Ben Eller: from Waffle House to Mastodon, Expression Trumps Speed

Greg Koch welcomes YouTube guitar sensation and touring musician Ben Eller (Uncle Ben) to the Gristle fire for a conversation that meanders from lighthearted Waffle House tales to profound insights about musical authenticity.

Ben shares how his guitar journey and popular YouTube channel were born from simple boredom - first as a homeschooled kid with time to kill, later as a guitar teacher with creative energy to burn. His candid "This is Why You Suck at Guitar" series emerged from the thoughts he couldn't express to frustrating students who never practiced. That unfiltered honesty resonated with viewers, launching an Internet teaching career that complements his diverse performing life.

The conversation takes a fascinating turn when they explore how our earliest musical influences create the foundation for our tastes. From Ben's childhood memories of Van Halen's "Eruption" to Greg's transformative experience with Hendrix's "Electric Ladyland," they agree that understanding "where your clock starts" is essential to respecting diverse musical perspectives.

Perhaps most compelling is their mutual admiration for guitarists who communicate mastery without technical flash. "The hardest thing in the world," Ben notes, "is proving you're a supreme sorcerer without even breaching 16th notes" - a pointed commentary on today's "Instagram shred post era" where technical fireworks often overshadow musical substance.

Ben offers golden wisdom for creators navigating online criticism: "Don't take criticism from someone you wouldn't take advice from." His ability to maintain positivity while acknowledging the gifts and challenges of internet fame reveals why his teaching connects so deeply.

The episode concludes with Ben sharing exciting upcoming projects, including a riff-focused solo album, potential metal ventures inspired by his recent stint with Mastodon, and comprehensive instructional courses revealing his "hidden Guitar Illuminati wisdom." 

Ready to chew some genuine musical gristle with two authentic guitar voices? This conversation delivers wisdom, laughs, and inspiration in equal measure.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Ladies and gentlemen, it's time once again for
another season of Chewing theGristle with yours truly Greg
Kauk.
Can you believe it's alreadyseason six?
We've got so many coolinterviews lined up.
Are we going to talk aboutmusic, you betcha?
But what else are we going totalk about?
Well, quite frankly, anythingthat comes to mind.
So stay tuned, doggone it.

(00:30):
Let's chew that doggone gristle.
Season six come.
This week on Chewing the Gristle, we've got a favorite of mine,
Ben Eller.
Uncle Ben, if you will,Internet phenom.
He's a guitar playing fiend,but also a bass playing fiend

(00:55):
and an internet content providerof unparalleled excellence.
This week on Chewing theGristle, my buddy Ben Eller.
Come on y'all.
Chewing the Gristle, my buddyBen Eller, Come on y'all.
Ladies and gentlemen, boys andgirls, once again we've gathered
round the Gristle Fire for alittle conversatian, a little

(01:15):
Chewing the Gristle, if you will.
Today's guest, the mighty BenEller you know him as Uncle Ben
on the inner Googles, guitarplayer, educator, rascal,
extraordinaire, recently seen onstage with Mastodon.
I myself have been accused ofbeing a Mastodon, but in another
context entirely.
But, Ben, how the hell are you,my good man?

Speaker 2 (01:38):
Oh, my goodness, I'm so happy to be here, gregory
Cochrie.
Dr Cochrie, I like to call callyou, it's such a pleasure to be
here on your show.
It's a splendid podcast thatyou've got going and I'm honored
to be a guest upon it and chewsome gristle, do some chin
wagging with you, you're on theshow.
So thank you, and thank youlisteners, for uh giving this a
listen with your, your hearingears yes, well, you know what?

Speaker 1 (01:59):
you're one of my favorite peeps.
I always enjoy hanging with youevery time I'm down there in
beautiful Tennessee and we havean opportunity to maybe make
some music together, maybe justhang out, maybe just go to a
certain Waffle House.

Speaker 2 (02:10):
Maybe we trash a Waffle House.
Maybe we turn that Waffle Houseinto a Waffle Home.
Have you?

Speaker 1 (02:15):
thought about that.
Oh, I am with you.
1,000%.

Speaker 2 (02:19):
When I'm there with you and I'm having that buttered
pecan waffle and some smotheredand covered hash browns, I feel
like it's more of a waffle home.

Speaker 1 (02:26):
Yeah, you're damn right it is.
You know, when I was a young'unand I was on the road with.
I hadn't really been south allthat much, and some of these
other buddies of mine that hadbeen on the road a bit were just
oh, the Waffle House is theworst, We'll never go there.

Speaker 2 (02:40):
Don't ever eat at a waffle house.

Speaker 1 (02:41):
So I had this kind of prejudicial image of that
establishment until I finallywent and I thought those
individuals were high on crack.
Oh yeah, it is a place toengage in a delicious feast.
And the waffles because it isthe namesake item of the
establishment.
I'll tell you what it's awaffle like no other place, Am I
right, or am I right?

Speaker 2 (03:02):
No, you're exactly right.
They take great pride in theirwaffling there.
I'll tell you that, yeah, andrightly so, I've got a concept
for a chain of competitorwaffle-based restaurants.
Yes, maybe you can be like aninvestor in on this.
Maybe this is a good idea.
Trademark Ben and Greg,obviously I like it.
Maybe we start a chain ofwaffle houses.
It's like you know, we'retrying to take it back to the

(03:23):
scuzzy times before Waffle Househad this family friendly
jukebox on the table image.
We got to take it back to where, like you, got to fist fight
somebody to even get in the door.
I'm talking about a WaffleHostel.
How do you feel about?

Speaker 1 (03:36):
a Waffle Hostel.
Oh, I like that.
It brings all kinds of thingsto the fore.
Not only does it it kind of hasa whiff of violence, but also
kind of a homeless vibe as well.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
I need a place to stay sounds like adventure,
sounds like intrigue, soundslike you're gonna make some
memories to me ah, you arecorrect and I'm for it.

Speaker 1 (03:55):
One thousand percent waffle hostel coming soon.
I'm in now.
Where are you as we speak?
I see that you're in yourstudent people will be listening
to this.
They won't actually be seeingour activities, but I see many
fancy amplification devicesbehind you.
This is the official Uncle Benlair.

Speaker 2 (04:14):
This is the Ben Cave which is full of WMDs, which is
my shorthand for weapons ofmusical destruction.
Oh, I see you.
Things full of tubes and highgain and hot pickups and all the
things that I love you likethat rock music.
I like to.
I like rock music.
Yeah, I like to play rockguitar.
Um, I know Andy Wood.
If he's listening to this.

(04:35):
We'll be pleased to know thatevery gain knob on all of these
amps is at 10.
There's a boost pedal in frontof them as well.

Speaker 1 (04:46):
Oh.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
I like what you're doing there.
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
I'm fond of it personally.

Speaker 2 (04:48):
You're bringing the filth as any co-proprietor of
the waffle hostel wood I'm notonly the owner, I'm also a
client exactly, exactly correct.

Speaker 1 (05:00):
So you have a very, very successful YouTube channel
and it's excellent.
You do a great job ofdissecting some pretty
complicated and also some more.
It's for all levels of play, ofcourse.
But I'm wondering when did youget hip to this whole idea of
internetting and doing thisinstructional aspect with your

(05:23):
own convivial charm, right,right?

Speaker 2 (05:26):
You know it's interesting.
It was kind of a project thatwas born out of, I would say,
boredom.
First, you know, which isactually even the reason I
started playing guitar in thefirst place is out of boredom.
It seemed like something to do.
You know, when I startedplaying guitar it was because I
was homeschooled, and so, youknow, my graduating class was

(05:46):
pretty small, so it isn'texactly what I would say.
I could wake up in the morning,get all my schoolwork done by
11, and then just have to waitaround all day until, you know,
my friends that live down thestreet came home from real
school or whatever.
So it was like I need somethingto do.
My brother has a guitar.
I really wanted to play bass,but I might as well give this a
shot.
So that was kind of born out ofboredom itself.

(06:08):
And so was the YouTube channel.
So if you go back and perusethe archives of the channel and
dig really deep, there's a fewjust like kind of random covers
that I put up, just recorded ona little you know digital camera
, and it'd just be like oh,here's like a cover song of like
a Macedon thing that I learned,or this or that Right, but when
I got kind of serious about itwas when the instructional

(06:30):
aspect kind of came about andthat's when, like the this is
why you suck at guitar seriessort of started and took off
pretty well because the entiremindset there was.
You know, at the time I wasteaching a lot at a local shop,
at the guitar vault inMorristown, tennessee, used to
be called the fret store, butnow it's the guitar vault.
Go and visit him, tell himUncle Ben sent you I was

(06:52):
teaching at the shop and I mean,as you can imagine, dude, it's
like I'm a pretty kind andgentle instructor man.
I want people to feel motivated, I want people to feel positive
and stuff.
Sometimes that's hard whentimmy has come in for six weeks
and he's never practiced once inbetween, right, so, even as I'm
sitting there, you know, acrossfrom in the, in the teacher
chair, giving him good,encouraging stuff to work on, in

(07:15):
my head I'm going, timmy, thisis why you suck at guitar.
You didn't practice, you didn'tdo anything we talked about.
This is why you suck at guitar,right?
You know, at the time before Istarted that series, um, I was
in, I was in a band called ark.
It was this progressiveinstrumental um, mutant band,
really, really awesome, threeguitar players.
It was rad man, uh, more onthat later.

(07:37):
But I was in this band and thatband kind of imploded and so it
was just like dang it.
I got all this extra time now.
My wife was working nights a lotof the times.
A lot of my friends had movedoff to the big city and I was
still out in the country, so itwas kind of the same spot I
found myself in when I startedplaying guitar, where I was like
I kind of got to wait for myfriends to come home.
I need something to do.
So my wife and a couple otherpeople encouraged me.

(07:59):
It's like you're such a goodteacher, you love teaching so
much.
You should put some stuff on onthis YouTube thing that's
getting started off.
It was, like you know, 10, 11years ago at this point, maybe
12 years ago at this point, andI was thinking to myself, if I'm
going to be putting this stuffout there for free and I'm not
getting paid for it, I'm justgoing to tell it like what I'm

(08:19):
thinking as I'm sitting in thechair across from Timmy.
Timmy, this is why you suck atguitar, right, you know?
I'm just going to say what I'mthinking.
If I'm doing it for free, right, and somehow that worked for
people, I got a sneeze coming in, I think.
I think I got an epic sneeze.

Speaker 1 (08:34):
That's all right, do what you got to do.
Humans going to God.
Bless you.
Oh my goodness Bless you.

Speaker 2 (08:41):
Uncle Ben Freight train.
So yeah, it just kind ofspawned that way and somehow
people caught on to the snarkyhumor and I think they
understood that I wasn't beingmean or anything.
It's all in good wit, you know.

Speaker 1 (08:52):
Yes, of course.
Of course time.
Thanks to the oracle that mostof us carry around in our hands
or back pocket or whatever itmight be, we have access to
information unlike at any pointin human history, and certainly
as a guitar player, we haveaccess to anything we're even

(09:17):
mildly curious about.
We can do the deep diveinstantaneously.
But I find that, even thoughthat is the case, people don't.
And I always say there's reallyno reason to suck at this
juncture in time, other than thefact that the age old thing is,
if you don't put the time in,it doesn't matter how much
informatian you have at yourfingertips.
If you don't do the doings,you're going to suck the seconds

(09:39):
.
Am I right, or am I right?

Speaker 2 (09:40):
No, it's all the time put in.
You know, you're right, thoughit's like, with the information
that we have available, you canreally shrink those timeframes.
I mean, rather than diggingaround and trying to find
something, trying to find thetechnique that so-and-so used to
play the song, and spendinghours on that before you come to
the conclusion, you can just gostraight to YouTube, watch a
live video and be like, oh, hedid it with this technique or
whatever, and get right, you'recollapsing time frames now.

(10:03):
Yes, but at the end of the day,is it you putting in the hours,
is it you doing the work?
Right, it's on that thing andmashing that rope a little bit.

Speaker 1 (10:12):
You know, that rope gotta mash, that rope gotta be
now tell us a little bit aboutyour musical journey, how you
got into, the tunes you got into, and so on and so forth oh my
gosh.

Speaker 2 (10:25):
So okay, I I didn't really grow up in a house full
of musicians.
My dad had an acoustic guitarthat was a gift to him.
It was an old yamaha, one ofthose like fg.
It was fg 120 or something youknow.

Speaker 1 (10:38):
Yes but not a bad little guitar, not a bad first
foray into the six string atwilderness, oh huh no, my
brother still has it too, whichis cool.

Speaker 2 (10:47):
Um, he would get that thing out probably about once
every year or so.
Open up the case like.
I still remember what the casesmelled like.

Speaker 1 (10:54):
Oh yeah, you know what I mean you know that's an
oft uh undervalued thing.
Is the is the memories of thesmells of guitar cases the case
with.

Speaker 2 (11:03):
It's changed over the years.
I find a lot of new guitarcases are noxious smelling, but
like the ones from the 70s, 80s,90s, they had this like cake
frosting smell to them.

Speaker 1 (11:14):
You know what I'm talking about.
Yeah, I'm with you.

Speaker 2 (11:17):
They had a thing.
They're doing it all wrong.
They're doing it all wrong,that's right.
So my old man would get out theguitar about once a year and I
remember like he could play likethe riff from Smoke on the
Water.
He could play a basic blueshuffle, just a doom, doom, doom
, doom, doom, doom, doom, yeah,and he just had like another
riff or two and then go back inthe case, you know, for the rest

(11:38):
of the year.
So that was kind of my guitarexposure growing up.
But both of my parents were bigmusic fans, you know, and had a
big record collection and my dadhad a lot of classic and
Southern rock stuff and my momhad a lot of classical music,
you know, bach and Beethoven andall that, as well as stuff like
the Beatles, you know.

(11:59):
So I would say like a lot of mychildhood was spent listening
to classical music Van Halen, zzTop, the Beatles and, like Leon
Redbone, a lot of Leon Redbone.
Yeah, what a mysterious cat.
I know you're hip to Leon.
Oh yeah, you know that guy diedand like we still know nothing
about him, like nothing.

(12:19):
There's no info about when hewas born, how old he was, like
there's no info about the guyGuy, there's no info about when
he was born, how old he was Like.
There's no info about the guy.
Guy's an enigma, I love it Ikind of grew up with a you know
a wide array of differentmusical influences, I guess.
And man, like some of my, myfirst memories that I have in
life are of listening toeruption on my, my parents, like

(12:40):
turntable, like racks, you knowmy brother putting the needle
on that thing and be like, whatis that sound?
You know what I mean?
It's like I remember that, uh,I just remember that so clearly
in my head.
One of my first memories is vanhalen one I, I remember
listening to.

Speaker 1 (12:55):
Uh, I was telling the story the other day about, um,
my sister had this old, like 77chevette you remember those?
They were really, really asmall, small car and it had this
am radio and running with thedevil would come on and I'd be
like I, this song is so awesome.

Speaker 2 (13:15):
But I'm terrified because I actually think these
guys are in league with rightyeah, dude, on this car horns at
the front of it, like it alwayscreeped me out as a kid man,
like just hearing the car hornsat the front of that.
It sounded so ominous and likeit did, and that bass just bam,
bam, bam right.

Speaker 1 (13:35):
Oh man, it's like how , how evil do you have to be to
actually exercise with the devil?
You?

Speaker 2 (13:40):
know what I mean.
Let's go for a run satan.
You know what I mean I've alwaysfound the ultimate evil um
about all of that is just thetrack listing itself and what
they did to us, because itstarts off with, you know,
running with the devil, vanhalen.
One starts off running with thedevil and it's like, okay, this
sounds like a rad ass rock band.
These guys are swinging.
They're definitely drunk.
Like these guys are awesome,the guitar playing in it.

(14:03):
It's one of the van halen songsabout everybody can play, like
even the flow in it, notferocious at all.
Right, everybody played such acruel joke.
Track two eruption right, itsays hello, that's the most evil
trick in music history.
It really is, really, really is.
But yeah, the same memories Ihold for Eliminator by ZZ Top.

(14:25):
That was a record that my dadhad that we listened to all the
time.
Man, I can probably sing.
I've probably been able to singevery note on that album since
I was like four.
That's like embedded in my DNA.

Speaker 1 (14:38):
You know, what's interesting about that is being
slightly older than you, uncleBen Is that I was a huge ZZ Top
fan and when that first record,when that record, came out, I
hated it originally.

Speaker 2 (14:51):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (14:53):
Because you know, I just saw ZZ Top on the El Loco
tour and it was awesome and theyhad just started to do the you
know the choreographed maneuverstogether, but it was a
bare-bones just started to dothe you know maneuvers together,
but it was a bare-bones stage.
You saw the marshals.
It was the loudest concert I'dbeen to up to that point and um

(15:13):
and I may have, may or may nothave been imbibing in something
to make enhance my you knowsensory perception of the events
.
Uh, but it was awesome.
I was a.
I was a guitar fiddler at thetime and my one of my favorite
buffet of tones was tahash thatI mean there's just so many good
gnarly les paul tones, awesomestrat tone.

(15:33):
The whole gamut is on thatrecord.
And then all of a sudden,eliminator comes out and I'm
listo.
It's young dylan calling me.
I can't talk right now, youngdylan, I'm engaging in spirited
conversation, um, anyway.
So I did not like.
I was like what are they doing?
One of the greatest tonesmithsof all time has like reduced

(15:55):
himself to playing whateveratrocious shit box.
And then all of a sudden I spenta little time with I was like,
oh no, this shit rocks, oh man,and then I was all in and then
of course I had it and I playedit out and I knew every morsel
on the whole damn thing yeah,it's funny because because, yeah
, it's like I had the oppositeexperience, where that was my
first exposure, so I didn't knowany better.

Speaker 2 (16:14):
It would be I mean forever, forever.
After that that I heard, youknow, some of the early records,
trace hombres and all this and,right, you know, learned about
this other side of the band thatwasn't drum machines and
keyboard and all that kind ofstuff.
Um, I mean, I, I just I love itall.
Because of that, I don't reallyhave a preference either way.
Can I tell you my cool billygibbons story?

(16:34):
Please do, man.
So it was september of.
I gotta think about what yearthis would have been.
I think 2021, if I'm notmistaken, might have been 2022.
I think it's 2021.
You'll know my math based onthe story here.
But I went sort of last minutewith a couple of friends
Actually, I think a couplemutual friends of ours went to

(16:58):
see Jeff Beck and ZZ Top, oh,yeah, yeah, yeah, outside of
Nashville and it was incredibleand I'm so glad that it went,
because we lost Jeff Beck.
I think it was like two monthslater, right, exactly.
So I got to see him rightbefore he passed Again.
That's where my math on theyears is getting fuzzy, but you
know, zz Top was playing.

(17:20):
Billy Gibbons was up there andit's like you know, a different
rad guitar every song right meand my buddies are just oogling
over all these different guitarsthat he had.
Joe Wyatt was there, we werejust oh, yeah, you know, joe,
yeah and um, so I can't rememberwhat song it was during, but
they bring out this just likeincredible, definitely like a 59

(17:41):
, you know, burst, justlegendary museum piece, les paul
, it's got this gorgeous flametop.
It was just amazing.
And so, like you know the wholesong, me and my buddies are
just oogling over this thing anddrooling over it, being like
man, I bet that thing's worth abajillion dollars.
That's so cool, man, you knowthat should be in the
smithsonian, right, right.

(18:01):
And dude billy gibbons beyondcool, he's the coolest guy
that's ever lived, obviously,right, you know, at the end of
the song, with this priceless 59bursts that he's holding dude,
he like he lifts the guitar sothat he's kind of like showing
the crowd the back of the guitarinverted, yeah, and it has this

(18:21):
ginormous sticker that coversthe entire back of the guitar
and it says beer and he kind ofpoints to it and gives us like
it's cool, huh, look, and thenjust hands it off to his tech.
You cannot be cooler.
You can't be cooler than thatBeer, that's it.

Speaker 1 (18:41):
There.
It is Only thing that wouldhave been better if I said
waffle house that's the only way, man, the only way.

Speaker 2 (18:48):
Yeah, that's, that's the uh.
Only billy gibbons can get awaywith gilding the lily, quite
like that, correct?

Speaker 1 (18:55):
but yes, uh, the top, uh, one of my favorites and one
.
And billy gibbons, always oneof my, uh, uh, my favorite axe
ticklers, especially thatfunky-ass vibrato of his.

Speaker 2 (19:10):
You know, Hank.

Speaker 1 (19:13):
It's just so damn juicy.

Speaker 2 (19:15):
I'll tell you that show with Jeff Beck and ZZ Top.
One of the things that was areal revelation for me about it
is I got to see two examples ofwhat I think the hardest thing
in the world is to do on guitar.
The hardest thing, which isprove to everybody in the crowd,
everybody in the room, that youare a supreme axe wielding

(19:37):
sorcerer, without even breachingthe realm of 16th notes.
Yeah, that's true, absolutely.
I mean, you know at that pointtoo, both those guys they're up
in their years anyway, butneither of them have ever been
like shredders.
Exactly, that's true, just backa little more so.
But you know, even if you watchlike live at ronnie scott's
like there's not a lot of right16th on there, you know exactly

(20:00):
a scant sextuplet availablepleasure.
But to me that's the hardestthing in the world is when you
can prove to everybody that youare in total command of the
instrument and not use speed toget there.
Yeah, I'm with you, that's thehardest thing, yep, for me
anyway.

Speaker 1 (20:19):
It's well, yeah, in most of the guys of that era you
know that were where theelectric guitar was elevated to
the pantheon of godliness.
You know were practitioners ofthat activity.
You know Paige would get alittle sticky.
Diggity, diggity, diggity, hereand there.

Speaker 2 (20:36):
And Jimi Mernie Mernie too.

Speaker 1 (20:40):
And old Jim Hendricks would throw out a salvo or two,
but for the most part it wasnot to your point.
Not a 32nd or 16th noteonslaught.

Speaker 2 (20:50):
Exactly, man, exactly Kind of getting back to some of
the musical origin stuff youwere talking about.
You know from there, I think,and this is something that I
think has changed so much overthe age of youngsters these days
, with the availability of musicand streaming services and all
that, and I'm sure you rememberthis exact experience for
yourself too, and I want to knowwhat yours is.
But, like for a lot of peoplein the pre-streaming era, a big

(21:15):
turning point for me was findingmusic that I wasn't introduced
to by my parents.
Yeah, you know, and for me thatwas.
I remember my brother cominghome this one time.
My older brother, noah.
He came home this one time froma friend's house and he's like
dude, I just saw this musicvideo by this band called Weezer
.
It's called the sweater song.

(21:36):
Dude, you won't believe it.
They're nerds, they have likesweaters and glasses and they
play rock music and it's so cool.
And we got the blue album byWeezer, which has remained one
of my favorite things humanshave ever produced, but like
that.
And then Dookie by Green Day.
Those were both incrediblyimportant records for me because

(21:59):
they were music that my parentsdidn't introduce me to.
It was like I found this.
It's mine that's crazy.

Speaker 1 (22:06):
Well, you know what.
What's interesting is thatyou're from a generation whose
parents were in, were in thewere in the original rock
generation.
I'm the youngest of seven, somy parents were world war ii
people, right.
So my parents were World War IIpeople, right.
So my parents were notinterested in any of the music I
was into until later on.
They're like, you know, I kindof like this song or I like that

(22:26):
, and they were into it, butonly after my entire youth.
They were like turn that noiseoff.
So all my stuff was from myolder siblings.
So my older brother is 14 yearsolder than I am, so I was
exposed to his record collection.
So I guess the most you knowwould be what music I was
introduced to that you know hewasn't already into, and boy

(22:50):
that that could be all over theall over the map.
But um, you know probably a lotof the you know older school
blues stuff and so on and soforth.
But I I will always remember mybrother bringing home Electric
Ladyland from Jimmy Hendrix,because he always told me,
because that was one of therecords we didn't have yeah,
dude.

Speaker 2 (23:07):
And for whatever reason.

Speaker 1 (23:07):
I was really young and I was really into Hendrix
and I'll just always rememberhim saying to me man, you
haven't heard anything untilyou've heard Electric Ladyland,
wow.
So he came home one night afterbeing out and we had to share a
room because we were the onlytwo boys and my I had five
sisters.
So he came home and I rememberwaking up and he put on still
raining, still dreaming, and Istill remember and I heard that

(23:31):
it's like I know what I'm doingit just clicked.

Speaker 2 (23:37):
You know it's like you heard something and it just
clicked and you're like, butthis is what something in me is
looking for yes, exactly correctwhich brings us to the whole
thing of you know.

Speaker 1 (23:48):
It's so interesting because the internet is filled
with people with variousopinions.
Right, I've noticed you've gotyou've got all these different
people saying this, that and thenext thing, and I've just come
to the feeling of you know, youjust have to be cognizant of

(24:08):
where everyone's clock starts.
Like you just told me whereyour clock started, of what you
know, like ZZ Top, you heardthat it completely depends on
that as far as what you valueand you know you can do homework
and you can, you know, figureout where your perspective came
from.
But where you start the clockmusically and how that imprinted

(24:29):
on you is your desire to pursue.
It is a very specific thing and, as I said, you can inform it
from past and current stuff andso on and so forth.
Said you can inform it frompast and current stuff and so on
and so forth, but depending onwhere that clock starts is where
those real kind of intrinsicbeliefs, beliefs are held, and
you should respect that, andother people too, because it's
going to be different foreverybody, because there is no

(24:50):
right or wrong.
Am I right or am I right?

Speaker 2 (24:52):
No, no, you're exactly right, and you can't
glean that information off of ageneric username and a stock.
You know avatar of that person.
You don't know, like you don'tknow all that stuff.

Speaker 1 (25:04):
Right, exactly.

Speaker 2 (25:06):
Yeah, the internet has I don't know, man, I mean
obviously there's, there'samazing things that have come
from it, you know, I mean it's,it's the entire world we live in
, you know.
Now I mean hell, we couldn't doit, if you know, we couldn't do
this interview if not for theinternet.
That being said, I think thatit's probably grown faster than

(25:27):
the human brain.
Here's what I'm talking about,greg.
Like, when I think about, whenI think about my grandparents
over the course of their lives,how many people do you think
they knew?
Like, maybe 70 people livingout in the country, living out
on the farm?
Like, maybe they knew 70 peopleover the course of their lives.
And now you know our brainsthat were formerly just hiding

(25:49):
out in caves and eating nuts andberries and foraging all day
and maybe knew 70 people overthe course of a lifetime.
Now we have access to everyhuman on earth.
Right, exactly, that's a potentcocktail, right there it is
indeed, you know it's.

Speaker 1 (26:06):
It's uh, it's a fascinating thing.
A buddy of mine, um, he wasabout my older brother's age, he
worked, he's always been amusician, but for a time he had
a a straight job, if you will.
He worked for a militarycontractor, because he's very,
he's, very, smart guy, and, um,and he was working for, and so
they were hip to, you know,because the first access to the
internet was through, you know,the defense industry, right, and

(26:29):
so, being a musician and being,um, you know, exposed to this
technology, he foresaw all of it.
He's like music's going tobecome digital, all this stuff
is going to, you know, he, heknew it was all the writing on
the wall, yeah, and um didn't doany good, but I'm just kidding
though he's, he's done just fine, but it was just interesting

(26:51):
how he knew it was coming.
He did an article for a a localuh uh paper or did an interview,
or they're kind of saying, hey,all this stuff is, stuff is
coming and and you know and I'mnot somebody, and I know you're
not either that's just like, oh,you know, it was so much better
.
I mean it's just different.
I mean you go, different thingshappen and you just pivot and
you go and you enjoy it forwhatever it is.

(27:13):
I mean I personally, from mycareer point of view, it's like
I couldn't do everything I'mdoing if it wasn't for the
current situation.

Speaker 2 (27:21):
I mean when, totally, I grew up in Talbot, tennessee,
dude, you know how close thatis to anything important or
relevant for the music industry.

Speaker 1 (27:31):
It gives you the ability to communicate, as you
said, with people all over thedamn world, and that's pretty
awesome.

Speaker 2 (27:37):
Yeah, totally man.

Speaker 1 (27:38):
It can be used and harnessed for the for the
purpose of good we interruptthis regularly scheduled gristle
infested conversation to give aspecial shout out to our
friends at fishman transducers,makers of the greg caulk
signature fluent gristle tonepickup set can you dig that?
And our friends at WildwoodGuitars of Louisville, colorado,

(28:00):
bringing the heat in the shadowof the Rocky Mountains.
Well, on the subject ofinterfacing with people on the
inner Google, how much do youengage an individual post?

(28:22):
Because I find it if someoneasks like a very specific
question that hasn't beenanswered a million times, I'll
pipe in and say something.
But if someone says somethinglike really obnoxious or even
like astoundingly stupid youknow trying to get a rise out of
me or whoever else I will notengage at all.

(28:43):
I'm just curious as to have youfluctuated in your levels of
engagement in this regard, asyour star has risen, if you will
, as far as followers and so onand so forth?
How do you approach that?

Speaker 2 (28:54):
Right?
That's a great question.
I think the golden rule thatanybody that is out there using
their time to create content forthe consumption of others,
especially free content, stuffthat nobody is forcing anyone to
watch and no one is gettingbilled for, you know, I think
one of the golden, you knowrules that everybody should
abide by, buy and it's verysimple, but it's totally changed

(29:17):
my approach.
Don't ever take criticism fromsomeone you wouldn't take advice
from.
It's that simple, Excellent.
Yes, Simple, you know, becauseobviously you know I put a lot
of stuff out there and I'll tellyou the feedback is 99.9% great
.
I mean people that I engagewith and the comments that I see

(29:38):
from people are vastly positiveand very thankful and very,
very cool people I want toengage with, you know that's
because you are positive andit's a positive thing thank you,
I.
I like to think that whateveryou put out there is what
circles back to you.
You know, um, and that's kindof evidence of that.
But, like every now and thenone slips through the cracks,

(30:01):
maybe no doubt.
He just wandered in uh off thestreets and found himself in one
of my videos and does not likethe cut of my jib, right and
there, you know there'll be atrash talk comment about like,
oh you know, that's not how heplays it, you're playing it
wrong, you're doing this wrong,you're an asshole, like whatever
you know.
Some people just don't likeyour thing and it would be
really easy to get down in theditch with them.

(30:22):
You know it would be reallyeasy to get down there and sling
some mud.
But at the same time, do I knowthis person?
Do I know their pedigree on theinstrument?
Do I know that they know whatthey're talking about?
Why would I treat like they do?

Speaker 1 (30:35):
I don't know this person, you know exactly and
then you look and they have liketwo followers and no videos, or
if they have a video, it's likeoh yeah, believably foul,
Totally.
If you even bother to engage,but sometimes they're so the
comment is so out there.
You're like where is thiscoming from?

Speaker 2 (30:51):
Yeah, I don't think this is about me.
I think this is about somethingelse Exactly, exactly Correct,
else, exactly correct.
Call your dad, right, call him,call her, you know, you know
it's.
It's kind of a funny thing howall that stuff works out,
because you're exactly right,man, and I get a lot of people

(31:11):
that you know talk to me andthey're like I thought about
doing a YouTube channel, Ithought about putting more of my
playing out there, but I'm I'mso scared of the haters, I'm so
scared of people that will justrip me up and talk, smack to me
and all that.
And, dude, it's like I'm here totell you, as somebody that has
done this for a long time, andas somebody who does the thing
you're not supposed to do andreads all the comments.
I do, I read all the commentson my stuff, um, and I I check

(31:36):
it out.
Whenever somebody has some youknow, some some, uh, some smack
to talk, right, I go check outand I see, well, what have you
been up to, Right, and I'm hereto tell you everybody who's
scared of doing something orputting something out there,
because they're scared of thehaters, the haters have time to
talk shit because they're notdoing shit.
Exactly, it's a fact.
Right, like seriously, likeright, like seriously.

(32:01):
Like I've never gotten.
I've never gotten a smack talkcomment from steve I.
You know why it's too busymaking the best guitar stuff
ever exactly exactly correct.
So don't don't fear the haters,you know, don't.
Don't do it like don't don'ttake criticism from them because
you wouldn't take advice fromeither.
It's like you don't know thesepeople and most all of the time
it's entirely projection andthey're not doing anything to
make the world better themselvesthat's a fact.

Speaker 1 (32:23):
Sometimes the comments are so, as you said,
it's like somebody just wanderedright in.
This is the thing I mean and Iand I understand it to an extent
.
I mean, I, I do.
I try to put myself in otherpeople's shoes at all times and
that helps me from any number ofdifferent kind of knee-jerk
reactions to things I wouldregret later.

(32:45):
But you know, you get people whoit's like they don't do any
research at all, like you'rejust some random dude, you know
who, just you know like theydon't do any homework on.
Well, maybe this person hasdone X, y and Z and maybe
they'll take this one thingcompletely out of context.
But again to your point, it'slike they're projecting whatever

(33:08):
mental hellscape they're in onsomebody else, some random
person on the Internet, and toeven engage them whatsoever is
to give credence to their owndysfunction.
But how about the whole thingof?
You know you've explainedsomething.
You've even explained it in thedescription in terms of you
know what it's from, what thetune is, what gear is this?

(33:30):
But then it'll just be the samequestions all throughout.
I just I'm like I'm notanswering that.

Speaker 2 (33:39):
You reach that point right when you're like.
I did my part by putting it outthere in the first place.
Exactly, Sort out the detailslater, Right.

Speaker 1 (33:48):
Right, I mean, unless it's something you know.
For instance, if you doanything on slide guitar,
anything at all the firstquestion you'll get is what
tuning is that?
So I always go, I'm in standardtuning or I'm an open G and
without a doubt you know rightdown what tuning is that, and so
then I even did a video.
It's like you know what you cantell when you're in open tuning

(34:10):
.
Well, this happens.
You know if you hear openstrings ringing, then you can go
.
Oh, if I'm borrowing at acertain fret, then you're like,
oh, okay, well, that's got to bethis tuning.
But I find that you know, andagain I empathize, I understand,
but at the same point in timeit's like we had to figure all
this shit out on our own back inthe day.

(34:31):
And now it's as if people wantto just like take some kind of
device, medical accoutrement andopen up their craniums and for
us to just pour the shit in andclose it back up again.
Okay, now you're good.
It's like no, you got.
You got to do a little footworkin this case.

Speaker 2 (34:47):
Just read the description of the video, right
yeah, we're not quite adownloading uh kung fu into uh
keanu reeves's cerebral cortexlike we did.
We're not there yet, right it's?
It's a matter of time, but fornow it is fascinating for me as
somebody that puts out contentstuff all the time and and has
dealt with the exact issueyou're talking about.
It's interesting to me to kindof play the game of psychology

(35:10):
there and be like how do peopleassimilate information?
How is it getting in theirheads?
Because, like, if I did this,this and this and it still
didn't click, it almost becomesa game to me where it's like how
do I get the little ball intothe hole?
Right right, yeah.

Speaker 1 (35:27):
But you wonder a lot of times if it's just.
They know damn well that theycould find out what it is, but
they just want to engage withyou.

Speaker 2 (35:34):
Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, oh, totally there is that.
There's the dog peeing on therug for attention, which is very
real.

Speaker 1 (35:41):
That's a great.
That's a great image, by theway, but we can incorporate that
in some of the waffle hustle,yeah probably.

Speaker 2 (35:48):
Yeah, there's dog peeing on a rug in every corner
of the waffle hospital.
But you know, on the positiveside of the interaction thing,
um of the internet, you know Iget so many, so many great
questions and so many greatcomments on on my channel and on
my Instagram and my Patreoncommunity and I think sometimes

(36:08):
you can tell when people havethat genuine desire to learn, to
know more.
You know, even in text form,with an anonymous picture and
username, sometimes you can tellwhen somebody has that spark of
like they legitimately want toknow more and excited to help
them, because I remember, Iremember being at that phase.
I mean, I'm still in that phaseof wanting to know more, I'm

(36:29):
still learning, but Absolutely,when you have that spark, you
can recognize it.
You've recognized it in otherstudents and stuff you've worked
with over the years, I'm sure,where you can see, ah, this
person has the spark, I want tofeed it.
You know I want to get, I wantto help.
So I'm always happy to engagein those kinds of conversations
on the various platforms in thatway as well.

Speaker 1 (36:55):
And to your point.
I mean, 99% of the people thatengage are positive and they're
saying positive things.
And then you, and then you goout there and you know we're
touring all over the place withthe band and these people come
out and they're like hey, thankyou so much, and you really get
this feeling of man.
This is cool.
You've you've connected withthese people on the internet but
, of course, as you knowmusicians which we are when some
at some point we were so needythat we had to do something so
people would go look at me.

(37:16):
We have a that, that insecuritything where it's like a
thousand positive comments buttwo sorry sons of bitches come
along with some weird andthey're like what?
This is outrageous.

Speaker 2 (37:30):
I don't deserve this.
But, you know human's got tohuman.
What you can always do and it'salways worked great for me.
Whenever somebody does have oneof those you know, again it
feels like this isn't reallyabout me, I think you're having
a bad day and just taking it outon me or something right?
One of my favorite responses,and it works every time I just

(37:50):
say, hey, man, thanks so muchfor watching.
Your refund for what this videocosts you to watch is in the
mail.
Stay right, exactly.
Would you like a refund?
Right and because, really, like, at the end of the day, what
are you going to say Like well,I guess I didn't pay anything
for this.

Speaker 1 (38:10):
It's yeah, I'm with you a thousand percent,
especially you know if you'recovering anybody else's stuff?
Yeah, and of course I'm not.
You know the stuff Ioccasionally like I did a thing
on Funk 49 the other day, justfor how I play it.
And you know the stuff Ioccasionally like I did a thing
on Funk 49 the other day, justfor how I play it, and I even
said like this is how I play it.
And you're like, well, that'snot what Joe did, that's not
Joe's tone.
I'm like you are correct.

Speaker 2 (38:32):
You are 100% correct.
That's right.
That's right.
You know Well the thing that Ialways kind of run into as well
man, anytime I am doing one ofthose like meticulous, you know,
transcriptions of somebodyelse's riffs or solos or
whatever, and somebody is inthere and they're like hey,
that's, that's not how he doesit, you're playing it wrong.
Like, I'm very much of the Ipicked this up from like Kevin

(38:53):
Smith, the film director, buthe's very much into the mindset
of like man, don't, don't cursethe darkness, light a candle,
you know, right, right.
So a lot of times, even withthose kind of hostile comments,
I like to respond back to thesepeople and be like hey, man, I
went to your channel looking fora video on the right way to
play it.
Didn't see one, looking forwardto seeing you enlighten us all

(39:14):
on the right way to do it, right.

Speaker 1 (39:16):
Perfect, because I am .

Speaker 2 (39:17):
Honestly, if I'm wrong, I look forward to
learning how to do it right,right.

Speaker 1 (39:27):
You know you should share, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2 (39:28):
You are correct.
I like it, ben.
These are good tools, that'sright.
They need them.

Speaker 1 (39:31):
So in the various years that I've been down,
you've done various things withour buddy.
Andy Wood, we were actuallyplaying bass and what's your
regular gigging scenario?
Is, or is it always fluctuating?

Speaker 2 (39:46):
It's always in a state of flux and that's
honestly how I like it.
I mean everything from touringwith, you know, death metal
bands like White Chapel playingshredding guitar and brutal
riffs to get people punching thesnot out of each other down
there in the pit to.
You know, I play with like a.
I occasionally play with ayacht rock band here in town and
play a Strat through my, youknow, sarabella and play

(40:07):
Christopher Cross tunes andSteely Dan, and all that Playing
various bass gigs.
You know, whether that be likea funk band, disco band, andy
Woods act, whatever, I like thevariety.
Honestly, I kind of like think Iwould wither if I had one of
those gigs where I did the samething all the time Cause I liked
a big variety of stuff.

(40:28):
You know, some people, somepeople thrive in those
environments and they're like Ilike speed metal.
That's all I want to play,that's all I know how to play
and I played 30 years in thespeed metal band and that's
awesome.
But I I just like a little bitof everything and I like to play
a little bit of everything.
I just like a little bit ofeverything and I like to play a
little bit of everything.
So I feel very fortunate thatI've gotten to do so many

(40:52):
different kinds of gigs,especially on bass too, because
I love playing bass.
Man Like I'm the I think I'mpart of the rare guitar
community that doesn't feel likeI'm getting grounded from
soloing when I play bass Like Ilegitimately love big guitar and
I wanted to play bass first.
That's what I wanted to playoriginally bass.

Speaker 1 (41:05):
You wanted to rumble those polyps with the great low
end.

Speaker 2 (41:10):
You know, I did.
You know I really didn't have abass.
My brother had a guitar.
So it was like, well, you know,pick this up, see if you, you
know, think it's something youwant to stick with and maybe
we'll get you a bass later.
But by the time that point came, it was like, well, I'm gigging
and teaching now, so I guessthis is me.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
Right, I can dig it all.
So how much do you figure yougig a month, I mean, is there
like a?
I mean obviously you're doingthe YouTube stuff that I know
the incredible amount of timethat takes to maintain, to
produce those things, to figureout, to engage all of that kind
of stuff.
So what kind of a balance doyou have between your

(41:47):
internetting and your your goingout and shredding?

Speaker 2 (41:51):
Right, you know it really depends and varies month
by month, year by year.
You know, I mean in the past.
In the past month alone it'slike we've had a couple, a
couple of gigs with a skankbanger, which is your metal
tribute band me and Andy Woodand Andy Campbell and a couple
of our other buddies, chris Cookon bass and various different
vocalists that work with thatband.

(42:12):
We've had a couple of differentskank banger gigs going around
doing the eighties thing lights,tights and catfights.
People love it.

Speaker 1 (42:19):
Lights, tights and catfights.

Speaker 2 (42:28):
I don't understand it , but the people love it.
So we're here to provide.
I like doing that stuff, man.
We had an andy wood gig thatjust got canceled because
apparently someone fell throughthe stage and they had to
rearrange.
Outrageous, yeah, exactly.
So that was on the books, butnow it's no longer.
Um, as well as doing, yeah, themastodon gig, you know over the
past months too, down thereplaying in the dominican with
them.
So it really varies a lot, man.

Speaker 1 (42:46):
I like what you're doing and I like it.
Thank you, and I like whatyou've done.
I like what you're doing and Ilike what you've done.
Say what.

Speaker 2 (42:56):
Get it.
I bet that tablet.
Could you send me tabs for that?

Speaker 1 (43:01):
You know, I wanted to ask you something, you know
again, I don't want to soundlike I'm negative, Nancy,
because you know I'm not- no,you're not, but I can't help.
I mean, I understand this, whatI'm about to explain.
I understand the methodology.
I understand why people thinkit's a thing, but you and I both

(43:24):
know it's not a thing.
But what is with this constantneed on social media, whether it
be on any of the platforms, theneed for people to vigorously
discuss the greatest guitarplayers, the greatest bass
player, who's the greatest rockdrummer of all time?

(43:46):
What the hell is the deal?

Speaker 2 (43:48):
dude the sith has invaded social media.
We're dealing in absolutes.
What's going on anymore right?

Speaker 1 (43:53):
exactly.
I just like you like what youlike.
You know if you want to talkabout why your favorites are
what they are, but again, it'sall going to come back to, as I
said before, where you'restarting your clock.
Yeah, but this need that thereis some kind of inside scoop of
who really was the best one.

Speaker 2 (44:12):
It's oh shit it is.
Yeah, dealing with those kindof extremes and absolutes gets
absolutely nowhere, becausereally it all comes down to well
, best.
Best at what?
Exactly Best at what?
Because, especially with ourinstrument man, with the guitar
in its various different forms,you know, going all the way from
the pointy super strat to thetelecaster, to the arch top, to

(44:35):
the nylon string, all thedifferent forms of guitar,
there's oftentimes very littlecommunication between the
languages of even just thevarious forms of guitar, right?
So, for example, if you takesomebody like that, you think of
one of the greatest electricguitar players on earth, like a
Steve Vai.
For me, steve Vai is like mydude, right?

(44:55):
I think of that Steve Vai asbeing, in my opinion, you know,
my favorite guitar player.
Guitar player.
Well, if you handed him Paco dela Silla's flamenco guitar and
asked him to play with Paco anddo flamenco stuff, suddenly
there is no translation of thatmusical currency anymore,
correct, correct, now he isdefinitely not the greatest.

(45:18):
Steve Vai is not the greatestflamenco guitar player, right,
because there's, you know, thoseare two completely different
realms of technique, of harmoniclanguage, of everything, and
oftentimes there's not a lot ofcross talk between those things.
So, yeah, it's like comparingsomebody like Paco to Steve Vai.
It's as Andy Wood likes to say,it's not apples to oranges,

(45:40):
it's apples to bicycles.
Like why?
How can you even compare andsay what's better, right,
completely different, absolutely?
Talking about favorites is onething.

Speaker 1 (45:49):
Sure, you can have a personal favorite, exactly, but
I think, especially in the realmof the non-musician that likes
to talk about music, sure, Ithink that that's this, you know
where, I'll see.
I don't even know why I end upseeing them as I'm scrolling
through, you know, twitter orwhatever the case may be, or X,
whatever it's called, or any ofthese other different platforms

(46:10):
where they're like the greatestof this.
Well, I think so-and-so is thegreatest.
It's just like kids, it's not athing, and a lot of times it's
you know, whatever.
I just find it to be amusingbecause I mean, I remember when
I was, that was something wewould do in high school.
You know what I mean.
And I remember in high schoolthere was a buddy of mine who
was more of a he was, at thattime, more of a prog guy.

(46:31):
Of course, you know that's.
That concept has changed quitea bit but he thought steve howe
was the greatest guitar playerof all time.
And I would say, yes, stevehowe is unbelievable, but I like
hendrix better, because that'she.
He does a thing that I likebetter I've now.
Can I?
Can Jimmy play with SteveHowell plays?
Absolutely not.
Can Steve Howell play withJimmy plays?
Nope, nope.

(46:51):
So and that's cool and that'sthe way it should be.
You like him, I like this, butit's not like one guy's got a,
you know, can walk around with amore decorated military
ensemble, with with medals andso on and so forth, because he's
achieved a status that issuperior badges, exactly.
It's just.
Uh, it's a curious thing and Ialways get back to wouldn't it

(47:14):
be better time spent, instead oftalking about it, just playing
your instrument?

Speaker 2 (47:18):
you know what?
How about that?
Because you're right.
It's like how can you quantifygreatness?
Can you just put on an albumand hold up the greatness meter?
Right, I'll measure it.
It's nailing the red lineIndeed.

Speaker 1 (47:31):
This thing is going crazy, it's going haywire, it's
beeping off the charts.

Speaker 2 (47:37):
Right Now, favorites is one thing, though you know
favorites is one thing and youcan't quantify that and you've
always got to ask like okay,best, in what way Are you asking
fastest?
Right, are you asking bestsongwriter?
Because that's a whole notherthing, nothing to do with each
other, exactly All you know, Imean, if that's the case, you
know, paul McCartney is thegreatest guitar player that's

(47:59):
ever lived.

Speaker 1 (47:59):
Right, exactly.
And then, of course, songs arecompletely subjective.
You know people say well, youknow the recipe for a great pop
song is this yeah, you're ofcourse, you're right.
You know, of course there are.
You know certain aspects of howsongs are made to be
commercially successful.
But even the aspect of you knowwhat goes into great songs is is

(48:20):
very subjective, so it all justcomes down to where you start
the clock, what your level ofsophistication is in terms of
how much you've listened tothings, and so on and so forth.
But even that it's completelysubjective and in the end no one
gives a shit.

Speaker 2 (48:35):
It is, and I'm sure that you know exactly what I'm
talking about here too, but theaverage level of technique of
young guitar players now is, Imean, astronomically higher than
it's ever been.
Oh, totally, absolutely unreal,unreal.
The shred arms race is at anall-time high right now.
Totally.
But on the subject of songs,how do you feel about this?

(48:56):
Where, where are the tunes?
Now, you know?

Speaker 1 (48:59):
well, that's it, or even any kind of context for
those chops that is, it justgrew.
Give me a groove, for fuck'ssake you know what I mean.
Give me something I want togive me something I want to
listen to, other than to beamazed by.
You know what I mean exactly,man, exactly.

Speaker 2 (49:15):
Yeah, songs are always at the heart of
everything to me, you know, Iknow, even on my own channel,
you know I have a lot of videosabout technique and like
exercises and hey, learn thislick, it'll help you with your
picking and stuff, and I lovedoing that stuff and I love
approaching it that way, andpeople love learning that way
too, which is great.
I think the greatest teacher ofall is always going to be songs
, though, right, and I thinkthat's something that in the you

(49:39):
know, 15 to 60 second Instagramshred post era that we live in
right now 15 to 60 secondInstagram shred post era that we
live in right now I think thatthe value of playing and
learning songs is reallyundervalued right now.

Speaker 1 (49:52):
I think you're correct.
I love figuring out you knowwhat and I don't know about you,
but I, uh, even though I won'tsay I, I haven't done it in the
past, but it's a rare occasionwhere I'll slow something down
to figure it out.
Let me quantify that and justsaying, if I'm learning the
exact line of a song, yes, interms of the actual melodic

(50:16):
content, that's another matter.
But if I'm like playing alongand you know, if I'm hearing a
lick or something like that,I'll be like how's that go?
And then I'll, I'll learn it,but I won't Cause I, however,
I'm going to figure out, I'mgoing to twist it anyway.
You know what I mean.
So, anyways, I'm just gettingback to the point of, you know,
going in and figuring out thosevarious different things.

(50:37):
I just like playing along withrecords, like all the time it
the blast, but then learning theactual songs and then figuring
out how am I going to do thatsong in my own way?
Not, I'm not, I'm not really,but of course that's.
That's my own perspective.
However, anybody else does, itis is their own thing and that's
another thing.
It's all good, however, you'redoing it is good yep, but as I

(50:58):
was just bloviating on thisother bullshit, I was thinking
about asking you, asking youabout this whole thing that's
come out, about theseindividuals who have doctored up
their videos.
Sure, yeah, and you know A lotof fakery, a lot of fakery about
A lot of fakery, and you knowto your point.

(51:22):
I mean a 60-second video.
You can make anything soundgood for 60 seconds and then, if
you really want to take yourtime, and you know slow things
down, speed them up and all thatkind of stuff for the purpose
of astounding folk.
But what is your?
Obviously you know it isn'tgreat to steal other people's
material.
That's a whole nother thing.

Speaker 2 (51:42):
This is something I've been going about lately,
Exactly, but and then so youhave two separate material.
That's a whole nother thing.
This is something I've beengoing about lately, exactly, uh,
but, and then.

Speaker 1 (51:47):
So you have two separate things.
Obviously you've got this thestealing of other people's stuff
and making it your own for thepurpose of internet notoriety,
and then doctoring upperformances, uh, for internet.
Internet notoriety is, you know, in the end, if people are
enjoying it and the person isprofiting from it, is it icky?
Yeah, but in the end, I, ifpeople are enjoying it and the
person is profiting from it, isit icky?
Yeah, but in the end, I mean,what are your thoughts?

Speaker 2 (52:10):
Yeah, no, there's a lot to unpack there, honestly.
And there's part of me thatI'll play devil's advocate here.
Okay, there is part of me thatwhenever I hear people talking
about how like, oh, did you know?
This section on this record wasrecorded at half speed, or this
was recorded one note at a time, he wasn't really playing, that
, that's a sampler, whatever.

(52:30):
Um, there is part of me that,again, to be devil's advocate
will be like, well, it's, it'sart, it's not the olympics,
exactly right, performanceenhancing drugs is in fact,
encouraged, like, really like it.
It's not the only thing, so youcan't get disqualified for
however you choose to becreative Like.

(52:51):
Here's an example I rememberreading years back Are you
familiar with the band fearfactory?
Yeah, I remember that band.
Yeah, like industrial, likethis cyber metal thing.
Man, I've always been reallyinto their stuff.
I think it's very fun.
It just sounds like metal fromthe Terminator 2 soundtrack is
what it sounds like, you know.
But I remember reading anarticle when they released their

(53:13):
Digimortal record which cameout.
I mean, I think that was early,early 2000s, early days of
digital recording at home andstuff you know.
Well, not at home in the studio, but I remember dino the guitar
player.
He had this thing where he wastalking about how a lot of times
with the, the songs on therecord, which again are very
terminator, cybernetic, you know, inspired industrial metal

(53:34):
stuff he's like, yeah, I justplayed the gallop thing like
once, and then we'd copy andpaste it.
So it was literally the sameevery time.
That way it sounded less humanand that was part of the entire
aesthetic.
It was made to make it soundlike a machine dude, right.
And there was like part of me Iremember reading that like a

(53:55):
guitar magazine and reading it,and part of me being like, oh,
that's cheating.
And then part of me being like,no, that's done for aesthetic
purpose.
That is making it less humanthan human, right, and if that's
your intent, there's nothingwrong with producing art that
way, absolutely, you know, Imean.
So there is that aspect ofthings to me.

(54:15):
But I will also say to countermyself I don't think that's how
a lot of people are using this.
I don't think that a lot ofpeople are making these choices
for art purposes.
Exactly, I think that a lot ofpeople are using this.
I don't think that a lot ofpeople are making these choices
for art purposes Exactly.
I think that a lot of peopleare using these tools that are
available and very easy toaccess, yeah, to do things that
are cheap, shock and awe and getthe attention.

(54:38):
I think it's almost a sign of alack of creativity.
I can't think of any better wayto get your attention than
doing something inhumanly fastor precise, so I'll just do that
.
That only shows a lack ofcreativity to me.
Yeah, I agree, like when I hearyou play a guitar and you make
those squawks and squeals.
And again, that's that area I'mtalking about where you have

(55:02):
that factor too.
You don't have to touch 16thnotes to prove to anybody you're
the baddest dude in the room.
You don't at all.
You have mastery and commandwithout ever putting your foot
on the gas pedal.
Dude, oh, I appreciate that.

Speaker 1 (55:15):
Tell him again but thank you.

Speaker 2 (55:19):
But you know that and that's because you're a
creative person that hassomething to say and you have
things to say that aren't justlet me grab your attention by
doing the easiest thing, whichis speed and technique and
virtuosity.
Yeah, virtuosity itself is justkind of the fastest way to get
attention Oftentimes the easiestway to get attention.

(55:39):
So I think that's kind of whata lot of people reach for very
often, of what a lot of peoplereach for very often.
Um, rather than usingcreativity without using
aesthetic, artistic direction,identity as a way to grab
somebody.
I'm with you I'm with you it'seasy.
I mean, at the end of the day,the short answer is it's easier

(55:59):
yeah, yeah, yeah yeah yeah, it'seasier.
If your intent is to get follows, likes and clicks Right Now, if
your intent is to make art, ifyour intent is to express
yourself and make things thatare going to mean something to
people, make songs that peopleare going to remember and want

(56:20):
to hear time and time again.
I'm not going to say you can'tdo that with that tool set.
I'm just going to say I thinkthat tool set doesn't often
align with that intent.

Speaker 1 (56:29):
All right, I'm with you.
You know, I can dig it all.
I can dig that all.
As we're getting up to the topof the hour here, why don't you
just give us a little load on ofwhat we can look forward to in
the in the nearish future fromyou?
Is there anything you want tocall out to the attention to the
peeps?

Speaker 2 (56:45):
Oh, man, I think after this I'm probably going to
go and make myself a prettygreat post-workout protein shake
.
I think I might do that formyself.
You should be happy we're notrecording this and smell a
vision.
I just got back from thegymnasium getting harder to kill
HTK every day.

Speaker 1 (57:05):
I was like to say which is why.

Speaker 2 (57:06):
I'm nauseo, getting harder to kill HTK every day.
I was like to say, which is whyI'm wearing it, my, I'm
exercising, this is not backfrom the gym.
So, yeah, a shower and the twoS's the shower and the shake are
probably in my my near future.
But past that, I'm really,really excited, man, to be
working on this solo album thisyear.
You know that's going to besomething that I'm very, very
excited to put out there for youguys, because it's been on the

(57:27):
to-do list absolutely foreverand it's been kind of kicked
down the road by having the thewonderful fortune of being so
tied up playing everybody else'smusic for the past decade or so
.
You know.
Um, so there's a saying I thinkit's either.
I want to say it's a Germanproverb that said the
shoemakers' children go barefoot, shoemakers' children go

(57:49):
barefoot, and that's kind ofwhere I've been.
It's like I've been doing allthese other gigs, which has been
incredible and the bestexperience ever, but as a result
of that, my own creative outputhas not been what I would like
it to be.
Sure, I've got these tunes, man.
I've written, you know, tonsand tons and tons of stuff
that's ready to roll and goingto be getting on some production

(58:10):
and stuff on that here reallysoon.
So I'm very excited about that.
Well, I look forward to hearingthat.
I think that you'll like it,man, I think that you'll like it
.
I think a lot of people will bemaybe surprised at how like not
shreddy it is.
It's a very it's instrumental,it's rock stuff.
It's kind of progressive, notlike, not like genti progressive

(58:30):
, but more just like.
I like, odd time signature isprogressive, you know, sure, but
it's very riffy, dude, it'svery riffy.
It's all about big ass riffs,because that's my love language,
dude.
My love language is riffs.
I know I love them too.
So I'm very, very excited abouthow this is coming together.
There might be I'm kind oftoying around with the idea of

(58:52):
doing another metal project heretoo, which has been pretty fun.
I just recently did that gigfilling in with my friends from
Mastodon, which is a dream gigof mine.
I've adored that band for 20something years now, so to get
the opportunity to go andactually play with them was
phenomenal.
Yes, amazing, um, that kind oflike.

(59:12):
It got my metal hackles back upagain, because it's been a
while since I got to play someproper heavy, brutal stuff live
and that's.
That's kind of my home base.
You know, I like playing a lotof everything really.
If the players are good and thevibe is good, I like it.
But, like, metal is so fun toplay live, it's so fun to play
aggressive stuff, yeah.
So I think doing that gig kindof rekindled sort of a passion

(59:36):
for that in me.
Nice, excuse me.
So there might be some morebrutal stuff coming down the
pike sometime here soon too,because I've written a lot of
songs, just kind of while I'vebeen on this high from that gig
and, uh, they gotta go somewhere, they gotta go somewhere they
need to be unleashed, you know.
So I might be doing somethingheavy as well.
Um, I mentioned earlier in thepodcast my old band, arc, that

(59:59):
progressive band, uminstrumental band.
We uh, like I, we broke upyears ago but we had some
unfinished tunes.
We had some songs that we hadput together but never recorded,
and me and the guys who startedtalking and stuff again and
everybody's on great terms andwe're thinking about going in
the studio and recording thoselast couple of songs for that

(01:00:19):
project.
So I'm excited about that.
You guys can find all the theold arc stuff at soundcloudcom.
Slash official arc.
That's arc official arc.
You can listen to songs that werecorded back then up there.
I think it's fun.
I'm still really proud of thatmusic, so I might be doing a
little bit of that stuff as well.
Um, I've got some lesson courses.
That's again another long-termproject that I've talked about

(01:00:42):
doing.
That's kind of got kicked downthe road a lot, but it's time,
greg.
I've been stepping over dollarsto pick up dimes and the time
is over, baby.
Yes, the lesson course is Ihave some hidden guitar
Illuminati wisdom that I'm sostoked to share with everybody.
It's awesome Things about musictheory and ways to approach it,
scale, pattern visualization,technical stuff, all kinds of

(01:01:05):
good things afoot.
I'm so excited to put intothese lesson packages.
So that is again.
That's been on the to-do listfor way too long, but I'm
excited to unleash it upon themasses now.
So that will definitely be cool.
Possibly some more Macedontouring Not sure about that yet.
Everything's kind of up in theair right now.

(01:01:25):
I've had a lot of my fans askif I'm going to be on the next
Macedon tour that they're doingwith Coheed and Cambria and
Periphery and they are takinganother guitar player on that a
very fine guitar player, I mightadd.
Hey, they're just flirtingaround.
You know what I mean.
They're playing.
Play that dating game.
You just got out of a 25 yearlong band marriage, right?

(01:01:46):
Why don't you go flirt around alittle bit, you?
know, I can dig it Right, so Iwon't be on this next tour,
maybe some more later on downthe road.
I'm very excited for you guysto see who is on this next tour,
though because it's I'm not atLiberty to say, but it's a very
fine player and a friend of ours, so I think that you will enjoy

(01:02:06):
seeing that as well.
Stay tuned to MastoCamp formore news on that as it comes
along.
But yeah, very excited man.
A lot of cool stuff afoot forthe year, for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:02:17):
Beautiful.
Well, listen, ben.
Thank you so much for takingthe time to converse with us.
It was a pleasure as I knew itwould be the pleasure has been
all mine, sir, and I lookforward to hopefully crossing
paths with you sooner than later.

Speaker 2 (01:02:30):
Am I going to see you at the Woodshed Guitar
Experience this year?

Speaker 1 (01:02:33):
I have not heard.

Speaker 2 (01:02:35):
I know I'm traveling quite a bit around that time,
but we shall see Okay well, Ihope that we do, and if we do we
will smash a meat wall atBucky's, We'll find a Waffle
House and hopefully engage insome musical chicanery.
I love all of the above.

Speaker 1 (01:02:49):
My friend, thank you so much.
Pleasure is all mine.
Have a good one.
Well, thanks for tuning in.
Ladies and gentlemen, toanother episode of Chewing the
Gristle.
We certainly do appreciate youstopping by.
Make sure you tell your friendsall about us.
I think they might enjoythemselves.

(01:03:11):
So thanks again for tuning inand we'll see you next time.
Bye.