Upcoming Tour and New Fender Bass

Here's a teaser video for the new Fender Dimension Bass, I show up around 2:30 in.  I'm really happy to be helping Fender get the word out about this new bass style, it's somewhere between their classic Jazz and Precision models, and like all Fender basses it sounds killer with a band!
I'm also very excited to hit the road in a few weeks with 3 Inches of Blood!  I got connected to them through Gene Hoglan's manager and I really love their music, total old-school thrash with great songs.  It's gonna be a really fun tour, plus we'll be opening for thrash metal legends Death Angel, and sharing the stage with Battlecross, Diamond Plate, and Revocation.  We'll be all over North America in Oct-Nov so come on out to a show, dates are below!
Also, Gryphon Labs will be making our triumphant return to the Baked Potato on November 27th, come out and celebrate Thanksgiving Eve with us!
I've also been working on an upcoming album by a true guitar legend, but I can't say too much about that just yet...

My Time in Dethklok...

It's been a little over a week since the last Dethklok show, and I'm still reeling a bit from all the fun I had.  Our final show of the tour in NYC (after being rescheduled due to hurricane Sandy) was one of those moments where everything came together for me.  The combination of the amazing music, the enormous amount of admiration and respect I have for the band members, the mind blowing spectacle of the video/light production, and the unbelievable fervor of the crowd made that night one of my favorite musical moments ever.  It also didn't hurt that it was at Roseland, where I saw my first club show ever back in 1993.
I keep saying that this tour felt nothing like work and more like a vacation, and that's due largely to the amazing crew that was taking care of us.  Just getting to live on a bus with Brendon Small, Mike Keneally, and Gene Hoglan was such a pleasure.  Not only are they all masters of their instruments, but they're all huge fans of music of all genres, not just metal. 
I have to admit that when I left ZPZ a year ago I was a little afraid I might never get to tour again, but even just subbing for Bryan Beller on this tour was such an awesome and positive experience that I'm excited to see where this crazy music business takes me next!

Gryphon Labs 10/13@ the Mint and Dethklok Tour!!!!!

A lot has happened since my last blog post, but the biggest news is that I'll be playing with cartoon death metal band Dethklok for the first 11 dates of their upcoming tour!
I've been a HUGE fan of the TV show Metalocalypse since it began, and Dethklok is the fictitious band that show is centered on. I've been friends with creator/guitarist/vocalist Brendon Small for a while (he was one of the guitar players for the Queen tribute I was a part of last year) and I'm still so impressed at how he took this bizarre idea for a cartoon about a metal band that's the world's seventh largest economy and turned it into an actual touring band with some of the best musicians on the planet providing the talent, namely virtuoso guitarist Mike Keneally, metal drummer legend Gene Hoglan, and bassist/all-around amazing person Bryan Beller. Well, Bryan has some conflicts with the upcoming tour due to his commitment to his incredible power trio The Aristocrats so I get the formidable job of filling his shoes until he joins the tour.
Bryan and I have been orbiting in the same music circles for years now, he's played with Dweezil, Steve Vai, and Mike Keneally as well, but what's interesting to me is how different our approaches can be to the same material. For example, on the Dethklok tunes Bryan employs a three-finger technique with his right hand that allows him to match the speed picking of the guitars (and the double-kick drum stuff), but I've never really used more than 2 fingers on my right hand. However, I use a pick and he doesn't usually, so I have to figure out which technique to use where, in addition to getting used to playing in CFBbEb tuning (rather than EADG). But if playing Zappa music for 6 years taught me anything it's that nothing is impossible, so I'm up for the challenge! My 11 dates with them will be in the Northeast from October 30th to November 11th, come check it out!

In the meantime, Gryphon Labs is playing The Mint on Saturday October 13th with our good friends Steel Toed Slippers and Year of the Dragon (featuring Dirty Walt from Fishbone). We'll be closing this night of amazing music, so we'll go on around 11, which is a perfect slot for your Saturday night!