Thursday, February 26, 2009

Alexi Laiho

Alexi Laiho
Alexi Laiho performing.
Alexi Laiho performing.
Background information
Birth name Markku Uula Aleksi Laiho
Born April 8, 1979 (1979-04-08) (age 29)
Espoo, Finland
Genre(s) Melodic death metal, power metal, speed metal, neo-classical metal, black metal
Occupation(s) Musician, singer-songwriter
Years active 1993 – present
Associated acts Children of Bodom, Sinergy, Kylähullut, Impaled Nazarene
Website [2], [3]
Notable instrument(s)
ESP Alexi Laiho Signature Models


Great guitarist. He is a lead guitarist for band called children Of Bodom Finland. He played guitar and sing at the same time.This is completely a difficult task to do. People always found that they can't sing well while playing guitar at the same time, but not for Alexi Laiho. I had all of the band albums from the first one until the latest one.I only managed to get the un-original album for the latest one, wah it is hard to find the original one in Malaysia. But if I find one, I'm definitely gonna buy it. Say no to piracy! I'm sure all of us agree that piracy will only brings disadvantages to the music industry right? So lets buy the original one, no buyers no sellers! Ok, enough of my speechs. Lets go back to Alexi Laiho topic.

Well, Alexi Laiho is surely a true guitar hero, at such young age he and the band already won many awards, within their country and of course internationally. The reason why he has a high techniques of guitar playing skills is because a lot of sacrifices he made. He was dropped out from school since he was 16 and playing guitar is what he was doing ever since. He once said that "We've done this (making music) is not because of money, if one of the band member decided to quit then let he go, because it gonna be totally fake if he still staying and not enjoying it." I've quoted his words from the metal video produced in 2001. I forget the video title, trying to search it within my hardisk but what the f##k, I've just formatted my laptop and lose the video,arrgghh! If someone knows the video that I'm talking about, please do tell, really want to see it again.

You know, I actually can write a lot about Alexi Laiho, but I bet you will get bored reading my thought about him, besides all informations about him is available on the internet. There is no point for me to copy and paste, and re-posting it in here. I'm wishing all band members of Children Of Bodom, ( Alexi, Roope, Jaska, Janne, Henkka and ex-member,Alexander) a super gigantic, titanic good luck, still many years to come, the band has a very bright futures!!! Metal forever!!!

For further reading:
(a) Children Of Bodom - wikipedia
(b) Children Of Bodom Official website

Children Of Bodom - Hellhounds On My Trail


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Sunday, February 22, 2009

Slash

Slash
Slash performing in 2008
Slash performing in 2008


His real name is Saul Hudson (born 23 July 1965), he is widely known known as the former lead guitarist of Guns N' Roses (1985–1996) and as the current lead guitarist of Velvet Revolver.

History of Guns N' Roses Formation
In 1984, both Slash and Axl Rose, with their own band opened for Christian metal band Stryper. After the show, they were introduced to one another by a friend. The two quickly became friends, months later, Slash and his friends, Steven Adler were invited to join with Axl Rose, Duff McKagan and Izzy Stradlin.That was the day Guns N' Roses was formed.

Guns N' Roses (1985–1996)
The band once had been tagged as the "Most Dangerous Band In The World".From the start, they've built their images by spent half of their advance on clothes, and the other half on alcohol and drugs. With 15 million copies sold in the United States, their album Appetite for Destruction is the second highest selling debut album of all time, behind Boston's debut. By 1988, Guns N' Roses scored its first #1 hit with Sweet Child o' Mine. At the same year, Guns N' Roses released G N' R Lies and it sold over 5 million copies.
In 1991, the band released Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II. They toured for 28-month long to promote their new albums. Upon completion of the tour, Slash was naturalized, becoming an American citizen.
Because of his long confrontation with Axl Rose, Slash officially departed from GNR in 1996. As Rose expressed a desire to pursue more progressive genres, Slash and McKagan fought to maintain their traditional sound as a punk/blues-based hard rock band.

Velvet Revolver (2002-present)
They released their first single, "Set Me Free" as part of the soundtrack for The Hulk. In June 2004, they released their first studio album, Contraband. The album went double platinum and re-established Slash as a mainstream performer. In July 2007, they released Libertad, a follow-up to their multi-platinum debut. Following their second studio album, Velvet Revolver also began a second tour. On March 20, 2008 during a glasgow gig, Weiland announced to their audience that it would be Velvet Revolver's final tour. On 1 April 2008, Scott Weiland officially split from Velvet Revolver.On September 30, 2008, Slash began recording demos for the upcoming album.Rumored singers for the project include Slash's close friends Lenny Kravitz, Sebastian Bach, Alice Cooper and Vince Neil as well as his past Guns N' Roses pals, Izzy Stradlin and Duff McKagan.




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Friday, February 20, 2009

Marty Friedman


Marty Friedman was born in December 8, 1962 (age 47 years old). His early career as a guitarist is known by his project band called Cacophony, where he team up with Jason Becker. Cacophony is often recognized for its technically challenging, neo-classical metal and speed metal elements.Both of them always been compared with each other.They broke up in 1989, with Friedman joining the successful thrash metal band Megadeth and Becker joining David Lee Roth's solo band. The fans famous questions are who is better, who has better shredding techniques, an so on. But for me the comparison made is totally not fair because both of them are guitar god, every one of them has their own skills. Jason Becker is known because sweep picking technique he had developed at such young age (see serrana video by Jason Becker in Youtube if you are not believe me). Marty Friedman is surely seem weird when he is holding the pick, but that's his style, people can do whatever they feel confortable right? Also, his is an exellent composer.He and Paul Gilbert had jammed together for the Young Guitar Magazine, I think the video is the best instructional video that ever been recorded. You can see the video here, they consist of 5 parts.
Part 1
Part2
Part3
Part4
Part5

He is currently live in Japan and speaks Japanese fluently. I'm sure he can easily gets Japanese girls as many as he wants to. Haha! Urrrgh, definitely gonna visit Japan someday...hehehe. Owh, why am I smiling like a freakin' idiot? Lol!

Marty Friedman


Marty Friedman - Thunder March

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Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Steve Vai

Another ultimate guitar legend who owned the name Steve Vai. While other guitar players easily fit with their own genre and stail, Steve Vai's music remains un-categorized.His guitar sounds are extremely unique, and whenever I heard his song, my head automatically imagined an alien figure. I don't know why but that really happened, so weird!
I'm always wondering about how did he invented that kind of sound, for those who never heard of Steve Vai's music, I think you probably should.I love his 'Tender Surrender' song, insane technique!

Steve Vai
Steve Vai in 2007
Steve Vai in 2007
Background information
Birth name Steven Siro Vai
Born June 6, 1960 (1960-06-06) (age 48)
Carle Place, New York
Genre(s) Instrumental rock, Hard rock, Experimental rock, Heavy metal, Progressive rock
Instrument(s) Guitar, vocals
Years active 1980 - present
Associated acts
David Lee Roth, Whitesnake, Alcatrazz, Frank Zappa, G3, Billy Sheehan, Ozzy Osbourne



Tender Surrender


Crossroads Guitar Duel



Further information:
Wikipedia
Steve Vai's website
Youtube

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Saturday, February 14, 2009

Paul Gilbert

He is one of my favorite guitarist, really like his composition like Scarified, Technical Difficulties, Get Out of My Yard,..........oh man,the list goes on. Back in 2004, my friend played Paul Gilbert 's song on his computer, I still remember the title of the song is Technical Difficulties.That's the day when I fall in love with Paul Gilbert's composition. I wish I could have his guitar, the fake f hole is awesome.

I was shocked like a freakin' baboon 2 years ago when I discovered the Ibanez guitars hanging at the music shop have Paul Gilbert's signature on it, not one but two. The guitars was wrapped with plastic and labeled as "Not For Sell". Until now I'm still wondering are they fake or what? How did the guitars arrived here? Or may be the shop owner had an opportunities to get Paul Gilbert's sign when he was touring Malaysia in 2002? So many questions huh, why don't I just go and ask the shop owner where the hell did he got the guitar?I guest next time when I visiting the shop again I'll definitely ask him and force him to sell them to me.haha.




For further information:
(a) Wikipedia
(b) Paul Gilbert Official Website



Scarified


Technical Difficulties


Get Out Of My Yard



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Monday, February 9, 2009

Yngwie Malmsteen

The day Jimi Hendrix died, the guitar-playing Malmsteen was born.This was his famous quote, which quoted from his official website.He initially had no interest in music,but when he was 7 years old,he saw a TV documentary about the death of guitar hero, Jimi Hendrix. He saw with awe how Jimi Hendrix burned his guitar in flames and how his music attracts many kind of people.He was only 7 when that happened and I tried to remember,where was me when I was 7,watching some guitar program and dreaming about becoming a future well-known musician? No! Of course I was watching cartoons.haha.

Yngwie also created his first band "Track On Earth" when he was only 10 years old!I think that's odd because not many people can do that in a such young ages.His name already became legend in guitar shredding industry, he was known as one of the earliest neo-classical guitar shredder in the world,he studied most of the skills from the 19th century violin virtuoso Niccolo Paganini whom he cited as his biggest classical music influence.

I've bought his new album(Perpetual Flame),5 stars are not enough to rate this album,I would like to add 5 more stars,oh yes dude that's a total of 10 stars!It's worth buying and I highly recommended it.

These are some of his music life for the pasts 20 years, which is quoted from Wikipedia.

1980s
In late 1982 Malmsteen was brought to the U.S. by Mike Varney of Shrapnel Records, who had heard a demo tape of Malmsteen's playing. He had brief engagements with Steeler, for their self-titled album of 1983, then Alcatrazz, for their 1983 debut No Parole From Rock N' Roll, and the 1984 live album Live Sentence. Malmsteen released his first solo album Rising Force in 1984, which featured Barrie Barlow of Jethro Tull on drums. His album was really meant to be an instrumental side-project of Alcatrazz, but it contained vocals, and Malmsteen left Alcatrazz soon after the release of Rising Force.

Rising Force won the Guitar Player Magazine's award for Best Rock Album and was also nominated for a Grammy for 'Best Rock Instrumental', achieving #60 on the Billboard album chart. Yngwie J. Malmsteen's Rising Force (as his band was thereafter known) next released Marching Out (1985). Jeff Scott Soto filled vocal duties on these initial albums. His third album, Trilogy, featuring the vocals of Mark Boals, was released in 1986. In 1987, another singer, former Rainbow vocalist Joe Lynn Turner joined his band. That year, Malmsteen was in a serious car accident, smashing his Jaguar E-Type into a tree and putting him in a coma for a week. Nerve damage to his right hand was reported. During his time in the hospital, Malmsteen's mother died from cancer. In the summer of 1988 he released his fourth album, Odyssey. Odyssey would be his biggest hit album, mainly because of its first single "Heaven Tonight". Shows in Russia during the Odyssey tour were recorded, and released in 1989 as his fifth album Trial By Fire: Live in Leningrad.

Malmsteen's "Neo-classical" style of metal became widely popular among guitarists during the mid 1980s, with contemporaries such as Jason Becker, Paul Gilbert, Marty Friedman, Tony MacAlpine and Vinnie Moore becoming prominent. MacAlpine came to the neoclassical/shred field by applying his classical piano training to his guitar playing and Moore arrived at a similar style because he shared Malmsteen's major influences. In late 1988, Malmsteen's signature Fender Stratocaster guitar was released, making him and Eric Clapton the first artists to be honored by Fender.

1990s
In the early 1990s Malmsteen released the albums Eclipse (1990), The Yngwie Malmsteen Collection (1991), Fire and Ice (1992) and The Seventh Sign (1994). Despite his early success, and continuous success in Europe and Asia, by the early 1990s 1980s heavy metal styles such as neoclassical metal and lengthy, virtuoso shred guitar solos had become unfashionable in the US. In 1993, Malmsteen's mother-in-law, who was opposed to his engagement with her daughter, had him arrested for threatening her with a shotgun and holding her daughter against her will [2]. The charges against Malmsteen were dropped when he denied the incident.

In the 1990s, Malmsteen continued to record and release albums under the Japanese record label Pony Canyon, and maintained a devoted following from some fans in Europe and Japan, and to a lesser extent in the USA. In 2000, he once again acquired a contract with a US record label, Spitfire, and released his 1990s catalog into the US market for the first time, including what he regards as his masterpiece, Concerto Suite for Electric Guitar and Orchestra, recorded with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra in Prague.


2000s
After the release of War to End All Wars in 2000, singer Mark Boals left the band. Malmsteen went on tour with former Ark vocalist Jorn Lande. Due to various tensions on tour, Jorn left before the recording of Malmsteen's next album, Attack!!. He was replaced by former Rainbow vocalist Doogie White. White's vocals were well received by fans. In 2003, Malmsteen joined Joe Satriani and Steve Vai as part of the G3 supergroup. Malmsteen made two guest appearances on keyboardist Derek Sherinian's albums Black Utopia (2003), and Blood of the Snake (2006) where Malmsteen is heard on the same tracks as Al Di Meola and Zakk Wylde. In 2004, Malmsteen made two cameo appearances on Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law- possibly alluded to his status as a guitarist.

Malmsteen released Unleash the Fury in 2005. (This title may be a reference to an audio recording that supposedly captured Malmsteen's immoderate response to a flight attendant who spilled a beverage on him. The recording found popularity in filesharing networks as an example of the absurd behavior of celebrities.) He is married to April and has a son named Antonio after Antonio Vivaldi, and they live in Miami, Florida. A noted Ferrari enthusiast, he owned a black 1985 308 GTS[3] for 18 years before selling it on eBay, and a red 1962 250 GTO.[4] In the mid-2000s, he gave up smoking and drinking alcohol (date: April 2007).

In 2007, Malmsteen was honored in the Xbox 360 version of Guitar Hero II. Players can receive the "Yngwie Malmsteen" award by hitting 1000 or more notes in succession.[5] February 2008 saw the replacement of singer Doogie White with former Iced Earth and Judas Priest and current Beyond Fear singer Tim Owens, with whom Malmsteen had once recorded a cover of Ozzy Osbourne's song "Mr. Crowley", for the 2000 Osbourne tribute album Bat Head Soup: A Tribute to Ozzy. The first Malmsteen album to feature Owens is titled Perpetual Flame and was released on October 14. On November 25, 2008, Malmsteen had three of his songs ("Caprici Di Diablo", "Damnation Game", and "Red Devil") released as downloadable content for the video games Rock Band and Rock Band 2. Malmsteen was recently in 2008 a special guest on the VH1 Classic show "That Metal Show"




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Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Jason Becker


He was born July 22, 1969 is an American neo-classical metal guitarist and composer. He started playing guitar at the age of 5. At the age of 16, he became part of the Mike Varney-produced duo Cacophony with his friend Marty Friedman. They released Speed Metal Symphony in 1987 and Go Off! in 1988.Speed Metal Symphony is the most melodic sound that ever been recorded.

Jason Becker probably can be considered one the most unique and versatile guitarist known by the world, he have a very short time of playing guitar because of his ALS disease, I'm very sure that who ever know Jason Becker's high difficulty of guitar skills will agree that if he still can play today,the world of guitar shredding will become even better.

He was known for his insane guitar sweeping technique, not every great guitar player can sweep easily and smoothly as him, this was admitted by Paul Gilbert himself. Go try play Jason's compositions and you will know exactly how hard it is to play his composition. Becker's compositions often include sweeping, high speed scalar and arpeggio passages, all of which are trademarks of his 'shred' style of guitar playing. He demonstrated the arpeggio sequence during a clinic at the Atlanta Institute of Music.

Becker and Friedman toured together with Cacophony in Japan and across the United States. In 1989 Becker left to pursue a solo career, releasing his first solo album titled 'Perpetual Burn' in 1988, and has since released 'Perspective' and 'Collection' , as well as two albums of demos, entitled 'The Raspberry Jams' and 'The Blackberry Jams'.

When the ALS disease took his ability to play guitar, his friend and music producer Mike Bemesderfer helped him with a music-composing computer program which could read the movements of his head and eyes enabling Becker to continue to compose after he lost control of his entire body. Several years later Becker released Raspberry Jams (1999) and Blackberry Jams (2003), the first contained various unreleased demo-tracks and the latter contained demo-tracks and alternate versions of songs that were later reworked and published into other albums.

Two tribute albums to Jason Becker have been issued. Respectively entitled Warmth in the Wilderness I and Warmth in the Wilderness II, they feature guitarists such as Steve Vai, Paul Gilbert, Marty Friedman, Joe Becker, Rusty Cooley, and Mattias Eklundh. The album profits were sent to Becker to help him with his medical finances.


New album released in 2008 - Collection


On November 4, 2008, Shrapnel Records released a new Jason Becker album entitled "Collection". The album includes three new songs in addition to some older recordings (some never before released) and features Marty Friedman, Greg Howe, Joe Satriani, Michael Lee Firkins, Steve Vai, and Steve Hunter.

Track Listing:

  1. Rain
  2. River of Longing
  3. Images
  4. Opus Pocus
  5. Higher
  6. It's Showtime!
  7. Altitudes
  8. End of The Beginning
  9. River of Longing (Reprise)
  10. Meet Me in The Morning
  11. Air
  12. Electric Prayer for Peace
  13. Mandy's Throbbing Little Heart

Enhanced CD Features:

  1. End of The Beginning Demos (5 Tracks)
  2. Go Off! Intro
  3. Noodling For Rob and Tony


Jason Becker ABC2008



His solo when touring Japan 1989.



Jason Becker - Serrana

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