{"id":444,"date":"2011-02-09T05:31:26","date_gmt":"2011-02-09T10:31:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=444"},"modified":"2011-02-09T05:31:26","modified_gmt":"2011-02-09T10:31:26","slug":"trey-gunn-have-touch-guitar-will-travel-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2011\/02\/09\/trey-gunn-have-touch-guitar-will-travel-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Trey Gunn: Have Touch Guitar, Will Travel (part 1)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Trey Gunn is renowned in progressive and avant garde music circles for his technique, expression and boundary-pushing sense of musical adventure. Gunn has worked with (and provided his singular talents to) a wide variety of musical artists; the most high-profile of these would undoubtedly be King Crimson. He played \u201ctouch guitar\u201d on record and stage with the group from 1994 to 2003. His most recent project (one of many) is the new compilation <\/em>I\u2019ll Tell What I Saw. I had a few questions for him concerning this unusual compilation. \u2013 bk.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Bill Kopp: <\/strong>While there\u2019s a sort of sonic thread running through the various pieces compiled on I\u2019ll Tell What I Saw<\/em>, it\u2019s really widely varying music.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trey Gunn: <\/strong>Specific to this recording, it didn\u2019t start out the way it ended up. Which is often the case: you have an idea, and follow it along. And in the course of following it, something else explodes along the way. Which is the reason why you just need to be working! You need to practice, to play, to be onstage doing it, and just be aware of what\u2019s happening.<\/p>\n

Originally the project was just going to be a promotional CD for Voiceprint, my label in Europe. They were going to put out our or five of my records, and they wanted a promotional compilation. I\u2019ve only ever done one [compilation] before, and it\u2019s a little tricky for me. Because I make each record as a kind of self-contained thing. So I thought, \u201cOkay, you\u2019re going to put out my records, so I\u2019ll give it a shot.\u201d And then they said, \u201cGive us two discs if you want.\u201d I thought, two discs is way<\/em> too much!<\/p>\n

So I started messing around on one, and I realized that I have so many different projects that putting them together is quite a potpourri. I started thinking, \u201cThis is turning out kinda cool.\u201d I had this track that I recorded with Inna Zhelannaya<\/strong>, the Russian singer, and I thought, \u201cMaybe she\u2019ll let me put that on.\u201d So my circle started widening. I realized, \u201cHey, I played on this guy\u2019s<\/em> record; I wonder if he\u2019d<\/em> let me add a track.\u201d The thing started to grow. So I called Rob at Voiceprint and said, \u201cThis is turning into something pretty cool, something bigger than a promotional disc. I don\u2019t want to do all this work and then just give it away! I\u2019d like to take it further.\u201d We decided it might be two CDs.<\/p>\n

So I got about two-thirds of the material together, and then I widened my circle again. I asked myself, \u201cAre there any projects that I\u2019ve played on but haven\u2019t thought of?\u201d I went through my CD collection and found more and more stuff. I contacted everyone involved and told them, \u201cHey, look. There\u2019s really no money involved here, but it\u2019s a great opportunity for all of us.\u201d Most of the records aren\u2019t available in America, and some not even in Europe. So I pulled the whole thing together, and it ended up being so much cooler than some sort of Trey Gunn\u2019s Greatest Hits<\/em> kind of thing.<\/p>\n

BK: <\/strong>If you had to distill it, define it, what would you say it is that attracts you to a potential project?<\/span><\/p>\n

TG: <\/strong>Whenever somebody asks me to play, I always consider it. I generally check to see if I think there\u2019s the potential for a genuine contribution from me. Then I try to make that work. Sometimes I don\u2019t: I feel like somebody else could do this as well as me, or better. Or maybe I don\u2019t have time. Generally, if I feel like I can do a genuine contribution, then I do.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

BK: <\/strong><\/span>Most of the music on this set is instrumental. That makes me curious about your concept of the voice. Do you think of the human voice as, in a matter of speaking, just another instrument?<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/center><\/p>\n

\u00a0TG: <\/strong>For me, it\u2019s not just another instrument. It kind of is halfway, but it\u2019s not. The human voice is so expressive, so unique. The voice is so unique to the person, where instruments are not. There are unique musicians. I can pretty much hear one, maybe two notes from Bill Frisell<\/strong>, and I know it\u2019s him. (I used to be able to do that with Jeff Beck<\/strong>, but now there are so many people who copy him. Of course when you hear the real Jeff Beck, it\u2019s like, \u201cOh, that\u2019s<\/em> the real Jeff Beck.\u201d) But nobody touches the instrument like Bill Frisell for me.<\/p>\n

Over the last ten years or so, I took on the challenge of writing instrumental music. And it\u2019s a real challenge. For me it\u2019s kind of a puzzle: how do you do instrumental music that\u2019s not just doing the genres that are already done? And I know a lot of players who think like that; it\u2019s almost the question of the age. I try to do it without using the jazz model, where there\u2019s a head and a solo.<\/p>\n

BK: <\/strong><\/span>In terms of sequencing, the two CDs jump all over the place chronologically and by artist. What factors did you take into consideration when deciding how to sequence the tracks?<\/span><\/p>\n

TG: <\/strong>The sequencing is really challenging, and it\u2019s really important to me. I realize that absolutely irrelevant to Ipod culture \u2013 I don\u2019t listen to records like that on my Ipod; I put it on random mode, and I even put records into random mode because I like being surprised \u2013 finding the right sequence is critical to me. And because it\u2019s two discs, I wanted it to flow. I think making a record is a lot like making a film in that way. Certain things set up other things, and other things are needed to close something.<\/p>\n

<\/center><\/p>\n

\u00a0BK: <\/strong><\/span>There are plenty of tracks from your solo works, from collaborative ventures like the Marco Minnemann<\/strong> drum solo project Modulator<\/em>, and what I suppose we could call \u201cguest spots.\u201d But nothing from King Crimson<\/strong> or any of the ProjeKcts<\/strong> with which you were involved. Was that down to licensing or some other reason?<\/span><\/p>\n

TG: <\/strong>It didn\u2019t even enter my mind. To get permission is complicated. And it\u2019s a different thing: as soon as you put King Crimson on there, the name \u2013 or the brand \u2013 kind of overshadows things a bit. It\u2019s almost like a selling tool. And it doesn\u2019t need to be on there, because there\u2019s so much King Crimson material out there that you can\u2019t get away from it. All it would be doing would be attaching me to that music, which I\u2019m already attached to. And I didn\u2019t need it!<\/p>\n

BK: <\/strong><\/span>It\u2019s not like you didn\u2019t have enough material. And it also might have given the CD the whiff of a spinoff project, which is not what it is at all.<\/span><\/p>\n

TG: <\/strong>For me, in my musical life, the Crimson stuff is sort of hermetically sealed in its own world. And I\u2019m happy for it to be like that. It\u2019s a separate thing.<\/p>\n

Now, I could see making a compilation of King Crimson stuff that I played on, but \u2013 my god — there\u2019s plenty of Crimson stuff out there already. Who needs that, unless you\u2019re introducing it to a new audience?<\/p>\n

BK: <\/strong>Yeah. It would be An Even-younger Person\u2019s Guide to King Crimson<\/em> or something like that.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>Click to continue\u2026<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

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