002 - Trey Xavier (In Virtue/Gear Gods)

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Today we sit down with Trey Xavier and discuss songwriting, the guitar as a tool and what role rhythm plays for Trey in his music!

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Yeah, like like heavy metal rhythm is not just downpicking open E, you know?

SPEAKER_02 0:07

Not with that attitude. Howard. Um so um you're right. There's also a B str a low B string. Oh my bad. So yeah, you're right. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 0:33

Xavier from Gear Gods and Virtue, and uh we are just now starting the interview. Absolutely. Uh how are you doing?

SPEAKER_02 0:41

We totally did not. This is not take two. I don't know what you're talking about. Yeah, absolutely not. I'm doing great. How are you doing? Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_03 0:48

Yeah, I'm good, man. Thanks for being here. Uh I know you got a trip coming up, and I really appreciate it. Um, Trey is on his way to Brazil.

SPEAKER_02 0:55

They said come to Brazil, and I was like, okay.

SPEAKER_03 0:58

Alright, so thank you for being here, man. We're gonna dig in, talk about a lot of guitar, possibly songwriting, because I know uh that's a big thing of what you do these days, especially on Gear Gods, but I'd like to start with the present. So back in November, which I totally knew, uh your band Invertu just released an album. Can we see that? Do you have it with you?

SPEAKER_02 1:15

Oh, weird, I totally do. Whoa. This is the album, it's called Age of Legends. Uh this is the vinyl version. Um it also comes in blue, if you like that.

SPEAKER_03 1:28

I love that red and black.

SPEAKER_02 1:30

We've got it on CD. Um. At InVirtue.band. Uh, but yeah, back in uh November we dropped that. We've got six music videos um for the singles that we released.

SPEAKER_03 1:46

Yeah, go check them out on YouTube at InVirtue. Let's talk about just your process of making the album, but more so the focus on the guitars, the songwriting process, how you use the guitars to um, you know, build the songs or what what role they played, and sort of just your process of recording guitars, primarily rhythm guitars, and how you like to uh do those in the studio.

SPEAKER_02 2:13

Sure. Um so I don't know if anybody else out there ever used this, but when I was sort of coming up um and learning guitar and also like starting to write my own stuff, I used to use this program called Tabit. We've all used Guitar Pro. Guitar Pro is um is like too powerful. Tabit was like the super simple, real shitty version, but it was free. It was incredibly easy to use, and it's kind of like a notepad almost like version of Guitar Pro. Like it's you tab things out and it has a bunch of like general MIDI sounds and stuff, and you can write drums and everything, but like it's worlds simpler than Guitar Pro. And I loved tab it. Um and it's you know in a way sort of reflects my um the the way that I think about a lot of music, which is that it's sort of like a crayon drawing version of an idea, okay? And I always want I don't use it anymore. I haven't used it in like 15 years, probably. I I want an idea to hold up musically on its own before I kind of get fancy with it, you know, and by fancy I mean the actual specifics of how I'm going to play something, right? Like uh the the nuance, like the expressiveness and expression of it. I I like the idea to hold together on its own and also to feel right in the full structure of an idea, of a part of a song or whatever, and not just the guitar. Like I'm not just writing riffs, like writing a song structure, and then slapping some kind of vocal or top line on top of it, right? Like I'm I'm thinking this way all the time. Um and in Tabit, I would be writing stuff, and it's like super easy to go back and forth between all the different like instruments and and like add like write a little bit of riff, write a little bit of melody, or like write a little bit of bass line, write a little bit of drums. Um and like uh I I think I didn't realize it at the time, but it was kind of my first introduction to um like sequencing in a way, right? If you ever use like a like a MIDI sequencer, you know, if you're using um like a MIDI track in Pro Tools or whatever, that's a MIDI sequencer. Um and this really helped me think in like three dimensions while I'm writing. Um so even though the way that I do it now, I'm like recording scratch guitar parts as I'm writing, I'm still sort of thinking, at least also vertically. You know, I'm thinking like, how is this going to interact with the vocal, with the drums, whatever? Like I'm thinking arrangement all the time. And then you know, um and then I sort of start to dig into how I'm actually going to play something, um, where I'm like where I'm going to palm mute apart to make it like to make it sound kind of um small and like tight versus a big open version of an idea um or something that's really chunky, you know. Um and as I'm going through the song horizontally, I'm also thinking in terms of the arrangement, the dynamics, what it needs for the moment, right? What it needs like is the part gonna get really big and wide, and like um are we gonna, you know, does it need more room for the vocal, like a you know, a big ringing out power chord type of a thing, or something a bit busier with the right hand, or something that's very nodey. Um, you know, like in our song Um Karma Loop, it has like a pretty busy single note type of a riff that happens uh during the vocal, during the chorus. And every time it happens, it's like slightly different. Um the first time I play it, it's got it's got a lot of space in it, and it's pretty tightly palm muted. By the time we get to the last one, it's like wide open with no palm muting at all, I think. Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-do-do-do do. Um and that that's like kind of a small thing, but I'm just always thinking about those kinds of things while I'm writing. A lot of guitar players aren't thinking like that because they're not really like produce thinking like a producer or a songwriter, you know. They're focusing on making their part. And those people are usually much better guitarists than I am. Um and, you know, like you can come up with awesome guitar parts like that, but sometimes you wind up with just something that's so guitar focused that only guitar players are going to care about it, or it's just like a it can be just kind of a busy mess, and like the the song is an afterthought, and that doesn't I mean that can be whatever. Uh like people like different things. Right. But to me, that's like m kind of missing the point of making music, right? Like, you should make whatever music you like, um, and whatever the focus is should be that. But like I don't make music for guitar players, I make music on the guitar because the guitar is my instrument, but the song is king. Um I love riffs, I love um you know, heavy sounds, and I love love the guitar, but it is it's not the focal point most of the time. So different points in the song it can be. I'll use Karma Loop as an example again, but like, you know, it opens with like a big um lead guitar arpeggio thing, and then it comes in with a big heavy riff underneath that. You know, and then the verse happens and the guitar just goes away for like half of the verse. Um it's just bass, drums, and vocals and a piano, and like that to me was like the right move because um, you know, I I wanted to strip it way back and put the focus on the on the vocal for a bit and then like bring the guitars back. And it's like a lot of the time a guitar player, you know, is just is like just a guitar player, and they're not thinking of the whole picture. And um I for me the guitar is a tool to make awesome songs. Um I think of Eddie Van Halen, right, who's like obviously the guitar player's guitar player, but like he was always thinking of the song, like amazing songwriter. They he wasn't just shredding, he was shredding on fucking nuclear party bangers, you know, like fucking incredible songs, and even though his guitar playing was always like very obviously right there, it always worked with everything else. So that's my that's my approach and my mindset with the guitar. Um I'll never be as great of a guitarist as like so many others, but my strength is like thinking of the whole big picture and then like trying to you know trying to hit that target specifically.

SPEAKER_03 10:51

Yeah, and honestly, that is important too, and it's a good thing to remember too, like if anyone listening is an aspiring songwriter, is I know, and this isn't me knocking anybody, because like you said, you play to your strengths. I know many guitarists who are incredible guitarists, far better than I'll ever be, but they can't write a song to save their life, you know. It is a completely different uh talent, you know, uh or skill set or whatever you want to call it. Um, and I've worked with guitarist. Yeah. And yeah, there is so you know, I I don't know if there's something to this, but you know, you see a lot of bands too, uh, the primary songwriters, usually usually, not always, but usually not the lead guitarist, right? Um, and again, it's sort of like they've put their attention into this and the guitarists put their attention to that, but then you got guys like Michael Romeo and I don't know what's real, you know. Um but cool man, yeah, and then mentioning too, like, you know, knowing what the song needs, because you know, a lot of times when you hear a great song, even with great riffs, usually when the vocals come in, the guitarists back off, right? They're not they're not doing a crazy intense riff. Again, usually depends on the genre, like Trey said, depends on what you like, but knowing sort of the right place, the right time kind of thing, you know. And then actually, as someone who does a little bit of everything, because you don't only just play guitar, you sing keyboards, drums. I mean, you're you're literally a one-man band. I mean, you make these videos. Um, has that changed at all the way you approach writing? You know? Um thing I thought was interesting, and I learned this like years ago, uh, Dark Tranquility, right? A melodic death metal band, they write all their songs starting on piano, and that like you know, as a guitarist myself, admittedly, who doesn't really dabble with these other instruments, I was like, How in the fuck do they sit at a piano? And then we get a dark tranquility song from that. Because uh I was reading something, the singer's like, Yeah, every every Dark Tranquility star song starts on a piano, and I was like, that's very and like I get the the idea, right? You get the chord progression, you get whatever you're gonna do, but then it's like sick, now it's a melodic death metal song. Here we go. So I always find that kind of stuff very fascinating. Have you ever done anything like that?

SPEAKER_02 13:17

Oh yeah. So um, as you mentioned, songwriting's my jam. Uh I have uh few songwriting courses now um on how songsarmade.com if you're interested. But like um in my first songwriting course, my sort of main big one, which is called complete rock and metal songwriting, I demonstrate how to write starting from a lot of different points, right? Starting from a a lyric or a vocal idea, starting from a melody, starting from a riff, starting from a drum part, starting from just chords, um, starting like because I think if you can start from any little seed, any little nugget of an idea, you're gonna be unstoppable, right? If you have to have the guitar in front of you, you it's just not like your perspective is just a little narrow. I've always just pursued musical knowledge, right, and understanding. Um I literally bought a trumpet this week. Okay, like that's uh like trumpet is impossible. You think guitar is hard. I can barely make the thing make notes. Like, but I wanted to I wanted to try it out and have like a little bit more on like a different perspective. Uh I'll never be good at it, but like I that's been my approach with everything outside of guitar is just like do it a bit shitty. Like um, I I took piano lessons, um I learned drums kind of on my own, actually. Um I I love drums. Uh once again, never I'll never be good at the drums, but I love to play the drums, and I uh learning how to how drums work has made me a thousand percent better at writing songs. And like it didn't make me better at playing the guitar, but it made me better at understanding what I should be doing with the guitar in the song and like what the like what drums could be doing with a guitar part that I've written, right? Um and um my just understanding of of music in general has allowed me to like understand that, for example, like there's only twelve notes um outside of microtonal music, right? In the standard, like you know, Western uh twelve-tone system, there's just these twelve pitches and like that's on every instrument, you know, um except the drums, really. But I mean they're there, but whatever. You know, you know what I'm saying. Like there's if if I write a part on the guitar, it could also be a flute part, right?

SPEAKER_03 16:22

Like one of my favorite things is when you hear exactly that, right? Um like bands Arion, a band I love, does it a lot. He'll do a very sci-fi org any thing, but then the guitars come in playing the same thing to add that oomph.

SPEAKER_00 16:46

Yep, dun. Exactly, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:49

Dude, I fucking love Arion. You don't get you don't get me started. Uh I had him on my podcast. It was awesome. Oh, that's fucking that is so cool.

SPEAKER_03 16:58

Yeah, yeah. Aryan, uh dude, hands down. But um he does he does that a lot, and you don't you don't notice it really until you're like digging into what's going on. But artists, it's just like it seems like so much more is happening. Um like the Star of Siren, I think it's called, uh from the source, and he's got that little intro on his like um keyboard or whatever he's playing. Um, and then the guitar comes in, but you realize, like, oh, it's the same thing, but it sounds so good and different. So doing that is is a really cool, like would you even call it a trick? It's just kind of like you said, just having the understanding of if it's a trick, it's a real fucking stupid trick.

SPEAKER_01 17:42

Yeah. Just play the same thing on a different instrument. Yo, dude, okay.

SPEAKER_02 17:48

Dude, I feel that way about guitar players sometimes, though. You don't even know.

SPEAKER_03 17:51

Yeah. But bro, it's it's the same effect as like a key change at the end of a song where you know, to a casual listener, like, come on, man, Bon Jovi, everyone hears that key change and they're like, oh my god. Yeah. And it's like it's just we're just changing where the chord progression is.

SPEAKER_02 18:08

I think one of the things that like makes it a bit easier for guitar players to understand, if you've ever done this, I have I have mine sitting back here. You ever used a MIDI guitar? Like a MIDI pickup on a guitar? No. So if you if you you know plug in a MIDI pickup into uh into your DAW or whatever, and like you just s set it to any sound, like an organ or a a flute or a fucking orchestra and a voice, whatever, and then you're like, oh, I can like make all of these instruments make the same notes as the guitar, you just it suddenly becomes very clear that it's the same shit. But I I think because the way a lot of people come into playing the guitar, especially in metal, they just kind of learn songs and they learn like where you put your fingers and how you make it go. But you you don't have like a sort of even a conceptual theoretical understanding of how notes and pitches and chords work. Um like it there's sort there's sort of like this almost folky approach to it where you um it's sort of like bottom up instead of top down. Like there's not a a broader musical understanding, um, which is which is fine. Like there's I'm I'm not knocking that necessarily, but it's just that like sometimes I like I'm like guitarists of Earth, like you why didn't you learn this under why don't you understand this idea? Um and so uh hold on. Well, we're I'm I want to make sure that we don't lose the original thread of the point, which was that um it it doesn't exist in a void. It's it doesn't have like special its own notes or whatever. I remember uh seeing uh an interview with Brian Fair from Shadows Fall, which was like a super influential band for me, speaking of awesome rhythm guitar. Him talking about like he just started singing, you know. He's a he's a singer, not a guitar player, obviously. Um but he like started taking lessons with uh Melissa Cross. So he's uh you know, um I think he's in the the Zen of Screaming DVD, and he talks about how she was like making him match pitches on the piano, and he was like, I didn't know that I was singing notes that you could find on the piano. And I was like, fuck. Like, and I think a lot like a lot of guitarists like I I feel like I'm just throwing guitarists under the bus left and right here, but it's you know, it's more just like like it's very important to understand that the guitar i is is it's special in a lot of ways, but it's not that special. Right. And I I think that's okay, man, because guitar podcast where I shit on guitar.

SPEAKER_03 21:16

I swear we're gonna get to guitar, guys. Um no, but it is important to know because just for anyone out there, everything you're describing, I started off that way. Dude, I I had the yeah, I had the Injustice for All tab book, man. That's what I knew. Uh and I didn't really start, I don't know if backwards is the right way to say it, but I didn't start learning a lot of the stuff you're talking about until adulthood. So I still feel very behind. And when it comes to deep knowledge, I do not claim to be an expert. But even what I've been able to obtain as I got older, it has opened up so much, especially if you're a striving songwriter. Like, I love a good riff, but if all you can do is riff, And not know how to apply it. Um and so it's it's it's in it's just as important, right? And so yeah, I'm with you there.

SPEAKER_02 22:10

The the tabs thing is huge because tabs are cool. I mean, I just described using tabit. Tabs are cool, but all they show you is where to put your fingers to uh achieve uh playing a song that already exists, and there's this huge disconnect between that and the sort of musical theoretical understanding of what's you know, of notes and pitches and rhythms in a broader sense. So um you can spend your entire music career like just doing it like that and learning how to play songs, and you might even get really fucking good at your instruments, um, but you haven't actually learned anything about music exactly. Like you're it's um I remember so I started on the cello. That was my first instrument. Never got good at it, I was always terrible at it. Um but I remember in high school I got to a point where I was like I started playing guitar as well. I didn't want to learn like any more technique stuff on the cello. I wanted to learn like about music theory, and my teacher, of course, is like a you know a classical, like an orchestral player, and she was like she did she didn't really know a lot of the theory stuff that I was asking about, and I was kind of like, oh fuck. So like you know, orchestral musicians, anybody who like plays in orchestra at a high level, they are fucking sicklos. Like they can read stuff off a page first take with the with the right articulation and feeling, and like you know, you get the people play in like orchestras for um film scoring and stuff, they're incredible at playing. At r they read what's on the page, they're like um uh what's his name? Anchorman Ron Burgundy.

SPEAKER_03 24:17

Oh, right.

SPEAKER_02 24:18

He'll read anything you put on the telecom. Like whatever the musical equivalent of go fuck yourself, San Diego is, right? Right. Um and uh they might ha they might have a lot of musical knowledge also, but like you understand the the sort of metaphor here, right? Like you can learn to play and not learn any music stuff, like, or not not nearly as much as you might want to. Um and it once again, it's not so much that there's something wrong with that, it's just like understanding where it fits into certain things. Now, if you don't have someone in your band who's like writing, it will probably fall to you. Um as the guitar player, that's pretty often the um the guitarist's job. Like a lot of guitarists are writing, like at least they're providing those, like that sort of initial seed of an idea, even if it's just a riff. Um and maybe they're maybe it's a collaborative writing process or whatever. Um, but no matter what, you gotta be thinking of where each person's like strengths lie and where their like where their place is in the in the little um pantheon of your band or your song or whatever. And I'm always thinking of about that probably more than anything else. Now, uh, the original question was whether or not I'd ever written anything starting with piano. And we are now very far afield of that. But this but I'm gonna bring it back, I'm gonna bring it all the way back around. If you are a guitar player who has never has only ever written on the guitar, I highly recommend you try writing on something else, or at least starting from a different instrument or or idea, right? Start with uh a rhythm, start with um a piano, a few piano chords, right? Like uh the way that I write is complete fucking chaos, okay? I'll start with whatever little idea I had. More often than not, it's a vocal idea, um, like a phrase that I think sounds cool or like means something that I that I'm feeling or or thinking about or whatever. And you just kind of build on that, right? Like I, you know, you just sort of um start from there, layer things, add more horizontally and vertically, but I'm always thinking, like, what's the what is the backdrop for all of these ideas? What's the foreground idea? What's the sort of background accompaniment idea? This is a podcast about rhythm guitar. There's a a a huge swath of things that the rhythm guitar could be or what it could do, but more often than not, it's accompaniment, right? Um it's sort of uh usually inhabits a space from the sort of background or um accompaniment space to uh a sort of interesting middle ground, right? If you've got like a really melodic riff, for example. It might be sort of foreground, but it's um it's not usually gonna spend the whole song there if it's still living in the realm of rhythm guitar. I always think of the um one of my all-time favorite riffs, the um Winter Sun um I mean the first riff off the first album. Now uh what's amazing about that is that it contains the melody and the the harmony in one riff, and it's got great phrasing and like it's really uh got interesting rhythm and all kinds of shit. It's fucking fucking great. Perfect riff. Um and he like sort of like p like it's very self-contained, but most riffs aren't like that, you know? So um anyway, all that to say I'm usually thinking of all of those things as being layers of instruments within the song, right? Maybe the vocal has the melody, the rhythm guitar and the bass are providing the harmony. Um keyboard could be providing a a variety of those things, but it's usually like a sprinkling of extra harmony, um some interesting in-between bits, and then the drums are are doing the providing the rhythm. And if you're if you don't play any other instruments, or you can't like think about what they should be doing and write them, even if you don't play them, um, then you're just like really gonna be kind of stuck in a guitar mindset, which um does actually have a lot of strengths in a way. I don't wanna like once again throw Min-maxed guitarists under the you know, under the uh under the bus. Uh you said you had Donnie on here, right? Like like Donny's full-on writing everything. Like he can write, you know, I've seen him do like full-on orchestration and drums and and bass, the whole the whole fucking works. And um, you know, like that's pretty OP for like being a guitarist in Cradle of Filth. Like he could just learn the parts and play 'em, right? Right. Yeah. But you're not gonna yeah, I don't know. It's um I think it's really important to be thinking about it like this and be thinking about where your guitar part goes in the song above and beyond everything else. And one way that you can really figure that out real quick is to write something, maybe even a whole song not on the guitar. You know, maybe like a full-on song on not guitar and then add the guitar. Yeah. Uh that's a that is a long answer to a short question. Write that song. TLDR, write a song not on guitar. Done.

SPEAKER_03 30:53

No, I love it. Uh, another thing that got lost earlier, but it it kind of fits here. Um, that we were talking about, I mentioned to Trey uh a song that really because if you if you dig up my old shit, dude, it's just riff soup in the worst way. Like sometimes there's good riff soup, but not my stuff. Like I listen to it and I cringe. But for some reason, the song The Haunting by Camelot was my realization that hey, maybe the guitar doesn't always have to be doing something big. Because in that song, it's really just providing some chords, some backbone, but it's keyboards and the vocals are leading that song, and that was like my first aha moment of like, oh, maybe when I write a song, like the guitars can chill the fuck out. Uh, and wouldn't you know it? I started to write better songs. Um, and I still have my riffs, but I again I learned like, yeah, maybe chill out when the vocals come in. Um, and so I always just credit that song as a good reminder of that. So yeah, and you know, Thomas, the guitarist, is the songwriter of that band, at least the primary songwriter. So he probably applies a lot, he has to, with all the shit that Camelot writes, he's gotta have that knowledge of like he knows because also Camelot gets super riffy sometimes, so he he knows when to riff, when to not. Um, also, funny thing, but I have to rant about this every time I talk about Camelot. Listen to every goddamn Camelot song, everybody, and I dare you send it to me. Find me a Camelot song that doesn't start off riffy, and then when it gets to the first verse, everything dies out. That is every Camelot song. To a point that I've noticed it and I have to comment on it.

SPEAKER_02 32:42

I mean, it's uh it's a formula and it works. So the um I mentioned our song Um Carmaloop, and Karma Loop is very strongly uh inspired by Camelot, and we 100% do exactly that.

SPEAKER_03 33:04

Um There's nothing wrong, it works. There's nothing wrong with it, but every song on every album. I dare you to find me one, Trey, that it doesn't do it.

SPEAKER_02 33:14

I think I can't remember, but I'm gonna pay closer attention. I mean, I I absolutely believe you.

SPEAKER_03 33:20

Ballads don't count, obviously.

SPEAKER_02 33:22

But but I yeah, I like I believe it.

SPEAKER_03 33:25

Like just quickly flipping through my Camelot Rolodex in my mind, I'm like I know, just I am like it's something I clocked even in high school where I was like, wow, every song.

SPEAKER_02 33:40

Uh I think it's like because you were sitting there learning them and you were like, oh, this part I get to stop. Like, or like you fast you gotta fast forward through it to learn the next riff.

SPEAKER_03 33:50

You kind of started to answer a question I was gonna ask you. So let's just do that.

SPEAKER_02 33:54

Now that all the guitarists have left, because they're like, I don't want to hear about star writing, I want to hear about guitar stop.

SPEAKER_03 34:01

Our hour-long episode. We got 10 minutes to talk about guitar, everybody. Let's go. No, um, you kind of you kind of started to talk about this, so it's a good moment to bring it up because this is something I wanted to specifically ask you because of how versatile you are with your writing and your playing and everything. Because when we think rhythm guitar, heavy metal, we're thinking Metallica, we're thinking the downpicks, we're thinking the gallops. But in your opinion, what is just as important or more important than just being able to play a solid downpick? You know, as if like as a strong rhythm player, like you're not gonna downpick all the time. There's plenty of songs, bands that don't really rely on that but have great rhythm. Like, rhythm isn't just you know what I'm saying? So uh this is one I specifically wanted to ask you, just in your experience of all the songwriting, different genres you've done, because you do your videos of like writing like this band or writing like that band. So, what are other things that you think are just as important? Like like heavy metal rhythm is not just downpicking open E, you know.

SPEAKER_02 35:10

Not with that attitude, Howard. Yeah, um so um you're right. There's also a B str a low B string. Oh, my bad. So yeah, you're right. Okay. Realistically, this is probably a really dumbass answer to this. There's really only two possibilities, right? There's a down and an up. Okay. So you can I've tried going sideways, but all that does is give you a scrapie sound. That is that is my answer, but now the now I'm gonna make it make sense. And that's syncopation. I I do this without really thinking about it, but you you'll have to um you'll have to check this against your own playing, people who are watching this. Um Typically, I start like the the down picks match up with like on the beat things. Right? Like one and two and three and four and down down, down, down, down, down, down, down. Um and anytime I'm playing something that's off the beat, just bec just because of the binary nature of picking, like if you're doing two downstrokes in a row, that means that you have missed an opportunity to do an upstroke, right? Because if you pick down past the string, the fastest ne the next thing could be an upstroke. You have to you have to bring your pick back to the other side of the string in order to do the downstroke period, right? Uh that stands to reason. Um so if you're picking down on the numbers, the upstroke is going to be the and and the or the the s and syncopation is just uh emphasizing those uh off beats, right? The ands or the the e's. Like r uh if you're doing sixteenth notes, it's like one e and uh, two e and uh, right? Um in which case the e's are the syncopation, the e and the uh, one e and uh. And you can s you can very clearly see this if you uh count like this. One and two and three and four and right with your finger. If you're just listening to this on the podcast, you can't see what I'm doing. But I'm just you know, I'm like waving my finger like a baton, like down, up, down, up, down, up, down, up. Down picking is super heavy sounding. It's got such fucking beefy chunk to it, right? That's why we love James Heffield, right? There's a fucking beautiful sound to it, and it's very heavy. The off uh the syncopations um like you can still get a really heavy, chunky sound out of it. Actually, uh watching Ola England is really interesting because he like he'll do uh like gallop things down up, down, up, down, up, down, up, down, up, down, up. Um, but all that to say, um the syncopation to me provides more musical interest um and it's um it's like it's uh very spicy and like rhythmically spicy and and interesting. Um to me it is like a lot of metal is very uh Eurocentric, you know. It's not um it it's it's honestly like lacking a lot of syncopation as compared to uh like world music, right? Dance music, uh stuff that's like, you know, more that has more movement to it. Like uh down downstrokes and uh sort of on the beat music has a sort of a leaden feel to it in a lot of ways. And figuring out a really strong upstroke situation where you're adding like where you've got interesting syncopations in there um will allow you to create much more bouncy, interesting rhythmic patterns and things. Like I think because we as metal guitarists we focus on that downstroke thing, um, a lot of the time we make very, very boring on-the-beat rhythms without a lot of syncopation. Now, you know, there's it's if you only have syncopation, all you have is reggae, right? One, and two, and three, and four, and one, and two, and three, and four, and or ska, I guess, but um you can see how um an overemphasis on the downstroke can give you really, really boring music, really great sounding heavy guitars, but uh pretty boring, like music rhythmically boring musical ideas. So um one thing that I really like to do, um, and this is straight out of Paul Gilbert, um, is to is to strengthen your upstrokes by trying to play things with only upstrokes. Like sit there and and just improvise whatever, play, maybe play something that you play normally. Like play Master of Puppets with all upstrokes, and like you're gonna find out real quick how fucking weak your pick hand is. Like, that to me is one of the best possible exercises, and just to just to improvise and play things with all upstrokes, because it's like the it's like you suddenly turned over the the menu to see that there's um you know chocolate milkshakes on the back, and now you can order a chocolate milkshake, and you're like, oh fuck, I've been there only uh I've been only drinking vanilla ones because I didn't see that there was another option on the back of the menu. So uh all that, once again, a long answer to a short question, upstrokes. I'm good with it. You're like you were like, downstrokes? What other ones are good? And I was like, yeah, have you ever heard of upstrokes, bro?

SPEAKER_03 41:17

You haven't. Speaking of Paul Gilbert, one of my favorite exercises, and I have my guitar for anyone who's actually watching it, was one that I saw from Paul Gilbert, you might know it. And it it's it because I was looking like this was like years ago, I was looking up like new rhythm exercises, and he does on the the high, the high three strings, right? E, B, and G, he does upstroke, upstroke, downstroke. And it's it's fucking I was like, oh, that doesn't look bad. That doesn't seem bad. It's a fucking nightmare. Um so you're on the E and the B, you're doing an upstroke, palm muted, and then on the G, he does a downstroke. And at first you think, oh, that's not too bad. Um, but then he starts going Paul Gilbert speed, and yeah, it's fucking crazy. Yeah, that's that's rough. And that's one he was saying he did like he warms up um. So sorry.

SPEAKER_02 42:10

Um good the reason I thought of Paul Gilbert um when it comes to upstrokes, I'm sure many of you heard have heard this story before, but for the first like two years that he played he played guitar, it was the opposite. He did everything with upstrokes and he did not know that you could downstroke. So he got crazy fucking good with the upstrokes. And now he like so he's it's kind of like being ambidextrous, ambitious, like, but he was just opposite, right? You know, and that's great. I never knew that. And somebody was like, hey man, you ever think about picking in the opposite direction? He was like, What? I mean he was like, I think it was like eight or ten or whatever, like you know, um and so that like kind of weirdness of weird backwards approach turned out to be one of his biggest strengths, and now he like the way that he looks at guitar, everything is like uh just a completely different perspective, you know. Like everybody was doing sweet picking, and he was like, Oh, how about these like string skipping arpeggios instead? And he does it super different from how everybody else does it. Like he does it really well, and I do it shit.

SPEAKER_03 43:27

Yeah, I mean, yeah, you get me a you get me past that 12th fret at 200 BPM and you gloss me. Um so I think for the the rhythm question, it wasn't so much more about like the downpick, uppick sort of conversation, right? Like I more meant when people think like people think of rhythm guitar, what comes to mind, James Hetfield, right? But there's a lot of, you know, if you think more like groove metal or like stone or doom, the more kind of like loose kind of riffs do bird, you know, or whatever. Um Um that's still rhythm, right? It's it's groovy and stuff, and they're not it's not like tight picking. And so I feel some people kind of forget about that part and they just think, well, I can downpick really well, so I'm a I'm a great rhythm player. Guilty. Um and so but there's a lot more to rhythm playing than just well, I can I can downpick, you know. I think that's more what I was asking you is yeah, what other sort of styles would you say are important, if that makes more sense.

SPEAKER_02 44:28

It does. Um, but um I I stand by my first answer, but I'm uh I can I will I I have more ideas. Um I love hearing the sound of my own voice. I'm a fucking narcissist, so I'm gonna keep talking. Fuck you. Um good. No, but uh I mentioned Van Halen earlier, and one of the one of the things from that sort of era of guitar playing, right? The sort of 80s and um and 70s, like late 70s style of guitar stuff that you also hear in like extreme and like rat and like a lot of a lot of those kind of hair metal bands.

SPEAKER_03 45:09

Um I know where he's going and I love this style of playing. I just had to say that. Keep going.

SPEAKER_02 45:14

Yes. Where they would use like um like a lot of uh three string chords on like the um the B, G, and D strings while they were also playing like a usually like a pedal tone on maybe the A string, you know, um, but like utilizing bigger chords and kind of going back and forth between like a lower note, like a root note, and then superimposing higher chords on there. Um is it unchained? Dan and it dan it dan and like uh that's a just a the first example that pops into my mind, and that's cool for a number of reasons, but also because once again it's it's thinking more broadly than just like a riff. It's like um you're filling out a lot of harmony, right? You've got bigger chords, but you've still got the heaviness um of the the sort of chunkier lower notes, and um there are a lot of people who have taken this idea um to sort of the next level. I mean, um, do that um a lot of the time with a lot crazier, bigger chords than I can even think of off the dome. But um just, you know, like getting breaking free of just the lower, lowest two strings or whatever, um, by adding in larger chords, um, you know, it it gets a it gets a lot harder to play because the playing stuff like that clean, especially on a more than six-string guitar, is is it what's just difficult and challenging. And uh if you like a challenge, then uh I would actually recommend uh Ben Eller has a lot of tutorials on his channel about that kind of playing. Um he's uh I mean he's a great teacher too, so um that sort of stuff um lives a lot on his channel, but I think once again exploring sort of bigger chords and more harmony um and not just doing that and pedaling on the low open string. Uh hear a lot of that in um in a lot of like shittier gent, like people who miss the point of gent, just like bigger chords, but it's all still anchored to a single pedal tone, um, which I think is really fucking boring. You know, finding ways like the Winter Sun Riff to To carry a a chord progression within a riff. Um to me that's like that's peak. If you can get all of the like an interesting chord progression and feel the the full chord progression, all of the harmony within the riff, and then you have a great bed for an awesome melody, to me that's peak. Like that's peak rhythm guitar. Um it's not always the move, but uh I think if you can do that, you've you've uh struck fucking gold.

SPEAKER_03 48:52

Yeah. And it does, I do agree, like again, it's it's the it's the timer place, right? Again, because there's nothing wrong, obviously there's nothing wrong with the Hetfield way. We all love it. Um, the thrash, the down to the ease, but man, sometimes when you get those nice, beautiful fucking open chords and you're riding that sh and like riffing on that shit, and it's clean. That's the thing too, right? The it's gotta be clean, and this goes back to like the performance of it, because it can sound sloppy real fast, and then it's not as good. But when it's done right, and like you said, the the guys in the 80s really kind of mastered that style. Um, and I didn't bring this up earlier when you're talking about Van Halen because I was I was letting you go, but that's one thing that's great about Van Halen that I don't think it's talked about enough, right? Because he's he's known for the tapping and the solos, but motherfucker was a beast of a rhythm player too. Yeah, like just all around great player doing all great great feel to the rhythm.

SPEAKER_02 49:51

Like it just it carried the song um in a lot of ways, harmonically, of course, as well, but just the um just the feeling of it, you know, like caring about how it how it felt against the the pulse, against the beat, against the drums and all that, you know, and of course having a super solid rhythm section doesn't fucking hurt, but like, you know, um we can't give them too much credit because it's a guitar podcast.

SPEAKER_03 50:25

Yeah, yeah. But like we got one for you guitarists, don't worry. Yeah. Um all right, so I got one more question for you, and then we're gonna do some fun rapid fire shit, and then I'll get you out of here. Um but this is more so it's gonna we'll go back to using In Virtue for um our example, and we can plug the album a little bit more and all that. But one thing that I'm always fascinated by, because it's something I feel like I still haven't mastered, and I always love hearing other people, but just so let's talk more on the production side of tracking guitar, how you approach getting those great takes.

SPEAKER_02 51:09

Well, I can tell you how I like to approach it. Yeah, that's fair. Um so I think the end product is what's going to live in everyone's memory forever, okay? Um so it has to be right. Um but I also know that over-editing something can suck all of the fucking life out of it. That's not an excuse to leave something shitty, right? Like a lot of people are like, no, we just want it to be real natural, and then it just fucking sucks. Um I can tell you that the goal should be that you should practice it until you can play it not just perfectly, but also in a way that feels good and is very tight and doesn't have a bunch of uh just noises, you know, like un like bad noise that you don't want. And if what it takes for you to get a recording that sounds like that is that you're, you know, recording it in pieces and doing a bit of editing, um then that's what you should do, but what you should actually do is practice it until you have it just feeling fucking great and get it nailed because the other thing that you're going to have to do inevitably is to double it or maybe quad track it or whatever, okay? Um so you should practice it until you can do that. For us recording the album, it was sort of a combination of factors because we wrote these songs, like I wrote the vast majority of everything, right? And as I explained before, like I'm writing the I'm writing the song, okay? Like there was input from other people in a lot of pl uh spots, but it was mostly like I need keyboards that go here, Alex. Like, let's cook some keyboard parts up, and he would come up with some stuff, and it would it would be like things that were going within the context of what I'd written. Um, and it's you know, like fifty-something minutes of music. Um, and it's not like we were rehearsing as a band a lot. So sometimes I would go to the studio and like so most of the time nowadays and before this, I'm tracking myself most of the time. Okay, so I have gotten really good with working in Pro Tools, okay, to get the takes. In this case, there was a producer who was um who was actually running the sessions. Um and so I would have to get it pretty good. And a lot of stuff I would be doing like like long takes of parts. But you know, some of the stuff I'd be like, oh fuck, how does this go? And then I'd have to sit there and like, you know, and it was just like catch as catch can and like you know, get the get the take however you can get it. But I will say that like it's so much more of a slog if you don't if you have to cut it together like that. Like people say like, oh they just it's all editing. And like that's that's way harder than just learning it and playing it fucking right. You know, like like editing sucks. It's not fun. It it sucks a lot of the life and fun out of recording and possibly out of your final product. In luckily, like I am, you know, pretty good and I did write all the parts, so like I, you know, like even if it was sort of uh even if I wasn't quite as good at it at one part as some of the others, you know, it still came out exactly how I wanted to, but it's more about like the process. If you know the stuff a lot better and you've you're feeling how it should feel in the song, um it's like the final product is going to be way better. Like unedited guitars just sound better, they feel fucking better. Um like if you have to be in there like stretching and fucking chopping everything, like it's it's just suboptimal. And like it's hard to because so much of what we do is super technical, right? Like the guitar is a is a technically demanding instrument, and it the curve of getting like going from not being able to play at all to being able to play at a level where you can be recording metal guitar is years and years and of sucking balls just fucking sounding like shit. Um and that's so we we get into this mindset of like this sort of technical perfection and we forget about the feel, which is um you know, you just lose the plot. It's easy to do. Like you're spending, you know, dude, when I was at Berkeley, I was spending like fucking eight hours a day in practice rooms just like just practicing my instrument. And that is, man, that's fucking rough. And like, so then you get, you know, you get to a point where you can just like do it and you're like, fuck yeah. And then you go like, oh shit, it has to feel good too, it has to sound good like No, I got the I got the technique, isn't that enough? Wasn't enough! It's never enough. Um, so but the you know, like the being able to get it to feel really good comes, you know, once you've got a bit of the technique down, but you also should be thinking about that as you go, and that's the level that you should have it to before you hit record on the final product. Now, I'm writing in the DAW 99% of the time, because that's just how I think, because I can think of the arrangement as I'm going. Um so I'm recording like shitty fucking scratch versions of these ideas as I go, and they you know, I and then I go through and learn it, and then I record it for real as often as time permits. Um, but I'm also writing and recording a lot of music for things that are not in virtue, right? Right. Like um stuff for videos for the channel, like I'm doing one this week, uh, another time travel metal video, and like it doesn't, you know, this isn't like an fucking expression of my personal art on a you know, it's not super deeply personal and representative for me, and so I'm just janking it the fuck together because I'm trying to work fast, you know. Like right now I'm I'm actually considering whether or not it's gonna be worth it to like retrack some of the guitars that I wrote for this stupid fucking video. And I think I'm pretty sure it's not going to be worth it. But I'm also like just doing writing sessions for all kinds of stuff these days, which is pretty fucking awesome. But like you kind of just gotta go, and like if you're working quickly, you might have to just record. But I find that recording is also one of the best ways to get tight because like how often, like in under what other circumstances can you play something and immediately see how far off from the beat you are. Like you can see the fucking grid. Um you know, you don't want to necessarily just be fucking grid man, like and be super metronomic, but you can you can see exactly where you played this, like where in time you played this thing. So, um the part. And that's how I've gotten uh to be pretty tight. Like it's really, really good to be able to play with other people if you possibly can. Uh there's there's a an urgency to that that you can't get from recording in the DAW when you have infinity takes. But in terms of just like understanding how to get tight good sounding rhythm guitars or anything, um, like pr I have Pro Tools to thank for that, and I recommend anybody who's been playing guitar for a while who if you don't record yourself, you absolutely should start in whatever DAW you can get your hands on. I've been doing it for a while.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:38

The DAW will pull no punches, so you'll see right away.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:42

Yeah, yeah. And it's just instant feedback. You you can see and hear what you just did, and the thing is it's it's rough for a little while, it's emotionally rough for a little while. You think you're great.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:56

Yeah, sometimes you don't realize, even when you do a take, you're like, oh, that felt good. And then you listen back and you're like, aha. It wasn't.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:04

And the opposite happens all the fucking time. I'm like, I'm like, ah shit, that was a garbage take. And then I listened back and I was like, no, that was that was the one. It was perfect. Why did I think your your perception in the moment is immediately followed by an objective perception. And oh, I like that. Yes. And you learn how they match up and how they're different. Like, but it's instantaneous. You're like, your perception in the moment, you play, you think it's went a certain way, and then you immediately get the playback. Like that, you get the what do they do in sports? The instant replay.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:40

Oh, yeah. Yep.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:41

You know, the player on the field doesn't get to see the instant replay, but you do, as the you know, it's fucking it's humbling. Yep. And I love it. I agree.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:53

Made me the man I am today.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:56

Alright, let's get you some rapid fire questions and then we're gonna get you out of here. But I want to thank you one more time for your time, my man. I do appreciate it. Thank you. Uh alright. Couple rapid fire questions here for Trey. So, a riff that makes you get an instant stink face.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:13

Oh, the bad thing by periphery.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:17

Okay.

unknown 1:02:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:18

I'll be able to do that.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:19

That to me is like right here. Yeah, instantaneous.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:24

Nice. Okay. Uh a riff that I wonder if this would go hand in hand. Uh I didn't think about when I wrote these, but a riff that made you mad you didn't write it. Mmm. In a playful way. Obviously, right, you know, we're all proud of what we've done mostly. But speak for yourself, bro. I said mostly.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:48

Um that makes me mad I I didn't write it. Oh. Like a riff you heard, like fucking.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:53

I wish I'd yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:55

96 Quite Bitter Beings.

unknown 1:02:57

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:58

By CKY. I mean, that's um this m this might ruin a question you're about to ask, but I think that's the greatest riff of all time.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:06

Nice. Actually, don't have that question, but good to know. Okay. Now, I don't really know much of CKY, but is that like the riff everyone knows?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:15

Uh it's the Bernadette Nur riff? Okay. Bernadette.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:23

One band you would join tomorrow, no questions asked.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:27

So honestly, I'm not gonna join any band, but uh if if In Virtue dissolved for whatever reason and we couldn't do it, I mean it would have um it would have to be Amaranth. I mean, that's just my favorite band. Uh cool. That would suck because that's some really, really hard guitar. Really hard shit. I don't know why I thought of this, but uh maybe Kansas also.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:02

Kansas got riffs. Kansas has got riffs. Well, thank you, Trey, for being here. Uh I appreciate it, man. I hope you have a great time in Brazil. First time pioneer here, everybody. First metal musician answering the call of Come To Brazil.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:18

Yeah. I you know, I like to be the first as often as possible. Yeah, and I'm uh yeah, just on the bleeding edge. But um we're gonna let as as promised, here's the blue here's the blue one. Sorry.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:33

Oh, yep, yep.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:34

I forgot that I was gonna show you. This is the this is the doorknob moment. You've got your hand on the doorknob and you're like, oh no, I was gonna we were gonna leave now. And I'm like, no, no, no. Here's the here's the blue version, which we also have in virtue.band. This is what I this is what I earned by being on your podcast. I earned the chance to to uh shill my own vinyl.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:56

Well, I was actually gonna tell Trey that we're gonna end the episode with him plugging his stuff, but he uh he got ambitious there. Fuck he he had to be first. He had to be first, and that's okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:08

Um but no to ask me any ask ask me anyways so that I don't feel bad about myself for jumping the gun.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:15

Okay. Uh I was just gonna say, real quick, if you are a rhythm guitarist, an up-and-coming player, and you want to join a community of other rhythm players, metal players, where we help each other out, give feedback, whatever, join the Discord, share this podcast, please. Uh get it out there to more people. And I would love to end with Trey, our good friend Trey here, uh plugging his stuff, where he can find you, what he's got, um, and you know, just anything. Now's your moment. Whatever you want to do.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:42

Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity. So yeah, In Virtue is the band. We're you know on all the streaming services. Our album is Age of Legends. We have it for sale. If you want to really support us, buy it on vinyl. Obviously, the you know, full size artwork. comes in both red or uh it comes in either red or blue, splatter, vinyl. We have it on C D. We've got t-shirts and uh handwritten lyrics and all kinds of stuff. I suppose since this is the guitar podcast, I uh I wish I could tell you that we have tabs for sale um but we do not um but we've got everything else. In virtue.band is the website and of course we're on uh all the uh socials and all of that YouTube is probably if you really want to get an idea of what we're about head over to YouTube and look us up. We've got some music videos and that's sort of like gives you the full picture. So thank you uh for letting me shill my own shit.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:45

Of course. And you guys if you want to get some good songwriting from check out check out GearGoz as well. Yep. Alright. See you next time.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:55

Peace out