"For the mechanised mind": Brian May interview with Pete Makowski - from 'Sounds', 16 March 1974
Feb 26, 2024 8:17:39 GMT
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Post by fabiogminero on Feb 26, 2024 8:17:39 GMT
Hello everyone and have a good start to the week.
Below I post an article by Pete Makowski, which appeared in the British music magazine Sounds on 16 March 1974: entitled For the mechanised mind, it is an article/interview with Brian May.
The topic addressed is his Red Special (a topic already widely discussed in various music magazines between July and December 1973): Makowski interviews Brian on how he built his guitar, what materials he used and goes into detail about the equipment used by the guitarist, citing the Vox AC 30 amplifiers and the Echoplex. A few words are also said about May's guitar influences.
Below is the scan and transcription of the article for a more immediate reading. Enjoy!
Below I post an article by Pete Makowski, which appeared in the British music magazine Sounds on 16 March 1974: entitled For the mechanised mind, it is an article/interview with Brian May.
The topic addressed is his Red Special (a topic already widely discussed in various music magazines between July and December 1973): Makowski interviews Brian on how he built his guitar, what materials he used and goes into detail about the equipment used by the guitarist, citing the Vox AC 30 amplifiers and the Echoplex. A few words are also said about May's guitar influences.
Below is the scan and transcription of the article for a more immediate reading. Enjoy!
For the mechanised mind
QUEEN HAVE established themselves in a minimal amount of time, and one of the strongest assets of the band is the fiery guitar playing of Brian May.
The originality of his sound is contributed by the fact that he made his guitar himself. The guitar has some interesting features: the nek is made from wood taken from an antique fireplace. I asked Brian the reason for this.
"The wood is mahogany and being so old it makes it tougher". The body of the guitar is made of oak and the pick ups originally began life as Burns Tri Sonics. He originally had built a fuzz box into the guitar but found ir unreliable on stage.
Recently there has been a spate of letters from readers (including Steve Grosvenor from Birmingham and C. Evans from Mariborough) who are interested in building their own guitars. I asked Brian how people should approach this, are there any good books on the subject?
"I've personally never found anything worth reading, I've been thinking about writing a book on the subject but commitments have stopped me from this as yet. There is a book available by Dan Armstrong".
I asked Brian if he ever built any instrument before, "No, but I always used to be mechanically minded. You see the best way to approach this kind of thing is by sitting down and thinking about it from a mechanical level. Draw your designs down to the very last detail. You've got to think about things like truss rods and whether the neck of the guitar will take the poll of the strings. And above all make sure that the wood on the neck of the guitar is well seasoned - the older the better."
Brian says that he's been playing guitar since he was a baby but only began developing his style about six or seven years ago. He drew his basic influences from the Yardbirds era and Clapton. Hendrix and Beck are some of the guitarists he describes as influential.
For amplification he uses AC 30s because "they distort smoothly". For effects he has an Echoplex which has single delay and a sustain module. He has made his own delay effect but although it works it's not reliable enough for stage.
"It's difficult to expand on effects because there is so much you can do, and it takes time to acquire the feel for the modules".
Before joining Queen, Brian played for a college band called Smile. "There's nothing I play now that I couldn't play then. The only difference now is that there's better communication between my brain and my fingers."
QUEEN HAVE established themselves in a minimal amount of time, and one of the strongest assets of the band is the fiery guitar playing of Brian May.
The originality of his sound is contributed by the fact that he made his guitar himself. The guitar has some interesting features: the nek is made from wood taken from an antique fireplace. I asked Brian the reason for this.
"The wood is mahogany and being so old it makes it tougher". The body of the guitar is made of oak and the pick ups originally began life as Burns Tri Sonics. He originally had built a fuzz box into the guitar but found ir unreliable on stage.
Recently there has been a spate of letters from readers (including Steve Grosvenor from Birmingham and C. Evans from Mariborough) who are interested in building their own guitars. I asked Brian how people should approach this, are there any good books on the subject?
"I've personally never found anything worth reading, I've been thinking about writing a book on the subject but commitments have stopped me from this as yet. There is a book available by Dan Armstrong".
I asked Brian if he ever built any instrument before, "No, but I always used to be mechanically minded. You see the best way to approach this kind of thing is by sitting down and thinking about it from a mechanical level. Draw your designs down to the very last detail. You've got to think about things like truss rods and whether the neck of the guitar will take the poll of the strings. And above all make sure that the wood on the neck of the guitar is well seasoned - the older the better."
Brian says that he's been playing guitar since he was a baby but only began developing his style about six or seven years ago. He drew his basic influences from the Yardbirds era and Clapton. Hendrix and Beck are some of the guitarists he describes as influential.
For amplification he uses AC 30s because "they distort smoothly". For effects he has an Echoplex which has single delay and a sustain module. He has made his own delay effect but although it works it's not reliable enough for stage.
"It's difficult to expand on effects because there is so much you can do, and it takes time to acquire the feel for the modules".
Before joining Queen, Brian played for a college band called Smile. "There's nothing I play now that I couldn't play then. The only difference now is that there's better communication between my brain and my fingers."