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Current Projects - My
Rock History - Fave players - Gear
I am a guitar player inspired originally by Hendrix and Zeppelin etc, the
bluesy heavy style. I work at Kosmic in Perth Western Australia.
I am now back in Black Steel. Check out www.blacksteel.com.au
or my personal page: more...
My Rock History...
 I have played guitar since age 13, learning to play whilst living in Zambia,
Africa. I remember being amazed by the natural talent of the local people,
especially their love and feel for the guitar. My school friends used to mimic
the sounds they were hearing orally, the ultimate air guitar heroes! Imaginary
wah pedals and ferocious wang bars reigned supreme! I remember my school friend,
James Mvula and a couple of friends gazing excitedly under their desk at what
should have been a naughty picture, but no!... The Holy hand grenade of
Antioch....Not....could it be....a set of Yamaha guitar strings! Wow, how cool!
The look on their faces told me I HAD to have a guitar, and sure enough, I
convinced Mum to buy one.
That was the launch of an unwitting retail career as I learned the various ways
to sell my case for new gear in the future!
Our family left Africa for Australia, settling in
Whyalla, S.A. Whyalla was a
rock and roll hotbed of talent, where it seemed everybody was a guitar hero.
With guitarists as good as Steve Garde, John Mclaughlin (!), Richard Leach and
many others setting an incredible standard it provided an immense challenge to
me. Being a quiet, typical teenager needing self esteem it seemed the perfect
way to gain respect, and I wagged school to stay at home practicing
endlessly....well, it seemed like a good idea at the time! Around this time, my
folks gave me the greatest guitar ever, a white Fender Strat!
The Strat stayed
with me till 1987, when it was stolen from my flat in Lewisham, South London...AAAARGH!
If you ever see it, it was #530004, with a Floyd bridge and Seymour pick ups. See
pic. above.
Anyway....it was the custom of Whyalla guitarists to migrate to Perth,
Western Australia in search of a better life, and my family did that. John Meyer
was the undisputed god of guitar in Perth, followed by Dave Hole, and again,
they set a great standard to follow. I struggled through a variety of cover
bands, reliving Spinal Tap many times along the way.
The first bands that actually released any material
were Black Alice "Endangered Species" and Trilogy "Life on
Earth" 1985. Both bands had great potential as the standard of Perth
players at the time was very high!
Both albums are out of print as far as I know. If you see a used copy of
Life on Earth it is worth hearing as a precursor of modern Power Metal,
and vocalist - Bass player Jon Ryder puts in an amazing performance.
"JR" as he is known is a great undiscovered talent and should be
a hero on the world metal stage!
My period in the UK meant joining a band called
Driveshaft with vocalist Gerry Lane, yet another amazing singer. The band
recorded an album (Unreleased) featuring Cozy Powell & Neil Murray, ex
Whitesnake at the time, and keyboardist John Sinclair, at the time with
Ozzy Osbourne, who also had a hand as a producer.
The band was renamed Cajo, but unfortunately missed the elusive record
deal and fell apart.
Two songs, "Shout" and "Cryin'" ended up on Cozy's
"Drums are back" album (Still available) and are worth hearing
for Gerry Lane's singing. My favourite song "Lonely Nights" is
still in the vaults at RAK somewhere, as are "Unchain my heart",
"Hold on", "The Race is on" and a bunch more. I hope
one day they may be released as they are great songs. Another song written
at the time, "Ride by night" also ended up on "The Drums
are Back" as "Ride to Win", which in turn became
"Resurrection" on Brian May's "Back to the light"
album.
Check out Cozy's masterpiece version on the "Brixton" live
album, featuring an awesome drum solo!
Cozy is sadly missed as a human being and a great drummer. What can you
say?!.....
Returning to Australia in 1989 meant a career
rethink, and the hope was to put some kind of solo album produced by Cozy,
or some similar project. I continued to write, playing in a variety of
different outfits, the most notable being Angus McDeth, who is a Perth
Metal icon. We made two very fun albums that were well received though a
bit lost on the Thrash metal fans of the time. Again, it was Power Metal
before it's time.
The albums are:
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Evil Empire.
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Great Horned Beast.
Both albums are available from DM records at http://members.networx.net.au/~raven/Angus.htm
From there, the main band was
Black Steel, which brings us up to date.
Fave players:
In order of inspiration!
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Marc Bolan - T-Rex.
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Jimmy Page - Led Zeppelin
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Jimi Hendrix.
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Paul Kossoff - Free.
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Rory Gallagher.
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Ritchie Blackmore.
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Jeff Beck
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Steve Hackett - Genesis
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Al
Dimeola.
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John Mclaughlin - Mahavishnu Orchestra.
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John Meyer - Local hero!
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Michael Schenker - The king of taste, speed, feel
and emotion...
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Gary Moore - Monster!
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Randy Rhoads.
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Yngwie Malmsteen.
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Eddie Van Halen.
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Steve Morse.
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Steve Vai.
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Stevie Ray Vaughan. The ultimate power blues
player!
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Zakk Wylde.
Gear:
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