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8. Interviews/Venom

"Venom" Interview with Chris Impellitteri - YTSEJAM (May 10, 2015)



Interview with Guitarist Chris Impellitteri


May 10, 2015  |  by Tommy Hash  |  





- Words by Tommy Hash


It’s a sunny day in Los Angeles, four guys are practicing their asses off, priming themselves to enter NRG studios in the Hollywood area. The recording process shall hath no hours sitting in some bedroom meticulously editing the sound on a computer with an ethic that would even make Alan Parsons laugh, stripping the music of the last grain of soulful grandeur and the edgy atmosphere that adds the ballsy overtones to any record. Nope, as the tape began to roll, the band was on that roll in unison, recording an album the proper way, just like al bands used to do prior to computers and technological bullshit causing bands to literary gain (the computer as) a new member. But this band, featuring vocalist Rob Rock, bassist James Pulli, drummer John Dette, and axeman Chris Impelliterri, would create a record with a big fat sound; no questions asked.


Not since Hendrix has there been a guitar revolution as rich in technique and intriguing as the shred revolution that began in the 80’s. Shrapnel Records, Yngwie Malmsteen, guys not afraid to play jazz and classical riffs, new publications including Guitar Player, new breeds of instruments such as the Ibanez Jem, digital effects, you name it; faster playing became the new voice of musicians and an aspiration of guitarists that resonates loudly today. A key figure within that scene was Chris Impelliterri.


Making his mark in America during that period, he later landed in Japan as a key figure with massive fanbase; yet his albums weren’t being unleashed in the U.S., hence the Harem Scarem/Fair Warning syndrome. Now with a deal from Frontiers, all of that has been solved and the release of his record Venom that will facilitate Chris and Co a broader to deliver the tunage. Chris Impelliterri begins by speaking of the evolution of his career leading up to the time of now.


CHRIS IMPELLITTERI: Obviously I’ve evolved I hope (laughing), I’ve been doing this for a while; this guitar as an instrument is ingrained in who I am. The evolution of me is the process of virtually hearing music in my head like a crazy person hearing voices in their head. And for me to express what I hear in my head, I have to master the art of the instrument, and that includes music theory and everything. If I express myself on the instrument, I want to do basically anything that I hear in my head; that’s how I got to where I am now. It’s been years of mastering this concept of songwriting, creating great riffs and good solos; at least hopefully they’re great. And of course, production is something I am fascinated as well.


TH: That the thing about the production of this record, it really has that massive, bold sound; not sounding thin as if it was recorded in various bedrooms over the internet. And this is something that has been missing from records from power metal tinged records. Plus the music beholds “songwriting” and not composing like many groups that try to be too progressive or symphonic.


CI: My process basically is that I’m always playing guitar; maybe six hours a day, either it’s upstairs in my office, downstairs in the media room, the family room, in the loft, kitchen; everywhere in the house. I mean I have guitars everywhere. What happens, I might be doing scales, looking into theory or whatever, and I will stumble upon a riff and I think “wow that was cool” and I’ll play it again. If I get that same feeling I’ll start to develop it in some sort of a song or two and then from there, if I immediately like it, it will be recorded to get it on tape. Then a day or two later, I’ll go back and listen to it and think, “is it really that good” or “did it suck due to the fact that I got too close to it?” And if I really think it was really good, I will go into my demo area, pull out the drum machine and create a template for a song and bring it to the other guys on the band, and we’ll go into the rehearsal studio and play as a live band and develop the song. If we are onto something where were all have smiles on our faces, we will then play it for our friends and they say, “dude that’s great,” we’ll use it. If our freinds say “it sucks,” we ceratinly won’t use it as only the great stuff makes it – that’s what we develop into these songs; we rehearse our asses off eight hours a day and then go into a studio and do this stuff live.


TH: And that live vibe has it eminence on Venom.


CI: Most of these performances your hearing are taped live performances. I definitely go back in and thicken up the guitars, adding a double or triple rhythm part just to fatten everything up. But for the most part we work on this music, and worked and worked as a band. When we went into the studio, we were like “let’s just tack it live.” It feels like you are listening to it with us. The music feels so real and honest as opposed to bands sending files across the county.


TH: Biting the bullet as for forking out the dough to record this has has its reward in the end.


CI: It was really an expensive record to make and we tracked it at NRG studios in Los Angeles, one of the most expensive studios. In fact, Linkin Park did their last studio album there. Slash’s last album was done there and Venom was done in the same room. NRG is such a great facility and our co-producer Greg Reely perfectly captured us and the performance, he’s just really great.


TH: Although you weren’t signed to Shrapnel, you also came around at the time when labels like Shrapnel were huge, where the shred guitar sound was not only introduced, but a broader audience took notice.


CI: It was a little bit difficult for me to feel part of that, because I was always in a band. A lot of the guys that I love like Tony Macalpine and Vinnie Moore were part of it, yet I always got compared to those guys even though I was never on Shrapnel. That was interesting because it was a beautiful time for guitar, it was a point in time where people were trying to push boundaries and that’s part of evolution which I lived, and to me that was the exciting part of that era and am so grateful to be part of that. There were both good things and there were bad things. When we first started doing it, it was enjoyable and you’d express yourself on the instrument, but the bad thing was an in article in Kerrang magazine. Those guys did a review of our first record, which is called The Impellitari Black E.P.; we did the E.P. and Kerrang did a great review of it, but they called me the fastest guitar player in the world. Not so soon after what the magazine said, I saw people self promoting themselves as the “worlds fastest guitarist,” and I joked in an interview that “my solos will get faster,” and again it was really a joke – how could they get faster I was already playing as fast as I humanly could, right? But it got to the point where it became such a competition, forgetting that music first and foremost comes from the soul; it’s human expression. It got dangerous; and sadly, I got blamed for a lot of this stuff; mainly because of the speed due to the fact that I was one of the first who was playing really fast and I recognized that. Those were the reasons that time period had many difficult moments for me, because you hear that people say it’s “wankering,” and I’m like really? It was also really great to be part of that.




TH: What was it that you personally saw that influenced this style and sparked the flame in the first place.


CI: People actually think that the 80’s was the beginning, they always give Yngwie credit for it, but that’s so wrong – listen to Uli John Roth’s playing on The Scorpions “Virgin Killer,” he’s the one who started this. I’ve seen kids write all things about me on Youtube saying this is great or that you are and Yngwie clone and you suck. Those guys amke it a point to say “you are playing a scalloped Stratocaster and your wearing white boots.” This was during the “Stand In Line” era where Impelliterri were doing a tribute to Rainbow. I’ll laugh at that and think if they would have paid attention they would have seen that that Blackmore. Meanwhile, other guys got all this credit and I’m thinking you might want to look at this and maybe get some reality. The big artists that influenced me were Al Di Moela, John Mclaughlin and Paco de lucia. Look at John Mclaughin playing acoustic guitar from the seventies, playing in front of thirty thousand people, it’s insane. I make sure that any solo that I play on electric guitar, came be played by me on an acoustic. Just pluging the guitar into a Marshall without any affects and just doing it is the way to go sometimes.


TH: Nowadays, there are artists that boast about how many guitars they use and the equipment, getting self-indulgent for the wrong reasons.


CI: I have friends that go to Eddie Van Halen’s house; everyone plays through his gear and they realize that they don’t sound like him. A lot of the sound comes from your own development from your hands and your technique. You have to have a good ear for what gear you need as well; if you don’t, no matter how much gear you have, it’s sure not going to sound as good or better than you can actually play. Ultimately it comes down to your hands and technique.


TH: Now with a broader deal with Frontiers Records, do you feel that this is a new beginning for you guys, especially after releasing albums only in Japan for the past several years.


CI: You know, I have had a lot of record companies offer me deals for years now, especially in America and Europe. To be honest we didn’t want to do that because we were so big in Japan, we didn’t want to slap the hand that was feeding us, which were the record companies that we were signed to. What I mean by that is that when you convert the yen to dollars, it comes out to 23 dollars a CD, and when you release a record in the U.S., the imports go back to Japan at half price, so the music fans over there can actually buy these imports cheaper than they can a domestic release. Our fear was that if we released the records that we did in the 90s here in America, and a lot those go back to Japan, it would kill the labels by cutting a big portion of their royalties due to the fact that they only get so much for imports as opposed to selling them directly. The band has sold millions over there, we made a business decision and looked at the fact that sadly, metal is not really big in America as the chances of us playing arenas is really small; we don’t want to be a club band. In Japan, we were going to play arenas and theaters because of the music’s popularity. I knew that people were buying our imports all over the world at insanely high prices and I felt bad about that. The labels were coming to us and saying, “dude you got to sign with us so we can put out these records and make them widely available. So with Venom, we went to every label in Europe. And someone told us that we really needed to talk to Serafino Perugino at Frontiers; he signed Journey & Whitesnake and was very passionate about the music. I talked with him and was in constant communication with him; eventually going ahead with playing him what was done so far to make sure he was interested and he said “yes I want this”. I could see that he could really get this off the ground, and we were like “yes, get this band back to America, let’s go back to Europe.”


TH: There are so many great labels that exist over there that promote this music, Avalon, King, & JVC-Victor; but yes, prices are insane, but you have to give the fans in Japan full credit for keeping this type of music alive during metal’s darkest hours.


CI: People over there love this music over there and I am so grateful for them giving us a career. Especially since they help us live another day surviving on making music, do this for a living where we can buy houses and stuff; it was from that market that kept us alive. Words can’t describe how grateful I am to them for loving our music, as they are our biggest fans – it’s a beautiful experience.


Copyright And Publishing: 2015 Tommy Hash for Ytsejam.com



Please Visit:

https://www.facebook.com/ChrisImpellitteri

www.frontiers.it

https://www.facebook.com/frontiersmusicsrl?fref=ts




Category: Interviews  |  Tags: Chris Impelliterri, Impelliterri





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