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seat-safety-switch · 3 months ago

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I love my fireworks, say all my neighbours as they cram a flimsy plastic tube full of low-yield explosives. Surely everyone in my community will also appreciate them. If not, they are some kind of Grumpy Gus and are not invited to the block party cookout. Friends, I can tell you this right now: I am not going to that barbecue.

As you might have imagined, the residents of my area of the world like to shoot off a bunch of Roman candles when they feel like it. Sure, fireworks are fun and all, but I feel like if you're burning three or four hundred dollars worth of illegal noise-and-light generators every couple of weeks, you might as well just take up smoking again.

At first, it was a lot of fun. Very festive. It helped the community spirit, even if all the dogs were constantly terrified and kept trying to chew through a fence to escape. Ol' Ray down the block lost a finger trying to grab onto what he called a "Winky Sprinkler," though, and then everything changed.

Once there was a scent of blood in the air, it became a competition. Ray needed to "make it worth" his sacrifice, so he started amping up his production. Bigger shows. Coordinated by electronics. More frequently. This drew the ire of another rich asshole (Bob Winsome, who used to own the Ford dealership) with poor impulse disorder, and soon the two of them were getting up to a night-time artillery show that the police were not equipped to stop, mostly because they were at the doughnut store or trying to knock over a casino for some quick cash in the retirement fund at the time.

Nearly every night became a terror of pop-pop-pop. although I am very good at ignoring troublesome noises, those noises are usually generated by my own car while I'm driving them. Not constantly happening while I'm trying to focus on my usual problems: things like "why is this bolt stripped," and "where did this pile of wires I just cut through go to?"

As the Constitution says, though: "fuck 'em if they can't take a joke." After one particularly rough night of having exploding munitions going off directly over my head while I was trying to find the origin of some faint valve clatter, I decided to respond in kind. A friend of mine, who will be called Millie Teri for reasons that are about to become clear, loaned me a couple pieces from her private collection. I had myself a patriotic parade that night. Courtesy, of course, of some army bases didn't really pay too close attention to what they listed on eBay. That's what they call "taxpayer value," even if I did have to technically buy the low-shrapnel M107 flash shells twice.

I had expected to draw a truce after demonstrating my superior firepower, much like how French tourists can shut down any discussion of cheese. After bombarding both rich pricks' homes, however, it soon became apparent that the dickheads blamed each other for the massive destruction wrought on their properties, and refused to believe that a belligerent third party could have done such a thing to them just for "several months of sleepless nights courtesy of constant 120dB outside noise."

After the mutually-assured destruction finished, though, I never saw or heard another fireworks display from Ol' Ray or Bob Winsome. If they ever find an identifiable chunk of either of their bodies, we'll probably have a pretty cool tribute at the funeral using up whatever unexploded fireworks they have still left in the scorched remnants of their family homes.

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riaaanna · 1 year ago

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INTERVIEW WITH BRIAN MAY - GUITAR & BASS JANUARY 2008

Affable, funny and knowledgeable, Brian May always gives – as our American cousins say – ‘good interview’. With his much-publicised degree in astrophysics finally done and dusted, he agreed to meet Guitar & Bass for an exclusive chat. We decided to steer him towards explaining the inside secrets of that famous guitar sound, but we took in some diversions along the way – including just what it felt like to play the biggest rooftop gig of all time…

G&B: Keeping busy then?

Not too bad – I’ve still got a head full of astrophysics at the moment, but I’ll wrench it round to talk about guitars! I’ve been rewriting my thesis after a 30-year gap, which has been tough, but I’ve got the doctorate now. I’ll be glad to get my life back, really!

Well then, Dr Brian May… how did you get into guitar? Was it always electrics?

No – for my seventh birthday I asked for an acoustic guitar and I had the Josh White Guitar Method book that came with it. I played acoustic for quite a few years. It was good, because that way I had a solid grounding in rhythm. I used to sing and play, and it was only a few years later, at about 14, that I started getting into lead guitar.

How did that come about?

The first time I went electric, as it were, was when I wound my own pickup. I figured all you needed was some magnets and a bit of wire, so I went to Kingston and got some Eclipse magnets and wound a lot of 48-gauge copper wire round them. Then I connected it up to my dad’s homemade hi-fi amp and, lo and behold, it worked! I’d invented the pickup… but Les Paul had got there first.

Was it a humbucker or a single coil?

A single coil. I didn’t discover humbuckers until last year. It made a particularly wonderful sound, and one that I’ve never quite been able to get back to. But I’m happy with the sound I’ve been able to develop over the years.

What was your firsts amplifier?

That came quite a lot later, because we had no money. That was what dictated my development – we made the guitar because we couldn’t afford to buy one. I didn’t get an amp until I was about 17. I went out and bought something, maybe an early Burns transistor amp, and I didn’t like it. I couldn’t make it do what my dad’s hi-fi amp would do, but I quickly discovered that valves were where it’s at. So I traded in the Burns for a valve amp that was somewhat better. But to cut a long story short, I went to see Rory Gallagher at the Marquee Club one night – and Rory had the sound that I was looking for. I just completely fell in love with it. I loitered around after the show to ask him how he got his sound, and Rory, being a real gentleman – I was only a kid and he was a star – told me “Well, Brian, it’s basically the AC30, and I have this little treble booster, it’s a Rangemaster. That’s what makes it sing.” So the very next day I went out scouring the secondhand shops for an AC30 and a Rangemaster. As soon as I had ‘em, my sound was born – a combination of that and my own guitar, basically what I still use today.

What was it about Rory Gallagher’s sound that inspired you?

Rory was like me, he played rhythm and lead at the same time – it was only a three-piece band. He was able to make chords sound really good, not horribly distorted, but the single notes would sing like a violin. He had a Strat, though, and I’ve never been able to make a Strat work for me – but with my guitar, which as quite a bit more middle, the AC30 seems even better. And now we know why – or at least, I think we do.

There are so many different ideas on why valves might work better than transistors.

My dad had a point of view on that. He was quite an electronics genius, and he figured it out. He said the reason valves work so well is that they go smoothly into saturation as opposed to suddenly from a straight line, which is what transistors do, and that the way to get the best sound from them is to take away all the negative feedback, which makes a very good hi-fi amplifier but stops the overload curve being as smooth. If you can make it go smoothly into overload, that’s really the basis of a great guitar sound, whether you’re talking about Marshalls, Fenders, or Voxes. It’s really the valves and electrolytics [filter capacitors – Ed] that you’re hearing.

Is it an area between clean and dirty you’re looking for?

Exactly, that’s the crucial area for me. I have to be able to get clarity in the chord work but still get that fatness in the notes. The AC30’s special in that way because it works the valves in class A, so there’s no inherent distortion at low levels. You have a smooth straight line at low levels giving you that clarity, then it turns over gently into saturation and there’s that beautiful sustain we all need.

Which of your tracks give the best example?

Tie Your Mother Down has both parts, the chord sound and the lead sound. I’m fond of Bijou - there’s a little bit of extra treatment from the desk, but it’s still fundamentally my sound underneath. All that nice lush guitar – I was able to spend a lot of time on it making sure that the strings vibrated in just the right way. It’s not just the guitar and the amp, it’s down to how you play it. The way that you pluck it can make a huge difference to the sound. There’s a way I have of plucking that you can hear on Bohemian Rhapsody, particularly towards the end, where the finger pulls the string gently to one side and lets it go so it vibrates pretty much parallel to the fingerboard. It makes that very pure sound. Those are some of my favourites.

So playing technique is as important to your signature sound as gear and guitars?

If someone picks up a guitar you can always tell who they are by just listening, because everybody’s technique is different. I noticed that with Hank Marvin, when we were working together a few years ago. People think he’s all about a wonderful guitar and a wonderful amp, but really he sounds like he does because he’s Hank. He played my guitar, and it still sounded like him. I think that’s why the guitar’s such a great expressive instrument, because a certain amount does come through it consciously, but something also comes through unconsciously that says a lot about the person who’s playing it and how they’re feeling at the time.

Do you need to be inspired to play well?

Definitely. There’s a whole lot of difference between someone playing well technically and playing like they mean it.

When did you get your first Vox amplifier?

During 1967, I think. I bought two, secondhand in Wardour street. We still have them somewhere. Later on, we bought them at quite a rate – some current ones but also some secondhand ones, because we figured the older ones had a particular sound to them. Really, though, it was just a question of suck it and see. I just used to plug in and listen, with no theory to it at all. If it sounds good, it is good. It’s still true!

What about other effects?

I customised some Echoplexes myself very early on. I was into electronics, so I made new boxes and added some pickups to make long delays and short ones. That’s how the Echoplex solo began, the Brighton Rock solo. But they were dodgy on the road, as you can imagine. I wouldn’t have liked to be my roadie at the time, but they got by! I had so many problems, though – it was like walking a tightrope every night. It was astonishing they worked at all. Later we were able to replace them with digital delays, which is what we use now.

Is your present sound very different to the sound you got in the old days?

In some ways. The problem with off-the-shelf amps on the road is always reliability, and most of my amps have been rebuilt to be more robust, hardwired and with various modifications. I’d have to mention Dave Petersen at this point – Dave’s responsible for a lot of the work that’s made the amps so reliable these days, and has also made them capable of reproducing a certain sound, because that was always very variable in the past, depending on the age of the valves and what state the electronics were in. the other thing is simplification, because original Voxes had a lot of things I didn’t need, like a Tremolo channel and a Brilliant channel. We stripped out everything that wasn’t necessary that was using up power and quality, just leaving the bare essentials with no frills. It’s quite significant improvement, and Vox have made a special Brian May signature edition which incorporates these improvements. It’s something rather different from the standard AC30, one knob as opposed to many – that’s all you need to get my sort of sound! They work very well.

Are you still using the little Deacy battery practive amp?

Yes, in the studio it’s still absolutely incomparable, although I have to say that Greg Fryer has now got incredibly close with the new version he’s making. But I gather there’s now some guy in the States about to bootleg them, which I’m upset about because you put so much work into these things and it doesn’t seem right that someone can just come up and steal it. I don’t see any need for that – he’s also making Brian May guitars, without permission. But the Deacy amp usually turns up trumps, quite magical really, and I still use it a lot. John played it once, on a song called Misfire. He played guitar; he wanted to do it so I just watched him get on with it, and he made a very good job of it. With his permission I added some bits of guitar at the end, a little bit of icing on his cake.

Were Queen like the Beatles – always doubling up on each other’s instruments?

A bit. Everybody played guitar at some point!

Did you every play any bass parts yourself?

I did, but generally I liked to let Deacy do the final version, because he was better. Certainly Roger played pretty good guitar, and Deacy of course, and Freddie also played on a few songs, mainly on acoustic. He did the original solo on Crazy Little Thin, on a version that got lost, and I had to redo it. He was very good in a particular style of his own. He did play electric onstage – he used to do Crazy Little Thing on a Telecaster which got stolen from the warehouse when we stopped playing. Somewhere, Freddie’s white Telecaster is sitting on a wall. I’d recognise it… but I’m not going to tell anybody how!

The Red Special: any close competitors?

Only the ones we’re making ourselves. Brian May Guitars is now a separate company. I’m in a partnership with Barry Moorhouse; Barry, Pete Malandrone my tech and myself are Brian May Guitars, and we’re directly in charge of the manufacturing now. The quality is zooming up, we’re very pleased with them at the moment, and we’re also making a Japanese range that will be a bit more expensive – and that’s very exciting, too. That’ll be even closer to my original.

We saw a Burns version of your guitar a while back, and the vibrato didn’t work as well as your original. Are the new ones better?

The Burns was a very early attempt, and the trem was a compromise, otherwise it would cost an arm and a leg. We have a much better trem now, with a lot less friction – much closer to mine in feel.

Would you be happy to use those on stage?

Absolutely, and I have done. I use a variety now. Andrew Guyton’s done some fabulous copies for me, including one with a scalloped fingerboard, but I’m not quite confident on stage with it yet. It requires great delicacy, and if you press too hard it goes out of tune. But it gives you great fluidity and no friction whatsoever between the fingers and the board. Ritchie Blackmore invented it, I believe, many years ago – he had a Strat with all the frets scooped out, and Steve Vai also had one, I think.

What gear do they use in We Will Rock You?

Off-the-shelf Brian May guitars, but we usually do some special setting up on them, or else they do it themselves. They’re free to customise them any way they want – particularly my friend Paul Crook in the States, he’s done a fantastic custom job on his… one of the best that’s ever existed. The London show has my customised A30s with separate cabs to give a bit more control in the Dominion theatre. I think the other shows around the world use a mixture of AC30s and smaller Voxes – still bona-fide Vox valve amps, but a bit more controllable.

Has the perfect Vox amp ever been built?

Mmm… the Brian May signature model was very close, but I’d like to do another one with input from Dave and Greg, and all the benefit of our more recent experience. So I believe there could be one more, which could be even better.

Tell us about that Buckingham Palace rooftop gig. What was the technical story behind it?

I used three amps. It was an incredible blast. I stood up there with three tip-top Vox amps in front of me, the centre and the first and second returns from the chorus, and that sounded beautiful, very huge and smooth. Then behind me was a huge monitor with the orchestra in it. I had to balance the two by moving my head. It was an incredible sensation, a bit like going down the fastest bit in Space Mountain – the same feeling right in the pit of your stomach.

You hid the nerves pretty well…

When I’d finished, I thought I’d never be frightened of anything again! So many problems, with the orchestra a few hundred yards away… but if I’d been able to hear them there’d have been a problem because of the delay. I couldn’t see the conductor past a TV monitor, and even that didn’t work until half an hour before the thing was due to start. It was very scary. A million things could have happened outside my control – a broken string, temperature changes putting me out of tune – anything, in front of a million people, live, and I would have looked a complete idiot. But as soon as the roof bit was over, the rest was a doodle. I was beaming the whole time because it had worked!

You made the national news…

The international news, in fact. But I’m not doing it again, although I’m glad I did. It’s had some strangely negative comments recently, which I find odd. But I’ll stand by it to my dying day, because I defy anyone else to do what I did. It wasn’t just a question of going up there and playing the tune, either… there was a whole orchestra arrangement that I did for the fanfare that the BBC and the world used for the opening of the concert – most people probably don’t realise that – and there’s also the piece in the middle that I also arranged for the orchestra., and then on top of that a whole outro section that made the climax of the piece. It involved a certain amount of improvisation and I had to really know where the parameters were, not to take too many risks. If anyone thinks that it was easy or it was crap, I’d defy them to do something similar!

It’s hard to avoid making comparisons with Jimi’s Star Spangled Banner.

It was different, but comparable in terms of risk. There are places you can go in music if you’re prepared to take your courage in both hands – Hendrix did a lot of that, and I’m proud to have done a bit of it. But there was a lot more forethought in mine, because I’m that kind of person. I like to improvise, but I also like to prepare. There were lots of other people involved and we all had to be on our toes. Ray Cooper [percussionist] was fabulous on that occasion. He went through all the rehearsals with me and was really a huge support and magnificent on the day. But it was probably the most – how can I put this – terrifying prospect I’ve ever faced professionally, because it was so hard to make it work.

To come full circle, now your doctorate’s done, will you be taking up the guitar again?

Yes… I’m thinking of taking up the guitar! Seriously, the Ph.D’s been tough for me – I had to ditch everything – but I’ll certainly be enjoying the music even more, because I’ve been deprived of it.

Any more tours in sight?

I don’t know about Brian May Band tours, but you may see Queen on the road next year. We’re definitely talking in that direction at the moment.

Are you looking forward to it?

Yes, I have to confess I am. There’s always slightly mixed feelings because you have to lose your private life for a while. That gets tougher as you get older – I certainly value my private life very highly, spending time with the family and doing all the other things I enjoy. But there’s nothing quite like being on stage, doing what we do. I think Roger, Paul Rodgers and I will be looking at putting something together for next year.

We’re looking forward to that. We’ve missed you during your ‘time off’.

Ah, thanks! You know, I’ve missed me too!

#queen band #brian may #interview #article

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