Guitarist Excerpts

Guitar-The Magazine: September, 1994 

By Michael Leonard

Jeff Buckley reckons that whoever conceived the guitar was drunk at the time. Michael Leonard finds the late Tim's rising son to be much more than the sum of his Pa.

  Who'd be the musician son of a rock star, eh? For starters, you end up blessed with a stupid name (hello, Dweezil, hi Zowie), find yourself terminally crippled by the weight of Dad's rep (goodbye, Ziggy, seeya Julian Lennon), or have journalists interested in you solely because they want some dirt on your 'ard fella (Jakob 'no interviews' Dylan). Jeff Buckley - 'son of Tim' - could be an exception to the rule. First, he's got a proper name; two, his own star is rising so fast it could soon eclipse Pa's; three, if you ask him about his dad he'll tell you to fuck off - so you don't ask him.

  Tim Buckley remains a near-deity in the history of popular music. Possessor of a wild, soaring and beautiful voice, Buckley took '60s folk-rock on a heady trip through jazz and downright silly music before dying (accidentally) of a drug overdose in the early '70s. As is too often the case, it's only since that he's been acclaimed a genius. Jeff Buckley has not yet been acclaimed a genius, but he's perhaps the one rock biz 'son of' from whom very big things are expected. Individual to the last, Jeff's fiercely reluctant to trade on his family's name; it also emerges that Buckley senior left the family household when his son was just six months old and they met for a grand total of nine days thereafter. Jeff is nonetheless blessed with the stellar talent that made his father a legend.

  He grew up with his mother and stepfather, weaned on Led Zeppelin, The Who, Pink Floyd and Hendrix but was never, perhaps suprisingly, steered towards a musical career. He discovered music anyway, adding West Side Story, Mendelssoh, Chopin, Judy Garland, Dylan, too many things to mention' to his armoury of influences. Even when he could consider himself a pro-standard guitarist and singer, Buckley still shunned the spotlight, refusing gigs and record deals, even walking away from Gods and Monsters, a US underground "supergroup" that also featured Bob Mould's old bassist and drummer and ex-Beefheart guitarist Gary Lucas. Soon though, Buckley was playing his trade solo in the cafes of boho New York, resulting in the 1993 four track EP Live at Sin-é (on Big Cat Records). Coupling two of his originals with Edith Piaf and Van Morrison covers only further emphasised the eclectic and idiosyncratic similarities to his natural father, unwelcome though they might be. At other times he'd veer from sneering Elvis impersonations through Dylan and Smiths covers to snatches of Bad Brains choruses.

Now comes his debut album proper (for Columbia), Grace. It's a truly remarkable record, blending the singer/songwriter's haunting singing and mercurial guitar on eight originals and two extraordinary covers-Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" and Nina Simone's "Lilac Wine". Above all, it's an album of rare passion. The jazz flavours are still there in the off-the-wall progressions and, at times, scat-like vocals. As seems the norm chez Buckley, jazz was another genre hoovered up in his formative years.

  "When I was younger I wanted to be Miles Davis. He gave me a really deep love of jazz, the stuff where the composition has a seduction to it-all the stuff off 'Kind of Blue', Coltrane's 'Africa Brass', any Duke Ellington. But people just soloing over standards is just boring as hell. It's the same as everyone else has said, but after Miles it got all stale. Fusion, or jazz rock just annoys the hell out of me, especially the fact that it's still here today. All I see there is a lot of people who are afraid of what real music is. I don't see any heart, I just see a lot of chops and whizzkid bullshit, and a lot of damage being done. Miles was naked, very romantic."

  The nakedness of the performer is something that obviously fascinates Buckley. He says he insisted on the risky tactic of releasing a live EP as his debut because, "I really wanted to know what it means to make music in a room, to start completely from nothing. It was the only way to learn. Though there was certainly nothing romantic about it-there's nothing romantic about some drunk from New Jersey who wants to know nothing, howling at you like a dog to impress his girlfriend! You get a migraine from people constantly talking 'cos they're just not interested, and you get just 15 bucks for a night's work."

Though Buckley's dreamy, soaring voice is no doubt the star of the show, his guitar is equally to the fore, ranging from Cocteau Twins-like washes ("Dream Brother"), noise-fest soloing ("So Real") to more traditional folk arpeggios ("Hallelujah", "Grace"). Mirroring his career in general Jeff insists it's taken him years to realise what the guitar is for.

 "It's all about supporting the voice-any real guitar player should know that. Rhythm and melody are the king and queen and it's all to support the voice-ask Keith Richards, ask Robert Johnson. Because of my interest in jazz, modality and harmonies were all things I enjoyed, but playing it on the guitar I just sounded like a complete wanker, some lounge bar guy. Then I got really into tunings and that's how I found my cornucopia. I use loads of tunings and that's where you get different and interesting tonalitites whilst still being guitar-ish, and simultaneously creating texture and drama.

  "I admit it, for a time I delved into the evils of what being a guitar player can bring, what I call the God of Wank syndrome. Every kid does it. When I first got a guitar I used to put my marbles on it and listen to them rolling down my guitar-that's more like what I play like now. The guitar is a mysterious instrument, but a lot of the mystery has gone or has been hidden. It's like when people have real hard, meaningless sex all the time they become insensitive-to me that's like what the guitar has become. But that doesn't mean that aspect doesn't exist-you're just got to find it.

  "Most guitar magazines I can't stand," he offers helpfully. 'They're very pornographic. So few guitar magazines are smart enough to do anything on someone like Johnny Marr. Do I like Yngwie Malmsteen? Ha! He says he loves the guitar yet it's obvious to me that the guitar hates him. He can't write a song at all. I remember hearing a bit of an album of his after reading so much about him...it was a complete joke. He's no threat to anything or anyone whatsoever - except maybe his own bowels.

  "All the metal guys have got nothing anymore. To me, it was always a bit played out but it's really on its last legs now. You got the guys in Motley Crue totally pierced and tattooed with their fake punk outfits, and the music still sounds like Troubador, Sunset Strip bullshit. These are the guys that used to yell at punks, and now they're wearing their boots. Pathetic."

  Before we get the, erm, "opportunity" to focus on Yngwie's catastrophic colon or the Crue's clovver, Jeff's off on another of his flights of fancy: "I'm convinced that the guitar must have been invented in a bar by some drunken Spaniard, some guy who'd just been kicked out of his house. I mean, you listen to it-you get it in tune in G and it's never in tune in E major, and when you get in tune E major it's not in tune in G. It's wierd. All those blues guys used to tune the G string a little bit sharper, and though that makes it out of tune, it tempers the sound in other ways. It's a beautifully chaotic instrument."

  Chances are the chaos of cafe and cellar bar gigs are already behind Jeff. Give him a few years and he'll have uprooted the family tree too - they'll be saying; Tim Buckley, 'father of' Jeff Buckley...

Guitarist Excerpts
Done: May, 1994

Published: September, 2004 

Submitted by Sai

"I grew up on Zeppelin, The Who, Hendrix - the usual-but also West Side Story, Mendelssohn, Bach, Judy Garland...that stuff was from my mom. I just loved music. Music was a very giving hostess."

"I started off pretty innocently. When I first got a guitar I'd roll my marbles down it to hear the sound they made. That's more how I play like now. I prefer it when the guitar is a thing of wonder, not an extension of ego. A guitar has spirits flying through it - it's not just a vehicle for erudition. It's a mysterious instrument but, sadly, a lot of that mystery has gone or is hidden. It's like people's bodies, when they have hard, meaningless sex all the time-that's what the guitar has become. But it doesn't mean another side doesn't exist. It does, and I'm trying to find it."

"At one point I wanted to be Miles Davis. But that doesn't work for a guitar player. I went through an amazing period of love for certain kinds of jazz-(Davis's) Kind Of Blue, John Coltrane's Africa Brass, any Duke Ellington. It's got the improvisation inside but there's a lot of seduction to the composition too. Soloing over standard changes is boring as hell to me."

"My jazz phase ended (at MI). I looked around to see if I could thrive and it just wasn't possible. That stuff's dead. I couldn't learn from the masters, like (legendary jazz double bass player) Ron Carter, so why bother? I needed to find the thing I most strongly identified with and that's my voice. But still, the guitar IS music to me. You can go anywhere with a guitar, and it taps into all these different musics. I'm into a lot of loud, hard rock and really romantic music. The guitar can do both."

"Man, I don't know why this Gods And Monsters thing keeps catching so much fire because I was only in it for a few months. I wrote some songs with Gary but only two (on Grace)-Mojo Pin and Grace."

"For a time I delved into all the evils that being a guitar player in America can bring. That God Of Wank syndrome, as I call it (laughs). Every kid does it. But it helped me make up my mind about what I wanted to do. I got into Siouxsie And The Banshees, The Smiths, the Cocteau Twins and The Cure. That was the attitude of guitar playing that changed me. The solo gigs weren't contrived. I really wanted to know what it was like to make music in a room, completely naked. To do it like Nina Simone or Ray Charles."

"I really wanted to record old style - in a room with the guys, no overdubs, just mics, amps and guitars. It didn't happen quite like that. We worked more on sounds. But, y'know, when you're making an album, you're dealing with ultimates. What you leave on tape will stay forever."

"I could totally play the Heartbreaker solo by Jimmy Page right now if you want (laughs). But that's not where I lie. When we're jamming, I do huge, huge solos and go off...but for songs I'm more interested in finding melodies. They're more poweful. Every guitar player should know that. Ask Keith Richards, ask Robert Johnson. Listen to Physical Graffiti; I don't hear any fast solos, but you can sing every one. They're baaad-ass melodies, they're rocking, they get right in you. That's my aesthetic."

"I'm not now what I was before. I'm sure that if I make it to 35 I'll make crap albums. I'll have to, because what I'm doing now is all of me, it really is. So if I get that far it'll be a crap box set-six CDs of crap, with special crap postcards and a special crap booklet full of crap. But whatever, music is all I've got..."