How is a Bullet for my
Valentine song being born?
95% of the times it's born from a guitar riff
And the vocals and melody come after?
Maybe Matt's got a melody in his head which will inspire a riff
but it's usually
a guitar riff that comes first
or a clean riff. And then everything comes after as we build up the song.
So do you jam it
or do you work on it in the studio?
Both. It's always good to go into the rehearsing room and jam on some stuff.
uhÉjust be inspired
by different places maybe go to a studio
somewhere else in the country
Just get inspired by different sort of surroundings.
you know when
we finally go into pre-production we've got a big bunch of stuff
you know.
a good chunk of stuff ready to go
and things will come in the studio.
Hopefully!
So do you play around a lot
with effects in the studio when you're writing songs?
I've got a small board
in the studio,
you know,
if things need to be 'nice'ned up,
or go through a bunch of choruses,
different sorts of reverb etc.
delays.
Usually
the
producers got a good ear as well.
unique destinations
loose this partisan new
and you know
you usually trust the producer.
Is it a thing you continuously develop, your guitar tone and use of effects?
In the studio, yeah for sure.
live is like a stripped down version of what we do in the studio.
So you're tend to take the effects
you used in the studio and try to take them onstage?
Yeah we try to take them onstage or try to emulate them with the gear
we use on stage.
To try to get as close as possible?
To the record, yeah?
So the TonePrint, was that for a specific song?
Not really!
In ? there's a lot of clean stuff, a lot of guitar parts
it's always nice to 'schmauze' them up with a
bit of chorus and flange to
just add that depth
to add to the swing of the riff.
So, over the years, who
have inspired you to create
your guitar tone?
My guitar tone?
Mostly the heavy players: James Hetfield
Dimebag Darrell
I don't tend to go through to many sort of effects or stomp boxes
in my rack.
Just go through the amp and may one or two
kinds of effects.
I used Tube Screamers before
and now I'm on the MXR's Zakk Wylde.
So nothing major, just straight out of the amp, through pedal, straight out through guitar and the EMG pickup.
So you don't use many effects?
Mostly on clean tones I use choruses
but I wouldn't say that anyone's
inspired me to get those tones it's more
what you feel in the studio and what you feel live.
As long as it sounds nice
and fits into the tempo of the song, if you're using delays etc.
it works!
When you use effects, do you prefer to have a bunch of parameters,
so you can tweak a lot of knobs, or do you prefer just an 'on and off'?
It depends. If it comes out of the box
and you press it on and it works.
But usually in the studio you try everything first.
until you end up with the best sound.
With the optional parameters
the possibilities are endless.
You can just pull it out of the box
and you're gonna have to use those pedals!
You are using the
G-system, how did that happen?
It just organizes everything that is
into one pedal
Obviously you can go into that thing and tweak as well which is really cool. It's got some awesome effects.
It totally helped on my footwork!
You know it's really hard to tap dance.
usually when you go to one sound to another,
you're gonna have to turn effects on and off.
Yeah it organizes it very well.
And fortunately for me my tech presses all the buttons.
I just got a wah wah send!
So its just your job, that has become easier? Yeah it's easier to blame someone else!
What do you think is the one coolest thing about the TonePrint concept?
Definitely the parameters
that you can download
because you are sort of limited with just the four knobs here.
And if you find something on here you like, you can still go into the computer and
tweak it some more
which is very clever.
And also you can
download somebody else's file
which is, if you are a fan of that guitar player or a band it's very cool.
And then you can put your own
signature on it yourself.
So it's very cool.
Have you also experienced when you tweak around
After a while you've
just tweaked so much
that you are all confused?
Then we just break and have a cup of coffee or some fun.
Yeah it can get very messy, but that is half the
fun as well -
finding new sounds!
