Julian Lage might be one of the world’s best jazz guitar players, but he has admirers on the heavier end of the scale, too.
Last year, Alter Bridge’s Mark Tremonti and Myles Kennedy revealed they were surprise Lage fanboys in an interview with Guitar World. Kennedy said Lage’s playing was as impactful on him as Eruption was. In the same interview, Tremonti branded him “intelligent and sophisticated”.
Guitar World brought those compliments up in a recent interview with Lage, who was staggered by the praise.
“I’m very humbled by it. I find it hard to believe because I don’t think of myself as [an inspiration],” he says. “I’m touched by it. If anything I’m doing is meaningful to them, that’s great. They’re monsters.
“I will say, though, that I recognize that our community is a good one,” he adds. “There’s a sense of camaraderie, and if someone’s carving a path out or pursuing something, that person’s discoveries are available to everybody else.
“Because I do it too; I go to bed at night, like, ‘I want to know everyone who played a pine Telecaster,’ you know? So I’m learning from all these people’s experiments.”
These learnings, he then says, are not bound in place by genre. That’s the beauty in two prominent metal guitarists immersing themselves in the music of Lage, or, like Cecil Alexander, bringing metal and prog influences into the bebop space.
“It makes me feel like we work for the same company; we’re all in different branches,” he smiles. “I get it, because I feel the same with them, too. Those guys are amazing.”
To that end, Lage keeps a close eye on what his fellow employees are doing and name-drops Little Barrie main man Barrie Cadogan as a player doing something very interesting in a more raw setting than his.
“He’s doing all the things I said I wish I could do," Lage says. “He’s pushing amps, and he’s using phrasing in a beautiful way. Guthrie Govan and Tosin Abasi are amazing, too.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Lage discusses sharing the stage with slide guitar master Derek Trucks, and how he had to convince himself it wasn’t a dream. He also recently sat down for a fascinating chat with Al Di Meola.
Head over to the Guitar World YouTube channel to watch the full interview with Julian Lage.
