“I don’t have any equipment. [Laughs] It’s still the same old, same old. To me it’s like a ’50s toaster. You just plug it in and switch it on. If I don’t hear me in there, I don’t like what I’m plugged into. There are millions of fantastic guitar sounds, but they always sound exactly the same no matter who's playing.
“They’re not transparent enough to reveal the character. I could use maybe one flurry of notes with that kind of sound, but I prefer the sound of a really loud amp blasting away. I like for there to be some size. I like to hear the room. I don’t like to stuff the mic right up against the cone. You can read the long full interview on Guitar World
Jeff Beck: looking back at his childhood in newly unearthed audio of an interview with Rolling Stone’s Kory Grow. “They were one step away from jail, most of them. The guitar saved me from that.
Jeff Beck, the ‘guitarist’s guitarist’ who forever altered the course of rock’n’roll.
“Jeff could channel music from the ethereal… his technique unique, his imaginations apparently limitless,” said Jimmy Page of this “six-string warrior” and “the spell he could weave around our mortal emotions”. Jeff Beck “was punk rock before punk existed,” declared The Edge. “The Salvador Dali of the guitar,” said Aerosmith’s Joe Perry; “an infinite source of joy,” claimed Stevie Van Zandt; an innovator, pioneer and profound influence, stated Dave Gilmour, Steve Hackett, Johnny Marr and Joe Satriani. The phrase “guitarist’s guitarist”, which could have been coined for Beck, had never felt more apposite.
Beck – who died early in January at the age of 78 – looks back at his entire career, from the Yardbirds to the Jeff Beck Group to his fusion era and beyond in the interview, which can be heard in its entirety in the new episode of our Rolling Stone Music Now podcast. “I’ve never made the big time,” Beck said, “and mercifully, probably. When you look around and see who has made it huge, it’s a really rotten place to be when you think about it. Maybe I’m blessed with not having had that.” (Source Rolling Stone)
The nearly two-hour-long tribute episode also features new interviews with three guitar legends: Mike Campbell of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Vernon Reid of Living Colour, and Joe Satriani. Elsewhere in the episode, Andy Greene joins host Brian Hiatt to discuss Beck’s entire career.
“Jeff Beck probably stood out the most in terms of spontaneous, quirky, but melodic stuff,” says Campbell. “It was always surprising, like, ‘How’d he come up with that?’ Plus, he looked great!” Campbell also reveals one thing he had in common with Beck: Both of them kept guitars in their bathrooms, just in case.