THE RAY SHASHO SHOW WELCOMES LEGENDARY 'GENESIS' GUITARIST
STEVE HACKETT
STEVE HACKETT is widely renowned
for his intricate progressive and classical rock guitar stylings and
composition with Genesis. But over the years, Steve Hackett has affectionately
embraced numerous musical genres while brilliantly composing, arranging, and
recording track after track of pristine musical enchantment.
In 1971, Steve Hackett made his
studio debut with Genesis on the album Nursery Cryme. The classic lineup became
Peter Gabriel (Lead singer), Steve Hackett (Guitarist), Tony Banks
(Keyboardist), Mike Rutherford (Bass guitar), and Phil Collins (Drums). Genesis
became touted for their intricate musical arrangements and instrumentation
along with frontman Peter Gabriel’s raconteur theatrical stage antics. During
this time Hackett became an early pioneer for an electric guitar technique
called “tapping” which is more commonly used on instruments like the Chapman
Stick.
In 1985, Steve Hackett and Steve
Howe (Yes, Asia) united to form GTR. The band released their self-titled debut
album in 1986 produced by Geoff Downes. The release spawned the hit “When the
Heart Rules the Mind” reaching #14 on Billboards’ Hot 100 Singles Chart. GTR
disbanded in 1987.
On March 15th of 2010 Steve
Hackett was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of
Genesis.
In 2012, Steve Hackett joined
forces with YES legend Chris Squire and formed Squackett. Their debut release
entitled … A Life Within a Day received rave reviews.
Earlier this year Hackett
released his latest solo album entitled Wolflight. The album debuted at number
31 on the UK album charts. Since 1975, Steve Hackett has expeditiously released
more than (25) inspired solo studio albums.
Most recently Esoteric Recordings
announced the official release of a 2 disc deluxe edition of GTR, the
self-titled 1986 album by Steve Hackett and Steve Howe’s band GTR. This edition
has been newly re-mastered and is presented here with the addition of a bonus
14-track CD of GTR live in Los Angeles in July 1986. There are also three bonus
tracks taken from promotional 12-inch singles of ‘When the Heart Rules the
Mind’ & ‘The Hunter,’ two of which appear on the CD for the first time.
It is my great pleasure to
introduce British guitar virtuoso, singer, songwriter, a musician’s musician
…
STEVE HACKETT!
STEVE HACKETT INTERVIEW POSTED
ON YOU TUBE FROM BBS RADIO 1
THE
RAY SHASHO SHOW
Bi-weekly
Monday Afternoon at 3 pm Pacific/6 pm Eastern
British virtuoso guitarist, singer and songwriter Steve Hackett
is a musician’s musician. While Hackett’s musical realm is limitless,
he is widely renowned for his intricate progressive and classical rock
guitar stylings and composition with Genesis.
But over the years, Steve Hackett has affectionately embraced numerous
musical genres while brilliantly composing, arranging, and recording
track after track of pristine musical enchantment.
Steve Hackett’s Genesis Revisited-Genesis Extended will be performing at the newly renovated Capitol Theatre in Clearwater, Florida on Thursday April 3rd 2014 at 7:30 p.m. For tickets visit www.rutheckerdhall.com or call 727-791-7400 for more information. Steve Hackett’s Genesis Revisited-Genesis Extended will also be playing on Friday April 4th at Plaza Live in Orlando and on Saturday April 5th at Parker Playhouse in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Born in Pimlico, London, England, Steve Hackett initially developed a
fondness for classical music. Hackett’s father Peter was a
multi-instrumentalist. Hackett’s earliest band associations were with
Canterbury Glass and Sarabande. His first recording experience
transpired as a member of Quiet World. The group also featured flautist/guitarist John Hackett, his younger brother.
In 1971, Steve Hackett made his studio debut with Genesis on the album Nursery Cryme. The classic lineup became Peter Gabriel (Lead singer), Steve Hackett (Guitarist), Tony Banks (Keyboardist), Mike Rutherford (Bass guitar), and Phil Collins (Drums). Genesis
became touted for their intricate musical arrangements and
instrumentation along with frontman Peter Gabriel’s raconteur theatrical
stage antics. During this time Hackett became an early pioneer for an
electric guitar technique called “tapping” which is more commonly used
on instruments like the Chapman Stick.
The Peter Gabriel Genesis era released albums…From Genesis to Revelation (1969), Trespass (1970), Nursery Cryme (1971), Foxtrot (1972), Selling England by the Pound (1973), The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway (1974).
In 1975, Peter Gabriel left Genesis to pursue a solo career. After
auditioning hundreds of singers to replace Gabriel, it was decided to
promote Phil Collins to the new lead singer role. Genesis had been
perceived as Peter Gabriel’s band by many of their fans until the
release of the critically-acclaimed … A Trick of the Tail
album in 1976. The release featured an incredible musical accord
between bandmates and became a masterpiece. Later that year … A Trick of the Tail was succeeded by the Wind & Wuthering album, another exceptional effort by Genesis.
In this interview … Hackett revealed that Disney had a huge influence on Genesis throughout the 70’s. After the Hackett penned “Entangled” lyrics were introduced to Phil Collins, Collins said the song had a Mary Poppins feel to it.
After the Wind &Wuthering album
Steve Hackett departed Genesis.
Some of Steve Hackett’s magical and
memorable moments with Genesis include legendary performances on the
tracks… “Horizons,” “Blood on the Rooftops,”“Firth of Fifth” and “Fountain of Salmacis.” The Phil Collins Genesis era with Steve Hackett released albums…A Trick of the Tail (1976), Wind & Wuthering (1976), Genesis -Spot the Pigeon (EP) (1977). Genesis Live released albums … Genesis Live (1973), Seconds Out (1977), Three Sides Live (1982).
In 1985, Steve Hackett and Steve Howe (Yes, Asia) united to form GTR. The band released their self-titled debut album in 1986 produced by Geoff Downes. The release spawned the hit “When the Heart Rules the Mind” reaching #14 on Billboards’ Hot 100 Singles Chart. GTR disbanded in 1987. GTR released albums …GTR (1986), GTR Live (1997).
Since 1975, Steve Hackett has expeditiously released (25) inspired solo studio albums … Voyage of the Acolyte (1975), Please Don’t Touch (1978),Spectral Mornings (1979), Defector (1980),Cured (1981), Highly Strung (1982), Bay of Kings (1983),Till We Have Faces (1984), Momentum (1988), The Unauthorized Biography (1992),Guitar Noir (1993), Blues with a Feeling (1995),Genesis Revisited (1996), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1997), Darktown (1999),Sketches of Satie (2000), Feedback 86 (2000),Genesis Files (2002), To Watch the Storms (2003), Metamorpheus (2005), Wild Orchids (2006),Tribute (2008), Out of the Tunnels Mouth (2009), Beyond the Shrouded Horizon (2011), Genesis Revisited II (2012).
On March 15th of 2010, Steve Hackett was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Genesis. He joined Phil Collins, Tony Banks and Mike Rutherford onstage but did not perform.
In 2011, Phil Collins announced his retirement from music and
possibly diminished any chance for a full- fledged Genesis reunion.
Recently, I had the rare pleasure of chatting with Steve Hackett
from his home near London, England. Steve and I chatted about the
Genesis Revisited tour, those incredible Genesis days, Squackett with
Chris Squire, solo material, the history behind “Entangled,” and of
course my infamous “Field of Dreams” question. Here’s my interview with
legendary guitarist, singer, songwriter, member of Genesis, GTR,
Squackett, and an incredible solo career … STEVE HACKETT.
Ray Shasho: Hello Steve! Where am I calling you in the UK? Steve Hackett:“Hello Ray, I’m in the outskirts of
London. The weather is quite mild for this time of the year and there
was a nice sunset this evening, so it’s been okay.” Ray Shasho: Steve, you’ve got several ‘Genesis Revisited’
Florida dates coming up in April … including an appearance at the
Capitol Theatre in Clearwater, Plaza Live in Orlando and Parker
Playhouse in Ft Lauderdale. Hopefully you and the band will get to enjoy
the beach and some Florida sunshine during that time. Steve Hackett: “I’m sure we will. I hope we will get a moment to enjoy the beaches because often it’s all work.” Ray Shasho: ‘Genesis Revisited’ is a fairly large production so I can understand why it takes away from the bands R&R time. Steve Hackett: It is a big production; we carry a
bigger production in Europe but it’s more pared down when we’re in the
states and tend to rely on the light show more. Where over here it’s a
light show and LED screens, so it’s slightly different, but at the end
of the day, the music is the star of the show and that’s how I kind of
see it.” Ray Shasho: Do you add an orchestra to the show when you’re doing the European dates? Steve Hackett: “No we don’t have an orchestra on
this one. I was playing with an orchestra the other night, but not with
Genesis material. So, I do get to work with orchestras from time to
time. In Hungary, I was working with some string players. But for my own
stuff …it’s a six piece band.” Ray Shasho: Steve, who is the lead singer for Genesis Revisited? Steve Hackett:“The lead singer with these
particular shows is Nad Sylvan. He’s from Sweden and is one of several
Swedes that I have been working with over the past year. I worked a
little bit with Roine Stolt of The Flower Kings who did a gig guest spot
with us at Royal Albert Hall and he was also a guest on Genesis
Revisited II. Plus there’s Mikael Akerfeldt who was also on the same
album. So that’s gone very well, an awful lot of people were involved in
the studio version of that album. But on the live one, the core band
sometimes gets joined by special guests in different parts of the
world.” Ray Shasho: Have you had anyone from the original Genesis lineup join you onstage? Steve Hackett: “I think the nearest has been Ray Wilson. Ray worked with Genesis on Calling All Stations and
he’s joined us onstage for three or four shows. So that’s getting to be
a regular thing. Its lovely working with him, he’s got a great voice.
So we have a number of guests who seem to be wandering through. The
reinterpretation of this material is somewhat flexible by now. We’re
able to do it as a band and I’ve got two singers within the band … Nad
Sylvan and Gary O’Toole who plays drums with us. So it works out very
well that a number of us sing harmonies and what have you. On my solo
stuff, apart from the Genesis material, I sing the lead vocals myself,
so it’s a kind of shared responsibility.” Ray Shasho: I chatted with Chris Squire after the release of A life Within A Day
the debut album by ‘Squackett,’ an incredible collaboration between you
and Chris. Chris told me … “I have to be honest going into this project
at the beginning; I didn’t really know that Steve sang, so that was a
big plus for me.” Steve Hackett:“Right… we had a good time doing that
and what we decided to do was to be our own lead singers on that. I
sung lead on a number of albums and I know Chris has as well. At times
people might think its Jon Anderson but it’s actually Chris at times. He
has a similarity in a way because they always had a great harmony vocal
sound. Although I know Jon hasn’t worked with them officially for
awhile. Who’s to say how that goes in the future?” Ray Shasho: I had a short discussion with Chris about Jon
being booted out of ‘Yes,’ and I did let him know that I was both
surprised and upset when he was let go. Steve Hackett: “Well who knows … I don’t know what
actually went down. I know that Jon was ill for awhile and I think he’s
doing gigs now for what I’ve gathered. I wouldn’t want to get into that
for whatever issues they have between them. But obviously from a fans
point of view I would say that ‘Yes’ obviously has an extraordinary
history and Jon’s voice was part of that. They’ve had a couple of
singers since then … Benoit David and Jon Davison.” Ray Shasho: The absolute ‘Yes’ aficionado will probably never
watch another ‘Yes’ performance again until Jon Anderson’s return to
the group. Steve Hackett:“I understand that and people often
feel the same way about Genesis. But it could be a very long time
waiting for Peter Gabriel to come back on lead vocals. It’s highly
unlikely that team will ever be put back together again… and with Phil
singing vocals, highly unlikely, not impossible, but extremely
improvable. As much as it would be great to work with either of those
guys, again, I think at the end of the day, the star is the music. When
I’m doing these Genesis shows, which is the emphasis for me over this
period, the response was so great in the rest of Europe and other parts
of the world including Japan that instead of doing that for just a year,
I decided to do it for another year. But I am going to do some solo
material as well to balance that out, because otherwise it is very easy
to become part of a museum. But I’m very proud of all those songs, it’s
just that I feel the need to also write new material.” Ray Shasho: Going back to Squackett’s A life Within A Day … I gave the album (5) Stars before the official release in late May 2012. Steve Hackett:“It was very much put together in
piecemeal as oppose to all in one go. It really took shape over a couple
of years. At times we took things that were potentially going to be
solo material of mine and Chris and combined and altered them. But it
was a very easy writing process with Chris. Out of all the people that
I’ve ever written with, I would say the easiest writing partner I ever
had was Chris. He tends to have the attitude if somebody’s got an idea
with a song; the song just expands in order to incorporate that idea. So
the song gets longer with a new variation. That may sound like a very
simple equation but to me it’s a very good one. Where I find with most
bands and writing partners it will be … my idea is better than yours and
we should do this instead of that and I could see how ‘Yes’ worked in a
way to encompass lots and lots of different ideas and it’s a very good
way of working.” Ray Shasho: I think if you’re having fun during the recording process than you can expect great music. Steve Hackett: “I think enjoying it is part of the
process. Very often just building the cake can take a very long time. By
the time you come to do the icing on the cake, sometimes you can end up
splitting yourself a little bit thin. It’s important to go in fresh. I
think if I did guitar on something for instance, I like to go in fresh.
That’ll be the first thing I do on that particular day. I don’t like to
be building the track all day and then come six o’clock it’s time for me
to finally start putting some guitar on. I like to have both guns
blazing at the beginning of the day.” Ray Shasho: Steve, do you think some of the greatest albums and individual tracks were recorded rather quickly and easily? Steve Hackett: “Absolutely. But it can often be the
case that if you have a band and you’re all playing live together…
that’s one thing. Your level of investment will be very high if you’re
having a band standing around while you’re working out the arrangements.
What tends to make more sense is what we used to call a demo … but now
it’s an updatable piece of software. You update things having gotten the
bones of it down to show people. Often I’ll be showing people things
that have got a finished guitar part on them or finished vocal plot, but
the drums might be the last thing we put on because we may find what
holes we’ve got left is the drum breaks. So I tend to work that way and
tend to record one instrument at a time with a computer sketch, most of
the time I don’t use amplifiers and I just play into the computer. It’s a
more flexible system.”
“As much as I love amplifiers and using them for live albums all the
time, I’ve used Marshall, Roland, Roland Cube, Hiwatt, HH, Fender …and
I’ve been through quite a few.” Ray Shasho: The conventional ways of recording in a studio and the technology has changed immensely. Steve Hackett:“It certainly has. I’ll tell you what
I find interesting is using an amp within a computer. I’m very fond of
my pedals but sometimes we’ll just use something if I want to get a very
distant thin buzzy sound or use something that’s in the computer and
it’s amazingly good. I do have my treasured pedals mind you that do
wonderful things and my Fernandes Burny model guitar which looks like a
Les Paul and has a Floyd Rose tremolo. It’s a really extraordinary
sounding instrument with sustain that goes on forever without the need
of being volume dependent. The Tierney of volume is no longer an issue
for me in getting guitar sounds.” Ray Shasho: Steve, do you alter the electronics of your amplifiers or guitars, or ever build your own equipment? Steve Hackett:“I’ve been involved with guitar
manufacturers from time to time with building guitars to specific
specifications. I just acquired a Jack Dent guitar with P-90 pickup
which is very good. I also acquired a Farida 12 String which was built
to my specifications. In terms of amplifiers I have not been involved
with a signature amp so far, but I interact more and more with people
who seem to want the association. I’m from a world where anyone who
owned a Les Paul or a Marshall Stack had already made it. So from the
teenage view point, that’s how it seemed to me. Maybe it’s the fact that
Everest was there and needed to be climbed. The fact that you already
had the equipment meant you were automatically going to make the assent.
You already made it once you had the equipment.”
“In reality it didn’t quite work out like that because nobody walks
into immediate fame on the world stage. There’s a tremendous benefit for
being the new face on the block. The thing that moves me most is the
passion for music, the challenge is still there and as greater as it
ever was. There’s this thing that I have to face, absolute desire to
want to excel and out do myself and the fear that I might not each time.
Somewhere between the two there’s some kind of chain reaction that gets
setup and if I spend enough time doing it I can disappoint myself from
time to time.” Ray Shasho:You’ve made so many incredible solo albums … I could spend hours discussing each one, but I think Out of the Tunnels Mouth (2009) is one of my favorites. It’s an eclectic musical mix of sheer heaven! Chris Squire was also on that album? Steve Hackett:“I had a good time doing that one.
Chris, Anthony Phillips, Nick Beggs and a number of interesting people
and they all did a wonderful job. I’m actually very proud of that album.
It was a very difficult album to do. I was going through a number of
personal things that made it very difficult to pull off. I was in the
middle of a divorce and a very difficult court case. But in a sense, I
think that’s what made it all the stronger and the fact that there was
so much to fight against. In a way, I went with songs that I knew that
were going to work because the form of those songs were probably less
experimental than I’ve done before. I knew where each of the songs ought
to be heading. I was stockpiling material that I couldn’t release at
the time because it was my right to be able to release albums that were
being challenged in court. In a way it made it more concentrated. Of
course it had something to do with the album title; it all relates to
that … Out of the Tunnels Mouth… out of harm’s way and out of
the lion’s mouth. In many ways it was a miracle that it got done and got
finished. I do think that it is a strong album.” Ray Shasho: So many great tracks on Out of the Tunnels Mouth. A few of my favorite tunes were “Emerald & Ash” and especially “Last Train to Istanbul.” Steve Hackett:“Interesting … I was playing that one
with the Hungarians recently. We play it with the same violinist and
his daughter is playing flute on it. And I was doing some live backwards
guitar stuff. I’ve got a Line 6 device that does backwards guitar
almost in real time. But I work with these reverse repeat echoes and
that’s a very interesting sound. Whenever I play like that it
immediately starts sounding like The Beatles circa Revolver.
But then I use fourth octaves on that and sometimes use either Micro Pog
or another device like Digitech Whammy Pedal II to play an octave
higher than what the guitar plays naturally, then when you play in a
faster type of way and you end up sounding a little bit like the sound
on “Baby You’re a Rich Man.” It’s a very odd sound but a very good one
and something I like very-very much.” Ray Shasho: Steve, did you receive formal musical training growing up? Steve Hackett: “No, I didn’t have any formal
training. My father was able to play a number of musical instruments and
I fell in love with classical music in my teens and I allowed it to
influence me. I like to think I took and still do from classical music
and various techniques, I have made classical albums and recorded seven
different pieces of Bach on different albums and its all music too me.
There’s no need to be either one thing or another. I think you can
operate in all those areas, provided that you love it enough. You don’t
really need someone to grade you and say you’re not doing that properly.
The idea of the mixture of genres has appealed to me greatly, the
mixture of sounds and instruments, two instruments making up a third,
and so on and so forth. There are so many schools of thought and if you
can allow yourself to be totally immersed in each of those schools at
various times, and I think the main thing is to listen which is the best
lesson of all … and to love it. Then you don’t need to judge or be
judged.” Ray Shasho: I believe artists like you are also very gifted
because so many musicians can’t play like you …I play a little guitar
and get very frustrated because I feel there’s always something missing. Steve Hackett: “I think all of us think there’s
something missing with our playing. Approaching it every day to try and
do something that you didn’t do the previous day. I think we all inch
our way forward and imagine other people operate like Gods but I think
it’s much more like worms inching their way forward occasionally out of
the darkness and into the light.” Ray Shasho: I chatted with drummer Jim McCarty of TheYardbirds back in 2011 and he said you were a big Yardbirds fan. Jim also mentioned that your favorite album was the Roger the Engineer album. Steve Hackett: “Yes, Roger the Engineer is a
great album. I love the guitar work on it and sonically the world owes a
tremendous amount to Jeff Beck for having blazed a trail and having
used effects on the guitar as well… like the effect of echoes and the
way guitar production owes so much to him with a great lesson to us all.
There’s no doubt that he’s one of the greats and I’ll always love him
for that.”
“But Jim’s a lovely guy and I enjoyed working with the reformed
Yardbirds when they became Box of Frogs. I played on their second album
and I’ve done things occasionally with Jim and played on his album Sitting On the Top of Time a couple of years back and also jammed with him live on one show with TheYardbirds. So yea, that was great fun.” Ray Shasho: One of my favorite Genesis albums is …A Trick of the Tail (1976)
which was the first release without original frontman Peter Gabriel. I
had surgery and a two week stint in the hospital a few years back and a
song that came into my mind during that time was “Entangled.” Was being
in the hospital the premises of the song? Steve Hackett:“It was really the psychiatrist
couch. Whether you place it in a hospital or somewhere else, it was the
idea of drifting in and out of consciousness. I remember when I first
had the lyric ready and I showed it to Phil who was going to sing it and
he said this has got a Mary Poppins feel to it … Over the Rooftops and Houses.
Indeed, the whole world of Disney cartoons and the attendant music was a
huge influence on Genesis. Certainly throughout the 70’s, beyond that …
possibly less so for them, but then I really shouldn’t comment on what
they did post Gabriel and post me.”
“I loved my time with Genesis and I was a huge fan of what the rest
of the guys came up with. I think they were all very clever writers and
very individual and unique players. It was a great school to be part of.
And to quote Phil, I remember him saying on the very first day that I
met him and we were going to be working together he said we’re bound to
influence each other. I thought it really hadn’t occurred to me because
I’d never worked in a band context before. It was a very different
proposition working with a band that is often very competitive with each
other. But we managed to cooperate sufficiently to come up with a
great bunch of songs between us all which is why I’m still doing this
stuff live, and it’s because I think so much of this group’s written
material which is so damned good. When I first joined the band it was on
the premises that if you wrote a guitar part you were already part of
the writing team, so I joined as a full writer from the word ‘go’ and I
think it was a very healthy way to run a band. You keep everyone happy
and everyone is going to end up being on an economic equilibrium. That
struck me as a very good way to keep a band together and get the best
out of everybody. If you just feel like you’re a hired gun you’re not
necessarily going to give the best of yourself.” Ray Shasho: What was the spark that got you to write “Entangled?” Steve Hackett: “I was thinking on the lines of
Crosby, Stills and Nash and I was thinking of Graham Nash’s voice. Funny
enough, I’ve run into Graham a few times in recent years and very often
in the same place in New York. When I think of harmony I often think of
the sound of his very sweet high voice. I think if a band that has
three part harmony and can have the sweet voice on the top then the
sunshine can really come out of those harmonies. So I was thinking of
that … working a song that was less dependent on the lead singer and
more on a harmony sound. I often still take that approach myself.
“Entangled” is a song that I’m really proud of.” Ray Shasho: Did the lyric or the music come first on “Entangled?” Steve Hackett: “Actually, I think the music came first and the lyric followed.” Ray Shasho: You left the group after the Wind & Wuthering album.
Many of the Genesis die-hard fans became disenchanted with the group
when they became a Pop or Top 40 band. Did you have any idea that the
band was headed in that direction before your departure? Steve Hackett: “It’s difficult to say. Some people
were more pop orientated. I think Tony was starting to head that way. To
my mind it was more important to have the occasional hit single rather
than to have a whole succession of hit singles. I think there’s a
certain price …you end up playing the game where as for instance I had a
hit single with Genesis with “I Know What I Like” and then the next hit
I had was “Cell 151” off my own album Highly Strung and then
the next hit single was “When the Heart Rules the Mind” with GTR. But
since then, I never really have taken the singles market seriously. I
make albums … I’m that kind of animal. I like the musical journey on an
album.” Ray Shasho:Phil Collins made some
Disheartening remarks several years ago saying that there was no longer a
place for him in today’s music. In an interview he stated, “I'm much happier just to write
myself out of the script entirely. I'll go on a mysterious biking
holiday and never return. That would be a great way to end the story,
wouldn't it?" It stirred a huge outpouring of concern from all
of his fans around the world and later Phil responded back saying that
he wasn’t really a basket case. Have you spoken with Phil Collins lately and is he okay? Steve Hackett:“I think he has some health issues.
To be honest I tend to bump into Phil at the occasional function. He had
become extremely withdrawn so I think he attends those functions less,
as far as I know. All I would say as a musician, I’ve always loved him
and he’s a great all rounder. The great thing is we encouraged each
other. I hope he recovers in every sense of the word. He’s given us a
lot of different music over the years and is one of the greats. I’m just
wishing him a lot of luck and love frankly. The drums have been
difficult for him to manage because of his hands. But there may be some
other past there. We have to be adaptable and flexible. To be a
conceptual thinker is terribly important, to think outside the box.” Ray Shasho: Is there a certain period during the day that is better for you to write music? Steve Hackett: “Occasionally I’ve managed to dream
melodies. That always seems like the greatest gift, to wake up with a
song that you remember, or a tune, a riff, a line …anything. It’s a
great thing. I’ve awoken in the middle of the night to write things down
or record them on tape. I’ll gladly give up sleep any night of the week
to come up with something extraordinary like that. It’s the reason I
tend to write first thing in the morning. I tend to get up quite early,
usually by 6 a.m. That’s when I get the pen out, in that first hour when
all around is quiet and before the sun is up … it’s important to me. I
find first thing in the morning that I’m in a semi-dream state.” Ray Shasho:Steve, here’s a question that I
ask everyone that I interview. If you had a ‘Field of Dreams’ wish like
the movie, to play, sing or collaborate with anyone from the past or
present, who would that be? Steve Hackett:“Let’s hope they would all like to
collaborate and teach. I’d love to find out what Tchaikovsky and Paul
Butterfield might come up with between the two of them. Of course
there’s Bach. I think really it’s the meeting point between opposites
that engages me the most. Those contradictions that get resolved in
music are the genuine breakthroughs. I’d just let every one of them
flood through me, the idea that all music is really one cell of
opportunity. If you were to become all of those things at once, that
would be something wouldn’t it? It would be incredible.” Ray Shasho: Steve, thank you so much for
being on the call today … but more importantly for all the great music
you’ve given us and continue to bring. We’ll see you in Florida in
April! Steve Hackett:“It’s been great talking with you
Ray. Good luck with your endeavors and I’ll see you in Clearwater,
Florida soon … all the best.”
Steve Hackett’s Genesis Revisited-Genesis Extended will be performing at the newly renovated Capitol Theatre in Clearwater, Florida on Thursday April 3rd 2014 at 7:30 p.m. For tickets visit www.rutheckerdhall.com or call 727-791-7400 for more information. Steve Hackett’s Genesis Revisited-Genesis Extended will also be playing on Friday April 4th at Plaza Live in Orlando and on Saturday April 5th at Parker Playhouse in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Contact classic rock music journalist Ray Shasho at rockraymond.shasho@gmail.com Purchase Ray’s very special memoir called ‘Check the Gs’ -The True Story of an Eclectic American Family and Their Wacky Family Business … You’ll LIVE IT! Also available for download on NOOK or KINDLE edition for JUST .99 CENTS at amazon.com or barnesandnoble.com- Please support Ray by purchasing his book so he can continue to bring you quality classic rock music reporting. “Check the Gs is just a really cool story ... and it’s real. I’d
like to see the kid on the front cover telling his story in a motion
picture, TV sitcom or animated series. The characters in the story
definitely jump out of the book and come to life. Very funny and scary
moments throughout the story and I just love the way Ray timeline’s
historical events during his lifetime. Ray’s love of rock music was
evident throughout the book and it generates extra enthusiasm when I
read his on-line classic rock music column on examiner.com. It’s a
wonderful read for everyone!” …stillerb47@gmail.com