Marty Friedman has launched the latest touring leg in support of his solo effort from last year, Drama. With his long-time backing band joining him on the road once more, Nikki Stringfield & Patrick Kennison will be providing support on the trek, which runs from January 25th through February 22nd. And tickets, exclusive meet and greet VIP packages, sand stage played guitars can be obtained by visiting Marty’s official site.
Just before the launch of the tour, Friedman spoke with BraveWords correspondent Greg Prato about what lay in store on the road for he and his audience, and what each of his bandmates brings to the live show.
“What they can expect is to leave the show feeling very uplifted, to feel a very new positive energy that is going to spill into their daily life,” Friedman explained. “They’re going to feel an energy like, ‘Okay, now I can face the next week, or a couple weeks, and kick ass.’ I want that to be the main goal. I want people to feel something that stays with them when they leave. You know, I think a lot of people, when they hear about a concert for example, of some kind of guitarist…instrumental guitarist, they’ll think, ‘Well, it’s a virtuoso display of guitar techniques and fancy guitar work,’ and you leave the show saying, ‘Wow, that guy’s a great guitar player.’ That’s absolutely not what we’re doing.”
“Of course, there’s going to be probably more guitar playing than you’ve ever seen in this show, but it will be overshadowed by just the very positive, uplifting feeling that you get from my band and myself. You might know me going to the show, but I’m going to tell you right now that my band is going to outshine me every night. And for those of you who don’t know the band, it’s Chargeeeeee, who’s been in my band for 13 years, on drums, and people say he’s like Animal from The Muppet Show. But I think he’s more like Tommy Lee on crystal meth and steroids playing more technical drum beats.”
“And on the guitarist is Naoki Morioka, who’s been in the band almost eight years now, and he’s the guy who can play literally anything that is in my catalogs. So it’s so incredibly helpful to have him on my team, because it allows me to play the most challenging music together, the most layered music and the most intricate music easily. So that allows us to perform rather than having to look at our instruments and worry about what we’re doing. Having someone who’s such a great guitarist next to me, well, I’m used to playing with great guitar players, so that’s nothing new, but now he’s just the perfect guy for my band.”
“And on bass is Wakazaemon, and she’s been in the band for almost two years now. And she is like a contrast: when you see her, you see this cute little girl, very tiny, from Japan. And you hear the bass, the bass is like this big, monstrous, fat, huge, gnarly tone and aggressive playing. It takes a while for you to focus on the contrast of what you’re seeing and what you’re hearing. And her performance is just wild, and everything from aggressive to pensive to moody to dark to light…she’s just the whole package.”
“So, the band that you see is really gonna change your image of what you might have thought, quote, unquote, ‘instrumental guitar music’ was.”
Source: bravewords.com
