Andy Timmons Breaks New Guitar Ground With ‘Theme From A Perfect World’ (INTERVIEW)

Andy Timmons has built his reputation into a well-respected cerebral guitar instrumentalist. He’s been on the G4 ticket with Joe Satriani and Paul Gilbert, and toured with former Scorpions guitarist Uli Jon Roth; all three men known for their technical performances. You’ve got to be pretty darn good to hang with those guys onstage and Timmons can definitely hold his own.

After an early career start in the pop metal band Danger Danger – two MTV video hits and tours opening for KISS and Alice Cooper – Timmons eventually took his playing to newer heights, more complicated levels, putting his Jazz studies at the University of Miami to use more broadly. And thrived along the way.

Abstract background, fantastic 3D gold structures, fractal design.His first solo record was 1994’s Ear X-Tacy, which featured a rhythm section of drummer Mitch Marine and bass player Mike Daane who are still with him today, appearing on the new Andy Timmons Band release, Theme From A Perfect World. The record might have been released several years ago if not for some noodling around on Beatles tunes in the studio one day, turning into the well-received Andy Timmons Band Plays Sgt Pepper in 2011.

But it’s a good time to release Theme From A Perfect World. The songs are personal, melodic, fun, lively and non-ego-influenced. In other words, no extravagant solos and more songs that mean something to him. “Some of them don’t even have a guitar solo per se,” Timmons said prior to it’s release at the end of September. “Which is kind of unusual for an instrumental guitar record but that underscores the importance of the idea that a good song has to be there right from the start.”

“The interesting thing I’m finding about this instrumental music is a lot of the songs are very specifically influenced by life events, be it my life or that of somebody else near me,” explained Timmons. And most every composition on the ten track CD has a story behind it, from beloved pets to friends to fans who were in life-threatening situations. They all inspired Timmons to sit down with his guitar and create, not just for himself but for the people who provided the inspiration in the first place. In fact, I joked with him that our interview could inspire a song on his next record. “That’s right, you could have your own song,” he said with a laugh.

And on that note, Timmons was more than happy to talk about his new songs, focusing on instrumentals and the first autograph he ever asked for.

You write for Glide Magazine I see.

Yes, and you play guitar I see

(laughs) You know I try. I own a couple of guitars. But I’m a student, I’m a beginner, a work-in-progress.

If I had your fingers, just think of what I could do

(laughs) Exactly! The world is your oyster.

This is a busy week for you as your new record comes out.

It’s a crazy week! It comes out officially on Friday [September 30] and we kick off our tour the next night in Dallas at the Granada. I think we’ve kicked off our last two records there as well. It’s kind of one of our local homes here. But it’s a great venue. So off to the races! It’s exciting cause this record has been some years in the realization and then finally finishing it. So it’s great to get it out there.

“Ascension” has been around for a few years already

Yeah. The last record the Andy Timmons Band did was the 2011 release, when we did the Sgt Pepper record. This record was actually begun during those same sessions. We had started the record, and I guess it would have been 2009 or 2010, in Dallas, and we’d actually gone in to begin what is now Theme From A Perfect World. At the end of those sessions, our engineer let us know that he had a couple of days to come open and he said, “Well, I’ve got two extra days. What else do you have?” And our drummer Mitch Marine, he had heard me talk about these Beatles arrangements I was just kind of doing for fun and he said, “Well, let’s just record those.” So in two days we knocked out the basic tracks for what became the Sgt Pepper record and then that kind of took on a life of it’s own because those arrangements were more fleshed out than the original material that we had at the time. So I decided to finish that first and now here we are and it only took six years to get back to it (laughs). So yeah, we had some tunes, like “Ascension” and the title track, “Theme From A Perfect World.”

What are some of the newer songs?

One is called “Sanctuary,” which I wrote for my good friends George Fuller and Maylee Thomas. They have a music shop here in McKinney called The Guitar Sanctuary, so it was actually a gift for them when they opened up their entertainment center. Then there’s “On Your Way Sweet Soul” and “That Day Came,” which are actually both about cats, oddly enough. “That Day Came” was written when my wife and I’s beloved cat Cookie Face passed away. You know as a pet owner we obviously become very close and form a deep bond that actually goes deeper than some family you know. So before we had our child, who is twelve now, we had three cats and we’d look at them and go, “Oh man, I don’t want to think about when that day comes when they’re not here.” So that day came.

There’s been many times in my life where there’s been heavy emotional moments where the music just seems to come from that a lot of times. It could be, obviously, in happy occasions as well, but that particular song was written as somewhat a cathartic release of emotion for that event.

And the last song on the record, which is called “On Your Way Sweet Soul,” is for another friend of mine, a longtime Warner Brothers Music person, and her beloved cat passed away and I knew how much that cat meant to her so I wrote this as kind of a comforting tune, and this goes back years ago. I just recorded a little demo and gave it to her and they played it at the cat’s little memorial. It was very sweet. But I listened to the track, and it was actually several years later, and thought, this is a really good song and I think the band should record this and we did and I love it.

andy-timmons-by-simone-cecchetti-01So you write songs as gifts?

There are a lot of tunes I’ve written as gifts for people over the years and some of those will never be heard by anybody else but the recipient. But I love giving people that, being able to write a song for somebody, especially for those friends that, you know, what do you buy for somebody who has everything? Well, you create a piece of art that can’t be attained anywhere else and music is a great way to do that. I have been doing it since my college years when I couldn’t afford presents for my family. I would record these little cassette tapes of me playing. Sometimes I’d record a Beatles song. There is a song that ended up on my first record Ear X-Tacy called “There Are No Words” that was a Christmas present for my family, basically thanking them for loving me and supporting me through all the times of difficulty struggling to be an artist, to be a musician in a crazy business world, you know.

There’s another pretty heavy tune that’s called “The Next Voice You Hear.” This young fan of ours that we’d met in Japan, and I think it was as long ago as 2007, and he was clearly born challenged. He was in a wheelchair and on a respirator, seemed like a pretty difficult life, but he was a big music fan. And he had a friend, a journalist friend of his, that would bring him to our shows and we’d always make time to go at the end of our show to go visit him and his name is Takeshi. Sometime late last year I got an email from this friend of his that he was in a coma and they didn’t expect him to live. They basically were making funeral plans cause he wasn’t going to make it. And she suggested that maybe I could send him a message or something. I think she meant either record a little voice message or send him an email or whatever but in that moment it really struck me that I’m not going to see this person again and I wrote a song kind of on the spot for him.

I made a little recording in my office and I immediately forwarded it to his friend maybe the next day or two and a few days later after that, I got a message saying they played him the song and tears formed in his eyes and he woke up. He came out of the coma. And this could be purely coincidence but at the same time you have to think that possibly people in that state, they’re really hearing everything that is going on around them but they can’t necessarily respond. But somehow this music or the idea of the music, maybe he knew it was from me or it just connected in some kind of way, and I can’t think of a more gratifying response from somebody to your music. But again, it’s just a simple thing to write a piece of music and to think that there’s any positive result to that is amazing. And it’s selfish at the same time, you know. It’s going to make me feel good if I do something nice for other people and you hope to spread that to the other folks. But that’s examples of songs on the record that were presents, you know, and initially not intended for a commercial project such as this.

Since so many of these songs are personal, would you say that’s the main theme going through this record?

There are some songs that were just written purely as, oh, this is some nice music and I’m going to develop this. Like “Ascension,” I had this song before I had the title so there wasn’t really a specific meaning or intent other than just trying to create some art that I would enjoy and hopefully other people too. But yeah, in songs there’s a deeply personal connection, just from the way that I play and the way that I’m trying to present the music and present the melodies. I think that’s the thing I’m most proud of, the growth of the band and my own writing.

The instrumental guitar genre can be very self-indulgent. It tends to be about showcasing abilities and it can be far removed from just the art of songwriting and trying to play something that rewards people or encourages people to listen multiple times. I think first and foremost there’s some strong songs on the record and I’m happy with the time that Mike Daane, who is the bass player in the band, been with me since 1988 and we’re still speaking (laughs), now his role in the band has grown immensely. I mean, he has always been a very important influence in the music but now he’s engineering the records and really producing. He will say we co-produce but in my mind I really consider him the main producer on the record. I guess with the more experience and maybe maturity in realizing that everything is going to be stronger when you have the right people around you and really take that advice and direction, sometimes even if I feel strongly in other ways. “Hey, let’s try that.” And Mike has maybe gotten me out of my comfort zone and tried things maybe opposite to what I might think might be best. But doing so it brings out better things.

So there is a lot more of that on this record and I have Mike to thank for a lot of the creative direction. The general songwriting and melodic approaches is largely mine but the way he has always kind of shaped stylistically is a huge thing, and just starting with him being just an incredibly inventive bass player. But it’s a really great creative mind and we’re working stronger together than we ever have. It’s exciting because I know there’s lots more great stuff to come.

So you have all this positivity on this record and making people feel better but yet you have a song called “Lift Us Up (Something Wicked This Way Comes)”

(laughs) Yes, but it’s a very uplifting, optimistic theme I think. In fact, I had that initial theme and melody for years and I could never really finish the song for some reason. We play in Europe frequently, especially in Spain and Italy, and when the crowd is really excited and into the show, in-between songs you start hearing them break out in these chants like what you might hear them chant at soccer or football matches, you know what I mean. So I kind of pictured this song as being what a crowd like that might like to sing.

But then the addendum to this, the PS, is that, I had this riff I knew I liked. It was strong, the b-section very Todd Rundgren/Raspberries/1970’s pop and I thought it felt great. But I didn’t know what to do with it after that. But we got to the studio and our drummer Rob Avsharian and Mike Daane were just hashing over the song again and in the studio I wrote the next middle section. I think David Bowie might have just passed at that point and I’ve always been a huge, especially early Ziggy era, Bowie fan. So that section kind of takes on a bit of that flavor from the Ziggy record.

So in the studio we were like, “Well, we’ve got to figure out an ending.” I’ve got in mind these two chords I’d always wanted to end the song with but Rob the drummer instead of maybe uplifting and rocking it out kind of did it to this half-time groove and it kind of turned into a pretty dark theme at that point. So I was torn because I’d really intended this to be this uplifting thing but it dawned on me that it’s very much as optimistic as you can be in this current day and age. You’ve got to be realistic in what’s really happening in the world and there’s plenty to be concerned about on every front. So it dawned on me that this could really represent the current state of the world and our country and all that’s happening. So I feel it’s a very optimistic song but with a little bit of reality thrown in at the end.

Guitaristically, I pictured myself being Mick Ronson. Mick was the wonderful guitar player with Bowie back in those Ziggy Stardust days and some of the emotions he would have evoked, playing very simply but with this amazing sound and tone, and Mike and I had a bit of fun creating the chaos that is going on in the background. There’s all kinds of tape echoes, there’s something that sounds like screaming that is actually me. I have this large pedal board that has about ten different guitar sound gadgets on it and I turned all of them on, which is an incredible noise on it’s own. Then with the wah wah pedal, in conjunction with all the noise that’s just coming through without even playing the guitar, that’s just me manipulating the wah wah pedal with all that noise and it really does sound quite tortured (laughs).

Which guitar did you use predominately on the new record?

There is a lot more than there has been on the last few records. My main guitar is a signature guitar that Ibanez makes for me called the AT-100 and the main guitar on the record is my original prototype from 1994. But there is also a variety of other instruments. There’s some vintage Stratocasters, there’s a Rickenbacker 12-string, an Ibanez AS-50, which is like a 335, there’s a 1968 Telecaster. It really got down to what voice is best going to carry the sound of the song. And again, sometimes I would have an idea for that and Mike would go, “Try this guitar,” cause he has a guitar collection, I have a few to say the least, so we would just audition them, like auditioning singers. Who’s going to sing this song the best? And that’s what we’d do. So a lot of times it was my main guitar but sometimes, like “On Your Way Sweet Soul,” that’s a 1960 Strat and there’s a 1965 Strat on the track “Winterland” and “That Day Came.” So sometimes that vintage sound is what really kind of won, even though I might be more comfortable on my main guitar.

Why does making songs without words so appealing to you?

You know, I do write music with lyrics as well. I’m certainly more known for the guitar instrumental thing. So it’s not that I don’t enjoy the lyric part of it, because I do like trying to craft words, but I think that music can transcend so much that goes beyond the written word. Our language is very finite for ways that we can combine our words to express particular thoughts or emotions. I feel that music can maybe go a lot deeper; especially on the guitar I think we’re just scratching the surface of the possibilities of tapping into that emotion. There’s guys like Jeff Beck or Pat Metheny that are heroes for me that I think I’ve done a lot to further that expression along and that’s my goal. I really like creating music that I don’t have to paint exactly the picture, the meaning of the song, to the audience. They might know my inspiration. When it comes to a song like “That Day Came,” certainly specifically to me it was the passing of a beloved pet, but it applies to everybody because all our loved ones, nobody lasts forever. It could be about your mom or your dad. I lost my mom and a brother between my last record and this record. We all deal with it, it’s part of life, that cycle, but I like putting in what I put into it and then people can attach their own meaning in it.

Brian Wilson and Carl Wilson, two of the founders of the Beach Boys, were talking and I think Carl Wilson was asked about the Beach Boys music, specifically the Brian Wilson composed ballads like “In My Room” and “God Only Knows,” some of these really deep emotional tunes, and he said, “It gives people a safe place to explore their emotions and to feel things. If it’s a happy song, you get energized. But if it’s a sad song, to have a cry if that’s what it evokes.” Again, that’s a wonderful thing to put out there to hopefully have people connect with. So that’s kind of the underlying theme and goal, as far as my writing and my playing and what Mike and I have done production-wise with the music and keeping it as organic as possible and as undigitized, even though it’s going to end up on an MP3 in somebody’s earbuds, it does sound more like a record done in the sixties or seventies.

How did you do that this time?

We used a lot of the original gear at every step so that’s kind of an underlying credo as well. We wanted to not sound loud for loud’s sake and everything overcompressed. If you look at a WAV file of current music it’s just this black block of information whereas older music, you’ll see peaks and valleys and these lovely mountainscapes of what the music looks like when it’s not overly compressed and made to be loud for loud’s sake. So this record is lower volume than most records out there but we did that to maintain the dynamics and the intimacy of all the details of what we put into this, especially on the guitar. The subtle nuances are where all the emotion lives. If it’s all flatlined and compressed, it takes away that emotion and how you can reach people and we did everything to fight for that or protect that and we did a good job. Because you can easily get talked into, “Listen to how much better it sounds when it’s louder or more compressed.” And there’s an energy to that and it’s not like I don’t like music that’s mixed that way or produced that way. But again for the larger goal of that dynamic it’s so important to get it to that extra level I think.

What do you see next in the evolution of the guitar and what it can do?

Most certainly a deeper connection and expressiveness. That’s the beauty of Jeff Beck. I don’t know, he’s got to be in his late sixties now and he keeps evolving. He never repeats a record. He’ll do this phenomenal record and he could easily make another one just to try to appease the fans that liked that record but his new record’s completely different from the last one. He’s continually evolving and changing. I’m happier now than I’ve been ever as far as the music goes, because I’ve gotten back into it as a student mentality. When I was in school back in my college days, I was gigging three or four nights a week, and by the time I got to Miami I was gigging six nights a week and school all day and when I wasn’t doing one of those things I was jamming with my friends and exchanging ideas.

Life takes over and you get busy and a career and there’s so much about your career that isn’t necessarily music-related. There’s taking care of all the other stuff. But I just made it a point to get back, every morning first thing, to practicing and that sets my day up for success cause I feel like I’m honoring my gift, I’m accomplishing things on the instrument that I wouldn’t have done maybe just a couple weeks before. I think with Jeff, and I mentioned Pat Metheny and so many other musicians throughout history, they keep upping the ante as far as possible on the instrument. And again, I’m just scratching the surface. The music I hear in my head and what I’m able to do on the instrument currently, sometimes they are very connected and sometimes I go, oh man, I’ve got a long way to go. But that’s the juice right there. That’s the energy that I want to tap more into and to keep improving, cause I know that’s a huge core of happiness in my life at this point is just realizing that. You’ve got to keep growing, you’ve got to keep learning and working towards improving.

Would say improvisation is more important than sitting and working out something over and over until you feel like you have it right?

I think that each end of that is completely valid and very important. Having played a lot of Jazz throughout my playing career, there’s a certain mentality that it has to be improvised and different and new every time. But the composer in me, the songwriter in me, kind of contradicts that. So I’d rather work something over and over until it’s exactly the emotion exactly. It took me years to get to the point where I was comfortable doing that and Resolution was the first record that is almost 100% composed, meaning that there were solos improvised in the original studio sessions. But I eventually trashed all those tracks, learned what I liked that I did and then composed around it so that when I listen to that record I can go, every note is exactly what I wanted to hear. And that was the first record where I’d done that. There can be sacrifices as far as the freshness in the immediacy but the new record is kind of a combination of that. There are some things that are very composed but there are some things that are very improvised and fresh. But the key is once something is composed, to keep it sounding fresh and I think I have accomplished that. We’ll see what the people think.

For someone who plays very cerebral instrumentals, besides the guitar itself, to you, what is the most important piece of equipment to create the sound you’re looking for?

I don’t know if there’s one specific thing cause there is so many things in the chain that can affect that sound. Obviously it’s the fingers on the frets that’s the most important thing and then whatever little pedal gadget you’re running into. But I have to say it’s not a gadget but it’s my ear because that’s what shapes it. I have to kind of imagine it in my mind or get that direction from Mike. It has to be that goal of what you want it to sound like. Otherwise, there is no piece that is going to achieve it. It has to come from a certain goal and a certain direction to really achieve that. So I think I have to steer it more towards the most valuable part of a musician’s arsenal is his ear – before a guitar, before a finger hits a fret; the intention of what you want to hear, what you think it should sound like, what are you trying to get out of that instrument, not letting all the gear dictate what that is. And it takes years, obviously, to have command of that.

Have you always had that from when you were first starting?

Oh gosh no, it was all about performance and all about the energy and what notes I was playing. I think that comes with years of just application. The more you play the more you’re going to develop your own unique sound. Part of that is time on the instrument and part of that is the ear that you develop by everything you take into your musical mind, every favorite guitar player, every guitar sound, song or whatever it might be. These are all collected and I think that helps shape your direction of what you think you would like to sound like, whether it’s somebody that copies Stevie Ray Vaughan or Jimi Hendrix, which is great. But my goal is I love those guys but I don’t want to sound like them. I want to learn from them and always revere them in the highest regard but hopefully it’ll take my playing to a more unique place by not just focusing on those guys but taking what Jeff Beck and Pat Matheny and Wes Montgomery and Satriani and Vai and Eric Johnson and all of my heroes and just seeing what I can do combining all that and forming my own version of what I think a great guitar sound or performance might be.

dangerdanger-rockamericaDo you look favorably back on your Danger Danger guitar playing as compared to now or do you think it’s almost juvenile? Not to say it was bad …

No, no, no, I think it’s a good point to make that I think a lot of the music was juvenile unfortunately. There was a lot of great music and I’ve been very open about that in the press. But it was music for that time and that mentality. We did a handful of reunion shows a couple of years ago, which I kind of assumed would never happen but it did and I’m happy it did. But it was really interesting because I had to go back and visit twenty-five year old Andy Timmons (laughs). And it was difficult, because my playing would have evolved over, that’s twenty-five years ago now, half of my life, and I was very pleased actually with how I played and I had a hard time figuring out what I did. In some cases I really had to relearn. Some things came back real easily but there were some things where I’m using transcribing audio plug-ins to help me learn.

What song in your catalog of work was the most difficult to transfer to the live stage and why?

Probably my arrangement of George Harrison’s Beatle classic, “Within You, Without You,” from our Plays Sgt Pepper record. It’s extremely technically demanding to really replicate the inflections of his vocal and the orchestral/sitar work. But a lot of fun.

Who was the first real rock star you ever met?

Count Basie and Freddie Green. Ok, technically not rock stars but HUGELY influential jazz icons. I also still have their autographs, which were the first ones I ever asked for. I now have a huge collection of signed LP covers that I personally obtained from all of my heroes that I’ve had the unbelievable good fortune to meet. Everyone from Ringo, Brian Wilson, almost all of my heroes. The only person I haven’t met is Paul McCartney. Someday I hope!

What was your first “I can’t believe I’m here” moment?

Touring with KISS as the opening act in 1990 while in Danger Danger. KISS was the first concert I ever attended. I was thirteen years old so it was 1976 and their album Destroyer had just been released. I knew that day that music would be my life, so you can imagine the feeling fourteen years later of playing and traveling with these early heroes. Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley treated us quite well and we learned a lot from them.

The first song or album you obsessed over as a kid?

“I Saw Her Standing There” by The Beatles, which was the flip side of “I Want To Hold Your Hand.” My favorite part was in the middle when they stopped singing – that lovely reverb-drenched guitar solo.

What are your plans for the rest of the year?

We kick off our US tour October 1st in Dallas that culminates with two shows in New York City at the Iridium, October 23rd and 24th. Then we head to Southeast Asia for more tour dates in Japan, Thailand and Taiwan.

Photos by Simone Cecchetti

TOUR DATES

Tue 10/11          Charleston, WV             The Empty Glass

Wed 10/12         Cincinnati, OH               The Mad Frog

Thu 10/13          Indianapolis, IN             Radio Radio

Fri 10/14           Detroit, MI                     The Token Lounge

Sat 10/15           Chicago, IL                   Reggie’s Live

Sun 10/16          Columbus, OH              Rhumba Café

Tue 10/18          Akron, OH                     Musica

Wed 10/19         Buffalo, NY                   Nietzche’s

Thu 10/20          Rochester, NY               The Montage Music Hall

Fri 10/21            Marlboro, NY                The Falcon

Sat 10/22           Philadelphia, PA            The Voltage Lounge

Sun 10/23         New York, NY               Iridium Jazz Club (headlining)

Mon 10/24         New York, NY               Iridium Jazz Club (headlining)

 

Photos by Simo

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