http://thehub.musiciansfriend.com/artist-interviews/artist-interview-guns-n-roses-dizzy-reed
Excerpts:
The HUB: You?re also a percussionist and I gather that has to do with making yourself useful on songs that don?t lend themselves to a keyboard part.
Dizzy Reed: That?s exactly it. When I joined Guns N? Roses, some of the guys weren?t ready to hear keyboards yet. At that time I was doing what I always wanted to do: I was keeping it very organic-sounding?something you really couldn?t do in the ?80s. They thought it made things sound ?dated.?
Matt Sorum, the drummer at the time, he had a deal with LP [Latin Percussion] at the time, and they brought down some congas and he said ?Here,? and put them in my corner. I started just beating on them and basically taught myself how to do that in a very short period of time. I definitely wanted to add something to the music. But I didn?t want to just be like a monkey beating on a drum. So I listened to a lot of older rock that had percussion on it and tried to emulate that. I worked on fitting it in where it would serve some sort of purpose.
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The HUB: The keyboardist?s role in genres like jazz, blues, R&B and so on has been pretty clearly developed over the years. But that wasn?t the case in the L.A. hard rock scene where you got going. How did you go about making a space for yourself in that scene?
Dizzy Reed: When I first moved to L.A. hair metal and pop were pretty much the dominant thing, and if you heard any keyboard it was usually on a ballad or an intro. It was usually a DX7 [Yamaha synth] or something like that. Most of the bands, producers and fans would say that keyboards made the song sound dated. But my dad always told me that everything goes in cycles, so I was patient. In the meantime, I did what I could. I experimented with a lot of synth sounds. I was playing with a band called The Wild and we were doing sort of funk-pop, so sparsity and textures were good. I?m glad I went through that; now I can usually add something to any song if need be.
With GNR, I knew that Axl always wanted to add a keyboard player. There were keyboard players around L.A., but they were doing a different sort of thing?more like classically based music. Not so much blues based. I think I might have been one of the few guys in town who was doing that at the time. Axl heard me play while I was still with The Wild and I think it was sort of a relief that someone was still doing that. So he told me, ?When we add a keyboard player you?re going to be that guy.?
The HUB: During that era, I imagine you did a lot of sitting in with bands. Do you have any tips for our readers on how to get invited back to jams and shows?
Dizzy Reed: I think one of the main things is to have your chops ready, which means practice. And when you?re done practicing, practice some more. And when you think you?ve learned everything you think you need to learn, try to find something else to learn. When it comes to jams or auditions, the most important thing?and this goes for everybody: check your ego at the door. Go in knowing you want to be a part of a band and don?t overplay.
The HUB: Sounds like sage advice. In recording the Use Your Illusion records, were your parts arranged going in, or did they evolve organically in the studio?
Dizzy Reed: Everything was written at that point in time. There were a lot of songs that Axl had written and played on the piano. That was part of his wanting me in the band so he would have someone to play his parts. But with everything else, I just tried to play along and add what I could. I don?t think I had a lot of set parts; I just added what I could. You know, with a lot of those songs I don?t think I ever played them twice the same. It?s that kind of music. It?s like with the Stones?they do the same song so many different ways. Obviously there are songs that are based around a piano part that has to be there, but otherwise it comes from years and years of playing along and jamming that lets you approach a song different ways each time. Everything I came up with, with the exception of a few songs like ?Live and Let Die,? I just went in and kind of went with it. It?s important to get feedback in those situations from the control room about what does and doesn?t work. In a lot of ways that?s how I still operate.
The HUB: I gather that apart from Axl, you?re the longest-standing member of the Guns N? Roses lineup. What do you attribute that to?
Dizzy Reed: [Laughs] I don?t know, maybe it?s half craziness. But I got a great opportunity from Axl and I?m very appreciative of it. I think we had a mission and we still have a lot to prove. So I didn?t really have a desire to go anywhere else; not on a permanent basis. When other people quit, it was like we were going to hold down the fort and keep it going. Obviously, the Chinese Democracy record took a longer time to make than we had planned, which has something to do with it. But we still have things to prove and show people. I don?t like to quit; let?s put it that way.
The HUB: Fair enough. Speaking of Chinese Democracy, there?s been a lot of speculation about stuff you guys have in the can that?s supposed to come out as a sequel. Is there anything you can tell us about that?
Dizzy Reed: Not much more than you know unfortunately. There is a lot of stuff in the can and a lot of stuff that needs to come out and will come out. I think it?s just finishing touches on a few things. It?s getting the right songs to put out in the right package. It?ll come out when it?s ready to come out, but it?s definitely there.
The HUB: Well, GNR fans have learned to be patient over the years, so I guess we?ll stand by for that.
Dizzy Reed: And thank you to all of them; no one appreciates that more than I do.
The HUB: I wondered if you had any particularly good war stories from either the GNR sessions or touring.
Dizzy Reed: One of the banes of my existence as a keyboard player has always been the fact that bands like to tune down the guitars a half a step. Which I was unaware of when I first went in to work up a song called ?Civil War,? which was recorded by the original [Guns N? Roses] lineup. They asked me to come in and do that. They had an old Yamaha CP80 electric piano that they tuned down a half step. I don?t have perfect pitch, so I didn?t know that we were playing in E flat and they had tuned the whole piano a half step down rather than transposing as some of us do. So after these rehearsals, they called me one night to come in to lay down the track. There was a big Steinway piano set up and the track?s almost done. It?s about two in the morning and I sat down to play it, and Slash, Duff and Axl are all in the control room. Went to play it, and it was all a half step off.
The HUB: That?ll drive you crazy!
Dizzy Reed: Suddenly it all became clear?that they had tuned down the rehearsal piano?or they were playing it in standard [tuning] just to mess with me. So I figured out really quick how to play that song on the black keys.
Literally within five minutes there was a bottle of 151 rum sitting on the piano.
So Slash comes out with his his guitar and says, ?Okay, here?s how the song goes.? And I say, ?No, I know the song bro, I?m just trying to figure out how to play it in the right key.? So he says, ?What do you need?? And I say, ?You know what? A bottle of 151 rum.? And never having been part of a major recording session, I didn?t realize the turnaround on a request like that. Literally within five minutes there was a bottle of 151 rum sitting on the piano. I took a couple of swigs off that, which is like drinking gasoline, and away we went, and the rest is history.
The HUB: So you transpose better on 151 rum?
Dizzy Reed: Absolutely. The black keys are a little bit closer.
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The HUB: That makes sense. Do you have any solo projects in the works at the moment?
Dizzy Reed: I do. Starting about six years ago, I had some demo stuff I was playing for people. My good friend, Del James, who is a jack of all trades with Guns N? Roses, and who is also a tour manager and co-writer and one my closest friends for about 30 years listened to it and said, ?We?ve got to get this stuff recorded for real the right way.? I had ground loops; I was just demoing it for when the time was right. So we found a situation where we could actually go in and do that and recorded 12 songs that I?d written or co-written with Del. A whole bunch of great musicians were kind enough to come in and play on it.
I had to put that on the back burner for a while though. It was getting expensive and I had to pay the bills. I was out with Guns and started doing cool things like The Dead Daisies. So I just recently dusted it off and it?s getting mixed and is going to be out soon. I was kind of worried to go back and listen to it thinking I would want to change everything, which I did at first. If I was allowed to go back and re-record my very first recording in junior high, I?d still be there trying to get it right. You have to move on at some point.
/jarmo
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