Joe Walsh the Eagles Guitarist's Live Technique
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Joe Walsh The Eagles Guitarist’s Live Technique Text: Dieter Roesberg Photos: D. Roesberg / U. Roesberg / Archive There’s hardly any other band that makes as much money with their worldwide tours as the Eagles, who are battling for the first ranks regarding ticket revenues with Paul McCartney, the Rolling Stones, Elton John, and U2. However this band also pays back, with exquisite music, a great show, perfect sound, and sophisticated technique. The Eagles indulge themselves with comfortable touring as well as excellent equipment: in occasion of the Cologne concert Joe Walsh’s guitar technician Mark Reis allowed G & B [acronym for the magazine “Gitarre & Bass”] a look on stage and backstage, the guitarist himself was available for a little interview two days later in Frankfurt. Guitar World “Welcome to guitar world”, that was the friendly welcome from guitar technician Mark Reis, after Joe Walsh’s personal tour assistant Smokey Wendell was kind enough to smuggle me into the Lanxess Arena. It was preceded by an hour of chaos: in Cologne a major telecommunications line had broken, the conventional phone network was dead, the mobile network completely broken down. And the offer to “call me when there are any problems” was meant in a nice way but was completely useless. That all reminded me of former times when there were no mobile phones. But as people from Cologne say: still it always turned out well [this is not translateable in the appropriate slang – it’s actually funny]. On the right below the big stage there is Mark Reis’ working place that he shares with Steve “Charley” Cohen, the technician of the Eagles’ second live guitarist Steuart Smith. Joe Walsh brought about 28 guitars on this tour of which he needs about a third each night. Also the stage looks rather spartan. Two small Carvin combo amps, a Crate acoustic amp, a Roland booster for the talk box, a pedal board with a few effects, that’s all. Mark Reis is working for Joe for already six years and knows every detail of the set- up: “this equipment sounds really good for what he has to do. For Joe Walsh solo shows and also for the James Gang concerts he of course still uses Marshalls and his Leslie, but for the Eagles, a vocal band, the pedals, different fazers, chorus and delay and the small amps are exactly the right thing. Joe uses his in-ear monitoring only for the vocals, he wants the stage sound from the combos and monitors. That’s why we also have two amps which are arranged in a certain angle to each other, so that he can hear them everywhere.” Also Steuart Smith’s equipment is well-arranged with two tube combos and a pedal board – amazing considering the sound diversity he’s creating with them. Everybody in the crew agrees that Joe Walsh is a “guitar maniac”. All the time he shows up with new guitars that he saw in some store. Many of the instruments he uses on tours are run of the mill, or as Mark puts it “right off the wall”. So for example his new white Strat, a regular standard model that he has just bought. And also the Ibanez Joe Satriani JS1600 that he just discovered is brand new. Before we showed up Mark has just put new strings on eight guitars which took him one and a half hours. Since he’s using an electrical string crank (my secret weapon) he became much faster he proudly states. Joe uses Ernie Ball and DR strings, .010 to .046 for his electric guitars, .011 to .052 for slide. For the PRS Mira that he also uses for slide he uses a .084 E-string on the .011 set. Mark Reis loves his job as he can work in a pleasant atmosphere. But there’s also everyday life, routine: “there often are simply boring days, only with three additional hours of concert where we have to fully concentrate on the artists. Then it’s a pity that we never see anything of the show.” But then he has this in common with every big or small artist that never sees his own show. Joe Walsh Two days later, in a 6 star hotel in Frankfurt, we meet Joe Walsh who together with his wife gives us the warmest welcome. Manager Smokey leaves us alone, he has to go shopping with Mrs. Walsh. “Now please don’t tell her that there are many great shops in Frankfurt”, Smokey growls who actually had been looking forward to his day off. “Then it will again take forever …”. Appropriately Glenn Frey announces an Eagles classic the next night. “My wife calls the next song the ‘Credit Card Song’, here’s ‘Take It to the Limit’.” Joe Walsh is a friendly likeable guy who has a sparkle in his eyes and very seriously and skillfully starts to talk shop as soon as the topic guitars comes up. You notice that on stage he’s playing two roles: the serious side man who does his best to make the Eagles songs sound perfect, but also the clown when it comes to Walsh solo songs. The manufacturer Paul Reed Smith had arranged the talk with G & B after Joe had visited the site. “I was in Stevensville at the site, had a look at everything, also the numerous machines. It’s fantastic what they have there and what they’re doing: the computer controlled production, and most of all the quality control really enthused me. But the most exciting thing was Paul’s wood storage: you have to see this. After this we were in some back room where all the secret material is stored. I couldn’t believe what I saw there. Wood, 40 to 50 years old, wood of which I never knew it existed. Paul has dug up some woods of which violin necks have been made earlier on. He showed it to me, knocked on it, and it had a sound, a tone … Before that I had never thought of it. And exactly from that he built me a guitar. He said ‘Give me six months’ and then there was the guitar. I have it at home, it’s the most beautiful I’ve ever seen with its sunburst top.” This guitar is a Paul Reed Smith 28; from the very best woods Paul has built exactly 28 of those. For obtaining the wood for the decks he had to deliver in payment a Dragon I to the seller. When one week later I meet Paul at the Meinl Guitar Festival and tell him about Joe Walsh he first is very upset. “What? He has this guitar sitting at home? He should play it and take it on tour, so the people could hear it. It’s so fantastic, and his guitar got such a wonderful sunburst …”. After that Paul grabbed the PRS 28 displayed at the Meinl Festival and went to his workshop. “Then I will play it!” Back to Joe Walsh. “Paul had the wood in storage already for a very long time. I think he was looking for a good reason to use it for building a guitar that he wanted to create by any means. And so I’m the one to blame. (laughs) Blame it on me! And I’m proud of this guitar. Anyway I’d never take it on tour …” Apart from PRS Joe collaborates with many different manufacturers and with that he tries to pass his experience. “I know when a guitar feels good. It’s good if there are people like Paul Reed Smith to who you can tell in an abstract way how something feels and then they can translate it and tell the computer how it has to be done. The pure technicians don’t know a thing about the sensation, they don’t know what a guitar feels like. But Paul has it, this feeling.” Joe Walsh picks his guitars for the live concerts according to various criteria, a.o. he looks about the instruments from the original studio recordings to get the appropriate sound mix of the songs: “With the Eagles we often mixed single coil sounds with Humbuckers to get a contrast and thus a width in sound. So also today my choice depends on what Steuart takes on stages. In a three piece band like the James Gang I actually always go for a fat Humbucker sound.” On what you can rely as an Eagles and Walsh fan: you’ll always see Joe with different guitars. “Yes, I like switching guitar models, check them, then I have a new favorites, play them for a while, but then I switch again. Then I see something new, buy a few here, a few there. Like the Ibanez Satriani. It’s got a great shredder neck which is good for my big hands: I can play it up high to the end of the neck. That’s great! I love to experiment and do it a lot. I can be a better musician when I know my way around with different guitars, different amps … But in the end I still keep getting back to the Telecaster.” For a while now Joe can often be seen with the German Duesenberg guitars. How did he find those? “Duesenberg guitars sound great. I saw Mike Campbell playing one at a Tom Petty concert. I took it in my hands and immediately said to him: ‘Ah, that’s why you play it!’ Then he gave me the phone number and told me to call.