GILMOUR! TOWNSHEND! HAMMETT! GIBBONS! G U I TA R P L AY E R . C O M
Inside Mick Fleetwood & Friends’ Peter Green Tribute Concert
P L AY B E T T E R • S O U N D B E T T E R
PLAYERS
ROBERT CRAY
Behind his Strat-scorching tribute to ’60s R&B
CELISSE
Lizzo’s guitarist breaks out on her own
“Tom said, ‘You’re in my band forever!’”
ROGER McGUINN LILLY HIATT NADA SURF KINGFISH
MIKE CAMPBELL The former Heartbreakers guitarist opens up about his songs, riffs and partnership with Tom Petty
LESSONS FROM RANDY RHODES TO JIMMY PAGE
21 enticing minor-key riffs
VIC JURIS
Techniques of the late jazz genius
JOE SATRIANI
Reveals his vintage guitar collection
TRIBUTE
Billy Gibbons and Kirk Hammett in rehearsal at Music Bank, Acton. “They were playing ‘The Green Manalishi (With the Two Prong Crown),’ ” Halfin says. “Kirk owns the Greeny guitar [Peter Green’s 1959 Gibson Les Paul], and his presence brought a rockier edge. During the show, Pete Townshend put his arm around Kirk and said into his ear: ‘That was f*cking great!’ which shocked and pleased him a lot.”
Inside the Guitar Gig of the Year The guitar stars come out for a one-night tribute to Fleetwood Mac founder Peter Green. B Y
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IT WAS A guitar concert to outshine all
group formed the nesting ground from which
Although the evening’s honoree didn’t
others. On February 25, David Gilmour, Kirk
Fleetwood and bassist John McVie emerged
show up, the night was full of great moments,
Hammett, Pete Townshend and Billy Gibbons
with Green in 1967 to form Fleetwood Mac,
which were captured in pictures by rock
gathered with other musicians at the London
along with guitarist Jeremy Spencer. Happily,
photographer Ross Halfin, who was on hand
Palladium to perform a tribute to Fleetwood
Spencer was on hand for the show, as was
to shoot both the concert and rehearsals.
Mac founder Peter Green. Arranged by
Fleetwood Mac keyboardist, singer and
“What I really liked about the event was that
drummer Mick Fleetwood, the show raised
songwriter Christine McVie. Mick Fleetwood’s
people did it for the right reasons,” Halfin
funds for the Teenage Cancer Trust.
core band for the evening included himself,
says. “Bill Wyman turned up on his own, and
drummer Zak Starkey, onetime Fleetwood
Pete Townshend was with his driver. There
former Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman,
Mac guitarist Rick Vito, Jonny Lang, Andy
were no entourages. It felt like a party at
Oasis guitarist Noel Gallagher, Aerosmith
Fairweather Low, Fleetwood Mac touring
somebody’s house. The nicest thing about
frontman Steven Tyler, and venerable British
keyboardist Ricky Peterson and bassist
the room was that everybody was having
bluesman John Mayall, whose Bluesbreakers
Dave Bronze.
their own fan moments.”
The other big names onstage included
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David Gilmour holding Greeny. “David Gilmour was a very big part of the show, obviously,” Halfin says. “He played ‘Oh Well, Pt. 2,’ which Fleetwood Mac had never performed live. When he did that, the band sounded like Pink Floyd. His style took the song to a whole new place.”
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NEW & COOL
Pedigreed Mutt
Nik Huber extends his family with the mixed-breed Piet. B Y
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TH ROUG H M OR E T HAN two decades, Nik Huber has been recognized for his marriage of precision and artistry, as well as for the fine woods and top-shelf components crafted into his original, yet familiar designs. At this year’s winter NAMM show, the German luthier debuted “Prototype #2,” which was hustled along to Guitar Player afterward for an exclusive test drive. Officially dubbed Piet, the new model is named after Huber’s youngest son. It’s simultaneously something a little different for Nik Huber Guitars, yet redolent of the maker’s signature touches and the quality that results from them. Huber founded Nik Huber Guitars in Rodgau, Germany, in 1996, and quickly developed a reputation for the quality of his wood stash, and the exotic beauty of the alternative timbers he brought into the process, such as figured redwood that he crafted into tops that are works of art. It’s worth noting that his profound connection to the material comes from deep roots. In 1886, precisely 100 years before Huber launched his own guitar company, his great-great grandfather, Nikolaus Huber, began his woodworking business in southern Bavaria. With the Piet, the family connection goes deeper still, and Nik IV wouldn’t have it any other way. “There are too many ‘casters’ in the world already,” he tells GP. “And I like the connection to family. J OE L NIE MINE N
“This model has been an exciting new adventure for me,” he adds. “We’re more known for the mahogany-body vein of guitar making, and so creating something totally in
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the alder-body-maple-neck mold meant
slots that have been routed to eliminate
anything. By nature, the neck pickup is warm,
exploring new ground as a luthier. There was
sharp ends, a five-screw neck attachment
rich and articulate, while the bridge is
no business strategy or deep calculation
with a plate that’s recessed flush into the
muscular and a little gritty, with a honky
behind it. I just wanted to push myself as a
back, and a contoured neck heel that allows
midrange snarl and some edge of bolt-neck
guitar builder and explore something new.”
unfettered access to the top frets.
snap. Either one rocks beautifully, but dial
While many Nik Huber guitars share body
Huber has long used pickups from
down the tone control a tad and the neck
lines, the Piet falls more into the camp of the
esteemed German winder Harry Häussel. The
pickup segues seamlessly into lovely jazz
existing Twangmeister and Surfmeister
Piet carries one of his ’56 P-90s in the bridge
tones. Flick to the middle position, and the
models, with the bolt-neck construction of
position (with a stylish, gold foil-like cover)
pair blend together for a tone that is
the former and a 25 1/2-inch scale length.
and a Broadcaster-style pickup in the neck,
simultaneously funky, twangy and meaty,
Extrapolating from there, you might call this
with a three-way blade switch and master
without sounding overly scooped.
design “Tele meets Jazzmaster, with a little bit
volume and tone controls. The vibrato
of Les Paul Junior thrown in.” It’s a popular
tailpiece and bridge are both Mastery’s highly
Both pickups work very well with overdrive from the Friedman’s lead channel, the
breed of mutt these days, and one that
cranked 5E3-style combo, or JHS Angry
should take well to Huber’s spin. The body is
Charlie and Wampler Tumnus Plus pedals.
made from a single piece of lightweight alder, carved with softly radiused edges, a ribcage/ belly contour at the back and a forearm contour in front. It’s dressed in a thin, open-pore nitro finish in two-tone sunburst that’s tastily offset with a tortoise pickguard, rear control-cavity cover and truss-rod cover. The maple neck is topped with an
YOU MIGHT CALL THIS DESIGN “TELE MEETS JAZZMASTER, WITH A LITTLE BIT OF LES PAUL JUNIOR THROWN IN”
There’s a lot of brightness in this guitar, and I found myself mostly playing it with the tone rolled down about 20 to 30 percent. But bring it back up to max for that big solo in the bridge position, and the Piet bites, snarls and slices, without getting overtly spiky. As other high-end makers have shown, you can get interesting results when you combine this Jazzmaster-style bridge and
unbound East Indian rosewood fingerboard inlaid with silver rings between its 22
regarded take on the Jazzmaster/Jaguar
vibrato format, with its inherently low string
medium-jumbo frets, and leads up to an
format, which most players agree improves
tension and that ringing dead-string space
unbleached bone nut and die-cast Gotoh
on the original hardware for tone, stability
between bridge and tailpiece. In this guitar,
tuners with ebony buttons. Among the Nik
and return-to-pitch consistency. Strap
the result is a fun clankiness that projects
Huber guitars I’ve played and tested over the
buttons are Schallers, with the strap-lock
rhythm playing into a clean or semi-clean
past 20 years, I’ve discovered some of my
units included in the case — a nice touch.
amp for indie-rock, garage-rock and what
favorite neck shapes, and this one is no
I tested the Piet into a tweed Deluxe-style
have you. Combined with a lot more sustain
different. A full, deep, ’50s LP-style carve (I
1x12 combo, and a Friedman Small Box
and overall sonic richness than you usually
get a depth of around .915 of an inch at the
50-watt head with 2x12 cab. With this pickup
get from guitars that carry this hardware, it
first fret), it lacks protrusive shoulders and is
selection, the Piet offers three rather
enables the Piet to easily tackle more refined
extremely comfortable in the hand, providing
dramatically different sounds from each of
genres too. Overall, this is an extremely fun
plenty to grab hold of. A width of 1 21/32 inches
the switch positions, which are nevertheless
design, and a very well-built instrument.
at the nut falls right between the vintage
complementary. Together, they present a
Fender and Gibson standards and still allows
broad range of voices that sit together
CONTACT nikhuber-guitars.com
plenty of room to get your digits around the
extremely, and surprisingly, well. Which is to
PRICE $3,795 base price; $4,385 as reviewed, with
strings. Among the tasty touches here are fret
say, this Huber creation will do just about
Mastery hardware and one-piece body
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CAREER
Eyes on the Prize
Following highprofile stints with Melissa Etheridge and Lizzo, Celisse preps an album of her own. J U D E
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“ GUI TA R I S K I N D of a crazy story for me,” says Celisse Henderson, who nowadays performs and records simply as Celisse. “I’ve only been playing for about six years.” It’s what Celisse has done with the guitar in just six years that’s so impressive. In her
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Celisse performs at Gibson’s NAMM concert in Anaheim, California, January 16, 2020
short career on the fretboard, she has already played lead guitar for Lizzo on Saturday Night
on her own path.
Live, toured with Melissa Etheridge,
“Even after I’ve had a
performed with Jon Batiste on NPR’s Tiny
good amount of
Desk Concert series and, this past January,
success, I’m kind of
shared the bill at Gibson’s all-star NAMM
the shame of my
concert with such greats as Slash, Billy
family,” Celisse says.
Gibbons, Jimmy Vivino, Elliot Easton, Lzzy
“My parents are still
Hale, Don Felder, Rick Nielsen, Richie Faulkner
like, ‘Oh, you never
and Jared James Nichols.
got your degree.’” She
Then again, Celisse’s accomplishments seem less crazy when you consider she’s been performing almost since she could walk. “My
doing okay.’” Walking by a
“I’M HERE TO REMIND EVERYBODY, ‘THIS GENRE — IT ’S A BLACK ART FORM. AND IT STARTED WITH A REALLY INCREDIBLE BLACK WOMAN DOING THIS IN CHURCHES’”
enrolled in a guitar class at Los Medanos College in Pittsburg, California. “I learned how to play ‘Brown Eyed Girl’ and four or five chords.” Ironically, it was Celisse’s theater career and stunning, church-bred singing
mom was a choir director at a pretty big
grand piano at the
church in Oakland, California, and she always
Gibson Showroom in Los Angeles, she can’t
tells a story about the first time I sang
resist sitting at it and launching into a
publicly,” she says. “While she was directing
beautiful rendition of “I Wanna Be Your Lover”
the Broadway national tour of Wicked when I
the choir one Sunday, she saw me suddenly
by Prince — a fitting artist for her to cover,
was 20,” says Celisse, who now lives in New
get out of my pew and wander up to the
because, like Prince, she’s an accomplished
York City. “I did a bunch of other shows, too.
microphone. I think I was between one and
singer and multi-instrumentalist.
The last one that I did was a revival of
two years old at the time. The woman who
“I started on violin when I was two, but my
voice that would put a guitar in her hands professionally. “My first big job was in the ensemble of
Godspell, on Broadway, and they wanted me
was watching me went up and pulled me
first real instrument came when I was four
to play electric guitar at the end of my song
back, but I kept getting free and heading back
and started playing classical piano,” she
[“Learn Your Lessons Well”]. Every night,
to the microphone. Finally, the preacher just
explains. “I have this big classical music
they’d hand me this Fender Strat, and I would
said, ‘Let the baby sing!’ ”
background, and I come from a super-
chunk along, playing chords, while two other
conservative family, so electric guitar has
guys in the band were really ripping it. At the
choral conducting and expected she would
never been their bag.” But around the time
end of that contract, I was like, ‘I should buy
follow their example. Instead, Celisse set off
she was 18, Celisse put down $100 for an
an electric guitar and just learn the basics.’ So
Both her parents have master’s degrees in
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laughs. “I’m like, ‘I am
Ibanez guitar and
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One thing you will likely hear on Celisse’s
I did that and searched ‘12-bar blues’ on
over the last couple of years people have
YouTube, and I found some great videos by
been discovering her videos, and she was
new record will be her hand-wired Benson
Marty Schwartz. Suddenly I began hearing all
inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Vincent head, which she shows us with pride.
my Hendrix, Chuck Berry and Muddy Waters
“The thing about being a black woman
“The dirty channel on that amp has a nice
records differently. I began trying to learn
playing rock and roll is, so often it’s looked at
compression thing that lets it sit in the mix
things off them by ear.”
as a novelty, and people are like, ‘Oh wow, it’s
perfectly, because it incorporates a one-watt
so crazy to see you do this,’” she continues.
amp called the Vinny within it,” she tells us. “I
performing with multi-Platinum rocker
“To a certain extent, I understand that,
love that amp, because I can get that deep
Melissa Etheridge. “I had been hired to run
because there just hasn’t been very much
power-tube saturation at really low volumes
background vocals for her,” Celisse continues,
representation. But there’s this other part of
— not just at 10 but at 2 as well.”
“and a couple weeks into the tour, she pulls
me that’s like, ‘It’s actually the most normal
me aside and says, ‘I hear that you play guitar.
thing, because it started with a black woman.’
and Gabriel Tenorio strings: “I use .010s, but
We should have you play on a couple songs.’ It
We just don’t talk about her as much as we
when I told Billy Gibbons that, he said,
was a great opportunity, so I prepared very
do the other players. So I’m here to remind
‘Ambitious. I use .007s.’” She also employs a
thoroughly and learned all the parts. At our
everybody, ‘Hey, this genre — it’s a black art
Boss ES-5 loop switcher to call in any
first show on the next run, she let me use her
form. It started with black people, and it
combination of up to five pedals. “I love
Bad Cat amp, and as I played, she kept
started with a really incredible black woman
pedals,” she says. “That night at the Gibson
turning around and looking at me like, ‘Oh,
doing this in churches.’”
event I was using a Menatone Thundering
From there, it was one small step to
Celisse is at work on an album of her own.
you really do play!’ I just kept going with the
Celisse plays with Dunlop Tortex picks
Revival that I just love. It gives you a heavy,
Not surprisingly, the new songs are rife with
deep saturated, syrupy drive and also has a
rock, soul and funk flavors, plus gospel vibes,
trim pot inside so you can adjust the bass
a big way last December when she received a
as can be heard on her version of the classic
response. For moody reverbs and crazy
mysterious query on Instagram. “It was from
folk song and civil rights anthem “Keep Your
delays, I use Chase Bliss Audio stuff, too,
someone claiming to be casting for a
Eyes on the Prize.” “The album should be out
like the Dark World and Tonal Recall. I also
television opportunity,” she says. That
this year, but for now I’m taking meetings with
have Eventide H9 multi-effectors.
“someone” was keyboardist and musical
people who might partner with me to release
director Devin Johnson. “He got back to me
it. The musical climate
and said, ‘The client is Lizzo, and she loves
right now is exciting,
your stuff. She would love for you to play with
but if you release your
her on Saturday Night Live.’”
stuff without the right
guitar from there.” The national spotlight called for Celisse in
channels, it’s kind of
When Celisse arrived at rehearsals, she learned that Lizzo wanted her lead guitar spot
like a tree falling in the
to honor the late, great Sister Rosetta Tharpe,
forest — does anybody
one of Celisse’s heroes. “They said, ‘We’re
hear it?”
“Why do I have all these pedals?” she asks, with a laugh. “Because I’m still new
“HE SAID ‘LIZZO WOULD LOVE FOR YOU TO PLAY WITH HER ON SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE ’”
to all of this. So with each new pedal, I’m like, ‘Ooh, I’m so curious what it sounds like!’ I am truly excited by everything.”
making you this coat like one Sister Rosetta wore.’ I don’t know if they knew how deep the
Onstage at the 2020 Sundance
Sister Rosetta thing was with me. I was like, ‘I
Film Festival, in Park CIty,
not only have a tattoo of Sister Rosetta on my
Utah, January 30, 2020
arm — I happen to have her guitar!’” Celisse’s cream-colored three-humbucker ’63 Gibson SG reissue is like the one Tharpe famously wielded in the ’60s, and it’s her favorite. But her respect for Tharpe goes beyond the blues woman’s guitar playing. “Sister Rosetta Tharpe is the sole reason we have the genre of rock and roll,” Celisse says. credit Chuck Berry and Muddy Waters for being the foundation. But the truth is Chuck and Muddy were all in the clubs and churches listening to Sister Rosetta Tharpe. She was playing this rock style in the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s. Her career was quite successful, considering, but I think we sometimes we have a bit of amnesia in music history. Luckily,
G U I T A R P L A Y E R . C O M
GEORG E P IMEN TEL/G ETTY I MAG ES
“So often, the Stones and other big rock gods
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MORE ONLINE!
RIFFS
Watch Kingfish perform these at guitarplayer.com/may_riffs
My Life in Five Riffs Christone “Kingfish” Ingram reveals the fistful of tunes behind his formidable chops. B Y
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CH RI STO N E “ K I N G FI SH” I N G RAM learned his first guitar licks in an after-school program at the Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale, Mississippi, the home of the crossroads that many music fans consider hallowed ground. Ingram may be known for keeping the traditions of his hometown Delta blues alive, but that’s only half of his story. As it happens, influences ranging from psychedelic funk to gospel and hip-hop have their own chapters in it as well. Here are the five riffs that shaped his guitar playing.
“I PLAY THE BLUES FOR YOU” ALBERT KING “I learned this at the Delta Blues Museum under my teachers Daddy Rich [Richard Crisman] and Bill ‘Howlin’ Madd’ Perry. We would learn different Albert King songs, such as ‘I Play the Blues for You,’ and one of the licks in that song influenced my playing a whole lot, because it was one of the first licks I learned in that blues pentatonic scale that I could use. I worked my way around it, and from that I built up on other stuff.”
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“HIT IT AND QUIT IT ” FUNKADELIC
between the two — have that traditional
those played together. You can pretty much
sound but still get contemporary every now
pull off the song in any instrumentation. My
“Eddie Hazel is a big inspiration to me. I love
and again. I’m influenced by a lot of things.
love of Nate Dogg has to do with my love of
his playing. I listened to ‘Maggot Brain’ almost
Blues music is my first love, obviously, but I’m
music all together. I’ve always loved his vocal
every day; it’s one of my favorite tunes. I feel
into rock and classic rock and all sorts of other
style. He’s always been one of my favorite
like he’s one of the most underappreciated
stuff. I had been playing bass, and I started on
singers. I try to do some of my vibrato like him.
and underrated guitarists, and he’s one of my
guitar around 12 or 13, and I found this Hendrix
He had this long, shaky vibrato, and
favorite guys. Funk rock is a big inspiration to
Smash Hits CD that my mom got me. From
sometimes I like to emulate that.”
my playing, so I owe it all to him.”
that point on, it was right to where I am now.”
“CATFISH BLUES” ROBERT PETWAY (IN THE STYLES OF MUDDY WATERS AND JIMI HENDRIX)
“NEVER LEAVE ME ALONE” NATE DOGG
B.B. KING LICK “This is an old B.B. King lick that sounds very common, but it’s definitely a lick that I love.
“I’m a die-hard Nate Dogg fan. He comes from
You can incorporate it into any blues solo in 12
the same city as me in Mississippi, Clarksdale,
bars. Some of that at the end is stuff I added,
“This is ‘Catfish Blues’ two ways. The first way
before he moved to Long Beach [California]. I
but it’s B.B. King influenced. It’s not a
is the Muddy Waters way. Hendrix took that
listened to the bass line and listened hard to
particular tune. It’s one of his signature licks
and made it a little different. I like to alternate
the guitar on the record, and this is basically
that I would add into my playing a lot.”
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COLUMN
CLASSIC GEAR B Y D AV E H U N T E R
Set to Stun With its bright orange case and vintage circuit, the script-logo MXR Phase 90 is a TKO. FO R A T I M E in the 1970s, guitarists were using phase shifters like they were going out of style. Remarkably, while the effect lost some of its popularity in the decades that followed, it has remained a staple of the guitarist’s arsenal. After all, why hack out static-sounding guitar tracks when a phaser can give them a stunningly three-dimensional swirling sound? Maestro and Electro-Harmonix were among those that popularized the devices, but undoubtedly the most-loved phaser of its time was the MXR Phase 90. More dramatic sounding than MXR’s Phase 45, more affordable and less obtrusive than the larger two-knob Phase 100, the Phase 90 hit the sweet spot, and it landed on a bucketload of classic recordings and touring pedalboards as a result. Edward Van Halen smeared its tones all over Van Halen I, David Gilmour used one to add six-string sheen to Pink Floyd’s “Shine on You Crazy Diamond,” and Mick Jones slathered it on the Clash’s “Lost in the Supermarket,” to name just a few artists and recordings associated with the Phase 90. At the heart of a phase shifter is a circuit that splits the incoming signal in two and reverses the phase of one strand by 180 degrees. A low-frequency oscillator is then
90 is a four-stage phaser, since it has four
Phase 45 was released, followed by the
applied to the signals, causing them to
independent stages at which the signal’s
Phase 100 in 1975. These early pedals had
intersect at varying points along the
phase is reversed, resulting in two modulated
their names and MXR’s logo silkscreened on
frequency spectrum. When the two signals
frequency notches. The speed at which these
their fronts in a distinctive script font. By 1976,
meet, they are 180 degrees out of phase with
notches are swept up and down the
all the pedals in the line were given more
one another and cancel each other out,
frequency spectrum is controlled by the
modern block-letter logos encircled by a
creating a “notch” in the frequency. As the
Phase 90’s lone control knob. Because the
black box. By then, MXR was the pro choice
oscillator sweeps those notches up and down
original MXR pedals were not true bypass,
among the many alternatives on the market.
the audio spectrum, it produces the
the input signal passed through the pedal’s
Unfortunately, the competition was massive,
characteristic swooshing
buffer stage even when
and that, among other factors, helped drive
effect that these pedals are
the effect was switched
the company out of business in 1984.
famous for. The Phase 90 was the debut effect from MXR, which Terry Sherwood and Keith Barr formed in 1972 in Rochester, New York. Designed by Barr and released in either 1972 or ’74 (sources vary), the Phase
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ESSENTIAL INGREDIENTS > Black script MXR logo >F our-stage analog phaseshifting circuit > Iconic orange die-cast metal housing >S ingle control knob for speed function
off, which caused it to suffer from tone suck. By late 1974, MXR had
Dunlop acquired the MXR brand in 1987, and has released several reissue renditions of the Phase 90 and other MXR favorites, as
introduced other pedals,
well as modernized phasers that pay homage
including the Blue Box
to the original circuit, with conveniences such
octave fuzz, Distortion+
as contemporary DC power inputs, LED
and Dyna Comp
indicator lights and true-bypass switching.
compressor. Toward the
But for purists, nothing except an original
end of the same year, the
script-logo Phase 90 will do.
PLAYERS
FROM TO M P ET T Y ’S R I G H THA ND MA N TO A M E M B E R O F FL E ETWOOD M AC A N D L EA D E R O F HIS OW N GROU P — M IK E CA M P BE L L RE FL EC TS ON H I S LO N G CA R E E R AS THE ROC K GU I TA R I STS’S GU I TA R I ST. B Y
J O E
P H O T O G R A P H Y S T Y L I S T :
B O S S O
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K E V I N
M A R Y E L L E
S C A N L O N
D E V I T T O
Mike Campbell photographed at home in Los Angeles, February 18, 2020
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PLAYERS
M
ike Campbell is what you might call a “band guy.” Currently, he’s a member of two outfits — Fleetwood Mac, which he joined in 2018, and his own act, the Dirty Knobs, a group he formed as a side project more than a dozen years ago and which is readying its debut album [see page 50]. If he had more time in his schedule, he’d probably join a third band. “It’s just the way I am,” the veteran guitarist says. “Some guys join a band and use it as a springboard to go solo. I never saw the point in that. I like the idea of being in a gang and having your buddies around.” He chuckles, then adds, “It’s less lonely that way.” For more than 40 years, Campbell was the ace lead guitarist and sometime co-songwriter of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, and if fate had turned out differently he’d still be making music with his lifelong friend. “I’m still going through grief and processing the fact that Tom is no longer here,” he says. “I treasure the memories of what we did together.” The Florida-born Campbell first hooked up with Petty in the early ’70s in a Gainesville-based group called Mudcrutch. The band would ultimately relocate to Los Angeles, sign a record deal and morph into Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Before then, Campbell was playing around Gainesville in a band called Dead or Alive, which he remembers as being “pretty good.” “We got gigs, so that put us ahead of most local bands,” he says. “We played around the college for free and did some women’s clubs here and there. ‘Oh, the women’s club wants to give us 200 bucks? No problem!’ That was big money to us in those days.” Beyond the occasional $200, Dead or Alive offered Campbell a chance to hone his craft onstage. He’d been playing guitar for only a few years, starting out on a Harmony acoustic before moving to a $60 Goya electric that his father bought in Okinawa while serving in the U.S. Air Force. By slowing down records on his phonograph and learning the licks 44
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of his two biggest inspirations, Mike Bloomfield and Jerry Garcia, Campbell took his guitar playing to a decent level of proficiency, but he asserts that he didn’t find his own voice as a player until he starting gigging. “Dead or Alive was my first band and my first real chance to play live,” he says. “We did a lot of 10-minute jams. This was an important time for me. I had learned the basics, but now I could get out there and put it together. I think with me, I got to a point where I was like, ‘I know what I’m doing. People are responding to it and I’m inspired by it.’ So that pushed me to get better, to explore the nuances of playing. Guitarists know what I’m talking about. Once you go from nothing to ‘pretty good,’ you need that opportunity to go
to another level. That’s what happened with me. Playing live, I was able to establish what I was, and I stayed with it the rest of my life.” As for that Goya guitar, Campbell continued playing it for his first few years with Petty, until the singer suggested quite pointedly, “You should get a better guitar.” Campbell bought a Gibson Firebird and, thanks to a gift from a friend, acquired a Fender Strat. He gave the Goya away and lost track of it, but after mentioning the guitar in an interview 15 years ago, he was stunned when somebody from a Tom Petty fan club who had read the piece found the instrument and mailed it to him for his birthday. “Talk about a sweet gesture,” Campbell marvels. “We’ve always had the greatest fans.” G U I T A R P L A Y E R . C O M
(THIS PAG E, CLOCKWI SE FROM TOP LE FT) J IM McC RARY/ RE DFE RNS /G E TTY I MAG ES ; E D CARAEFF/GET T Y IM AGES ; IAN D IC KSON /RED FERN S /GET T Y IM AGES ; GUS ST EWART/RED FERN S /GET T Y IM AGES
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o let’s talk about how you joined Mudcrutch in the early 1970s. Did you have to audition for Tom to get the gig?
I don’t know if you’d call it an audition. My bass player left for Hawaii to be a surfer, so it was me and Randall Marsh, my drummer, left over. We had seen this band called Mudcrutch playing in the park. They were doing a Burrito Brothers–type thing, and they had harmonies and three-minute songs. I was impressed. I saw a sign that said they were looking for a drummer, so I told Randall he should audition. He called them up and they came to this house that he and I were sharing. I was in the back room, and as it turned out their guitar player had quit. So Randall said, “Hey, my friend in the back room is a guitar player.” So I came out — I had short hair and cut-off jeans
“TOM SAID, ‘I DON’ T KNOW WHO YOU ARE, BUT YOU’RE IN MY BAND FOREVER’” — and they looked at me and said, “Oh, f*ck. This guy’s a loser.” I had my little Goya guitar, and they said, “What do you know?” So I said, “How about ‘Johnny B. Goode’?” We played that, and when we got to the end, Tom said, “I don’t know who you are, but you’re in my band forever.” I told them I was in college because I didn’t want to go to Vietnam. Tom goes, “Don’t worry, we’ll take care of that. You’re going to grow your hair out, and you’re going to be great. You’re in the band.” G U I T A R P L A Y E R . C O M
(clockwise from top left) Mudcrutch in Los Angeles, December 1974: (from left) Campbell, Petty, Randall Marsh and Tom Leadon. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Los Angeles, July 15, 1976. Campbell backstage at the Hammersmith Odeon, London, May 14, 1977. With Ampeg Dan Armstrong guitar at the Rainbow Theatre, Finsbury Park, London, June 19, 1977
Tom saw something in you, but what did you see in him?
He was writing songs. He showed us some, and I said, “I write, too.” I showed him something I had, and I think maybe he saw me as a potential writing partner. We didn’t really discuss it that much. It
was just one of those destiny things — a chance meeting that changed our lives. We became fast friends, and that’s what we were till the end. Fast forward a few years to when Mudcrutch became Tom Petty and the M AY
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Cray recording in Capitol Records’ studio
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PAYING TRIB UT E TO T H E SOU N D O F SA M COOKE ’S RECO R DS , RO BE RT C RAY R EVITA L IZ ES R&B , SOU L A N D F U N K O N THAT ’S W H AT I H EA R D . B Y P H O T O G R A P H Y
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of his 40-year recording career, Robert Cray has forged a sophisticated blues-soul sound that is timeless, even while it has hewed to the roots of the Memphis soul scene. His recordings have been imbued with the sound of Stax and Hi Records, and he even cut his 2017 Grammy-nominated album, Robert Cray and Hi Rhythm, with members of that label’s rhythm section. V E R T H E COU RSE
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For his latest release, That’s What I Heard (Nozzle/Thirty Tigers), the guitarist has taken a different tack by paying tribute to the sound of Sam Cooke’s late-’50s/early ’60s soul, R&B and gospel records, which the late singer cut in Hollywood. The album is Cray’s sixth with producer/drummer Steve Jordan and was recorded at L.A.’s legendary Capitol Studios. “One of the great things about working with Steve Jordan is he’s really
good at putting people in the mood and capturing that mood in the studio,” Cray says. “Part of it was the combination of the styles we were going after — like doing a Curtis Mayfield number and a gospel number and stuff like that — and also by being at Capitol and using some of those old microphones they have there. There have been situations in the past where Steve wanted a certain vibe for a song and we weren’t getting it, so he’ll call everyone into the control room
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“YOU CAN’ T MAKE PEOPLE LIKE YOU. WHEN YOU ACCEPT THAT, THERE’S SOMETHING FREEING ABOUT IT ”
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STATES ON S HA P ES HIF T I N G , J O E SATR IA N I E MUL ATES HIS GU I TA R H E RO ES , RE -IMAGIN ES H I S CA R E E R A ND FOL LOWS H I S B L I SS TO A MUSICA L M ETA M O R P H OS I S . B Y
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HE R E’S A G R E AT piece of advice I once got from Glyn Johns,” Joe Satriani tells Guitar Player, recalling a conversation with the legendary British producer who helmed Satch’s 1995 self-titled album. “He said to me: ‘It’s not your job to decide what people will like or not like — it’s your job to play the guitar. So go play your bloody guitar!’” Satriani laughs at the bluntness of the directive. But, he adds, “It was just a really
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great, cutting-through-the bullsh*t statement. He was saying, ‘Make yourself happy. Play what you want to play!’” It’s a credo that the 63-year-old Satriani has taken to heart over the course of his long career, during which he’s released more than a dozen solo albums and played with artists and acts as diverse as Mick Jagger, Robert Fripp, Blue Öyster Cult, Spinal Tap and his own supergroup, Chickenfoot. But he’s never followed it more passionately than he did on his newest, and
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AFICIONADO
1969 GIBSON LES PAUL CUSTOM “ I H A D T H I S dream of finding that perfect Les Paul Custom for a long time, and it has always eluded me. But I picked this one up and my hand just fell in love with the neck. And it has that weird Les Paul Custom sound. I don’t know why they sound so unique, but they just don’t sound like regular Les Pauls. We did something crazy with it — we took out the original pickups, put them safely in a box, and then I had [longtime guitar tech] Gary Brawer put a [DiMarzio] Fred in the neck and a [DiMarzio] Satchur8 in the bridge, and we did the full Jimmy Page wiring. The guitar sounds amazing. I wound up using it on the new album on ‘Falling Stars’ and ‘Here the Blue River.’”
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1966 FENDER ELECTRIC XII “ YE A RS AGO, I was always saying, ‘I’ve gotta get that electric 12 that I’ve been looking for.’ I had a Rickenbacker at the time, and it was just killing me. You couldn’t play the thing — you had to keep stopping to retune. So my friend Mike found me this Fender, and I remember him telling me, ‘Hey, this is what Jimmy Page actually used on “Stairway to Heaven.”’ That’s a terrible thing to tell someone who’s buying a guitar, because it clouds judgement, right? [laughs] But this turned out to be a guitar I’ve used a lot. Sometimes I’d put it on the left channel and the Rickenbacker on the right, and together they make a beautiful sound. It’s like the perfect ancient tool that comes out when only that tool will work.”
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GEAR
Ernie Ball Music Man
SABRE
T EST E D BY J UD E GOL D IF YOU ’ V E E V E R dreamed of a guitar that
wide-radius fretboard and a 3/8ths-inch thick
weaves together the best parts of a Fender
contoured and bound flame-maple top.
Stratocaster and a Gibson Les Paul, you’ll
Related only in name to the Sabre that
surely want to check out the new Ernie Ball
Music Man offered in the late ’70s and early
Music Man Sabre. Like many a Strat, the
’80s, this new Sabre is available in four
Sabre has a 25.5-inch scale-length fretboard,
schemes — a range that spans the
strings that travel in straight lines to their
shimmering Honey Suckle model (lemon
respective tuners (minimizing friction at the
burst with chrome hardware) to the decidedly
nut), a vibrato bridge, bent-steel string
more lethal-looking Cobra model reviewed
saddles, a double-cutaway body (with a
here. I dig how the Cobra’s dusky hues and
backside comfort cut where it hits your ribs)
obsidian-black hardware team up to project a
and a diagonally mounted five-position
dangerous rock vibe. The vibrato arm, pickup
pickup selector. But then, like many a Les
covers and bridge cover (which makes a nice
Paul, the Sabre offers dual humbuckers,
palm rest) are actually matte finished. They’re
boosted tension on the higher strings (due to
so black and gloss-less they look and feel like
their tuners being closer to the nut), a
they survived the fires of hell. Pick up the Sabre and the first thing you’ll
S P E C I F I C AT I O N S
likely notice is the zippy feel of its slender
Sabre
neck. The simple oil and wax polish on
CONTACT music-man.com
this sculpted hunk of roasted maple
PRICE $3,199 street, hardshell
is nothing short of superb, as it
Music Man case included
delivers that coveted ultra-smooth (but non-sweaty) gigged-on-for-
NECK Roasted maple
decades feel. However, with its
NUT WIDTH 1 11/16”
shallow C cut, the Sabre neck is
FRETBOARD Maple, rosewood or
thin, so if you’re used to mid-size
ebony; 25.5”-scale, 10”-radius
neck profiles or thicker, it may feel a
FRETS 22 high-profile medium-width stainless steel
bit scrawny, particularly near the nut.
TUNERS Schaller locking
Measuring with a caliper, I found the
BODY Polyester-finished maple-bound
strings to be closer together at the nut
flame-maple-topped Okoume
than on an ’08 Stratocaster and ’03
BRIDGE Music Man fulcrum tremolo
Telecaster, and about the same width
with bent-steel saddles, cover
apart as the strings are at the nut on
PICKUPS wo Music Man custom-wound
an ’01 Les Paul. Interestingly, as is
ceramic-magnet humbuckers
the case on other Ernie Ball Music
CONTROLS Master volume and
Man double-cutaways, the
tone, 5-way blade selector
Sabre’s strings splay outward
FACTORY STRINGS Ernie Ball 2240
enough that they’re slightly
Regular Slinky RPS .010-.046
farther apart at the bridge
WEIGHT 7.5 lbs
than they are on those other
BUILT USA
three guitars I just mentioned. If you use hybrid picking, you’ll
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KUDOS Five killer tones. Great resonance
likely be a fan of this “fan,”
everywhere on the fretboard. Sharp looks
because by the time the strings
CONCERNS Neck may be too thin
reach your pick-hand fingers,
for some players. Pricey
there’s plenty of plucking room.
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9000
So far, I have performed four Jefferson Starship concerts with the Sabre, running it through either rented Fender Hot Rod DeVille 212 combos or a Gilman Mamba head and cabinet. From the very first soundcheck, I’ve been impressed by how confidently this guitar sings onstage, and I haven’t stumbled upon a single dead spot anywhere on the neck. I credit that boosted sustain not only to the guitar’s great materials and solid construction but also, perhaps, to having its pickups mounted directly on the body in the superstrat tradition. From aggressive bridge-pickup lead timbres to creamy, Clapton-esque toneknob-all-the-way-down “woman” settings, the Sabre is a versatile tone tool. The two in-between sounds — positions 2 and 4 on the selector — are great, too, and serve up either the two outside or two inside coils of the pickup pair, respectively. When playing clean, these settings are noticeably lower in output than what the full-humbucker sounds deliver, but a little compression — or a lot of distortion — evens things up nicely. After my first gig with the Sabre I swapped
done with it yet! When possible, I enjoy the
its .010 string set for a set of .009s. It could be
convenience of traveling with just one guitar,
my imagination, but with the Sabre’s bridge
and this guitar does just about everything I
set non-floating (and with zero give during
need it to do — from surf-adelic humbucker-
string bends), a .009–.042 set seems to offer
through-reverb-tank textures to searing hot
more string tension on this instrument than it
solo sounds to whammy-bar mayhem. I plan
might on other 25.5-inch-scale guitars,
to take it on the next run of shows. As you can
making bends more satisfying. Must be due to
undoubtedly tell from my enthusiasm for it,
that tried-and-true, four-plus-two Music Man
the Ernie Ball Music Man Sabre easily earns
tuner arrangement!
our Editors’ Pick award.
The only other accoutrement I’d consider swapping out on this instrument is the volume pot. Call me finicky, but, being a player who rides the volume quite a bit (to clean things up in overdrive situations), I prefer a pot with a more linear taper in the lowest range, because when this Sabre’s knob nears zero, the signal suddenly seems to fall off a cliff into silence. Overall, I am so thrilled with the Sabre’s playability and versatility that, well, I ain’t
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