Al Schnier and Chuck Garvey of moe.

by Brian D. Holland.

Once upon a time, back when improvisational freedom and prolonged instrumentals within the genre of rock ‘n’ roll first began, the jam band movement was born. In 1971, the Grateful Dead, aka the definitive jam band, released their first extended concert album, entitled Live Dead. The Allman Brothers Band released their live set recorded at the Fillmore East the same year. Though dissimilar in sound and style, these two legendary rock outfits helped form the jam band concept with shared characteristics, a general sentiment of earthly, laidback melodies containing amazing instrumentals and solo extravaganzas that soared off in various tangential journeys and psychedelic excursions.

Extended improvisation in rock music wasn’t new in ’71, as the Jimi Hendrix Experience, among others, had been doing it for a few years. On the other side of the Atlantic, Cream was well into it as early as 1966, with extended blues covers of Willie Dixon’s ‘Spoonful’ and more. Britain also spawned Wishbone Ash. Though innovative in their own right, emphasis on the dual lead guitar principle and prolonged instrumentals rendered them contemporaries. Dual lead guitar was often emphasized in jam bands, though it wasn’t a requirement.

Although jam band music is more of a rock thing, much of its musical conception can be attributed to the genres of blues and jazz, especially the latter, and to the bop and free form styles of the mid twentieth century. Besides the element of improvisation within prolonged instrumentals, another factor to the jam band recipe is audience participation. The bands possess a common desire to generate fan enthusiasm, rendering them a part of the show, equal partners with the performers onstage. Some even have names for their fans, like Deadheads and Parrotheads, or, as in this particular case, moe.rons.

Fondness for the concert setting, as well as for the multifaceted ideals of the word ‘freedom’: freedom within improvisation and melody, and freedom of the psyche, a temporary distraction from life’s harsh reality and everyday responsibility, has assisted the jam band movement in carrying on right up to the present day. In other words, listening to musicians play good music and interact with their audience in a laidback and enjoyable manner is a lot of fun. That’s what it’s all about.

Musical style varies drastically within the jam band umbrella. That’s what makes the festivals so exciting and interesting. A common interest in the concert vibe as well as a friendly relationship between performers and fans renders them part of the jam band scene more than genre classification. Though one can view the performers as somewhat similar, no actual ‘jam band’ genre even exists. It’s just a general term used to tag the atmospheric bands and performers who flock to the jam band festivals. Many interesting and diverse performers fill a jam band schedule.

moe. (period following the name is a must), consisting of Rob Derhak on bass and lead vocals, Al Schnier on guitar and vocals, Chuck Garvey on guitar and vocals, Jim Loughlin on percussion, and Vinnie Amico on drums, is today’s quintessential jam band. It wasn’t a planned thing, though. According to Derhak, they started jamming so they’d have enough music to play in the live setting. However, they were already groomed in the art of playing off-the-wall, humorous, and clever music, in the vein of Frank Zappa, the Dead, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Following a lot of hard work and touring, the moe. sound was eventually formed. An accompanying enthusiasm soon followed, laying the groundwork for the party atmosphere the band is known for in the live setting.

Besides the numerous studio albums moe. has gone on to release, they’re constantly producing live material as well, following in the path of other jammers like the Dead, The Allman Brothers Band, Gov’t Mule, and Phish, to name just a few who frequently release live material. It’s an indication of just how good these bands are live, along with the fact that fans can never get enough. Much of the music is gratis downloadable as well, in peer-to-peer outlets and other online sources, primarily because there’s so much recorded live material to go around. The word ‘free’ comes into play again. Fans not only have a lot of live music to hear, as well as a constant tour schedule to keep up with, but moe.’s own structured festivals are annual events. It's also another trait typical to the jam band scene. moe.down fest is held at the Snow Ridge Ski Resort in Turin, New York every Labor Day weekend. snow.down takes place in the winter. Besides moe. themselves, there’s always a full lineup of diverse acts that perform at these shows. The band has even hosted two cruises, labeled none other than: moe.cruise. They’ve also been known to frequent the other jam fests as well, such as Bonnaroo and Further Fest.

I caught up with moe. guitarists Al Schnier and Chuck Garvey on February 16, 2007, during a break in their everlasting tour schedule and shortly after the release of their latest studio album, The Conch. I spoke with Al first, and then Chuck. They both had a lot to talk about.

Al Schnier Interview

Al Schnier: I’m sitting here going through all my effects pedals. I’ve got a whole cabinet filled with them, so, I’m just trying to organize them and get them back into their boxes.

Do you use all of them, or do you pick and choose?

AS: I only have a few on my pedal board at this time. But when it comes to recording, you never know what you might want. I guess I have a bit of a collection of rare pedals, too. I’ve got some vintage ones, handmade boutique ones, and things like that. Though I don’t need to have a hundred pedals at once, it’s still nice to have them to go to.

Sure, it is. Let me tell you something, Al, that period at the end of the band’s name (moe.) is a real pain. [both laughing] I keep getting those squiggly lines beneath it, telling me I’m making typos, and ending all my sentences in the wrong place.

AS: Right. Sorry about that. [Laughing]

How would you describe the band and the music to those unaware?

AS: It’s always a difficult task. It’s not as easy as just saying, "We’ll, we’re a punk band, or maybe a bluegrass act." But first and foremost we’re a rock band. We lean heavily on improvisation, and obviously, guitars are a big part of what we do. And it’s true, that technically, I’d say we’re a jam band. But that’s such a vague term. Immediately, to the uninitiated, it conjures images of kids with dreadlocks listening to a hippy band. I don’t necessarily feel that our music or our fans are really like that.

The bands that are often encompassed within the jam band umbrella are all so dissimilar from each other anyway.

AS: Right. That’s the thing. It’s such a diverse group. Within the jam band context, you have bluegrass bands, rock bands, and you have various kinds of hippy bands. You have bands geared to electronic music; you have some that are more prog rock than others. Of all of the jam bands, we’re probably one of the more straight ahead rock bands.

The dual guitar thing you guys have going on is very interesting, too.

AS: Well, thank you.

“The Conch” is loaded with excellent dual guitar work. I’m really fond of ‘Down Boy’, ‘The Pit’, and the opener, ‘Blues Jeans Pizza’. In fact, ‘The Pit’ seems like it must be a fun tune to do at the festivals and such, getting people going in a fan involvement way.

AS: Oh yeah. It is.

I’ve heard that much of your studio material is actually recorded live and then polished up in the studio.

AS: Though the others were pretty traditional studio albums, for the most part, the basic tracks on the last two albums were recorded live. In fact, with ‘Wormwood’, all of the basic tracks were recorded live in concert on our summer tour. We then brought it all into the studio and made a studio album out of it. We were at State Theater, in Portland, Maine for almost two weeks for the last one. There was an audience there for only two days. The other ten days we were on our own. We still played all of the songs live, but we did it with the room quiet. We actually hung microphones out in the seating area, just to get all of the natural ambiance from the theater, and to get those natural reverbs for the drum sounds. So, both of the last two were done that way. We left the crowd sounds in the recordings on ‘Wormwood’, but everything was really close miced. If the fan sounds crept in, we let them stay in. It’s part of the equation.

I hear a lot of Zappa in your music, especially in the humor. But I was never able to find any information stating he was an influence.

AS: Right. He certainly is. In fact, when Rob, Chuck, and I started playing together, that was the one thing that we all really kind of thrived on. Actually, looking toward the model of the band, you can hear us play a wide variety of music with those erratic arrangements where things stop on a dime and change keys and time signature and whatnot. We were always very fond of Zappa’s music. In fact, the other night in Philadelphia, we played ‘San Ber’dino’, from ‘One Size Fits All’.

You do a lot of interviews. Do you ever find yourself wanting to say ‘No Doy’ to interviewers? [both laughing]

AS: Next question. [Laughing]

I often feel these days that jam bands are a shining light within the area of live rock shows. What’re your thoughts on that?

AS: I think there’s something very refreshing about the jam band movement. It’s real musicians onstage playing music in the moment, playing on the fly and really going for it. I imagine that people have that same excitement seeing Tony Rice rip a great solo at a bluegrass show, or like going to see one of the great bebop acts let it all hang out. You know, throw caution to the wind and make it up on the fly. I imagine seeing the Miles Davis Group back in the day had that same exhilaration. I do find it all very refreshing. But on the other hand, there’s something to be said for a well produced show by a really tight band. Take a band like Radiohead, or even the Who, for example. We just did this tour with the Who. They played the same show every night. It was obviously rehearsed for weeks or maybe months before they took it out on the road. The whole video element is all synched up with all the changes.

However, that’s a much different Who than the group we knew back in the '70s.

AS: Exactly. It wasn’t the way they were during ‘Live At Leeds’, for example. They were more like a jam band. But I’ve got to say, that show was really impressive. And some of my best concert experiences were, like, Peter Gabriel concerts, where every song is a great choreographed production. It’s just fantastic. He puts on such a great show. I don’t know what would happen if Peter Gabriel toured with a jam band [Laughing]. So, it kind of goes either way. At the same time, I’m a bit let down by people who use too much prerecorded music and are not really performing anymore. You go to a concert and find yourself watching the screen more than the band. It’s like, well, I could’ve just bought the DVD. That’s what I love about the jam band scene; the concert experience, the live experience, is a tangible, visual, exchange between the band, the music, and the fans.

There’s a lot of spontaneity onstage.

AS: Absolutely.

Does it ever happen, say for example, that either you or Chuck may decide to take a song in a totally different direction, different chordal arrangement and all, causing the other to be surprised?

AS: Absolutely. I mean, we have our song structures, and some songs are limited to just five minutes, and we perform those songs essentially the same way every night. And then there are those other songs that have a song structure and then an open section built into them. That open section is open. The key ingredient is listening, and making yourself available to change, and not playing with blinders on. We know that we could go from point A to point B, or whatever. A lot of it is just paying attention.

Was the decision to be a jam band part of the equation from the start?

AS: Not at all. It’s something that just happened. Rob’s take on it is that he feels it became necessary for us early on to have enough material to play an entire night. When we started we were playing shorter stuff that’s difficult to describe, kind of like Zappa, but with a heavy, Chili Peppers or Primus influence.

I heard it described as cartoonish and offbeat.

AS: Yeah. Our friend’s bands were, like, punk bands. There was one that was almost like an all country band. These were the bands we were playing with, yet there was still a whole Deadhead following that we hadn’t really been exposed to. I think that may have played a roll in it too. I’m a huge fan of the Dead.

Do you credit early jammers, the bands that weren’t yet labeled as jam bands, like the Allman Brothers, Wishbone Ash, and the Dead, for opening doors for what you guys do now?

AS: Oh, absolutely. This scene would not be what it is today if not for those bands. If not for the whole psychedelic rock movement, the whole live ballroom thing that happened in the 60s, you know. I shouldn’t say that it wouldn’t have happened, because who knows? Ultimately, it may have happened anyway. But clearly, this jam band scene that exists today is what it is because of that stuff. You could follow a direct line from that stuff. Anyone who denies it is just kidding themselves.

moe. has been known for doing charity shows over the past few years. I’ve been noticing a connection to autism lately. If you don’t mind me asking, is there a specific reason for the autism events?

AS: Well, to be honest, I have a child who’s affected by it, so that’s where it starts. I guess as soon as you start doing research in that area you realize how much work there is to be done. The numbers are absolutely staggering; the rate increase is alarming at this point. And I think a lot of people are starting to take notice. Being in a band, obviously we’re in a position where we can use our powers for good instead of evil. [Laughing] It’s an obvious choice for me. Not to say it should be our only choice. There are lots of things in the world we could be donating our time to. But I guess we have to kind of pick and choose, and this one hits close to home for me. My wife just did a benefit for MS. She put up an exclusive song, something that wasn’t on her last album, and donated all of the proceeds to MS. We also did a benefit for the Tsunami relief, besides the few different ones for autism. We did a March of Dimes thing, something for the American Heart Association, and like I said, there are so many things. I’d like to do something for the people of Tibet and for the people in Darfur. There are so many things that need funding. It’s nice to have sort of a tangible outlet for stuff like that. It’s nice to see it make a difference.

That’s great. Now, getting back to the music, how do you go about writing songs? Is there a certain procedure that works for you?

AS: There are many different ways, some more common methods for me personally. It often just starts with a musical idea. Then you try to nurture it and let it grow from there. Often, the melody and the lyrics come second. That’s been a very typical way I’ve written songs in the past. Though, quite a bit lately, I’ve been starting with lyrics first, even the melody first, and approaching it from that side. So often it’ll just start with something I came up with on the guitar and just kind of goes from there, occasionally the piano. The truth is, and this is true of all of the songs, you bring them to the band, maybe as just that little idea and we kind of build on it from there. But sometimes you bring a pretty well realized song, with a verse, chorus, and bridge. I’ll say, "This is where I’ll solo. Let’s end it like this." You may even go as far as saying, "No. Play the drum beat like this," or whatever. But it’s everything in between. Even on the songs that are essentially finished, if I go in with my parts, I’m not going in with everyone else’s parts. So I may give direction about the feeling I want, but everything is subject to band approval. We all work out an arrangement together, so everyone puts their own mark on it. That’s one of the things that makes being in the band worthwhile. I enjoy playing the songs that I didn’t write because I at least came up with my part for those songs. I have a vested interest in them. Like ‘The Pit’, for example, it was largely constructed by Rob.

Do you have a personal favorite moe. song and album?

AS: Near the top of the list is a song I wrote called ‘Gone’. I think in terms of the chords, melody, lyrics, and everything about the writing, it’s what I’m most proud of. It’s not terribly complex or anything like that, but I think it’s probably the most melodic song I’ve written. It’s one that I really connect with. On the other hand, our song ‘Rebubula’, which was very much a band effort, something we spent months composing and working on, is a good benchmark song for us. That’s the song that kind of defines moe. If there’s one song to show people the many different sides of moe, what we are and what we do, it would be that one.

Is there a general favorite that the band loves to play live?

AS: I don’t know [Laughing]. On one hand I could say it’s a song like ‘Meat’, because it’s almost seventy-five percent improv. Everybody gets to play. We really get to explore with each other and get into different areas. But it may be something a lot more composed. ‘Wind It Up’ for example, which we spent a week extracting, rearranging, and reworking. Everybody has a real vested interest in that song.

Talk about “The Conch”. Where’d the title come from?

AS: The title comes from The Lord Of The Flies. It largely stems from the fact that we often refer to our group dynamic on tour as seen very much like The Lord Of The Flies. [Laughing] Several things kind of tied it all together. I can’t remember who suggested it, or why we ended up there, but the “Lord Of The Flies” itself, was actually another euphemism for the devil, or Beelzebub, or whatever name you want to give Satan, which kind of appears sympathetically on the album, something else that we were sort of tossing around as title ideas. The other thing that came up was something regarding the Fibonacci sequence, a numeric sequence where you basically start with the number one, and then you add it to itself to get two. You just keep taking the last two numbers and adding them to themselves (1+2=3, 2+3=5, 3+5=8, and so on) until you end up with a numeric sequence that’s 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, etc. That numeric sequence actually occurs naturally in our environment. The spiral of sunflower seeds is based on that numeric sequence. Also, the spiral of the conch shell is based on that numeric sequence, too. The Fibonacci sequence is something we were tossing around for musical ideas or, again, as a possible title or concept for the album. So there were so many different things tying it all together. That just seemed like a very good iconic reference to all of those things.

Okay. That’s much more extravagant than the way I had originally viewed the title. [Laughing] I knew it as being the seashell of a snail-like creature often used as a musical instrument, but you took that much further for me. [Laughing] It’s quite a conceptual album. It appears that a lot of time and effort went into the making of it.

AS: Oh, yeah. A lot of time. [Laughing] We spent about a year making the album, or a little more, about 15 months. But that was while touring fulltime also. We didn’t take any time or a break from touring to make it. So, that‘s kind of why it took 15 months. The other thing was, we finished it in about six months, had a finished version in hand, and decided we didn’t like it too much. We went back to work on it and kind of made the second version of it. It came out much better.

Many of the included songs were already known to fans over the previous year or so.

AS: Yeah.

You have side projects going on. You’re working with Before Cowboys.

AS: Right. That’s my wife’s band. She did the MS fundraiser with that. I play in her band and I totally get to play musical director. She writes the songs and I get to arrange them. I’ve produced them for both of her albums. I also got to engineer the last one exclusively, which was a lot of fun for me. So, there’s that, and I also have a band called The Transamericans (Al and the Transamericans). That’s more or less a roots rock or country kind of band. It’s been kicking around for years actually. It was born out of my love for that kind of music, and really needing an outlet for it. I think, at one time, I was pushing the guys in moe. a little too heavily in that direction, beyond their taste. [Laughing] So, I have an outlet for it instead. It’s been a lot of fun. It’s all guys from different bands. The bass player is from Strangefolk (Erik Glocker). Gordon Stone plays pedal steel and banjo in the group. Vinnie, of moe., is the drummer also.

You’ve played with Phil Lesh. How was that experience?

AS: Yeah! I got to be one of the Friends. As I had mentioned, I’m a big fan of the Dead, so it was a real treat for me to get to go to the Grateful Dead rehearsal facility and hang out with Phil. We rehearsed for like, I want to say four or five days, and then we did three shows. It was awesome.

Let’s talk about Al Schnier gear, at home, live, and in the studio.

AS: Okay. Well, my main guitar that I’m playing these days is a Custom Shop Fender Telecaster. It’s a Thinline Tele setup like an early ‘70s Custom, so it has the humbucker at the neck, and it also has a Bigsby on it. That’s essentially how the guitar is made up. It has Seymour Duncan pickups in it. It’s all the elements of my favorite guitars combined into one guitar. That’s my main guitar. I’m also using a Gibson SG Special, primarily for anything requiring a drop D tuning.

Do you play a lot in drop D?

AS: Not a ton, but there are three or four moe. songs in regular rotation that are in drop D. Now we’ve actually got a couple in open G, but they’re acoustic songs. I almost have to have a second acoustic on the road in open G. Now I’m thinking about more electric stuff in open G, too. I’m interested in these alternate tunings, but then, in the back of my mind I’m thinking I haven’t even mastered standard tuning yet. [Laughing] My acoustic guitar is a Martin D18V.

I have a pedal board I go through. It has a Fulltone Clyde Wah. That’s followed by an old DOD 440 Envelope Filter and an Analog Man Comprossor, which is a Ross clone compressor. Then, I’m using an Interstellar Overdriver, made by Death By Audio. It’s a great boost pedal. Next, an Ernie Ball volume pedal and a Diamond Memory Lane analog delay, an Analog Man Bi-Chorus, and a Diaz Tremodillo. I have an Analog Man A-B switch just to go between the two inputs on my amp. I’m also experimenting with a Klon pedal and a Tim pedal, the latter made by a guy named Paul Cochran. I’m looking to branch out a bit, but haven’t quite figured out what I want to do. I’ve gone from having an effects pedal board with 16 effects on it down to this. I wanted to get rid of all the special effects and the gratuitous effects. At one point I had several overdrives and a couple of fuzz pedals. I felt I could make the same sound by stepping on any of five or six different pedal combinations. It was too much. Oh, yeah, I almost forgot. I’m also using a Death By Audio SuperSonic FuzzGun, a fuzz pedal I use from time to time.

The amp I’m using is an Oldfield Honky Tonk D’Lux, which is a Tweed Deluxe clone. It’s a 20 watt amp I’m using onstage. It sounds amazing. If I hit the compressor or the overdrive, or any combination, I can get a wide variety of sounds. But for the most part, I rely on the tone from the amp and a little boost in front of it. I’m really happy with my guitar and amp combo right now. One of the things I found when we were making The Conch is that four out of five times I’d go to record a guitar part I just plugged into an amp without using any effects. I just used different guitars and amps together to get the sound I wanted. I wanted the ability to take that to the stage somehow, instead of relying on a gigantic pedal board and a single amp. I figured there’s got to be a way to do this without having half a dozen amps onstage.

I love those little 20 watt combos, like the Fender Deluxe Reverb. You get that great overdriven sound at a low volume. You can just mic that.

AS: Right. I’m always trying to get a good clean sound, too. The Oldfield amp is great because he took the tweed deluxe, which sounds great overdriven, and he separated the two channels. You can set it at a reasonable level, on four for example, so it stays relatively clean. It might break up a little if I have my volume all the way up. The B channel I’ll put on like eight. It sounds amazing at that point. I actually have a whole collection of these low wattage amps. They’re all unique and I don’t want to part with any of them. But at the same time, I ask myself, how many single 12 combos do I really have to own? I have a Magnatone, a couple of Gibsons, a couple of Fenders, one called a Salano, which is like a Guild. I tend to gravitate towards those amps.

Chuck Garvey Interview

You guys do a lot of touring. I guess that’s what it’s all about, especially for a jam band.

Chuck Garvey: Yeah. We’re on the road for like five or six months out of the year. On top of that, we’re rehearsing and doing a lot of recording, editing and mixing our DVD as well. It’s a lot of away time.

A lot of time and effort went into the making of “The Conch”, from what Al had told me.

CG: Yeah. We did the basic tracks for over 20 songs and then whittled it down. We thought, well, maybe we can make it a double album. There was a lot of going back and forth. We thought we had a completed album, but it just didn’t feel right, so we had to go back and get rid of a couple of songs. We just wanted to make sure it was right.

I really get into ‘Blues Jeans Pizza’, ‘The Pit’, and especially ‘Down Boy’. Your lead solo following the talk box is fantastic. That could very well turn out to be one of those gratifying solos that often surface in conversation amongst guitarists for many years to come.

CG: Thanks.

Because of the band’s laid back atmosphere and comical yet witty lyricism, do you ever question whether or not the listening public, or even the fans, take you serious as a guitarist and all-around musician? The reason I ask this is that I hear a lot of Zappa influence in your music, in the lyrical humor and the poignant instrumentation. I’ve found, in the Zappa example anyway, that the general listener or non-musician sometimes has a tendency to pay more attention to lyricism than instrumentation and judges everything by that; therefore, they aren’t able to grasp the depth of the actual quality of the music.

CG: I think they do, the fans that are serious music heads anyway, and/or musicians. The humor, the music, our personalities, and the way in which we continue to interact with our fans is, I don’t know, just a personable thing. Whether or not people take us serious because of the goofiness, I don’t know. [Laughing] We take our craft and our professionalism very seriously. But at the same time, if we’re not having fun and not being ourselves then what’s the sense in doing it?

You do list Zappa as an influence, right?

CG: Oh, definitely. As a matter of fact, Frank Zappa was probably the one central, common influence that Rob, Al, and myself had at the very beginning of the band.

Which band member has the wildest off-the-wall sense of humor?

CG: Probably Rob. [Laughing] He has the knack for saying things most other people wouldn’t say, like stating the truth and doing it in the spirit of shedding light on something, or to diffuse a situation. He can go into the taboo farther than anyone and pull it off. So, in that sense, he has a talent for that.

What are you listening to these days?

CG: Right before the interview began I was listening to Charles Mingus. I tend to listen to a lot of instrumental jazz music, but currently I’m restocking a lot of music I used to own, anything from Stevie Wonder, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, classic rock kind of stuff. Current bands, I guess would be The Decemberists and Brazilian Girls; it’s kind of random. At the same time, I have a Django Reinhardt box set that I love listening to. It’s whatever I haven’t listened to in a while; I like the diversity a lot. I tend to go in opposite directions each time I need something to listen to.

Are moe.rons comparable to Deadheads?

CG: I would say so in that it seems like this small version of society at large represented. They have an affinity for each other and a bond in live music. They’re very invested in what we do almost as much as we are. There are a lot of parallels in those ways.

The snoe.down fest is coming up soon (March 23 - 25, 2007).

CG: Yes.

Do you enjoy playing outside at that, being winter time and all?

CG: [Laughing] It actually was fun (last year). I personally just had to jump around a bit to keep the blood moving. But it worked out pretty much okay. Our fans may have been freezing. The more you dance around, the better you feel I guess, when it’s like ten degrees outside. What carried that whole event was just the spirit of everything. Lake Placid is really a beautiful spot. It’s a fun destination. And the whole thing was really enjoyable for everyone.

I don’t know much about this year’s fest. What’s in store for the fans?

CG: We’re playing at the site of the 1984 Miracle on Ice. Last year we played in the large ice rink basically. There were some smaller areas where bands can play and DJs can set up. Another cool thing about it was that the town of Lake Placid actually got into it. The restaurants and bars geared it towards our fans, which was really nice of them. Last year was the first time we had done it with this promoter. It came off flawlessly, and a lot of the credit goes to the promoter we had partnered with. This year we have a lot of friends, peers, and people we really like a lot; Disco Biscuits, Little Feat, and Brazilian Girls. There’ll be some jam band favorites, like Tea Leaf Green and The Slip. Also, old friends like Peter Prince. He’s a musician from Buffalo that we’ve known probably for almost 20 years. He’s an amazing performer. It’s a lot like moe.down, our summer fest. We basically invite our friends, and we make up a wish list of people we’ve never met before and ask them to come and play. If last year is any indication, this year is going to be amazing. I’m looking forward to it.

How was the second moe.cruise?

CG: That was really interesting. With the exception of some rough sea the first night and the last, and some seasick people, it was really fun. The venue and the ship were great. We did the last one about two years ago. There are no immediate plans for the next one. It’s difficult because it’s an expensive destination type thing. We all had a really good time, but we may take another year off and then go back.

Do you have a personal favorite moe. song and album?

CG: That’s tough. Someone else had recently asked me that in an interview. Well, what they had asked was what I thought of The Conch and how it compared to our other albums. I felt that it stood up to our previous best. I had to think about it. I really like all of our studio albums. I think we did a good job on all of them. I really like ‘Dither’, mainly because we made a concerted effort to make the songs concise, and it was produced completely by us. We really got to the heart of what our songs sound like. Maybe ‘Wormwood’ sounds a little bit more like we do onstage, and even The Conch sounds more like our live personality. But as far as studio albums go I really like ‘Tin Cans And Car Tires’ and ‘Dither’. I don’t know what it is about them. I just feel like we really did a great job with the production, the playing, and everything on all the songs. By the same token, I really like The Conch. As I distance myself from it I’ll be able to be a bit more objective about it. I like the songs and what we did with it. I’m proud of it, and I’m proud that we took the time to do the best that we could with it.

Is there a band favorite to play live?

CG: There are certain songs that are a bit more epic. It seems people get really amped up for the pay off of some of the choruses, or solo or orchestrated parts of the songs. There are a couple of songs that are like that. There are older ones like ‘Brent Black’ and ‘Timmy Tucker’. There are other songs that aren’t necessarily so in-your-face. But I feel they’re well written songs, like ‘Faker’ and ‘Mexico’. I’m going to toot my own horn a little. [Laughing] I really like playing one of the newer songs, ‘Wind It Up’, that I wrote. It’s just really satisfying to play that. I like the diversity of the song and how everything comes together. There’s a big payoff at the end, and it seems the fans really like it. There’s a lot of that. We have a pretty deep catalog of songs, probably over a hundred. We get rid of some along the way and we write new ones.

You guys have done pretty well with your Fatboy Records label.

CG: Yes. It’s just us on the label. We do everything ourselves.

That doesn’t happen so successfully all of the time.

CG: No. And it’s really hard to do, too. [Laughing] When you first start out, you like, make a demo or a couple of studio albums, maybe until you get noticed. We did some time with Sony. It was a big learning experience. They put up the money for us to go into big, professional studios, and hired a producer and everything. Really, it was just kind of a learning experience. Funny thing is, right after that, our first release after leaving Sony was a live album. Our next live and studio albums did better than the Sony albums did. I really feel that has to do, in large part, with a very loyal fan base, and the fact that we were working very hard to continue to make this grow. It’s definitely attributable to the fact that our fans are loyal and we consistently work really hard on it. I don’t know if we do a better job as a record label than Sony does, but I can definitely tell you that it’s good to be the boss. It’s good when you sign the checks, make the decisions, and have no one else to answer to. For better or for worse, we have no one else to answer to but ourselves.

Will there be a ‘Warts and All - Volume 5’?

CG: Yes. Actually, the show has been picked already. I’m working on the art work right now. I’ve kind of fallen into doing the art work, just for the Warts and All series. I went to school for illustration and art. This is actually my one time a year in which I get to use what I learned in school. Hopefully it’ll come out about Memorial Day. Basically, we wanted to stagger it a little bit from the studio release.

[Note: Warts and All - Volume 5 will be in stores June 12, 2007]

When and why did you get into playing guitar?

CG: I played tenor saxophone for about nine years, starting in grade school. That’s where I learned theory and sight reading and a lot about what makes music work. I was kind of a frustrated guitar player and I ended up picking it up in my early teens. I got a bad Japanese Teisco Del Ray, 4 pickup, rocker switch, kind of crazy guitar for $3.50 at a garage sale. It was over after that. [Laughing] My dad had an Ampeg Reverberocket from the 50s that I’d use. At the same time I was playing sax I taught myself how to play guitar. It wasn’t until I got to college and started jamming with friends that Rob and I decided to start a band and do something with it.

Besides Zappa, whom we had already discussed a bit, who do you consider your influences?

CG: There are a lot of them, and definitely a lot of horn players. I listened to them for a long time. But as far as guitar playing goes, I’d say the earlier stuff was Mick Ronson and all the early David Bowie stuff, Pete Townshend, and Andy Summers. The Police, The Who, and David Bowie were really big for me when I was first picking up the guitar. Later, definitely Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan. When I was in high school I got turned on to King Crimson, especially the second incarnation. The album ‘Discipline’ was a really big influence on me.

A few great guitarists were part of that band.

CG: Yeah! Just doing some really out of the ordinary things with the guitar, too. Adrian Belew is amazing.

I’ve read that your guitar playing has been equated to the likes of Eddie Van Halen and Duane Allman.

CG: That’s bullshit. [Laughing]

[Laughing] I was going to say that they’re two very diverse yet dissimilar players.

CG: I was a big fan of Eddie Van Halen, but I never really aspired to play like that. To tell you the truth, Duane Allman isn’t really a huge influence; although the songwriting of the Allman Brothers is. Duane wasn’t that big of an influence on me. I appreciate it, but I guess that’s just someone else’s interpretation. They kind of see those parallels.

There’s certainly nothing wrong with being mentioned alongside those two.

CG: No, there isn’t. The Eddie Van Halen one, though, is really misleading. I am in no way capable or likely to do anything Eddie-ish.

Let’s talk about your gear. What are you using onstage?

CG: My main live guitar is a Terry C. McInturff Taurus Sportster. It’s basically a two humbucker guitar where you can tap the coils and get realistic single coil sounds, unlike PRSs, which I never thought did it right. Terry is a great guy and he has a lot of great guitar designs to his credit. You can compare them a little bit to some Hamers. The build quality is really first rate. He does everything by hand, which completely amazes me. He’s a great craftsman. We’re already talking about the next guitar he’s going to make for me, so I’m getting geared up for that. I’ve been using that guitar pretty much nonstop for the past two and half to three years. I played Strats for a long time, so I take a couple of them on the road. One’s a custom shop relic, a Vince Cunetto era, which is a really great ’56 or ’57 styled Strat. I have a fraud that someone put together to look like a ’59, but it’s really a Japanese reissue. [Laughing] But it’s a great guitar. I have all my own hardware and electronics on it. I feel that the Japanese have an attention to detail that some of the American production guitars lack. I’ve had a couple of Japanese Strats, and they’re actually some of my favorites, mainly because I can’t afford the really expensive ones, like a $40,000.00 custom shop model or vintage. But the McInturff is my main guitar.

My FX are constantly changing, but I’ve kind of settled in the past year or so on about nine of them that I use live. I use a Geoffrey Teese RMC3 Wah. I use Analog Man effects, a Bi-Comprossor, which is like a Ross Compressor and an Orange Squeezer. It has both compressors in it. It’s a very cool pedal. I’m also using a pedal called a Beano Boost, which is Analog Man’s version of a Dallas Rangemaster. It’s such an awesome pedal. It cleans up so well. You can do anything from fuzz to clean-boost. It’s amazing, yet such a simple device. There’s like two moving parts to it. I use a Klon Centaur for a slight volume boost, just to push the amp. This one really works for me, and it doesn’t get in the way. I used Tubescreamers for years, but I can’t deal with them anymore. I use an Octave Divider made by Foxrox. It does an octave up and an octave down, and you can blend your straight guitar signal with it. It’s pretty cool. I also have a couple of MoogerFooger pedals made by Moog. But the one I’m using now is the Ring Modulator, which is great because I can get some really great synth sounds almost. It also does a great tremolo. For a delay I use either the MoogerFooger Delay or a Fulltone Tube Tape Echo. I have a 60s Tube Tape Echo, a Maestro, and also a 70s Echoplex, and they did well, but I’ve got them kind of tuned up and I keep them at home. The Fulltone is working pretty well for me. I have to get it tuned up a bit. They’re kind of labor intensive but I really love how a tape echo or tape delay sounds. There’s a little bit of extra magic in there.

The only other effect I use is a talk-box, and I use the Framptone version. We were lucky enough to meet Peter [Frampton] a couple of years ago. He lives in Cincinnati, as do I. When we were playing at the Taft Theater, I called his manager and invited Peter down. He was really gracious, and came down and played a couple of songs. It was a great night. He was amazing.

Peter is a fantastic guitarist. I recently saw his live show on the PBS Soundstage concert series.

CG: Yeah! That was great.

That’s it with your effects?

CG: Yeah. The amp I used in ’97 was a Tony Bruno, kind of a one-off that he had made. It was a clone of a high-powered tweed Twin, his version of that 80-watt tweed Twin. That’s a great amp. It’s gone through a couple of incarnations. I’ve changed the speakers and he had changed some of the values of the internal components, but it’s pretty much the same. I have a couple of Tone Tubby 12" speakers, the paper cone ones, in that right now. I may try a different speaker. It’s such a great amp for a Stratocaster or a Telecaster. It’s perfect. The other amp I’ve been using for the past couple of years is his Underground 30, which is Vox AC30 inspired, but with a different character. I use that head with a 3/10 cabinet. He makes tremendous amps. They have so much character and clarity. The only problem is you have nothing to hide behind. [Laughing] They’re a little revealing if you’re not careful. You Can’t fumble through mistakes, like with a Deluxe Reverb and a Tubescreamer. Every little nuance comes through these things, which is good and bad. But they’re really works of art.

I use D’Addario strings. Al uses them, too. We met Peter D’Addario years ago in New York. He basically found us. We were already using the strings, but to actually meet him and strike up a relationship with the company was really great. We started that in ’94. Pretty much the entire career of the band we’ve been using D’Addario strings.

Cool, Chuck. Before we quit, do you have any words for new or old moe.rons?

CG: We’re looking forward to the festivals and seeing everyone on the road. We’ve had really great response to The Conch, and we’ve been doing a lot of in-store acoustic performances at Borders and indie record stores. It has been a lot of fun. I think we’re going to continue that for the next month or two. We’re actually talking about our next album. The plan is already in the works.

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