St. Vincent took inspiration from one of Neil Young's “one note” solos on her new record, All Born Screaming.
St. Vincent's discography is full of moments where her distinct guitar playing shines. However, on some tracks from new album All Born Screaming, the artist goes back to basics and adopts a less is more approach to guitar solos.
“I take a kind of solo in the chorus that reminds me of listening to Butthole Surfers in Dallas in 1997,” she says when talking about her track Flea in the latest issue of Total Guitar.
“I was going for a sound where it’s like… wrong? Like, ‘Is this person virtuosic, or do they totally suck?’ That’s kind of where I live. Like, one of the great guitar solos, Neil Young’s Down By The River is, what, one note? So it’s just in the hands of the beholder, I think.”
This doesn't mean that the album is short of solos, however. In So Many Planets, St Vincent rips a solo that the artist describes as her “love letter to second-wave ska and 2 Tone Records.
“I thought I was totally aping The Specials’ Man At C&A, and then I went back and listened to it and realised, ‘Oh, no I wasn’t.’ Usually when you reference things, you’re only really referencing your memory of the feeling that you had when you last heard something, you’re not literally referencing it.”
In a 2014 interview with Salon, St Vincent talked about her approach to crafting each song's guitar parts: “In the same way that I think that I really make pop music, I don't think of it as pushing the guitar lexicon. I'm thinking, 'How do I make something that's interesting to my ears?'
Recently Neil Young showcases his savage overdriven tones and channels Hendrix in the most menacing solo rendition of the Star-Spangled Banner you’ve ever heard.
Wielding his legendary 1953 Gibson Les Paul, Old Black, Young put his own spin on the US national anthem, nodding to a certain Woodstock performance along the way.
Neil Young posted a video titled Stand for Peace, which features him playing The Star-Spangled Banner solo.
Wielding his iconic, much-modded and road-worn 1953 Gibson Les Paul – known as Old Black – Young delivers a very Young-ian rendition of the US national anthem that will also bring to mind Jimi Hendrix's gloriously freewheeling Woodstock rendition of the same tune. (GuitarWorld)
