Ahead of the release of John Butler Trio’s new album Home, we spoke to Butler about how he crafted his guitar-playing on the record.
Butler’s guitar solos are always a visceral experience, but it’s the one on stand-out track Faith which gallops like an animal through (blue)grass. “I amplify my acoustics,” the musician says of the way the guitar tone begins by mimicking a keyboard and then opens out into the brinier sound of acoustic guitar as the solo builds. “I run cables through a volume pedal and then through a Marshall [amp] in the other room. So I’m kind of writing these two sounds together: really woody and really overdriven.
I did 20,000 solos, then I edited [them] together into one solo – I kind of DJ’d my solos. I stuck a delay on the channel on the mixing desk, and I ran my guitar through and I was able to ride that delay, [moving] in and out, and got really psychedelic with it. It went from this folk, ‘of the earth’ [style] – I’m looking at the stars and wondering who I am – and by the end of it I’m kind of in the stars. I’m atoms. I was really proud of how that song turned out.”
Stay tuned for the full interview.
Home is out September 28 via MGM.
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