Paul Gilbert is not naive. He is not stupid. He knows that when the audience come to see him play, they arrive in their seats with a certain expectation that he will perform some kind of pyrotechnics on the electric guitar.
Similarly, when they buy his records, the audience expects moments of the spectacular. Gilbert wants to give them what they want. But he also wants to give them what he wants, too, or rather, what the song needs.
His latest studio album, WROC, is replete with jaw-dropping moments of technicality, from the player who made his bones pushing the boundaries of shred with Racer X. And yet there is also the other side to Gilbert’s musical preoccupations, melody and harmony, super-sized FM rock hooks, deftly executed feel changes, and he is back on the microphone – those guitar parts have to support the vocal.
“Well, I try to be aware of my own habits, both good and bad, and so, if I find myself getting too dense, I’ll try to slow down,” he says, joining MusicRadar from his home studio. WROC (Washington’s Rules of Civility) is one of the most Paul Gilbert albums you could imagine.
It has the humour and playfulness, with lyrics inspired by George Washington’s rulebook for civility, manners, and so forth – these are songs about not soaking your bread in the sauce at the dinner table, not spitting into an open fire… And although it most definitely shreds, some of Gilbert’s most effective lead playing is when he is at his most restrained. Take Orderly And Distinctly.
“The solo is almost like something the Edge from U2 would do, just basically playing a three-note melody over and over again,” he says. “And then there is a little bit in the end where I play the vocal line on guitar. But the majority is almost like it’s just a riff. That one, to me, it was perfect for the song, and it’s not a shred thing, and it’s not a prog thing. It is just, like, this melody fits here.”
Gilbert admits that it can take a deliberate effort to resist the urge to shred. That’s the easy songwriting choice. “To me, that is actually a courageous thing to do, to not go crazy all the time, and rely on the fact that it works for the song – and not have to prove yourself every single second,” he says.
He is not the only player who can’t quite shake that sense that he must prove himself each time he takes to the stage or releases an album.
“It was funny, I did a [guitar] camp once with Joe Satriani,” says Gilbert. “I can’t remember exactly how he worded it but he said something like, ‘Every time I do an album, I feel like the first song I have to prove that I can play guitar.’ And he said, ‘I don’t like that. I wish I wish I could let that go. But it’s just really hard!’ I thought, ‘I know exactly what you mean.’
“There’s like this athletic element where you want to prove that you can still swim – like you’re Michael Phelps, ‘I can still swim just as fast as I did when I was 22!’”
If we’re using sports as a serviceable metaphor then it does Gilbert some good to remember that the album is a marathon, not a sprint. There are plenty of opportunities to stretch out and let it rip. But that first track? “…That’s a hard thing to resist,” he adds. “And obviously there are a lot of places where I didn’t resist and went crazy.”
This cannot be a phenomenon unique to guitar players. All virtuosos on all lead instruments have to make the judicious call when to rein themselves in for the good of the piece, but then sometimes the maximalist approach is required, that the composition needs to load the audience’s attention with musical ideas.
Does Gilbert believe that other virtuoso musicians operating in other styles have this same sense of having to prove themselves?
“I don’t know. That’s a good question,” he says. “I mean, when you mentioned other instruments – like, when I think of shredders that I love – Oscar Peterson comes to mind, the jazz piano player. When I listen to Oscar Peterson, I almost want to give up. Because it’s if this is a competition I’m gonna lose every time. I’m not even close!
Hopefully I’ve worked on my melodies enough now where they they’re starting to be on the level with the faster stuff
“Oscar Peterson is just so… Not least, speed and accuracy, but improvisational depths, and plans for all the chord changes. Every element of it is so… I mean, it almost seems inhuman, at least from my standpoint when I listen to it. Like, how can a human being get that advanced on an instrument? It’s just crazy.”
There is an upside to having to manage audience’s expectations. When he takes to the stage, Gilbert knows that the more spectacular moments will give him an easy win, and that makes him work doubly hard on writing melodies, and performing them so they really connect.
“People go, ‘I’m going to go see Paul. He’s going to rip it up.’ And then I do and they got what they came to see,” he says. “I don’t know if pressure is the right word, but if I decide that I am going to add in something different, like, if I’m gonna go, ‘Tonight, I’m going to play a lot of melodies,’ I’ve really got to play those melodies well to compete with people’s expectations… hopefully I’ve worked on my melodies enough now where they they’re starting to be on the level with the faster stuff.”
WROC is available for pre-order, and is out on 27 February via Music Theories. You can read our full interview with Paul Gilbert, coming soon to MusicRadar.
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