Guitar and Claviers, October, 1994
By Frederic Lecomte
Submitted by Ana
Translated by me
Jeff Buckley's debut album, Tim's son, is pure genious. Nothing is conventional about it, from compositions to tunings, through the lyrical flights of a haunted voice with imperceptible limits. Explanations of a genuinely tortured prodigy.
The following interview took place in Belfast, in pouring rain punctuated by military patrols. Reclusive in his bus, the abandoned child of Tim Buckley spoke twice, between six in the evening and two in the morning. Meanwhile, he gave a sumptuous concert in a small local club, singing his visions and covering two Van Morrison songs ("Sweet Thing" and "The Way Young Lovers Do") amidst the pearls of "Grace," his first and splendid album. Only one instruction was given by the English press officer: Never tell him about his father!
An enigmatic, tormented and shy visionary, Jeff Buckley lives in an inner world and seems impervious to any form of reality. His speech is mostly rational, like he knows his days are numbered.
"The interpretation of my songs systematically implies a cahotic and strange architecture, this chaos reflects every emotion contained in them. I see my music as a mirror of feelings, reflecting romanticism, ugliness, stupidity or anger, an anger of such intensity that it becomes ridiculous and destructive. I need a sound, a music, a song to express and catalyze these emotions. Every emotion has a voice."
What's the starting point?
I hear sounds in my head. I reproduce them directly on the guitar and on vocals, without any difficulty except, sometimes, that of remembering them. A very illusory process in the sense that I can write music, but I refuse to do so, so as not to freeze it.
Do you consider this facility to directly reproduce sounds that you hear as a gift or as a burden?
Every gift is poisoned.
What's your musical background?
As a child, I used to persecute my mother and grandmother for listening to music on the radio. The first songs I discovered were Simon & Garfunkel, Peter, Paul & Mary, Dylan, Janis Joplin, Ray Charles, The Beatles' Abbey Road...What a bad start! When I think about it, I find it deplorable. My first instrument was a toy drum set for children. It ended up in the trash because I was making too much noise. Then I started playing guitar on an acoustic belonging to my grandmother. She's the one who raised me. My primary motivation was as much about the game (I considered my guitar my favorite toy) as the musical expression. The first songs I played were little songs I composed for fun. It was at this time that I started to slide to enrich the possibilities of the acoustic guitar. When I was thirteen, I was given my first electric guitar for Christmas, a black Les Paul, identical to Jimmy Page's. I wanted to be Jimmy Page, it was the best Christmas of my life! Unfortunately I had to sell it because of money problems. One of my very first compositions was about a fat, unsympathetic girl I knew. A very cruel song called "She's So Fat". Today, I'm thinking of doing soul music as long as my music comes from the soul.
Many people and journalists consider "Grace" to be a masterpiece. Do you share this opinion, and isn't setting the bar so high going to hinder your future creations?
"Grace" is definitely not my masterpiece, far from it. I'm glad I finished this album, because I'm gonna be able to move on and do something deeper. I hope never to know the limits of the depth I intend to explore.
Which material suits you best?
For "Grace" I used Marshall and Fender Twin amps, sometimes an Ampeg or a Roland JC 120. My three main guitars are a Telecaster (which he will use almost exclusively during the concert, most often tuned in open D, NDR), a small acoustic Gibson L1 (on which he will perform crazy solos by triggering feedback from a Fender Vibrolux, NDR) and a Rickenbacker 12 string. Most of the effects present on "Grace" are done only with the fingers. On stage, I plug into a Vibrolux and use an Alesis Quadraverb, a Midimaster Control X11 Art and a Wirldwind selector. For the slide, I prefer copper bottlenecks.
How do you arrange your guitar parts?
Combining fingerpicking, disarticulated chord accelerations and riffs. I particularly like the moving melodic lines. When I think music, I immediately think guitar, even if what I hear in my head is a cello. I adapt my six-string to this imaginary cello...
You sing "blind and tortured", does this state of mind also apply to your guitar playing?
Every guitar sound must evoke a multitude of impressions. That said, it's true that my guitar parts are blind and tortured like my moods. How do we know where we stand?
Compared to "Grace's" rather grungy one, the verson of Eternal Life on "Live at Sin-é" reveals a very funky grain and groove, played in a Hendrixian spirit with lots of reverb. How did you get that sound?
There is no effect except that of the vibrato. I actually hate the sound of the chorus but there was an ambience mic right next to the guitar, which had the effect of making a chorus sound. I had to spend hours at the time of mixing to attenuate this horrible effect.
Conversely, the studio version of "Eternal Life" is very aggressive, consisting of a wall of saturated guitars. How did this metamorphosis come about?
On stage, the interpretation of each song depends on the energy of the room. I change the versions all the time. I don't want to have a list with my repertoire for concerts in a pre-established order. I hate doing things out of habit. In the same way I like to do scales of about twenty minutes, during which I totally improvise and compose new songs. The metamorphosis of Eternal Life between "Live at Sin-é" and "Grace" is simply a matter of great anger.
Speaking of which, for someone as tortured as you are, isn't eternal life synonymous with suicide?
No, it's about the moment just after death. I feel like this moment is perpetual. It's hard for me to think there's no duty to be done down here. To do them, you have to be deadly, break all the mirrors to see what's going on behind them and be in harmony with yourself.
A song like Last Goodbye starts with strange sound effects, then comes the dulcimer, the acoustic and the electric. How do you envision the often very complex arrangements of your songs?
I use the dulcimer in D and hit the strings with a pen. Then I play the sixths, either swinging them or holding them. Then I drag the notes and sometimes make them last thanks to the effect of the feedback. As for the arrangements of the string sections, they are 98% the work of Karl Berger. I bring my arrangement ideas at the end, for example to double the melodic line from guitar to cello. I also draw a lot of harmonic structures from musicians such as Coltrane, Mingus, Parker, Ellington, Robert Johnson, Miles Davis, the Smiths, Siouxie & The Banshees and the Cocteau Twins.
On So Real, you spit out a moving solo with some kind of maniacal distortion.
It is an acoustic guild whose feedback is obtained by playing face to face and pressed against the amp. I closed my eyes and played what hurt my left hand the most. Mentally, I wanted to spray the handle. It was pure destruction.
Your acoustic guitar playing is very special, I've never seen anyone capable of making this instrument cry within a second of using it as a heavy weapon. Your acoustic parts are often more violent than those played electrically...
In the future, I promised myself that I would implement very specific ideas about the work to be done on an acoustic. But not in the folk spirit. Folk bugs the shit out of me. Folk is dead! I prefer to approach the acoustics from an erotic angle. It's a very erotic and sexually violent instrument.
On stage you play most of the time in open-tuning (with two exceptions), using a capo in the sixth box (Cohen's Hallelujah) and in the eighth box ("I Do Not Know The End" by Piaf), playing weird and unusual chords. How do you make these chords?
Depending on what a guitar symbolizes. The guitar is made to be used in various tunings. A real guitar, pure and sincere, shouldn't even have frets. Diatonic scales are just a convention. It's a good system but there are a lot of notes in between, same for the chromatic scales. The different tunings I use allow me to play seconds, notes in unison, to have multiple tones, to modulate sharps and, especially, to amplify the depth of the harmonies. The advantage is also to be able to do phrasing with the thumb of the left hand, which brings the guitar closer to the piano.
Don't you ever feel the presence of a ghost haunting your voice? (A hijacked question to evoke his father, whose allusion he fully grasps)
... (long silence) Yes, but it's a child ghost, the ghost of a newborn, the ghost of an old crown.
By Frederic Lecomte
Submitted by Ana
Translated by me
Jeff Buckley's debut album, Tim's son, is pure genious. Nothing is conventional about it, from compositions to tunings, through the lyrical flights of a haunted voice with imperceptible limits. Explanations of a genuinely tortured prodigy.
The following interview took place in Belfast, in pouring rain punctuated by military patrols. Reclusive in his bus, the abandoned child of Tim Buckley spoke twice, between six in the evening and two in the morning. Meanwhile, he gave a sumptuous concert in a small local club, singing his visions and covering two Van Morrison songs ("Sweet Thing" and "The Way Young Lovers Do") amidst the pearls of "Grace," his first and splendid album. Only one instruction was given by the English press officer: Never tell him about his father!
An enigmatic, tormented and shy visionary, Jeff Buckley lives in an inner world and seems impervious to any form of reality. His speech is mostly rational, like he knows his days are numbered.
"The interpretation of my songs systematically implies a cahotic and strange architecture, this chaos reflects every emotion contained in them. I see my music as a mirror of feelings, reflecting romanticism, ugliness, stupidity or anger, an anger of such intensity that it becomes ridiculous and destructive. I need a sound, a music, a song to express and catalyze these emotions. Every emotion has a voice."
What's the starting point?
I hear sounds in my head. I reproduce them directly on the guitar and on vocals, without any difficulty except, sometimes, that of remembering them. A very illusory process in the sense that I can write music, but I refuse to do so, so as not to freeze it.
Do you consider this facility to directly reproduce sounds that you hear as a gift or as a burden?
Every gift is poisoned.
What's your musical background?
As a child, I used to persecute my mother and grandmother for listening to music on the radio. The first songs I discovered were Simon & Garfunkel, Peter, Paul & Mary, Dylan, Janis Joplin, Ray Charles, The Beatles' Abbey Road...What a bad start! When I think about it, I find it deplorable. My first instrument was a toy drum set for children. It ended up in the trash because I was making too much noise. Then I started playing guitar on an acoustic belonging to my grandmother. She's the one who raised me. My primary motivation was as much about the game (I considered my guitar my favorite toy) as the musical expression. The first songs I played were little songs I composed for fun. It was at this time that I started to slide to enrich the possibilities of the acoustic guitar. When I was thirteen, I was given my first electric guitar for Christmas, a black Les Paul, identical to Jimmy Page's. I wanted to be Jimmy Page, it was the best Christmas of my life! Unfortunately I had to sell it because of money problems. One of my very first compositions was about a fat, unsympathetic girl I knew. A very cruel song called "She's So Fat". Today, I'm thinking of doing soul music as long as my music comes from the soul.
Many people and journalists consider "Grace" to be a masterpiece. Do you share this opinion, and isn't setting the bar so high going to hinder your future creations?
"Grace" is definitely not my masterpiece, far from it. I'm glad I finished this album, because I'm gonna be able to move on and do something deeper. I hope never to know the limits of the depth I intend to explore.
Which material suits you best?
For "Grace" I used Marshall and Fender Twin amps, sometimes an Ampeg or a Roland JC 120. My three main guitars are a Telecaster (which he will use almost exclusively during the concert, most often tuned in open D, NDR), a small acoustic Gibson L1 (on which he will perform crazy solos by triggering feedback from a Fender Vibrolux, NDR) and a Rickenbacker 12 string. Most of the effects present on "Grace" are done only with the fingers. On stage, I plug into a Vibrolux and use an Alesis Quadraverb, a Midimaster Control X11 Art and a Wirldwind selector. For the slide, I prefer copper bottlenecks.
How do you arrange your guitar parts?
Combining fingerpicking, disarticulated chord accelerations and riffs. I particularly like the moving melodic lines. When I think music, I immediately think guitar, even if what I hear in my head is a cello. I adapt my six-string to this imaginary cello...
You sing "blind and tortured", does this state of mind also apply to your guitar playing?
Every guitar sound must evoke a multitude of impressions. That said, it's true that my guitar parts are blind and tortured like my moods. How do we know where we stand?
Compared to "Grace's" rather grungy one, the verson of Eternal Life on "Live at Sin-é" reveals a very funky grain and groove, played in a Hendrixian spirit with lots of reverb. How did you get that sound?
There is no effect except that of the vibrato. I actually hate the sound of the chorus but there was an ambience mic right next to the guitar, which had the effect of making a chorus sound. I had to spend hours at the time of mixing to attenuate this horrible effect.
Conversely, the studio version of "Eternal Life" is very aggressive, consisting of a wall of saturated guitars. How did this metamorphosis come about?
On stage, the interpretation of each song depends on the energy of the room. I change the versions all the time. I don't want to have a list with my repertoire for concerts in a pre-established order. I hate doing things out of habit. In the same way I like to do scales of about twenty minutes, during which I totally improvise and compose new songs. The metamorphosis of Eternal Life between "Live at Sin-é" and "Grace" is simply a matter of great anger.
Speaking of which, for someone as tortured as you are, isn't eternal life synonymous with suicide?
No, it's about the moment just after death. I feel like this moment is perpetual. It's hard for me to think there's no duty to be done down here. To do them, you have to be deadly, break all the mirrors to see what's going on behind them and be in harmony with yourself.
A song like Last Goodbye starts with strange sound effects, then comes the dulcimer, the acoustic and the electric. How do you envision the often very complex arrangements of your songs?
I use the dulcimer in D and hit the strings with a pen. Then I play the sixths, either swinging them or holding them. Then I drag the notes and sometimes make them last thanks to the effect of the feedback. As for the arrangements of the string sections, they are 98% the work of Karl Berger. I bring my arrangement ideas at the end, for example to double the melodic line from guitar to cello. I also draw a lot of harmonic structures from musicians such as Coltrane, Mingus, Parker, Ellington, Robert Johnson, Miles Davis, the Smiths, Siouxie & The Banshees and the Cocteau Twins.
On So Real, you spit out a moving solo with some kind of maniacal distortion.
It is an acoustic guild whose feedback is obtained by playing face to face and pressed against the amp. I closed my eyes and played what hurt my left hand the most. Mentally, I wanted to spray the handle. It was pure destruction.
Your acoustic guitar playing is very special, I've never seen anyone capable of making this instrument cry within a second of using it as a heavy weapon. Your acoustic parts are often more violent than those played electrically...
In the future, I promised myself that I would implement very specific ideas about the work to be done on an acoustic. But not in the folk spirit. Folk bugs the shit out of me. Folk is dead! I prefer to approach the acoustics from an erotic angle. It's a very erotic and sexually violent instrument.
On stage you play most of the time in open-tuning (with two exceptions), using a capo in the sixth box (Cohen's Hallelujah) and in the eighth box ("I Do Not Know The End" by Piaf), playing weird and unusual chords. How do you make these chords?
Depending on what a guitar symbolizes. The guitar is made to be used in various tunings. A real guitar, pure and sincere, shouldn't even have frets. Diatonic scales are just a convention. It's a good system but there are a lot of notes in between, same for the chromatic scales. The different tunings I use allow me to play seconds, notes in unison, to have multiple tones, to modulate sharps and, especially, to amplify the depth of the harmonies. The advantage is also to be able to do phrasing with the thumb of the left hand, which brings the guitar closer to the piano.
Don't you ever feel the presence of a ghost haunting your voice? (A hijacked question to evoke his father, whose allusion he fully grasps)
... (long silence) Yes, but it's a child ghost, the ghost of a newborn, the ghost of an old crown.
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