Alex Skolnick

Guitarist Alex Skolnick got his start with Testament, but has broadened his interest to jazz with the Alex Skolnick Trio and has played with Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Metal Allegiance and...

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.
My guest today is guitarist Alex Colnick. Alex explain jazz
to the.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Rocker A nice easy question to begin with, right, First
of all, thanks for having me on, Bob. I'm a
longtime reader, loyal reader. The occasional times I pop up
in the mail bag newsletters is always a big thrill,
So thanks for having me on.

Speaker 3 (00:39):
So no, but really, I listen, jazz came along and
people say jazz is dead. It's funny you're playing jazz
now because the rock is dead. But you were, you know,
guitarist in Testament, and now you have the Alex Golnick trio,
which is jazz. Their two things. There's a lot How

(01:00):
did you get into jazz and how does the average
rocker come to understand jazz?

Speaker 2 (01:07):
It was a very interesting journey for me because, yes,
as you mentioned, I'm sort of best known for being
the guitarist for Testament, which is from the San Francisco
Bay area music scene. We followed in the footsteps of Metallica.
I was very young when I joined the band and

(01:29):
I did my first record with the band. Way was eighteen,
shortly after high school, and I'd gone through this period
of just being in the post van Halen Revolution. You know,
it was all about Eddie van Halen and virtueoso guitar
players Rany Rhodes from the Ozzy Osbourne's band, the late

(01:50):
great guitarists like Joe Satriani who was actually a teacher
of mine, and I know, you know you've had him
on And by the time I was doing my first record,
I was still developing, you know. So at eighteen years old,
you know, I'm still discovering things musically, and I guess

(02:12):
you know, the way I found my way to it
was music that is arguably jazz. So an example would
be the music that Miles Davis recorded in the eighties,
where he had like screaming guitarists like Mike Stern and
John Schofield. And also, you know what's considered jazz rock.

(02:38):
So al Damiola is a name a lot of rock
guitar players would know. He inspired a lot of rock
guitar players. You could talk to Zach Wilde about Aldamiola
and he would not stop talking. John Patucci from Dream
Theater was very inspired by al Damiola, and Aldemia sort

(03:00):
of occupies this space that's in between jazz and rock
and world music. But he also had these incredible other
musicians that he collaborated with over the years, like Chick Corea,
for example, or Jocko Pastorias and if you follow the

(03:22):
sort of family tree of musicians on records by Al
Damiola and another one, Alan Holdsworth, who was a big
influence on Eddie van Haleen. He had worked with Tony Williams,
who had also worked with Miles Davis. So jazz rock
is really what got me right around the time I

(03:47):
was doing my first professional heavy metal recordings, and it
was wanting to understand jazz rock Aldemiola, Tony Williams with
Alan Holdsworth, et cetera. That made me want to study
actual jazz, jazz that even jazz pure jazz fans or

(04:11):
traditional jazz bands could agree is jazz.

Speaker 3 (04:15):
Okay? So what'd you do next?

Speaker 2 (04:17):
Okay? So so I well, I was, I guess, sort
of a guitar prodigy doing the first Testament records when
I was still in my teens and getting a lot
of attention for that because you know, in thrash metal, uh,
most most of the playing at that time was a

(04:38):
little more raw and punk based. If you were a
more polished player with a lot of technique, you were
expected to play glam metal, you know, something more along
the lines of the group's the Sunset Strip fans, for example,
who had some great guitar players. Yeah, and in my case,

(05:03):
you know, I was able to learn solos by the
likes of some of the people I mentioned, Randy Rhodes,
our friend Joe Satriani. You know, not that I could
play quite like them, but I could, so I could
understand it, and I could get it, get a handle
on it. When it came to jazz rock, I could

(05:26):
not understand what the heck was going on. Some of
the al Daimiola stuff made sense because he he st
of has his own vocabulary, which isn't really jazz. But
you know the music I mentioned before, Miles Davis in
the late eighties, mid to late eighties, with guitar players

(05:50):
John Schofield, Mike Stern, Robin Ford, I could not figure
out what the heck was going on. It's a completely
different language. And I went to a few different music
teachers in the Bay Area. By this time, Satrianni was
already off and running with his career, so I found

(06:11):
some music teachers in the Bay Area that were more
focused on jazz and jazz fusion, and they explained to me, like, Yeah,
all these people you're listening to, they know how to
play jazz even though you're hearing them in this jazz
rock setting. They can play tunes. They've listened to artists

(06:33):
like Charlie Parker and John Coltrane, saxophonists. They've listened to
piano players like Bill Evans and McCoy Tyner and all.
You know, there's too many essential jazz musicians to name,
but basically, you have to get a handle on the

(06:54):
vocabulary of the music. You have to appreciate the history
of it, you have to learn about all these historical musicians,
and you have to obviously, you have to like the music.
So by the time I started studying it just to
help with my jazz rock interest, I developed a taste

(07:15):
for it, and then I got it. I really liked it.
But I was never one of these kids that sort
of grew up wanting to be a jazz player. It
hit me later, which is very unusual.

Speaker 3 (07:30):
Okay, you keep referencing eighties Miles Davis and all those people.
Did you like it from the first time you heard
it or did you have to work and become comfortable
with it? Was it more of an intellectual appreciation before
an emotional appreciation. Tell me about that awakening.

Speaker 2 (07:49):
Well, the late eighties, Miles Davis was current as I
discovered it, which is very different because you know, when
I was here, when I heard what you could call
straight ahead jazz on the jazz radio station. Yeah, we

(08:10):
had a very good jazz radio station in San Francisco
areak kja Z, but it was definitely more straight ahead.
You didn't hear a lot of stuff like that. And
you know, I was young, I was in my teens
and very into screaming guitar. So to me, the reason

(08:31):
I didn't gravitate towards that type of jazz was it
sounded old. Yeah, I saw music from the you know,
the forties and fifties and early six It just it
felt old. And when I heard Miles Davis for the
first time doing late eighties music in the late eighties,

(08:54):
it sounded like the future. This is you know, this
is this is what's happening now, this is what's going
to happen. So it gave me a very different feeling.
And also I if I remember right. The first time
I discovered it was on a public television station, so

(09:15):
they were airing a concert. It was one of these
arts programs on PBS or the some East. I think
I was on the East Coast at the time, and
they were showing this whole concert and I was just
knocked out. I didn't know what it was. I remember
I wrote down the names of all the musicians afterwards.

(09:37):
But I think it really took hearing it, even though
I wasn't live in the room with them, but he
you know, hearing the music being played live, watching it
and just having it be current and not feeling like
old music.

Speaker 3 (09:57):
Okay, a lot of people would hear what we call
traditional jazz and from the get go say, I don't
get it. I don't like it. It's discordant, it's free form.
I don't know where it's going. Is it something where
it either clicks for you or not or can you

(10:19):
learn to like it?

Speaker 2 (10:21):
Well? You know, it's it's such a broad category, you know,
it's it's as broad a category, arguably as rock. Yeah.
So you know you have soft rock, you have punk rock,

(10:42):
you have so many types of rock, and it's very
similar with jazz. You know, there's what's called smooth jazz,
which you know, some would say isn't jazz at all,
but some would you know, which is. You might hear
at club med vacations, at dentist offices. You have avant
garde jazz, which had actually some of which has more

(11:05):
in common with punk rock. You know, you have artists
very few, but there are actually artists that cover all
this ground. John Zorn is an example of somebody like that.
You could hear moments of most types of jazz. So
I would say, you know, liking getting somebody to like jazz,

(11:30):
you know, it really depends on their taste. It depends
on the type of jazz. You'd have to point them
in the right direction. Somebody who likes funk and R
and B music, for example, well they might gravitate more
towards the music of early Herbie Hancock certainly seventies Herby Hancock.

(11:53):
They probably already know about that. You know, Horace Silver,
you know who is a big influence on Steely Dan.
Believe it or yeah, listen to Steely Dan. You know,
Josie Comes Home. It's almost sampled from a song called
Song for My Father by Horace Silver. So you know,

(12:17):
sometimes making these connections helps somebody who is familiar with
some element of rock and roll might relate to something
in jazz if you point them in the right direction.
And I would just also add that blues is something
that definitely, you know, you find all over rock and

(12:37):
roll and you find all over jazz and in very
different ways.

Speaker 3 (12:43):
So how would you describe the music of the Alex
school mactrio.

Speaker 2 (12:47):
I would say, you know, my trio is definitely more
on the jazz rock side of things, although guitar wise,
it has a little more to do with straight ahead guitar.
So the guitar is a little has a little more
in common with straight ahead jazz. The music is mildly experimental.

(13:12):
It's it's definitely more high energy than not, but you
know it's it's it's very hot, probably the hardest music
to describe as my own music.

Speaker 3 (13:30):
Is this a labor of love or is the audience
growing for the Alex Culnick Trio.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah, the audience seems to be growing. You know, I
started My whole story is strange. As I mentioned earlier,
you know, I sort of I took a sabbatical from
heavy battle. I didn't even know I was doing this.
It wasn't really planned, but I sort of followed my passion,

(13:59):
if you will, and it led me to moving to
New York City from Berkeley, California. And everybody thought I
was crazy. Most people make the move from the East
Coast to the West coast. I know you're you're one
of those. My parents are academics. They had done the

(14:21):
same thing. They had moved from New York to California.
I knew many people who would did that. And you
have to move back to New York from California was
considered a little crazy. So I needed a good excuse.
And my excuse was to get a music degree and
study at the New School in New York, and which

(14:41):
kind of made my parents happy because they hated the
fact that I never went to college. And also I
was getting to know people in the jazz world at
that time. So while at school, I threw this band
together just for fun and it started. We started getting

(15:06):
gigs and put out a record that was actually it
shocked me. It was actually well reviewed by Downbead and
jazz Is and some other jazz magazines. A jazz radio promoter,
Michael Morrick took a liking to it and got us
played on a bunch of jazz radio stations. So I

(15:29):
had really initially thought of our first album as like
a demo. I'll put this out into the world, we'll
see how it goes. But it did well enough to
launch a band that's still going a couple decades later.

Speaker 3 (15:54):
Okay, everybody talks about the economics of the road and
how terrible they are. Three guys go on on the road.
How many people come to see you? And can you
make any money?

Speaker 2 (16:06):
Yeah? Well, it's it depends on the situation. It depends
on where we are in the world for one thing.
It's all it's interesting. I think. I think in some
ways it's gotten better for the Alex and the trio,
partially because I think at this point, uh, it's very

(16:32):
clear I'm not doing this as a novelty. I think.
You know, when it was first announced after the first album,
you know of guitarist for Testaments doing a jazz guitar album. Okay, sure, next,
But you know, I've stuck with it all this time,
and the offers have gotten better. We've played some very

(16:57):
prestigious venues. We just did a tour in March, we
played a place in Vienna called Porgy and Best, which
is yeah, John Schofield was playing there the same week.
I can't play all the venues he plays, but yeah,

(17:18):
at least there's some common venues. And these are the
types of venues that twenty years ago absolutely not. You know,
they either assumed again it was a novelty or they
figured I'm some I'm going to be doing some shred act.
I'm going to do instrumental jazz, but I'm going to
bring in Marshall stacks and drums that look like Peter

(17:42):
Cris's kit from Kiss. You know. No, actually I have
real jazz players. I have great guys, Matt Sebraski and
Nathan Peck. The drum kit is small, the bass is
an actual jazz bass, although he does some electric now
as well, But for a long time it was always

(18:03):
with upright base and we always had this acoustic dynamic.
So it's taken a while to have the credibility to
play more established jazzy places, if you will, but we're
doing a lot of those, and yeah, we keep the
overhead low. We obviously don't. We don't have a light

(18:24):
show when we tour Europe. For example, we have one
crew person and he he's amazing. His name's Alex as well,
and he drives the van, does the merchandise, helps set

(18:45):
everything up. And this friend of ours, he also he
works for a lot of different musicians. Right after our
tour in March, he went off to tour for Dominic Miller,
who plays for guitar for Sting. And when Dominic Miller
is not playing with thing, you know, he's he's not

(19:08):
doing places like Stink, you know, he's to actually some
of the same same places my trios do.

Speaker 3 (19:15):
So who is coming to an Alex Goulnick trio show.
Is a Testament fans or New fans?

Speaker 2 (19:23):
You know, it's a it's a combination. Especially when we
play in Europe. We actually have a lot of fans
that know me more for the instrumental side of things,
and but there's always going to be a portion of
fans that know me from Testament and they're curious what

(19:46):
is going on. In the US, I'd say it's a
little more of a mix. It's more maybe more fifty
to fifty. But you often know the Testament fans because
you know they show up and teach. If not Testament shirts.
They'll show up in a megott Ass or a Slayer.

Speaker 3 (20:06):
Well, having listened to it, just giving my take. You know,
the big breakthrough when I was growing up as the
Mahavish New Orchestra, which I bought the first album and
I saw them live. John McLaughlan had played with Miles Davis.
That was one step a little much for me. Although
they had success with the second album. I think with

(20:26):
Birds of Fire Weather Report, I actually understood more. But
this is all a setup for the listeners. You know,
listen to Alex's trio because it's not as far out.
If it wasn't sold as jazz, you wouldn't necessarily hear
it that way. It's not as out there. Whatever, just

(20:48):
switching gears. Tell me about your experience at the New School.

Speaker 2 (20:55):
Okay, well I'll just piggyback off. You're what you said
before about the Mahavish New Orchestra. That's an example of somebody,
you know. I could talk about John McLoughlin too many
rock and metal guitar players. He's somebody that truly crossed over.

(21:15):
So we all we all know him, you know, and
uh true a true inspiration as well. So yeah, and
he was part of this whole group of players that
I think was my gateway to jazz guitar was guys
like John McLoughlin, Aldon Yola. And now, interestingly, I get

(21:41):
to the New School, this is uh late nineties around,
you know, two thousand and Yeah, I'm an older student
at that point, I'm like pushing thirty, but I'm ready
at that At that point, I was hungry, hungry to study,

(22:01):
and not just the jazz part of it too. I
also took a couple of courses in philosophy and creative writing.
A lot of my classmates were just out of high school.
Now I wasn't. There were actually a few older students.
I was definitely one of the oldest ones. I wasn't

(22:21):
the oldest one, but the vast majority had gone straight
from high school college. And yeah, they might have been
stars and their jazz program, you know, whatever town they're from,
so you had a lot of there was energy I
picked up on, like I was surprised, a lot of

(22:44):
unhappy energy because I think a lot of these kids,
you know, they'd been the jazz or you know, the
virtuoso champion and their little music scene in their town
and then they get here, they get to the big city,
this music program where you just you know, you have

(23:04):
like the best of the best, and you know, I
think a lot of hearts were breaking. I just I
picked up on it, and I was in this interesting
place because I wasn't really affected by it. I was
sort of disillusioned having been a professional on the rock

(23:26):
side of things, and I was just ready to learn.
I just I was so excited to study with all
these great players. You had legendary teachers at this school,
guys like you, Reggie Workman, who was a bassist who
played with John Coltrane, seeciul McBee. Yeah, yeah, there's like

(23:56):
too many to name, but a lot of these are
very well known names for jazz insiders. But you just
you have access to these people and you could talk
to them all the time, and you're put into ensembles
with other players, and you're you suddenly have this very

(24:19):
structured learning and I I never had that. I did
have guitar lessons with Satriani for a couple of years,
which was the most serious musician I'd ever studied with,
but that that was very guitar focused. And when I
got to the New school, it was really about music.

(24:40):
Guitarists weren't even the majority of the musicians there. There
were a lot of piano players and saxophonists, and I
was so excited to just be around that and just
be in this environment where it's not just about guitar
based and vocals and you know, other instruments matter, and

(25:04):
studying the history of the music, learning about what's called
ear training, where you actually focus on listening and not
just playing music, but being able to tell one note
from another, how far away is it, what type of
chord is this, just by hearing it. All this great stuff.

(25:25):
So I was really excited. I did see a lot
of you know, unhappy young players. I tried not to
get bummed out by that. I saw a lot of
people drop out because there were many players there that
just wanted to go there, network and drop out. I
was determined to get my education. So for me, it

(25:46):
was like the perfect thing. I met the you know,
these great musicians there I'm still friends with to this day,
launched my band from there, got my education. But the yeah,
the one thing that was odd about it, in addition
to yeah, the unhappiness I could sense from some of

(26:10):
the players that were kind of struggling. The younger players,
the artists we're talking about John McLaughlin, h Jaco Pastorius,
Weather Report, they really weren't talked about very much. They
were at that time there was such an emphasis on

(26:30):
straight ahead jazz, and there was this sense that it's
time to you know, to bring back, you know, the
real jazz. There had been this movement called the the
Young Lions. You know, Wynton Marsalis had been a part
of that, and he tended to have a little bit

(26:51):
more conservative jazz views. He wasn't a big fan of fusion.
He was championed by the jazz writer Stanley Crouch that
was a great writer and had great taste in music,
but absolutely hated electric music and jazz rock. So at

(27:15):
the time, the School I think was very much under
the effects of that. You know, it was almost like
the alternative music movement and rock suddenly, you know, this
big change. I've heard it's very different now. Now it's
a lot more open. You've had players come out of

(27:37):
from that period like Robert Glasberg, and he was actually
at the New School at the same time I was.
He's kind of one of the leading lights in jazz music.
These days, and he collaborates with hip hop artists. You know,
he's he's very well known for playing with Kendrick Lamart

(27:58):
and apparently so like somebody like Glassberg being a star
student at the News Classic, that's had a big influence.
So it's less conservative than it was. But at the
time I was there, there was this sense of it
being just being very conservative, and even guitar was a
little bit frowned upon. But I was at an age

(28:18):
where I wasn't affected by the negativity.

Speaker 3 (28:21):
Okay, you're going to college, You've already had a good
are you financially comfortable enough from Testament in order to
you know, pay for college and take the time off
from your regular career.

Speaker 2 (28:35):
Well, I had been very conservative with the earnings from Testament. Now,
Testament had never had hits. We never sort of crossed
the threshold of sort of winning awards.

Speaker 3 (28:54):
You know.

Speaker 2 (28:54):
The Bay Area music scene for heavy metal it was fun.
I mean they always compare different scenes. You know, the
British invasion you have the Beatles and the Stones, and
I had a bunch of smaller bands like Kermit's Hermits
for example. You know, and see at the Seattle scene,
you had several huge bands, and the Bay Area music scene,

(29:16):
you really had one huge band metality, and the rest
of the bands were more like the bands that you know,
insiders know about, but they weren't household names, so the
band never made the kind of money where you just
felt like you could retire. But at that point I

(29:39):
had put enough away. I felt like, Okay, I certainly
have enough to move to go back to school. Now,
full disclosure, I had academic parents that desperately wanted me
to go to college, you know, insist did on helping

(30:01):
out for one of my years. But for the first
part of going college, I've done it all myself. I'd
actually taken care of all my basic credits at a
community college in California, so actually I only had to
go to the new school for like a half a term,
just a couple of years, and yeah, financially I was okay,

(30:30):
I had enough to you know, I knew I could
take a few years and do whatever I want. But
after a few years, you know, of course, then you
have to start thinking, Okay, what am I going to
do here? And I was always able to teach, And

(30:50):
there was a music school called the American Institute of
guitar that was just had nothing to do with college journey,
just an informal music school that that had a few
guitar teachers and they were all professional musicians. And I
got in there and that became a job. And then

(31:15):
I got the strangest call in my life from someone
named David Krebs. I'm sure.

Speaker 3 (31:25):
I certainly know crib.

Speaker 2 (31:28):
So David, David Krebs calls me. Yo, actually his assistant
calls and I I call, I call back, and I'm
on hold waiting for he comes on. Doesn't even say hell,
It just starts telling me he he heard this guitar

(31:50):
playing on the he and he's he's managing this concert.
And I asked, who was that guitar play and and
and are you that guitar player? It was very funny,
and I'm you know, he's a friend too, I've were.
I saw him a couple of years ago at an

(32:11):
event where the Scorpions were being honored and yeah, one
of the great music industry personalities.

Speaker 3 (32:18):
For those who don't know, you know, he broke Erosmith,
AC DC Nugent. But continue your narrative.

Speaker 2 (32:25):
Yes, So David was managing a group called the Trans
Hibernian Orchestra. It was to be this traveling rock concert
come kind of with elements of a Broadway show. I
didn't really understand what it was. So it turned out
that the producer composer, Paul O'Neill was working with David,

(32:53):
who had worked for liber Krebs. And I had known
Paul because during the nineties, in between moving to New
York and leaving Testament, I got called to fill in
and with a group, Sabotage, that Paul was producing. And

(33:14):
it Sabotage is guitarist was a great, great guitarist, Chris Oliva,
and sadly he had passed away and the band needed
somebody quickly to do solos on the record. And initially
I said no, And I'd been a fan of the band,

(33:34):
and Testament had toured with the band, That's how we
knew each other. But I said no because, you know,
Testament had it had gotten very difficult towards the end,
you know, classic VH one behind the music stuff, you know,
we weren't getting along, felt like a toxic environment. So

(33:55):
I was also getting more and more into jazz guitar.
The last thing I was going to do was join
another band just because of those reasons. But the band
gave me a call personally, and you know, John Oliva
was Chris's brother, and he said, you know, I, Chris
would I think I want you to play guitar on

(34:16):
this album. I think you're the only one he would
want to play on this record. So how do you
say no to that? So I recorded for Sabotage. I
did a bunch of shows and that was how I
got to know Paul O'Neal. Well, fast forward a few years,
they've Sabotage had turned into this had become the nucleus

(34:40):
for the Trans Hyberine Orchestra, this traveling show with some
of this similar music but brought with Broadway singers and
dancers and a light show and everything. And yeah, I
got this this call from David Krebs and they were
auditioning people, but yeah, we just want you to do

(35:04):
it if you want to, like, you don't even have
have to audition. And it was funny because it wasn't
really what I saw doing. I kind of I was
so focused on developing as an instrumentalist and not thinking
about performing, and here was a show that's all about

(35:24):
performing and literally had pyrotechnics, but you know what, I
needed a job and I thought, Okay, you know what,
the experience will probably be good. And the next thing
you know, I this is while I'm still at the
New School. By the way, I was able to take
a month off and do homework assignments while I was

(35:47):
on this tour. And it was still theaters at the time.
We've played the Beacon. We played the theaters in Cleveland
and Pittsburgh for multiple nights, and.

Speaker 3 (36:01):
That was.

Speaker 2 (36:03):
Almost the beginning of TSO. I think they had done
like one tour before this, and it ended up turning
into this arena concert that is still going to this day.
Paul is no longer with us, May he rest in peace.
David stopped working with them at some point, but it's

(36:28):
still a big hit holiday concert. You know, if you
talk to anybody about TSO or transfer of your archers,
they know somebody if they don't know it themselves, they
have a family member that loves to go every year
and it's like this holiday tradition. And I was part

(36:48):
of this tour for nine years. At the end of
the year that that was what I did.

Speaker 3 (36:54):
Let's go back to the beginning, so you grew up
in Berkeley.

Speaker 2 (36:59):
Yeah, I was born and raised in Berkeley, California, and
it's a very straight, I guess, a strange place to
grow up. It's funny because now in the news, you know,
people talk about Portland and San Francisco as these lake
looney places where anything goes. But you know when I

(37:23):
when I grew up in Berkeley that that felt so normal.
It felt like, you know, the way they described Portland today.
I went to a school named after the head of
the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X Elementary.

Speaker 3 (37:41):
I know it sounds like was that a public school?

Speaker 2 (37:45):
This is a public This is the Berkeley Public school system.
We had a park nearby, they called it Ho Chi
Min Park in honor of our nemesis. And in Vietnam War,
of course, we had People's Park and uh, you know,

(38:08):
literal like characters everywhere, even some of them are well known,
you know, like Wavy Gravy for example. You know, he's
a pretty famous person, part of the Mary Pranksters, and
you'd see him around and it just wasn't unusual. And

(38:29):
you know, when you're a child growing up, you know
your city, that's your whole world. You know, they there's
that famous New Yorker cartoon about how New Yorkers see
the world, didn't they right? But you know, that applied
to us growing up in Berkeley, and we saw the
whole world through you know, it was te We have

(38:51):
Telegraph Avenue and then San Pablo Avenue and yeah, and
of course as you get older, you realize, oh, okay,
there's more to the world than just this little corner
where we are. But growing up, you know, from the
time time I was, when I was in single digits,
I assumed, oh, the whole world must be like this,
all these strange characters around and you know, and of

(39:15):
course I found I found out that that is not
the case.

Speaker 3 (39:19):
How many kids were in the family.

Speaker 2 (39:22):
Two So I was the youngest of two. My brother
was seven years older.

Speaker 3 (39:28):
And what path did your brother follow?

Speaker 2 (39:32):
So my brother got into music first, and in a
way he was kind of a gateway to the local
music scene in Berkeley. Now he was in his teens
at the time new wave music was popular, so he was, Yeah,

(39:53):
he was playing in bands that were influenced by groups
like The Cars and the Knack and stuff like that.
But you know, my brother, he in a way, he
was the opposite of what I became. I became this
hyper serious person that that's studied music NonStop and you know,

(40:17):
spent hours with the guitar at all times. And he
was always looking for gimmicks and ways to make it
as easy as possible, you know, and he he had
even you know, it's funny, and he thought it would
be so simple to just sign a record deal and

(40:38):
everything will just fall into place and you become this
big rock star. And even you know, even being seven
years younger, I realized, Okay, I think maybe he's take
you know, taking too many hits off the bong. You know,
he's uh.

Speaker 3 (40:56):
You know.

Speaker 2 (40:56):
He eventually got into teaching English is the second language,
which he still death. But he also when he's a
real Berkeley type, he spent a number of years living
in like ashram's and yoga centers. And by the time
I had reached adolescence, you know, my parents were determined

(41:19):
I was not going to turn out like him. I
was going to go to college. I was not going
to be this flaky musician. I was going to be
a serious person. But of course all that did was
make me be more serious about being a musician.

Speaker 3 (41:42):
What kind of kid. Were you growing up? Were you isolated?
Were you a sports person? You were good in school?

Speaker 2 (41:50):
Definitely isolated, not a sports person and not good in school.
Now I thought I was smart. I've since come to learn, Okay,
I'm actually quite intelligent. But I didn't realize that. I thought.

(42:12):
I thought I had little intelligence just because I had
very poor communication skills. And there, you know, words like
introverted weren't really tossed around back and knowing what I
know now, Yes, I was just very introverted and happy
doing my own thing, and uh, not a big people person.

(42:39):
And it is a bit ironic that I chose a
career where I'm on a stage in front of lots
of people, because that, yeah, that would seem to go
against it. But yeah, of course I later heard that
many shy children or even shy adults end up being performers.

(43:01):
And as far as sports, I just never got the neck.
I never had the interest that I never saw what
the big deal was, and I was never good at it.

Speaker 3 (43:11):
Are you still introverted today?

Speaker 1 (43:15):
Not like I was.

Speaker 2 (43:18):
I'm certainly better at communicating than I was. I. I
love being on a stage because then I feel like
I have all the control, you know, I could. I
can decide what's talked about on the stage. I can
make the joke you have. If you're seated and it's
my show, you you have to listen to me. But

(43:43):
but if I walk into a party and it's a
room full of strangers, yeah, I'm I'm panicked. I wouldn't
call it panic. I'm exaggerating, of course, But uh, I've
never understood people who can just instantly make friends at
a party and be the so called life of the party.

(44:05):
That's definitely not me. And it's funny. With sports, I
just I always felt it was this thing everybody was
into and I just couldn't get into it. I never
had the talent to throw a baseball or football like
everybody else did. But I'm almost having corrective experience in

(44:28):
recent years. I was just invited to play for the
Cleveland Browns at a pregame event on NFL Opening Day.

Speaker 3 (44:36):
How does that even happen?

Speaker 2 (44:40):
That happens because they partner with the Rock and Roll
Hall of Fame every year in Cleveland, and they like
to do rock and roll events. They've had Zach Wilde,
They've had Neil Sean, and this year they were going
to have orianthe and she had to cancel. I would

(45:06):
say at the last minute, but close enough to the
last minute that there was a search for somebody that
could jump in and play guitar and do what needed
to be done. And I happened to get the call
and it was It was amazing, It went, it went great.
I had a great time. I have a Cleveland Browns

(45:28):
jersey with my name on it. I watched the game
afterwards with these friends of mine who set it up
and had just had a great time. And actually a
couple of years before that, I played the anthem for
the Chicago Wolves.

Speaker 3 (45:44):
How did that come there?

Speaker 2 (45:45):
Happen? And then how did that happened? Because I was
playing for an all star group of musical all stars.
It's called Metal Allegiance, and it's like a collective of musicians.
We usually play and then around the Nam show. In fact,

(46:07):
we're playing this year at the House of Blues Ana
I'm January twenty second, and we always have it's always
with different people. So this Chicago show, it was the
drummer for masted On bron Daylor and Mark Mani the founder,
and myself, Bobby Blitz from Overkill you know, it's always

(46:30):
a mashup. We played in Chicago and it was right
I think it was right around hall Leen too, if
I remember. And somebody who works in the Bills office
is got word of it and they were looking for

(46:50):
somebody to do the anthem, and you know, they they've
had singers, but I think they've been talking about bringing
in an instrumentalist. And somebody who is this guy that
works for the team who's also a fan of music,
reached out it saw that we were going to be
in town and said, would you like to play the

(47:11):
national anthem? I said sure. So I love doing stuff
like that, and every time it's it's sort of it's
this window into sports fandom, like I get it. I'm
at the game, I'm feeling the passion from everybody. So
somehow growing up I never had it. But when I

(47:33):
do these events where I play music at the game,
so I have a great time.

Speaker 3 (47:37):
Okay, your brother was into music, who was in music?
Where your parents big music bands? Where they playing music
in the house.

Speaker 2 (47:46):
Not much, not much at all. I've talked about this before.
You know, some kids grow up hearing music played in
the house or they're singing around a piano or you
know there was There really wasn't much of that at all.

(48:07):
There was a lot of public affairs, television, uh, the McNeil,
Lair Report, Washington Weekend Review. So you know, you know
what these are. I probably have to explain them to
you know, some folks of a younger generation.

Speaker 3 (48:29):
How did you end up taking music lessons and what
were your first lessons.

Speaker 2 (48:33):
I got into music because the music that was occasionally
played around the house was good, So I have to
give my prayers credit for that. They like the Beatles
a lot, and I'm told that I used to sing
Beatles songs when I was too young to remember some
of those songs. Of course, you know they're perfect for

(48:55):
a kid. Yellow Submarine that could be a children's song,
Comes the Sun that could be a children's son. So
I used to sing those songs. And by the time
I was sort of nine or ten years old, I
think I was just looking for something exciting to do.

(49:18):
Even though I had tried piano lessons and the teacher
I really wasn't very nurturing. I think I needed more
attention as a student, and it just it didn't work
out with piano. I thought I wasn't gonna be good
at music, and then I started begging for guitar lessons

(49:40):
when I discovered Kiss. And the way I discovered Kiss
was on the schoolyard there was I was very tired
of hearing about baseball cards. All my friends, you know,
would trade baseball cards. And one day I these friends
were calling me over, I have to look at these
baseball car and you know, and I resisted, No, I

(50:03):
don't know, No, You're gonna love this look and it
was Kiss cards. And that moment was like it was
life changing. And you know, these guys, they looked straight
out of comic book and they have guitars and Ace,
may he rest in peace. We just lost Ace. You know,

(50:25):
he's got this guitar. Smoke is coming out of the guitar.
So suddenly guitar got very interesting. And then the first
record that I had wanted to buy on my own
was a Kiss record. And I didn't know about compilations

(50:46):
or Greatest Hiss records at the time, but it was
called Double Platinum and it was a compilation, but it
had some great songs and I genuinely loved the music.
And between Kisses music and imagery, I had to learn guitar,
So I started studying with.

Speaker 3 (51:08):
There's a lot of a lot of steps there. Hey,
you don't have a guitar, so you gotta You know,
the lessons can't happen without a guitar, So how does
it really go down? You're begging your parents right right.

Speaker 2 (51:23):
So at this point, my brother had already played, he
was already starting to play in local bands. Uh, he
was switching from guitar to bass. But for a while
he did have a guitar, and occasionally I could play
one of his guitars. But ye know it was a
typical older versus little brother. Yeah, guitar. He didn't want

(51:46):
me to touch his guitar. So eventually they we found
a cheap guitar at a garage sale, and it was
like the complete op of my brother. Because my brother
had gone to my parents and I begged for a

(52:06):
less Paul. He needed a less Paul guitar, which he
eventually traded for a bass. I was not gonna be
so lucky. They Yeah, they said, okay, yeah, we're gonna
get you this classical guitar and if you stick with that,
maybe one day you'll get an electric guitar. So yeah,

(52:28):
I had a really difficult to play acoustic guitar nylon strings,
but I stuck with it, and I think it in
retrospect I might have helped that I had to work
for it, and I had to put in all this
extra effort. And by the time I got a good guitar,

(52:50):
I was probably fourteen years old, and I'd been bagging
groceries at a local supermarket and saved up, and I
saved up enough to buy my own last bom. So
I got this sense of working hard at it and
also just really kind of earning my own keep and
earning what I got. Okay, not having things handed.

Speaker 3 (53:15):
How old are you then? How do you start taking
lessons with a nylon string guitar.

Speaker 2 (53:21):
So I'm about ten years old when I have the
nylon string guitar. And there was a local guitar teacher.
His name was Gary Lapoue and a real Berkeley type.
I used to play at anti nuclear weapons rallies, so

(53:43):
I had songs about saving the whales. But he actually
ended up going on to be a pretty respected children's
recording artist, So I need to look him up, but
his I think he's probably still doing it. Gary Lepoe,

(54:04):
and he was great. He was a great teacher. When
I went to him, I was very determined. I didn't
want to have the same experience that I had had
with piano, where I just didn't practice enough and I
lost interest. The teacher didn't want to teach me. So
I worked really hard my first week or so, and

(54:27):
he was very complimentary. I couldn't believe how fast I
was picking it up and taking to the chords. And
he was very good at making connections between different types
of music. So, for example, there was a fifties resurgence
going on around this time. This is around nineteen eighty,

(54:52):
so not only am I into kiss, but I really
liked fifties rock. I was hearing fifties rock. Happy Days
was the number one show. There was a film called
American Hot Wax that had Jay Leno and fran Dresser,
and it was not the best acted film. It was

(55:16):
kind of not surprising that they both ended up on
TV movies, But with all due respect, it was a
fun film and the best part about it was it
starred all these fifties artists as themselves. It was the
story about Alan Free, so it's kind of educational in
a Way too, and Judge Jerry Lee Lewis is in

(55:37):
the movie Screaming. Jay Hawkins is in this movie. And
the one who stole the show for me was Chuck Barry.
So when I went to Gary, my first guitar teacher,
I talked about the music I loved, and part of
it was Kiss, but also I really liked this music

(55:59):
from this film and especially Chuck Berry. And that was
perfect because this guy, he didn't know Kiss songs, but
he certainly knew about Chuck Berry, and he made connections
between like what Chuck Berry was doing and how he
influenced the Beatles and the Stones. The Beatles even covered

(56:19):
Chuck Berry songs. I didn't even know that at the time,
and it was very educational, and I learned those basic
chuck Berry hits, you know, Johnny be Good, roll over Beethoven.
To this day, those intros that Chuck Berry played on
those songs really get me excited. I still yeah, they

(56:42):
haven't lost any of their magic. But Gary's best quality,
I think, was just making that connection. And when I
started talking to him about ac DC, same thing, He's like, well, yeah,
here's how the blues riff influenced this AC DC tune.
Here's how I would influence this Kiss tune, and it

(57:03):
just really gave me a good understanding about connections with
fifties rock and the hard rock that I was then
getting into, like Kiss and Athies.

Speaker 3 (57:13):
Okay, you start with this guy, you start with an
acoustic guitar, what's the next step.

Speaker 2 (57:19):
So the next step, I guess A couple of years later,
by the time I played guitar for about two years,
we're talking eighty two. At this time, you know, Ozzie
has emerged as an artist and I didn't know anything

(57:40):
about him. I yeah, I hadn't grown up with Black Sabbath.
I wasn't a band my brother had been into. But
kids in my class, you know, the seventh grade, they're
all talking about Ozzie, and somebody who knew that I

(58:01):
played guitar told me, I have to hear this guitarist
on the Aussie record. And this is the time, too
win not as many kids played guitar. Today, there are
more kids than you can count that have that played
guitar and play guitar well, and they most of them
have Instagram pages. But at this time it wasn't as

(58:22):
common to start guitar at a young age. Most kids
I knew started in their early teens, and I had
already been playing for a few years. So I was told,
you know, listen to Ozzy Osbourne and this amazing guitarist
Randy Roads. And I think that was partly what got

(58:43):
me interested in wanting to play guitar solos. But I also,
around the same time, discovered van Halen. The van Halen
had been out for a few years, but he hadn't
really reached my radar. And then the same kids that
were into Ozzie were into van Halen, and then they

(59:04):
played the first van Halen record and that was it.
I was off to the races. And I know many
guitar players today tell the same story. Yeah, they they
heard eruption for the first time on a record or
a cassette and it was just life change, Like, oh,
I didn't know what guitar could do. That that's exciting.

(59:28):
And up until then I thought about being a singer guitarist.
I never cared that much about having an electric guitar.
I knew I would get one eventually, but you know,
playing that type of guitar was never a thought. And
then it all changed. The day I heard that first
Van Haalen record, as it did for so many.

Speaker 3 (59:57):
Okay, so how did you learn and how'd you get
the les Paul? I mean, what was the transition?

Speaker 2 (01:00:05):
Well, yeah, I had to break it to Gary, my
guitar teacher, that I need to I need to find
some teachers that can yeah respect, you know, because he
taught me so much, and it was very difficult. It
was sad, you know. It was almost like a fork

(01:00:28):
in the road, you know, because I liked him so
much and he was so nurturing and such a nice
guy and very talented at what he did. But I
had to make this decision. I need to find somebody
who can play.

Speaker 3 (01:00:44):
Like these guys.

Speaker 2 (01:00:47):
And as it turned out. I mentioned my older brother
was in the music scene and he tended to play
more me music that was could be described as new
wave SKA, not really hard rock. But he had some
friends that did play rock guitar and one of his

(01:01:12):
friends was a player. His name was Danny Gill, and
he was playing in hard rock band. He kept trying
to get my brother to join his band. My brother
was interested in that kind of music, but Danny was
really getting good fast, you know, and he was the

(01:01:35):
only guy that I knew in the Berkeley music scene
in that sort of had a grip on Van Hamlinton's
and I saw him play. We were I remember a
couple of times at home just or at there were

(01:01:55):
gatherings or at local parties when people would pass around
a guitar, This guy, Danny Gill would would get the
guitar and he would do these licks. He learned from eruption,
and so I could see how it was done and
that was shocking, right, Wow, that's how you do that.
And I ended up asking him for lessons, so I

(01:02:19):
studied with him for a while. He later became a
teacher at m I Musicians Institute down in Hollywood. He
lives in Sweden today. He actually married a Swede, but
he's a full time teacher. So but he ended up
being my next teacher, and he was a very good teacher.

(01:02:41):
And around the time I studied with him, that was
around the time I got my first electric guitar. This
lest Paul. I think in the meantime I had played it.
There was a cheap guitar that my brother acquired that
I played a little bit. It was so cheap. I
really needed a good guitar, so I I got the

(01:03:03):
less Paul. I started startying with Danny. But within a
year or so, it felt like I was able to
learn some of the Van Halen stuff on my own.
And I remember there was one lesson and I say this,
you know, with all respect to Danny, but I I
was showing him how this song was. It was a

(01:03:26):
song called Little Guitars off of nineteen eighty four, and yes,
I figured out how to do the riff and he
he looks at me, how do you do that? I'm like, wait, oh,
you should be paying me by the hour. So I

(01:03:47):
started realize, Okay, I wonder who taught Dan. Did you
know did Danny take lessons? And I knew Danny had
studied with this music teacher. He taught all all the
best players, all the top guitar players in the area.
They talked about this guy, the very mysterious person. All

(01:04:07):
I knew about him was that he was Italian and
he's from New York and he's very serious. Like, if
you go and study with this guy, you have to
do your lessons and you have to practice hard otherwise
he will he will fire you. Yeah, And of course
that turned out to be Joe Satrianni.

Speaker 3 (01:04:28):
So you go to see Joe for lessons, what's that
experience like?

Speaker 2 (01:04:33):
Yeah, that was a funny experience the first time because
Joe had a waiting list, so he taught in a
little guitar store and you go to the guitar store
or you call up you say you want lessons, and
then you'd have to wait. You have to wait like
a period of weeks, sometimes months. And one day I

(01:04:56):
got a call and Joe had an opening and I scheduled.
I remember I scheduled this lesson, but it was the
same day as this political rally. And my mother, I think,
you know, she's sort of been this repressed political activist,

(01:05:19):
you know, to this day, she's like an MSNBC news junkie.
And I think she'd always wanted to be involved with politics,
but it never did. And so she's insisted I come
to this rally, and I think she thought I would
take to politics and political activism. And the rally was

(01:05:41):
for a presidential candidate named Gary Hart, and all this
did it completely turned me off politics. First of all,
the guy showed up like hours late, and suddenly I realized,
I'm going to be late for this lesson. I've been
want on the waiting west for this, this teacher that

(01:06:02):
it's really important to me and my mother. You know.
It was arguing with me, you know, no, this is important,
and I remember running off going, you know, no, this
is important. And I was a few minutes late. I
but Joe was very understanding. It never happened again, and
it just caused me to be even more punctual and

(01:06:27):
serious in my lessons with Joe. And of course, as
we all know, Gary Hart ends up caught in a
sex scandal and kicked out of public office. The whole
situation was just very metaphoric.

Speaker 3 (01:06:40):
But didn't Gary Hart become the head of the new school? Ah?

Speaker 2 (01:06:46):
Did he that? When I was there? I should look
into that.

Speaker 3 (01:06:51):
Maybe it's another politician.

Speaker 2 (01:06:53):
There was a senator whose name escaped me.

Speaker 3 (01:06:57):
That was the head, Gary Hurt. So, okay, you're taking
lessons from Joe. How does that go?

Speaker 2 (01:07:06):
Yeah? So that taking lessons with Joe was that next level.
I felt like I unlocked a new level of music education.
And of course, you know, knowing what we know now,
he would go on to be this very important good
figure in the world of guitar. We didn't know that

(01:07:28):
in a way, it was a cautionary tale about the
music business, the fact that somebody this talented is teaching
guitar lessons of the little back room behind a guitar shop.
But it was amazing. It was just suddenly, you know,

(01:07:50):
I really understand unstood what serious music lessons were. And
guitar really wasn't thought of as a serious instrument at
that time. Like if you're a serious musician, okay, you
there's there were serious teachers for violin, for piano, electric guitar,

(01:08:15):
not so much at that time. But he was somebody
like that. It was like going to a classical violinist
or pianist that had regimens, and you know, practice was
incredibly important, discipline was really important, and he really didn't

(01:08:35):
want he didn't want his time wasted, and he made
that very clear. In fact, I was recently speaking to
a friend of mine, Mark Mark DeVito. He's a guy
who did a lot of artwork for various bands, my band,
He's did some work for Metallica, he did Motorhead's last

(01:08:59):
album cover, went on to be a full time artist,
but at one time he wanted to be a guitarist
and we were talking recently and he never told me
the story before, but he actually went to Joe for
lessons and yo, Joe was very honest with him. Yeah,
he said, do you have any other hobbies?

Speaker 3 (01:09:24):
So when do you start forming bands?

Speaker 2 (01:09:28):
Well, the whole time I was with Joe, you know,
like ages fourteen fifteen, I am trying to form a band.
I want to form a band, but again, to use
that word introvert, I very introverted. I don't have the
quality too, you know. I certainly didn't have leadership skill

(01:09:52):
for whatever musical skill I had for my age, which
was great, Yeah, I didn't have that know how to
just round people up pick musicians. And there also weren't
musicians my age, very there weren't very many. Like I
explained earlier, it was a different time. So yeah, I

(01:10:13):
tried jamming with a couple guys in my school and
it just didn't really go anywhere. And around this time
I am going to concerts. There's a whole local scene happening,
and I particularly enjoy with the music that is later

(01:10:34):
known as Thrash Meult. It was funny because at the
time I never thought about playing that music. I was
really focused on Van Halen Randy rose Evy Meltinstein has
come along by then, and he was my new hero.
But I loved going to concerts by these bands. And

(01:10:54):
you know, Exodus was one slayer who did I saw
their first time? Answered Metallica, I think was sort of
off to the races at that point. They'd already released
an album and I think we're working on their second record.
But under them, there was this whole scene going on,
and I remember thinking, you know, if I could join

(01:11:17):
one of these local bands that's already playing, then I
wouldn't have to go through this trying to search for
guys my age to play with because it's not working out.
And lo and behold, I hear about a band that
needs a guitar player. And it's this band that at

(01:11:38):
the time is called Legacy. It's the band that would
go on to be called Testament. And it all happened,
you know, in a snap. At this point. I think
when I first met them, I was fifteen. By the
time I did my first gig with them, I was sixteen,
and by the time I was eighteen, I was on

(01:12:01):
the East Coast recording my first album with the band.

Speaker 3 (01:12:06):
Okay, that's the framework, but there's a lot of steps.
Were these guys your age or older? Did they accept you?
How did you write the material? What about gigs? How
did it all play out?

Speaker 2 (01:12:21):
Yeah, well, the band was founded by the other guitarist.
His name is Eric Peterson. They were all older, they'd
been out of school a number of years. They were
all in their early twenties at this point, and somehow

(01:12:45):
it was interesting. Eric was kind of shy too, but
he was good at getting gigs, and yeah, we all
went to the same shows, even though we were all
from different places. You know, the Bay Area has all
these little pockets. Yeah, you've got the East Bay, the
far East Bay, like Dublin, Pleasanton. I was in Berkeley

(01:13:11):
where a lot of the clubs were, so in a way,
I was lucky because it was very easy for me
to and my friends. We could just take the bus
downtown and we would go to the Keystone Berkeley, which
was the big venue at the time, or you know,
go across the Bay. We had the Stone in San Francisco,

(01:13:32):
and Testament, which was then called Legacy, was already playing
these clubs. They supported Slayer. I think they supported Megadeth
on one of their first shows when Megadeth was a
brand new band, and Mustaine had just been kicked out
of Metallica and uh the Yeah. By the time I

(01:13:57):
got asked to join the band, they were already gigging.
They already had these shows. There was a new venue
called Ruthie's In, which became sort of an epicenter for
this type of music. Pretty Much all the thrash metal
bands you've heard of played there, except Metallica, who was
already on their way. They actually did play there once,

(01:14:20):
but it was like an unannounced fun gig. And my
very first show was that Ruthie's In and it was
just a whirlwind. Suddenly, you know, one minute, I am
kind of a frustrated high school student, yeah, wishing I

(01:14:43):
was in a band. The next thing, you know, I
have shows. I mean this, I'm rehearsing a couple times
a week, and you know, my parents were not happy
about it, but I think at that point they knew
there's there's no stopping me. And that was Yeah, that
was how it all started.

Speaker 3 (01:15:03):
Well, when did you realize it was starting to click?

Speaker 2 (01:15:09):
Well, the band had about probably I don't know, half
a dozen songs, like almost enough songs for a set
plus some covers. I had some musical ideas. I had
songs and parts that I'd been working on. Now, my

(01:15:29):
parts were much more like Ozzie Deo Rainbow, you know,
Vey the stuff I was listening to at that time,
much slower than this. So yeah, the first thing that
became clear is, Okay, we're gonna have to speed up
all these parts like double speed, and uh yeah, we

(01:15:56):
ended up it ended up working out. We put a
lot of my parts with parts that Eric had, and well,
you know, within a year we had you know, the
first almost half a dozen songs that the band had,
which were you know, much much simpler. They were mostly

(01:16:17):
like fast songs in one key, not a lot of harmony,
not a lot of melody. But I was bringing in
different elements. So I sort of taught Eric how to harmonize,
how to play scales together. Let's get out of you know,
the low key on guitar as all guitars know as
e but there, Yeah, we don't have to be stuck there,

(01:16:40):
we can we could take apart and move it somewhere else.
So I and by that point i'd been with I
had enough of my Satriani lessons that you know, I
was getting pretty good at harmony and melody, and uh yeah,
I'd say within a year and a half or so,
we had enough material to do the first record. Now,

(01:17:04):
of course, there was some major drama that happened with
the lineup, which I can explain later. We'll explain now, Okay,
So the lineup at that time included a singer. His
name's Steve Stuza, and he was like the drill sergeant

(01:17:24):
of the band. It was almost I didn't even know
Eric had started the band because I thought this it
must be his band, because this guy ran it like
he ran the show, and it was all Later I
thought it was kind of a source of contention with them,
but very type a personality. And during this time, the

(01:17:47):
biggest band around is Exodus, and every it's expected that
Exodus is going to follow in the footsteps of Metallica,
largely because Exodus was arted by Kirk Hamick before he
was coached by Metallic, so we all look up to Exodus.
You know, the outside of Metallica, the biggest concerts, the

(01:18:11):
biggest thrash metal shows are by Exodus, and lo and behold,
Exodus decides to fire their singer Paul bailoff. May he
rest in peace and take our singer. Yeah. So I'm
only in this band for a year. I'm still in

(01:18:32):
high school, and suddenly I'm embroiled in this like major
band drama. So Steve joins Exodus and we need a
singer right quickly. And another funny thing that had happened was, Yeah,

(01:18:54):
my my exasperated father. You know, he he gave up
on me going to law school and whatever the hell
he wanted me to do. But he said, the one
thing I'm going to insist on, which and he was
right about this, is that you hire a lawyer. So

(01:19:14):
he had had a former teaching assistant that ended up
working in entertainment law. And the teaching assistants name was
Elliot Kahan. Elliott Kahn had a very interesting history because
he had been a member of Shauna not while at

(01:19:36):
Columbia and had actually done Woodstock as a member of Shauna.
Not met Hendrix, you know, so he had this incredible backstory.
And around this time, you know, he's basically doing doing
law and but you know, helping out musicians in the

(01:19:58):
San Francisco Bay area. So I got to know Elliott
because my dad, Elliott became the band's manager. Elliott had
some connection with John and Marcia's Uzula, I forget what
it was, and knew that they had been involved with
Metallica on their first record. Knew that they were they

(01:20:24):
were signing metal bands, they were looking for metal bands.
So Elliott Cohn, my friend of my father, which is
so ironic, ends up sending our demo tape to the
Uzulas and this Zula's liked what they heard, and we
were already in negotiations to at least do a showcase

(01:20:49):
for John and Marsha's Zula. And then shortly before that happens,
we find out Exodus has fired their singer. They're talking
to Capitol Records. They take our singer, and we need
a singer, so I the singer we got is his
name is Chuck Billy, and he's this six foot four

(01:21:13):
Native American towering presence, and he had been in a
band that was more of a glam band, but it
was with that great guitarist who I used to take
lessons from Danny Gill, and that was how we knew
about him, and we weren't sure he would be able
to sing heavy music, you know, this fat but he

(01:21:36):
you know, he learned, he was willing to learn, and
he became the singer. And this all happened really fast.
We did a new demo with Chuck. The Zazulas liked
it and they came out and we showcased for them.
The day that we showcased for the Zazulas, Cliff Burton

(01:21:58):
from Metallica passed away in a bus accident. So it
ended up being this very somber, sad day, But it
was the day we showcased for the Suzulas and signed
our first record.

Speaker 3 (01:22:13):
So you must have been on cloud nine, yes and no.

Speaker 2 (01:22:18):
It was like, in a way, it was very metaphoric
because in some ways it was such a rollercoaster rat
in some ways, Okay, things are great, they're looking up.
You know, we have the you know, the people that
introduced the Metallica to the world are interested in us,

(01:22:41):
and they're also managing Anthrax, who's having a moment at
that time. So we were part of this whole thing.
But at the same time, just yeah, the whirlwind of
losing a singer, finding a singer, having a successful showcase.
But it's on this very sad day that the world

(01:23:02):
lost the great Cliff Burton. So it was definitely a
period of growing up fast and recognizing yes, you know,
there's going to be these very positive moments, but there's
going to be some difficult sad moments too, and sometimes

(01:23:22):
all within a very short period of time.

Speaker 3 (01:23:33):
So what was your experience with Testamon? You have a
record deal, Megaport is distributed by Atlantic. This music is happening,
So what was your world like?

Speaker 2 (01:23:44):
Yeah, well, all of a sudden, you know, we're not
just doing gigs at Ruthie's Inn, and you know the
zone and the local Bay area clubs.

Speaker 3 (01:23:54):
But we.

Speaker 2 (01:23:57):
Miszulas really wanted to get us out of our comfort zone,
the bubble of the San Francisco area. So they sent
us to southern California and we did a show I
think it was Corona, California, and opening for Anthrax, and

(01:24:20):
they sent us to a club called Lamore's in Brooklyn,
and ye know, Lamors is pretty legendary. And at Lamore's
we opened up for Slayer, which, on the one hand,
that's yeah, it's a big thrill. We were all big

(01:24:40):
fans of Slayer. On the other hand, the New York
fans of Slayer were notorious. You know, they were like
Mets fans, you know, just if they don't like you,
they they're not shy about it. But everybody told us,
if you can survive opening for Slayer at Lamores in Brooklyn,

(01:25:02):
you're on your way. And we got flown to New York.
We did the show with Slayer. We were booed, we
were subjected to Slayer chants, but it started dying down
midway through, and by the end, I think we'd won
over enough people, so it really felt like, Okay, things

(01:25:24):
are happening now. And right around the same time, we
went to upstate New York. There was a producer up
there named Alex Pirialis, and he had recorded Anthrax and
a bunch of other albums for Mega Force, and they

(01:25:46):
had a relationship already, so he wanted to take us
under his wing. And at the same time, a lot
of my friends were going off to college. I was
on a plane heading to Ithaca, New York, and uh,
you know, being in a pro recording studio for the

(01:26:08):
first time. We've done a couple of demos at this point,
but yeah, this this was the next level and the
whole going through the whole process of you know, the
calendar dates. Here's when you're going to do your drum tracks,
Here's when you're going to do your guitar tracks. Here's
the budget here. We want to come in under budget.

(01:26:30):
We want to come in ahead of time. You know,
I just learned this crash course learning how this is done,
and it was an incredible on the job experience, on
the job training.

Speaker 3 (01:26:45):
So you make these albums with Testament. How many dates
were you playing a year? And did you think that
you were just a minute from becoming Metallica? What was
going through your heads?

Speaker 2 (01:26:59):
Well, knowing it's funny knowing what I know now, I
can I could see that, you know, Metallica really had
they had some extra smarts to them. And of course
I know the guys and now it's not a surprise,
but they yeah, kind of really learn, you know new.

(01:27:25):
I think it's not that they knew exactly how big
they would get, but I think they knew how to
they were with all that. They were very in some
ways self produced, and obviously being with Q Prime was
a big help. But I think that you know, Lars
makes a lot of decisions too. It's like a real

(01:27:48):
great partnership. And I think with us, I think Testament
we were so green. We were really just started looking
for guidance, so I don't think we knew what would
have We just ended up on a tour with Anthrax
and across the United States. We ended up on another

(01:28:11):
tour with Overkilled. These are both Mega Forest bands. We
did our very first tour in Europe, and yeah, Mega
Death at that time is starting to reach a higher level.

(01:28:32):
So yeah, we were sort of part of this echosystem
of all of all these bands, but it was never
clear how big we could get, and Metallica just always
felt like they were in a category of their own,
so I kind of never never thought we would quite

(01:28:53):
catch up to them, but it did feel like they
were making it more acceptable to do music that at
the time was considered very uncommercial. This was not glam metal,
this was not Sunset strip.

Speaker 3 (01:29:10):
No, well, did you how many dates were you doing
a year and were you just grinding it out or
you say this is fantastic, this is my life. What
was it like emotionally?

Speaker 2 (01:29:23):
Oh it was uh, yeah, it was mixed, you know,
because you do have these illusions that, yeah, things are
going to fall into place and you're going to be
much more comfortable than you are you know, we did
that first tour in a van and you know, definitely

(01:29:47):
not enough sleep. There was a van and a rider truck.
Now at this time Anthrax had graduated to a bus,
so we could at least sort of see our future. Okay,
one day we aspired to the bus and we did

(01:30:10):
get the bus. I think like midway through touring for
the second record. But yeah, emotionally it was I definitely
went through some mixed emotions because I felt like, on
the one hand, yeah, this is kind of what I've
always wanted. I'm touring and I'm playing guitar, getting some

(01:30:34):
nice attention for my guitar playing. At that time, technical
playing wasn't really a thing in that style of music.
It was more limited to glam metal and for the
world of you know, sort of thrash or speed metal
as it was called. I was getting some nice attention,

(01:30:57):
but I also felt like at the shows, you know,
they didn't really know how to mix the music yet,
and the equipment has come a long way. It's much
better now. At that time, you're playing through amplifiers that
you know, they're designed for music like fog Hat Foreigner,

(01:31:22):
the whole crunchy heavy metal sound. It's still a very
new thing. It's very hard to get that sound, and
it often didn't sound good live. The PA systems could
not handle it. They weren't designed for that music, so
it just sometimes it sounded like this just wall with noise.
And yes, the crowds were excited and their crowdsurfing and washing,

(01:31:46):
but I felt like, Okay, I really kind of wish
there was more listening, and I wish there was more
attention to the music itself. And maybe this contributed to
me getting so into sort of yeah, virtuoso instrumental music
the way I did. A short time later.

Speaker 3 (01:32:06):
You ultimately leave Testament. Do you leave Testament to use
the cliche for musical differences or are you saying I
just can't do this anymore. It's a grind, it's not
becoming any bigger. What were your motivations?

Speaker 2 (01:32:26):
Okay, it's a little above. It's not that I didn't
want to do it anymore, but I was definitely disillusioned.
I felt like, yeah, we in between that first tour
I was just describing and the time I left, we
definitely had reached some milestones. You know, we had some

(01:32:49):
good moments. We went to Japan, for the first time,
and there the sound quality was terrific. The Japanese really
knew how to design PA systems. The crowd was a
more of a listening crowd. Uh so I that that
was very satisfying. But also we had our first arena

(01:33:13):
support tours, so we had supported judas priests and from
the time I was in you know, ninth grade, all
the way through high school, just you know, they were
heroes and they seemed like giants to me. But at
this time they were having a hard time. Suddenly the

(01:33:34):
arenas weren't selling as well as they should and it
was kind of right out of a spinal tap. And
then on top of that, we're the first group on
the arena tour, and so you've also got Megadeth, and
it's on the one hand, it's terrific. Wow. I got
to play the Oakland Colisseum, which is where I've seen

(01:33:55):
some of my favorite concerts, and that show was great.
But then we would do other shows where we're playing
people are walking into the arena and it's it's not
how you imagine. You know, there are some groups that
are lucky to just have a big break and suddenly
they're they're they're playing in front of an arena crowd.
But yeah, that wasn't the case. So there was some

(01:34:21):
disillusion there. As I mentioned much earlier, the band really
wasn't getting along. And also, yeah, I was having, you know,
musical interests that were different. I realized I could stick
around and sort of just be the thrash metal guy.

(01:34:42):
But I've been already been developing as a musician. You know.
When we did our third record, we didn't go to
the East Coast. We stayed at home and recorded at
Fantasy Studios, which was home to Fantasy Records. And at
that time, Fantasy Records was buying up all these defunct

(01:35:04):
jazz labels like Riverside and Impulse, and I was listening
to jazz albums being remastered. It was just an amazing experience.
I heard a live John Coltrane record being remastered. I
thought he was in the room. It sounded that good.
So that we really sort of contributed to my jazz interests,

(01:35:27):
and Fantasy cooked me up with a whole box load
of jazz albums that I got for nothing were dollar
and and then so I was studying jazz. And then

(01:35:47):
a couple of years later, by nineteen ninety two, the
band took a break. We had been going non stop too,
I should mention like it was practically an album a year,
followed by this touring cycle where everybody was exhausted. The
one time we did some time, the one time we
did take a break was in nineteen ninety one, and

(01:36:11):
everybody just yeah, took vacations, didn't want to think about music.
I auditioned for Stuart Ham, who was this great virtuoso
bass player who played on Joe Satriani's records, had toured
with Joe and Stu heard something in me and hired
me to tour with him. So that was my first

(01:36:34):
taste of the world of music outside of Heavy Melt.
And there I'm playing to people who have no idea
who I am, but they're listening and it was just
very diverse music. So get to get back to your question. Yeah,
by the time I leave the band, yeah, everybody's exhausted,

(01:36:54):
they're not getting along. I'm exploring, playing instrumental music, exploring
jazz music, and it was time.

Speaker 3 (01:37:05):
Okay, how do you end up getting back together with Testament?

Speaker 2 (01:37:11):
Yeah, that's a great question. That was not on the
bingo card. I don't think that was on. You know,
I don't get anybody could have predicted that. But by
the mid two thousands, you know, I was playing with
my trio, I was doing transpian orchestra part of the year,

(01:37:35):
I was doing recording sessions, so I I found a
place as a full time musician. But I always thought
about stepping back into heavy metal. I got curious about it.
I think I had been away from it for a
while and it started to interesting to me again. At

(01:38:03):
this point too, you also had some changes in the
music and the culture. The whole alternative period had died down.
The anti guitar solo fever had died down. You know
that that was another thing too. You know, the way

(01:38:23):
music was going in the nineties, it just seemed like
rock was going through this phase out with the solo
out with virtuosity. Okay, what am I doing? This is
what I do. So but by the two thousands, okay,
it's starting to come back. The guitar solo was coming back.

(01:38:44):
The oz Fest was happening at that time. So now
there's newer bands, and some of the bands had grown
up listening to Testament, and I was coming into contact
with some of these bands. One of those bands is
band called Lamb of God, and I got to know

(01:39:05):
the guys. They invited me to do a guest solo
on their record, a record called Ashes of the Wig,
and I thought, okay, that would be interesting. At that point,
I had not done heavy metal. I'm mostly, you know,
playing these jazz box guitars, and okay, let me step
back in there and see you. And it felt great.

(01:39:28):
And then I went to see Lamb of God play
at one of the OZ fests, and I met other
new bands, bands like Slipknot and Hate Breed, all these
newer bands, and they they recognized me, and they they
were very complimentary, and so suddenly I was feeling this

(01:39:50):
appreciation from this newer wave of heavy metal guys, and
I just started to think it might be fun to
do a metal project. You know, maybe I could get
some of these guys and put together some new band.
And just around that time, I hear from the guys

(01:40:13):
in Testament, the original guys that are still there. That's
Chuck the singer and Eric Peterson, the guitarist. They'd been
through a revolving door. By that time, they'd been through
about more drummers than Spinal tap other guitar and they
were tired of it. They were actually ready to retire

(01:40:33):
the band, and they we worked out. We had a
few business disagreements that got worked out, like here, here's
that thing you should have gotten paid for that you
didn't get sorry about that. That was okay, and we're
friends again. And they just, you know, they wanted to

(01:40:54):
do some shows with the old lineup, and they actually
had a couple offers come in because at this time
European festivals are really popping. You know, you have Vakin
in Germany, Sweden Rock. It's this whole other world where

(01:41:16):
every country is trying to outdo with each other with
a big hard rock and heavy metal festival and some
so these promoters were wanted us to play as the
original lineup, and we took We agreed and did a
few shows. We were like weekend Warriors for the mid

(01:41:39):
two thousands, and we would go to Europe play a
few shows here and there, and then the offers kept
coming in and the people said, oh, this is great.
You know, why don't you guys do a full tour,
why don't you do a record? And we were a
bit resistant, and then one day the band gets an
offer to tour with motor Head, Judas Priest and Heaven

(01:42:02):
and Hell, which is Black Sabbath with Ronnie James Dia,
one of his last go around on the condition that
there is a new album. You can't tour without an album,
so we go into the studio. We recorded an album
called The Formation of Damnation. We end up doing this

(01:42:23):
tour with Motorhead, Judas Priests, Heaven and Hell. It was
called the Metal Masters Tour, and next thing you know,
we're back. Offers kept coming in. Another tour that followed
was with Slayer and Megadeth, and that was called the

(01:42:45):
American Carnage Tour. In fact, the funny side note, Rachel
Maddow talked about this tour when Trump did his whole
American Carnage theme at the first inauguration, And if you
watch this episode of Madows, she actually holds up a
t shirt from this tour. Up until now, American Carnage

(01:43:08):
meant this tour with Slayer, Meganeth and Testament. Today it
means something. It was hilarious, but anyway, yeah, since then, yeah,
it's just it's kept up. The band had this resurgence
and we seem to be doing better. We're Yeah, we've

(01:43:32):
definitely learned from mistakes of the past. The new album
came out Parabellum, it's charting, it's actually getting good reviews.
We just we're in the Guardian, so a lot of
the types of outlets that would never have covered the
band before paying attention and it all yeah, it all

(01:43:55):
really started with that tour in two thousand and eight,
the Metal Mask.

Speaker 3 (01:44:00):
To So how much of your time is spent on Testament?

Speaker 2 (01:44:06):
Well, we're also at the point again the you know,
they were in their twenties when I joined the band,
and so they're a few years older, which works out
well because they don't want to do the band full time.
I mean, we are doing it full time because we

(01:44:26):
you know, we're in an era where you need to
tour much more than you used to due to the
depletion of album sales. But there's there's definitely an understanding
about having other projects. Other members of the band have
other projects that used to be sacrileged to have a

(01:44:47):
band outside of your main band, and now it's it's
very understood. So well. This year, for example, we we
did a summer tour that lasted about five weeks. We
just did a European tour that lasted three weeks, but
I also toured with my trio in March for the

(01:45:09):
whole month. Later this month, I'm going to do a
two week East coast Midwest tour with my trio. And
in January I'll be touring in Texas with the trio
and also up and down the West coast. But then
in the plant. Current plan is to do a testament

(01:45:31):
tour in March and April for about five weeks. So
normally the tours are about five weeks. There are about
three or four of those tours a year, so it's
actually a lot. It's a lot of time, and when
you add up the other the instrumental music I do,
it's it's a lot, but it's fun.

Speaker 3 (01:45:55):
So all these years later, yes, as you referenced earlier,
or you're a working musician, are you happy? Do you
have dreams and desires beyond where you are? Are you frustrated?
Is the dream still alive? Where you at?

Speaker 2 (01:46:15):
The dream is interesting?

Speaker 3 (01:46:16):
The dream?

Speaker 2 (01:46:19):
Yeah, it's funny. It's like you know that the theme
opening theme from Welcome Back Cotter, right, you know the
dreams have changed? They who'd have thought they'd lead you
back here.

Speaker 3 (01:46:33):
It's kind of like that.

Speaker 2 (01:46:34):
It's not as I expected. I thought, Okay, join the band.
The band is going to be your full time gig
and everything else will take care of itself. It's I
I am happy. I'm actually having a great time. It's

(01:46:55):
it's more complicated than it used to be because there's
and this is just reality, and I'm very accepting of it.
But to be a full time musician these days, you
have to be much more than a musician.

Speaker 3 (01:47:09):
You know.

Speaker 2 (01:47:09):
You you have to know how to use social media,
so you're you're in a way, you're a content creator. Uh,
you're an engineer part of the time. You know, we
all have studios on our laptops and that's part of
the music making process. So I used to always think,

(01:47:32):
you know, okay, people who work in studios, they do
the recording. That's not what I do. So, yeah, you
have to know that skill. You have to if you
run a band. I run a small band, which is
my trio. Yeah, then you have to learn about you book.

(01:47:52):
You know, transportation and logistics, and I'm able to delegate
some things and you know, there are things that I
don't do. Visual art is not something I do. I
admire artists like you know, Joni Mitchell and Rob Zombie
that do all their artwork. I don't. I don't do that,

(01:48:16):
but yeah, it's it's it's been fun. I mean, I
really like the un predictable things that come up. So
an example of an unpredictable thing is I just did
my first soundtrack and it's for a film called Traction
Park Massacre. The director works for Metallica. His name is

(01:48:39):
Adam Duban, and he did a year and a half
of the Life of Metallica, but he also did some
iconic music videos Beat by the Beastie Boys, fight for
Your Right to Party, and this is his first feature film,
and he and I kind of get it off. We
actually live in the same neighborhood, and he convinced me

(01:49:01):
to do this soundtrack. And the film just debuted at
New York Comic Con and it's getting some raves and
I'm hearing a lot about the music, so it's I
think it's possible I may do more of that. I
just got back from an event called the Guitar Summit
in Europe and played on a stage with Weasel Zappa

(01:49:25):
and Andy Timmins. And a bunch of other guys. And
you know, there's these guitar events like that. Joe Satriani,
our friend, has done some great guitar events. He does
this thing called the G four Experience. I've been a
guest on two of those, and yeah, just you know,

(01:49:49):
when you add it all up, it's it's a lot
of fun. I don't really know what each year looks like,
but I'm totally fine with it. This year I was
able to to squeeze out an album with it with
my trio. But you know, coming up, I also have
a tour with this great bass player, Percy Jones. He

(01:50:12):
was in a band called brand X in the seventies
and has He's associated with artists like Brian Eno and
h Phil Collins who was part of brand X, And
so Percy's a legend like any fretless bass player knows him.
And we have a project together, and uh, you know,

(01:50:33):
I just did a CD release party or album release
party in New York a few weeks ago. Vernon Reed
was a special guest.

Speaker 3 (01:50:42):
You know.

Speaker 2 (01:50:42):
So I'm doing a lot a lot of fun stuff.
So it's it's not I I never like planned it
this way, but I've also learned that you can't plan
too much. I think I've had more success by not
planning or ex expecting anything.

Speaker 3 (01:51:02):
Well, we'll look forward to what pops up in the future.
Once again, you can hear Alice's music on all the
streaming services which should check out. It's pretty interesting. Also
does covers of stuff like Tom Petty's Breakdown from a
jazz perspective, don't let that take you too far with
jazz if you listen to it, it's still Tom Petty's

(01:51:24):
breakdown and of course testament Alex. Thanks for taking this
time speaking my audience.

Speaker 2 (01:51:31):
Bob, thanks so much for having me again. I'm a
loyal reader and please keep up what you're doing. It's
you're our voice of sanity and it's a big honor
to be on the left of the podcast.

Speaker 3 (01:51:45):
Wow as they say, Yeah, you email me all the time,
so it's great to meet you in person. Until next time,
This is Bob Leftstacks