A life lived unexplored is a life not worth living.
My guitars are my umbilical cord. They're directly wired into my head.
After months of playing air guitar to 'Free Bird', what really got me into guitar was watching a documentary about Jimi Hendrix and picking up the Woodstock soundtrack. Listening to his version of 'Star Spangled Banner' and 'Purple Haze.' My brother played acoustic guitar and, idolising him, I thought, 'I'm going to get a guitar.'
I would have to say I'm bored with the standard rock, guitar solos, but I've done it for five albums now, and this time I wanted to go in a completely different direction. I wasn't interested in showing off any more.
We wanted to offer something new to our audience. I hate it when bands stop taking chances.
The word 'retirement' doesn't really sit well with me. There comes a time when you reach a position in society or culture where people will not let you retire. You can say, 'Alright, I'm going to hang up my guitar,' but people will still not let you retire.
Everyone has a side to them that's kind of unexplained and feels misunderstood.
The concept of clearing one's mind before performing a task so that it is consumed by nothing but that task, yet is open at the same time to anything that might happen - that concept can be applied to playing guitar, and it's enormously helpful for improvising.
I've always been attracted to the darker things in life. I was never one to go for light, airy stuff, even as a child. My whole aesthetic has always been one of the darker side. That rings true also in my tastes in music. It's just always something I've gravitated to naturally.
For me, one of the most perfect times to watch a horror movie is when it's cold and raining outside and there's pretty much no outdoor activity to be done. It kind of sets the mood.
Jeff Beck is one of my heroes and has been since I first picked up a guitar.
Metallica is a very complicated, fragile thing. On the outside, it's all metal, but on the inside it's very delicate.
Metallica is like the phoenix rising from the ashes. We set everything on fire, and this is what has risen from it - 'St. Anger' being the fire and 'Death Magnetic' being the phoenix.
One of my favorite horror films of the Nineties was 'Event Horizon.'
Because of things like iTunes and streaming and social networking, it's destroyed music. It's destroyed the motivation to go out there and really make the best record possible. It's a shame.
For the 'Load' album, I was experimenting so much with tone that I had to keep journals on what equipment I was using. For 'Hero of the Day,' I know I used a 1958 Les Paul Standard with a Matchless Chieftain, some Boogie amps and a Vox amp - again, they're all blended.
When people are confronted with something they've never seen before, they really don't know how to react.
I fix things all the time. Every time I do a solo, I re-check it and correct things that don't hit the mark.
A lot of the main characters in horror movies are outsiders as well, so that outsider syndrome reverberates within horror fans and geeky collectors. It's kind of a rallying call that brings fans and collectors together who are a little socially retarded, maybe.
It's definitely true that Stevie Ray Vaughan is one of my all-time favorite guitarists.
