800 --> 0:03:05.480 of occupies this space that's in between jazz and rock 0:03:05.600 --> 0:03:10.320 and world music. But he also had these incredible other 0:03:10.520 --> 0:03:16.200 musicians that he collaborated with over the years, like Chick Corea, 0:03:16.480 --> 0:03:22.040 for example, or Jocko Pastorias and if you follow the 0:03:22.160 --> 0:03:28.640 sort of family tree of musicians on records by Al 0:03:28.720 --> 0:03:33.200 Damiola and another one, Alan Holdsworth, who was a big 0:03:33.200 --> 0:03:36.680 influence on Eddie van Haleen. He had worked with Tony Williams, 0:03:36.680 --> 0:03:41.560 who had also worked with Miles Davis. So jazz rock 0:03:41.800 --> 0:03:46.840 is really what got me right around the time I 0:03:47.040 --> 0:03:51.720 was doing my first professional heavy metal recordings, and it 0:03:51.840 --> 0:03:58.120 was wanting to understand jazz rock Aldemiola, Tony Williams with 0:03:58.160 --> 0:04:04.120 Alan Holdsworth, et cetera. That made me want to study 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:10.600 actual jazz, jazz that even jazz pure jazz fans or 0:04:11.200 --> 0:04:13.880 traditional jazz bands could agree is jazz. 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:17.320 Okay? So what'd you do next? 0:04:17.640 --> 0:04:23.360 Okay? So so I well, I was, I guess, sort 0:04:23.360 --> 0:04:28.080 of a guitar prodigy doing the first Testament records when 0:04:28.120 --> 0:04:30.760 I was still in my teens and getting a lot 0:04:30.800 --> 0:04:35.000 of attention for that because you know, in thrash metal, uh, 0:04:36.279 --> 0:04:38.680 most most of the playing at that time was a 0:04:38.720 --> 0:04:43.240 little more raw and punk based. If you were a 0:04:43.240 --> 0:04:46.440 more polished player with a lot of technique, you were 0:04:46.480 --> 0:04:51.479 expected to play glam metal, you know, something more along 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:56.120 the lines of the group's the Sunset Strip fans, for example, 0:04:56.279 --> 0:05:01.839 who had some great guitar players. Yeah, and in my case, 0:05:03.680 --> 0:05:06.040 you know, I was able to learn solos by the 0:05:06.200 --> 0:05:09.039 likes of some of the people I mentioned, Randy Rhodes, 0:05:11.880 --> 0:05:16.320 our friend Joe Satriani. You know, not that I could 0:05:16.320 --> 0:05:18.240 play quite like them, but I could, so I could 0:05:18.320 --> 0:05:21.799 understand it, and I could get it, get a handle 0:05:21.839 --> 0:05:26.280 on it. When it came to jazz rock, I could 0:05:26.440 --> 0:05:32.880 not understand what the heck was going on. Some of 0:05:32.920 --> 0:05:37.520 the al Daimiola stuff made sense because he he st 0:05:37.560 --> 0:05:41.320 of has his own vocabulary, which isn't really jazz. But 0:05:41.640 --> 0:05:46.360 you know the music I mentioned before, Miles Davis in 0:05:46.400 --> 0:05:50.320 the late eighties, mid to late eighties, with guitar players 0:05:50.640 --> 0:05:56.400 John Schofield, Mike Stern, Robin Ford, I could not figure 0:05:56.400 --> 0:05:59.919 out what the heck was going on. It's a completely 0:06:00.040 --> 0:06:04.679 different language. And I went to a few different music 0:06:04.760 --> 0:06:08.560 teachers in the Bay Area. By this time, Satrianni was 0:06:08.600 --> 0:06:11.800 already off and running with his career, so I found 0:06:11.880 --> 0:06:15.760 some music teachers in the Bay Area that were more 0:06:15.760 --> 0:06:21.120 focused on jazz and jazz fusion, and they explained to me, like, Yeah, 0:06:21.160 --> 0:06:23.960 all these people you're listening to, they know how to 0:06:23.960 --> 0:06:27.880 play jazz even though you're hearing them in this jazz 0:06:27.960 --> 0:06:33.600 rock setting. They can play tunes. They've listened to artists 0:06:33.680 --> 0:06:38.880 like Charlie Parker and John Coltrane, saxophonists. They've listened to 0:06:39.000 --> 0:06:44.360 piano players like Bill Evans and McCoy Tyner and all. 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:47.720 You know, there's too many essential jazz musicians to name, 0:06:47.760 --> 0:06:53.919 but basically, you have to get a handle on the 0:06:54.000 --> 0:06:57.440 vocabulary of the music. You have to appreciate the history 0:06:57.520 --> 0:07:03.960 of it, you have to learn about all these historical musicians, 0:07:04.000 --> 0:07:06.440 and you have to obviously, you have to like the music. 0:07:06.560 --> 0:07:11.800 So by the time I started studying it just to 0:07:12.320 --> 0:07:15.280 help with my jazz rock interest, I developed a taste 0:07:15.320 --> 0:07:18.800 for it, and then I got it. I really liked it. 0:07:18.840 --> 0:07:21.400 But I was never one of these kids that sort 0:07:21.400 --> 0:07:25.080 of grew up wanting to be a jazz player. It 0:07:25.480 --> 0:07:27.840 hit me later, which is very unusual. 0:07:30.040 --> 0:07:34.680 Okay, you keep referencing eighties Miles Davis and all those people. 0:07:35.720 --> 0:07:38.160 Did you like it from the first time you heard 0:07:38.200 --> 0:07:42.000 it or did you have to work and become comfortable 0:07:42.040 --> 0:07:45.280 with it? Was it more of an intellectual appreciation before 0:07:45.280 --> 0:07:48.520 an emotional appreciation. Tell me about that awakening. 0:07:49.920 --> 0:07:55.840 Well, the late eighties, Miles Davis was current as I 0:07:55.880 --> 0:08:00.880 discovered it, which is very different because you know, when 0:08:00.920 --> 0:08:05.320 I was here, when I heard what you could call 0:08:05.360 --> 0:08:10.440 straight ahead jazz on the jazz radio station. Yeah, we 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:13.560 had a very good jazz radio station in San Francisco 0:08:13.840 --> 0:08:19.360 areak kja Z, but it was definitely more straight ahead. 0:08:19.640 --> 0:08:22.640 You didn't hear a lot of stuff like that. And 0:08:24.000 --> 0:08:26.120 you know, I was young, I was in my teens 0:08:26.200 --> 0:08:31.280 and very into screaming guitar. So to me, the reason 0:08:31.320 --> 0:08:34.920 I didn't gravitate towards that type of jazz was it 0:08:35.000 --> 0:08:41.080 sounded old. Yeah, I saw music from the you know, 0:08:41.160 --> 0:08:44.720 the forties and fifties and early six It just it 0:08:44.920 --> 0:08:49.600 felt old. And when I heard Miles Davis for the 0:08:49.600 --> 0:08:53.560 first time doing late eighties music in the late eighties, 0:08:54.760 --> 0:08:59.360 it sounded like the future. This is you know, this 0:08:59.440 --> 0:09:01.920 is this is what's happening now, this is what's going 0:09:01.960 --> 0:09:05.680 to happen. So it gave me a very different feeling. 0:09:05.840 --> 0:09:09.560 And also I if I remember right. The first time 0:09:09.600 --> 0:09:15.840 I discovered it was on a public television station, so 0:09:15.880 --> 0:09:18.600 they were airing a concert. It was one of these 0:09:19.160 --> 0:09:25.000 arts programs on PBS or the some East. I think 0:09:25.040 --> 0:09:27.319 I was on the East Coast at the time, and 0:09:27.400 --> 0:09:29.719 they were showing this whole concert and I was just 0:09:29.800 --> 0:09:32.920 knocked out. I didn't know what it was. I remember 0:09:32.960 --> 0:09:36.640 I wrote down the names of all the musicians afterwards. 0:09:37.840 --> 0:09:41.800 But I think it really took hearing it, even though 0:09:41.800 --> 0:09:44.800 I wasn't live in the room with them, but he 0:09:44.920 --> 0:09:48.720 you know, hearing the music being played live, watching it 0:09:50.880 --> 0:09:55.120 and just having it be current and not feeling like 0:09:55.520 --> 0:09:56.160 old music. 0:09:57.679 --> 0:10:02.160 Okay, a lot of people would hear what we call 0:10:02.320 --> 0:10:07.400 traditional jazz and from the get go say, I don't 0:10:07.440 --> 0:10:11.839 get it. I don't like it. It's discordant, it's free form. 0:10:12.200 --> 0:10:15.960 I don't know where it's going. Is it something where 0:10:16.720 --> 0:10:18.880 it either clicks for you or not or can you 0:10:19.080 --> 0:10:20.320 learn to like it? 0:10:21.720 --> 0:10:27.319 Well? You know, it's it's such a broad category, you know, 0:10:29.000 --> 0:10:34.600 it's it's as broad a category, arguably as rock. Yeah. 0:10:34.640 --> 0:10:41.120 So you know you have soft rock, you have punk rock, 0:10:42.480 --> 0:10:44.679 you have so many types of rock, and it's very 0:10:44.679 --> 0:10:49.040 similar with jazz. You know, there's what's called smooth jazz, 0:10:49.760 --> 0:10:52.520 which you know, some would say isn't jazz at all, 0:10:52.640 --> 0:10:55.640 but some would you know, which is. You might hear 0:10:55.720 --> 0:11:01.720 at club med vacations, at dentist offices. You have avant 0:11:01.720 --> 0:11:05.400 garde jazz, which had actually some of which has more 0:11:05.400 --> 0:11:10.000 in common with punk rock. You know, you have artists 0:11:10.480 --> 0:11:13.120 very few, but there are actually artists that cover all 0:11:13.160 --> 0:11:16.360 this ground. John Zorn is an example of somebody like that. 0:11:16.960 --> 0:11:22.959 You could hear moments of most types of jazz. So 0:11:23.000 --> 0:11:28.680 I would say, you know, liking getting somebody to like jazz, 0:11:30.200 --> 0:11:33.960 you know, it really depends on their taste. It depends 0:11:34.000 --> 0:11:36.360 on the type of jazz. You'd have to point them 0:11:36.400 --> 0:11:42.280 in the right direction. Somebody who likes funk and R 0:11:42.320 --> 0:11:45.400 and B music, for example, well they might gravitate more 0:11:45.440 --> 0:11:53.000 towards the music of early Herbie Hancock certainly seventies Herby Hancock. 0:11:53.160 --> 0:11:58.160 They probably already know about that. You know, Horace Silver, 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:03.280 you know who is a big influence on Steely Dan. 0:12:03.720 --> 0:12:06.920 Believe it or yeah, listen to Steely Dan. You know, 0:12:07.000 --> 0:12:12.480 Josie Comes Home. It's almost sampled from a song called 0:12:12.559 --> 0:12:16.920 Song for My Father by Horace Silver. So you know, 0:12:17.000 --> 0:12:21.200 sometimes making these connections helps somebody who is familiar with 0:12:22.200 --> 0:12:27.040 some element of rock and roll might relate to something 0:12:27.040 --> 0:12:29.480 in jazz if you point them in the right direction. 0:12:29.840 --> 0:12:34.280 And I would just also add that blues is something 0:12:34.320 --> 0:12:37.760 that definitely, you know, you find all over rock and 0:12:37.840 --> 0:12:41.480 roll and you find all over jazz and in very 0:12:41.480 --> 0:12:42.319 different ways. 0:12:43.360 --> 0:12:45.400 So how would you describe the music of the Alex 0:12:45.440 --> 0:12:46.200 school mactrio. 0:12:47.920 --> 0:12:52.240 I would say, you know, my trio is definitely more 0:12:53.120 --> 0:12:59.040 on the jazz rock side of things, although guitar wise, 0:13:00.320 --> 0:13:02.680 it has a little more to do with straight ahead guitar. 0:13:03.679 --> 0:13:06.480 So the guitar is a little has a little more 0:13:06.480 --> 0:13:11.520 in common with straight ahead jazz. The music is mildly experimental. 0:13:12.679 --> 0:13:23.920 It's it's definitely more high energy than not, but you 0:13:23.960 --> 0:13:27.440 know it's it's it's very hot, probably the hardest music 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:28.720 to describe as my own music. 0:13:30.000 --> 0:13:33.240 Is this a labor of love or is the audience 0:13:33.320 --> 0:13:35.760 growing for the Alex Culnick Trio. 0:13:36.920 --> 0:13:40.400 Yeah, the audience seems to be growing. You know, I 0:13:41.120 --> 0:13:45.960 started My whole story is strange. As I mentioned earlier, 0:13:46.080 --> 0:13:50.199 you know, I sort of I took a sabbatical from 0:13:50.280 --> 0:13:53.880 heavy battle. I didn't even know I was doing this. 0:13:54.000 --> 0:13:59.200 It wasn't really planned, but I sort of followed my passion, 0:13:59.400 --> 0:14:04.240 if you will, and it led me to moving to 0:14:04.520 --> 0:14:08.040 New York City from Berkeley, California. And everybody thought I 0:14:08.120 --> 0:14:12.000 was crazy. Most people make the move from the East 0:14:12.080 --> 0:14:14.280 Coast to the West coast. I know you're you're one 0:14:14.280 --> 0:14:21.360 of those. My parents are academics. They had done the 0:14:21.400 --> 0:14:24.720 same thing. They had moved from New York to California. 0:14:25.080 --> 0:14:28.320 I knew many people who would did that. And you 0:14:28.400 --> 0:14:31.480 have to move back to New York from California was 0:14:31.480 --> 0:14:34.480 considered a little crazy. So I needed a good excuse. 0:14:34.520 --> 0:14:37.720 And my excuse was to get a music degree and 0:14:38.000 --> 0:14:41.520 study at the New School in New York, and which 0:14:41.720 --> 0:14:44.160 kind of made my parents happy because they hated the 0:14:44.200 --> 0:14:49.360 fact that I never went to college. And also I 0:14:49.520 --> 0:14:53.520 was getting to know people in the jazz world at 0:14:53.520 --> 0:14:59.240 that time. So while at school, I threw this band 0:14:59.320 --> 0:15:06.160 together just for fun and it started. We started getting 0:15:06.520 --> 0:15:10.480 gigs and put out a record that was actually it 0:15:10.560 --> 0:15:14.800 shocked me. It was actually well reviewed by Downbead and 0:15:15.200 --> 0:15:20.440 jazz Is and some other jazz magazines. A jazz radio promoter, 0:15:20.680 --> 0:15:25.280 Michael Morrick took a liking to it and got us 0:15:25.320 --> 0:15:29.760 played on a bunch of jazz radio stations. So I 0:15:29.840 --> 0:15:33.320 had really initially thought of our first album as like 0:15:33.680 --> 0:15:36.280 a demo. I'll put this out into the world, we'll 0:15:36.720 --> 0:15:40.080 see how it goes. But it did well enough to 0:15:41.280 --> 0:15:45.960 launch a band that's still going a couple decades later. 0:15:54.240 --> 0:15:57.520 Okay, everybody talks about the economics of the road and 0:15:57.560 --> 0:16:01.760 how terrible they are. Three guys go on on the road. 0:16:02.680 --> 0:16:04.720 How many people come to see you? And can you 0:16:04.760 --> 0:16:05.520 make any money? 0:16:06.440 --> 0:16:10.640 Yeah? Well, it's it depends on the situation. It depends 0:16:10.640 --> 0:16:13.000 on where we are in the world for one thing. 0:16:16.360 --> 0:16:19.960 It's all it's interesting. I think. I think in some 0:16:20.000 --> 0:16:23.680 ways it's gotten better for the Alex and the trio, 0:16:25.600 --> 0:16:32.240 partially because I think at this point, uh, it's very 0:16:32.240 --> 0:16:35.360 clear I'm not doing this as a novelty. I think. 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:39.680 You know, when it was first announced after the first album, 0:16:39.920 --> 0:16:47.080 you know of guitarist for Testaments doing a jazz guitar album. Okay, sure, next, 0:16:48.560 --> 0:16:50.880 But you know, I've stuck with it all this time, 0:16:51.560 --> 0:16:57.800 and the offers have gotten better. We've played some very 0:16:57.800 --> 0:17:03.480 prestigious venues. We just did a tour in March, we 0:17:03.600 --> 0:17:08.560 played a place in Vienna called Porgy and Best, which 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:12.520 is yeah, John Schofield was playing there the same week. 0:17:14.560 --> 0:17:17.720 I can't play all the venues he plays, but yeah, 0:17:18.640 --> 0:17:22.040 at least there's some common venues. And these are the 0:17:22.080 --> 0:17:26.720 types of venues that twenty years ago absolutely not. You know, 0:17:26.960 --> 0:17:31.040 they either assumed again it was a novelty or they 0:17:31.400 --> 0:17:34.920 figured I'm some I'm going to be doing some shred act. 0:17:34.960 --> 0:17:37.960 I'm going to do instrumental jazz, but I'm going to 0:17:38.040 --> 0:17:42.080 bring in Marshall stacks and drums that look like Peter 0:17:42.200 --> 0:17:46.479 Cris's kit from Kiss. You know. No, actually I have 0:17:47.160 --> 0:17:51.080 real jazz players. I have great guys, Matt Sebraski and 0:17:51.160 --> 0:17:55.399 Nathan Peck. The drum kit is small, the bass is 0:17:55.440 --> 0:18:01.160 an actual jazz bass, although he does some electric now 0:18:01.240 --> 0:18:03.439 as well, But for a long time it was always 0:18:03.440 --> 0:18:06.400 with upright base and we always had this acoustic dynamic. 0:18:07.800 --> 0:18:11.280 So it's taken a while to have the credibility to 0:18:11.359 --> 0:18:17.040 play more established jazzy places, if you will, but we're 0:18:17.040 --> 0:18:21.159 doing a lot of those, and yeah, we keep the 0:18:21.200 --> 0:18:24.840 overhead low. We obviously don't. We don't have a light 0:18:24.920 --> 0:18:32.680 show when we tour Europe. For example, we have one 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:40.320 crew person and he he's amazing. His name's Alex as well, 0:18:41.240 --> 0:18:45.040 and he drives the van, does the merchandise, helps set 0:18:45.080 --> 0:18:51.080 everything up. And this friend of ours, he also he 0:18:51.160 --> 0:18:54.120 works for a lot of different musicians. Right after our 0:18:54.160 --> 0:18:59.119 tour in March, he went off to tour for Dominic Miller, 0:18:59.160 --> 0:19:04.240 who plays for guitar for Sting. And when Dominic Miller 0:19:04.320 --> 0:19:07.960 is not playing with thing, you know, he's he's not 0:19:08.640 --> 0:19:12.359 doing places like Stink, you know, he's to actually some 0:19:12.400 --> 0:19:14.399 of the same same places my trios do. 0:19:15.880 --> 0:19:19.760 So who is coming to an Alex Goulnick trio show. 0:19:19.880 --> 0:19:22.440 Is a Testament fans or New fans? 0:19:23.760 --> 0:19:26.639 You know, it's a it's a combination. Especially when we 0:19:26.720 --> 0:19:31.879 play in Europe. We actually have a lot of fans 0:19:31.960 --> 0:19:35.520 that know me more for the instrumental side of things, 0:19:36.920 --> 0:19:42.679 and but there's always going to be a portion of 0:19:42.760 --> 0:19:45.960 fans that know me from Testament and they're curious what 0:19:46.160 --> 0:19:50.399 is going on. In the US, I'd say it's a 0:19:50.400 --> 0:19:54.119 little more of a mix. It's more maybe more fifty 0:19:54.119 --> 0:19:58.080 to fifty. But you often know the Testament fans because 0:19:58.119 --> 0:20:01.399 you know they show up and teach. If not Testament shirts. 0:20:01.440 --> 0:20:04.720 They'll show up in a megott Ass or a Slayer. 0:20:06.040 --> 0:20:09.720 Well, having listened to it, just giving my take. You know, 0:20:09.800 --> 0:20:12.359 the big breakthrough when I was growing up as the 0:20:12.400 --> 0:20:16.399 Mahavish New Orchestra, which I bought the first album and 0:20:16.440 --> 0:20:20.320 I saw them live. John McLaughlan had played with Miles Davis. 0:20:20.880 --> 0:20:24.160 That was one step a little much for me. Although 0:20:24.200 --> 0:20:26.240 they had success with the second album. I think with 0:20:26.280 --> 0:20:30.879 Birds of Fire Weather Report, I actually understood more. But 0:20:31.000 --> 0:20:33.960 this is all a setup for the listeners. You know, 0:20:34.200 --> 0:20:40.320 listen to Alex's trio because it's not as far out. 0:20:40.400 --> 0:20:43.800 If it wasn't sold as jazz, you wouldn't necessarily hear 0:20:43.840 --> 0:20:48.439 it that way. It's not as out there. Whatever, just 0:20:48.600 --> 0:20:52.800 switching gears. Tell me about your experience at the New School. 0:20:55.000 --> 0:21:01.440 Okay, well I'll just piggyback off. You're what you said 0:21:01.480 --> 0:21:06.160 before about the Mahavish New Orchestra. That's an example of somebody, 0:21:06.320 --> 0:21:10.720 you know. I could talk about John McLoughlin too many 0:21:11.600 --> 0:21:15.160 rock and metal guitar players. He's somebody that truly crossed over. 0:21:15.680 --> 0:21:18.320 So we all we all know him, you know, and 0:21:18.800 --> 0:21:24.639 uh true a true inspiration as well. So yeah, and 0:21:24.680 --> 0:21:28.200 he was part of this whole group of players that 0:21:28.600 --> 0:21:32.760 I think was my gateway to jazz guitar was guys 0:21:32.840 --> 0:21:41.000 like John McLoughlin, Aldon Yola. And now, interestingly, I get 0:21:41.040 --> 0:21:46.000 to the New School, this is uh late nineties around, 0:21:46.280 --> 0:21:51.399 you know, two thousand and Yeah, I'm an older student 0:21:51.440 --> 0:21:57.040 at that point, I'm like pushing thirty, but I'm ready 0:21:57.080 --> 0:22:01.200 at that At that point, I was hungry, hungry to study, 0:22:01.359 --> 0:22:04.240 and not just the jazz part of it too. I 0:22:04.280 --> 0:22:09.960 also took a couple of courses in philosophy and creative writing. 0:22:11.520 --> 0:22:14.480 A lot of my classmates were just out of high school. 0:22:15.560 --> 0:22:19.160 Now I wasn't. There were actually a few older students. 0:22:19.560 --> 0:22:21.800 I was definitely one of the oldest ones. I wasn't 0:22:21.800 --> 0:22:26.119 the oldest one, but the vast majority had gone straight 0:22:26.160 --> 0:22:29.879 from high school college. And yeah, they might have been 0:22:30.000 --> 0:22:34.840 stars and their jazz program, you know, whatever town they're from, 0:22:36.400 --> 0:22:41.439 so you had a lot of there was energy I 0:22:41.480 --> 0:22:43.800 picked up on, like I was surprised, a lot of 0:22:44.320 --> 0:22:48.280 unhappy energy because I think a lot of these kids, 0:22:48.840 --> 0:22:52.040 you know, they'd been the jazz or you know, the 0:22:52.119 --> 0:22:57.080 virtuoso champion and their little music scene in their town 0:22:57.200 --> 0:23:00.240 and then they get here, they get to the big city, 0:23:01.320 --> 0:23:03.679 this music program where you just you know, you have 0:23:04.480 --> 0:23:07.840 like the best of the best, and you know, I 0:23:07.880 --> 0:23:12.280 think a lot of hearts were breaking. I just I 0:23:12.720 --> 0:23:16.600 picked up on it, and I was in this interesting 0:23:16.640 --> 0:23:20.080 place because I wasn't really affected by it. I was 0:23:20.800 --> 0:23:26.800 sort of disillusioned having been a professional on the rock 0:23:26.840 --> 0:23:30.680 side of things, and I was just ready to learn. 0:23:30.720 --> 0:23:33.439 I just I was so excited to study with all 0:23:33.480 --> 0:23:39.479 these great players. You had legendary teachers at this school, 0:23:41.200 --> 0:23:46.320 guys like you, Reggie Workman, who was a bassist who 0:23:46.480 --> 0:23:56.480 played with John Coltrane, seeciul McBee. Yeah, yeah, there's like 0:23:56.560 --> 0:24:00.639 too many to name, but a lot of these are 0:24:01.560 --> 0:24:05.560 very well known names for jazz insiders. But you just 0:24:05.760 --> 0:24:08.480 you have access to these people and you could talk 0:24:08.560 --> 0:24:13.920 to them all the time, and you're put into ensembles 0:24:14.720 --> 0:24:19.199 with other players, and you're you suddenly have this very 0:24:19.320 --> 0:24:23.080 structured learning and I I never had that. I did 0:24:23.200 --> 0:24:26.600 have guitar lessons with Satriani for a couple of years, 0:24:27.160 --> 0:24:31.280 which was the most serious musician I'd ever studied with, 0:24:32.280 --> 0:24:37.520 but that that was very guitar focused. And when I 0:24:37.560 --> 0:24:40.560 got to the New school, it was really about music. 0:24:40.920 --> 0:24:45.080 Guitarists weren't even the majority of the musicians there. There 0:24:45.119 --> 0:24:48.399 were a lot of piano players and saxophonists, and I 0:24:48.520 --> 0:24:52.000 was so excited to just be around that and just 0:24:53.880 --> 0:24:59.280 be in this environment where it's not just about guitar 0:24:59.480 --> 0:25:03.800 based and vocals and you know, other instruments matter, and 0:25:04.480 --> 0:25:08.240 studying the history of the music, learning about what's called 0:25:08.320 --> 0:25:13.399 ear training, where you actually focus on listening and not 0:25:13.640 --> 0:25:18.359 just playing music, but being able to tell one note 0:25:18.520 --> 0:25:21.399 from another, how far away is it, what type of 0:25:21.480 --> 0:25:25.720 chord is this, just by hearing it. All this great stuff. 0:25:25.880 --> 0:25:28.400 So I was really excited. I did see a lot 0:25:28.480 --> 0:25:32.080 of you know, unhappy young players. I tried not to 0:25:32.160 --> 0:25:34.320 get bummed out by that. I saw a lot of 0:25:34.359 --> 0:25:37.159 people drop out because there were many players there that 0:25:37.400 --> 0:25:41.760 just wanted to go there, network and drop out. I 0:25:42.119 --> 0:25:46.440 was determined to get my education. So for me, it 0:25:46.600 --> 0:25:49.800 was like the perfect thing. I met the you know, 0:25:49.920 --> 0:25:52.880 these great musicians there I'm still friends with to this day, 0:25:53.560 --> 0:26:00.240 launched my band from there, got my education. But the yeah, 0:26:00.280 --> 0:26:03.600 the one thing that was odd about it, in addition 0:26:03.840 --> 0:26:10.040 to yeah, the unhappiness I could sense from some of 0:26:10.080 --> 0:26:13.720 the players that were kind of struggling. The younger players, 0:26:15.119 --> 0:26:22.040 the artists we're talking about John McLaughlin, h Jaco Pastorius, 0:26:22.520 --> 0:26:26.719 Weather Report, they really weren't talked about very much. They 0:26:26.760 --> 0:26:29.560 were at that time there was such an emphasis on 0:26:30.400 --> 0:26:35.560 straight ahead jazz, and there was this sense that it's 0:26:35.640 --> 0:26:38.639 time to you know, to bring back, you know, the 0:26:39.000 --> 0:26:42.840 real jazz. There had been this movement called the the 0:26:42.960 --> 0:26:47.600 Young Lions. You know, Wynton Marsalis had been a part 0:26:47.640 --> 0:26:51.159 of that, and he tended to have a little bit 0:26:51.240 --> 0:26:56.080 more conservative jazz views. He wasn't a big fan of fusion. 0:26:58.520 --> 0:27:03.280 He was championed by the jazz writer Stanley Crouch that 0:27:03.920 --> 0:27:07.800 was a great writer and had great taste in music, 0:27:07.880 --> 0:27:15.560 but absolutely hated electric music and jazz rock. So at 0:27:15.600 --> 0:27:19.680 the time, the School I think was very much under 0:27:19.760 --> 0:27:22.000 the effects of that. You know, it was almost like 0:27:22.160 --> 0:27:26.920 the alternative music movement and rock suddenly, you know, this 0:27:27.040 --> 0:27:31.040 big change. I've heard it's very different now. Now it's 0:27:31.520 --> 0:27:37.119 a lot more open. You've had players come out of 0:27:37.640 --> 0:27:41.960 from that period like Robert Glasberg, and he was actually 0:27:42.040 --> 0:27:43.600 at the New School at the same time I was. 0:27:43.640 --> 0:27:47.440 He's kind of one of the leading lights in jazz music. 0:27:47.840 --> 0:27:52.200 These days, and he collaborates with hip hop artists. You know, 0:27:52.320 --> 0:27:56.719 he's he's very well known for playing with Kendrick Lamart 0:27:58.080 --> 0:28:03.240 and apparently so like somebody like Glassberg being a star 0:28:03.400 --> 0:28:05.960 student at the News Classic, that's had a big influence. 0:28:06.520 --> 0:28:08.840 So it's less conservative than it was. But at the 0:28:08.880 --> 0:28:11.399 time I was there, there was this sense of it 0:28:11.520 --> 0:28:15.080 being just being very conservative, and even guitar was a 0:28:15.160 --> 0:28:18.720 little bit frowned upon. But I was at an age 0:28:18.720 --> 0:28:21.159 where I wasn't affected by the negativity. 0:28:21.880 --> 0:28:27.000 Okay, you're going to college, You've already had a good 0:28:27.160 --> 0:28:30.399 are you financially comfortable enough from Testament in order to 0:28:30.600 --> 0:28:32.880 you know, pay for college and take the time off 0:28:32.920 --> 0:28:33.920 from your regular career. 0:28:35.680 --> 0:28:42.760 Well, I had been very conservative with the earnings from Testament. Now, 0:28:42.840 --> 0:28:51.000 Testament had never had hits. We never sort of crossed 0:28:51.040 --> 0:28:53.960 the threshold of sort of winning awards. 0:28:54.360 --> 0:28:54.520 You know. 0:28:54.680 --> 0:28:59.880 The Bay Area music scene for heavy metal it was fun. 0:29:00.040 --> 0:29:02.680 I mean they always compare different scenes. You know, the 0:29:02.720 --> 0:29:05.480 British invasion you have the Beatles and the Stones, and 0:29:06.200 --> 0:29:09.120 I had a bunch of smaller bands like Kermit's Hermits 0:29:09.240 --> 0:29:13.120 for example. You know, and see at the Seattle scene, 0:29:13.160 --> 0:29:16.400 you had several huge bands, and the Bay Area music scene, 0:29:16.400 --> 0:29:21.040 you really had one huge band metality, and the rest 0:29:21.080 --> 0:29:25.000 of the bands were more like the bands that you know, 0:29:25.080 --> 0:29:30.960 insiders know about, but they weren't household names, so the 0:29:31.080 --> 0:29:34.600 band never made the kind of money where you just 0:29:34.720 --> 0:29:39.200 felt like you could retire. But at that point I 0:29:39.320 --> 0:29:42.760 had put enough away. I felt like, Okay, I certainly 0:29:43.840 --> 0:29:49.920