(Reprinted from Musician Magazine: September 1990)
Apart from the guitar case he's carrying, John McLaughlin could be just another
splendid-looking bon vivant sauntering down Paris' Place Vendôme. "You know, I'm
quite happy to come today," he says about this interview. "But it seems that the
only thing we have in common is the guitar." On the surface, he's right. McLaughlin,
48, ascetic jazz innovator, keeper of the inner mounting flame, and Yngwie Malmsteen, 27,
brash hard-rock bird of fire, are the strangest bedfellows in contemporary guitar. Scratch
a bit deeper, though, and the pairing begins to make sense: note the deep flowing
classical gestures, the casual application of blinding torrents of speed picking, the
shared penchant for scalloped, scooped-fret guitar fingerboards. Recent career-threatening
injuries (John's hand meets a swiveling television set, Yngwie's Jaguar a tree) nearly
stopped both in their tracks. John McLaughlin had a funny name once too. He gave guitar
lessons to Jimmy Page, invented fusion, used acid, wore white, and made the world safe for
virtuosos like Malmsteen. John is a composer whose work has been played from the symphony
orchestra pits to the downtown jazz scene of New York; it's almost culture shock to listen
to him thrash his way through the classic Birds of Fire or Miles Davis' Jack
Johnson after hearing his two current releases, Mediterranean Concerto and Live
at the Royal Festival Hall, with Trilok Girtu and Kai Eckhardt. By contrast,
Malmsteen's Eclipse, his fifth studio effort, shows signs of retread for the young
Swede. Though Yngwie is adamant about his status as a trendsetter, it's clear by the way
he thumps his chest and knocks over table fixtures that in his heart he knows he's still
got a lot of room to grow. It would be pretty easy to dislike him if he weren't such a
heavy guitarist. It's not much of a struggle to dislike him anyway. But sage John
understands, as do the patrons of a Paris restaurant called Vishnou (of all names).
Yngwie's loud disavowals of practice and influences are harder to swallow than the
spiciest vindaloo; it intensifies the irony that he built his reputation on a musical
ideal the man who quietly munches chutney beside him created 20 years earlier. Maybe all
these two do have in common is their instrument after all. Small wonder our talk
eventually found its way to the French Open. Here they are, the John McEnroe and Arthur
Ashe of the guitar - gut string tension of a different kind.
MUSICIAN: Although you've both made a lot of strides for guitar, you've also
received criticism for forsaking emotional depth. Is there such a thing as overdeveloped
technique?
MALMSTEEN: I think it's not technique, really, but how you use it. I think that
technique can also be how you play a vibrato. Vibrato is, in my opinion, the most
important thing - not speed. I think both of us, actually, are kind of known for brrrrrrrr.
McLAUGHLIN: Technique is a global concept, isn't it? What people do, particularly
with guitars, is they split this global concept into things like speed, hammering, thumb,
pulling off, vibrato. I agree with Yngwie, it's not a question of technique, it's whether
you use the technique or whether the technique uses you. The thing is because it's guitar.
Over the years people have used me to say, "Technique, fast, and it doesn't mean
anything." And it's peculiar to the guitar.
MUSICIAN: Yeah, no one ever said Coltrane played
fast.
McLAUGHLIN: Or even Oscar Peterson, who has a phenomenal technique.
MALMSTEEN: I think maybe it has to do even with the guitar's being used in all
sorts of different genres; it's also the prime instrument in rock'n'roll, which is the
common man's music, not jazz, and they are not used to having extreme technique in a
rock'n'roll concert. They're used to hearing Eric Clapton or something.
MUSICIAN: What are the dangers of...
MALMSTEEN: I don't think there are any dangers.
MUSICIAN: John's played his share of thrash, but
he's also played delicate acoustic music, and there are times when you've brought together
very opposing ideas. What are the dangers of bring the common man's music to that level of
sophistication?
MALMSTEEN: I think it's making it more interesting.
McLAUGHLIN: I don't think it's a danger at all. I think it's a funny word to use.
It's not danger. Every generation's going to come up with its own way of looking at
things. Technique and mind and people are evolving all the time. I mean, look at the
difference between the rock'n'roll of the '50s and the rock'n'roll of the '80s. Worlds
apart. There are so many different variations. Why? Because there is evolution going on
all the time. To hear a guitar player like Yngwie is really nice for me. I've seen you on
MTV.
MALMSTEEN: My really commercial song.
McLAUGHLIN: I don't know. I came in in the middle, and I see somebody playing the
guitar like that, wild, and it stays with me. You played some amazing shit.
MALMSTEEN: That record's so old to me.
McLAUGHLIN: When you're my age and people say, "Yeah, what about this record I
like, that you made 20 years ago?" Then you can start to worry. A guitar player like
Yngwie wouldn't have come out in the 1950s or even the 1960s. Things have changed. People
like Coltrane, Miles, they've had their effect, especially on popular music, rock'n'roll,
the working man's music, as they say. It's like jazz in the sense that it takes what it
needs and doesn't lose its own identity.
MALMSTEEN: It's much more demanding listening to jazz. It's come to a point now
like where fusion jazz is musician's music. I love to listen to Jeff Berlin, Allan
Holdsworth - I love him. How many records does Allan Holdsworth sell? Ridiculously
few. Bon Jovi sells a shitload of records, and I can't stand it.
McLAUGHLIN: There's two different kinds of success. Artistic, musical and
commercial success don't always go together.
MALMSTEEN: I try to put it together.
McLAUGHLIN: But I have to admire people who are true to themselves, whether they
sell a lot of records or not.
MUSICIAN: What about improvisation?
McLAUGHLIN: Improvisation is work. You don't just do anything. You have to
know what the scales are, you have to know what the harmonic movement is. Unless you know
what you're doing, you don't just start improvising. Ask any classical musicians. They
have incredible technique, they can read anything, they can interpret anything, but you
ask them to improvise and they won't be able to do it, because it's another way of
thinking. It's work.
MUSICIAN: Does that mean that valid improvisation
can't happen early in a musician's development?
McLAUGHLIN: Of course it can, on the condition that he's working towards that, but
if you're a classical interpreter, you don't even think about improvisation, so you
cannot improvise. I have a lot of friends in the classical world. They would love to
improvise, but they don't know how to. Even if you have tremendous technique, it
doesn't mean you can improvise.
MALMSTEEN: There's not one note in any of my solos that's not completely
spontaneous. Straight off. Every night I play onstage, it's a different solo for every
song. Of course, it's in the same framework: If it's A minor, I play in A minor. I venture
out to G, G major or E phrygian or do some diminished or chromatic runs or whatever, but
it's always improvised. Every solo on every record. Most jazz guitar players do that, but
rock guitar players don't do it, classical guitar players don't do it. If you hear a live
tape of Michael Schenker or Eddie Van Halen, they play exactly the same solo as on the
record.
McLAUGHLIN: I find that hard to do.
MALMSTEEN: I can't do that [laughs]. I can't remember. Too many notes...
MUSICIAN: After playing for a while, your hands
might start doing gestures they've become accustomed to doing. It's an unintentional
structuring.
MALMSTEEN: Oh, I make a great effort to avoid that. Don't ever get into a rut. For
many years, I used to construct my guitar solos: "Okay, I throw in that run, some
symmetric pattern, do that pattern, then do an arpeggio, then that way and this way."
Now it's completely free-flowing. Most rock guitar players have that certain framework in
each key. That's all they play.
McLAUGHLIN: You have to structure your thought process. You have to structure your
way in music. But these structures should not be permanent. You should be ready to break
them at any moment. Be ready to break down and bring into question everything you do: your
phrasing, even how you look at the instrument. Listen, I'm maybe twice Yngwie's age, and
I'm still doing the same work. I'm still questioning what I do. We are creatures of habit.
The thing is to recognize when good habits become bad. At that moment, you've got to be
ready to break them and find yourself a little bit in the unknown. But that's music.
MALMSTEEN: Yeah, but that's very hard. Very few musicians would be able to do that
in my genre of rock'n'roll. Musicians are boxed in, very boxed in. Same chord
progressions, same scales.
McLAUGHLIN: That's dangerous, to use your word. It's hard to evolve. This is
where your technique starts to run you: When you're not ready to break the structure of
your mind, how you approach your improvisation, at a moment's notice. I practice and I
still work hard.
MALMSTEEN: I don't.
McLAUGHLIN: I'm in the middle of breaking a lot of things. But I'm happy to.
Because there are periods where there is no need to. Something happens in your life and
suddenly you start to think differently, you start to hear differently what you're doing.
You say, "It's time. There's something wrong. I don't like the way I go from A to B.
There's another way to do it and I have to find it." So you start to break structures
and the way you perceive harmonic movement, or your guitar, keyboard, whatever. It's all
the same. It's a way of perception. Music is a structure. And these are what we have to be
ready to break. But there are moments when I don't think at all, and you're just
flying, everything is just working beautifully.
MALMSTEEN: I understand exactly what you're saying. I'm happy right now with what
I'm doing, and I feel very comfortable...
McLAUGHLIN: [Patting Yngwie's back] Don't worry! It's gotta happen!
MALMSTEEN: A couple of years ago, I had a very serious car accident. That changed
me. I had a brain hemorrhage and the nerve endings in my hand were not working. I started
practicing like crazy like I did when I was fifteen. But this injury healed, and all the
practice I put in elevated me to another plateau. I might sound a little like I'm
bragging, but right now I feel like there's no boundaries to what I can do. It's brrr
like crazy, much more than I could do before.
McLAUGHLIN: The value of work! Two-and-a-half months ago I broke my left index
finger.
MALMSTEEN: Phew, that's a nightmare.
McLAUGHLIN: Yeah, it was a nightmare. I was having nightmares. I was waking up in
the middle of the night sweating. But there's a good side. Nothing's all bad and nothing's
all good. Already this accident has affected the way I think.
MALMSTEEN: How long did it take before you could play again?
McLAUGHLIN: I started two weeks ago. It took over two months before I could touch
the instrument.
MALMSTEEN: For me it was about two, three months. I wouldn't do it because I
knew I was going to hate myself. I was in the hospital, I was very injured, and my friends
brought me guitars: "You sure you don't want to play?" "No. Take that thing
away." But that was a little bit of motivation. As I said, you mustn't fall into a
rut.
McLAUGHLIN: I'm a very optimistic guy. I believe everything is a blessing, or in
disguise. Anyway, I was a little crazy. I'm sure you were a little crazy after your
accident.
MALMSTEEN: No, actually I mellowed out soon after that. I've always been a little
bit of a madman. I wouldn't want to put myself up with the great composers, but what you
hear about Mozart and Paganini, like the crazy lifestyles and women and whatever, I'm a
bit like that actually.
MUSICIAN: John, you smile as though you understand.
MALMSTEEN: You've been through it all.
MUSICIAN: When you got to a certain age you cut your
hair and wore white and disavowed alcohol, but here you are sitting and drinking and seem
a lot more earthy than monastic. Are you more impulsive now, after moving from being young
and excited, through being meditative, and then becoming a human being again and getting
back into...Š?
McLAUGHLIN: You know, I hate that "human being." What was I, a robot?
MUSICIAN: By "human being" I mean accepting the limitations we have.
Being in touch with one's spirituality means renouncing oneself, right?
McLAUGHLIN: Well, I had some peculiar views that were, years ago, more well-known.
I don't broadcast them so much, but I still hold my peculiar views. They're valid to me
insofar as I'm convinced of the great nature of human beings.
MUSICIAN: But do you grip the view less tightly as you get older?
McLAUGHLIN: No. I think it's all a question of perception, again. Have you ever
tried living a spiritual life? Well, until you make the action you'll never know, that's
all I can say. You can theorize about it till you're blue in the face.
MALMSTEEN: What exactly are you referring to?
McLAUGHLIN: Well, not that you renounce anything, but you impose a spiritual
discipline on yourself. You get up at four in the morning and you meditate. You think
about the nature of God, the nature of the universe, you meditate on the nature of the
void - anything that is your ideal. Whatever inspires you. But keep going.
Whether you become a Zen Buddhist or you become a Sufi, or whatever, it doesn't matter.
The thing is to impose another discipline on yourself, another structure, and you start to
see your life and this universe differently, and that's important. If not we're just
victims of whatever's going on around us, and I'm against that.
MALMSTEEN: I've never had the motivation to do that. Because there's nothing I can
do. As much as I don't want to be in this environment, I am in this environment,
and I gotta be like what this environment is like. I can't change it.
McLAUGHLIN: No, Yngwie, I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with the
environment. Your environment is perfect. The world is incredible, everything's perfect.
It's the way we view it, that's all I'm talking about.
MUSICIAN: Yngwie, can you foresee yourself ever doing some meditative acoustic
music, cutting your hair?
MALMSTEEN: See, I just happen to be very happy in this point in my life with what
I'm doing. I find a lot of artistic satisfaction. Who knows what is gonna happen in the
future? I'm very impulsive.
MUSICIAN: But you have to keep moving. As John
pointed out, part of being an artist is looking at what you're doing and saying,
"This isn't good anymore. I want something more from my music."
MALMSTEEN: Well, I change by changing, I change members of my band. I keep getting
the same questions: "Why don't you change?" "How come you don't start
playing more blues?" "Why don't you do that, why don't you do this?"
Listen, I just happen to be very happy with my style. In fact, if I may be so bold....
McLAUGHLIN: Be bold!
MALMSTEEN: ... not many players canboast that they have their own music
style. I'm happy with that. You know, nobody comes up to Jimmy Page or Eric Clapton
and goes, "How come you don't play more classical arpeggios in your blues
solos?"
MUSICIAN: Well, there's more potential for you as a young, facile guitarist to
change and grow. You look at it as an insult.
MALMSTEEN: Well, I don't look at it like an insult, but I just live more like... I
feel like a big fuckin' question mark, really.
McLAUGHLIN: The question is a trap. But if you ask me the same question - "So
what are you going to do? How are you going to grow, how do you see yourself in 10
years?" This is realy difficult.
MUSICIAN: That's not the question. The question was, Do you think you constantly
need to be dissatisfied with what you are in order to grow as an artist? Yngwie said,
"Well, I fire members of my band." He's pretty dictatorial, which cuts down on
how much you can learn from other players.
McLAUGHLIN: Have you ever played with him?
MUSICIAN: No.
McLAUGHLIN: Then you don't know. When you're working with musicians, they've got to
love what they do. You can give them ideas. You can say, "Okay, put the backbeat on
the fo