Garza Podcast - 219 - Keyan Houshmand: The Rise of Modern Guitar

Episode Date: February 9, 2026

Garza sits down in-person with Keyan Houshmand. Modern guitarist, producer & content creator from Adelaide, Australia. Best known for his informative YouTube guitar videos, covers, demos/reviews & music production. https://youtube.com/KeyanHoushmandLiveSPONSORS: Sweetwater - https://imp.i114863.net/rnrmVB00:00 - NAMM 202603:34 - Being Born & Raised in Adelaide06:55 - Seeing Metallica Live08:22 - First Guitar11:28 - Age & Wisdom12:35 - Getting a Computer Science Degree19:37 - Discovering Periphery30:25 - Riff: Arrest32:13 - Getting Into Gear, Plugins34:35 - Quad Cortex Mini37:14 - QC Patch/Tones Demo46:58 - Rhythm Players & AC/DC52:15 - Australian Bands57:27 - Plini58:26 - Professionalism & Not Drinking1:10:02 - Jackson Guitars1:14:12 - Chug Tones1:16:53 - What Makes a Good Tone1:24:03 - Pick Attack1:35:12 - Bareknuckle Pickups1:43:03 - Riff: Pirouette1:50:48 - Riff: Swell1:52:00 - Riff: Pulse1:54:19 - Top 3 Artists/Albums

Dick, man. Oh, you got the Damazio. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I'm freaking lazy, dude. I'm lazy. I think I'm just a combination of lazy and just balls of the wall going. Yeah, dude, 100%.

It's probably, because do you wear wireless packs? Of course. Yeah, so your pack is on the strap. Oh, yeah. Yeah, okay, that makes sense. Because I've tried it once before, but I was worried of that it would like scratch up my shit. So I was like, oh. But I think if it sits nicely in it.

case it shouldn't matter too much just let it get scratched up dude i think i'm getting to that point yeah i used to not be like that but jay are we a chugging sick keon thank you for being here man dude thank you for having me man this is really cool dude i'm honoured this is awesome man it's cool um so this is this is not my doing this is the work of the i don't know what you believe in universe or god because it kept something kept being um I kept being in your presence and you in my presence, you know? 100%. So it just kind of made, it made sense to make this happen.

Yeah, dude. I guess we'll give the backstory and how this even happened in the first place, or at least how I see it anyway. Okay, cool. So, yeah, NAM just happened. We're playing the bare-knuckle pickups booth had us play a couple tunes. And it just so happened that I was playing like 1.30, you were on at 2. So it was just like right behind each other, whatever.

and yeah dude you're exactly right like we were just kind of in the same place same time talking about gear talking about guitars you were checking out this little thing on the floor here the QC Mini

and I just kind of thought well why don't I just bring you up to the neural guys and show you really appreciate that man oh dude no stress at all no stress at all thank you for that and I guess like now we're here a couple days later you know what I mean it's like the

quick way of thinking about it I guess for me it's so surreal because like and I guess we'll talk about this more, but like our worlds are so close, yet sometimes they feel so far apart in terms of like the brand of guitar and like the style of guitar that we play. Even though they're both heavy, even though they're both low tuned, even though we're both playing seven strings, you know what I mean? At least in my mind anyway, I feel like like Deathcore, as it were,

especially like your guys' brand of Deathcore and like my style of guitars, like they don't really meet that often. I think these days they're meeting a little bit more. more. Yeah. But yeah, man, just goes to show how crazy it can be sometimes, you know. Yeah, I mean, there's so many forms of guitar and heavy stuff that, it's just, there's so many styles. Yeah, dude. It's why it's why when people, it's why I don't care if I say, like, I don't know. Because there's so many, if people really think about it, there's so many styles of, of guitar, so many bands, so many eras. I'm like, no one knows it all. It's ridiculous. No one, no, no, no, subgenres of metal that you could never keep up like it's um even like there's like what deathcore

metal core whatever but even like sub genres within those sub genres like melodic metal core or like melodic death core or whatever it is you know what i mean like this it's impossible to keep up with all of them oh yeah and uh dude keon it's so cool to like to like see you here so are so you're um are you from adelaide australia yeah so i was born and raised adelaide australia um sometimes people get a bit confused because of the name and like that. So, um, my name Kian is Persian. So my dad's from, originally from Iran. Um, and he migrated to Australia in the 90s, I want to say something like 90 or maybe it was like late, I think it was late 80s, late 80s, like, back with the whole like, uh, revolution and stuff that was going on. So he moved. And then my mom, uh, is of Italian descent. Um, and I never get the term. Is it first,

first generation immigrant. She wasn't born in Italy. She's Italian. She wasn't born in Italy. But my non-no and non-nor were. And they migrated in the 50s, which a lot of like Italians, Greeks, Croatians, like a lot of Europeans,

that's when they kind of came to Australia, like the 50s, so like, you know, my whole friendship group back at home, like none of them play music and they all have names like Papadopoulos and, you know, like a Siciliano or whatever. You know what I mean? Like they're all of some sort of European descent.

But yeah, born and raised, Adelaide Australia. Proper. Yeah. Okay. Is he born there or like around there? Who, sorry? Oh, you. I was one of you were born in an Adelaide or like some kind of smaller town.

Oh, no, absolutely not like. Adelaide, Australia, man, pretty much like, you know, very close to like CBD. Yeah, but it's not a big place. Like Adelaide is like, it's kind of like a, it's probably like, I want to say it's the fourth biggest. Yeah. So like it's probably like the fourth biggest capital city behind what Brisbane, Sydney. Melbourne and then like Adelaide and Perth are kind of like the same Perth is very far away there's all the way on the left over there so that's why bands never tour there because it's like

too expensive to go yeah only been there a few times yeah but like Adelaide you know has like it's still pretty healthy like population I think like two million or something like that but a lot of people say it's like a big country town like it's a yeah that's the city like that's that's how big the city is like it's not that big oh dude that is beautiful it's it's great yeah That's the river over there. And just behind that shot is like, uh, so that's,

I can see like the convention center just on the right side of the bridge, like that kind of brown roof. Yeah. Just, yeah, that one there. Um, and then like the Adelaide over where we play like Ozzy rules footy or whatever.

It's kind of like on the other side of this bridge. Okay. Um, but yeah, man, that's like 10 minutes away from my house. Like that's home. So if you were to go here,

where, where are you going? Oh, dude. I mean like anytime I'm walking on that bridge because like, I don't know if, So right where your mouse is like that white oval like entrance, like at the end of the bridge. So that's like that goes to both the casino and the train station. So the train station is like underneath the, yeah.

So that whole big building there is the casino. But if you walk on that bridge, you're going to Adelaide over to watch them like Aussie rules or whatever. So if I ever find myself at the train station, I'll usually walk up there, go on the bridge and catch my local Adelaide Crows, play some Aussie rules, which I'm big fan of. Yeah. Nice. I mean, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what's, like the venue? Oh, dude. I mean, it's funny, like, uh, because Adelaide is so small.

Um, there isn't really that many venues. Like, um, I guess, like, if we're thinking, like, big venues, like, sometimes bands will play Adelaide Oval, like, Metallica just played, I late Oval, like, in November, um, which is about 50, or I guess, like, 70, maybe when you count the floor as well, because the Oval was massive. Um, and it's, like, 50 in the, um, um, and it's, like 50 in the, stands but then yeah I did it was fucking sick it was the first time I ever saw Metallica and probably like

the last time I'm ever going to see them as well which is why I went oh yeah there you go so that was from the Adelaide show that's dope and I can't remember I think it was um 25 yeah Evanescence and uh oh it's alluding me who was it um like hardcore uh oh it's uh Weinberg plays or just left

Jay Weinberg just let, suicide tendencies. Oh yes. Yes. So that's who was supporting. But yeah, man, that was a sick show. That was really good. But yeah, below that, it'd be like,

Cooper Stadium, which is like a soccer stadium. I saw Foo Fighters there, like, 10 years ago. That's about, like, 15. And then I guess, like, club shows, it'd be like... Yeah, what's the club stuff? Maybe, like, there's Alla Entertainment Center, which is, like, 11. Allated Entertainment Theater, which is about four.

And then it goes down to, like, Heinley Street Musical, which I could probably point out that original photo it's like it's it's all within like a kilometer radius of each other like it's tiny um but it's cool and it's very easy to get to because there's not that many people there so i love adelaide adelaide's like my favorite place on earth it's great so uh were you born in 2001 no 1999 december 99 okay so so so you barely hit the 90s yeah i had like 27 28 days of the 90s yeah yeah yeah no not even sorry uh sorry uh sorry i completely got they wrong 17 18 days of the 90s and then yeah the new millennium hit so I was barely

sentient okay so you were born in December yeah December 1990 December 13 to be exact 13 9 I'm third oh that's cool awesome and you uh so your your uncle gave you your first guitar at five years old correct yes it was a acoustic night nylon string yes um that's right do you still have it I do it's in the garage somewhere locked it away in like a back corner it's locked away it's um it's not on display it's in a case it's in like a soft case um but one of the tune is broke and like it's i remember what it was it was like this like black and red ashton nylon acoustic it's like a very okay um it's like an import brand or whatever it's very very cheap but yeah that was my first ever guitar oh oh we're gonna find it oh dude that one right there that's the one yeah this is this it oh nice that's crazy yeah

so that's the first guitar i ever got in my hands when I was five. That's pretty, at five years old, that's a pretty sick guitar to have. No, it was cool, man,

you know, learning green sleeves and all that stuff and the proper, like, old school, when you first pick of a guitar, Mary,

the lamb, all that stuff, yeah. And then, like, maybe a year later, I got my first, like, electric,

which is, like, a, I still have actually, it's like this cherry red, um, like, knock off strap. But the, the paint job is actually sick.

Like, I've actually been having thoughts of, like, reviving that guitar and, like, putting a new neck on it and stuff like that. You should.

I should. Seriously, I might put like a baritone like conversion strat neck or something because I think the pocket's the same. They're all kind of built to the same spec. Nice. Yeah, so I got my first electric when I was six and then yeah, man, now we're here like 20 years later. And now you're in California. Yeah, it's crazy.

Right. I never thought that like music would end up like this. It was kind of one of those things where like, you know, when I say, oh yeah, I started at five, a lot of people kind of have the assumption. It's like, oh, like, you know, his parents must have, like, hammered him to play guitar or something like that. Like, it was like, no, you're, you're forced to play, but it was, it was never like that. Like, I kind of just picked it up and never put it down. And I'm sure there were moments where I would, like, be seven years old and, like, throwing attention, but like, I don't want to play anymore. It's too hard. And then my parents,

I think that was one time I did that. And my parents, I know, like, it's okay. Like, you, you still got time. Like, just keep going. But I'm glad that they did say that. Because ever since it's just, like guitar's like all I know essentially um which is cool um but yes that's how things kind of panned out I guess that's awesome so you're uh 27 26 26 yeah okay so it's it's hard to gauge it right because we just turned into 2006 and you're born in December yeah yeah yeah it's like right on the cusp yeah oh okay yeah you're 26 years old dude it's ripping oh thank you man it's ripping yeah i i i i try not to think about the age thing too much.

I think, like, it's funny. I was having this conversation with some of the other day. Like, I feel like when I turned 26, that was kind of the age. Well, I guess it depends who you ask, where that's kind of the age where you tell someone like, oh, like, how old are you? Like, oh, I'm 26. And they kind of go like, oh, yeah, cool. But, like, I feel like, you know, a couple years ago, if I said, like, oh, like, I'm

22 or something, they'd be like, whoa, you're so young. You're right in line. I was like, oh, cool, okay. I guess, like, I've got a little bit of time. Yeah. Yeah. But now, yeah, exactly right. I'm crossing over.

But no, it feels good. I feel wiser or whatever as the years go by. So I guess that's a good thing. I think that's the goal that we're all trying to do. Okay, one year older, but I feel a little bit wiser. A little bit less done. That's my personal goal. 100%.

Be more informed and all that stuff. It's hard, man. I know someone's listening to this right now going like, this guy's 26 and he's talking about being wise. But it's true to some extent. But yeah, I'm always trying to learn. No matter what it is, yeah. So you went straight from, you went straight from high school to, and when you're from, you call it the uni. Yeah, university.

So you went, so some, it's very common in people around here in California, I'll take a year off. Yeah. I'll take two years off. Yeah. But you just went straight in college for an IT degree, correct? Yeah, that's true. Okay. So, yeah, I mean, I guess like the thought process behind that, because it's pretty common back at home to like, they call like a gap year.

That's like you take it. Okay, the gap year. Yeah, the gap year, yeah. I'll take one year off, gap year. Pretty much, yeah. But I don't know, like, I guess like the way that I kind of thought about it was like, because at this point, like, Qatar was not even a thought. Like, it was kind of like, I hadn't even like started doing YouTube stuff or anything properly.

So my, my perceived like, life trajectory was like completely different. So at this point in time, it's like fresh out of high school, like, what I want to do. I guess, like, you know, I do have an interest in like general IT. Like, I love computers. and tech and all that stuff. So it just made sense to do something with that. And I had like, I have family members who are in that field as well. So I was like, oh, okay, like, you know, down the line, that would be sick too.

So trying to like piece all these things together. But yeah, the idea of not taking a gap year, I suppose, is like just, I just, that's the way to do it. Why not start now? That is literally the way to do it because once you take a year off, dude, I could just assume you don't want to go back. And then you kind of lose this, like, momentum. And I look back in my life, I'm so glad I didn't take.

a year off because I probably would never went or I would have never knew what that was. Yeah. You know what? Straight out high school, boom. Because like you've been doing school for like 13 years. You're in that schedule. You're in that routine. You wake up.

You have breakfast. You go somewhere. You learn. You study. And like I feel like throwing that away for a year would have just, yeah, that wouldn't have been good for me at that time. So I went and I did IT thinking I would, you know, get a job and something to. tech related but you know the degree is like sitting in my room um it took you four years right yeah so

the degree is three um you've done your research is really cool um yeah so it usually takes three but right in the middle of uni the music stuff started like taking a different um but it was like coming up i guess like yeah at that time um so i had like i had to think like what do i want to do here like do I want to do music or do I want to do IT? And then I was like, well, I'm not just, like, I've been doing IT for two years. Like, I'm not just going to throw that away and just like get a fat debt for nothing. So I dropped the subject. So I would only have like two to three subjects a semester.

And just instead of finishing off in three years, I would finish it in four so that I could have more time to do music stuff. Because at that point, like YouTube was going quite well. It was like just out of the pandemic. Oh, yeah. I haven't really thought about that, like the timing. Yeah. Oh, the timing. I didn't think about that.

Yeah. Like in terms of that, like it couldn't have been a better time because I guess like 20, 2020, 2021 is like when I was like right in the middle of my studies. I'm like even approaching the end. Were you taking? Because Australia, their lockdowns I heard was really strict. So were you taking like online courses? So from memory, I mean like there was a time where we weren't going in.

Like I remember one semester, our exams were done online. Okay. Which was. yeah that was that was something but i like melbourne was pretty locked down from what like i have a lot of friends in melbourne that go yeah we didn't leave our house for months and i was like oh yeah like we never really because like adelaide is kind of tiny so um there were like you know restrictions and stuff but it wasn't anything like that like that was um pretty crazy for them i heard but yeah it's from memory i think life just kind of went on just at a distance you're i mean like you kind

It kind of had to be a bit, because, you know, the whole, like, mass and, like, meter and a half distance or whatever, or, like, six feet, whatever it was here, right? Like, just trying to, like, adhere to that. But, yeah, from memory, I think it was mostly the same, apart from, like, the online exams. Because for the uni exams in Australia, it's kind of just, like, you know, a thousand kids in a whole desk to desk. So they probably just wanted to not do that, I guess. Oh, yeah.

Okay. So that's a really cool. And that's something that I think whoever's listening and watching and college could kind of take from. Because I never really thought about, oh, yeah, why not? If I still want to go to college but pursue my instrument or art or whatever you're doing, just stretch it out a little bit more and not just jam pack your schedule with all classes, just take out a few courses. Yeah.

I really thought about that. Yeah, because like I think like at that time with like, you know, I guess at that time was more like YouTube stuff kind of like coming. It's insane. It makes sense because your first video you posted on YouTube just got 25,000 views. Boom. Yeah. It was a different time.

It was a different time for YouTube. But yeah. So in that, I think I like, I like, you know, what I told friends of hand was like, yeah, I'm going to like just like take a subject off and like complete or whatever. But what they say? They were like, yeah, sure. Like makes sense. Like I think, yeah, I've been very fortunate with like, you know,

having a lot of support around me. Like no one's ever kind of, you know, sat me down like, what are you doing? Like, you're wasting your time kind of thing? Because I hear that that happens a lot and that sucks. You know what I mean? I couldn't imagine what that would do to my, I guess, like overall drive if I was having conversations like that on your regular basis.

Like, of course, like, you know, my parents, like, you know, no one in our family has ever been like a musician. So, like, there are musicians in my family. But like, you know, in terms of like, you know, traveling and stuff. like that and you know doing the whole like content creation thing that's kind of like the first coming from like immigrant parents or whatever like generation of first so it's like that whole world is like completely different to them so I'm like trying to explain to them like yeah like youtube and music and like new DSP and all these things and they're kind of just like yeah well like

as long as you're doing okay like that's all good kind of thing um so yeah I'm very I'm very lucky with that but yeah at that point it was kind of like I knew that the music it was like if I didn't pursue music with the spot that I was in at that moment, then I would regret it for the rest of my life. So rather than throw it all the way, let's like give myself more time, still finish it in case like it all goes like tits up or whatever. Can I swear on here? Of course. Okay. In case it all goes tits up or whatever. Tits up?

Is that an Australian thing or is that? Oh, yes it is. Okay. Okay. Yeah, that's like when things go bad essentially. But yeah, like if I go, oh yeah, this music thing didn't work out, at least I have the degree to kind fall back on which it's it's still there um but hopefully fingers crossed um such word i never have to actually whip it out yeah just kind of keep doing whatever it is that i'm doing well hopefully your plane doesn't go tits up right yeah yeah you're all over it yeah i'm already on it do we were looking at

a cover yeah oh my god this is for a very long time we posted eight eight years ago what's going on on here okay so oh this is crazy so this is um i haven't watched this in a very long time so So this is a 2016. 2016. I believe. Or I might have been 20. You can probably check on the video. Eight years ago.

Usually if you, okay, 20. Okay, so I was in senior year, like year 12 at this point. And there was like a every, at the end of every term, our school would do like a music night where the students would like come up and play something or whatever. And I, yeah, I actually did. like senior music the year before. What's the name of like the year level? Like what do you guys call it? We call it senior year.

Senior year and then the one before that? Junior. Junior. So I did senior, like I did my proper senior music in junior, like with a couple other kids. So we would have like a subject free the next year to kind of just like have that as a fail safe. Yeah. Whatever. But like so at this point like I wasn't really part of the music program that much.

But my, my teacher, Miss Rapucci and Mr. They asked me to play something. And at this point, like, this was like, this is very telling, actually, because it was at this time, like, this 2016, 2017 kind of era where I was, like, getting into all of the stuff, like, seven strings and, like, progressive metal and, and plugins and all that stuff. True, true, true, false. When you first heard, because I know you're sick of talking about this, but never heard you talk about this thing. Yeah. In particular. So you first, you first heard periphery and you hated it, correct?

Yeah. Okay. Yeah, my friend Henry, who I'm still good friends with to this day, it's funny. He always says, like, you know, the reason why anything is happening is because I showed you the music in the first place. And it's true. Like, he's showed me all the bands that I've ever loved. So shout out to Henry.

But, yeah, he showed me a cover. Do you know the band Polaris? Yes. So they're like, like, blown up. Yeah, they're crazy. It's awesome. They're like guitarist, Ryan Sue, used to do covers as well when he was a kid. and he did covers of Periphery songs

and I think it was a song I think it was like Make Total Destroy or something like that and my friend Henry showed me and I remember watching it going what it like because at that time it was all like Lambagod like Slipknot bullet for my Valentine Kill Switch Engage all very sick bands but like nothing off grid all 44

do you anything like very standard timing and stuff so hearing something like periphery for the first time it sounded wrong to me I was like why is like this beat going over the bar Like this sounds weird. Like I couldn't wrap my head around it. And I, yeah, there you go. Yeah, it might have actually been face palm mute.

One of these covers, yeah. Wow. Yeah. And like watching that, I was like, this guy can rip, but I don't like this song. And then it took me like a year or so to kind of be shown another song. And that song was prayer position. And that was off their 2016 record periphery 3. And that riff was like a bit straighter.

But there was like elements of like the shonky rhythms and the shonky like timings and stuff where it was more intriguing rather than me feeling like, oh, this is wrong. Yeah. And that riff is so sick. Like I love that song. That's probably one of my favorite periphery songs for sentimental reasons, obviously. But yeah, that was that was the thing that kind of got me into everything, I guess, yeah. And the way you and your friend Henry met was an art class. You guys, you were making a slip-up mask, right?

Yeah, man, how did you get this? You're like the Narduar of metal. Yeah. Do you still have it? I do. Yeah, I do. So, yeah, okay, this is a funny story. So, yeah, first, like, first day of high school.

Was the first day of high school? First day, yeah, first day of high school. That's such an important day, dude. Dude, I was shitting breaks. Yeah, it was crazy. A lot of my friends, thankfully, like, from my primary school, like, the high school was like a brother school to that school, whatever. So a lot of my friends did end up going to the same high school as me, which was sick.

Like it felt very familiar. But of course, like, you know, there's kids that you've never seen. You're like 13 years old. It's a bit scary. Seniors are running around. Like, oh my God, these guys are like trees. You know what I mean? Trees.

Yeah, yeah, it's crazy. But I think it was like the third class of that day. We had art class. And the teacher's like, yeah, like this whole semester, you're going to be making like clay masks. And at the end, like they have a kiln. Like, you're going to put in the kiln. And you're going to take it home. we're going to get graded on it.

I was like, all right, cool. And, you know, I don't think the teacher really knew what Slipknot was. I was like, oh, I'm not going to make a Slipknot mask, but I'll make something similar. Like, it was very, um. And not tell them. Yeah, yeah. It was, it was very, uh, inspired by the volume three album cover with that mask. Oh, yeah.

With the, with the zipper on it. Yeah, kind of like that. Yeah. So I definitely put a zipper on it. It might not have been straight. It was more of an angle, but like, iconic cover. Oh, dude. That's one of my favorite albums.

Yeah. But I, I kind of, like, ripped it off of that. And then this guy next to me who at that point, like he hasn't really grown much since then, but he was like six to you at that point. And he had like an afro. It was like, he gave him another six inches. So he was a very scary looking dude, like footy player. You know what I mean?

Like very. And I was like this like scrawny little 13 year old kit. And he's like, that kind of looks like the Slip-Num master. You listen to Slip-Nall. I was like, yeah, I do. And we just got talking. And then I was like, oh, cool. I've made a friend.

And we're talking about. He's like, yeah, like, who's a job? engaged too you should check out this guy Ryan Sue he does like these covers right have you ever heard of periphery I'm like no I haven't and then the next class after that it was music class and at this point I had a Gibson Les Paul 12 studio Alpine White gold hardware it was sick I've moved that guitar on since but um pardon a black a black card correct yeah yeah black pick guard um and I pulled it out um like open the case and then that same guy Henry pulled out his Gibson case and I was like oh that's weird we both

have gibson's I was like cool that's pretty cool I guess whatever but just same guitar same guitar we flipped open the case same guitar why that's just right here that's the one why um the black pig guard that's a nice guitar man yeah man it's cool um I learned all of my metal riffs on that guitar uh and I'm kind of upset that I moved it on but it was for good reason I got another guitar with the money that I got from that one but yeah man same guitar and at that point I was like oh like we're best friends do you know what I mean like where this is like something that's awesome from a greater power like you were saying before oh totally it's weird how like these little moments will just kind of lead you to where you're at now like these were little oh yeah I met that person but they

introduced me to this yeah and then now I'm doing this exactly right it's so it's so weird dude um and then like to put the cherry on top a couple months later we were like he was looking through old photos and he found like an under-eight's like footage the photo of like his footy team and I was in the team and his dad was the coach and I had no idea. Yeah. So yeah, shout out Henry. That is wild. Dude, that, dude, that first day of school. I haven't thought about it probably since the first day of school. Yeah, dude. I, uh, I, I don't know. How many high schools did you have in Adelaide? Oh, quite quite a lot. They kind of spread out everywhere. But like four or five? Oh, no, more. Like Adelaide's a pretty big place. There's

plenty of high schools, but like, I guess, like, the, the ones more, like, city central, there was probably, like, I want to say, like, four to five. Oh, I mean, like, for, like, all boys, because mine was an all boys school. So it would have been, top of my head, I'm thinking, like, four or five different schools, and they would, like, play each other in cups and stuff like that. And it was, like, always, like, fierce. Between my school and another city school, there was, like, a mad robbery. It still happens to this day.

I still see it on my phone, yeah. Oh, totally, dude. Each school has, like, their own, like, you don't hang around. with that person. Because I was supposed to go to a certain school, but at the time, I don't know what you call it, but grade eight, I had a, I had a girlfriend going into grade nine into the new school. Right. So I transferred to her school, so we, we, we could still date.

Yeah, yeah. So what I didn't think about was when I went there, I knew nobody. Yeah. And so she went to her class and waiting for first period to start. I remember, like, just standing there. I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know nobody. Yeah.

And my girlfriend's gone. But this guy that's bald white kid walks by me with the slipmott shirt. Sick. Fish. That's the whole thing. We lock eyes, Kian. And we just give each other like the nod. Yeah.

So also, oh, there's. And then we end up hanging out like for a whole freshman year. Yeah. That first day is there's something to it, man. It's good that you found that guy because it would have been a lot scary if you didn't. I think. Yeah. And then he brought me into the whole like slipmunt.

crew, as we will call it, like a new metal circle. Yeah. Is your new metal circle ready to start a band and you have no gear? Sweetwater has your back. They are the number one online retailer for pro audio and music instruments. They're the best. I go to Sweetwater whenever I need anything for the podcast, guitar gear, everything. If you're trying to bring some hot heat for the new year, Sweetwater has you covered.

Just click the link in the description below so they know you came from here. And now back to the podcast talking about our first day at school. Nice. Oh, I mean, if that didn't happen, like, who, yeah, right? I wouldn't be here. Literally. I wouldn't be here. You can say that for so many things along the way.

I find, like, it's crazy, man. I always look back to, like, even just dating that chick, if I didn't date her, I don't know. I, because the school that I was supposed to do, I would hear later on in my life, they had no scene. They had no punkers. Crazy. They had no hardcore scene. They had no numeral kids. So I guess it was like an all-brose school.

But I went to another school that ended up having, And like, you know, they had like a group of punkers, hardcore kids, and new middle. I'm like, man, what would it happen if I didn't even date that chick? Yeah. I probably wouldn't have transferred. I probably wouldn't have met them. And then the whole, then the, the, uh, the, the snowball. Were you playing guitar at that point?

Oh, yeah. Oh, so I started playing at, uh, seventh grade. Okay, so you were 12. Yeah, exactly. Good. Yeah. Good guess. Yeah, just little things.

When this fucking lines up, lines up. It's like a snowball that just keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. I know. Yeah. And now you're in California. Yeah. Like, right. Like, it's just insane.

What was that? So I was watching play at the bare knuckle booth. It was the last song. Yeah. What's that song called? That song's called Arrest. Correct. Yeah.

You were doing some, like, you were doing some chug and like, loo-l-l-l-l- Yeah, yeah. I was like, looking at it, I'm like, fuck. What's that riff? Oh, dude. I can't do it on here with, see, this is the thing. like, you know, with the whole like modern MediCorps thing, a lot of it is like the bridge between physically playing and like utilizing the gear, right?

So that riff is like impossible to play without some sort of like whammy automation because that's all that is. So like the the riff itself is, it's super simple. It's like that one. It's just chugs. But yeah, like that whole like, that's like I think that's how I recorded it

but if you were to look at like the whammy block on there like when producing the song at home I made like a whammy block kind of just go like you know what I mean like it's kind of just going crazy on it and no matter what I do

if I do this like whatever it is it would just sound fucked so at that point I try to make it like original do something like that but it's just

it's just noise being produced by the QC at that point. Yeah. Oh, damn. Okay. I got to get it. Is that, like, like a certain riff you have? Or is this, or? Oh, dude, it's like freestyle. I'm freestine. Like, I'm literally just going like, and like the whammy is like going up down, up down in such a fast way that it just, it just makes it screech and like with the gain and everything. Like, it just makes it do crazy stuff. You are the, you are the modern guitars. So yeah, you went straight into this scene. You didn't, so I think we talked earlier. You didn't, you never, you didn't go into amps at all.

No. You went straight into where you're at now. Yeah, I mean, like, I had practice amps and stuff when I was a kid, but they were all, like, solid state. Like, I guess, like, the most, like, if you were trying to, like, to bridge the generations, whatever, like, I had a line six spider. Of course you did. Yeah, because that had all the effects on it and stuff. So you got horned up when, when you heard that. Yeah, no, like, I love the looper on there.

That was my favorite function, the looper, because I would record the riffs. and then like rip like leads over whatever but it was like so janky like oh this is like insane i remember like putting my feet like this and like hitting the looper button with my toe on the amp and like ripping a riff because i didn't have like the foot switch or anything like that um but yeah that's like i guess like from that point it went from that to like oh like interface and plugins and all these things and at a time when like you know this was like before companies like neural DSP or whatever even existed. Like, that didn't exist at that point.

So, wasn't even a word, nothing. I mean, like, it was a thing. Don't get me wrong. Like, that plugins and stuff are a thing,

but it wasn't anywhere what it's like today. Like, now you talk to, like, anyone that's played, picked up a guitar in the past five years. They're like, oh, yeah, cool. Like, you know,

all these brands and neuroddddsp or whatever. But when did neural DSP start? 2018, I think. 2018. Okay. But yeah, I started using plugins when I was like 15, 16. and back then it was only like the positive grid bias stuff.

I'm not sure if you remember that. But yeah, the fidelity wasn't obviously like the same, but I try my best to make it work. Yeah. Is it 2018? Did I get that right? 2017, founded in 2017. I think the first plugin that they ever put out was the Fort NAMeless plugin,

which I'm literally using in the QC right now. That was the first one? Yeah, yeah. And it's like infancy state. and then they um oh yeah no sorry the the dark glass ultra that's a base plugin um because yeah Doug the founder of Neural um used to own he like founded dark glass so oh i didn't know that yeah so his whole thing is like i guess like making that pedal into a plugin and then it just spiraled into spiral yeah to what right now now uh for those you just listening i think it's time

to go into this is the first time kion that we have the the QC mini. Yeah. Yeah. This is insane, dude. It's crazy. This thing is, wow. Basically the same tone I have, but in the smaller form.

If you, like, uploaded that tone and, like, sent it to my account or whatever, I could download it on here in two seconds. Wow. Yeah. This is, I'm telling people, this is the past week. This is the future. Oh, dude. This is where I've been waiting from neural. Every time I started using it, like, they mean, like, a smaller version, but does the same thing.

because I think like the, the nano. The nano, yeah. So the nano is like, it doesn't have a screen or anything. It's a bit different. I think it wasn't what people wanted. This is exactly what fucking people want. Yeah, this is, I've wanted this for a while. Because, like, I made a video about it.

I was lucky enough to get this unit sent early, like, for testing and reviews and stuff like that. And because I've been using a QC for years. I've got two at home, one for myself and one for my bassist. And I never touch it. Like, it's sitting, it's sitting on the floor in front of me we play live but um i'm not like i don't even hit the tuner because i've got like the evertunes and the guitar so like are you lazy it's cool man like i i i let the midi do all of the work so um

yeah like i was in that video i was kind of just saying like you know this is perfect for me because if it's going to be controlled by midi anyway and i don't have to change the presets myself i don't have to change tones myself it just kind of does it through like a click track on a computer wow it can just sit there in a rack side stage or even better yet like just sit somewhere and I can just put it in my bag and fly it in literally like you walked in and you just pull this thing out of your backpack yeah I'm just like wow yeah this is like and it's it's crazy because I could put that in a backpack too it's that small but this is just like a new level um and there's like there are some missing like ports and stuff on the back like but I don't use them so it's fine like it for me it's perfect

like I'm not using physical expression pedals there is an effect loop but I don't need two because it's all um but i don't have any other pet like you you have like a couple pedals on your board but with the way that you got to set it up now it doesn't it doesn't matter yeah it doesn't matter exactly right so um yeah man this thing rips and it's like the it's the same like people go what does it sound like have you have ever ever heard a qc before they're like yeah it's the same thing i was listening to you jam uh at the uh booth i'm like yeah i can't tell yeah it's it's literally the same algorithms or whatever like it's the same blocks It still does the captures.

Like it's literally the same thing. Unbelievable. What's your, so you made a patch specifically for the podcast, but I saw your patch that you used there. It was like this great, you had a lot of stuff going on.

Okay, we can go through it. Oh, please. I can just like pull it up on my lap, right? Wow, dude. This is sick. So, yeah, when we play live, there's like a bunch of different stuff going on. But let me pick a song.

So say for like arrest. or whatever. Whoops, that's the wrong song. So, yeah, the way that, so pretty much, like, out of, there's only five blocks on here out of a total of four times eight. What are I doing? 32. I see, it's just, I see six EQs.

No, it's seven EQs. Yeah, there's, yeah, we'll get through. Okay, okay. But the way that I set up all my patches is pretty much the same. I use, like, the top row as kind of like a pre, like a pedal board, essentially. Okay, cool. And the reason. that I'm going to go to any of this is because

I like to, with the lanes and stuff, there's like four cores of CPU whatever, like computing power in the quads. So I want to like break them off cleanly. Like I don't want to load up a lane with too much stuff because sometimes it'd be like, no, you have like five reverbs on here already, you can't add another one. But you can add it to the next

lane to use on the next core or whatever. So I try to keep it that way. But yeah, top line is always kind of like pre-effects. So like things like what, whammy gate, overdrives, compressors, anything that you put kind of like in the front of an amp essentially. Yeah. And then they split off into three separate lanes.

So the first lane here is like the clean tone. The third lane is like the heavy rhythm tone. And then in this case, the lead tone, like the heavy lead tone of this track is just a derivative of the rhythm, although that's not always the case. Sometimes it's like a completely different amp. So like... Interesting. Yeah.

Can we hear it? Yeah. Yeah. So. Wow. I think it looks wide. It's a bit ridiculous. So yeah, like when I was doing the thing at Bearknuckle, like I had it running back through.

So I was using this as like my guitar tone and an interface and like an in ear rig at the same time. So like I had to do some routing stuff. Wow. If I go here, let me just make sure I don't blow this. But like, so that's like the main rhythm tone. That's nasty. Oh yeah, dude. So, like, in that riff, it was whamminging up and down.

So what I'm playing is like... But it kind of sounds like... Because I automated, like, a full octave whammy to go up in that section. And that's just me just, like, worshipping bands, like, Alpha Wolf and stuff like that, because they do a lot of that stuff, which I thought was sick. But, yeah, like, all those effects, like, that's... like yeah that's the I literally like I grabbed the preset because I did this tone on the Gejura plugin and then I just like pulled that preset onto the quad and just copied all the

blocks over so all the settings are the same or like the values of where I've turned the knobs on the plug in are exactly the same so yeah it's going into like the phaser it's going into the chorus it's going into the like the the the wow pedal or whatever it's going into all of that shit um and then what's this Oh yeah, that's the octave. Oh, what is that? So that's way too hot. That's what that is.

Let me turn that down. Dude, that's some hot heat. Yeah, like, for this song, I originally tracked it on this guitar, but I had it in drop D1. So like a whole octave below drop D on a seven string. So if you were to like get an eight string, drop the top string, and then put the whole guitar down two semi-tenth. tones, that's what it would be in.

So, which is this. And then for the chorus, instead of playing the eighth fret, I took this trick from Mike Stringer from Spiritbox, because he does this a lot where instead of playing the eighth fret, you just kind of down tune as many semitones as from the 12th fret to kind of get the octave of that note. So instead of going and then I go and then like that.

Oh, what the hell? Yeah, so you kind of get this like cool, because that's like probably the most melodic part of the song where I'm actually like producing some sort of chord progression. But to keep it heavy, I was like, oh, like instead of just playing the eighth fret, like the 087 metal core thing that everyone kind of does, why don't I just like

and just keep bashing zeros, like make it easy for myself. Are you just like constantly just playing it? Yeah. But the actual riff is... The actual riff kind of goes like... Where is it? And then we'll switch and go... And then we'll switch back up and go...

And then... So kind of, yeah, that's like the only part of the song that it goes down, but I have to dedicate a whole scene to it because... Oh, wow. It's pretty sick. So, like, if we were to figure out what that note is, what D, and then it goes down four. So C-sharp C,

B double drop A sharp. So if you got like in flames tuning and drop that a whole octave or whatever like that. Yeah, yeah. It's just it's ridiculous. Um, it's, I'm not going to see her and say that this is normal. Like it's definitely not. And it's again, this is kind of what I was getting into the side. It's like very far detached from our two styles.

Right. Like that like this note, um, is like one note of being a whole octave lower than your stuff at times, which is crazy. So would that be Okay, so it's a whole octave lower, correct? So almost. So this is drop A sharp, a whole octave, but you play drop A, right? Okay, wow.

Yeah, so it's just, it's ridiculous. And again, I'm not going to sit here and say that it's normal. And, like, the whole, like, being super far detached from it. Like, there's a lot of people in, like, the, I guess, like, the OG death. Because I see it all the time on comments and stuff like that, like the OG, like, metal and, like, OG Death Corps community that hate this stuff. Do you know what I mean? Like that's like oh like this isn't even like guitar this is even playing.

It's just like noise or whatever. These riffs, they all kind of sound the same. And to some extent, you know, that is true. But I mean, I just, I love it, man. It's fucking heavy as like I just, I love tuning as low as I can and seeing how like you can still hear the note. And that kind of try that. Yeah, dude.

And it kind of just gets into why there's like three different eKs on the, on the patch or whatever. Because to get that note to come out clear, there's a lot of stuff that needs to happen. If it's going that low, I mean, is the bass going up? I mean, what's the... So, yeah, so one of my favorite bands ever is Mushugur. And they do the whole... Because they play an F, but their bassist tunes up a half step.

So they're technically in the same octave. So you get this like melding of guitar and bass where it's almost acting like it's one instrument kind of thing. Like a lot of the criticism of like, I guess like modern metal and like gent or whatever. whatever, it's like, you know, you can't even hear the bass. But, no, like, you can because, like, if you mute the bass track, it'll just die. It'll fall apart. Because they're acting so closely to the... They're basically, like, one big instrument.

And a lot of, like, the bass lines are just mirrored of what the guitar is doing. But, yeah, in this track, like, for this whole track, the bassist is playing in the same octave as me. But even when it goes down... Yeah, what's happening? They go down, but it's still, like, it would be... like the same note as like drop A sharp on a guitar. It's yeah, there's a lot of like, okay.

Weird stuff that happens when you start doing stuff like this, but it's um. At least you're here playing it, man. I won't say who, but I was kidding. I invited a guitar player here and they didn't want to come down because I, I can't play it. Oh, true. I was like, Dan,

so at least you're here like trying to explain and play. I'm trying my best. Thank you for that. No, no, of course, no stress. But yeah, like this, the best representation of it is when it's being. played with the full song because you can hear all the like i think i said it when i was before i started playing um at the band i'll go with like if you listen out for it you can hear all the automations

and stuff going like i'm not sitting here trying to hide it like i need this to play do you mean this is like this is part of my sound this is part of my rig um there are some songs that i can play without it of course but like it it just won't sound the same i can sit here and tap dance like i showed you and that's fine but for like you know all like the like all that whammy stuff yeah um like me playing around now is never going to be a good representation of what it sounds like actually in the moment playing alive and it's all possible due to stuff like this yeah well guitar has no rules well yeah i mean thank you for saying that man because like it's no it's no rules dude a lot of people seem to think that there are you know what i mean like and i do i've been

hearing this shit ever since 2002 there you go ever since uh i think the whole respect rhythm players is a post-covid thing it's still very recent like oh shit you ever heard heard of like West Borland, I've ever heard of like this player or corn or it's a very recent thing where like rhythm players are finally getting there like oh shit this is like there's something to this as well. Yeah, of course. Of course. Yeah. Actually, you bring up a good point. This is so very recent. I mean guys like me know, oh shit like sullisans. Oh, that's, that's sick. It's a very, this is still new to me. Yeah. Or it's getting like, I want to say that's one good

thing that that happened with COVID. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like. People are like, started to respect the rhythm players. I think, yeah, because a lot of the rhythm playing, at least in my, I guess, how I've perceived it, is it's getting more technical as well. And there's like, you know, to, like, there's a couple guys that come to mind, guys like, you know, John Brown of bands like monuments and stuff like that

or even like bands like periphery, like, yeah, there's three guitar plays in there. But, you know, two of them are playing rhythms at any given moment. So not only is, like, the rhythm stuff more technical. But I think, like, the way that I like to put it is you can tell, if someone's a good guitar player by how good they are at playing rhythm. You know what I mean? Like if there's,

there's players out there that only do lead stuff, but you can tell as soon as they start playing a rhythm. Like they, it's, there's a different level of like cleanliness and, yeah, just like timing that comes from being a rhythm player. That is,

it's easier to become a good lead player after you've already got the great foundations of, of rhythm. And I think people started to realize that. Still slowly, but surely that. We're pulling J-play up a list. No,

No, number one is Malcolm Young. He might be the best rhythm player of all time. Yeah, 100%. He might be. I think he's the only guy who could write the same song 50 times and keep it sick every single time. Okay, you know what, dude? That's my North Star. That's my new North Star.

Malcolm Young, rest in peace, man. I saw ACDC like, oh, when was it? It would have been very late. So, like, very late December. They played, like, a, it was like a hundred and 20,000 people or something. Like, it was crazy. They had to put it in, like, the park. lands because there was just so many people but yeah man they ripped every single

acdc something you could ever imagine i'm a big acdc fan that was like a big part of me growing up being australian whatever and like ass g's and yeah um but it was oh it'd be like acdc uh like cdc uh like clipsel type clipsill because that was it was like a race car event or whatever and they were like the main gig at the very end oh shit um uh c l i p s on Um, nice, too. Clip,

oh, S. S.A. L. I don't know what I'm saying. Um, and then yeah, no,

no, O-N at the end. So, uh, yeah, and just, yeah, there you go.

Nice. There you go. Yeah. So, um, yeah, they ripped, man.

I tell you what, like, like, like, um, you could tell the age was showing a little bit, but like, the first half of the set was like very good.

And, um, Angus Young as well. Like, he's just, he's ripping rhythms. It's ripping. It's, I love ACDC to death.

Don't get me wrong. But that was, it was almost like, bittersweet because there's a lot of, like, a lot of people say like, oh, man, they should just hang it up. Do you know what I mean? Like, that's been gone on in the past six months. Yeah.

Yeah, I've seen it. And I kind of get what people were saying to a certain extent. Because, like, you, like, some of the leads and stuff, like the thunderstruck riff, like, it was very bittersweet because you could tell that he, it's like he knew what he wanted to do, but his hands just couldn't do it. Do you know what?

Like, his brain was, like telling him like do this but it just wasn't coming out in the hands but no one cares because you know acDCs they're legends yeah so that's the gig there like that's a six set of what how uh how long did they play oh like two hours or something it was long it was very and like i guess it's like a 20 minute guitar solo or something i don't know if i can do that now two hours it's it's long man i got i got one hour in me dude i and especially at their age like and uh angus was like he was moving dude like he was doing the whole like school boy kick and everything like It's like, it's like time hasn't moved.

He was moving and he was sweating too. He was like, you could tell he was going through the motions. But fair play, man. I wonder how long I got left. No, like, because I thought the same thing. I was watching him. I was like, I don't think I could do this for two hours. Like that's a.

Two hours, dude. With like the pyro and everything. Like it'd be hot up there too. Like a hour and a half. Yeah. Ah, dude. They did have breaks and stuff. But, like, you know, Bond definitely needed some, not Bonn, sorry.

the vocalist name right now Brian Brian Johnson yeah he needed some breaks so they yeah Angus play like 20 minutes solos and stuff but they kind of have to play along because people I don't realize there's a lot of time for people to go to the bar and back yeah and there was bars everywhere

because like it was 100,000 people in this massive space so pretty much like on the perimeter at the back there was just a bar anywhere and you know what Australians are like man they just yeah it's crazy you guys are all psychos no it's insane It's insane.

Dude, Australia is a very unique place. And I don't think I know anyone from Australia that really speaks highly of everybody. And I've heard you talk about everybody. You keep talking about like Aful Wolf, Polaris, Polaris, I'm sorry. Yeah, whatever. You're always speaking very highly of your country. It's cool. Oh, dude.

I love Australia. I love the music that comes. out of there. It's very interesting with like that whole scene bands like that like Alpha Wolf and Polaris. I've had this conversation with so many people like every because I get questions all the time like what are they putting in the water in Australia? Like what's going on over there? Like what's all these bands like even like bands like parkway drive. You're what I mean? Like that whole. Yeah. Yeah. Like I don't know. I think yeah like North Lane's one of my favorite bands ever. Oh Northland. Yeah. Colleguulus horse we did two of them a couple years ago. They're sick too. So like yeah, all these bands are just great. And it's always that question, like, what's going on over there?

Like, why all these sick bands coming out? And I think, yeah, go on. Is it like the separation or what? I think, I don't know. I think it's because, like, in this, we can get, like, philosophical or whatever. But, like, I think in this day and age, because we're so influenced by everything that's going on here, do you know what I mean? Like, it's, it's not that far detached. But the geography of it all is, like, we're still in this, like, we're still so far away.

So when bands like are coming up like the competition is insane like it's absolutely ridiculous like you know Now like that's why I think anyway when bands like alpha wolf or polaris like do come to the states or do go to Europe They come back 10 times bigger because people over there's like I think the caliber Especially in Melbourne and Sydney is so ridiculous because there are so many bands that have like are trying to do the same thing That everyone's just constantly trying to one up each other and that's how people get better obviously course um but yeah like to think that you know north lane i guess northane a little bit before but even like polaris and alpha wolf like they've kind of been doing their thing for almost the same amount of time or like getting the recognition that they deserve for the same amount of time and there's

a lot of bands that you know sound like them but what do you think separates the bands that break out and the bands that don't that's a great question i mean i think it's hard to say i mean like for me personally like North Lane in particular like you know they're not the biggest metal band by any stretch um they're one of my favorite bands ever but every time I see them they put on such a sick show like the production that they put on is absolutely ridiculous like um the lights like they got like automated time-coded screens that like go along with their music and um the vibe and the just yeah the general production is is so good like to a level where you're thinking like why am i seeing this? an 800-cat room.

Do you know what I mean? Like this is ridiculous. Like this could be in a theatre. Yeah. So like this is, yeah, this is at the end more. So that hometown show for them, Sydney, 2024. I saw this tour actually when they came through to Adelaide. But yeah, this is like, this is to me like the peak of like production on a live show in it.

That Australia bands, Australian bands have to offer rather. And it just, it to me when I see that, I think it's like no wonder why when bands like that come over here, they just blow up in. instantly because there's so much more here there's so much more like people and influence and bands and i'm just general like interest in this aesthetic and this music and this heavy culture whereas like australia it's like it's getting there for sure like Melbourne is definitely one of like the biggest metal core places on the planet i think but um it's just not even it can't even hold a candle to all the stuff that's going on in the states i think wow it was always wondering because when there's so much competition how do you fucking yeah the ones that just break out

It's pretty cutthroat, man. I won't lie. Like, being in that live, I guess, like, seeing the inner workings of it to a certain extent, you start to see why bands do well and why bands don't. But I think, like, you asked originally, like, I think that the big thing is that there's this, there's just, like, drive and perseverance to, like, just constantly doing it no matter what. And eventually it will happen.

Like, Alfalfa has been a band since, like, 2012. But they didn't really start doing the thing, I guess, until, like, maybe like 2015, 2016. And even then, that was like the first little peak. And now it's just like they're one of the biggest ever, I guess, in this space. So there's, it's all peaks and valleys. But it's that wanting to do it thing that I think is the big differentiator for sure. Is that what you did?

I mean, why? Because you think about it, it's kind of crazy that you're here. I think to a certain extent, I mean, like I'd like to like think that, you know, I'm trying my best or whatever. but I also acknowledge that, you know, time has been very kind to me in regards to, like, what you're saying before, like, the timing of it all. Like, if I didn't start doing social media stuff in COVID when everyone was at home on their phones watching, it might have been a bit different, you know? And I see it now, like, I guess even like the time thing, it goes both ways, right? Like, do you know Pliny? Yes.

Pliny is one of my favorite artists ever. I take big inspiration from him because obviously he's Australian as well and he does the whole progressive metal thing. But, like, you know, Pliny was one of the guys to kind of do this first. And then I modeled a lot of my, not only the music, but also, like, you know, behavioral, like, business-wise stuff behind Pliny. Because I really respected what he was doing and how he kind of, like, held himself together as, like, an independent, instrumental progressive metal artist. You know what I mean? But, yeah, I guess, like, just doing it is, like, a big thing as well. It's like, but I, again, I acknowledge that I did it the right time.

If I started just doing it five years later or whatever, or even like three, it might have been, like, we might not be sitting here right now. You know what I mean? So, but then again, I guess like you can't get held up on that stuff too much. Otherwise, you kind of just spiral and think like, oh, what if this did happen or what if this didn't happen? You know what I mean? Like, you kind of just take it as it comes, I suppose, yeah. Yeah, I like what you said, holding yourself together because you don't really drink. No, not really.

I'm not a big drink. Like, it's not like I'm completely straight edge or anything. Like, I'll do it like at weddings and stuff like that. But yeah, I've never been a big drinker. I've never been like super into like partying or anything like that. I think that comes from, that might be like a cultural thing. Because like my parents, like my dad's Persian, he doesn't do any of that stuff. And mom doesn't really do any of that stuff either.

So maybe it just wasn't around the house when I was a kid. So it wasn't a thing. But there's like nothing against it. I just don't do it. Yeah. Makes sense. I saw you in action. Nothing.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean like I'll, I have my vices and stuff. But what are they? Juice. I love juice. I mean like super crazy like sugary juice. Oh, like orange juice?

Oh, I love a good apple juice. But yeah, the sugary are the better. Like I'm a sucker for sugar, man. Sugar, gotcha. But yeah, like sugar is like an addiction in itself, right? Oh, 100%. Like I've like you know that kind of like three o'clock crash when you haven't had any sugar that day and you're like I need sugar Oh totally I do I get that all the time and then if you don't happen you get a fucking massive headache

Yeah 100 it's crazy um like the effect that sugar has and like everyone everyone is addicted to sugar whether they realize it or not do you know I mean It's an issue for me for sure oh yeah but yeah I mean like it's again there's nothing against it it's just Yeah not bad sugar that's it's awesome yeah especially being around like a big NAM convention. If you're not familiar what we're talking, it's like you're talking a lot of people around a lot of music here. Most people are drinking. Yeah,

I guess for me, it's like, I just want to keep my wits about me too. Like I don't want to be, because like, again, this is all super surreal for me. Like,

being at NAM and like, you know, even like being here right now and like chatting to you, like, you know, the last thing I want to be is inebriated. You know, like I want to know what I'm saying.

I want to have my wits about me. Like even like, you know, yeah, some of these photos like hanging out with like super cool guys and just bumping into guys that I'm, you know, fortunate enough now to call friends. But, you know, obviously. And to this day, there's a point in time where they're heroes. Do you know what I mean? It's like I don't want to be doing anything or saying anything that's not me. Because I've seen it happen. Like there's even at NAM like coming here and there's guys that have just been acting a fool basically.

And it's because they've been inebriated. And that that always sticks. And like even years later like people like within my circle that I always stay with at now We talk about like I remember that one time that um this guy got like absolutely hammered and started saying all this crazy shit I'm like yeah I do remember that actually I'm glad that I'm glad that I didn't do any of that Dude I figured out how to do nam yeah I've been there quite a few times tell me So yeah when we were all hanging out literally Friday Saturday I'm not tricky at nap Yeah, it's a very new thing I don't know why it just didn't feel right and like I got a lot done

Yeah. It was like kind of crazy. And then you kind of see what our drinking, aren't really getting a lot done. It was kind of an eye-opening thing. But I drank, I drank Thursday, not even at nap. Yeah. I told myself I was going to stay here or sleep and get a good nice rest for the bruncle jam. Yep. And I got a text. I don't know if I'm going to call him out. Meegs from Cole Chamber. I love him so much. So once I got the text, we met up somewhere. I had a lot of vodka cranberries. But it was just around him and a few people. Is that your advice? vodka of cranberries? Oh, it's just alcohol. Fair. I love alcohol. But it's a time, but I've been really good at choosing a time and in place. Yeah.

And okay, I went out, I was social. I had my drinks, but when I came down on a Friday, nothing. Yeah. And it's fucking handle business, Saturday's the same thing. No drinking, but hand on business. I was like, damn. It was just a, there's a time and place for it. It was really interesting how much more I got done at how much focus I was just by not drinking.

100%. And I drank away from everybody. as opposed of drinking around everybody. So we're doing the same thing, but at different times around different people, and it definitely changed the way how much I got done and how focused I was. I mean, granted, at Friday, I was hung over a little bit,

but I'm still, you know, as you say, I still have my wits, I still knew exactly where I was saying, and I still handled business, and then I left. Exactly. Like, even, like, the Saturday morning when we did the neural shoot together, like, if I did go out drinking the night before and, like, rocked up at,

like, what was it, like 10 in the morning or whatever. Yeah. With a camera in my face going, all right, let's go through this. I'd be like, oh, dude, like, what's going on? Yeah, it's just, you're around like these, you know, you're around professionals. Exactly right. I mean, I don't want to be around neural and, like, in imbriated. Yeah.

That makes you look so unprofessional, you know? That's, I guess, like, that really is my answer to all that stuff. I don't want to look unprofessional. I'm always trying to be, like, like, that makes me. as professional as possible because it people remember it it is a lasting impression i think um and you know i didn't get any of that like even though you said you were hung over on the friday when i met you do you i mean like oh actually i just see the day before but like it wasn't even a thought in my mind do you mean because you had your wits about you you know i feel like that's like super time time in a place

exactly right that's cool yeah i learned i learned a lot this year you got to be professional but you want to drink you know drink at other times exactly right nobody knew yeah i also So just being present. Exactly right. Just like, boom, being present. I mean, if I wasn't present with you, maybe the whole neural thing would have happened. And again, it's that snowball, right? Snowball.

Thanks snowball. Dude, you get older, man. It's just like you just realize things just snowball both ways, either negative way or a positive way. Exactly right. It's like that string theory thing. Like this happened because this happened because this happened because this happened. And it's true. I believe in that shit.

Yeah, me too. I believe in connecting dots and, uh, yeah so i i guess uh yeah i kind of see why you're here you know yeah i to some extent it's it's pretty sick that we're sitting here right now but it's 100% because of all that stuff you mean like it's it's no other reason i don't think did the uh i'm sorry what's name again uh polaris no uh pliny pliny yeah yeah yeah so did you get that from him like is he a drinker or what's uh i mean like plenty plenty plenty's a funnys a funnys a funny one like i i'm friends with plenty now um plenty's a great guy i don't like at least the way that like

i saw him growing up and like being influenced by him he just to me anyway it was like this guy just does the guitar thing and puts his head down and like that's all he does and that that really is all he does and you know there wasn't there was never any like um slander about anything it was kind of just people viewed him for what um he is and it's just a sick guitar player that writes sick music And I think there's something to be said about that in this age where like there's always something happening. Do you know what I mean? Like there's someone like so problematic who just like plays headless guitars and just like rip sick tunes. You know what I mean?

Like that's cool. But even like, you know, from I guess because he kind of had like the same upbringing. You know what I mean? And the same start to all of it. Like he was just a dude that was writing tunes in his room and now he's like literally touring the world. And that's why. It's so sick. Like I'm so influenced by him and I'm so grateful with that.

he's kind of like paved the way for you know um small fries like myself to kind of like follow in his footsteps and the generation beyond that so on and so forth yeah obviously he's a very popular guitar player but just like we're saying earlier this lot of shit i don't know about and i never really dope into two of him yeah it's like it's he he does a good job of like keeping that mysteriousness as well like his whole life isn't out there um which i don't think i'm as good out because of the way that everything happened. But like, yeah, this is interesting actually. Like, I think like, because I've had this chat to a couple of people as well, like, he started

doing this at the time where you could get away with doing that where like he would have started like writing stuff when he was like freshly in uni, like maybe like 2013, 2014, which is only like a couple years before. But that it's just a different time. And like, you know, Facebook was like still popular at that point. You know what I mean? Like so, um, he wasn't. really doing the whole like content created to musician pipeline it was just musician because back

then it was way more viable to do it that way so he's never uh you know probably felt the need to like put his whole life out there on social media to be seen as like uh as like a relatable presence like oh this is just a guy that plays guitar in his room like me you know i mean like people are well aware that it started from that but like um it doesn't need to be like a consistent thing whereas now um because I like I do private lessons and stuff a lot like social media coaching and I get sick I get this question a lot it's like you know what what do I do how do I like do the thing yeah sure um but I feel like in this day and age people want that relatability aspect like people want to be personable um and they need to see themselves in you as an artist for them to really care about

what's going on you're anything like gone of the days are like of like driving around and like being a rock star and like driving lambos and throwing TVs out of rooms and stuff like that. Yeah. And like even the the one after that is over. Like I feel like now there's a newfound not respect. I don't think respect is the right. Maybe like appreciation for artists who like start from the ground up because it's this kind of thing. I like because I thought the same right.

Like I was looking at planes like this guy just started in his bedroom and started ripping tunes. Like that's sick. I can do that too. do you mean and I have a bedroom I have a focus right interface like I can do all these things

and then you see guys like that get their own signature neural DSP plugin and it's like oh man that's so sick I know I'm always like around

around the quad I always see his name pop up yeah yeah he's um his tones are always great I should probably pop in okay um yeah you should definitely

he has to be on been on here before no he's in America quite a B he too is quite a lot so yeah maybe I can link you guys up he's from Sydney. Sydney, oh shit.

Oh, it explains like the direct. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's awesome. So again, yeah,

being like a young teenager and, yeah, so this is from 2012, like no face, no nothing. Like back when you could do this and people would like,

you know, it wasn't as saturated as it is today too. So again, it's that right place, right time thing, right? Like maybe if this video

was posted now, it would just be a video in the wind. But right place, right time, 2012, like, um,

you know, Steve I literally said he's like the next generation of guitar. Like, and that was in like, yeah. So like if that's damn, motherfucker. If Steve Vi is saying that in like 2015, 2016 or whatever it was like, I think you're fine. Do you know, like? Oh, that's sick.

Yeah. I think Steve I said, you know, Garza's the next future or chugging. 100%. 100%. That's one thing I'd pay a lot of money to see. Steve Vi just chugging. I will pay money for that.

Yeah, that'd be great. Dude, just fucking chugs, Steve, I. Just fucking 4-4-4-1-1. Just fucking like some of them from Steve-Vy. Oh my goodness. So, dude, we got to talk about the Jackson, man. Yeah. What do we have here?

So this is my daily driver. So this is actually, you know, Northland, the band that we mentioned before. This is Josh Smith's signature Jackson because he's been playing Jackson February. Yeah, there he is. Good old Josh. Um, Josh. Uh, yeah, so, this is his signature guitar. It's a seven string Jackson, um, but it's got the Fender headstock because, you know,

for those that don't know, Jackson is owned by Fender as is like Charvel and Evaheh and Gretch and all that stuff. So yeah, they work very closely together. So this is, it's, it's sick, man. It's like, it's, um, it's everything that I want personally out of a guitar. Like, I'm not playing this because it's a North Lane signature guitar and like I love Northlane, so get me wrong. It's the common, it's the common, like, appreciation for, like, similar spec that Josh has to,

a lot of the modern players that I think make this guitar sick, like, you know, the 27-inch scale. So, like, it's, like, a little bit longer so I can put this in F-sharp. You know what I mean? Like, this right now, acoustically, this is an F-sharp. So it does the thing. It came with bare-knuckle pickups. It came with his signature set of impulses.

Right now, I've got the Mike Stringer, Halcyon, in there. Oh, wow. Because I did a demo for the best. bare knuckle guys and they sent it over and I popped it in and wrote a song and whatever um so it's still in here it's sick um ever tune cannot play a guitar without ever tune these days I'm the biggest ever tune like fanatic I will not stop singing its praises for what I do um like the whole like heavy chugging like needing the guitar to be in tune all the time because everything's automated type stuff like when everything's like so tight um on like the grid so to speak like having this

there. It's like one less thing I need to think about. Like, I'm not tuning in between every song. My notes aren't going like, like back into tune. Like, it's just dialed. So, EverTune. Three-way pickup selector with two volume pots, which is something that is like, I haven't seen it any other guitar or like production guitar. So the way that Josh has this wire, the way he likes it is. Oh, like that's the, it's all bridge. But then when you flick it, it's both. But, yeah,

so, like, it gives you, you can do the split call thing because you can roll the volume of this one down and just have the inner coil of that. So,

like, if I go there and that's down, nothing's going to happen. Oh, yeah, cool. But if I roll it up, does the whole, like, split coil thing.

The gate is like super tie right now. Oh, yeah. I might even turn it down a bit. But, yeah, like, it definitely does the thing, for sure.

And, like, for me, it's like this combination of specs that are just a sick like the locking tuners the roasted maple neck like it's super smooth to play the ebony fretboard

like it's everything that I've pretty like if I had to make a signature guitar it would be like a derivative of this one maybe like a bit longer like maybe the shape would change or whatever but Benuckle ever tuned long scale like all of like the mainstays would be

there yeah but yours isn't too different Pretty close. Yeah, it's pretty close. I call them a foundational woods. Yeah. It was just a time, it's proven, like maple, ebony, mahogany, just like, you know, very like the staple.

Yeah. Yeah. It still holds up. This is, actually, yeah, now that you've mentioned it, this is a, it's a neck through. So usually I'm a bolt on guy, but Josh is a neck through guy. So maybe that's one thing I would change. But I don't notice it changing, like, you know, anything too much. But if I had it my way, it would be a bolt on.

But yeah, it's roasted maple, like, all the way through. And then I think either side is older. I could be wrong. Older, yeah. Also, yeah, it is. Sick. Awesome. So, again, that's another one of those, like, you know, the ones that, it's like

Mahogany, maple, older. Totally. It's like one of those foundational woods, right? But yeah, man. I think we got to hear a chug, dude. Okay. Let's go back. What's a good chug, Tom?

Uh, let's go back to the... Trying to get a horned up. Yes, like the gate is like super tight. But yeah, I just, I made this quickly before we, um, started because the, the, everything I'll be playing up to this point is like super, super dialed for the live stuff. Like, it doesn't sound that great in isolation because there's so many EQs and stuff going on. But this is super simple. It's literally just gate into, um, I've got a, I've got a fort and, uh, oh, that's a Zool.

I've got a Fortin 33, like them sugar overdrive pedal. I've got a mini one of that at home. I captured it. So that's in there. Cool shit. I've got the Fortin Zool block. So just like the digital version of that in here as well. Oh, interesting.

I'm using the Fortin amp. I've got an IR loader in now. This is an old I. I just thought I'd use it because whatever. But I've got like different ones in here. Like if I go here and maybe this one is a bit better. So like there's like different flavors or whatever. or even like

I find I use it all the time and then just like a super simple like EQ where I've just got like a high cut happening around like 10K so it doesn't blow the desk with like super shrill noise or whatever

but super like simple foundational tone but a lot of like the stringiness and like the like the chug factor comes from this rather than the the actual amp-ups.

I'm not doing anything crazy. It's very simple. It's just how you physically play it and then like the combination of the specs. Like this, if it was a shorter scale of like not as high output pickups and I wasn't playing as hard,

it wouldn't sound like that. It'd be like, not like. So yeah, it's, you know, it's like all in the physicality of it. Yeah. Totally. With all like the endless

possibilities and the options how does uh do you have any recommendations like how how does someone that's just coming in fresh like how do you find a tone man oh we could talk about this forever i'm such a big tone guy tone is like my my number one pastime because i know a lot of people uh i guess you would call it uh option paralysis yeah right so with all the options how do you just find like like a simple tone to start off with oh man i mean like like i mean like when I'm going through it with my students, like the analogy I always use is like good tone,

like good audio production, I think anyway, it's very similar to like cooking where like if you get it, if you get the foundations of it right, it's really hard to fuck it up. Especially these days where it's like, you know, you have stuff like this where you can literally just click here,

click there, drop in a like, you know, high gain air drop in a cab. And it should sound good. Do you mean? So if it doesn't sound good, if you don't think it sounds good,

then it's probably something you're doing in this process. before it hits the front of the quad or even the real physical amp or whatever it is because like again this is literally just what gate overdrive amp cab and then like I don't even have to have the EQ on I just did it because I felt like I had to do something do you know anything like yeah but I mean like for me it's it's all like it's all the the little things and even if they make up like 1% if you like tick all off the variables and get them all right then it could make up 20% or 30% of your tone so like things like you know like the the action of your guitar like is it too low like are your strings rattling like maybe that might give a bit more high end or cut some of the sustain on your chugs or whatever is it high

so it sounds like really like every note is like a piano where there's no inter interference or anything like that um the pickup height like is it hot is it down is it like not as hot um the bridge like this is like taking a huge sorry taking a huge chunk of wood out of the guitar so like of course that's going to have some effect, like, compared to that where it's just like a hard tail piece. And there's a full, it's wood. Exactly right, full mahogany body. That's definitely going to sound beefier and, you know, a bit lower, which it does. Like when you play it, you can hear it in there.

So it's not even like, it's not even making sure you pick the right one. It's more so having an understanding of these things that I find that makes any tone sound the that you want to sound because like when I put all these things on my head I'm like okay like I'm playing an F sharp I've got this 27 inch scale so that's going to make it a little brighter I've got this ever tune it's going to make it really bright I've got this super high output band uncle pick up so it's probably going to be super hot um by the time I get to hear it's like okay like the four and 33 pedal is like a very exaggerated low cut so it's going to take a lot of signal out my tone so maybe I need to dial in the gain a bit higher in the amp to kind

to make up the difference like all these like gain staging tone things like that's what I think makes a good tone rather than just like, oh, use X, Y, Z piece of gear. Okay. It's more like understanding what the gear is that you have in your hands. I don't believe in like, you know, I can't get this tone because I don't have this piece of gear. Unless it's like a very like specific effect or something like that, then sure, fair enough. But I think like anyone that has a guitar that has like humbuckers or whatever that work,

that, you know, even free plugins. Like there's free plugins. There's free plugins. And they sound sick these days. Like it's not that. It's not like, it's how you use it. You know what I mean? That's what I think anyway.

Yeah. And in course, and in the hands. Exactly right. And if you tick off all of those other variables and you still can't find it, then it's probably how you're physically playing the guitar, right? So, yeah, again, like, even like the difference between just going like, and then like, you can hear the pick attack way.

more. Do you know what I mean? Like the way that if you were to like record those two signals, because like I record my stuff at home and produce or whatever, so I see all the differences. Like, um, the way that your signal looks when you barely pick hard, like it's, it's like a sausage. Like it's, there's no transient. There's no like initial pop when your pick hits the string. Um, but when you do, it's like a much like harder impact and maybe it tails off towards the game at the end. Whereas if I don't pick as hard, it sounds gainier, but it's because the, the waveform is like a bit more solid state. So, wow.

Yeah, it's more so understanding that as a concept rather than like, oh, like every amp I pick, I'm going to dial the gain to seven because that's what I saw on a video once. It's like, no, like, learn that amp and figure out what that is. Yeah, yeah. I've spent way too much time on this stuff. But yeah, like, I'm a big sucker for learning everything about every amp and every, because like these amps and even though it's digital, like, they are modeled after the real thing. So like if you like even that 5150 block in the Gejira there, like if you dialed the master up on that, the volume would get louder, of course. But like the way that the mid range would saturate, it'd be completely different because that's what happens on the real life version. Like when you turn a 5150 past five, it's.

starts getting squishy, it starts getting rounder. Squished up. But what a lot of modern guys do is that they dial the master back to like three. And then they get a bit more of a sterile sound where it's like a bit more articulate. And maybe I can show that actually. Please. So like, so I've changed the amp to like the Nolly 50-150 because that's like my second favorite.

Okay. So right now everything's at like, I'm going to turn it down because I'm probably getting it pretty loud. I've got everything at 5 because I just loaded the block on there. The master's at 5. If I were to turn that master up, again, like the common thought process, like, oh, master is volume. It's going to get louder. But it does get louder a little bit, but the way it sounds is different. So like, it gets way darker. And you're like, oh, okay. but if I turn down to like three and then make up the difference on this just simple output

the output it's like way tighter yeah interesting I never put that together yeah so like and again like every amp is different this is how like typical 51 50-50 style amps react or whatever so again like even that little bit there can make such a huge difference to your overall um tone Nice. But yeah, man, I've spent way too much time getting into all this stuff. But yeah. How do you know? I guess the other question I haven't heard an answer to is how hard to pick

and can you pick too hard to get the tone that you're trying to get like an aggressive? Yeah, no, you definitely can pick too hard. That's for sure. I mean, like live, it's whatever. Like put on a show, make it look cool. That's fine. But for studio purposes, I mean, like, Like, I, I think I've dialed how hard I want to pick.

Like, if I'm picking simple notes, like, if I was to pick too hard, to be like, where you can start, like, it starts getting a little bit sloppy and your palm starts, like, getting in the way and all that stuff. But the way that I kind of like to do the whole, because a lot of it is like heavy downpicking. So I'm trying my best to kind of like keep it as controlled as possible. If you look at like the bottom side of my hand,

it looks like my whole wrist is moving but it's not like this part is like the anchor point and then all the motion is kind of coming from the top part of my hand kind of like stabbing through the string it's a bit weird but like even going like that wow yeah if you look at that yeah I don't notice that it's kind of like this like Chinese fan thing going on oh wow um but so you can downpick super fast that way and like use way less energy but still would get that super hard sound um because it's just all stabbing through the string you know okay yeah what about for like some something this we're just like you're just chugging like what's like that like big open like how you how you approaching that it's pretty much the same thing

because even that video i think like maybe i do like move this a little bit like this kind of lifts off the strings more or less but this part of my hand is kind of constant It's like when you're getting taught guitar If you've ever had lessons Like palm muting is like Oh yeah like put your palm on the guitar But for metal it's like your palm is kind of always on the guitar So it's like it's the opposite

Where you kind of need to learn how to lift it off In a way that doesn't fuck up the sound So like when you're like For the rest of it it's all on there Yeah. Okay. Can I test it out? Yeah, dude.

Yeah. I always forgot. I'll see someone play something. I want to play it, but I always forget to ask. Okay. That's right.