No one. Not one single person has more fun than Adrian Belew. He gets that little kid smirk almost saying, "Hey, look at this. Ain't it cool?" I remember seeing him first with Bowie then Talking Heads. Always pulling these amazing sounds out of nowhere. Nobody puts in more time on his sound. He has every pedal he ever owned in a room and can recreate those sounds just like the day he made them. AND he has the ability to now call up anything he's ever done, live on the fly. And such a character. Thanks Michael.
Oscar award winning composer Adrian Belew. His old instructional video Electronic Guitar is just an out of step, step one for the adventurous noisemakers out there. His body of recorded work as a sideman and solo artist is stunning. There’s The Great Curve solo with Talking Heads, Genius of Love by The Tom Tom club, King Crimson, Zappa, his stellar work with Bowie, the Bears, his entire catalog of solo albums, his guest solos from Porcupine Tree’s Deadwing album especially Halo. He doesn’t read notation but says he went to the Frank Zappa School of Rock. He can write beautiful beatle esque pop or the most avant garde pieces of music. He’s a treasure in a world of clones. He never wanted to sound like anyone but himself. I love him for it ❤
Rock and roll! This is so bonkers to me. It's like there are 4 songs melded together and they designed it to sound like unhinged chaos, but it's clear they are right there with each other and know exactly what's going on. Just makes me smile hearing it. Thanks, Michael!
I’ve seen them four times. This is just the tip of the iceberg. I saw their first performance ever. The drummer at that time was Julie’s younger brother, and he was still in high school. I think Julie was 18. Mind blowing show.
Thanks for this, love Belew. Small quibble, he wasn’t doing a Vai thing, he’d been doing this stuff well before SV got exposure (SV was Belew’s replacement in Zappa’s band after Belew took the Bowie gig).
This song blew my mind. At first it's confusing, but then it kicks in and... it actually kind of rocks? Live in Rockpalest is fantastic and on spotify if you want some guitar inspiration.
I have had the pleasure of seeing Adrian a bunch of times. He’s as good as it gets. Not being able to play like Adrian is like not being able to play like Victor Wooten. You can’t beat yourself up about it.
Adrian Belew shared the stage with Bowie, Fripp and Zappa (among others). He an amazing sonic craftsman. Julie Slick definitely needs more recognition as a phenomenal Bass player. And let's not forger to praise Tobias Ralph on the drums. Saw the Power Trio in 2017.
Keep in mind Adrian is 73 years old, he's played with Zappa, Bowie, NIN, Talking Heads, and for a long time was the frontman in King Crimson. I was lucky enough to see him both with Crimson and solo, he's a beast. A huge inspiration to me. I'd recommend his Side 1 Side2 Side3 album series as a primer. Or just jump into the deep end with King Crimson - Power To Believe.
Adrian Belew has been one of my all time favorites since the early 80's. I am especially attached to his Lone Rhino album and King Crimson's Discipline.
Adrian is my hero and a friend. This piece is the finale of a musical suite he wrote after being inspired by Julie and her brother Eric , who came with Julie to play drums. (He has since moved on to Dr. Dog.) Ade found them at Paul Green’s School of Rock in Philly, where he went to appear as a special guest. The trio played Zappa songs that day, with the kids hanging right in with the Master. Adrian was looking to form a power trio, and there they were! Absolute MONSTERS! Look up the video for “B” while you’re at it. It’s from the same session.
One of my all time favorite musicians, not only a great guitar player but a great singer as well, and also has played pretty much every other instrument on most of his solo albums. A brilliant innovator. And his straight pop sensibilities are amazing, his Beatle-ish songs are so damn good. Mr. Musichead remains my favorite AB solo album, highly recommended! Also check out The Bears, one of his lesser known side projects, four phenomenal albums.
After years of watching and listening to Adrian, I'm convinced he made it to mess *with himself*! The guy just lives and breathes music and inventiveness - and the joy of that has been obvious every time I've seen him play! I've met him after smaller shows several times - and he is just like that all the time - if you love music, you just can't help but love being around Adrian! The bassist is Julie Slick - the original version of the Power Trio formed when Adrian visited Paul Green's School of Rock in 2006 - and Green told Adrian he just had to see this brother and sister: the sister was of course Julie, and the brother was Eric on drums - Adrian was in his late 50s, and one of the siblings (don't remember off the top of my head which one) was underage: Adrian was so impressed that the Trio was formed shortly afterwards. Eric has moved on, to be replaced by several other masterful drummers, but Julie is still playing with Adrian, along with several of her own projects! This video was recorded during or close in time to the Covid mess - so quite a while after the album was released - I'm pretty sure the drummer was Jordan Perlson - the third drummer the band had. Of course, any drummer that can keep up with Adrian and Julie gets pretty major respect 🙂 For this song, those alternate picking lines are purely chromatic with octave jumps - ranging from the root E to the third an octave up and back down! Definitely listen to the whole album - then get the orchestral version of the same music! Then get some 80s - 90s King Crimson - "Discipline" and "The Power To Believe" kind of "bookend" Adrian's time with King Crimson - and both are great albums!
I saw these guys not that long ago, talk about a show!! The bassist shredded our faces off, the drummer was insane(playing on an old Bill Bruford kit), and Adrian was a madman as usual...never seen anybody use a whammy bar like that!
I remember seeing E in Amsterdam (Paradiso) with the amazing Metropole Orkest. Not only was it an amazing gig - which was released on cd; you won't be disappointed! - but I brought a friend who knew nothing of what was about to happen. At several times during this seated gig, my buddy leapt out of his seat of pure giddy enjoyment. Double the fun for me. A treasured memory.
Michael, This is a great example of playing in between each other. The bass hit the 1, 2 and the drummer accented, then Adrian starts dancing in between both the rhythms of bass and drums as well as melodically between the lines of the bass. The whole thing is flats with the accent notes being major, natural, or whatever suits their fancy, even the bass took lead and Adrian switches to rhythm in places. I use to do this with friends in my garage back in the early 2000s. I'm no Adrian, but can hold my own. Funny how no-one knew who he was back in the 70s.😂 I'm a few years younger than Adrian, but as a heavy metal guy, I watched VanHalen, Zappa, Clapton, and all the different directions guitar was going in, just trying to plot my course, but I'm a lead singer who plays guitar.😉 Probably why I hear things differently. A lot of comments mention the different influences over time with Zappa, Bowie, Crimson, and so on, but some people simply stand out on their own like Adrian, Beck, Hendrix.🤙 Here is a link to a video of Adrian sharing sound secrets. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-eZ93rucNVBI.htmlfeature=shared
Love thw pure joy you show listelning to music. Had a band since 1983 but have been a music junky and fiend since I bought a Pioneer stereo in 5th grade when I bought my first 4 albums..Axis Bold as Love, Paranoid, John Mayals Blues Breakers with Clapton, ELO Out of the Blue, Jethro Tull Thick as a Brick. Adrian is a monster who came from the Zappa fold❤
Adrian is an absolute gift to music. I bought Lone Rhino when it was released, because Big Electric Cat was so cool. The guy in the record shop laughed at me and said why do you want to buy that? It's horrible. AB has been an inspiration and a favourite ever since. Love your reaction Michael. Priceless 🙂
I have had the pleasure of seeing them do this live a few times. Julie Slick is a monster on bass, she is also playing with Ade on the remain in light tour he is doing with Jerry Harrison. after Tina Weymouth saw it, she told Julie, these songs are yours now. Adrian has been a huge influence on my playing,attempt to mimic his technique. great video, I loved your reaction to the tune. He has also done this piece with a full orchestra, a nod to his teacher, frank zappa.
5:54 sounds like a reference to the song _Indiscipline_ from his early King Crimson days. I won't pretend to be able to follow everything Belew plays, but it's just a helluva lot of FUN!
If you want the full meal deal, find and listen to Adrian play "E" with Metropole Orkest. I don't know the details, but somehow Adrian got the Dutch Govt and The Nederlands largest broadcaster to fund a one concert performance of an extended orchestration of this same piece of music. (to the tune of nearly $250M!) It is a 3/4 of an hour, musical wonderland.
I’ve been familiar with Adrian Belew since I started playing decades ago and every so often I sit down to work out what he’s doing on tracks like Bowie’s “Boys Keep Swinging”. I can never even get started, it’s so angular and “non traditional”. I love his work though.
Only recently discovered Belew as I've went down the KC rabbitwhole. The guy is amazing! Serious set of pipes on the man too. His style is so impressive
I remember seeing this guy play on the Talking Heads live in Rome video. The dude was making sounds I've never heard come out of a guitar. The effects and his whammy bar sounds were unreal. I was wonder who the F is this guy and how can I play like that.
I just heard it for the first time today. I was blown away! My drummer and I do weird stuff like this but this is on a whole other level! At first I wasn't sure if I like it but it pulled me in before I realized it I was really getting into it. That harmony lead that Adrian does is otherworldly, that bass player is bad ass! I am inspired!
I've seen AB power trio once, with Tobias Ralph on drums that time, and the Crimson projekct with Pat Mastelotto on drums, Marcus Reuter on Warr guitar and Tony Levin on Chapman stick as the other half of a double trio. Gobsmacked and happy both times. No wonder Zappa was pissed when Belew left his band for Bowie.
Maybe because I listen to so many bands like primus and ween that have these kind of weird outside the box jammy parts and guitar riffs…this really did not sound that odd at all. I could be wrong but a lot of the guitar just sounded like it was doing some basic harmonic minor stuff but yea maybe with a note changing a chord from major to minor…either way the notes sounded harmonious to my ears, dissonant but in a way that is very accessible
I’ve never heard this guy before but to me the closest thing it sounded like to me was primus. An when I think about it, sounds kinda like jazz to me……..I like it tho, it’s something different, instead of the same old same old……PEACE!
It's funny you say that because when Primus first came out they reminded me alot of king crimson discipline era. Confirmed later by Les who said early on they played a ton of crimson and frog brigade covered Thela hun gin geet from discipline era crimson and Les has played and recorded with Adrian. Side One from Belew has Les and Danny Carey on a few songs
These guys are amazing. PS - ever hear or see *Matteo Mancuso???* He's a young player out of Italy with one of the wildest techniques I've ever seen. He plays finger-style like a bassist. Super tasteful, unbelievably clean. Like a combo of George Benson, early John Petrucci, Al DiMeola, and Allan Holdsworth. Just tremendous. (sorry to come out of left field with this, i dont know where else to recommend him.)
Hey Michael, please do a breakdown/reaction to Matteo Mancuso. A young wunderkind with chops and maturity beyond his years. Al dimeola and Steve Vai were blown away when they heard him. He has a unique picking style without a plectrum that is revolutionary.
Your reaction is hysterical! I loved the video for that alone. As for the music, I dunno. I don't get it. It's great, confusing, maybe more perplexing, but whatever it is what it is whatever it is and that's great. The band seems to love it and that was certainly great to see. But Michael, you stole the show.
Adrian Belew has been doing stuff like this for decades. He was in King Crimson in the late 70s and early 80s with Robert Fripp. Listen to King Crimson's song Discipline. It is written in 15/16 time.
Well, he was in KC more than any other musician besides Fripp. Started in '81 and remained a member up until 2009 (whenever the band was active) or even - if you like - until 2013 when Fripp announced the next reformation to be without Belew for the first time since 1981 (as far as I know)
This is actually tame as far as the rhythm section following Adrian goes because he's been known to try and fake out the drummer during shows at random 😂 He'll lean forward like he's about to strum after hitting one of those loops or at the start of a song and then just stop midway. At a show I went to the drummer caught it every time and he was all "I'll get you one of these days!"
Belew was looking to play with some new blood and give some youngsters a chance and found Julie Slick (playing bass here and still with Adrian) and her brother Eric Slick (former drummer with Adrian) at the Philadelphia School of Rock.
Just when you think you know everything about guitars, Adrian Belew comes in and holy whammies you! Also, Adrian tends to use alternate tunings, so be lucky he wasn't using is more avant garde ones!
Saw Adrian with his band The Bears at Thompson House (formerly Southgate House) in Newport, Kentucky years ago. Straight up rock-n-roll band of local musicians from Adrian's old stomping grounds growing up. I think he liked this band because the other guitarist shared being frontman with Adrian and the audience was not only fans but also friends and family. Outside of musical circles, Adrian is pretty much unknown.
well, there were obviously more than one genius in King Crimsom :) not sure it "talks" to many people. but to me it's pure joy and discontrucKted harmony :)
Adrian has so much material, it's almost impossible to put him in a genre honestly; that's why some songs are like this, and other songs are about him talking to his damn car, haha
I like to think of Adrian's playing a little like sushi, on the one hand it can be a refined and cultured taste, and on the other hand, it's raw fish. I fell in love with Adrian on King Crimson's Beat album, nestled neatly between Discipline and Three of a Perfect Pair.
You have to watch Kasey Chambers she covers Eminem lose yourself. She’s a country singer starts out with a banjo and it just gets nuts. She throws everything into it. It’s insane.
