Govan began playing guitar aged three, encouraged by his father, but initially learning mainly by ear. His father taught him three chords first and introduced him to his record collection. Govan began listening to 1950s rock N roll artists. He worked out chords and solos from listening to the records, Half-Scottish Govan was also heavily influenced by Zal Cleminson, a Scottish guitarist best known for his work with the Sensational Alex Harvey Band. At the age of nine Govan and his brother Seth played guitar on a Thames Television programme called Ace Reports, At secondary school he was exposed via older classmates to shred guitarists of the time, His first electric guitar was a Gibson SG which he keeps at home. After leaving school Govan studied English at St Catherine's College at Oxford University, He dropped out after a year to pursue a career in music. Govan states that he was torn between continuing his studies or focusing on becoming a musician, he ultimately decided to concentrate on the latter. Around this time he sent demos of his work to Mike Varney of Shrapnel Records. Varney was impressed and offered him a record deal. Govan declined, despite initiating contact in the first place. In 1993 he won Guitarist magazine's Guitarist of the Year competition with his instrumental piece Wonderful Slippery Thing. A version of this song was included on his debut solo album, The demo of the track earned him a place amongst several other entrants in the live final which he then won. In the meantime Govan hit upon the idea of transcribing music from records professionally and submitted the most technically difficult piece he could think of to Guitar Techniques magazine, This earned him a job as a contributor to the magazine, ending a spell working in fast food. Govan began his involvement with Asia playing on the album Aura after the band was unable to secure the services of their first two choices for guest guitarists Brian May or Steve Lukather, Govan explained that he was then chosen as an affordable option for the band which had not experienced recent chart success. With his work on the album complete Govan was added to the Asia line up for the tour to support the new album, He wrote an instrumental song Bad Asteroid which itself was based on material from Govan's early 1990s demo, He went on to play on the band's 2004 album Silent Nation. In 2006 Asia keyboardist Geoff Downes decided to reform the band with its original 3 members, Govan and two other band members bassist and singer John Payne and Jay Schellen, along with keyboardist Erik Norlander continued under the name Asia Featuring John Payne. Govan left in mid 2009, He was replaced by virtuoso guitarist Mitch Perry, known for his work with Cher, Ratt, Lita Ford and the Michael Schenker Group. Since Govan's departure from Asia featuring John Payne, they have gone on to considerable international success. Payne, Govan and Schellen also formed GPS and after the addition of Ryo Okumoto on keyboards the band released the album Window to the Soul. Most of the material on that album was written for a proposed Asia album, but was scrapped by Geoff Downes when he reunited the original line up of Asia. Govan performs on a number of tracks on Your Music Is Killing Me, the debut album of UK electronic dance music act the Young Punx and is part of their live act, He also appears in the music video for their track Rockall. Govan has played live guitar for Dizzee Rascal including a performance on Later With Jools Holland.
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17 май 2024
