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.

Given how they juggle their time between playing in Creed, Slash’s band and various other projects including a Sinatra tribute, the two six-stringers in Alter Bridge are likely up there with the busiest musicians working in rock ’n’ roll today.

But despite the excess of musical activity, the band they play in together still remains top priority for singer/guitarist Myles Kennedy and lead guitarist Mark Tremonti – the songwriting force whose creative exploits turned the group into one of the most widely respected arena headliners of the modern age.

After making the decision to record their self-titled eighth record at Edward Van Halen’s 5150 Studio in Los Angeles, the music was born in an environment heavily steeped in guitar history.

This record seems to live on the heavier side of the Alter Bridge sound.

Myles Kennedy: Yeah, [the track] Tested and Able came out almost like a heavy metal Morse code riff. It’s super rhythmic and detuned. Maybe that was partly influenced by knowing we’d be at 5150, which is like hallowed ground for guitar riffs, right? Mark and I knew we had to show up with the biggest riffs possible, which helped dictate what this record was going to be.

I was playing baseball in the backyard with my brother in the summer of 1983 when I heard Eruption by Van Halen and their cover of You Really Got Me by The Kinks. That afternoon I decided what my life would be. Eddie’s genius guitar playing was that awesome. Eruption sounded like it was from outer space. It’s a piece of music that genuinely changed my life.

So it was a conscious decision to focus more on heavier riffs than ballads?

Mark Tremonti: I remember calling Myles, asking how he felt about not doing any ballads and it all being high energy. We sort of agreed. Then we got to the studio and it was all pretty heavy. The last song we recorded, Hang By a Thread, ended up being the ballad. It’s not necessarily a super-ballad, but it’s the most ballad-esque song on there.

What was it like for you both working in such a legendary studio?

Myles: It’s not a super-facility. It’s a very functional utilitarian setup for people who want to go in and work without distractions. That’s what I loved about it. Some studios are nice because you can play Xbox for a few hours. 5150 is more like, “Here’s a great-sounding room with some great gear. Go in and work”. It was a really important part of forming this album.

Any time we hit a wall creatively, wondering where to go next, we couldn’t help but feel some of the ghosts of the past in there helping inspire us. Maybe it was more of a psychological thing, but I could almost hear a voice saying, “Play the D chord!” It’s like the walls were telling us what to play next, and it was always the D chord [laughs]. That was pretty awesome.

Songs like Scales Are Falling feel experimental in places, showing how you are still finding ways to tread new musical ground.

Mark: “It ended up being one of my favourite guitar moments on the album. I remember my brother saying how much he loved Myles’ leads in the bridge and I had to tell him, ‘That’s my solo!’ He was surprised because my approach is usually more aggressive. But I love that kind of melodic playing over a clean section, I just don’t get the opportunity to do it much. Scales Are Falling is in open G minor, which gives it a lot of that character and personality.”

Myles: The solo I played in the outro was my tip of the hat to David Gilmour. I played a few solos on this record. Any time I do, I’m happy. Lead guitar is the best. And, yeah, it’s an unorthodox song. The phrasing is strange; it leaves the listener wondering where the ‘one’ is. It’s always important to keep expanding and trying new approaches. As a band, you need to keep testing the possibilities.

You’re both PRS signature artists. Is that what you stick with in the studio?

Myles: It was mainly my PRS signature, which was their first version of a T-style guitar. I was honoured to be part of that process because Paul and the team knew how much I love those kinds of guitars. So we got on the horn and they asked if I’d be interested in helping them step into that realm.

What I learned is that it’s difficult designing a guitar from the ground up. Even if you have a broad overall view of what you want it to be, every little detail matters. I have a newfound respect for R&D, that’s for sure.

Mark: I had about seven guitars with me, but there’s a black and grey one with a Van Halen sticker that I used a lot.

We do this thing where we get PRS to send us a bunch of guitars, then we’ll track an individual song with each of those guitars and our fans can buy the guitar that ended up on the record.

This one got sent to me a few albums ago. While I was playing it, I was like, ‘No, I’ve got to keep this.’ As close as they all are, each guitar has its own personality. This one just sang to me. I use it all the time.

Myles, you used Jeff Buckley’s 1983 Telecaster in Paris for a performance of Hallelujah back in 2019. That must have been quite an experience.

Myles: Grace is an album that gave me the same feeling as hearing Eruption, with my brain wondering, ‘Whoa, what’s happening here?!’ I also felt that way when I heard Julian Lage.

Playing Jeff’s guitar was amazing, though I truly didn’t feel worthy of it. I was a little uncomfortable, to be honest. I gradually convinced myself that it was okay. It’s just a guitar that’s part of this incredible history. All I had to do was not taint that history [laughs].

What do you think is so special about that instrument?

Myles: It’s just an early-to-mid ’80s Tele, but there’s something weird about how the pickup was wired. Apparently, there’s something technically wrong with it, at least from what [Matt’s Guitar Shop owner] Matt Lucas explained to me. That’s what gives it that beautiful shimmery sound. It’s all down to this imperfection, which makes it even cooler. When you plug it in, you think, “Oh yeah, there’s that sound!”

In Alter Bridge you and Mark have quite different preferences when it comes to guitar amp brands.

Myles: I usually stick with my Diezel VH4. But when we started at 5150, all my amps were in the warehouse, so they let me borrow one of the 5150s, which sounded great. In the end, we blended my VH4 with that. Now I’ll be using both amps live.

Mark: “I mainly used the clean and dirty channels on my PRS MT 100. On top of that, just like with my live rig, I used my Synergy amp. The modules I had were the SLO II preamp, to pair with the MT 100 dirty channel, and then the Fender[-style] TDLX preamp with the clean. That 5150 III in the studio sounded killer, so I blended all three. Like Myles, I’m going to incorporate it into my live rig.

I’m a big fan of multiple amps when it comes to tone. Each one has its own frequency range, together they fill a bigger space. That approach works for us as a band as well as within my own rig.

Were there any pedals involved or was it mainly direct?

Mark: The one I rely on most is my [signature] Morley wah. I love the attitude and scream of a wah. If I solo and it doesn’t have a wah on it, I almost think it doesn’t sound right. It’s been like that since I was a kid.

I love using my Electro-Harmonix Micro Synth to make single-string lines sound heavy. That thing is like our secret weapon. Our producer calls it ‘the Alter Bridge pedal’ because he never uses it with anyone else. What I love is that it’s not just one sound. It’s an actual living thing that sounds different every time. We might track that five times before we find the perfect sweep.

We also used the Kemper Profiler shimmer effect for the beginning of Scales Are Falling. It sounded perfect on the demo, so we kept it on the final recording. It’s funny, when the album came out, one of the first responses was, “Glad to see somebody is digging the Kemper shimmer,” which made me think, “Good ear!”

The name Julian Lage cropped up earlier. What do you think makes his playing so special?

Myles: He’s got the whole thing figured out harmonically. It’s so interesting because he’s moving it forward and it’s exciting to see for the rest of us. It’s rare to hear something like that done so well, where the guitarist isn’t just regurgitating the same thing over again.

He’s breaking new ground, which is something all of us strive for, while making it look effortless. I’ve seen some of his recordings with Dave King on drums, who is one of my favourite drummers. The interplay between Julian and him is special.

Mark: Julian is such an intelligent and sophisticated player, half of it probably goes over my head. If you’re not fully theoretically bulletproof, you might not even understand how or why he’s playing like that. It would take a lot of work over many years for me to play like that, but I still try to take in as much as I can.

• Altar Bridge is out now via Napalm.
• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.

Two decades and eight albums into Alter Bridge’s lauded career, the hard rockers are pulling off a first in 2026 – they’re embracing the definitiveness of a self-titled album.

While you could argue 2010’s AB III almost did this – at least typographically – there’s a to-the-point toughness behind the band’s new, eponymous 12-song statement that fully fortifies what Myles Kennedy and Mark Tremonti have been working on together since 2004. And it all comes down to the sickness of the riff.

“The essence of the band has always been to build the song on a good, solid, heavy riff and then balance it with a certain melodic sense and a certain depth of the lyrics,” vocalist-guitarist Kennedy says of the Alter Bridge aesthetic. “But from record to record, we kind of lean one way or the other – like maybe we incorporate some Eighties synths as a texture.”

He reiterates of Alter Bridge, though: “You’re not going to have any keyboard extravaganzas on this. This is a straight-ahead hard-rock record. So it felt appropriate – as far as the self-titled approach goes.”

Sure enough, Alter Bridge deliver tunefully brawny anthems by the boatload. Close to four years on from their seventh album, Pawns & Kings – and following Tremonti’s recent arena-conquering Creed reunion tours, as well as albums from his eponymous metal outfit and Kennedy’s solo project – the band broke a long silence last summer with the release of their deep, D-chunking Silent Divide.

Beyond its infectiously swampy groove, the single features solo sections that contrast Kennedy’s kinetic vibrato skills with Tremonti’s famous fretboard dexterity.

Both players explain that they brought their A-game to L.A.’s iconic 5150 Studios, where they recorded the album at the behest of longtime friend, collaborator, and tourmate Wolfgang Van Halen. Kennedy and Tremonti were wowed by the magnitude of making music within the hallowed walls of Eddie Van Halen’s home studio.

Inspired by the room’s rich history – and with the help of one in-house EVH 5150 III head – Alter Bridge put their all into the album’s hard-swung screechers (What Lies Within) and gloom-crested arpeggio attacks (Scales Are Falling).

“It made us want to be better musicians and take advantage of the moment we had,” Tremonti says of the setting. “When you have your guitar in your hand and you're playing in that studio in the same spot those guys played in, there's no slop coming out. It's got to be on point. You’ve got to man up, you know? You’ve got to band up when you're in that situation.”

In Silent Divide, Myles, you’ve got these really decadent string slides coming out of the second chorus, right before Mark switches into that galloping bridge.

Myles Kennedy: That’s something that I got from – rest his soul – John Sykes. He was a big influence for me, and he was the master of the string slide.

When we’re recording, [producer] Elvis [Baskette] always says, “Do more of that string-sliding stuff,” and I don't really think anything of it. It's just been in my DNA for 30 years. But we leaned in for Silent Divide. Like, let’s be unapologetic about it!

There’s a lot of dynamism between your and Mark’s respective approaches to soloing; the two leads you bring to Silent Divide reflect this. How do you see your respective styles complementing the other’s?

Kennedy: I always try to sing the guitar solos. I’m generally singing along with them as I’m playing them. I don’t know if you’re familiar with Oscar Peterson, the piano player, but that was something I used to love on those old jazz records. You could hear Oscar singing every note. I like to incorporate certain techniques and punctuate things with a flurry of notes, but I really lean into the melodic thing.

Mark loves learning new tricks and runs. I think that’s the main difference, and that’s maybe why we complement each other; we have enough of a different approach where you can kind of tell who’s who.

Mark Tremonti: I think Myles has a very soothing way of playing. Some of my favorite vibrato I’ve ever heard is Myles on the guitar. I grew up more on the speed metal side of things. He listened to metal, but early on he dove deeper into jazz, which really helped his playing.

He’s very good at improvisation. He has a lot of moments where he writes beforehand, but he also has a lot of moments where he’s just improvising in the studio, whereas I like to come in fully prepared with a written solo.

How did you come to record this album at 5150?

Kennedy: Wolf was incredibly kind enough to bring that offer up with our manager. We were like, “Really?” We knew the history of all the incredible music that had been made there. Just the fact that he trusted us enough to come in and not totally ruin the legacy really meant a lot.

When we all showed up, we were very cognizant of that, and we wanted to honor the situation. If you know you're going into this sacred ground where all these incredible riffs have been constructed and recorded, the last thing you want to do is show up empty-handed. It was definitely fuel for the creative fire.

Did Wolf have any stipulations for you coming into 5150? Like, “You can come in here, so long as you punch a werewolf in the face in my music video,” as you did in Mammoth’s The End music video?

Kennedy: Right? [Laughs] “Yeah, you can record here, but you have to sit in a makeup chair for two hours and turn into a zombie.” Getting to do that was awesome. So much fun. But yeah, I think the only thing was “Please, don’t play Eruption.” He didn't say that, but I wasn't going to do that.

Was all the gear at 5150 at your disposal?

Kennedy: There were pieces of gear there they had set out, but nothing super iconic. We weren’t tracking with Frankenstein. Have I held Frankenstein? Yes. Was it a total, Excalibur-level experience? I don't even know how to articulate that, but I got emotional – that was a pretty special moment.

But as far as amps and whatnot, there was a 50-watt 5150 III that we used when we were doing pre-production, so I plugged into that. I had it set up because I couldn’t fly out my Diezels. I fell in love with that amp, and it became a big part of the sound. I ended up marrying it with the [Diezel] VH4 when I was actually tracking.

Tremonti: I thought [the 5150 III] sounded so good, especially mixed with what I was using, which was my signature PRS head. I loved it so much that I got one; they were nice enough to give me one, and I took it on the last tour we did. So now it’s a part of my sound. It’s given me a new appreciation for 50-watt heads.

As long as I’ve been playing guitar, and as long as I’ve collected amplifiers, I don’t think I’ve ever owned a 50-watt head – maybe a single 1x12 combo that was 50 watts. I never appreciated how aggressive a 50-watt head is. When you pair it with 100-watt heads, it’s got a certain character – a bite that cuts through the mix. But it’s not harsh.

Did any Van Halen vibes seep into these songs?

Kennedy: Without a doubt. The riff for Silent Divide has definitely got an Eighties vibe. Mark kept comparing it to an old Judas Priest riff, but with the way I keep coming back to that chugging on the low D, I think of a riff like Unchained. Those were such important riffs for me. Does it sound like Unchained? No, but there's definitely that element there.

Tremonti: I try to explain to people that 5150 Studios isn’t some sterile environment where they’re cleaning up for the next band to come in. It was pretty much left the way [Van Halen] used it last.

Wolfie has a great Neve console in there now, but it’s pretty much the same letters on the kitchen fridge; there’s the 5150 necklace hanging over the door – all the cool stuff that was there when those guys were there. We by no means sound like Van Halen in any way or form. But you can feel the spirit of the band and Eddie in that room.

One characteristic to your solos on this record, Mark – whether on Rue the Day, Silent Divide, or Power Down – is that heavy, wah-filtered tonality. When we spoke with you around your last Tremonti record, The End Will Show You How, you were prototyping your own line of pedals behind the scenes, including wah pedals. Are any of those on the record?

Tremonti: No, that’s the Morley wah. I’m still dabbling with trying to get some stuff together. It’s going to be called Tremonti Audio Company, but there’s such great stuff out there [already]. I’m a picky guy, so I gotta make sure it’s right before we do it.

Pardon the pun, but what else lies within this record, gear-wise?

Kennedy: Guitar-wise, I’m just using my signature models. On this record, there were probably two or three, depending on what the tuning was, that were just off the rack. No changes, just stock MK signatures from PRS, and they worked out great.

Tremonti: I just used my signature model. PRS always gives us a handful of guitars we can play in the studio, and then fans can buy the actual studio-recorded guitars. But there was one that they sent over that I really loved and I kept. There’s also a baritone we used on Rue the Day.

Getting back to the heavy riff, how did you come about the doom-waltzing feel of What Lies Within?

Tremonti: That’s in open D5, which is one of my favorite alternate tunings. I had that riff and chorus sitting around. I put the demo together with all those parts on there and left the melodies in the verses up to Myles’ interpretation.

Kennedy: I came up with a little alternate melody, a little octave part. The way we marry those two concepts has really become a thing since the record we put out about 10 years ago, [2016’s] The Last Hero, where he’ll have this kind of chugging, driving riff and then I’ll put on an octave thing in an eighth- or 16-note pattern, just to move it along.

You’re both prolific workers and writers. To paraphrase Myles’ lyrics on Power Down, you don't necessarily slow the overall pace, but you’re not always at it with Alter Bridge, specifically. What are the things you notice about each other once you get back together?

Tremonti: Just how much of a powerful singer Myles is. When we play in these multiple bands, it keeps it all fresh. I couldn’t imagine being in one band now. I think it would start getting stale, and you would kind of take it for granted.

So, when you come back to playing these songs you haven't done in three years, it’s like, “Oh yeah, I love playing this!” and you see the smiles on everybody's faces. I think that's why we’ve had a 20-year-plus career with the same members, because we’re all open-minded enough to go out and do other projects before coming back together.

Kennedy: It seems like the longer we do it, the more that dynamic is solidified – there’s this level of comfort. It’s the same way I look at why we continue to use Elvis as our producer, where you know how it’s going to play out and you trust everybody’s instincts.

With Mark and me, part of the reason it’s really worked since day one is because we realize we’re kindred spirits who are obsessed with writing music. You never feel like you’re having to pull someone along.

Are you ever able to fully power down?

Tremonti: I love to do this. When I want to power down, what’s better than sitting around and playing guitar? It’s not relaxing to practice sweep arpeggios or that kind of thing, but sitting down with a guitar and writing and improvising – that’s relaxing.

I don’t power down in the typical sense of, “I’m going to sit on the couch and watch TV.” I like going to bed at night thinking, ‘I did something today. I wrote this part or practiced this or that.’ That makes me feel good. If I go to bed going, “I just wasted a day,” it bugs me.

Kennedy: Power Down is written from the perspective of, “Take some time to stop and smell the roses.” Given what we’ve been talking about, that’s something I’ve really been working at the last few years. It got to a point where I was never home. I realized life was just passing me by.

Though the life I was living was all music and touring the world – and I don’t want to sound like I’m complaining – there are other responsibilities I have as a partner, family member, and dog owner. I wanted to be around more and take this all in, because this side of life is great.

Referring back to the chorus of Power Down, how would you describe the Alter Bridge experience these days?

Kennedy: It couldn’t be better. I’m at this stage in life where I feel like all the boxes have been checked. I’m very grateful for that. At this point, it really is just a matter of continuing to revel in what this has all turned into and just savor and enjoy it.

When I was younger, that wasn’t the mindset. I was hungry and sometimes frustrated and kind of lost in my own head and ego. I feel there’s been this shift, and it really is beautiful. I love it. I recommend it. Gratitude is the attitude.

Tremonti: I couldn't ask for anything else. First and foremost, I’ve got a family that is the best, and the most supportive circle of friends. I spent a lot of time in the beginning of my career worrying that I wouldn’t amount to anything. You’re just dying to be a musician, then once you become a professional, you’re worrying it’s going to end.

People are telling you you’re going to be a one-hit wonder, and then people are telling you you’re going to have a sophomore slump, or that tastes in the music scene are changing and you’re no longer relevant – you hear these things every day in the music business.

But halfway through the Alter Bridge records, I was finally at peace with my career. Like, as long as I keep on writing – not just phoning it in, but putting all my heart and soul into this – I can do this as long as I want. I get to do what I love!

• Alter Bridge is out now via Napalm
• This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.

Recording at Eddie Van Halen's legendary 5150 Studios is an experience most mere mortals can only dream of. Holding some of his gear, including the iconic Frankenstein, and examining it up close, is another beast altogether.

Alter Bridge's Myles Kennedy and Mark Tremonti got to do both – and it got their creative juices flowing.

The band was given the opportunity to record their self-titled eighth album at Van Halen’s studio with the blessing of longtime friend and former Tremonti bassist – and Eddie’s son – Wolfgang Van Halen.

“Wolf was incredibly kind enough to bring that offer up with our manager,” Myles Kennedy reveals in the latest issue of Guitar World when asked how this enviable opportunity came about.

“We were like, ‘Really?’ We knew the history of all the incredible music that had been made there. Just the fact that he trusted us enough to come in and not totally ruin the legacy really meant a lot.”

“It made us want to be better musicians and take advantage of the moment we had,” adds guitarist Mark Tremonti.

“When you have your guitar in your hand, and you're playing in that studio in the same spot those guys played in, there's no slop coming out. It's got to be on point. You’ve got to man up, you know?” Or, perhaps more aptly, “You’ve got to band up when you're in that situation.”

“If you know you're going into this sacred ground where all these incredible riffs have been constructed and recorded, the last thing you want to do is show up empty-handed,” continues Kennedy. “It was definitely fuel for the creative fire.”

As for whether the band encountered any of Van Halen's iconic gear during recording, Kennedy replies, “There were pieces of gear there they had set out, but nothing super iconic. We weren’t tracking with Frankenstein.

“Have I held Frankenstein? Yes,” he teases. “Was it a total, Excalibur-level experience? I don't even know how to articulate that, but I got emotional – that was a pretty special moment.”

And it seems like Eddie himself would have approved of the band recording at 5150, as the Van Halen legend once attended an Alter Bridge show when Wolfgang was filling in on drums.

For more from Alter Bridge’s Mark Tremonti and Myles Kennedy, plus exclusive interviews with Joe Perry and Danielle Haim, pick up issue 602 of Guitar World from Magazines Direct.

Mark Tremonti says he was reunited with one of his cherished PRS guitars after it was stolen thanks to the help of an eagle-eyed fan.

The Creed and Alter Bridge guitarist recently gave Revv Amps a tour of his current live rig, with PRS guitars a natural topic of conversation. But it’s the story of the last guitar he pulls off the rack that feels the most remarkable, because he’s lucky to have it still.

The six-string, finished in a striking ‘Tiger Eye’ burst, was one of the earliest single-cut guitars to ever come off the PRS production line. It's his main instrument for Open D5 tuning songs, in Alter Bridge and Creed, but for a while, he had to live without it.

“The guitar was stolen from me, back when we had a rehearsal spot in Orlando; somebody had broken in and stolen a bunch of stuff,” he says.

But the guitar gods were smiling down on him, as the thief, apparently loitering outside a Guitar Center looking for a buyer, came across someone willing to take it off their hands – because they knew exactly what guitar it was.

Tremonti remembers, “Somebody bought this from somebody in a Guitar Center parking lot, called the police, and said, ‘This is Mark Tremonti’s guitar.’ They were nice enough to call us up, and we bought it for whatever price they had paid for it.”

“I'm glad to have it back,” he adds, “because this is a guitar I use a lot.”

From Alter Bridge’s Open Your Eyes to Creed’s Weathered, Tremonti uses the alternate tuning a lot. Consequently, this truly beautiful guitar – complete with enviable tiger stripes on the back of its neck – is a valuable part of his arsenal.

In related news, Tremonti recently made the argument for PRS guitars and Dumble amps being the perfect tonal match, and reflected on Alter Bridge becoming the first band outside of the Van Halen family to record at the legendary 5150 Studios – a place that Eddie Van Halen once nearly burned down after an amp test.

Mark Tremonti may be a sucker for Dumble amps, but the Alter Bridge and Creed guitarist has succumbed to the pull of digital amp modelers.

Revealing his newly devised live rig in an interview with American Musical Supply, Tremoti has revealed that the Dumble-inspired tones of his signature PRS head, which remains a key part of his Creed setup, are now augmented by a Neural DSP Quad Cortex.

At the heart of the rig is a trio of tube amps, which run simultaneously. That comprises his PRS MT 100; a “great-sounding” EVH 5153, which is a 50-watt version of Eddie's famous head; and a rack-mounted Synergy Amps creation that he describes as his “best find in the last five years”.

The real surprise, though, comes when the camera pans to his QC, nestled in amongst his rack-mounted pedalboard.

“That we just brought out for this tour as an experiment to maybe put it on top of the lead tone for the front of the house,” he says, referring to the Quad Cortex. “But it's still in the early stages of us messing with it.

“I'm a very tube-driven guy,” he adds, ensuring that this isn’t a huge change of tonal heart. “This is just a, ‘Can't beat them, join them,’ kind of thing to see how it sounds when you add it to to the arsenal.”

Tremonti is the latest in a long line of tube amp loyalists to have waded into digital waters. John Mayer was spotted using a Quad Cortex at Coachella, and Slipknot’s Jim Root has gone “sacrilegeous” with a QC, too. Meanwhile, The Edge dropped Universal Audio pedals into his rig to work around the Las Vegas Sphere’s volume restrictions.

Notably here, Tremonti is proving that the two amp styles can co-exist. It doesn't have to be one or the other.

Elsewhere in Tremonti’s rig, pedal picks include a Wampler Audio Tumnus overdrive “for lead tones,” a Boss OC-5 octave pedal, and a G-Lab SD-1 delay. He also employs a Kikusui adapter for power conditioning – a “vital safety” net found in Angus Young and Joe Bonamassa's rigs.

“When you travel around the world, power is gonna be drastically different,” Trremonti explains. “If the power's off, your tone's off. It could be one of the most important pieces in your entire rig.”

In related news, Tremonti has reflected on the honor of using Eddie Van Halen’s 5150 Studios as a base for the writing and recording of Alter Bridge’s forthcoming new album. The band was afforded the rare chance to utilize the space thanks to their connections to Wolfgang Van Halen.

And the digital modeler game is getting hotter by the month. Line 6 announced its potentially game-changing Helix Stadium in June, while the QC just got some big new updates to strengthen its position in the rapidly expanding modeler market.

Mark Tremonti has reflected on the “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” of writing and recording Alter Bridge's new album at Eddie Van Halen's 5150 Studios, having been afforded the chance by the late electric guitar legend’s son.

For their eighth, self-titled album – and first since 2022’s Pawns & Kings – Mark Tremonti, Myles Kennedy, and co. said they wanted to “approach the process differently.” Their friendship with Mammoth mastermind Wolfgang Van Halen helped them achieve that, with the band moving into the studios built by Eddie Van Halen, where Van Halen recorded some of their most seminal albums.

In its hallowed spaces, the band and longtime producer Michael “Elvis” Baskette enjoyed writing sessions, pre-production, and drum recording during their month-long stay.

“It gives you the confidence like, ‘We must be doing something right if we’re allowed to be here on this hallowed ground of rock ‘n’ roll’,” says Tremonti via an Instagram post.

“After working for hours, you almost fall into a daydream and forget where you are. Every now and then, you’ll look at the wall, snap out of it, and think, ‘I can’t believe we’re here’. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and a dream come true.”

The 5150 sessions were a poignant moment for Tremonti, who had been taken under EVH’s wing during his Creed days.

“I remember Eddie going, ‘Hey, who’s the guitar player?’ and I raised my hand,” Tremonti told Classic Rock last year, looking back on Creed's two shows supporting Van Halen in 1998.

The late shredder was incredibly supportive of a young Tremonti and gifted him his “most prized possession” the next day, with Eddie muscling through a crowd of screaming fans to give it to him.

Over the years, their connection grew. Wolfgang has spent time in Tremonti's solo band and has also helped out in Alter Bridge, leading to a role reversal as Tremonti found himself playing to a crowd that included Eddie Van Halen.

He told Loudwire in January. “He [Eddie Van Halen] came to an Alter Bridge show in LA when Wolfgang was filling in on drums. You'll play a show and see him there, smiling, looking down. It was hard to shake the nerves, but it felt good him being there.

“We went to see them [Van Halen] practice at 5150 Studios, and they were playing the new album [2012's A Different Kind of Truth],” he continued. “They finished a song and I was like, ‘Wolfie, that was a killer song, I loved when you did all the chordy stuff,’ and Eddie was like, ‘Were...were my parts good?’ You're Eddie Van Halen, your parts are always good! But he was always pushing to be the best he could be.”

Tremonti has been road-testing his hotly anticipated pedal line, with one of his creations poised to be “going after the Klon.” These pedals likely feature on the new Alter Bridge album, alongside what he feels is the unbeatable combination of PRS guitars and Dumble amps.

PRS has rolled out two newly spec’d versions of its popular Archon and MT 15 guitar amps – and has notably equipped its Mark Tremonti signature amp with a fresh Dumble-inspired overdrive channel lifted from the hugely versatile MT 100.

Previously a two-channel 15-watt amp head that offered a second clean channel voice, the new-for-2025 MT 15 has now been overhauled with a revamped Lead channel that – thanks to a new push/pull control – looks to deliver one of the most sought-after amp tones in a lunchbox amp format.

Specifically, the MT 15 features the voice of the MT 100’s overdrive channel, and offers a push/pull control on the Treble parameter that removes two gain stages to produce “vintage, crunchier mid-gain tones”.

Tremonti’s affection for both PRS and Dumble amps is well documented, so it makes sense the pair have opted to put such Dumble-inspired tones into the MT 15. Indeed, it was actually Paul Reed Smith who got Tremonti hooked on Dumbles after an all-star PRS jam night.

Last year, Tremonti discussed his then-new MT 100 with Guitar World, and revealed how he had originally worked to get the response and feel of his many vintage Dumble amps into his signature head.

“There’s a certain something that happens when you play a Dumble,” he says. “When the pick hits the string, you hear this certain quality that I tried to replicate with this amp. You can turn the gain down, sit on a note and it will bloom.”

The original MT 100 was highly regarded by Guitar World, and was even badged not only one of the best metal amps on the market, but also one of the most versatile all-rounders – and to have some of that flexibility added to the more affordable MT 15 will no doubt please many.

Otherwise, the MT 15 stays true to its original blueprint. There’s a Clean channel with Bass, Middle, Treble and Volume controls, with a push/pull on the Treble for unlocking a “touch of overdrive”.

Similarly, the proper Lead channel hosts Bass, Middle, Treble and Gain controls. Presence, a Master pot for the overdrive channel, and a Lead/Clean channel toggle switch complete the front panel.

“Seven years ago, we released my signature MT 15 amplifier, a compact powerhouse that quickly became a go-to for players seeking both pristine cleans and crushing high-gain tones,” Tremonti says.

“In 2023, we took things even further with the MT 100, delivering a full-scale amplifier that carried my signature sound to the next level. That inspired us to find a way to fit the 100's third channel into the 15's lunchbox size.

“Today, I’m beyond excited to introduce the next evolution of the MT15, now featuring a push/pull overdrive control on the Lead channel and a half-power switch, giving players even more tonal flexibility to shape their sound with a compact amp.”

As for the all-new Archon Classic, PRS has refined and revoiced the gain structure from the original Archon’s lead channel, resulting in a wider range of gain tones. As per PRS, the Archon Classic was designed to be a “go-to tool for playing classic rock or pushing the envelope into modern territory”.

Elsewhere, some features from the previous iteration are present, including a bright switch, and presence and depth controls. It has been joined by a 4x12 “mega-sized” cabinet – only the second four-speaker cab in the PRS lineup, which features Celestion V-Type speakers.

“The Archon Classic is not a re-issue of the original Archon, but a newly voiced circuit with the lead channel excelling in '70s and '80s rock tones and a hotter clean channel able to go into breakup,” notes PRS Amp Designer Doug Sewell.

“This is the answer for those wanting an Archon with a hotrod vintage lead channel gain structure without changing preamp tube types, and a juiced-up clean channel without having to use a boost pedal, all wrapped up in a retro-inspired cabinet design.”

The MT 15 is available to preorder now for $949, while the Archon Classic is available for $1,149. The matching cab is priced at $999.

Visit PRS Guitars for more information.

The end is near, but time is on Mark Tremonti’s side. It’s got to be – he planned it this way.

When Guitar World reaches the legendary Floridian guitar force in late November 2024, he’s just stepped into a Toronto hotel room on a day off from Creed’s extremely successful and rapturously received reunion tour, which packed arenas throughout much of the year.

To say he’s caught during a moment of downtime, however, might be a stretch.

Once this interview wraps, he’ll be warming up his voice in preparation for another round of “Tremonti Sings Sinatra” shows, black-tie events where he smoothly croons Ol’ Blue Eyes’ standards.

He’s also touching up some songs he wrote for an upcoming album with Alter Bridge, his other long-running and beloved hard rock project. He may QC a pair of wah-styled prototypes for a long-promised pedal-making project. He and his family are going to sneak in some Christmas shopping while wandering through the Canadian metropolis, too.

Even after tackling all that, the guitarist will be sitting in the hotel relearning rhythmically crushing riffs from The End Will Show Us How, the latest album from his eponymous and more metallically tinged Tremonti project.

He’d made sure to finish that record at the top of 2024 to avoid conflicts with Creed’s weighty tour schedule, but the pendulum is swinging back toward the musical multi-tasker’s heaviest outfit for 2025.

“In my now very-layered career with all these bands, I’ve got to work about a year and a half ahead of schedule to make sure everything’s on time,” he says of an ever-morphing creative flow.

Throughout The End Will Show Us How, Tremonti and the rest of his group – co-guitarist Eric Friedman, bassist Tanner Keegan and drummer Ryan Bennett – are a wrecking ball of kineticism.

They’re smashing darkly anthemic choruses into ominously quarter-bent alt-rock gloom (The Mother, the Earth and I); they’re busting out bare-knuckled baritone riffage alongside pinch-and-burn soloing (One More Time, Nails).

But while generally several shades heavier than Creed or Alter Bridge, End also unveils tender rock balladry (It’s Not Over).

First single Just Too Much may be the record’s most unique surprise. Sporting an infectiously quirky verse groove built around alternating 8- and 9-bar phrases, the song passed Friedman and Tremonti’s smell test immediately.

Perhaps more irregular to the band leader was how his wife was an instant fan, too.

“That was one of the only songs I’ve ever worked on in my studio where my wife was like, ‘What was that thing you were playing last night? That was really cool!’ ” Tremonti says through a hearty laugh.

“She thought it was Audioslave-ish, which is one of her favorite bands. So I was like, ‘All right, we’re onto something!’ ”

You’ve called The Mother, the Earth and I one of your favorite songs you’ve ever done with this band. Pardon the pun, but what makes it so elementally “Tremonti”?

“I heard the initial demos back and it just hit a spot with me. And when it kicks into the chorus chord progression, that’s musically the most satisfying part to play. I like setting up an atmosphere and finding a lyric that fits the mood.

“When I was writing this song, I just spit out those lyrics. I thought it would be a fun thing to tackle, this love for the earth. Finding beauty and peace in nature while the world is in shambles, and everybody’s killing for religion and politics.

“It’s about sitting back in that tranquility of the earth itself… that’s something we all share, no matter what you believe.”

One More Time kicks off with a gnarly, gun-turreted rhythm riff that locks in with a monstrous double kick. It’s one of the heaviest grooves on the record.

“That’s signature Tremonti. Whenever I have a riff in a rhythm that needs to stay super-tight, and it has an almost speed metal-y approach to it, that’s definitely earmarked for Tremonti. If I brought that to [Creed/Alter Bridge bassist and drummer] Scott Phillips and Brian Marshall, they’d look at me funny.

“They like rock. They like progressive rock. But I don’t know if they like speed metal as much as I do. So I do as much of that as possible with Tremonti. That’s one of the main reasons I started this band – to be able to get that side of my songwriting out. They don’t have to be heavy, but that’s definitely a flavor of this band.”

There’s this bending lick you do in the bridge breakdown of One More Time that had one YouTube commenter asking, “Did I just get Weezer-ed?” because it shares a similar feel to the end of Rivers Cuomo’s solo on Buddy Holly. Had you come across that comparison yet?

“No… I’m not too familiar with Weezer. I’d have to go back and listen to it, but it’s definitely not a tribute to Weezer. [Laughs]”

Parallel thoughts, perhaps. A good lick is a good lick!

“It’s just rock ’n’ roll! There are 12 notes; it’s all been done. When that lick came together for One More Time, I thought it was great for the song. It wasn’t because I was listening to a Weezer record, I’ll tell you that much. [Laughs]”

In your last interview with GW, you talked up your love for the clean channel of your PRS MT 100 head. Did that end up being the primary clean tone on The End Will Show Us How?

“The MT 100 is the primary amp in general. Our producer Elvis [ed. Michael ‘Elvis’ Baskette], absolutely loves that amp. That being said, I’ve always been a firm believer in having multiple amps doing any given job. It’s been a career-long quest for me, pairing amps to find these perfect marriages between tones.

“We had the MT 100, and I brought in a couple of new Dumbles that I love. I honestly think there’s no better tone in the world than a slightly overdriven Dumble. When you mix that with the MT 100, it’s just bliss to me. And then Elvis loves my Cornford RK100, so I brought that in for layering the high-gain rhythms and leads. I think we had it all covered between those three or four amps.”

A while back, you’d started teasing the idea of producing your own pedals. Where are you at with that project?

“Just yesterday I tried out two pedals, but I’m trying to be as picky as I can and not pull the trigger until I’m perfectly happy with it. I’m trying to come up with something cool that’s also very affordable and road-worthy. When you put your name on something, you’ve got to make sure it’s right. We’ve been at it for a few years… but we’ll get there.”

What were you testing out, specifically?

“They were two wah pedals, but we’ve worked on a tremolo, a Uni-Vibe-type of pedal, and a dual overdrive; I love the idea of a stackable overdrive. I also want to do an octave pedal at some point, but the parts are a little tougher to come by than you would think.

“So, it’s been [about] hunting some of that down. I want to come out with three pedals when it launches and then come out with a pedal a year after that.”

How much octave pedal work is on this record?

“Any time there’s a big, single-string heavy riff, there’s got to be some kind of layered octave on there. What we usually do in that case is we’ll put a layer of Micro Synth in there, too.

“Micro Synths have some of the nastiest fuzz tones. If you listen to All the Wicked Things, there’s a section in the bridge where it drops to a real heavy single-string riff. I’d be surprised if we didn’t layer some sort of octave on there.”

How excited are you to start promoting this record with Tremonti? That’s going to be a different vibe than these Creed arena shows…

“Oh, absolutely. All my bands feel so different. It’s crazy going from the Sinatra shows, where I’m wearing a tux and playing with all of these incredibly gifted performers, to going over to Europe and playing in clubs with my heaviest band. It’s definitely a different vibe.

“You’ve got to take a different approach. I can’t get on stage with Tremonti and be like, ‘Hey, you all look beautiful tonight, thank you for coming to the event,’ like I would with a Sinatra performance.”

Maybe you’re underselling the power of that. Everyone loves a compliment!

“I feel like when I do Tremonti, I become a different character. When it’s heavier music, I become a WWE wrestler: ‘Get up, everybody!’ Whatever the music pulls out of you, you know…”

On the idea of pulling out music through these different personas, is there any other music you’re working on at the moment? Whether with Alter Bridge, Creed or Tremonti?

“I’m going into the studio with Alter Bridge in March. I put together nine demos last month that I’ve shared with everybody. I’m always thinking about volume two of Tremonti Sings Sinatra.

“Every record that we put out [donates proceeds] to the National Down Syndrome Society, so I want to keep raising funds for that. And it’s also just a lot of fun to do. We’re still looking at what happens [in 2025] with the Tremonti tours, stateside. And then we’re looking at Creed as well. We’ll see how it all pans out!”

• The End Will Show Us How is out now via Napalm.

Tone freaks everywhere were intrigued by Mark Tremonti’s September 2023 announcement he was launching a pedal company. “I’m going after the Klon,” he declared, “and I don't want it to be $8,000 – I want it to be 200 bucks.”

Since then, things have been understandably quiet on that front as Tremonti busied himself with Creed’s arena-filling reunion tour. Tremonti recently updated Guitar World, though, and the pedals are happening.

“Just yesterday I tried out two pedals, but I’m trying to be as picky as I can and not pull the trigger until I’m perfectly happy with it,” Mark says. “They were two wah pedals.”

“I’m trying to come up with something cool that’s also very affordable and road-worthy,” he added. “When you put your name on something, you’ve got to make sure it’s right. We’ve been at it for a few years... but we’ll get there.”

When he announced the project, Mark had been testing a Uni-Vibe style model, which is still on the cards. His most recent prototypes, however, were two wah models. Additionally, Tremonti says, there’s a tremolo, the aforementioned Uni-Vibe, and a dual overdrive. “I love the idea of a stackable overdrive,” he adds.

Mark’s plan remains as it was when he first announced the line: “I want to come out with three pedals when it launches and then come out with a pedal a year after that.” He also has a fifth pedal idea in addition to those already mentioned:

“I want to do an octave pedal at some point, but the parts are a little tougher to come by than you would think,” he admits. “So, it’s been [about] hunting some of that down.”

When Tremonti announced the pedals, he had the Uni-Vibe prototype on his Alter Bridge board. Now the Creed tour is wrapped up, Mark is preparing to go out with his Tremonti band, so we can be confident the pedals will have had plenty of gig testing when they do emerge.

Tremonti has not commented on whether he will start his own company or, like Jack White’s Third Man Hardware, partner with existing manufacturers to release the pedals.

The past year has been good to Tremonti gear-wise, seeing him reunited with the Les Paul he used on Creed’s debut album and launching his MT100 signature amp.

The full interview with Tremonti is in the May 2025 issue of Guitar World, available from Magazines Direct.

While all guitarists learn from the greats, few actually get the opportunity to play alongside the best in the business night after night. But with 20 years as Mark Tremonti’s bandmate in Alter Bridge, and a dozen with Slash featuring Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators, Kennedy has done just that.

Which has afforded him, among other benefits, a unique perspective on what makes a guitar legend. What has he observed?

“With Slash, there’s a few things,” Kennedy says. “One is his unorthodox approach – his phrasing and the way his lines go where you wouldn’t expect them to go. There’s an unpredictability that I really appreciate with him. He doesn’t think like other guitar players.

“Also, he’s such a character player. Within one or two notes you know it’s Slash, just because of his vibrato. He has his own way of speaking.”

Regarding Tremonti, he continues, “A lesson I took from him early on was how he would approach song ideas when we were writing together. He would catalog things – ‘Here’s a riff, will it go with this verse…’ He would have these parts laying around and put them together like sonic puzzles.

“I always thought that was a really interesting way of doing things, because I would try to do it all in one sitting, like, ‘Okay, I have a verse, now I need to come up with a chorus.’ That was my pattern.

“But playing with Mark opened my eyes to trying this other way of, ‘You know what? You might have to wait a month, or even a year, to find a part that’s good enough to go with this other part.’ I learned the art of patience.”

One thing Slash and Tremonti have in common? “Their work ethic,” Kennedy says. “Slash’s work ethic is over the top. He goes so hard, and that’s been really inspiring to me. And Mark is the same way.

“It’s great being surrounded by people who still have that passion, even after being in the game for decades, because it would be so easy for them to go, ‘I’ve got a catalog, I’ve got a legacy. I can just pick up a guitar and go out and play the hits and call it a day.’ But neither one of these guys is hardwired that way.

“I’ve always appreciated that, because for me it’s always been about the work,” Kennedy continues. “None of the other stuff matters. I’ve found that the satisfaction comes from the creativity, and from when you know you’ve got something that moves you, or hopefully moves somebody else. That’s where the joy is.”

• The Art of Letting Go is out now via Napalm.

It’s often the case that high-profile guitar players are also avid guitar collectors, but while the majority may be assembling inventories of vintage electric guitars and acoustic guitars, Mark Tremonti has found himself focussing on another corner of the collector’s world altogether: guitar amps.

The PRS signature artist has long favored collecting amps over guitars, and in a new interview with Rick Beato, Tremonti dives deep into his long-held affinity for amplifiers – and, in particular, his affection for vintage Dumbles.

Not only that, he recalls how he first got “hooked” on the Dumble drug after partaking in an all-star PRS jam night, during which he fought off competition from some A-list guitarists in order to play through the amp of his dreams.

“Most people collect guitars. If I have an extra dime to spend on gear, I’m buying amplifiers,” Tremonti says. “And my biggest affliction is buying Dumble amplifiers.

“Paul Reed Smith got me hooked. It's like a needle in the vein,” he continues. “When I plugged into my first Dumble, it was at a PRS gig where he had all his endorsers getting up and playing guitar. And he’s like, ‘All right, everybody, sound check.’

“There was a Dumble and I ran right for it. I beat Carlos Santana and David Grissom and Johnny Hiland and all these guys. I'm like, ‘Out of my way!’

“I got to the Dumble and it was a 50 watt head. Loved it. You almost couldn’t dial in a bad tone on it. Paul’s like, ‘I’ll give you that amp one day.’ He never did. In all fairness, I think a good friend of his was sick, and he helped him out and gave it to him.

“From that point on, I just searched and searched for Dumbles as good as that. I’ve bought a few along the way and those are my favorite. I like lots of amps, but Dumbles to me are the best amp ever built.”

Tremonti has been vocal about his love for Dumbles in the past, and once told Guitarist about the first Dumble he bought for himself after that fateful first encounter.

“The folks at Blackbird Studios in Nashville had bought two and I bought one of them,” he said. “Everyone looked at me like I was nuts for buying it because it was so expensive, but it more than doubled in value over the 15 years that I had it.”

Visit Rick Beato’s YouTube channel to watch the whole interview.

Mark Tremonti has recalled how Eddie Van Halen took him under his wing – and gifted him an electric guitar – during his early Creed days, which gave the young musician a huge boost as he navigated the first years of his career.

Creed supported Van Halen for two shows in 1998, with Tremonti and co supporting the release of Van Halen III. Eddie liked what he saw and singled out the guitarist, who was in his early 20s at the time, for praise.

“I remember Eddie going, ‘Hey, who’s the guitar player?’ and I raised my hand,” Tremonti reminisces in the new issue of Classic Rock.

“He’s like, ‘Come here,’ and he showed me his whole guitar rig and how everything worked. He’s like, ‘What color do you like?’ I said: ‘Black.’ The next day, he brings me a black guitar, the Wolfgang guitar. It’s one of my prized possessions.”

Eddie’s support didn’t end there, though. Speaking to Guitar World in 2021, Tremonti recalled how Van Halen then later singled him out from a crowd in order to pass on some extra words of wisdom concerning the guitar he'd just given away.

“When the show was over, we were backstage underground and there was 300 crew, guests, press everywhere, just swarming the place,” he explained at the time. “We saw Wolf, his mom and Eddie walking out.

“Eddie saw me out of the corner of his eye and walked through hundreds of people to come over and say, ‘Hey I forgot to tell you – you need to take out two springs to make it play right – sorry I forgot to tell you that earlier!’”

If a guitar and sage gear advice from one of the world’s greatest players hadn't already given Tremonti superior bragging power, Eddie’s final parting gift did.

“He gave me a kiss on the cheek and walked right through all the people clamoring for him again,” Tremonti continued. “He did that for me?! He had his kid and his wife with him and knew he’d get caught up by everybody, but he took his time out because he gave a shit about his products and passing on knowledge.”

Eddie was a famous supporter of other talents. Mötley Crüe's latest recruit, John 5, recently recalled playing through Eddie's rig after being invited to the band’s rehearsals. He also helped shape Def Leppard's Hysteria with a single piece of advice.

Elsewhere in his Classic Rock interview, Tremonti discussed another peak moment in his life and career, reflecting on the moment he felt he’d officially made it.

“When we started playing arenas it was like: ‘Alright, this is what I’ve dreamt about my whole life,’” he says. “I remember specifically being in an arena and opening up a guitar case that had my signature guitar, my PRS Tremonti model, like, ‘I can’t believe I have a guitar with my name on it with the best guitar company in the world.’

“We were just college kids from Tallahassee, Florida. We put all our money together from college to buy gear to go on tour and start from the bottom.

“We were a college band that got signed to a brand-new label, and none of us knew what we were doing. We got lucky to be surrounded with a bunch of hard-working people that wanted to make this thing happen.”

Visit Magazines Direct to pick up the latest copy of Classic Rock.

In the spirit of the Summer of ’99 tour, we asked Mark Tremonti to weigh in on some of the biggest bands of the ’90s. Just for kicks, we threw in a surprise at the end.

Hole

“Great songwriting – great emotional, moody tunes. I like it when somebody puts it all out there and doesn’t hold back, and that was definitely Courtney Love.”

Stone Temple Pilots

“Great band. Iconic. Some of the best musicianship to this day. I loved seeing them live. We had our ups and downs with their old frontman back in the day, but they wrote some tremendous albums.”

Soundgarden

“One of my favorite bands of all time. Kim Thayil is one of the coolest and most inventive guitar players ever. He was a huge inspiration to me as a guitarist and songwriter. Chris Cornell is definitely in my Mount Rushmore of singers, no matter the genre. Matt Cameron on the drums was absolutely phenomenal.”

Weezer

“I never bought any Weezer records, but I’ve always appreciated what they did. I think they’re great songwriters, and they definitely had their thing. I remember somebody telling me at the time that Weezer and Veruca Salt had signed two of the biggest record deals for new bands. When I heard Weezer, I was like, ‘I get it. They know how to write a song.’”

Pearl Jam

“Pearl Jam were the biggest band in the world when I was in college. You couldn’t walk anywhere without hearing Ten coming out of every dorm room. It was a very special record. I remember seeing the video for Alive on Headbangers Ball, and it seemed so different. 

“Eddie Vedder’s voice grabbed everybody right out of the gate. The Temple of the Dog record was another special record to me – incredibly emotional and so well-written. Chris Cornell and Eddie Vedder back to back were so good. I must have played Hunger Strike a couple of thousand times.”

Creed

“When I think of Creed, it’s almost like another lifetime. I feel like I was a kid when we first came out. It was such a long time ago when we were doing it, and now all these old videos are popping up of us playing the clubs before our record deal. 

“It’s funny how different things were. We had mosh pits and we were all aggressive; I tried to push the metal thing. It was before With Arms Wide Open kind of tamed down our crowd a little bit.”

Launched by PRS in 2018, the MT 15 would go on to become a hit with players needing something versatile that could take them from bedrooms to smaller stages. Six years later, after a whole lot of tweaking, Mark Tremonti is unveiling his second signature amp, the MT 100 – a 100-watt behemoth capable of conquering venues of any size.

“I wanted three channels this time, so I could replicate my favorite amps at home,” he says. “The Fender Twin-like clean is one of the things I’m most proud of, because with high-gain amps, that channel is often there as a side note. A lot of metal players won’t care; they just want to play metal. But cleans are important to me.”

The middle channel also required some extra attention to detail; Tremonti says he didn’t just want it to work as a “gained-down version of channel three.” It had to stand on its own two feet and inspire the player to do different things. Having owned six Dumble amps over the years, Tremonti knew exactly how he wanted to dial that second channel in.

“There’s a certain something that happens when you play a Dumble,” he says. “When the pick hits the string, you hear this certain quality that I tried to replicate with this amp. You can turn the gain down, sit on a note and it will bloom – which is a beautiful thing if you’re playing something slow and sweet. It won’t if you’re burning like Malmsteen!”

The latest signature amp is also notable for its old-school sensibilities. You get three independent channels, but don’t expect any USB connectivity, power attenuation or cab sims. Things like that, Tremonti says, can often get in the way.

“When I was growing up, we didn’t need all those functions,” he says. “I’ve seen comments where people were wishing it had a bunch of bells and whistles, but that’s not what this amp is. This is not a Kemper or something you program 10,000 presets into. This is a tube amp. I didn’t want too much because when things go wrong, you don’t know what the hell’s happening. I also wanted to keep the price down.

“I told Paul Reed Smith to keep it around $1,800 because that’s the breaking point between affordable and expensive. You still get three excellent channels that are individually voiced and completely isolated, sharing nothing but the effects loop.”

So what can we expect next from the longstanding PRS devotee?

“I think it would be good to do another line of baritones,” he says. “When we did that in the past, they sold out quickly and people missed out.

“I’m spitballing here, but we’ve also talked about doing a limited run of MT 100s with hand-painted Joe Fenton art. A 50-watt combo could be good. We’ve also talked about doing replicas of my Charcoal Burst with the Dimebag sticker – beaten up so they look like mine. We’re always discussing things.”

“We didn’t plan any of it,” Mark Tremonti says. “I don’t think anybody could have planned it. Everything just fell into place and happened organically. It’s pretty incredible.”

The guitarist is responding to the strange, unexpected and borderline paranormal phenomenon that swept the nation last fall when Creed – that’s right, Creed, perhaps one of the most polarizing bands of the past 30 years, mercilessly derided by critics as overly earnest Pearl Jam knockoffs but adored by millions of music fans – were publicly embraced by not one, but two professional sports franchises.

The Texas Rangers were the first to get the ball rolling. The baseball team were facing a midseason slump when they started psyching themselves up to Creed’s music in their locker room. Before long, the Rangers’ fortunes turned around and they began pumping Creed’s anthemic 1999 hit Higher during home games at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas, resulting in rapturous fan singalongs.

By the time the Rangers swept the Baltimore Orioles 3-0 in ALDS playoffs, Creed’s streams were up 175 percent on Spotify. Baseball’s Creedmania culminated with the Rangers winning their first-ever World Series against the Arizona Diamondbacks. Online videos captured the team celebrating in their locker room with a Champagne-soaked, full-throated rendition of Higher.

A similar scenario unfolded in the NFL world, when Minnesota Vikings quarterback and dedicated Creed fanboy Kirk Cousins used Higher as a locker room team motivator. One victory led to another and another, and as the team rode a five-game winning streak, they moved Creed’s music from the clubhouse to the stadium.

Vikings fans adopted Higher as their own rallying cry and sang along mightily as the track roared over the P.A. at U.S. Bank Stadium. During one game, in which the Vikings defeated the New Orleans Saints, the audio dropped out, but the crowd kept right on singing without missing one lyric.

Madison Avenue got in on the zeitgeist with a Super Bowl ad for Paramount Plus that featured Drew Barrymore, Patrick Stewart and other stars trapped on snow-covered Paramount Mountain. Various rescue methods are shot down by Stewart until he hears the opening chords to Higher and sees Tremonti and Creed singer Scott Stapp rocking out.

What follows is even more surreal: An inspired Stewart (who reveals a Creed tattoo on his lower back) grabs the animated character Arnold (from Hey Arnold!) and tosses him like a football while crooning, “I just threw him hiiiiigher, to a place where we won’t freeze.” Watching it all, a vaguely dazed-looking Barrymore joins the chorus.

In the late Nineties and early 2000s, hating on Creed was something of a public pastime (remember those “Even Jesus Hates Creed” T-shirts?).

But the sweet serendipity of the events that gave rise to the band’s recent revival (fueled even further by young, meme-making TikTokkers, many of whom weren’t even born during the group’s heyday) has led to a stunning reversal of perception: Creed are cool. And not just some ironic form of nostalgia cool, but cool as in the genuine article.

None of which surprises Stapp one bit. “I’ve always said that Creed was cool with the fans,” he says. “The critics and the media painted this narrative that didn’t reflect 95 percent of the population. You don’t sell millions of records and sell out multiple nights in arenas if you’re uncool. The media put this idea out there because we were so big, and it wasn’t the story they wanted moving forward. But it’s the people that matter, not the press.”

Tremonti draws a straight line between the backlash and the band’s massive popularity, noting, “Whether it’s LeBron James in basketball or Creed in rock ’n’ roll, anytime somebody is on top, people want to see them knocked down. We were on the radio non-stop, and we were playing your city every other month. Some people push back on that.

“You’re seeing it now with Taylor Swift. She shows up at a [Kansas City] Chiefs game, and everybody wants to hate on the situation. It’s just a shame. Don’t hate on people because they’re successful.”

On their own, Creed, who haven’t toured since 2012, began laying the groundwork for a comeback last summer when they announced a “Summer of ’99” cruise in which they would headline concerts featuring 3 Doors Down, Buckcherry and other acts.

The cruise sold out in 30 minutes, and the band quickly put another nautical experience on sale. When it, too, sold out, it became clear that the demand for Creed called for a full-scale summer tour of sheds and amphitheaters, which was soon extended to a fall arena run.

“I remember when Bon Jovi came back and blew up arenas, I thought, ‘I sure hope this happens with Creed,’” Tremonti says. “People grow up and they want to relive their youth and see the bands they loved. Lo and behold, here we are doing exactly what I hoped would happen. We put the summer tour on sale, and it took off well beyond what we imagined. I spoke to my agent, and he said, ‘This is bigger than you guys were at your prime, ticket sales-wise.’ It’s unbelievable.”

Coming out of Tallahassee, Florida, Creed (which also includes bassist Brian Marshall and Scott Phillips) took the music scene by storm during the first wave of late-Nineties post-grunge.

The combination of Tremonti’s widescreen riffs and solos and Stapp’s commanding baritone guitar was catnip for both alternative and hard rock fans. Along with their huge and heavy sound, Creed had the tunes.

Dispensing with any sense of anti-commercial pretense, they knocked out hooky, radio-ready slammers – With Arms Wide Open, What’s This Life For, One, What If, One Last Breath, My Sacrifice and, of course, Higher – that drove sales for their first three albums (1997’s My Own Prison, 1999’s Human Clay and 2001’s Weathered) into the tens of millions. All told, the band has sold more than 53 million albums worldwide.

Critics did their level best to topple Creed, but the band ultimately did themselves in. Friction between Stapp and the other members grew heated, and Marshall left the group in 2000 to battle alcohol dependency. Stapp’s own drug and alcohol use escalated, and by 2004 his relationship with Tremonti and Phillips was beyond repair.

Stapp went solo, and Tremonti formed Alter Bridge with Marshall, Phillips and lead singer Myles Kennedy. Creed would eventually reunite in 2009 for a well-received album, Full Circle, and a touring cycle that lasted till 2012, but after attempting to record a fifth album, the group went on hiatus in 2013. For the next decade, any future band activity remained in doubt.

Fast-forward to today. Nine years sober, Stapp looks healthy and cheery, and he’s ready to put the past behind him. Appearing on Zoom with Tremonti, he says, “I think time heals. You grow up and mature, and things that kind of mattered 20 years ago don’t matter now. Whatever issues I had, I can’t even remember what they were.

“It’s been nothing but good vibes since we’ve been in rooms together and hanging out. But have we ever laid everything out on the table and done a kind of Metallica therapy session? No, that’s not happened.” He laughs. “Mark, you think we need to do that?”

Tremonti doesn’t answer that question outright, but he echoes Stapp’s positive outlook.

“I think things are going perfect right now,” he says. “I had a conversation with my wife, and she asked me, ‘How are things between everybody?’ I told her, ‘We’re all rooting for one another. We’re all on each other’s side.’

“This feels good – no negativity here. It feels like when we got our first record deal. We were all pushing for one another and trying to make this the biggest thing in the world.”

Let’s go back to the beginning. When the band formed, did the two of you feel like you were a good fit musically?

Mark Tremonti: “We were a mismatch all around. I was the metalhead. Scott Phillips was more chill – Living Colour, soul, rock, funk. Brian Marshall was a classic-rock Rush-meets-Iron Maiden-type thing. Even though Iron Maiden is metal, I was into Slayer and speed metal.

“Scott grew up on Elvis and the Doors. When I came in and started playing heavy metal riffs, everybody looked at me like I was crazy. We had to fall into place with one another, and once we did, the Creed recipe came together.”

Scott Stapp: “I think there’s no doubt that we had tremendous chemistry. When we’re playing and writing together on stage, it’s undeniable. If Mark is just noodling, I’ll hear something that inspires me to create in that moment. Despite our differences, I think it was the perfect recipe for the soup to make the music that Creed made.”

What did you have in common, then, musically? What was the glue?

Stapp: “I was such a fan of Mark. Everything he played was awesome, so I tried to write over whatever he played me. We kept digging through stuff until we found what we both connected with.

“Mark was very patient with me and allowed me to find my niche as we were trying to find our sound together. I remember the first time we got together, and he played all these riffs and heavy metal things I had never gotten into before. But I didn’t care, man! [Laughs] I loved what he was doing, and I tried to write songs over it.”

Tremonti: “We went to high school together, but then we met back up in college at Florida State University. I was desperate to get a band going; that’s all I wanted in life. I would find local musicians. It was easy to find another guitar player, a little bit harder to find a bass player, but it was impossible to find a great singer.

“Scott came to town and just blew everybody else away. There was nobody who could sing like him. I was like, ‘Wow, we have this absolute powerhouse of a vocalist that we can work with here.’ I even remember going back into the studio on the Full Circle record, when I hadn’t heard Scott sing in the studio for years. His voice was a mile wide. He has an iconic voice that millions of people in the world can immediately put their finger on. I think that’s a massive strength.”

Stapp: “I feel the same way about Mark. As soon as you hear his guitar playing, you know it’s him. He’s got an undeniable sound, and he’s an incredible writer with an amazing melodic sense. I’ll go to my grave saying he’s probably one of the best guitar players of our generation.”

The sound of your first album owed a lot to grunge. Did you think at the time that perhaps you should move away from that sound?

Tremonti: “At the time, there was more of a poppy rock thing – Third Eye Blind, Marcy Playground. When we came out with My Own Prison, it was the moodiest song on the radio. I think that kind of set us apart. We were fans of a lot of the grunge bands, but I don’t think we ever tried to fall in line with them. We were just doing our own thing.”

Stapp: “When we wrote a song called Grip My Soul, we all kind of looked at each other and said, ‘We found it. We found who we are.’ From that day forward, we pumped out song by song what would end up becoming the My Own Prison record.”

Scott, quite a few writers criticized you for sounding like Eddie Vedder. That must have stung.

Stapp: “Hey, they said the same thing about Darius Rucker. He was the Eddie Vedder rip-off before they called me the Eddie Vedder rip-off. I felt like I was in good company, and I was honored by the compliment.”

The second album, Human Clay, featured more riff-oriented hard rock. Was that in any way a response to critics who called you grunge copycats?

Tremonti: “That all kind of happened naturally. What was terrible about the first three records of our career was, everybody was talking about how we were going to fail. Each next step was going to be a disaster. We came out with My Own Prison, and everybody said, ‘You’re going to be a one-hit wonder.’ Then we set a record for Number 1’s in a row on a debut record, and then everybody said, ‘All right, now you’re going to have the sophomore slump with Human Clay.’

“We pushed as hard as we could to stay alive. Imagine the pressures that we had being probably the most heard band on radio and MTV. Record labels and publicists saying, ‘You gotta do this, you gotta do that.’ No matter how much you tour – ‘Scott, you gotta take Advil to keep your voice going.’ They were just pushing us like we were invincible. When Human Clay came out, that was a band trying to fight and survive.”

Stapp: “And we had four Number 1’s off that record.”

Creed had the classic hit band scenario: You had years to write your first album and months to write your second.

Stapp: “I think it was a key to our success. From my perspective, I didn’t feel any pressure. With My Own Prison, we immediately went to headliner. We were writing songs that would be on Human Clay on tour at soundcheck. Then we’d play them live so we could do a longer set. I felt so confident in the band and the songs Mark and I were writing.

“We’d play these new songs for fans that were written a week before, and after seeing their responses I walked into Human Clay with tremendous confidence – and to be honest with you, call it youthful naivete. The thought of failure never entered my mind.”

Mark, had you already made the switch to PRS guitars on Human Clay? Could that be why it’s more riffy than the first album?

Tremonti: “I remember being in an arena, so it had to have been the second record when I opened up the [PRS] guitar case on a stage. That was one of the coolest days of my career. So that was probably during the second single of Human Clay.”

I talk to musicians all the time who say they never knew what song would be a hit. When you guys wrote Higher, did you have any idea how big it would be?

Tremonti: “We felt really good about it.”

Stapp: “[Laughs] Yeah, we did!”

Tremonti: “We were standing up writing that song. Scott liked to play this game where he would put the band on the spot and say, ‘We’re going to write a song.’ In our college years, he would do that in front of a live audience at a club, and I would just start riffing out. The band would follow me and he’d start singing. The chorus of Higher was born that way. That song was written in front of a live group of people.”

Stapp: “It was probably in front of 4,000 people. It was a freestyle. I still like to do that – I’m sure the band guys around me hate it. But it’s fun and you get in a flow. Mark can trigger me with some of his licks and interludes between songs. When I hear it, I roll with it. I’m glad Mark jogged my memory on that, because that’s how that chorus was born.”

As you were having such success, the press kept treating you like battering rams. How hard was that to deal with?

Tremonti: “I remember thinking, ‘If you want to do what we do and you want to have the success we had, you’d better have thick skin.’ I did get to the point if, say, my brother called me up and said, ‘Hey, this person said this,’ I’d be like, ‘Dude, do me a favor: Don’t tell me anything negative. Just tell me things that are positive. I don’t need negativity.’ I’m looking out at these thousands of people we’re playing in front of every night, and they’re not complaining.”

With Weathered, you guys debuted at Number 1. That didn’t suck, did it?

Stapp: “No. And if the press were right, the album wouldn’t have done that.”

Tremonti: “When we came back for our reunion with Full Circle, Michael Jackson had just passed. We were on our way to another Number 1 record, and then his whole catalog kind of stole the charts.”

Stapp: “He put out a record from the grave, so our album ended up debuting at Number 2. Had that not happened, we would’ve had our third consecutive Number 1 album. But you know what? We’ll give it to the king.”

Mark, let me ask you about Full Circle. It’s far heavier than any of the prior Creed albums. Did your time doing Alter Bridge rub off on Creed?

Tremonti: “From day one, I was pushing the heavier side of the music to the band. I would get pushed back, but I’d keep pushing. I’m just that constant force of pushing it to the guys and seeing what I can let slip by.

“Little by little, I won ’em over as far as getting those riffs put forward. I think the biggest difference [on Full Circle] was that I was used to the layered guitar sound. The first three Creed records were just me doubling myself. Even the live thing. I hate just being the only guitar player up there. I used to like it, but now I’m like, ‘It could be so much bigger and better.’

“I’m writing a Tremonti record right now, and I can play with the drummer all day long, but as soon as [guitarist] Eric Friedman steps in the room and we got two guitars going, it fills so much more space. On Full Circle, I had already fallen in love with that dual-guitar thing, but I was the dual guitar with myself. When we played live, Eric came out and played guitar with us. There were rhythm parts behind the solos. It felt naked to me without that rhythm guitar.”

Scott, are you an Alter Bridge fan?

Stapp: “I’m a fan of anything Mark does.”

Mark, how do you feel about Scott’s solo work?

Tremonti: “I think it’s great. Like I said, he’s got an iconic voice. He’s got a great song sensibility and delivers every night on stage.”

No doubt people are wondering if you’re going to work on a new album. Any plans?

Tremonti: “This year’s been so crazy, so we would’ve had to plan way ahead to have new music for this tour. But we’ve always got tons of ideas in the hopper ready to go. It’s just a matter of getting it done and doing it in the proper manner before the next time we get out.”

Stapp: “Let’s see what happens. Let’s do these tours and let’s see where we are. If it compels us and inspires us to take that next step and do a new record… you know what I mean?”

By the time of Weathered, the band began to have serious personal issues. When did the two of you feel like you were headed for trouble?

Stapp: “We gave it a shot even after that. In 2004, we got back together to try to make another record, but I was in the throes of addiction, and so it just didn’t manifest. We weren’t ready to throw it away in 2002 or move on. I’ll have to take ownership of that one, because there would’ve been a follow-up to Weathered had I not been in the throes of my addiction.”

Tremonti: “It was just a whirlwind. It was a pressure cooker leading up to that point, and our personalities just got pushed kind of apart. You’ve got to give it up for anybody that’s on top and they stay mentally healthy, because it’s definitely a challenge for anybody. It’s very rare to see a band like Aerosmith staying together, but I’m sure they’ve had their ups and downs as well.”

Stapp: “You throw in the disease of alcoholism and addiction, and we dealt with that with another member in the band who was suffering and dealing with that issue. And then it got me. It’s not a new story in music. It’s unfortunate that it happened, but here we are today with so much good in front of us.”

It’s nice to see the two of you are in a good place once again. It feels like you guys want to make the most of this reunion.

Stapp: “I do – 100 percent.”

Tremonti: “Yeah. I’ve got people coming out of the woodwork. They’re so excited to see Creed back on stage.”

Stapp: “Reliving the past is good for reading, but that’s not what we’re focused on, man. We’re focused on today, riding this wave and just trying to keep things positive and the vibe as cool as possible. I guess the story is good because there’s other people always out there suffering from alcoholism, addiction and mental health issues.

“If our story of renewal, rebirth and healing through overcoming those obstacles can be told by what’s happening with this band, then it can help other people out of the darkness. I pray that it happens, because there is hope.”

• Creed tour the U.S. throughout July. See Creed for more dates and ticket details.

PRS electric guitars are known for their super-sleek designs and practically perfect cosmetics, characterized by pristine finishes and unblemished aesthetics.

However, if recent comments made by Mark Tremonti are anything to go on, it’s possible the PRS catalog could soon receive a vintage-inspired shake-up.

Speaking in the new issue of Guitar World, the Creed guitarist teased some of the upcoming projects he and Paul Reed Smith have been discussing, and one of them is a rather notable replica of his Charcoal Burst PRS single-cut.

However, it wouldn’t just be a factory-finished, clean-out-of-the-box recreation of the guitar; it would be a like-for-like reissue of the real deal – scrapes, stickers, war wounds and all.

“We’ve also talked about doing replicas of my Charcoal Burst with the Dimebag sticker,” Tremonti teased, “beaten up so they look like mine. We’re always discussing things.”

The fact the guitar would be “beaten up” is rather telling, especially considering PRS has yet to enter the market of artificially aged guitars. In fact, the only relic’d PRS guitars you’ll find are unofficial DIY jobs.

Examples of those include the Stevie Ray Vaughan Number One-style Silver Sky and Zach Myers’ custom pink Silver Sky.

The Silver Sky is a popular canvas for relic’ing (most likely due to its Stratocaster vibe) and back in 2019, a US retailer offered an unofficial custom aging job for $400.

So, clearly, there is demand for artificially aged PRS guitars – even if the brand’s USP is geared the other way – and Tremonti may have given the first inclination they could become a reality.

A few caveats before we get too excited. First, “discussing” a beaten-up replica and actually doing one are completely different things. However, given the fact Tremonti is one of PRS’ oldest and most loyal champions, he probably holds considerable sway when it comes to OK-ing projects.

Second, even if PRS did do a relic’d Tremonti replica, there’s no guarantee this will extend into the company’s standard catalog. Not only that, Tremonti’s Dimebag guitar is, at best, rather modestly aged, and so a replica wouldn't require any drastic relic'ing.

So, don’t expect a Murphy Lab-style PRS offshoot any time soon, but the fact Tremonti and Smith are actively engaged in such discussions is still rather intriguing.

Pick up the latest issue of Guitar World at Magazines Direct, which features the full interview with Mark Tremonti.

Elsewhere in his GW interview, Tremonti revealed that one of Creed's biggest hits was written spontaneously live on stage in front of 4,000 people.

The past few years have borne witness to a drastic resurgence in popularity for Creed, and that’s largely thanks to the fact one of their biggest hits has reached a new adoring audience.

The hit in question is Higher – a hard-riffing cut released in 1999 that has become the unofficial anthem for not one, but two sporting franchises. 

The first is the Texas Rangers baseball team, who began belting out the track in order to overcome a mid-season slump. The team’s fortunes restored, the song was then enthusiastically adopted by the club’s fans, who sing it at home games.

In the NFL, the Minnesota Vikings used the track to similar effect. First, it was a dressing room anthem. Then it became a rallying cry for fans.

For Mark Tremonti and co, it became a harbinger of a new era for Creed, and helped showcase the mounting level of enthusiasm and demand there was for another reunion.

But as Tremonti and his bandmate Scott Stapp explain in the new issue of the Guitar World, the world-beating, passionately embraced, anthemic rallying cry that has mounted their resurgence had rather humble beginnings – and was originally written on the spot live during a gig.

“Scott liked to play this game where he would put the band on the spot and say, ‘We’re going to write a song,’” Tremonti says of the band’s writing approach. “In our college years, he would do that in front of a live audience at a club, and I would just start riffing out. 

“The band would follow me and he’d start singing. The chorus of Higher was born that way. That song was written in front of a live group of people.”

Stapp clarifies that “group” totalled around 4,000 people, and comments the ultra-popular cut began life as a “freestyle”.

“I still like to do that – I’m sure the band guys around me hate it. But it’s fun and you get in a flow,” Stapp adds. “Mark can trigger me with some of his licks and interludes between songs. When I hear it, I roll with it. I’m glad Mark jogged my memory on that, because that’s how that chorus was born.”

Visit Magazines Direct to pick up the latest issue of Guitar World, which features the full interview with Tremonti and Stapp, as well as a celebration of the Stratocaster’s 70th Anniversary.

Mark Tremonti has become the latest high-profile player to experience a heart-warming guitar reunion, having recently been reunited with his childhood guitar nearly 26 years after it was stolen.  

The 1986 Gibson Les Paul was returned to Tremonti on his 50th birthday. It features a unique Kahler bridge, and helped launch Creed’s career, playing a huge role in the writing and recording of their debut album, My Own Prison. 

The guitarist's manager, Tim Tournier, shared the story of the guitar's return on Instagram, saying: “Sometimes life gives you opportunities to right some wrongs. In this case, that opportunity presented itself via a Reddit DM about 18 months ago. 

“A deal was made, hands got shook and I was able to get my buddy his 1986 Gibson with a stock Kahler [bridge] back for his big 50th.”

The guitar was stolen in 1997, shortly after the release of My Own Prison – a record that would hugely raise the band’s stock. 

As vocalist Scott Stapp revealed in a 2019 interview, Tremonti's LP wasn't the only piece of equipment that was stolen from the band: an entire trailer full of gear was taken when their tour hit Boston. 

“We didn’t have a bus,” he explained. “We were just getting started. We parked right in front of the hotel and the following morning, our van is on blocks. The wheels are gone, the trailer has been taken, the chains connecting it cut, and the trailer gone! And so all our gear for the show that night was stolen.”

The trailer was ultimately found – empty - several miles away, with what Stapp calls Tremonti’s “prized possession” seemingly gone forever. The show went on, with tour partner Fuel lending Creed their gear, but the sentimentality of the stolen gear wasn’t lost on the singer. 

“Not only are you upset, but there was an emotional attachment to some of those instruments,” he continued. “We weren’t at a place yet where we had endorsements and tons of guitars. For years, we have been trying to find it.” 

It’s a sentiment shared by Tournier, who has put himself in line for ‘Manager of the Year’ with his find. 

“The contents of the trailer were the instruments of their childhood,” he details, “the gear they mowed lawns for – or – in the case of Tremonti, worked at a car wash for.”

It's the latest example of a guitar being reunited with its rightful owner years after it had been stolen. Already this year, Paul McCartney’s long-lost Hofner bass, described as “the most important bass guitar in history”, was found in a London attic. 

In another story with eerie parallels Tremonti's tale that also concerned a Les Paul, an avid guitarist was reunited with his beloved Gibson – also on his 50th birthday, oddly enough. 

Then there was Jerry Cantrell’s odd-but-amusing ‘I’ve lost my 'Blue Dress' G&L”… ”Oh no, I haven’t” episode. But there’s no disputing that Tremonti’s LP had been tragically missing throughout a career it helped create.

Mark Tremonti is one of PRS’s most prolific and dedicated artists; his boundless talents are more than one or even two bands can satisfy. Having found global fame with Creed, Tremonti went on to form Alter Bridge in 2004 with Myles Kennedy, followed by a solo album project in 2010 that turned into the band Tremonti. 

All three projects are still on the active list, with Creed set to reform again for a tour in 2024. The guitarist is just as busy on the gear front, with Core and SE PRS electric guitar models alongside the well-received MT 15 head – which is now joined by a new addition, a guitar amp that Mark has been deeply involved with through the design and test phases and is now using in live shows, the signature MT 100 head.

The first thing that’s apparent on unboxing the MT 100 is its size and weight. At a time when there’s been an increasing trend toward more compact and portable products, the MT 100 is unapologetically large and heavy thanks to outsize transformers and a tough steel chassis.

The mains transformer is possibly the biggest we’ve ever seen on an amp of this type. At the time of writing, we don’t yet know if a matching 4x12 will be available, but visually a serious rock amp such as this needs a 4x12 or an oversized 2x12 to sit on. 

Inside the chassis, most of the electronics live on one large main PCB, including the front-panel controls, preamp tube bases and a bank of nine relays. A smaller PCB strip handles the rear-panel bias connections.

The sockets for the quartet of TAD Redbase 6L6s are chassis mounted and hand wired, keeping the main heat source away from the PCB and making a positive contribution to the amp’s longterm reliability.

Where most tube amps have separate mains and standby switches, the MT 100 has a three-way toggle for off, standby and play.

Around the back, the rear panel offers three speaker outlets, a pair of send and return jacks for the tube-buffered series effects loop, and a set of bias test points with an external adjustment screw. While the bias can be checked individually for each tube, the bias setting is a global one. The only other feature on the rear panel is a seven-pin DIN socket for the MT 100’s three-button footswitch.

The MT 100 is a proper three-channel head, with independent preamp channels accessed by small push-button switches on the front panel or via the remote footswitch. Matching coloured LED indicators tell you which channel is active. 

Overall, the MT 100’s ‘none more black’ steel grille, control panel and vinyl sleeve make a clear statement that this is a serious rock machine, albeit one with minimal features. However, as Tremonti himself says in his personal introductory demo video, “It’s got everything you would need and nothing you don’t need.”

Sounds

The MT 100’s three channels are optimised for an ideal starting point with all the tone and gain controls set roughly at 12 o’clock, giving the widest range of adjustment. 

The Clean channel has huge headroom if needed, with a punchy Fender-influenced clarity. Turning this channel’s Volume (gain) control past the halfway mark adds a subtle chime effect, becoming a sweetened crunch with the volume all the way up.

The Overdrive channel takes over at this point, with a mild crunch that gets progressively wilder, transforming into a thick, harmonic-laden distortion that many amps would be proud to call a lead channel. 

The MT 100 still has another gear to shift up into, though, with a Lead channel that packs so much distortion it can feed back at will on practically any note. Thankfully, it’s easily tamed by backing off the Gain control.

With our Les Paul, we tended to run all three gains at more or less the halfway mark, and used like this the MT 100 easily covers any base, producing the definitive high-gain overdrive tones Tremonti is known for. Swapping to single coil pickups was equally impressive, although the higher gain settings of the Clean and Overdrive channels made us reach for a noise gate.

It goes without saying that the MT 100 is loud enough for any eventuality, although unlike many high-powered designs it also sounds quite decent at bedroom levels. But let’s be clear: this is not a bedroom amp. It’s designed to fill huge halls and stadiums with ferocious rock riffage, delivered with clarity and authority. 

For maximum impact, it needs to be partnered with a good 4x12 and turned up, at which point the dynamic range, articulation and bass response all come into focus in a very satisfying way.

Our favourite channel was the medium-gain Overdrive, which has enough gain and tonal range to go from jazz and blues to high-gain powerchords. Just by varying the guitar’s volume control there’s plenty of colour and subtlety, which is artistically rewarding to play with while being almost at odds with the MT 100’s image as an all-out weapon of rock.

Verdict

While the MT 100 isn’t the most compact or portable of amplification solutions, it sounds great – and sat atop a suitably big speaker cabinet it looks the part, too. Carrying around a half or full stack demands a certain commitment (or a happy road crew), and while an amp like this may not be practical for the smaller venues most of us perform in, there’s no denying its stellar range of tones will bring out the best in anybody who plugs into one.

Aimed at pro, semi-pro and dedicated amateur users – and, of course, the hordes of Creed, Alter Bridge and Tremonti fans out there – the MT 100’s price is another temptation, coming in at $1,849/£1,599 thanks to offshore manufacturing. 

Specs

• PRICE: $1,849 / £1,599
• ORIGIN: Indonesia
• TYPE: All tube pre and power amp
• TUBES: 8x 12AX7 preamp, 4x 6L6
• OUTPUT: 100W RMS
• DIMENSIONS: 660 (w) x 275 (d) x 280mm (h) 
• WEIGHT (kg/lb): 19.5/43
• CABINET: Plywood
• CHANNELS: 3
• CONTROLS: Clean channel: Presence, Master Volume, Treble, Middle, Bass, Volume. Lead & Overdrive channels: Presence, Master Volume, Treble, Middle, Bass, Gain
• FOOTSWITCH: 3-button footswitch selects channels
• ADDITIONAL FEATURES: Tube‑buffered series effects loop. Individual tube bias test points and overall bias adjustment on rear panel
• CONTACT: PRS Guitars

Mark Tremonti has had a hugely successful career as the guitarist in Alter Bridge and the recently reunited Creed. But as he admits: “Honestly, I wouldn't be here right now if it wasn't for Metallica and Master Of Puppets!”

In this exclusive interview, he explains how his life was changed after hearing that classic album, and why down-picking has become one of his greatest strengths.

What do you remember about your first time hearing Metallica?

“One of the most important Metallica tracks for me is Welcome Home (Sanitarium). When I heard my older brother playing that in the bedroom above me, I just couldn’t fall asleep.

“So I went up there asking, ‘What’s this song about a sanitarium?!’ He gave me Master of Puppets and I did not sleep that night. I was just blown away by what I was hearing. Before that, I was listening to the Beastie Boys, Agent Orange... nothing metal. Hearing that album made me go out and carry on searching for the heaviest music I could find. 

“What I loved most was the dynamics. That’s something I really credit Metallica for. A lot of heavy bands from that period didn’t use dynamics like they did. Metallica would write these beautiful intros on songs like Battery, Damage, Inc. and The Call Of Ktulu, the latter being the song with which I developed my own fingerstyle technique. Then there was all that beautiful stuff in To Live Is To Die. 

“My favourite song of all time could very well be Orion. That variation is a really big thing for me, going from cleaner verses to those kick-you-in-the-nuts choruses, which is what you hear on Welcome Home. Funnily enough, there’s a video online of me covering that song on a Hello Kitty guitar!”

It’s no secret that a big part of that sound comes from James Hetfield’s down-picking...

“James Hetfield’s right hand shaped me as a guitar player. All of us have our strengths and weaknesses, right? It usually comes down to what you grew up playing and practising. With me, I know one of my biggest strengths is all that right hand downpicking rhythm stuff that sounds like ‘Jud jud jud’ because it just keeps going like an engine. That’s where I feel comfortable. 

“I don’t need to warm up for that stuff, I can go straight into it because that’s my background. I learned it from bands like Metallica, Slayer, Forbidden and Testament... but Metallica were always the main one. Guitar-wise, Metallica were always more influential on me.”

It’s interesting how a lot of those riffs don’t sound quite right using alternate picking.

“As much as you might not realise it, upstrokes and downstrokes sound a bit different probably because of the angle of the pick. Picking downwards has a bit more of a slice to it, while coming up is usually a bit rounder. That’s why there’s something special about that downward motion – there’s a consistency. I know this might sound weird to beginners, but sitting there for an hour just picking downwards is an artform in itself.

“We tend to dig in and play harder when using just downstrokes. With alternate picking, a lot of us lighten up. I remember Paul Reed Smith picked up one of my guitars once and said, ‘I’ve never seen frets this worn down!’ I just can’t help playing hard and it’s because James plays hard. 

“Another difference between him and Kirk is which hand leads and how they hold the pick. Kirk uses more of his left hand virtuosity and holds the pick like most players. James is more right hand-led and holds the pick with his thumb, first and middle fingers. I hold my pick that way, too! I don’t know why, but two fingers and a thumb helps me dig in harder and heavier, plus it feels like there’s more control. Now I have to play like that. I didn’t realise it wasn’t the normal way of holding a plectrum!”

There are similarities but Kirk also draws from his own pool of strengths.

“They’re two very different players, but you have to remember Kirk has to keep up with James when they play those fast riffs live! Kirk is a great alternate picker. He’s also a big reason why I love wah pedals so much, he often does those big one-string wah runs that I love. 

“Metallica have two very different guitarists and I think that’s how every band should be. Me and Myles [Kennedy, Alter Bridge guitarist/vocalist] are different – he’s more jazzy and bluesy, and I’m more of a metal guy. We complement each other’s sounds, using different amps to fill different frequency ranges to build a bigger picture. That’s something Metallica have always done.”

What are your favourite Metallica solos, then?

“There’s millions of great Kirk solos. A lot of the ones I’ve mentioned like Sanitarium, Orion and To Live Is To Die have my favourite leads, and One has a beautiful solo. I remember learning that when I was in high school and having so much fun picking it apart. I spent so much time learning all these riffs and solos over the years. 

“Metallica are such a big part of my DNA as a player. Both James and Kirk are great blues players – what James does on Nothing Else Matters is all straight pentatonic stuff. That’s what I tend to enjoy the most these days. Maybe when you’re younger you prefer all the flashy stuff, but as you get older you appreciate the bluesy stuff on a deeper level. 

“You can’t get away from the pentatonic scale. That’s what speaks to your heart. When you hear rock ’n’ roll vocal melodies, they often come from the pentatonic scale because those are the most emotive notes.”

You’ve used Mesa/Boogie amps a lot over the years. Would it be fair to say that’s partly down to Metallica?

“Yes! I remember getting the Mesa/Boogie 2C+ and they’re probably the most sought-after Mesa amps. They go for a lot of money on Reverb because they’re incredible. I also think the Dual Rectifier Rev F is one of the best amps ever made. 

“They’re very different, though. The Rectifier is like the big schoolyard bully that pushes everybody else out, it sounds so big. The 2C+ is more focused and has this great scooped sound that makes you want to play more and more. The Rectifier eats it up by taking more sonic space. And it goes beyond amps. I actually have one of James’s guitars! 

“Years ago, one of our security guys was working for them and I mentioned I’d love one of his used instruments. And James was totally cool with it as long as I replaced the one I took with a new one. So he signed this LTD Explorer for me – which was awesome!”

Have you interacted with them much over the years?

“When I first met them, I was really intimidated because they were my heroes. I’ve met them many times now and they’re all very nice. The last show we did together was Download Festival and Lars came into our dressing room to chat for half an hour. 

“Later that night, I was watching from the Snakepit. Kirk came along during Fade To Black with his serious face on. Then he spotted me and smiled, saying, ‘Hey Mark!’ It was funny because I was smiling like a schoolkid waving at him and saying, ‘He knows me!’ I’ve probably hung out with Kirk most. Something similar happened a few years ago. 

“We were on stage watching them when Fade to Black was starting. The intro was on and Kirk came over, took off his in-ears and said, ‘Hey man, how’s it going?’ I asked what amps he was using and he told me he was running a Kemper plus this and that. Then I said, ‘Dude, your solo is coming up in four seconds!’ and he laughed, saying ‘Oh shit!’ while running off with his in-ears back in!”

• Mark Tremonti’s festive album Christmas Classics New & Old is out now.

Mark Tremonti formed Creed in 1994 and released four albums with the band, as well as winning a Grammy for the single With Arms Wide Open. In 2004, Tremonti put together his new band, Alter Bridge, who have to date released seven studio albums. 

The group’s music contains lots of melodic guitar playing, chord progressions, heavy riffs and soloing, and has gained Tremonti respect from fans and peers alike. As well as Alter Bridge, Mark has released five albums under his solo project, Tremonti, which has an even harder metallic edge. 

Mark describes himself as a songwriter first and foremost, which is reflected in his frequent output over the past decades. But that said, his guitar playing is as inventive as it is technical. In this lesson we will look at some of the trademark shred techniques that Tremonti uses.

Our first example is a lick that could be used in a modern blues, rock or metal context and is based in the Minor pentatonic scale. There is a mixture of traditional two-notes-per-string pentatonic shapes as well as three-notes-per-string shapes, which allows for various legato techniques to be applied to wider intervals.

Example 2 is an arpeggio-based part using a combination of picking and fretting-hand tapping. Fretting-hand tapping is a combination of legato and string muting. 

When hammering on to a new string, use your fretting finger to land cleanly and squarely on the string near to the fret-wire. As well as this, lightly touch the unused strings with your first finger and any other spare fingers in order to mute them. If done correctly, it should be possible to play these notes without using the picking hand.

Our third example is a long legato line using some odd groupings within 16th-notes. Tremonti likes to play legato phrases using either five-note or seven-note groupings that can be connected together to smoothly navigate through positions of the scale, while at the same time not sounding repetitive or predictable.

Lick number four is a single-string idea using pull-offs and selective picking. The combination of repeating open-string pedal notes, picking, and pull-offs is tied together by keeping the picking hand moving down and up continuously – even though the pick is not always in contact with the strings. Maintaining constant momentum is the best way to stay in time and ‘in the pocket’, while synchronizing your two hands.

Our fifth and final example uses a combination of sweep picking and alternate picking using triad shapes from the key of E Minor, and scale notes in-between, which connect them together.

Learn each example slowly and accurately at first, and only when you can sense that muscle memory is attained, gradually speed up in small metronome increments. 

Get the tone

Amp Settings: Gain 7, Bass 4, Middle 5, Treble 6, Reverb 1

If you have one, go for a guitar with humbucker pickups and use the bridge pickup for a tight, clear, articulated tone. Tremonti favors 6L6-voiced tones, such as Mesa Boogie, or his signature PRS amps, so a more ‘American’ gain would be most appropriate. Use the gain control sparingly and aim for a balance between an organic rock guitar tone and sustaining shred-style lead.

Example 1. Descending pull-off lick

Start with your fourth finger and pull off from the 17th to 12th frets, then use your third finger to pull off from the 15th fret. Use this three-notes-per-string approach to descend through E Minor pentatonic (E-G-A-B-D). In bar 2, switch to palm-muted alternate picking to complete the scale.

Example 2. Ascending fretting-hand tap triad phrase

Pick the notes along the fourth string with downstrokes and fret with your first finger, using your remaining fingers to fretting-hand tap the notes on the fifth and sixth strings. Ascend the neck through these Minor and Major triad arpeggio shapes and finish with an E Natural Minor (E-F#-G-A-B-C-D) legato line.

Example 3. Five and seven-note fragment lick

This legato lick is based in E Natural Minor (E-F#-G-A-B-C-D) and uses fretting-hand taps and slides to change strings and shift positions. The lick is comprised of five and seven-note fragments, but is played with a straight 16th-note feel.

Example 4. B minor pedal-tone lick

Use the open second string as a pedal note for this B Natural Minor lick (B-C#-D-E-F#-G-A) and use pull-offs to play the notes of the scale. Keep your guitar pick moving in an alternate picking fashion throughout, in order to synchronize the hands.

Example 5. Linking triads and scale lines

This lick combines sweep picking and alternate picking and uses an E Minor triad and a C Major triad, which are connected with E Natural Minor Scale positions on the first string. Focus on synchronizing the pick and fingers when transitioning from 16th notes to 16th-note triplets.

PRS has rekindled its partnership with Alter Bridge titan Mark Tremonti to produce a new signature guitar amp head, the MT 100.

It’s the second time the Maryland-based brand has tapped Tremonti for his own guitar amp, with the MT 100 following in the footsteps of 2018’s highly regarded MT 15 – which was described at the time by Guitar World’s Chris Gill as “the biggest-sounding lunchbox amp I’ve ever played”.

Now, the two parties have teamed up for an expanded, three-channel offering that Tremonti says has become his “one and only touring amp”.

The MT 100 has been a long time coming. Back in 2020, Tremonti teased the arrival of the amp head, which he said would deliver everything from “brutal high gain” tones to Fender Twin and Dumble sounds in one amp.

Well, it looks as though PRS has made a good effort in delivering that assortment of options with the final MT 100, which features a pristine and chimey Clean channel (think Fender Twin) and a new Overdrive section modeled after “one of Tremonti’s favorite personal amps” (read: Dumble).

Naturally, the MT 100 builds on the successes of the MT 15, and is said to be the result of “years of R&D and road testing”. Here, there are dedicated Clean and Lead channels, which are likened to those found on the amp’s predecessor, as well as that added Overdrive channel for an additional gain structure and “musical midrange response”.

Specifically, that Overdrive channel is modeled after one of Tremonti’s favorite personal amps, which the guitarist recently revealed to Premier Guitar to be a Dumble.

According to the PRS signature artist, these three sections are good enough to stand on their own: “Each channel alone is worth the entire price of this amp,” he said in a statement.

He might have a point, too. Each channel is built from its own unique circuit with dedicated preamp tubes (these are all 12AX7s, eight in total) to promote independence and tonal separation. Further still, the three channels have their own dedicated control layout, comprising three-band EQs, as well as specific Presence, Master and Gain parameters.

All of the above counts for an amp that looks to cover the broad bread-and-butter guitar tones, with each particular section receiving the level of attention they require. In Mark’s own words, the Lead tones are “huge, chunky and aggressive”, while the Clean section offers “the best-sounding clean tones in the high-gain amp world”.

As for the final section, “The Overdrive channel is a very special addition to this amp,” Tremonti reflected. “We obsessed over this channel, using one of my favorite personal amps for the voicing. We wanted the gain structure to fit between the Lead and Clean channels and for it to have a sweet midrange response all its own.”

Other specs include a three-button footswitch for channel selection, an effects loop for pedalboard integration and a quartet of 6L6GC power tubes.

“The MT 100 is at the same time the most complicated yet simple design I have been a part of,” said PRS Amp Designer Doug Sewell. “The result is a refined and effective beast of an amp with an intuitive, highly user-friendly layout.”

The MT 100 is available now for $1,849.

Head over to PRS to find out more information.

In other gear-related Tremonti news, the Alter Bridge guitarist recently revealed he was developing his own pedal company – and he is already road-testing prototypes.

Over the past few years, there’s been a sharp uptake in the number of gear brands that have been set up by professional guitar players.

Of course, most gear companies are owned by players, but this new wave of player-owned brands includes the likes of Tosin Abasi’s Abasi Concepts, Ola Englund’s Solar Guitars, Zakk Wylde’s Wylde Audio, and Kirk Hammett’s KHDK.

Now, Mark Tremonti has announced his plans to join that growing cohort of guitarists-turned-entrepreneurs by revealing he is currently developing his very own pedal brand.

While in the midst of a Rig Rundown with Premier Guitar, the Alter Bridge maestro took a deep dive into his live pedalboard, which includes an intriguing nondescript pedal – and turned out to be a Uni-Vibe-inspired prototype.

“I’m starting a pedal manufacturing company,” he said when the discussion turned to the unfinished stompbox, which has controls for Rate, Depth, Blend and Volume. “It will be a fun project. Just like everything else, I’m going to try and keep them real affordable, real user-friendly.

“This is a Uni-Vibe-type pedal,” Tremonti goes on. “This is a prototype for a new pedal I’m developing. I’m trying to develop a whole line of pedals – I don't know what we’re going to call them yet, but I want to come out with three pedals first.

“This one is a modulation-style [pedal]. It’s got a lot of pure vibe. I don't use it much live, but there's three or four songs that I’ll use it in.”

The PRS signature artist was also kind enough to demo the pedal, which sounded pretty darn good. That shouldn’t come as a surprise, really – it must be of a certain sonic caliber if Tremonti is willing to play it live with Alter Bridge.

To our ears, it sounds like a high-quality Uni-Vibe clone, with lots of spacious modulation and nuanced vibe-y-ness. The early signs bode well for the future of Tremonti’s pedal brand already.

It also looks pretty rustic, too, and though Tremonti revealed he’d been experimenting with “hip” aesthetics for the pedal, he admitted to being a particular fan of the no-nonsense visuals: “To me, it looks like if Alexander Dumble were alive and making pedals, that’s what it would look like.”

So, don’t be surprised if the final version ends up looking remarkably similar to the prototype Tremonti is currently road-testing.

As Tremonti explained, his decision to lead the charge of his new brand with a Uni-Vibe unit stemmed from his own personal penchant for modulation effects, which in turn resulted in a desire to make a pedal that’s “as good… or better” than any of the boutique pedals he’s owned in the past.

But Tremonti’s plans for his pedal brand span far beyond the Uni-Vibe. As mentioned above, three pedals will be used to launch the company – and one of them has been set very lofty ambitions indeed.

“So right now I’ve got this pedal, I’ve got a tremolo pedal… and then we’re going to do an overdrive,” he continued, “which is a tricky one because of course I’m going after the Klon. Everybody’s going after the Klon.”

It’s an ambitious step to take for the as-yet-unannounced pedal company, the Klon Centaur being one of the most expensive, elusive and celebrated drive pedals in guitar history – but as Tremonti notes, Klon clones are incredibly common in the market, even if they don’t sound too convincing.

He explained: “Everybody’s like, ‘We got it, we got the Klon,’ and then I’ll hear it, I’m like, ‘You don’t have the Klon.’ It’s like the Dumble thing. People are like, ‘We’ve got this thing that sounds like a Dumble.’ It does not sound like a Dumble.”

Tremonti’s pedal company will therefore approach its own Klon clone with very specific objectives: “I want it to be transparent, I want it to sound like the Klon, and I don't want it to be $8,000 – I want it to be 200 bucks.”

It's still early days, and nothing has been officially announced, but we suspect Mark Tremonti's Instagram page is the best place to go for early updates and future previews.

Many-times-platinum hard-rock band Creed are set to reunite for their first live performances in over a decade.

The occasion is the Summer of '99 cruise – a true bonanza of late-'90s/early-noughties rock that will also feature 3 Doors Down, Buckcherry, Tonic, Vertical Horizon, Fuel, The Verve Pipe, Tantric, Dishwalla, Veruca Salt's Louise Post, and Nine Days.

Set to run from April 18-22, 2024, the cruise will sail from Miami, FL to Nassau, Bahamas, and will be hosted by Eddie Trunk and the stars of AXS TV’s Power Hour – Matt Pinfield, Caity Babs, and Josh Bernstein.

The cruise marks Creed's first live performances since 2012, and will reunite electric guitar hero Mark Tremonti, bass guitar player Brian Marshall, and drummer Scott Phillips – all of whom have remained together in the Myles Kennedy-fronted band Alter Bridge – with vocalist Scott Stapp.

Creed will perform twice for attendees and host a live Q&A open to all aboard the ship. All attendees will also reportedly receive a “commemorative item“ signed by the band.

In keeping with the late Clinton-era theme, the cruise – which will take place aboard the Norwegian Pearl – will also feature a “Y2K Countdown“ party. 

This cruise, mind you, does seem quite a bit more organized than the festival that brought a bunch of multi-platinum hard-rock bands together during the actual summer of 1999...

Pre-sale signups for the cruise are available now, with the pre-sale itself set to run from July 25 through July 27. The first 500 cabins to book will secure a cabin photo opportunity with Creed. Sales to the broader public will commence on July 28 at 2 p.m. EST. 

In a 2010 interview with Guitar World – conducted during Creed's first reunion, which petered out in 2012 – Tremonti spoke of the connection Creed fans have with the band's music, and how that connection has served as a spark for the band members themselves.

“We’ve changed so much as musicians and as people in the time we’ve been away from Creed,“ Tremonti said. “But one thing that hasn’t changed is that, when we play the songs and we hear the crowd singing the words back at us, it’s incredible. The connection that people have with this music is powerful.“

For more info on the event, visit Summer of '99 Cruise.

Guitar builder extraordinaire Paul Reed Smith joined hard-rock titans Alter Bridge onstage at a recent performance to lend his licks to PRS artists Mark Tremonti and Myles Kennedy.

At the February 4 show in Silver Spring, Maryland – just under an hour’s drive from PRS HQ in Stevensville – Smith was introduced by Kennedy, who proclaimed, “I just want y’all to understand the gravity of the situation: in my opinion, this guy is a legend. I mean, he is one of the great guitar gurus of all time.”

Fan footage shows what happened next, as the band launch into anthemic show closer Rise Today, taken from 2007 opus Blackbird. Armed with a Paul’s Guitar model, Smith wastes no time in embellishing the track’s intro with a handful of bluesy bends that really sing – so much so that Kennedy is compelled to dash over to the mic and comment, “Listen to that sustain!”

The superstar luthier continues to add some sweetly phrased call-and-response solos in an exchange with Kennedy’s vocals, but really lets those power chords fly in the chorus.

The ante is upped in the middle eight, which finds Smith and Kennedy trading licks over a pounding bass drum before Smith takes a final solo over the track’s closing chorus. In fact, the leads are flying so thick and fast that Tremonti doesn’t manage to muscle his way in until the finale, which finds him opening up a can of blistering legato to send the set home.

PRS has been the Alter Bridge guitarists’ builder of choice since Tremonti’s early years in post-grunge juggernauts Creed, and his single-cut signature guitar remains a staple of the company’s affordable SE line.

In the years since, the virtuoso has worked on an Explorer-style model with the firm – which, sadly, sounds like it won’t see the light of day – while Kennedy has been leaning on a Tele-style model that provided the bulk of the tones on the band’s latest record, Pawns & Kings.

This isn’t the first time Paul Reed Smith has made a guest appearance at a PRS artist’s show – last year, he hopped onstage with DragonForce to solo with Herman Li and co.

As 2023 starts to pick up speed, the age of digital guitar gear continues to mature at a rapid pace – and with it, the influence of amp modelers, digital cabinet emulations and virtual effects continues to expand into new corners of the guitar world.

It’s proven to be one of the most contentious sticking points between traditionalists and modernists over the past few years: as amp modeling technology becomes better and better, are traditional tube amps becoming redundant?

Naturally, tube amps will always have a place in guitar music – there’s no denying that – but in recent years we’ve seen more and more guitar stars switching to the ranks of the digital realm for amp and effects sounds to record and perform live with.

Names include John Mayer, who used a Fractal amp modeler on his recent album, and Mark Knopfler, who switched to the ranks of Kemper for his live performances in 2019.

Mark Tremonti, however, is one guitar titan who has remained loyal to the leagues of tube amps in the face of digital expansion. That’s not to say he hasn’t dabbled with the other side, though.

In fact, the Alter Bridge guitarist said he conducted half a tour using a Kemper Profiler, but had to switch back to his usual PRS MT 100 signature amp midway through proceedings as he couldn’t seem to get over some “digital weirdness”.

“I did half of a tour with a Kemper at one point, just to try it out,” Tremonti told Premier Guitar. “I never found the right lead setting that made me comfortable. I always felt some digital weirdness in there. 

“When I switched to my MT 100, I wouldn’t go back. So, on the road, it’s just the one MT 100 now.”

Tremonti’s Alter Bridge bandmate Myles Kennedy is also strongly on the side of tube amp supremacy, and conceded in the same interview that although Kempers represent an efficient logistical upgrade from large, heavy touring rigs, it’s one he can’t get behind.

Kennedy, who favors Diezel Herberts and VH4s, said, “Mark and I still want those tubes to be working. We’re kind of old-school in that sense. 

“Our manager, I’m sure, would love us to switch to Kempers to save a ton of money,” he continued. “But we’re kind of bullheaded. We’ll keep flying the flag, man.”

Though the debate between the two will no doubt rage on, it's hard to argue against the fact that Kempers are becoming pretty adept at creating authentic-sounding tube amp tones.

Case in point, JHS Pedals' Josh Scott recently revealed the tones he's used in his videos since September 2021 come from a Kemper Profiler, and not the tube amp shown onscreen.

Mark Tremonti says he was approached by Rex Brown about taking on guitar duties in the reprised Pantera, but thought better of auditioning for the role.

In a recent interview with Irish publication Overdrive, Tremonti revealed he’d had a brief conversation with Pantera bassist Brown at Download festival in the UK “a number of years ago”.

“He was talking about a possible Pantera reunion,” says Tremonti. “He looked at me and said, ‘You should put your name in the hat,’ and I was like, ‘No way, man.’ You have to be a certain type of personality to take on that role. It's not just about the playing, it's very much the personality, and Dime [late Pantera guitarist ‘Dimebag’ Darrell Abbott] had a huge presence.” 

Instead, Tremonti seems to have predicted that his more studious approach to metal may not have entirely gelled with Pantera’s audience. With that in mind, he says that the eventual choice of Zakk Wylde was definitely the right way to go.

“Put it this way,” jokes Tremonti. “Nobody's gonna flip off Zakk Wylde onstage. They very well might do that to me, but there's just no way I would put myself in that situation.”

Tremonti’s comments echo those of longtime Pantera producer Sterling Winfield, who recently told Texas station KNON’s Reckless Rock Radio show that Wylde was among a list of players considered for the role. 

“There were some other guitar folks that were brought up,” reveals Winfield, though it is not clear if he is alluding to Tremonti. “I’ll just say this – that it would not have been a good fit, and quite honestly, they would not have been able to pull it off. 

“But it always kept circling back around to Zakk. And after a couple of times, it was, like, again another no-brainer. Because he knew Dime better than most any other guitar player on the planet knew him. Is it gonna be Dimebag Darrell's exact notes and riffs and everything? No. It's Zakk Wylde, you idiots. It's Zakk.”

You can hear Winfield’s full interview above. It’s fair to say that Tremonti has enough strings to his bow for now, though. The guitarist is back on the road for a full US tour with Alter Bridge (accompanied by Mammoth WVH) at the end of the month, while Pantera next hit the stage in Spring, kicking off their summer run on May 20 at Daytona Beach, Florida.

Mark Tremonti has shared footage of one of his “happiest moments on stage”, in which he gives his guitar to a young disabled fan who was watching the show from the front row. 

The heart-warming moment occurred at the band's Milan date at the Mediolanum Forum di Assago in Italy on November 25. The footage shows the guitarist point out the fan and hand his electric guitar to the crew to pass on to her. 

Fortunately, they are able to go one further and soon manage to lift her over the barrier, so she can receive the instrument to widespread applause. The band's security then lift the delighted young fan on to the stage, where she gets a hug from Tremonti and an onstage view of the audience, including her family below.

Posting on Instagram, the guitarist wrote: “I just have to share one of my happiest moments on stage. I hope she loves the guitar as much as we loved giving it to her. Thanks for such an awesome night Milan!!”

Members of the fan’s family, who say she is called Eleonora, have since commented on Tremonti’s post, thanking the guitarist for his generosity.

Tremonti’s family welcomed a daughter, Stella, with additional needs in 2021. Then in May 2022, the songwriter released an album of Frank Sinatra covers in aid of the National Down Syndrome Society (NDSS). 

“I decided to do this record to raise funds for families and individuals with Down syndrome,” said Tremonti at the time. “This project is the start of a new purpose that I will have for the rest of my life.”

Watch the full video footage of Tremonti’s onstage gesture above.

Mark Tremonti and Myles Kennedy have been honing their guitar double act in Alter Bridge for the best part of two decades. As they sit together in the bar of London’s Royal Garden Hotel, they laugh when Myles says, “We’ve been playing together for so long, we’ve now morphed into one being!”

Tremonti has long been celebrated as one of the finest and most articulate guitarists of his generation, and while Kennedy is most famous for his four-octave vocal range – displayed both in Alter Bridge and in Slash’s solo band – he’s also a skilful guitarist in his own right. 

Their guitars are front and centre on the new Alter Bridge album Pawns & Kings. Produced once again by the band’s longtime collaborator Michael ‘Elvis’ Baskette, the album is focused on what Myles calls “meat and potatoes” guitar riffs, with a bare minimum of extraneous textures and instrumentation. 

As Mark explains: “A lot of times in the past, we used to have a string or a keyboard underneath to boost the music up, but on this record, we got rid of all that stuff. It sounds like the guitars are breathing. They’re open and they have all this space to live.” 

For this reason, he adds, “People keep saying that this is our heaviest record yet.” But beyond the abundance of abrasive, interlocking dual-guitar riffage, there is much more to Pawns & Kings. 

“I think this is maybe our most involved record,” Mark says. “Out of all of the records, if somebody listened to it cold, it’d be the hardest to grasp right out of the gate because there are so many twists and turns. As an artist, you’re trying to not let the listener go: ‘This is Alter Bridge. It’s going to do this, and then it’s going to do that.’ We want to keep people guessing.”

And what also resonates powerfully in this new album is the shared conviction between Tremonti and Kennedy for conveying meaning in their songs. 

On Pawns & Kings they deftly balance a hard-hitting instrumental attack against deep lyricism, anthemic choruses against introspective verses, and moments of self-restraint against explosive displays of fretboard fireworks. “One of the hardest dances to do is to make something heavy and technical and still emotional at the same time,” Mark says. “But unless the song means something to you, there’s no point.”

One of the more surprising elements of the new Alter Bridge album is how Tremonti and Kennedy have shaken up their ‘traditional’ roles. While it might once have been safe to assume that lead guitar duties would fall naturally to Tremonti, the precise call-and-response soloing on the album’s title track and the eight and a half minute epic Fable Of The Silent Sun makes it hard to decipher exactly who’s playing what. 

And although Myles describes himself, with tongue in cheek, as “the sensitive ponytail guy” of the band, he is the author of many of this record’s heaviest riffs – including the moshpit-starting groove of Silver Tongue and the foreboding clangour of album opener This Is War.

Myles acknowledges that it’s Mark’s exemplary right hand chops that truly animate these riffs. “It’s kind of like James Hetfield,” he explains. “Some guys have it. It’s an aggression. When I’d go in to track my part it was like, ‘I can’t wait to hear Mark play over the top and add his attack because it’ll help bring it to life.’” 

Myles also reveals that when the pair descend into drop tunings, he opts for thick strings so that the “intonation is tighter,” while Mark is more likely to use a lighter gauge and allow the strings to “flop around” – thus differentiating their tones. Reaching for a colourful analogy, he explains: “It’s like when you get hit in the gut. If you’re a bigger person, it bounces around. That’s part of what makes that sound.”

For tone and technique, Mark asserts that it’s well worth reassessing the itty bitty pieces of triangular plastic that guitarists often take for granted. Picks, he says, are “the thing that you’re interacting most with on your guitar. It’s how you touch the guitar so it’s important.”

Having recently embarked on a quest to “try every pick ever made” and see if a change could help him play better and dig in more, he found new favourites in Dunlop’s 1mm and 1.35mm Flow guitar picks. “It made a huge difference,” he enthuses. “Now I can’t look back.”

For all his dedication to his craft, his precise and methodical approach to the guitar, Mark doesn’t feel the need to flaunt his status as a guitar hero. The album’s introspective ballad Stay – on which he sings lead – is one of a handful of tracks that doesn’t contain a solo. 

“After being known as a guitar player for so many years, I always feel pressure, like I have to live up to something,” he explains. “Being a writer excites me way more than being a lead guitar player.” He has come a long way as an artist since his formative years as a speed metal buff. “If I just spent my time sitting down, 100 per cent trying to be an excellent guitar player, you might hear a very different, more technically proficient guitar player, but I’d much rather create songs.”

Conversely, Myles has keenly embraced the opportunity to shred more on Pawns & Kings, and even got himself a bespoke new tool for the job. During his solo summer tour, he was spotted rocking a sleek black PRS-built take on a Fender classic, and while an initial probe for details elicits a tongue-in-cheek, “I don’t know what you’re talking about!” he gleefully divulges that this is indeed a new prototype made to his exacting specifications.

The semi-secret project came about after the 2021 release of his second solo record, The Ides Of March, which he cut using a selection of vintage Telecasters. Not wanting to subject the valuable instruments to touring, and as a longtime player of PRS guitars, he called upon “Paul and the gang” to help him develop an alternative. 

“We riffed for a long time and they found this sound that was in my head,” he says. “I have a real fondness for those early Telecasters, so you always wonder if there’s a way you can combine elements with a more contemporary approach in something that would be very versatile. It’s like a P-90 meets an old Blackguard-era Telecaster sound.” 

Myles used the guitar for all of his solos and the majority of his rhythm tracks on the record. “It cuts – it’s all there,” he enthuses. “It’s got its own place, especially with Mark who’s using humbuckers. It helped distinguish the sound.” 

Myles stops short of calling it a signature model, and in regards to a consumer roll-out he teases: “We’ll just have to see how it plays out.” But things feel positive, with his bandmate already staking out a spot at the front of the queue: “It’s not just for him,” Mark laughs. “I’m getting one given to me!” 

Of course, the star of Mark’s collection is his own PRS Tremonti signature model. In fact, the only time you’ll hear him without one is if a particular riff calls for a baritone chug. With its high output humbuckers and single cut body shape, we’re best off, he suggests, thinking of it as “a modernised version of a Les Paul.” 

He adds: “I hate to say it’s more refined because there are so many great Les Pauls. But a perfect analogy for it is if you took an old hot rod from back in the ’60s and put a brand new drivetrain inside it.” 

When it comes to guitar amps, Mark is a genuine aficionado, so there was no chance of travelling light when it came time to hit the studio for Pawns & Kings. “I got my car and put ten amps in there – all my favourites,” he explains. “That’s always one of the most fun days; we do an amp shoot-out and check them all out.”

Those that came out on top this time included his all-new 100-watt signature PRS MT100 (which, he says, will “probably” be released for public consumption in 2023) as well as its baby brother, the nifty PRS MT15 lunchbox valve amp.

A Cornford RK100 also made the cut, alongside a Granophyre from modern metal specialists, Omega Ampworks. Last but by no means least, Mark brought two Dumbles to the high-class amp party, and Myles took a particular shine to one and used it for his solos.

“It’s crazy,” Myles says. “I used an amp that was probably more expensive than my first house.” Indeed, because of their hefty price tags (often fetching upwards of $75,000), these rare and revered creations tend to dwell far out of reach of most players, so we asked the amp expert in chief to distil their magic. 

After a considered pause, Mark says: “There’s something that happens when your pick hits the string. It’s this weird sensation that doesn’t happen on other amps for me. It just has this thing. A lot of Dumble clones don’t have it. There are also Dumbles that don’t have it. There’s bad sounding Dumbles and I’ve owned one, but when it’s right, it is the best amp in the world.” 

For his rhythm parts, Myles used a Diezel Herbert and a VH4 – a tried and tested combination. Initially, however, it took years of searching for him to find amps that would sit comfortably among the expansive frequencies already occupied by Mark’s well-established sound.

“He uses a lot of real estate sonically and that’s one of the things I loved about his tone when I first heard it,” Myles explains. “The real challenge was finding where I fit in, and it was tough. We didn’t figure it out until we were doing the Blackbird record [in 2007]. We were trying everything. I brought my JCM800s – we had tons – but we kept shooting out. It wasn’t sitting in the right spot or it sounded too similar to what Mark was doing.” 

After almost running out of options, Myles recalls how the lightbulb moment came when he stumbled across a Diezel Herbert stashed away in a closet: “We gave it a try, plugged it in and fired up channel two and there it was – all the frequencies that complemented what Mark was doing. I haven’t looked back since.” 

Similarly, Myles has also been getting maximum mileage out of a favourite stomp box – a “big blue” Line 6 MM4 Modulation Modeller, used for many of the cleaner, more ambient textures on the new record. He laughs, “I don’t even know if they still make them, but there’s this one sound I programmed back around 2000, and I’ve done my best to make sure I don’t ever lose it.” 

Armed with their respective weapons of choice, Alter Bridge will be touring arenas this winter – a thought that was never far from mind when Pawns... was being written. “When we write a record, we know we’re going to play it live,” Mark says. “We like the ballads but we also like to rock. Heavy equals energy – and energy equals a great show!”

• Pawns & Kings is out now via Napalm Records.

Chunky, weighty and extraordinarily articulate, Mark Tremonti’s electric guitar tone on the new Alter Bridge album, Pawns & Kings, is nothing short of sublime.

His tone can be largely attributed to his high-output humbucker-loaded PRS Tremonti signature guitar, and an accompanying array of guitar amps, including his signature PRS MT100, its baby brother, the MT 15, a Cornford RK100, an Omega Ampworks Granophyre and two high-class Dumbles.

But as he explains in an interview with Total Guitar, one of the most significant components of his sound came from a far cheaper part of his rig: his choice of guitar pick.

In fact, Tremonti reveals that he embarked on a quest to “try every pick ever made” – though we’re not sure if such a feat is even possible – in order to see if a change could help improve his tone and playing.

“[The pick is] the thing that you’re interacting most with on your guitar,” he muses, justifying his ambitious experiment. “It’s how you touch the guitar, so it’s important.”

Though he doesn’t dive into much detail on how many different guitar picks he went through in search of the perfect one, he reveals he has new favorites in Dunlop’s 1mm and 1.35mm Flow picks, which reside on the heavier side of the spectrum and feature beveled edges to minimize drag, along with a pointed tip for extra attack.

“It made a huge difference,” Tremonti says. “Now I can’t look back.”

Tremonti is widely touted as one of the finest guitarists of his generation, but as he explains, he placed more emphasis on being a songwriter than a lead guitar player during the making of Pawns & Kings. 

“After being known as a guitar player for so many years, I always feel pressure, like I have to live up to something,” he explains. “Being a writer excites me way more than being a lead guitar player.”

He continues: “If I just spent my time sitting down, one hundred percent trying to be an excellent guitar player, you might hear a very different, more technically proficient guitar player, but I’d much rather create songs.”

Elsewhere in the interview, Tremonti’s Alter Bridge co-guitarist and frontman Myles Kennedy reveals how he used his PRS Tele-style model – custom-built for him by “Paul and the Gang” at PRS to harness the sound of a selection of vintage Telecasters he played during the sessions for his latest solo album, The Ides of March – for nearly all of his playing on Pawns & Kings.

“I have a real fondness for those early Telecasters, so you always wonder if there’s a way you can combine elements with a more contemporary approach in something that would be very versatile,” Kennedy says. “It’s like a P-90 meets an old Blackguard-era Telecaster sound.”

On why he opted to use the guitar for the majority of his guitar parts on the album, Kennedy adds: “It cuts – it’s all there. It’s got its own place, especially with Mark who’s using humbuckers. It helped distinguish the sound.”

No strangers to scorching solos, industrious riffs and thematic intensity, Alter Bridge are back with their seventh album, Pawns & Kings. Across ten songs, the band welcome fans new and old alike to join them on the next chapter in their journey – which at this point, has spanned nearly two decades. Heralded by the singles ‘Silver Tongue’, ‘Sin After Sin’ and its title track, Pawns & Kings veers away from the themes of its two (largely politically driven) predecessors, The Last Hero (2016) and Walk The Sky (2019). 

For album number seven, Alter Bridge have instead opted for a message a little more resolute. This resigned standpoint is delivered with a combination of techniques and gear that uphold the signature Alter Bridge character, while introducing new elements that demonstrate the band’s continued evolution in songwriting and performance. 

From their respective homes, guitarists Myles Kennedy and Mark Tremonti (who also just released a covers album, Mark Tremonti Sings Frank Sinatra, to raise funds for Down Syndrome charities) talk to Australian Guitar about the themes, gear and more that drive the hard rock heroes’ latest offering. 

ON THE MESSAGE BEHIND PAWNS & KINGS…

With The Last Hero released around the time Donald Trump was elected as the 45th US President, it was difficult for Kennedy to say how (if at all) the unfolding of a new political landscape would shape the future of Alter Bridge. Though on the surface, Pawns & Kings may show the band in the same ballpark of disdain and incredulity they were on The Last Hero, there’s more throwing of arms to the air with a sense of “whatever”. 

Ever a pensive man, Kennedy broaches the band’s thematic evolution: “These are very tumultuous, strange times, and they’re very polarised. And for me, I think what I’ve learned is that you’re not going to change anybody’s minds. Some bands are really good at that; they find their spot and preach their worries and that’s great for them. For me, I don’t feel comfortable in that realm, I like to keep the lyrics timeless.”

Kennedy takes album cut ‘Silver Tongue’ as an example, noting how people have tried to attach “something” to it. He, however, observes it to be a “timeless tale” – one that’s “been going on as long as there have been human beings”. He says: “You have people that seduce, people that are good at manipulating other people, and it doesn’t always lead to good things. That’s a song that is relevant now and will probably be relevant a hundred years from now because that’s just the way we’re hardwired, unfortunately. 

“Then you have a song like ‘Pawns & Kings’, which I feel is an empowering song. It’s like the battle cry for the underdog. Though you may look at a circumstance and think it seems impossible to overcome it, that song is that ray of hope – at least, that’s what I extract from it. After years and years of writing songs, I’ve learnt that if you can keep it ambiguous enough, it’ll apply in different arenas. I feel like it ages better – the shelf life doesn’t run out as quickly.”

Alter Bridge have indeed written songs that fit that mould in the past, such as ‘Wayward One’ from 2007’s Blackbird. It’s far from a conscious reasoning, though, that Alter Bridge have no notions of being the best band in the world for pushing political opinion. Kennedy says humbly: “Speaking for myself, I think if there’s any agenda, [it’s to] remember to be good to one another. Humanity is very important to me. And that song, ‘Wayward One’, is definitely a song about empathy. It’s supercharged with empathy. 

“[Nowadays] there’s so much divisiveness, so much tribalism and so much embolism, I don’t want to add to the noise there.” Kennedy pauses, drawing a weighted breath. “I don’t know what’s going on – as a human being, I just want there to be more bridges – no pun intended! I want there to be more conversation – everybody just needs to chill out and talk to one another and remember that we’re all in this together. At the end of the day, we’re all stardust, man. We all have the same blood.”

To speak to Kennedy, perched on top of a stool, relaxed in an environment he controls, he comes across as being the kind of man who prefers being in his own head rather than having everyone else’s conversations melting in there. “I like to learn things,” he says reasonably. “I’m always up for learning from somebody and I do like stimulating conversations, it keeps you sharp. And I need all the help I can get there, trust me. Especially the older I get and the more I realise how important it is to try and silence all the noise. 

“It’s no secret at this point, especially after Walk The Sky. Walk The Sky was essentially, in a lot of ways, me really being open to talking about how into meditation I am and being present I am, and I feel like that has been such a saving grace in my life. Not to preach the gospel of meditation; I don’t want to be that guy, but at the same time, I feel like it’s helped me be a better artist, because by learning how to turn down the noise in my brain, I can centre in on the music.”

ON ALTERING THEIR SONGWRITING PROCESS…

Centre in on the music, Kennedy and Tremonti surely did. Though the pair have a certain aptitude in how they’ve demoed songs over the last 25 years or so, pandemic-driven lockdowns and not being able to be physically present with one another forced Kennedy, at least, to refine his song writing craft even more. “All I had to do was sit in my studio and work,” he says. “I feel like I became, not a better songwriter, but better at documenting ideas and concepts. Just quicker. For me, that helped a lot with the process.

“[Album opener] ‘This Is War’, that came to me in kind of a dream state. And as I was waking up, I’d spent enough time after the pandemic in my studio getting pretty proficient with my stuff where it didn’t take long to take what I was hearing in my head and track it.

“Program the drums quickly, play all the parts, and then move on without it being this laboured, ‘Oh I’ve gotta get this right and this right and fine tune this,’ so it’s just very streamlined – in a lot of ways, that helped the creation of this record tremendously.”

Kennedy’s statement isn’t to say that his approach to his contribution to Pawns & Kings was entirely different to Alter Bridge’s prior six albums, rather, he sees it as more of a carry-over methodology that began with Walk The Sky. “The demos were more realised than they had been in the past,” Kennedy recalls. “A lot of times Mark and I would kind of get in the same room and go ‘Hey, do you have a part that goes with this part?’ 

“It’s funny because people will go, ‘Oh, go back to the old way you used to do it,’ and well, it’s really no different. We’re refining the ideas a little bit more before we present them to our partner. So, if I hand over a track, I’m still leaving him a space there to put his stamp on it, it’s the same concept.”

Tremonti offers his take on working out balance between himself and Kennedy when lockdowns prevented them from working simultaneously. “I would break out my cell phone, get on Zoom with him,” Tremonti says of a process that became the standard for so many other musicians. “I would turn in a few songs, he [Kennedy] would listen to them and give his input. I remember the first song he turned in was ‘Silver Tongue’ - he turned in two parts that went back and forth [between us].

“We like to keep our demo phase loose. We don’t want to say, ‘Here’s this completely completed song,’ because then it turns into somebody’s solo project. So, when we can get together as a band, we can always have that alternate sound.

“When Scott and Brian [bassist Brian Marshall and drummer Scott Phillips] come to the mix, it gives it that backbone, that rhythm section that is so recognisable to us. When it’s just me and Myles doing our demos, it sounds a little bit like me, it sounds a little bit like Myles. But when you get us all playing on it, it gets that AB characteristic.”

ON GUITARS, PEDALS AND MORE…

Kennedy is positively swimming in equipment in what he calls his “office studio environment”. He sits with his arms folded looking from an angle at a monitor, the camera capturing his profile. None of the gear here, however, made it onto the new album. “I had grand delusions of trying to do a YouTube channel like when the pandemic hit,” he explains with a bashful smile. “I bought all the stuff, and had it set up and I was like, ‘Well I’ve gotta come up with content for that. I can set the camera, but I think I’d be a huge bore,’ so I scrapped the plans!” 

Thanks to a good hunk of other gear though, the sonic stamp in Pawns & Kings is distinctly Alter Bridge, with many of its riffs’ nuances and the execution of solos echoing the band’s earlier work nearly some 20 years ago. Album cut ‘This Is War’, for example, boasts a menacingly effervescent opening riff with a very distinct attack that continues into the chorus. Such a sound was established throughout the album by a relative newcomer to Kennedy’s arsenal, the PRS McCarty Electric Guitar. “It has elements of a single coil sound that uses Narrowfield pickups,” the frontman says of the instrument’s make up. “It gets that top end that I really like with that character without all of the hum, and especially when using high gain like we’re using, the last thing you want to do is plug a single coil into some of these amps, it’s going to buzz like crazy. 

“This guitar worked really well for that. It just has a certain cut – I used that guitar on about 80 per cent of the record. Then there’s my tried and true [PRS SC] 245 that I’ve used since the Blackbird days [2007], I used that on the other tracks. I’ve used it forever, it’s kind of been a signature guitar for a long time until this black [McCarty] one came along, it’s like I love this guitar! It just has such a character to it.”

At times, some of the album’s guitar rhythms and melodies boast a wonderful push and pull, which are then interjected by wailing, desperate solos. This marriage of sound and technique is sometimes broken down in songs like ‘Stay’ (which sees Tremonti take on lead vocals) or can establish a particular swagger as in ‘Holiday’, before bringing back the aggressive drives as heard in ‘Fable Of The Silent Son’. Because this audio landscape is so in keeping with the noise of Alter Bridge releases of yore, you may think the band have utilised many of the same pedals – not so. 

Where FullTone was the preferred pedal for the effects on renowned Alter Bridge hits like ‘Before Tomorrow Comes’ and the solo on ‘Blackbird’, Kennedy has “started veering away” from the brand, his eye caught by something a little sexier – the J. Rockett Chicken Soup Overdrive. 

“They’re amazing,” Kennedy gushes. “I’m afraid to say this because people are going to snag them up! They have a notch at the mid-range frequency that works perfectly for us. It’s like corduroy, that’s the sound I’m shooting for; it’s not too saturated, it’s still got this space, and that’s what I like about using [these] pedals, you know. I’m not using Metal Zones, let’s just put it that way!”

Choosing the right instrument is (as Kennedy attests, appreciative of the intentional pun) instrumental in establishing one’s signature sound. 

“I think that’s part of the journey,” he says. “I kind of look at it like my voice – it took me years and years to find this sound and it’s the same thing, stylistically, the inflections: it’s me. When I sing, you’re gonna know ‘That’s that guy’. It’s the same thing with guitar, and that’s why I’m so grateful that PRS did this for me, it’s like I was hearing this thing that didn’t exist and I was like ‘Wow how can we get this character?’ 

“Mark has utilised these guitars now for nearly two decades, probably over two decades, and you know it’s part of his musical DNA – so you combine that sound with his touch and there’s Mark. I think that’s why I embarked on this as well.”

ON AMPS AND THAT ELUSIVE MT100… 

Tremonti looks as if he’s nested in a small warehouse, but really, it’s his home studio, “the best room in the house”, according to the Riff Lord. It’s really no secret but Tremonti is, by all accounts, an amp-over-guitar man. “I have a signature guitar and I don’t need to upgrade, you know, because I love my guitar,” he says. “I’ve got the MT 15 right here,” he points over his shoulder. He flips around his phone camera to proudly show off his collection of amps, moving away from his desk and taking the camera into what can only be described as a walk-in wardrobe for amplifiers. “There’s the RK100,” he says, pointing to a monster at the bottom of a shelf housing various heads. “Here are the best ones though,” he adds, gesturing towards a Dumble and a Trainwreck. “Those are the best other than, of course, the MT 15. Yeah, that’s my obsession: all these amps.”

Rumours about and images of the MT100 have graced online forums and interviews with Tremonti for around four years now. Amp aficionados and/or followers of Tremonti’s dedication to the box beasts will already know, with the PRS Mark Tremonti Signature MT 15 being the colossus that it is, that the MT100 should knock down walls – and Tremonti has one right behind him.

It’s a wooden prototype and not the actual thing; Tremonti’s not permitted to share photos of it yet. Nevertheless, the MT 100 was the main focus on Pawns & Kings. “I’ve got two prototypes here,” Tremonti says. “The first prototype was a two channel but now it’s a three channel. That was one of the first versions of the three channel,” he finishes, indicating the wooden box again. “I just sent the newest prototype back to the factory two days ago, and I should get it back tomorrow. And fingers crossed, after almost four years, I’ll be able to greenlight the head. 

“I’ve also been opening up all my cabinets at home and mix matching speakers and trying to come up with the best [configuration]. ‘What are we using? What speakers are we using? What dimensions are we using? What grill are we using?’ I finally came up with a pattern of speakers in the cabinet that sounds perfect for the head, and to me it’s going to be the greatest, greatest tone I’ve ever had.”

In collaboration with PRS’ Rich Hannon and Doug Sewell, Tremonti was instrumental in developing his new obsession. “Round and round and round just to get it right,” he says of the meticulous process in the amp’s creation. “Because, you know, once you think you’re at a finish line with something, all of a sudden, a war breaks out, and you can’t get the tubes. So, we had to change tubes. And we had to make that work. We had to, like I said, go from a two channel to a three channel and they had to find a whole new chassis.

“It’s made us come through a lot of changes, but it’s going to end up being, for me, the perfect amplifier. And I’m glad, I don’t ever want to just put something out because it’s easy. You know, I want to put it out because it’s absolutely right, and it’s taken a lot of years to get it that way.”

ON RECREATING THEIR IN-HOUSE SOUND ON THE LIVE STAGE…

Alter Bridge hit the road once more earlier in November when they commenced a tour through Europe and North America that will take them well into 2023. No matter where you’re positioned in any kind of venue – front back, stalls, balcony etc. – the high-end quality of sound with which Alter Bridge perform never wavers. That being said, there’s much to account for when trying to balance the distinct preferences and styles of both guitarists’ gear and technique. 

“There has to be a good balance between me and Myles, our amps have to fill different frequency ranges,” Tremonti begins. “When I was younger, I used to like that scooped kind of low end and high-end heavy metal kind of sound, but that stuff doesn’t cut through a mix well. So, I added way more mid-range to my tone. So, it really punches through the mix, and it doesn’t really live with the bass guitar when it comes to the frequencies, [so it] can get muddied up there.

“Our sound engineer is brilliant at taking everything we do and putting it in its own space, you know, so nobody shares the same frequencies. Myles is here, and I’m there, and it all works.”

Kennedy’s preference for amps still lies with his trusted Diezel VH4 100w Guitar Amp Head and his Herbert 180W Tube Guitar Head. “They fit really well in this context,” he says of using them for Pawns & Kings. Were he and Tremonti both to utilise Diezels on the live stage, they’d end up filling the same frequencies, as Tremonti explains. 

“I used to be a huge believer in having two amps at the same time for your tone,” he says, “because those two amps are going to do two different things and fill that bigger space. But I’m finally down to one amp live and it’s just going to be the MT 100. That’s  because I have a three-channel amp. It’s such a versatile amp, I don’t need anything else.

“It’s got the best clean channel I’ve ever heard on a 100 watt head,” he continues, “and it’s got a great overdrive channel that serves a good gap between your dead clean and your heavy lead sound. That amp will go from as clean as you can get to a really sweet overdrive, like a Dumble kind of boutique sound, to a heavy metal sound, you know? So, it’s got everything, everything that you could ever, I could ever need live.”

“It’s a noise machine up there!” Kennedy cries. “120 decibels of pure sonic fury up there!” A stark contrast to the in-studio setting, then.

ON HOW TO PLAY SONGS FROM PAWNS & KINGS…

When you give it a listen, it may seem that there’s a certain complexity of character to Pawns & Kings. Tremonti, however, says there are both technically demanding aspects to playing some of the new material, and some relatively simple areas, too. On the album’s title track, Tremonti elaborates, “There’s not a lot of effects on there. I leave my gain at about noon and just kind of use a lot of palm muting for some of the heavier, faster riffs.

“Like, if I was to learn that song from scratch, I would probably start with the hardest part and go straight to the bridge and learn the bridge breakdown riff, the heavy riffs, because that’s the toughest part to learn.” Tremonti’s advice? “Go backwards from there.”

Tremonti got tripped up in the early stages of putting down the track, though. “Scott and Myles were playing the intro with this weird feel,” he recalls. “Me and Elvis [producer Michael “Elvis” Baskette] are like, ‘What are you doing? This is so weird’, like, it’s this weird time thing. And me and Elvis were like, ‘I don’t get it’, but Scott and Myles are like, ‘No, this is great, we’re gonna do this.’ So, the beginning of that song, I would leave that for last and then learn the rest of it.

“Learn the bridge first,” Tremonti’s lesson continues. “You know, the chorus is very simple and straightforward.” Tremonti moves onto unpacking the more technically challenging and “weird” ideas of ‘Pawns & Kings’, revealing they can trip up even a well-seasoned musician like Tremonti. “I would compartmentalise every bit of that song,” he advises, “because I remember how difficult it was for me to memorise the song as a whole in one day and be able to... because when we do pre-production, you could spend a month on a song but then you put it away for three months, so you have to relearn it and play it in one day.

“And that song was a challenge. For your brain to have to take that information in so quickly and be able to play it from start to finish in one day, it was tough. There’s a lot going on there.”

As for other cuts of the album suitable for some stellar Alter Bridge imitation action, Tremonti recommends single ‘Silver Tongue’. “I think the driving force of it is the main opening riff that, um,” Tremonti vocalises a few chugga-chugga-chuggas, “That’s how that song was born.

“When you write a song, there’s usually that key part where you’re like, ‘Alright, I’m gonna build a whole song around this part,’ because that was the special part that I think built that song.”

HOW THE ALBUM STANDS UP IN THE ALTER BRIDGE DISCOGRAPHY…

“I’m such a funny bird there because I don’t truly know until about a decade later,” Kennedy says of how he thinks Pawns & Kings will stand up in the band’s twenty years of music-making history. “You’re talking to the one guy who very rarely listens to a record once he’s [been] a part of making it. I’m always just kind of moving onto the next thing.

“Part of the problem also is I’m hypercritical; I’ll pick things apart and get lost in my head, and that’s something I’m trying to work on so maybe I’ll be more comfortable listening to records as I continue to evolve as a human being and become more conscious. I think for whatever reason, it’s a real challenge. 

“But with all of that nonsense aside, I will say that we’ve achieved what we set out to do when we made this record, which was have it be a little bit more refined, not as dense from a sonic standpoint, not as many layers, though there’s still layering here and there – on ‘Fable Son’ there’s some sonic landscaping – but overall, we tried to keep this more focused, and Elvis was on board with this as well, but Mark and I, we were like: this is what we want to shoot for here.

Kennedy ponders, “People keep comparing it to Fortress, which is interesting for me because I don’t know if that’s going to be a shared assessment. Who knows.” It’s an assessment Kennedy admits he would be more than happy with. “From what I remember [of it], that probably would be on top of my list as one of my favourite AB records,” he says, “especially its title track; it shapes the whole thing and pulls it altogether.” 

That old delivery choice, you might argue, should have been considered for the title track on Pawns & Kings, which serves as the album’s closing track. “Part of the reason we did that is because we thought, “Well if it’s gonna be the closing track, because we called the record Pawns & Kings, we figured it might be a nice way to punctuate the record, and there’s something about the way that song ends where it’s very final.” 

You might say it’s the checkmate. Realising he’s set himself up for one final yet appropriate pun, Kennedy smiles, “Yes! There you have it.”

Mark Tremonti and PRS have one of the most successful partnerships in modern electric guitar history. Partners for more than two decades, it was Tremonti and Paul Reed Smith’s collaborative minds that brought about one of the first PRS Singlecut guitars – a model that later formed the basis for Tremonti’s own signature guitar.

Around 2016, the two rekindled their experimental tendencies by creating a custom, double-cut, Explorer-style guitar, which has been spotted in the wild sporadically with the Alter Bridge man over the past few years.

Unlike the single-cut design, though – which is now one of PRS’s most popular offerings – it doesn’t sound like Tremonti’s infinitely more quirky concept will be getting a full production run any time soon.

Speaking to Ultimate Guitar, Tremonti discussed the origins of his wild PRS axe, and explained why its contemporary metal aesthetics – and complex build – will prevent it from becoming a regular star in the PRS catalog.

“I have four of those now,” Tremonti revealed. “But the problem with it is they would have to create a three-piece top and they would have to create new CNC machines to build just that one model, and it's just not in the cards, you know. 

“I've asked them a lot of times,” he continued, “and they'd have to carve out a corner of the warehouse to do that, just for that one guitar, so I don't think it's worth it.”

Tremonti went on to say its “radical” appearance also hinders its production chances, saying it goes against the “traditional, classy” nature of the PRS brand.

“They're not a heavy metal kind of guitar place,” Tremonti said of PRS. “I think it's kind of traditional. So I think that design was a little bit on the edge. 

“Some of the people at PRS absolutely loved it, and some people didn't like it. So I think it's kind of cool that it's something that only I get to play at the time, but it would be also great to see it hit the stores, but I don't think that's gonna happen.”

Radical is perhaps an appropriate label for the concept guitar, which features two small double-cuts – unusual for Tremonti, who famously favors single-cuts – as well as an elongated upper bout, offset shape and reversed PRS headstock.

In 2016, Tremonti sat down with Total Guitar to show off an early version of the concept, which at the time was still in its infancy. 

“I went up to the factory and I wanted to design a new style with Paul, and Paul said, ‘If you want to design a new style, you have to come up and do it with me,’” Tremonti recounted. “We went into his office, got out his dry erase board and just started sketching ideas.”

Mystery PRS guitars seem to be in fashion at the moment. Earlier this year, Tremonti’s Alter Bridge bandmate Myles Kennedy was spotted playing a Tele-style model. Whether that model will fare better in the quest for a production run, it remains to be seen.

Alter Bridge have announced they will be hitting the road with Mammoth WVH next year for an extensive tour of North America.

The Wolfgang Van Halen-led outfit will join up with Myles Kennedy, Mark Tremonti and co for a hefty 30-date stint around the country, which kicks off on January 25 at the Seminole Hard Rock in Tampa, Florida.

Divided into two legs, the first part of the tour will see the electric guitar heroes visit Nashville, New York, Michigan, Massachusetts and more, before concluding proceedings at Chicago’s The Riviera Theatre on February 18.

The second leg will pick up on March 10 at the Quapaw Downstream Casino Resort in Oklahoma, with the tour wrapping up at California’s Highland Yaamava' Theater at Yaamava' Casino Resort on April 1.

During the two legs, Mammoth WVH will serve as direct support to Alter Bridge, who have also recruited secondary support acts Red and Pistols at Dawn for the first and second legs, respectively.

“Looking forward to these tours guys,” Van Halen said. “Thank you so much for having us!”

It will be the second time in as many years Alter Bridge and Mammoth WVH have shared a tour bill, after the pair teamed up with Halestorm to announce a comprehensive set of European tour dates to promote Alter Bridge’s upcoming album, Pawns & Kings.

Scheduled to kick off in November in Germany, the trio will visit Denmark, Sweden, Norway, France, Spain, England and more, before concluding on December 12 in London.

Alter Bridge’s new album will arrive October 14, and has already been previewed by the hard-hitting title track and scorching second single, Silver Tongue. 

The album will reportedly see Kennedy and Tremonti swap their usual roles more regularly, with Tremonti also teasing that it was Kennedy who penned Pawns & Kings’ heaviest riffs.

For more information about upcoming tour dates, head over to Alter Bridge’s website.

A full list of the 2023 dates can be found below.

• Jan 25: Tampa Seminole Hard Rock, FL
• Jan 27: Orlando Hard Rock Live, FL
• Jan 28: Atlanta Coca Cola Roxy, GA
• Jan 30: Nashville Ryman Auditorium, TN
• Feb 01: Montclair The Wellmont Theater, NJ
• Feb 02: Huntington The Paramount, NY
• Feb 04: Silver Spring The Fillmore Silver Spring, MD
• Feb 05: Philadelphia Franklin Music Hall, PA
• Feb 07: Wallingford The Dome At Toyota Oakdale Theatre, CT
• Feb 08: Boston Roadrunner, MA
• Feb 10: Waterloo Del Lago Casino Resort, NY
• Feb 11: Toronto History, ON
• Feb 14: Detroit The Fillmore, MI
• Feb 15: Indianapolis Murat Theatre At Old National Centre, IN
• Feb 17: Prior Lake Mystic Lake Casino Showroom, MI
• Feb 18: Chicago The Riviera Theatre, IL
• Mar 10: Quapaw Downstream Casino Resort, OK
• Mar 11: Kansas City Arvest Bank Theatre At The Midland, MO
• Mar 14: Chesterfield The Factory, MO
• Mar 15: Oklahoma City The Criterion, OK
• Mar 17: Houston 713 Music Hall, TX
• Mar 18: Dallas South Side Ballroom, TX
• Mar 20: Denver Mission Ballroom, CO
• Mar 21: Salt Lake City Union Event Center, UT
• Mar 23: Seattle The Paramount Theatre, WA
• Mar 25: Airway Heights Northern Quest Resort & Casino, WA
• Mar 28: Anaheim House Of Blues, CA
• Mar 29: Tempe Marquee Theatre, AZ
• Mar 31: Reno Silver Legacy’s Grande Expo Hall, NV
• Apr 01: Highland Yaamava Theater At Yaamava Casino Resort, CA

Last month, Alter Bridge announced Pawns & Kings – the band’s seventh full-length studio record, due this October, which was previewed with the effort’s hard-hitting title track.

Now, the acclaimed rock outfit, which is spearheaded by electric guitar heavyweights Mark Tremonti and Myles Kennedy, have dropped the album’s second single, Silver Tongue.

The third song on the Pawns & Kings tracklist, Silver Tongue follows its predecessor's penchant for explosive guitar action, underpinned by scorching lower-fret action, sizzling six-string jabs and oversized, drop-tuned tones.

It’s been teased as one of Alter Bridge’s “heftier songs” of recent times, and it's an observation that rings true: there are no flashy solos here, just four minutes of bruising, destructive dual-guitar riff action.

Accompanying the track is the Silver Tongue music video, an animated film directed by Ollie Jones that “follows two characters who fall under the spell of a painting that comes to life”. Supposedly, this painting forces our protagonists into a “dark world” where a classic battle of good versus evils rages on.

Silver Tongue is yet more evidence that Pawns & Kings will make good on Tremonti’s promise that the album will feature some particularly “heavy riffs” – a tease Tremonti issued to My Planet Rocks prior to the album’s announcement.

Tremonti also hinted that Pawns & Kings will see him and Kennedy swap their usual roles more regularly: Kennedy took on more lead action, while Tremonti handled more vocal work.

“At this point, Myles loves playing guitar solos, and I love singing,” Tremonti said. “So we like to do each other's roles, because I think he doesn't feel the pressure as a guitar player because he's known as a singer; I don't feel the pressure as a singer because I'm known as a guitar player. So we liked filling the other person's role. It's fun.”

Pawns & Kings will arrive October 14 via Napalm Records, and will be promoted via an extensive headline tour. So far, the band have announced dates for a European tour, which starts on November 1 in Germany and concludes December 12 in the UK.

For the European tour, Alter Bridge will receive support from Halestorm and Mammoth WVH.

To find out more, and to preorder Pawns & Kings, head over to Alter Bridge. 

Myles Kennedy and Mark Tremonti have kept plenty busy over the last year or so.

Kennedy released his stellar second solo album, The Ides of March, in 2021, and unleashed his latest LP with Slash and the Conspirators, 4, earlier this year. Tremonti, meanwhile, released Marching in Time – the fifth full-length he's made with his solo band, Tremonti – in late 2021, and followed it up earlier this year with a Frank Sinatra covers album in support of the National Down Syndrome Society.

Now though, Kennedy and Tremonti – plus bass guitar player Brian Marshall and drummer Scott Phillips – have teamed back up for a new Alter Bridge album called Pawns & Kings. The band's seventh album, Pawns & Kings was helmed by longtime collaborator/producer Michael “Elvis” Baskette, and is set for an October 14 release via Napalm Records.

You can check out the lyric video for its lead single and title track below.

In an interview with My Planet Rocks earlier this month, Tremonti said that the then-unannounced new Alter Bridge album would feature some rather "heavy riffs," and the record's title track certainly delivers on that promise.

Clocking in at over six minutes, Pawns & Kings shows the band's mastery of dynamics, rising from a subdued intro to galloping verses, while touching on thrash in its middle. Best of all, it's highlighted with some truly epic call-and-response solos.

We'd usually credit those to Tremonti by default, but in that same My Planet Rocks interview, the guitarist also said that he and Kennedy swapped their usual roles more regularly while recording Pawns & Kings, with the former handling more vocals, and the latter taking on more lead electric guitar work. 

Indeed, the album is set to feature a tune called Stay, a ballad that features Tremonti on vocals.

You can examine the cover art and track list of Pawns & Kings below. To preorder the album, visit Alter Bridge's website.

Alter Bridge – Pawns & Kings:

1. This Is War                                                            
2. Dead Among The Living
3. Silver Tongue
4. Sin After Sin
5. Stay
6. Holiday
7. Fable Of The Silent Son
8. Season Of Promise
9. Last Man Standing
10. Pawns & Kings

Earlier this may, Mark Tremonti dropped the news that Alter Bridge’s upcoming album will be titled Pawns & Kings, and that it is scheduled to arrive on October 14 via Napalm.

While we’ve yet to hear anything from the album, at the time Tremonti did say the record will be promoted with an extensive tour soon after its release, starting November 1 and concluding December 12.

Now that the release date is creeping ever closer, Tremonti has started stoking the proverbial fire of the hype train, teasing an upcoming album full of, in true Alter Bridge fashion, some seriously heavy riffs.

What’s more, the electric guitar titan revealed that this time out it was his bandmate and fellow six-string hero Myles Kennedy who brought the heaviest riffs of the lot to the writing table.

Speaking to My Planet Rocks, Tremonti confirmed the mastering process had recently been completed and teased, “I think if you're a fan of Alter Bridge, you'll dig this record.”

“There are some heavy riffs on there,” he said. “And you know, some of the heaviest riffs on the record, Myles brought to the table. It's funny that even my producers can't tell who's bringing what to the table anymore. 

“Because back when the band started, [I was] the heavy guy, Myles was the moody guy,” he added. “And now you never know.”

Tremonti elaborated by saying he and Kennedy swapped roles more regularly while recording Pawns & Kings, with Kennedy taking on more solo action and Tremonti handling more vocals.

“At this point, Myles loves playing guitar solos, and I love singing,” he continued. “So we like to do each other's roles, because I think he doesn't feel the pressure as a guitar player because he's known as a singer; I don't feel the pressure as a singer because I'm known as a guitar player. So we liked filling the other person's role. It's fun.”

The Creed guitarist went on to pile the praise on his bandmate, and recalled being suitably impressed by Kennedy’s playing prowess when Alter Bridge were in their formative years.

“He's an amazing guitar player,” he observed. “I remember when he was at my house, when we were putting together the first or second [Alter Bridge] record, I heard some jazz going on in my spare bedroom. 

“And I walked by, knocked on the door, opened it up, and I thought, 'Who are you playing on the radio?' And it was him. 'I had no idea you could play guitar like this, you've got to play on the next record!'

“To me, he's got one of the best vibratos of any guitar player I've ever heard. So he's definitely a very studied guitar player.”

Pawns & Kings will arrive later this year. For updates, head over to Alter Bridge.

“The show must go on.” That’s the maxim the musician lives by, no matter what slings and arrows of outrageous fortune come their way. 

This is one of the immutable tenets of performance ethics, contributing to the surely apocryphal tale of the Titanic’s band maintaining their jam during the most infamous maritime disaster of all time. It’s also one that animates the following guitar players to keep on playing when their strings break mid-song, reducing the six-string electric guitar to five – a situation that’d reduce lesser players to jelly.

There is a lot we can learn from watching these professionals deal with a string breakage, often with an air of casual defiance, as though they were Da Vinci swatting a fly from his brow before gamely putting the finishing touches to the Mona Lisa. 

Of course, we know that sometimes the show must not go on, and yet it just does, steamed by its own momentum. How many times have we stood there, riffing into the abyssal void of an empty provincial venue? Or when the crowd just look confused, and it’s only once the adrenaline has subsided that you realize you can’t hear the singer, the drums are mixed too low and you’ve missed a chorus?

Just like string breakages, these things just happen. But, even if you’ve got a Floyd Rose vibrato and a B string flapping in the breeze, the show must go on. With that in mind, here are 10 notable guitarists who kept their cool and kept on playing after snapping a string mid-song.

1. Stevie Ray Vaughan

If the American Film Institute treated YouTube footage of master guitarists playing on after a string breakage with the same reverence it reserves for the feature film, this would be talked about in the same breath as Citizen Kane.

Here, playing with Double Trouble at Austin City Limits, Stevie Ray Vaughan was just 34, and was at the height of his powers. In an all too short a time on this world, SRV was generous with his gifts. This performance of the Hank Ballard blues standard Look At Little Sister is worth studying on many levels. Perhaps the first lesson is on how to stitch together a 12-bar groove with a relaxed-fit pocket with room to swing, and how to assemble a formidable backing band and then get the best out of them.

The second, though, is all about delivering the solo, and continuing to deliver it once the string goes ‘pop’. Wait for the vest to swap out his ‘Number One’ Strat for ‘Scotch’. There is a lot of scuttlebutt with regards to SRV’s preferred string gauge. If you believe some, he used tow ropes for the wound strings. That would certainly allow him to dig in as he did.

2. John Frusciante  

We’ve all been there, right? Jamming with the Red Hot Chilli Peppers in Brazil on our 1960 Fender Telecaster Deluxe, and a string goes. You can’t blame it. Its tensile fortitude had been tested to the limit and beyond by a particularly fevered performance of If You Have To Ask from the Chilis’ 1991 tour de force Blood Sugar Sex Magik – the solo of which is one of Frusciante’s most freaky-deaky.

If the stage-lights hadn’t got this gossamer strand of silver blowing in the wind, no one – perhaps not even Flea, who’s directing traffic in this jam – would have noticed, with Frusciante digging into the elasticity of his right wrist to keep the funk going. It’s funny, because on the record, Frusciante receives a round of applause from those in the studio when he finishes his solo. It’s like they knew… 

3. Slash 

One of the reasons Slash’s guitar playing is always worthy of deeper study is the dichotomy between his deft use of the harmonic minor scale and its melodic grandeur to complement the pentatonic bread-and-butter, and the fact that he has a quasi-bestial playing style. It’s like Dr. Jekyll picks the notes and Mr. Hyde plays them.

The man attacks the strings. Little wonder Ernie Ball used Slash as a test pilot to demonstrate just how tough their Paradigm sets are – Ernie Ball claims its RPS (Reinforced Plain String) technology improves tensile strength by up to 35 per cent, with fatigue strength up 70 per cent.

In this fan-filmed performance of Anastasia – the centerpiece of his 2012 album with Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators, Apocalyptic Love – Slash is tearing it up through the solo before the B string goes bye-bye. Which, frankly, begs the question: if you were to lose a string mid-performance, which would you want it to be? 

Either way, Slash is totally unperturbed. He knows his style, his gear. Those purple Tortex 1.14 mm guitar picks he prefers have very little flex, even when you’re playing a set of 11s. In other words, he knows the risks. They have been priced in. And even when things go south, you can’t let it take you out of the moment. Though, we’d wager it is on occasions such as this that Slash was more than happy he didn’t go down the Floyd Rose route like so many of his peers.

4. B.B. King  

Some might have worried that B.B. King would be out of his element when he took to the stage at Farm Aid – that the wide open spaces and bright afternoon light of the Memorial Stadium in Champaign, Illinois, were too expansive for the King of the Blues to seat 80,000 people in the palm of his hand. But just so long as there was a stage, B.B. King was all right.

Organized by John Mellencamp, Willie Nelson and Neil Young, this star-studded fundraiser must have drawn a high proportion of its audience from the agricultural community, and the cucumber growers among them would have recognized a whole new level of cool when King broke a string during a feisty rendition of How Blue Can You Get?, not taking a moment’s pause, and restringing Lucille while putting heart, lungs and soul into the vocals.

We know King was a stickler for intonation, with the fine-tuning TP-6 tailpiece one of the things that distinguishes Lucille from a garden-variety ES-345. Indeed, an unprintable curse word might have entered his head. But onstage, all that mattered was the song, the audience, the show. Total pro. 

5. Tommy Emmanuel  

If you are performing an unaccompanied rock ’n’ roll boogie on an acoustic guitar at a hazardous tempo – a performance so out-there in the scale of its virtuosity that we’re glad there was video to prove it was one player – and you do it all without breaking a string? Well, did you even perform such a piece.

Here, Australian acoustic maestro Tommy Emmanuel breaks a string and carries on, and that is why this performance is on this list. But this footage is more than just documented proof of Emmanuel’s god-like credentials; it’s that sort of humbling-yet-inspiring wizardry that makes people want to pick up the instrument in the first place.

And all of us who have done so already... well, it’s time to revisit the guitar and ask of ourselves; how can our technique and improvisational brio produce an étude such as this? Chet Atkins would have looked on with pride.

6. Mark Tremonti  

No-one will ever or has ever questioned the physical condition of Mark Tremonti. He is the one player you do not want to go circuit training with. That goes double when it comes to exchanging lead guitar lines. Who among us would not wither like a dandelion stewing in weed control at the prospect?

But such physical condition comes with a health warning for guitar strings, and on this occasion – as Alter Bridge took to the stage at the Baltimore Soundstage, Maryland – Mr. T leaned into the rhythm figure for Cauterize and opened up a can of whoop-ass on the E string.

As the other Mr. T might say, “To have a comeback, you have to have a setback.” Well, luckily a tech was on hand with another PRS solidbody Singlecut to see the song through. Tremonti never missed a beat.

7. Eric Clapton  

Here is some documentary footage of ecclesiastical importance, proving that Eric Patrick Clapton is not God. That’s right: if he really was God, do you think he would be standing onstage at Knebworth putting his Fender Stratocaster through the mill, only for a string to break? 

Surely, fellow six-string theologians, this is incontrovertible proof that Clapton puts one leg of his pink suit trousers on at a time like the rest of us. Or, is this just the sort of thing that God would want us to think. Why set a bush aflame or send Gabriel with a message when a little diversion could be just as effective? 

Whatever the divine provenance or otherwise of Mr. Slowhand, you have to admit that Clapton epitomizes cool here in this performance of Before You Accuse Me. 

You can just picture the scene, side of stage:

Satan (laughing): “Broken string, Mr Clapton? Do you want to have a cry?”

Clapton (hair flowing in the breeze, tastefully hirsute, definitely owns a sports-car): “Get behind me, Satan! I licked you at the Crossroads, mate, and I’m gonna lick you now. You got that!? I’m onstage at Knebworth, wearing a pink suit, with Lace Sensor single-coils in my Strat – ‘cos its 1990 and that’s still legit. This is still a free country, mate!”  

8. Buddy Guy  

Sometimes it’s happenstance that makes a performance great. That’s especially true of playing the blues – an art form that has parallels with stand-up comedy. The storytelling discipline and crowd management requires a similar temperament, the likes of which blues great and master showman Buddy Guy has in spades. 

This performance from 2010’s Crossroads Festival – since released as a concert LP and film – has an end-of-semester feel, the promise of an endless summer. Everyone played this show. But even as proceedings ease into a casual jam on the Stones classic Miss You, with Ronnie Wood and Johnny Lang as wingmen, Guy is always switched on.

When his string breakage interrupts his part and Wood steps in to offer him his Strat, Guy has that look in his eyes; it’s time to style it out and have a little fun with the crowd. “I broke my guitar string, I’m going to keep on trying to play…” His polka-dot signature Strat gets prepared, but all in good time. String breakage? Don’t let it give you the blues. Turn it into the blues. 

9. Ed Sheeran 

With his Chewie II loop station on hand, there are few players in the world more prepared for a string breakage than Ed Sheeran.

It’s a creative tool, of course – the looper building layers of accompaniment, with one of the world’s highest-grossing musicians ostensibly using a beefed-up busker’s rig – but it also serves as a technological prophylactic. Handy when you’re strumming the bejeezus out of a capo’d small-bodied acoustic guitar during the helter-skelter folk-pop of You Need Me, I Don't Need You... something could go.

And it does. The G string succumbs. The loop pedal hangs in there. Another five strings keep the layers going and Sheeran’s vocal delivery puts on a display of alphabet aerobics that’d see a veteran cattle auctioneer pull up injured with a twisted tongue. That’s showbiz.

10. Steve Vai 

Steve Vai’s DIY DNA has stood him in good stead over the years, and its reframing of challenges – physically, creatively and otherwise – as opportunities typically leads to him doing something pretty special, and more often than not something that no-one else has ever done before. 

Recent examples include Knappsack, from his latest album, Inviolate, quite possibly the most Steve Vai album ever recorded. With his arm in a sling, he wrote and performed a track using just his fretting hand, making full use of his Jedi legato training.

But what makes Vai more vulnerable to string breakages than anyone else on this list is that double-locking vibrato. As we all know, a breakage on a Floyd is panic stations for your tuning as the unit is off-balance.

Vai loses his top string, the least problematic, and yet to adapt the solo to The Crying Machine with intonation on-point is genius at work. When he gets the chance to switch JEMs, it’s like a video-game power-up has come online to see him through to the end, triumphant and divine.

Mark Tremonti has announced a new covers album, Tremonti Sings Sinatra, on which he trades electric guitar riffing for sultry crooning as he takes on a series of classic songs by Frank Sinatra.

Scheduled to arrive May 27, the album was created in partnership with the National Down Syndrome Society (NDSS) – which helps support individuals with Down syndrome and their families – and will be released through a new charity initiative created by Tremonti called Take a Chance for Charity. Proceeds from the album will go towards the NDSS.

The cause is close to Tremonti, as his daughter Stella was born with Down syndrome in March last year.

“For years, I've loved singing along to Frank's songs,” he explains. “One night, I found an old video of him performing The Song is You from 1944. It made me want to dive into his vocal approach. I was all in and I wanted to do something with it.

“When we found out about our daughter Stella's Down syndrome diagnosis, the stars aligned. My obsession with Sinatra had its reason. Frank Sinatra raised more than a billion dollars for charity and that is a fact I wish the public knew more about. Beneath his cool and calm persona, he had a big heart.”

“Doing this charity in his name was another way the stars had aligned,” Tremonti continues. “I decided to do this record to raise funds for families and individuals with Down syndrome. This project is the start of a new purpose that I will have for the rest of my life.”

Tremonti Sings Sinatra might be a covers album, but the Alter Bridge guitarist did everything he could to faithfully recreate 14 of the New Jersey-born crooner's classic tracks.

In addition to seeking creative guidance from the Sinatra family themselves, Tremonti reached out to Sinatra's musical director Mike Smith, who collected as many members of Sinatra's touring band as he could for the recording.

The result is a faithful recreation of Sinatra's soft and sultry orchestral-backed music, as heard in the album's first track, a rendition of I've Got You Under My Skin. Take a look at the record's track list below.

1. I’ve Got You Under My Skin
2. I’ve Got The World On A String
3. I Fall In Love Too Easily
4. Wave
5. Fly Me To The Moon
6. Nancy (With The Laughing Face)
7. My Way
8. You Make Me Feel So Young
9. Luck Be A Lady
10. That’s Life
11. Come Fly With Me
12. In The Wee Small Hours Of The Morning
13. The Song Is You
14. All Or Nothing At All

The album has already been well-received by several high-profile names in the guitar sphere, including Slash, who praises Tremonti's uncanny take on Sinatra, and Kirk Hammett, who notes his astonishment at the guitarist's “golden pipes”.

Tremonti Sings Sinatra is available to preorder now.

Here we have it, folks: your favorite riffs of 2021. The votes have been counted and, by the power invested in the crude democratic efficiency of the online poll, we can see which ‘short repeated phrase in popular music and jazz, typically used as an introduction or refrain in a song’ reigns supreme.

This year was big for metal. Indeed, only two out of the 10 could be described as something other than metal, and even then, one is hard rock, and the other was written and performed by a guy who knows Slash. It’s impossible to decipher what this list tells us about the riff, and our tastes in it, but maybe it's the same thing that every year-end Best Riff list tells us – that, even within the one subculture of guitar playing, there are innumerable ways to get the job done, and that rhythm is key to making these parts work.

After all, there are only so many notes. How we arrange them, and the pockets of groove that we can summon out of the raw ingredients of electric guitar, is crucial. 

This list also begs the question: are the best riffs always on electric guitar? These certainly are, but we would argue that a great riff will sound just as great on a parlor-sized acoustic guitar as it does through an enormo-rig. For evidence, check out Melvins’ Five-Legged Dog, which saw Buzz Osborne rearrange some of the most inventive riffs for acoustic. 

Are there any glaring omissions here? Well, there are so many riffs it's hard to keep score, but it is strange that Greta Van Fleet missed out after taking top spot in your Best Solos of 2021 list. And to have such a metal-heavy list but then no Carcass, when Torn Arteries presented such a smorgasbord of gourmet hesher’s delights, seemed like an oversight.

But that’s life. And you’ll just have to check in later in the week to see if any of those turn up in your favorite guitar albums of 2021.

• The 10 best guitar solos of 2021
• The 20 best guitar albums of 2021

10. Architects – Animals 

Architects have something philosophically grand but ultimately pessimistic to say about humankind’s place on this planet – something about us not quite fulfilling the promise of our Darwinian triumph. Or perhaps its just misanthropy; there’s a lot of it around. Either way, to articulate this, the British metalcore band dress the guitars in a gorilla suit and go 100 per cent silverback primitive on our unworthy asses. It’s quite spectacular.

It is maybe too early in this list to go referencing the Brown Note, but what Adam Christianson does with his seven-string is in effect a chemical-free colon cleanse, with a style of songwriting that invites crude analogies to such profound physical reactions from its audience. This is a chug inspired by the mind’s sharpness but delivered via high-volume low frequency blunt force. Crude, effective and, yes, animalistic.

9. Spiritbox – Circle With Me 

Mike Stringer loves nothing more than taking contemporary metal into ever more progressive and technologically augmented spaces, and Circle With Me is a prime example of this aesthetic sensibility in action, with the trance-y, aerated electronic parts endowing the track with the soul of the machine.

But for all this future-forward, metal 4.0 frontiersmanship, Stringer is at his best when he is engaging with the manual pleasures of electric guitar manipulation, scoring the strings with the pick and introducing the timbre of his Abasi Concepts Larada 8 Legion to seismologists the world over. He might keep us waiting for the riff to detonate but we know it’s coming. As Hitchcock explained, that is the definition of suspense.

8. Iron Maiden – Stratego 

Written by Janick Gers and team captain Steve Harris, Stratego is something of a throwback for the British heavy metal institution: a work of 21st-century NWOBHM that captures the quintessence of the Iron Maiden anthem. You’ve got a gallop, octave guitars, harmonies, melodies, and the riff so favored by the six-string triumvirate of Gers, Dave Murray and Adrian Smith is more rapier than battle axe. The flash of the blade, if you will.

While Senjutsu – the latest long-form heavy metal odyssey from Iron Maiden – puts some distance between these dramatic moments of derring-do, when they come together like this, with Bruce Dickinson channeling Sun Tzu and his Long Beach rocking self, it’s pure gold, and all the invitation we need to park a sand-shoe on a wedge monitor and toss our Stratocasters around without a care in the world. 

7. Dream Theater – Awaken the Master 

Why did no one think to make John Petrucci an eight-string electric guitar before now? You'd think it would have come up in conversation at one of Petrucci and Sterling Ball’s epic barbecues, a platter of franks evoking that mega-hench low F#. No matter, it’s here now, and as soon as Mr. P took receipt of the prototype Majesty 8, he wrote Awaken the Master.

The extra fretboard acreage sure doesn’t slow him down here. This is a lithe groover, the jolly green giant in tap shoes, and it lends what is otherwise a 10-minute prog-metal jam a sense of physicality to contrast the otherworldly arrangements that stretch out and color in what is yet another epic Dream Theater soundscape – and indeed extend what’s possible with an eight-string guitar. Never mind the beard oil, JP, we’d need liniment on the fingers after attempting this one at home.

6. Bodom After Midnight – Paint the Sky with Blood 

The tragic death of Alexi Laiho casts this posthumous release in a bittersweet light, but there could be no more appropriate track to sign off on than this. Paint the Sky with Blood is a distillation of the Laiho ethos and a typically extravagant guitar spectacular that carries on in the Children of Bodom tradition of mainstreaming extreme metal for the broadest audience possible.

This subversive act is to be commended, and facilitated by Laiho’s gifts as an entertainer. The melody is foregrounded but not at the expense of the aggression, for holding both in equilibrium is key to making this material work – that and the imagination to make it come alive.

5. Trivium – In the Court of the Dragon 

The riff that Matt Heafy and Corey Beaulieu hatch on the epic title-track from the Orlando, Florida metal stalwarts’ 10th album, is all muscle and sinew – a veritable boa constrictor. Some occasions call for Trivium to invoke the hyper-animated power of Skolnick/Peterson but for others, such as this, they need something different, and what is, of course, prima facie a kinetic, powerful metal riff is really kind of like a blues turnaround, weaponized and taken out of context.

Where did that style of riff-making come from in popular metal? Dimebag Darrell was certainly one of its architects, and Lamb of God use a similar construction for their riffs. What links all three is that sense of groove and swing, proving that metal can sound all the more physically imposing when it can move its hips.

4. Gojira – Born For One Thing 

This is a list of greatest riffs, and so first off the kudos has to go to Joe Duplantier and Christian Andreu for rewilding metal with this thrashing squawker. But Duplantier’s kid brother Mario on drums gets a little co-ownership of this one, for his beat really makes that riff shift and turn.

Indeed, there are two principal riffs here. There’s the squawker, and a head-down chug to test the tensile strength of the Earth’s crust. Like everything in the Gojira catalog, both are executed exquisitely, but not at the expense of the human feel. No-one grooves quite like them. It’s perhaps a lesson learned from listening to Sepultura in their pomp, but this uncanny sense for finding the pocket and stretching it a little to defy metal’s rigid form is something you are born with.

3. Mammoth WVH – Don’t Back Down 

In a list dominated by the box-office pummel of today’s contemporary metal set, the feel-good defiance of Mammoth WVH’s Don’t Back Down is a welcome change of pace. It’s a fun, Friday night fuzz jam that leans into a sort of plaid-shirt Kyuss groove, albeit without the desert sand under the fingernails. 

Just when you think you’ve got a bead on it, Wolfgang Van Halen will throw in a passing note to keep you honest. But really the triumph of this riff is in its adaptability and how it informs the song, reprised as a melody to sit under the lyric. Then, when it’s time to come out into the foreground, it strong-arms its way through the mix, doing as all great hard-rock rhythm guitar does: commanding all that goes before it and carrying the song forward on broad shoulders. 

2. Myles Kennedy – In Stride 

Myles Kennedy slides into our affections and takes silver with a track that sounds like he has turned American popular guitar culture into a big ol’ engine, and he's revving it up to hurry everyone out for a summer-long road trip. 

Oh, yes, this is a fun one. A delectable truffle shuffle that sounds a little anachronistic for our overly serious and fraught present, and would play better if we all lived life at the pace and zen temperature of Dazed and Confused’s David Wooderson. That would be all right, all right, all right. It also reminds us that in rock ’n’ roll the slide can do a lot of heavy lifting when you need to write something effervescent and instinctive like this. But then it is a track about a preparing for a zombie apocalypse, and that really would be a bummer for the summer.

1. Tremonti – Now and Forever 

Let’s talk about Mark Tremonti’s right hand. There has always been a physicality to his playing, something of the Green Beret wrestling champ 2006 about his manipulation of the strings. But here, proving once more that rhythm is the lifeblood of the metal guitar riff, his wrist has got a Federer-esque mastery of its brief. 

Is this the triumph of science? Has Alter Bridge Inc. amassed a team of specialists to train our point man and riff-master general 2021, to make sure that, when the time comes to lay down a take, he is in prime physical condition. Or is this just years spent umbilically tethered to a metronome – “Hi, everyone, the name’s Tremonti, Mark ‘Soundbrenner’ Tremonti” – and stopping just before the point of passing out? It’s probably the latter. Or alien tech. Either way, Tremonti’s Now and Forever riff is a tour de force of power and precision, shock and awe. 

• The 10 best guitar solos of 2021
• The 20 best guitar albums of 2021

It’s that time of year when we give it up and offer the lead guitarists a well-deserved round of applause. Well done, everyone, you’ve earned it. As we guitar players know, a great guitar solo contains multitudes. 

Oftentimes it’s all about the woodshedding, but then mavens of tantric sustain might beg to differ. Technique can be critical, but usually it’s the tone, or even the lack of a rigid schoolbook performance, that makes a solo worthy of multiple listens.

For many players, especially those whose names are not on the ticket, diplomacy is key when convincing bandmates to surrender 32 bars or more to your musical genius. But perhaps we should stop looking at lead guitar as being separate to the songwriting process. Here, we have a wide range of styles, and yet all conform to that one rule of serving the song. 

It has been quite the year for lead guitar. John Petrucci has put his name to two albums and yet the top 10 eludes him. Julian Lage’s Blue Note debut, Squint, saw him attack electric jazz guitar with a freewheeling zeal, and then we had Eric Gales’ show-stealing solo with Joe Bonamassa, when he dug deep into his musical vocabulary to set alight to I Want My Crown. 

Then there was Steve Vai’s act of one-armed legato genius, Knappsack. That none of these made the cut speaks to the impact of the following, and that the pop-cultural compass of the Guitar World reader is pointed towards the sounds of the '70s and '80s reimagined for today.

• The 10 best guitar riffs of 2021
• The 20 best guitar albums of 2021

10. Slash ft. Myles Kennedy and The Conspirators – The River Is Rising

Is it even an end of year best guitar solos list if it doesn’t include the top-hatted rock animal who signs his Christmas cards ‘Slash’? Here, his long-time co-Conspirator Myles Kennedy gives him the big build-up, before the band take a deep breath and heave into a double-time feel for a solo that has shades of Slash’s fast-picking Paradise City approach, foregrounding a helter-skelter melody that resolves in a muscle-car AC/DC/Aerosmith lick.

There are faster guitar solos. There are more melodic guitar solos, too. But there’s something about Slash’s feel that is so aggressive you wonder how you could ever replicate it, least not on a Les Paul stringed with a set of 11s. Maybe we’ll try the Rocky method, downing raw eggs at sun-up, and perhaps spiking our superfoods smoothie with a healthy tot of sour mash whiskey.

9.  Joe Bonamassa – Mind’s Eye 

Time Clocks took all of us for a spin. The way Mr. Bonamassa was talking, this was to be a stripped-down New York album, a work of throw-and-go electric blues. And yet it turned out to be a long-form epic with the influence of prog heroes such as Chris Squire coming to the fore and broadening the canvas. 

Mind’s Eye takes the blues ballad through the looking glass – a dark night of the soul on the dark side of the moon – and it’s capped with a lead passage that eschews any temptation for pentatonic boogie for melodic minor key virtuosity, played on guitars that could tell you first hand what John F. Kennedy was wearing at his inauguration.

With the feel on this one, it’s as though Bonamassa had been watching the weather channel for inspiration, building and building the intensity of the storm then allowing us a moment to get our heads together in the aftermath.

8. Flock of Dimes – Price of Blue 

And so for something skronky, spanky and crunchy. Jenn Wasner’s Flock of Dimes is always essential listening for budding tonesmiths who want to take the electric guitar out of its conventional jazz/blues/rock/metal law of gravity, and her latest album, Head of Roses, is exquisite in terms of tone and composition.

The Price of Blue solo, though, tracked on an '80s Fender Stratocaster owned by producer Nick Sanborn's father, is a remarkable piece of work. It’s the tone, yes, but it’s also the phrasing and Wasner’s use of the vibrato. It sounds like it has gently torn something in the mix, as though something mechanical has gone and it’s set loose the song’s ID. It also serves as a successful reference for how to hold the atonal and the melodic in perfect equilibrium.

7. Myles Kennedy – The Ides of March 

As a soothsayer to the Roman Emperor, Caesar famously said, "Beware The Ides of March." Not necessarily because your courtiers and palace rivals might stick the knife into you, but because nailing the phrasing on this standout guitar moment from Myles Kennedy’s latest solo album might drive you madder than Schumann.

Guitar players will recognize the real heroes behind this piece – the guitar techs who set up the guitar, and the engineers who made the guitar tuner so accurate. Like walking on the moon, a solo that relies on such on-point intonation is a team sport, and spectacular when it comes off. 

Kennedy’s profile as a guitarist is often overshadowed by his pals Slash and Alter Bridge bandmate Mark Tremonti, but the title track from his latest solo album is a showcase for his formidable talents, chief among them that sense of feel, intonational propriety, and phrasing.

6. Cardinal Black – Tell Me How It Feels 

Chris Buck gives this neo-soul rocker a welcome power-up with some sweet cream fingerstyle lead guitar that seems to have culled its note choices and phrasing from the back catalog of Motown Records. 

Okay, so most human voices might not get up this high – and God help Tom Hollister if his voice ever reaches this pitch – but Buck’s solo here really sounds like an ancillary vocal line played on guitar.

You might have arrived here as a Cardinal Black fan, but the chances are you will already be familiar with the amiable six-string phenom from his YouTube presence, and he has been typically kind enough to break this solo down for us on his YouTube channel. 

Check out that video if you want him tell you more, but one last word from us – that Yamaha Revstar, Mythos Golden Fleece fuzz pedal, ThorpyFX Gunshot into a Victory V140 Super Duchess is a recipe for artery-clogging tone, leavened with a soupçon of lemon juice treble. It’s positively epicurean; Bon Appétit should run a column on Buck’s tone.

5. Tremonti – Marching in Time 

Mark Tremonti’s guitar solos are a little like the post-millennial acting career of Tom Cruise. You know there will be running. You know there will be thrills, spills and a sense of shock and awe. But even though you know all this is coming, there’s a gratifying adrenaline rush for seeing – or in Tremonti’s case, hearing – this all come together.

Marching in Time is vintage Tremonti, widescreen and dynamic, and its solo could only come from a black belt in legato jiu-jitsu. Using a wah pedal as a filter, he showcases some ridiculously dexterous chops, with intervallic gaps that suggest you might need hands like E.T. to fret them comfortably. But if we are to anoint Tremonti as Top Gun of crowd-pleasing virtuosity, it is probably on the super-human fluidity of his position changes.

4. Dinosaur Jr. – I Met the Stones 

A punk-rock, four-to-the-floor jam that sounds like the Stooges if they were stoned out their gourd and enjoying a six-month sabbatical in Tahiti, I Met the Stones is a highlight from an album of highlights. There’s something cosmic about J. Mascis’ timing; Sweep It Into Space arrived just when we needed it. A soulful, half-awake, half-blissed out, imaginative and human alternative rock album that injected some '90s optimism into our fraught and disquieting present.

While most of the album was tracked on a Fender Telecaster – with Mascis and Fender collaborating on a very smart signature model – Mascis reached for his Eastwood baritone for this solo. The lead guitar on this song is, again, like another vocal presence, snaking around the verse, always present, and it's a wondrous sound: thick, vibrant, and human.

3. Mammoth WVH – Mr. Ed 

We've learned many things about Wolfgang Van Halen in the past year, but perhaps chief among them is that he is his father’s son and his own man. The dignity, strength and, indeed, good humor that he displayed in the months after losing his father, having to process his loss in the public’s eye, is a testament to his character.

And, as a musician, we all learned that WVH is not EVH and there are different influences shaping his sound. But on Mr. Ed, the Van Halen name indicates more than just the familial link, with a guitar solo that references Eddie Van Halen’s trick bag and makes a feel-good song a little more feel-good, but also bittersweet, too. 

Even if you took all the names off this and it just arrived in your inbox in an unnamed FLAC file, the Van Halen ideology that says the guitar solo must boost serotonin and serve as a pick-me-up is all over this. 

2. John Mayer – Last Train Home 

Would the real Last Train Home solo please stand up? Such is John Mayer’s penetration of the Web 2.0, it seems like everybody who has ever picked up an electric guitar has put their stamp on this yacht-rockin’ Valentine’s Day standard. But by democratic assent, your favorite Last Train Home solo – and indeed your silver (sky) medalist for 2021 – is Mayer’s own ballad version.

Again, the tone is primo. We’d call it cutting edge, but we know Mayer was repping '80s Clapton here and enjoying reruns of Manimal and Cagney & Lacey between takes. The retro appeal for anyone who lived through that era is intoxicating. You might even let out a little squeal much like the slide that introduces Mayer’s solo here.

What can we say? This sort of material is right at the heart of the Mayer wheelhouse, and it’s sumptuous. Can lead guitar be coiffed? This sounds like Don Johnson’s hair looked onset circa ’85. Not a note out of place.

1. Greta Van Fleet – Age of Machine 

Your number one solo of the year, and by a wide margin, Age of Machine represents the scale of GVF’s ambition on The Battle at Garden’s Gate.

Once upon a time, there was a sense that the influence from the big beasts of '70s rock was over-weening, but Jake Kiszka’s sleight of hand contends such notions with daring and bold cinematic compositions like this. Age of Machine does to classic rock what Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy did to Tolkien; it updates the text, it recontextualizes it, and it challenges those who might argue that today’s audiences lack the attention span for world-building.

Perhaps conscious of this, Kiszka’s leads make regular appearances, pulling focus at the four-minute mark, just over halfway through the jam, to set the table for the track’s denouement.

When Kiszka was in conversation with Guitar World about The Battle at Garden’s Gate, he spoke of the importance of dynamics with regards to tone, but it holds similarly true for the songwriting. Altogether, it makes for an audiophile’s record. Or, as Kiszka describes it, "An orgasmic, cinematic piece of rock ‘n’ roll."

• The 10 best guitar riffs of 2021
• The 20 best guitar albums of 2021

A Fender Elite Stratocaster, which has been played onstage by blues guitar legend Stevie Ray Vaughan and owned by metal maestro Mark Tremonti, is set to go up for auction at Gotta Have Rock And Roll.

The bizarre-looking electric guitar, a far cry from the traditional Fender Stratocasters that Vaughan favored throughout his career, is an example of an Elite Strat – a forward-thinking redesign of the six-string that came out in 1983.

Vaughan, who had wielded the quirky six-string for a show in the Palace in 1989, signed, dated and sold the Strat for charity, with the following owner placing it on display at the Rockwalk in Los Angeles.

That was until Creed and Alter Bridge’s Mark Tremonti came along and purchased the guitar in 2001 – hopefully to play a beef’d-up, chug-heavy version of Pride and Joy – before selling it once more through Carter Vintage Guitars.

Now, the Elite Stratocaster – which has been handled by two of the biggest names in the blues and metal worlds – is up for auction once again, and is estimated to sell for up to $150,000.

Whoever bids the highest will also receive a letter of provenance from the current owner, a number of tags from its time as a Rockwalk exhibit, a James Spence Authentication letter of authenticity and a certificate of authenticity from Gotta Have Rock And Roll.

The high-profile names associated with this Strat isn’t the only thing that makes it unique, however. A quick visual appraisal will reveal just some of the bonkers appointments that the Fender Elite Strat’s spec sheet boasts.

Gone is the five-way selector switch and spring-cover backplate. Instead, the Elite comes equipped with three pickup selector buttons, which introduce a host of unique pickup configuration options – including neck and bridge, and all three single-coils at once.

If that spec sounds familiar, that’s because it was popularized by David Gilmour, who equipped his own Fender Strat with a mini-toggle that could access the aforementioned pickup pairings.

Other unorthodox features found on Vaughan’s Strat include the side-mounted output jack – rather than the usual body-mounted alternative – and a revised, slightly cumbersome vibrato system.

In a recent video, Music Is Win’s Tyler Larson road-tested the unusual six-string and attempted to see if the Strat could succeed in serving up Vaughan's signature sound. Safe to say, it certainly threw up some interesting tones.

The Gotta Have Rock And Roll auction got underway on Wednesday (December 1) and is set to run until December 10.

To find out more, visit Gotta Have Rock And Roll.

What was the first guitar you bought with your own money? 

“I bought a Les Paul imitation called a Tara and it cost me 10 bucks. I had a buddy in sixth or seventh grade who had the guitar and he was going to upgrade and so he said, ‘I will sell you this guitar for 10 bucks if you join my band and I’ll teach you to play.’ 

“We started a band called Wit’s End. We did punk rock and heavy metal and Cheap Trick… lots of different things, whatever we could actually play. It wasn’t very complicated stuff. I got into the more Mötley Crüe kinda stuff later on and I wanted to play Metallica and Slayer, of course, but the band couldn’t handle that at the time.”  

What was the last guitar you bought and why? 

“Jeez, I can’t really remember to be honest with you. All my guitars nowadays are PRS, and they’re nice enough to give me those [laughs]. Maybe it was a Telecaster that I bought last? I bought a limited-edition Fender Telecaster with custom artwork and they were nice enough to let me pick one up. Sometimes I’ll use it just at home, but when I’m on stage I stick to the signature PRS model.”  

What’s the most incredible find or bargain you’ve had when buying gear? 

“I don’t know if you could call it a bargain, but I was playing with Paul Reed Smith at the NAMM convention and there was a bunch of amps on stage and I saw a Dumble up there. There must have been eight guitar players up there all racing to whatever amp they wanted to play and I plugged into the Dumble and fell in love with it.

“Ever since then I was obsessed with getting one of my own and the folks at Blackbird Studios in Nashville had bought two and I bought one of them. Everyone looked at me like I was nuts for buying it because it was so expensive, but it more than doubled in value over the 15 years that I had it. I ended up parting with it and getting different Dumbles, but when I think of any kind of gear I’ve bought and sold, that was the one I had the best deal on.”

What’s the strongest case of buyer’s remorse you’ve experienced? 

“It was a nice piece of gear that I just didn’t vibe with. I can’t say the name of it because I don’t want to be a mean guy. It was an amp and everybody was talking about how great these amps were and how I just needed to get one. So I hunted it down and, when I got it, it just wasn’t my thing, y’know? Not all amps are going to speak your language.”

Have you ever sold a guitar that you now intensely regret letting go?

“There was a reissue Goldtop Les Paul that I used throughout the big Creed days and I sold it because there was a lawsuit between Gibson and PRS. I was just angry that my [PRS signature] guitar got taken off the shelves for all those years, and so I got rid of that Les Paul just out of anger.

“But I should have kept it because the folks who had made that Les Paul had nothing to do with the folks who caused the lawsuit. And the business has changed hands; there’s new guys in charge who are doing great things. But that’s one I wish I still had.”

What’s your best guitar-buying tip?

“I think a lot of people want to spend $800 instead of the $2,000 that would be a lifelong guitar. When I was younger I spent a lot of money stepping up to guitars, spending four times as much as I needed to, instead of buying the right guitar in the first place. 

“It’s easier said than done as not everyone has that kind of money sitting aside to buy the nice guitar first. Especially when you’re young, you need to have a guitar that’s capable of making you a better player instead of one that frustrates you and makes you not want to play the guitar to begin with. 

“My point is, don’t look for the deal on paper. Pick that guitar up, put it in your hands, play it, be sure it’s not frustrating you and that you can do what you want with it.”

When was the last time you stopped to look in a guitar shop window (or browse online) and what were you looking at?

“It goes without saying that I see all these PRS guitars that I want, but, like I said, if I wait long enough and push hard enough they’ll give them to me!”

If you were forced to make a choice, would you rather buy a really good guitar and a cheap amp or a cheap guitar and a top-notch amp?

“Well, I’m an amp guy. So I reckon I would probably go with the expensive amp and a PRS SE Tremonti model. I think a ton of it comes from the way you play guitar, y’know? I see all these guys who do gear demos – and gear to gear to gear it all sounds the same because of the way they approach it. I think it has a lot to do with technique, how hard you play, how soft you play, what kind of pick you use… it’s a lot to do with those hands and those fingers.”

If you could only use humbuckers or single coils for the rest of your career, which would it be and why?

“Humbuckers all the way. I love single coils, but humbuckers just have a bigger rhythm chunk to them and that’s what I’ve used my whole life. I remember trying to play the song Lenny [by Stevie Ray Vaughan] for a long time and I just thought I was no good.

“I couldn’t get it, but once I picked up a Stratocaster and played it I went, ‘That’s why I didn’t get it, you cannot get that tone without these single coils.’ I love them both, but if I have to go with something for the rest of my life, it would definitely be the humbucker.”

What’s your favourite guitar shop and why?

“It used to be Rudy’s Music up in New York. I mean, every time I was there I would just spend all of my tour money. I haven’t been there in a while because it’s moved around so much – they have two locations and I haven’t gotten the chance to go in recently. But they were one of my all-time favourites.”

• Marching In Time is out now via Napalm.

Mark Tremonti has been with PRS for a long time – 20 years now, if you can believe that. 

In celebration of the 20th anniversary of their relationship with the Alter Bridge electric guitar player, the esteemed Maryland company has unveiled an extremely limited-edition run of Tremonti signature guitars, each hand-painted by artist Joe Fenton.

Only 20 models will be made, with each numbered axe sporting the signatures of Fenton and Tremonti, as well as brand head honcho Paul Reed Smith. 

The new line of one-of-a-kind electrics also marks the latest link-up between the Creed guitarist and the artist, both of whom initially collaborated way back in 2013 when Fenton created Tremonti’s first-ever custom-painted guitar.

That guitar, dubbed “the Fenton”, was first delivered in 2014 and only makes public appearances for special tour dates and photoshoots.

Of his relationship with the brand – and the stunning new guitars – Tremonti commented, “Working with PRS for the last 20 years has been one of the great honors of my career, and we wanted to celebrate that partnership with something really distinctive. 

“Joe’s artistry was an immediate choice for me,” he added. “I love the guitar he painted for me – I play it all the time – and making more of these together is really special.”

Aside from the striking new body art, each model comes equipped with Tremonti’s stock specs, meaning a 25” scale length, 22 frets, Pattern Thin neck profile and adjustable stoptail bridge all make the cut.

“Creating a design for a guitar is really enjoyable,” said Fenton. “PRS guitars are a work of art in themselves. I approached designing each guitar as if I was embellishing a jewel with the shape of the guitar informing the final design.”

The commemorative models will only be available from a select list of retailers in the US – including Guitar Center, American Musical Supply and Sweetwater – as well as a limited list of online outlets around the world, such as Peach Guitars in England and GuitarGuitar in Scotland.

For a full list of retailers, and to find out more about the limited-edition PRS Mark Tremonti guitars, head over to PRS.

Mark Tremonti is a busy man. The longtime PRS Guitars endorsee and signature artist has only just finished wrapping up the fifth Tremonti record, Marching in Time, and he’s already in the process of switching gears for early work on the next Alter Bridge album. 

“It’s almost like the sessions never stop!,” he says, speaking to Guitar World from his home studio, where stacks and stacks of pedals are neatly lined out on the many shelves behind him.

The newest effort from the Tremonti band, in which he sings while sharing guitar duties with Eric Friedman, packs in plenty of the metallic crunch out of which he’s built a magnificent career. And though his recorded output in this group has almost caught up with his main band – at least in terms of albums released – he admits there has been a small amount of cheating involved. 

“I think we barely skipped a beat between [second album] Cauterize and [third album] Dust,” he says. “I kinda think of those two as one record, because it was really just one long recording session. So this feels more like our fourth album, at least in terms of the workload.”

Talk us through the writing process for the record. When did you start building this new body of work? 

“Pretty much immediately after [2019’s] Walk the Sky with Alter Bridge, I kinda hit the ground running. I was probably a year and a half into the writing before I got together with [co-guitarist] Eric Friedman. He’s the guy I count on for demos and bouncing ideas with. He’ll just come stay at the house and I’ll break out my laptop and play him a few hundred ideas. 

“Those are some of my most fun moments as a songwriter. Sitting there, we’ll break out some beers and go on until four in the morning going through all this material. I like to get that first reaction. Eric’s always been great to bounce ideas with. You need to have a comfort spot with your bandmates. 

“The same goes with Myles [Kennedy, Alter Bridge]; both of us are very open with one another on our creativity. You have to let your walls down. It’s the same with Eric. I know what I like, so once I’ve bounced all these hundreds of ideas, it’s good to hear another review of what I’ve done. Once I get the second opinion, I haul ass with arranging the ideas that seem like they’re at the forefront.”  

How exactly do you choose which songs end up in Alter Bridge and which ones are for Tremonti? 

“The most obvious way of knowing is if there’s any kind of speed metal influence in the song. I’ll tend to keep that for Tremonti. Whenever I bring speed metal to Alter Bridge, Scott [Phillips, drums] and Brian [Marshall, bass] kinda look at me like I’m crazy. [Laughs] 

“I think that’s one of the main reasons I started this band. I got tired of coming up with riffs that I loved playing and those guys would be like, ‘Aaah!’ I probably reminded them of the days when we started the band – I’d bring out my Metal Master distortion pedal and do horse gallops. They thought I was nuts. I get to live those moments through this band. So it’s mostly the metal stuff. 

“As far as what works for Alter Bridge, I find it’s usually the more drawn-out, atmospheric stuff. It probably fits that band more, though I love doing songs like that with Tremonti. One of the longest songs we’ve done is the title track on this new record, and that definitely crosses into that grey area of what could work in either band. 

“The subject matter of that song I needed to sing; it’s a song from a father to a child, and my perspective singing it to my daughter. Having your wife being pregnant through 2020 was sketchy, so it was the sentiment a father would have speaking to his child.”  

The opening track kicks off with some of the heaviest sounds you’ve ever dialed in, though you still somehow find the right melodies to follow through. 

“I think the balance I’m always searching for is finding things that are fun and exciting to play, but carry emotive melodies that mean something. That’s the most important part of any song, the vocal melody. You can strum campfire chords and sing great melodies, but that’s not fun night after night. I want it to be musically challenging and fun to play. Sometimes the heaviest and most brutal riffs are the hardest things to write a great vocal melody over!”  

Your solo in The Last One of Us has a wide interval arpeggio that gets played twice and really catches the listener’s ear. 

“It’s that old trick of playing something and then repeating it to make it a theme. That arpeggio that starts it off is the theme, but the second half is actually my favorite part of the solo. There’s a lot of space to phrase; you can do a lick and stop before doing the next one. The heavier stuff is more intense and flashy, but I like the dramatic stuff a bit more.”  

And in other parts of the solo, it sounds like you’re playing pentatonic runs in five. 

“Yeah, that’s one where I’m using fives. I fell in love with fives a while ago. I’d listen to other players and whenever someone would use those patterns, it would turn my head and I’d say, ‘That’s badass!’ I love that sound, especially when Eric Gales, Eric Johnson or Joe Bonamassa pull it off. I’d always think, ‘I’ve gotta learn that thing!’ And I tried for years to do it like Eric Johnson does it. 

“I watched a million videos and can do it when I’m sitting at home with nobody watching me. As soon as I get any adrenaline flowing, I just can’t! That little sweep between the two strings every time you reset that phrase of five is tough. I play hard, so I’m not good at it when I’m amped up. But I finally found a pattern of five where I could pick every note and I’m abusing it on this record… I love it maybe a bit too much. [Laughs] It’s my new go-to picking pattern.” 

Perhaps the hardest thing about those Eric Johnson runs is keeping time when switching from alternate picking to economy for that one note.  

“Yeah! It’s a strange new reflex to learn as a guitar player. It’s not only hard to keep in time but it’s also hard to keep the same velocity to the picked stroke when striking through. You don’t want it too soft or hard, or slipping through too quickly. 

“I think Eric Johnson has such a soft touch and so much control when he does it. Like I said, I’ve spent hundreds of hours playing that stuff, putting on the metronomes and learning all the licks he’s known for. I watched Troy Grady’s stuff, the guy who mastered picking, who teaches incredibly well. You can trust what he’s showing you.  

“When I was growing up, a lot of the teachers would teach you things wrong or the tabs weren’t right, so it’s good to find people like that. You can trust what he’s teaching you is correct because he’s done his homework and shows you the original video and then him playing it with close-ups of the picking. I went through all of that and there were moments where I felt I had it and then I’d pick up a guitar somewhere to show someone and I’d screw it up every time. 

“I got it when I sat there for 45 minutes playing the same thing over and over again, but never to the point where it could be part of my live arsenal. I kinda gave up on it! And you should never be a quitter as a guitar player, but I’d spent too much time on it, so I found my own secret trap-door to doing it picked, but without that sweep.”

Now and Forever features some serious modulation on some of the guitars. What are we hearing? 

“The one I used at the end of the song is wicked. It’s called The Carrier by Hexe Guitar Electronics, and it has this really cool, trippy sound. You have it either rise or decline in tone and it ramps up or down with this kickass swell. And then when it hits the top or bottom, it goes blub blub blub, almost like a muscle-car engine. 

“When it comes to recording sessions, I’m usually the meat-and-potatoes chunky rhythm guy. Myles and Eric are pedal nerds; they’ll sift through boxes until four in the morning with [producer] Michael ‘Elvis’ Baskette. 

“There’s one pedal I loved using for these sessions, and that’s the EarthQuaker Devices Transmisser. It’s really cool and vibey, so I used it for this trancey atmosphere here and there. There was a hand-wired Tube Screamer for overdrive, my Morley wah, a Phase 90 and a Guitar Systems Vibe Tool.”

What guitar amps did you end up using? 

“I wanted to focus mainly on the PRS MT 100. We’ve gone through a lot of different versions of it now. The one I used on the record was a two-channel version and it’s very close to what the final product will be. We’ve actually dialed back the gain because it had so much.

“I noticed I never went past two o’ clock on the amp; I never needed to. I wanted this to sound quiet at bedroom levels if needed. The clean channel had a push/pull, now we have a little bit of gain boost – you can dial that back, but it’s probably my favorite clean from a non-combo amp. 

“My favorite of all time is a Fender ’65 Twin. This, for a 100-watt head, is the best clean I’ve heard. So that’s the main tone. For cleans, I always brought in a Victory V40, which always makes me bring in my Cornford RK100. I think I got a special one. Back when they were still making me amps, they offered to send me one while they were making mine. I liked that one but when they sent the new one, it was a whole other animal. Everyone I know who has tried it absolutely loves it. You can dial the knobs any way you want, it will still sound great.” 

It’s interesting how composed some of these leads feel, like If Not for You, which has very distinct jumps around the neck. 

“I come up with my solos by improvising and then stumbling upon something that I dig. But by no means do I ever worry about making mistakes. If I’m improvising in front of people, sure, I might be more pentatonic and stay safe. But when writing solos, I’ll try to go for sour notes, open strings, overbends, things that might not make any theoretical sense whatsoever.  

“And that’s how I stumble upon the things I dig. About 90 percent of it goes away and 10 percent turns into the solo. On this one, I also got to use an Yngwie lick I learned when I was a kid; it’s the first fast run in that solo. I also got to use one of my favorite descending legato things, but I’d say my favorite thing about this solo is the use of open strings. 

“I do it twice, just like in The Last One of Us, where you have that repeating theme. In this one I do the lower octave for the first half and then a higher one for the second, but it’s the same notes played the same way. The rest is just experimentation and finding which notes speak to me more. 

“A lot of times the hardest thing with writing a solo is coming up with the first four notes. Once I’ve done that, it kinda floats. My weakness, probably, is the blues jam stuff. I feel a bit like when I play the blues it’s pretty typical stuff and not very inventive. That’s kinda why I get out of the box and do stuff that hopefully you haven’t heard a million times.”

We’ve spoken a lot about the solos, but some of the riffs on tracks like In One Piece are tricky in places too. 

“I’m using a combination of open strings and fretted, on the 12th fret. I was doing my best to make it not a simple riff, with something extra weaved in there. When you’re a young guitar player and the first things you learn become your home base for the rest of your life. For me, that’s metal rhythm playing – palm-muting and galloping rhythms. That’s my comfort zone. 

“The lead stuff is harder for me. I practiced a lot of the fast Paul Gilbert patterns when I was younger, but when it came to stuff like Stevie Ray Vaughan, I was terrible at it. My bending and vibrato was nowhere good enough. I attacked the guitar so hard with that rhythm stuff, it didn’t translate well to picking higher strings and bending during solos.” 

What kind of exercises helped you most with your down-picking and triplets? 

“When I was in school, I would challenge people to draw the letter N continually on a piece of paper. I would bet them a dollar I could do twice as many in a minute. I’d practice that all day in school! [Laughs] 

“The best way to get the right hand ready is to set a metronome for 104 or 105 bpm and see how long you can survive doing just downstrokes. Try to get that going for a minute. If you can last three minutes, you’re a champ. Downstrokes are the core of metal rhythm guitar. 

“Once you’ve gotten that down, do the exact same thing with gallops. Those things are workouts. It’s not something you can just instantly get; you have to build up that muscle and make it part of your technique. 

“Growing up listening to Metallica, Testament, Slayer and Exodus, I couldn’t care less about most of the leads. There was no way in the world I was going to learn a Slayer solo. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anybody play a Slayer solo note for note. It’s funny – I went to see them live and saw Kerry King playing a solo from one of their records. I thought he would wing it but no, he played it exactly as it was recorded.”  

You recently shared a cover of Another Day, Another Idea by Brazilian guitarist Mateus Asato, which uses some really colorful ways to link through chords. 

“I found this guy called Darryl Syms online who taught that song. It would take me weeks to sit and learn it by ear, watching videos of Mateus. There was a guy who had done the work for me! It took a few days to get under my fingers and a few more to get closer. It’s those things that might not sound difficult but are difficult, little slides and switches here and there, that I like. 

“The reason I learned that song is because he uses his thumb like Hendrix and does some fingerstyle stuff in the second half. I wanted to incorporate some of that and find new ways of using fingerstyle in my clean playing. I’m always going through YouTube looking for new ideas to pick up, at least one thing a day. 

“It’s funny… my in-laws are staying here right now and my mother-in-law came in asking me the name of that beautiful thing I’d been playing all day. And it is a beautiful piece. I think Mateus is an incredible guitar player, one of the best on earth. There’s so much feel because of that rhythmic side, the way he slaps the guitar as he’s going along. He always finds nice, big-sounding chords and knows how to intertwine them.”  

You had Wolfgang Van Halen playing bass in this band for a number of years. It must be nice to see him enjoying all the success with Mammoth WVH. 

“When you take away the Van Halen name, he’s just a really nice, down-to-earth kid – and he’s super-talented. When you hear him sing live, he’s incredible – plus he’s great on drums, guitar and bass. I found he was really good at learning stuff and memorizing parts. 

“Writing a record is a different skill; it’s very far away from being a shredder or killer drummer. I know so many great guitar players who don’t write. I was blown away when I heard the album. It’s an amazing record and one that I’d wanted to hear for a long time. 

“He and Elvis had been working on it for a few years, maybe even three years. I was online the other night and saw a clip of him playing in Hershey [Pennsylvania], opening up for Guns N’ Roses. I think he’s doing a little better than playing bass for the Tremonti band right now! [Laughs] I’m happy as hell for him.”

And you were also lucky enough to meet Eddie a few times, too. 

“I have some really special memories. One of them is when we were opening for Van Halen at Madison Square Garden and Wolfgang was there. He must have been six – he was just this tiny kid! His mom was there too. Eddie had given me one of his guitars backstage; he tapped away on it and said, ‘Yeah, feels good, here ya go!’ and obviously that’s become one of my most prized possessions. 

“When the show was over, we were backstage underground and there was 300 crew, guests, press everywhere, just swarming the place. We saw Wolf, his mom and Eddie walking out. Eddie saw me out of the corner of his eye and walked through hundreds of people to come over and say, ‘Hey I forgot to tell you – you need to take out two springs to make it play right – sorry I forgot to tell you that earlier!’ Then he gave me a kiss on the cheek and walked right through all the people clamoring for him again. 

“He did that for me?! He had his kid and his wife with him and knew he’d get caught up by everybody, but he took his time out because he gave a shit about his products and passing on knowledge. I got to see him at his core a handful of times and I was lucky. It was a very cool thing.” 

• Marching in Time is out now via Napalm Records.

If you’d ever had the chance to meet the late Eddie Van Halen, the encounter would probably have included a fair bit of stunned silence followed by some nonsensical, awe-struck mumbling. 

For Tremonti, however, his meeting with Van Halen went a far cry better, and saw him leave New York’s Madison Square Garden with a free electric guitar, some sound-shaping axe advice and even a kiss on the cheek. 

Speaking in the latest issue of Guitar World, Tremonti recalled the time he received all three after the pair crossed paths way back when the Creed and Alter Bridge guitarist was opening for Van Halen in the late-'90s.

“I have some really special memories,” Tremonti began. “One of them is when we were opening for Van Halen at Madison Square Garden and Wolfgang was there. He must have been 6 – he was just this tiny kid!

“Eddie had given me one of his guitars backstage,” he continued. “He tapped away on it and said, ‘Yeah, feels good, here ya go!’ and obviously that’s become one of my most prized possessions.”

However, the tale doesn’t end there. As it turns out, Van Halen bestowed the axe to Tremonti without giving him one crucial piece of advice, which concerned the guitar’s functional setup. No surprise there, given Van Halen’s much-discussed fondness for DIY.

“When the show was over, we were backstage underground and there was 300 crew, guests, press everywhere, just swarming the place,” he explained. “We saw Wolf, his mom and Eddie walking out. 

“Eddie saw me out of the corner of his eye and walked through hundreds of people to come over and say, ‘Hey I forgot to tell you – you need to take out two springs to make it play right – sorry I forgot to tell you that earlier!’

“Then he gave me a kiss on the cheek and walked right through all the people clamoring for him again. He did that for me?! He had his kid and his wife with him and knew he’d get caught up by everybody, but he took his time out because he gave a shit about his products and passing on knowledge. 

“I got to see him at his core a handful of times and I was lucky. It was a very cool thing.”

It’s the latest story of Van Halen giving his peers guitar-tweaking advice, after Phil Collen revealed Eddie helped shape the tone of Def Leppard’s Hysteria by encouraging him to put a humbucker in his Fender Stratocaster.

Elsewhere in the interview, Tremonti praised the recent successes of Wolfgang Van Halen and Mammoth WVH, who released their debut album earlier this year and recently completed a US tour supporting Guns N’ Roses.

Of Wolfgang, who played bass guitar in Tremonti between 2012 and 2016, Tremonti said, “When you take away the Van Halen name, he’s just a really nice, down-to-earth kid – and he’s super-talented. 

“When you hear him sing live, he’s incredible – plus he’s great on drums, guitar and bass. I found he was really good at learning stuff and memorizing parts. Writing a record is a different skill; it’s very far away from being a shredder or killer drummer.”

Tremonti went on to say he was “blown away” when he heard Mammoth WVH’s self-titled album, citing his impressive compositional chops, and described it as a record “I’d wanted to hear for a long time”.

“I think he’s doing a little better than playing bass for the Tremonti band right now! I’m happy as hell for him.”

Head over to Magazines Direct to pick up the latest copy of Guitar World, which finds John Petrucci compare guitar playing with weight lifting and features an interview with The Black Crowes’ Rich and Chris Robinson.

If, for whatever reason, you’ve ever parted ways with one of your electric guitars and then immediately regretted your decision as soon as it’s left your hands, you’re not alone. Whether they've been sold to finance future purchases or declutter your collection, post-sale six-string blues are a real thing.

According to a recent interview with Guitarist magazine, Mark Tremonti knows the feeling all too well, and to this day still carries the regret he faced upon selling one of his prized guitars – a Gibson Les Paul Goldtop reissue – a number of years ago.

However, rather than being the result of catalog maintenance, Tremonti instead impulse-sold his six-string while Gibson and PRS were slogging it out in the courts over a legal dispute that pulled his own PRS signature guitar from the stock shelves.

When asked if he’d ever sold a guitar that he now regrets letting go, Tremonti explained, “There was a reissue Goldtop Les Paul that I used throughout the big Creed days and I sold it because there was a lawsuit between Gibson and PRS. 

“I was just angry that my [PRS signature] guitar got taken off the shelves for all those years,” he continued, “and so I got rid of that Les Paul just out of anger.”

However, it was a decision that proved to be fateful, with the Alter Bridge guitarist continuing, “I should have kept it because the folks who had made that Les Paul had nothing to do with the folks who caused the lawsuit. 

“And the business has changed hands: there’s new guys in charge who are doing great things. But that’s the one I wish I still had.”

The lawsuit to which Tremonti refers initially began two decades ago in 2001, and saw Gibson file against PRS over the release of the brand’s recently released Singlecut models, which first emerged in the late ‘90s.

After the courts ruled in favor of Gibson’s case, PRS’s Singlecut six-strings – including Tremonti’s debut signature guitar, which was released in January 2001 – were barred from production, and an injunction was ordered that prevented the models’ creation as of 2004.

Nevertheless, a reversal of the decision was ordered in 2005 and PRS production promptly resumed, with Tremonti’s signature axe making its way once again onto guitar store shelves.

And, though Tremonti was no doubt pleased with the outcome, the entire ordeal unfortunately left him with one great big Gibson Les Paul Goldtop reissue-sized regret to live with. Not the easiest of regrets to get over, we imagine.

Head over to Magazines Direct to pick up the latest issue of Guitarist, which unpicks the history of Les Paul’s Number One, and features interviews with Billy Gibbons and Phil Manzanera. 

Tremonti have shared the final pre-album release from their upcoming studio effort Marching In Time, the bruising, emotionally charged chug-a-thon, Now and Forever.

It’s the fourth single to arrive from the much-anticipated Marching In Time – following the release of If Not For You, A World Away and the record’s title track – which is set to be released later this week (September 24).

And, while the Mark Tremonti-led outfit have already delivered on their claims that “thrash-induced fret fireworks” were inbound via their previous singles, Now and Forever ensures that such impressive form continues right up to the album’s release.

As always, it’s Tremonti and his PRS electric guitar that steals the show, see-sawing between some pulverizing, 100-miles-per-hour right-hand rhythm work and electrifying lead passages.

The Alter Bridge/Creed guitarist receives ample support from his bandmates – Eric Friedman, Tanner Keegan and Ryan Bennett – who in turn offer up a spirited performance of their own, bringing battering kick drums and hammering stringed support lines to the table.

A lyric video has also been released alongside the single, which you can check out – and sing along to, if you so wish – above.

In celebration of the release of Marching In Time, the band will take part in their first-ever livestream event – a virtual concert that will feature a setlist made up of songs from the new album as well as the Tremonti back catalog.

The broadcast will be shown via NoCap Shows on the album’s release day at 9pm ET, and will be available for one week following the premiere.

Marching In Time – Tremonti’s fifth studio album – serves as a follow-up to their 2018 concept effort, A Dying Machine, and sees the band once again join forces with longtime collaborator/producer Michael “Elvis” Baskette.

Tickets for the livestream are available now for $17 from NoCap Shows.

• Marching In Time is out September 24 and available to preorder now.

Tremonti have unveiled the video for the title track of new album Marching In Time.

The song follows previous single If Not For You and is reportedly an exploration of a recent chapter of frontman Mark Tremonti’s life,  as he once again became a father against the backdrop of the pandemic.

Marching In Time is the album’s eponymous final song, the culmination of the group's fifth record, and seems to channel a mixture of fatherly advice and personal mantra. 

Coming in at over seven minutes in length, it offers a suitable scale for its subject matter, blending a belting singalong chorus, with an evolving progressive song structure. Of course, this being a Mark Tremonti project, there’s also a chunky solo thrown in for good measure.

The full release of Marching In Time lands September 24 and Tremonti will be touring the US with Sevendust throughout the month.

When Tremonti – the band led by Alter Bridge/Creed guitar-slinger Mark Tremonti – announced their fifth studio album, Marching in Time, a couple weeks ago, they promised “thrash-induced fret fireworks, wrecking ball grooves, and searing melodies.”

From the sounds of the album's lead single, the newly-released If Not For You, Tremonti's a man of his word.

Armed, as always, with his signature PRS electric guitar, Tremonti unleashes a bounty of sledgehammer rhythm work, with Eric Friedman delivering some cascading leads in turn.

It's Tremonti though, who lights up the song with a climactic solo that blends speed, his blues influences and a keen melodic sense. You can give the tune a spin below. 

Set for a September 24 release via Napalm Records, Marching in Time was produced by Tremonti's longtime collaborator, Michael “Elvis” Baskette. It follows the band's 2019 concept album, A Dying Machine.

You can preorder the album here, and check out its cover art and track list below.

Tremonti – Marching In Time:

1. A World Away
2. Now And Forever
3. If Not For You
4. Thrown Further
5. Let That Be Us
6. The Last One Of Us
7. In One Piece
8. Under The Sun
9. Not Afraid To Lose
10. Bleak
11. Would You Kill
12. Marching In Time