Ace Frehley Interviewed By Modern Guitars Magazineby Dr. Matthew Warnock
Anomaly features Frehley originals and one cover of Sweet's classic song "Fox on the Run." With long-time bandmate Anton Fig on drums, the songs feature hard-driving grooves and catchy guitar riffs that have become a staple of Frehley's work, both as a solo artist and with KISS. Set for release on September 15, 2009, the new CD is Frehley's fifth solo release and first since 1989.
While fans may have been anxiously waiting for a new solo release, and wondering if Frehley had moved on from his solo work, the new record is definitely worth the long wait. Anomaly includes moments that bring to mind Frehley's early days with KISS and his solo work during the '70s and '80s, but also presents forays into new musical territory by the veteran guitarist.
Frehley has also been working closely with Gibson Guitars on the upcoming release of his new Gibson Les Paul Ace Frehley Signature Model guitar. The new Les Paul is a follow up to the highly successful and popular Frehley model that was released to wide acclaim in 1997. Currently in the finishing stages of development, Frehley is hoping that the new signature model guitar will be released around the same time as the new solo album.
With a new solo CD and signature model guitar being launched this year, Frehley has managed to find time to make appearances at charitable concerts and events. After appearing on an episode of VH1's Sober House, Frehley and the housemates headed over to the Rock School to meet the kids and perform a charitable concert that helped support the school's students and programs.
Anomaly signifies Frehley's return to his solo career and gives his fans welcomed new material after waiting for almost 20 years. With hard rockin' grooves, catchy lyrics and Frehley's signature tone, Anomaly is sure to excite his fans and expose a whole new generation of listeners to one of the most legendary figures in rock guitar history.
Ace Frehley: I've been trying to get this album out for a long time. We actually started cutting some basic tracks back in the beginning of 2007. I had to put the CD on the backburner when we went out on tour last year, and of course producing it myself made it take a lot longer because I'm such a perfectionist.
It was picking and choosing the right songs. If you don't come out with a studio album for 20 years you want to make it special for the fans, and I think I've achieved that at this point. It was also getting it mixed right. In fact, I mixed this record with three separate guys. All the mixes were done fine, but the ones that Marty Fredrickson and Anthony Fox did really hit the mark.
Matt: Why did you decide to act as producer as well as songwriter and performer on this album?
Ace: Because I knew what I wanted it to sound like, and I don't think anyone knows how to do it better than me. I've been doing it for a while now. [Laughs]
Matt: How much of an influence did you take from the great producers you've worked with over the years, such as Eddie Kramer?
Ace: Everybody I've worked with I've learned something from, good, bad or indifferent. From Eddie, I learned a lot of micing techniques. Working with Bob Ezra, he always thought outside the box and tried unique things. I learned different things from these guys and put them in my bag of tricks, then when it's time to do my own thing I draw from that in the same way that as a guitar player I was influenced by guys like Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, Hendrix, Clapton and Keith Richards.
Matt: How did you approach the recording process for this album? Some of it was recorded in your home studio and some of it outside. How did the recording process develop as a whole?
Ace: Some of the tracks we actually threw together in the studio. Others I'd recorded demos of and rehearsed with the trio, with bass and Anton Fig on drums. I don’t have a set way of working on this stuff. People will sometimes ask me how I write a song. Sometimes I come up with a guitar riff, sometimes it's a lyrical idea--there's no set format for how Ace writes songs. A lot of them are different.
Matt: Anton Fig has played with you on a number of albums going back to your self-titled debut album in 1978. What is it about Anton's playing that keeps you coming back to him as your first call drummer?
Ace: I think he's just one of the best studio drummer's I've ever heard. If you listen to songs like "Genghis Khan" and "Pain in the Neck" on Anomaly, they have this swing to them. He has this unique way of playing where he never plays right on the beat. He's usually on the back of the beat and never on the front of the beat. He's just one of my favorite drummers, and he was available so I took advantage of it.
Matt: When he's playing behind the beat like that, do you try and go with it, trying to connect with his time feel, or do you just do your thing over it and find that works best?
Ace: When I track with Anton, it's kind of magical. When I'm thinking in my mind that I want him to do a fill at a certain point where there wasn’t one, he'll just do it. He's a lot like John Bonham. You know, Bonham always played behind the beat that gave him that great groove he had. For a lot of drummers, this seems to elude them. If you're playing a little behind the beat, it just gives the song that swing, that groove that's hard to put into words, but I know it when I hear it.
Matt: You've picked the song "Outer Space" as the first single off of the album. What made this song stand out to you as your choice for the first single?
Ace: Initially I thought about releasing the cover I did of Sweet's "Fox on the Run." I talked to some friends, especially DJ Eddie Trunk, and he said, "You can't do that. You have to put out a song you wrote. It's been 20 years--you can't do that to the fans." A lot of people have been responding well to "Outer Space." They thought it was in tune with my old persona, with my old character with KISS. It's the only song I've ever recorded in drop-D tuning. I thought a lot of the younger rock 'n' roll guitar players would get off on that. The tune's got a catchy hook, so we feel it'll be a good lead-off single.
Matt: What was it about the Sweet tune "Fox on the Run" that inspired you to put your own stamp on that particular classic rock song?
Ace: I didn't come up with that idea. A good friend of mine Pam, who does my make-up for photo sessions, suggested it. I told a bunch of people I was working with about the idea, and they all jumped on it. I was talking to a friend of mine, and he said the first time his wife heard Sweet do that song she thought it was me. [Laughs]
I heard all of this positive reinforcement and I always thought it was a great song. So me and Marty Fredrickson got together and tracked it. It was actually the last song recorded on the album. In fact, that was the only song I tracked in California. Marty's playing bass on that and singing background harmonies, so it's got his stamp on it. That's the only song he produced on the album.
Matt:The album is being released on your own label Bronx Born Records. What led you to start your own record label?
Ace: The reason I started my own record label is because a lot of the major labels are having hardships and financial difficulties and aren't giving the advances they used to give several years ago. The whole economics of the business has changed dramatically because of the digital downloads. I just thought it was smarter to hire a good marketing team and a good distributor under my own label. Of course, down the road I'd like to produce some new bands under my label.
Matt: You've been working with Gibson on a new signature Les Paul that's coming out later this year. Was that the guitar you used on Anomaly?
Ace: No, that guitar isn't even finished yet. It was supposed to be released at the NAMM show in Tennessee, but I guess they're a bit behind on that. I'm thinking it'll be ready to go out around the same time the CD is released in September.
Matt: What are the upgrades and changes being made to this guitar compared to the highly successful signature Les Paul you released in 1997?
Ace: I changed the pickups--the new pickups are going to be wired to my specs. It's going to be blue burst instead of cherry burst. The neck's going to be a bit different. It's going to have custom speed knobs with lightning bolts on them, but I don’t want to give too much away.
Matt: Understood. What guitars did you use on the new album?
Ace: Well, I used my old signature models, some of my favorite Les Pauls and acoustics. I double a lot of my rhythm tracks with Fender guitars, both Strats and Teles, pretty much exclusively.
Matt: Does that give you a thicker tone for the rhythm tracks?
Ace: Fender guitars have a much different sonic range than Gibsons. It's usually a little twangier, a little more high end. For some reason when you blend that sound with a Les Paul you get an even richer sound. I've been doing that since my first solo record. It's a format that seems to work. Sometimes I'll overdub an electric guitar track with an acoustic guitar, but keeping it really low in the mix. You don’t really hear it in the final mix, but if you pulled it out you'd miss it, that kind of thing. That gives a fuller sound.
Matt: Are you still playing some of your old Les Pauls that go back to your early days with KISS and earlier?
Ace: About 15 or 20 years ago, I got rid of a bunch of vintage guitars at a time when the vintage guitar market kind of bottomed out. In retrospect, I wish I had kept them because they would've been worth like a half-million dollars a piece these days, some of them. Gibson has made me a couple of reissue '59 Les Pauls that are just fabulous guitars. I can't tell the difference. I end up throwing old humbucker pick-ups from the '50s in them, and it's pretty much inaudible to me the difference between these guitars and a guitar that was made in the '50s.
Matt: You've always had a solid tone. Some would even say it was ahead of its time in the '70s. How do you get that crunchy drive sound that you've became famous for?
Ace: I rarely use any pedals or any special effect. 90% of the time I'm playing directly into the amp. It's pretty much just the Les Paul through a Marshall. To me that's a no brainer. If you take a Les Paul, plug it into a Marshall amp and turn it to 10, that's pretty much the Ace Frehley sound.
Matt: On top of your recognizable, tone you've also developed your own unique approach to vibrato. Was this something you thought about or did it develop naturally?
Ace: I have a lot of versatility in my vibrato. I can do a fast vibrato, a medium vibrato or a slow one. I also do it upward and downward. It's just one of those techniques that took a long time to develop over the years. It's not something that's easy for a beginner.
I remember for a real short time I had a wang bar on my Les Paul. Maybe for like a year around the time I released Frehley's Comet. People would write and ask, "What the hell are you doing with that thing on your guitar!?" [Laughs] I actually realized it was probably not a good idea because when you have a whammy bar, I end up relying on it too much and my technique suffers. So I basically ripped it off of my Les Paul, never to be seen again.
Matt: Speaking of your technique, there's a video of you playing in 1975 with KISS live at Winterland. In your unaccompanied solo, you do some Van Halen style two-hand tapping, but years before the first Van Halen album came out. Was this something that you did often back then in your solos?
Ace: I was doing that technique before Eddie. I didn't think that actual style was that indicative of my normal style, so it wasn't something I clung to. On the live records I did some tapping, but I did it with my pick so it was a little different than Eddie's approach.
Matt: As much touring as KISS was doing back then, it must have been inevitable that Eddie was at least aware of what you were doing with tapping. Do you think you had an influence on Eddie's development of the technique?
Ace: All guitar players influence other guitar players whether they want to admit it or not, even if it's subconsciously. Even if you hear something, you may not remember it, but your subconscious does. But it's all good, you know. Just the fact that Eddie may not have remembered me influencing him in any way shape or form, who knows, you know? Eddie's a great guitar player in his own right, and he doesn't need me as an influence to stand on his own. [Laughs]
Matt: Well put. Having been on top of the rock guitar world for many years, how do you see the rock scene today comparing to the scene when you were first coming up?
Ace: The first thing that comes to mind is that I haven't heard a lot of new bands that are unique. You have to remember when I was growing up there was Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Led Zeppelin, The Who and I believe that all those bands were innovators and had their own unique sounds that influenced generations of musicians. I don't seem to be getting that at this time.
It may be because I'm ignorant or don't listen to that many new bands, but I'm not getting that sense that bands these days are coming out with something that different or that radical. I can remember when Hendrix came out and it was like, "What the hell was that?" I'm not getting that sense anymore. I don't know if you can't take the genre any further than it's gone or people just aren't thinking outside the box. I don't have an answer for that, but that's what I notice.
Matt: How did you become involved with the School of Rock charity event that happened this July?
Ace: That was so much fun, and it actually happened by accident. I was doing an episode of VH1's Sober House, because Mike Starr needed some help with his sobriety, and it just so happened that the guys in the Sober House were getting together to do a show in support of these School of Rock kids.
It was a great experience for two days. The first day I was at the Sober House where I met everyone and worked with Mike, trying to keep him on his journey in sobriety. Then I had the opportunity to go over to the School of Rock and work with those kids and do a concert with them. The whole thing turned out to be a great experience, and I've only gotten positive feedback from people after it happened.
Matt: After being in one of the most successful and iconic rock bands of all time, KISS, and then also having a solo career, do you find that your fans expect you to do a KISS record when you release a solo album? Have you been able to separate your two distinct musical personas in the minds of the fans?
Ace: I think they are always going to overlap to a certain degree. I don't think that the sound I have on my solo records is that different from the sound I had on the early KISS records. A lot of people cite that in their critiques of early KISS records, that maybe I was a big part of the early KISS sound, which was probably true.
There are definitely, especially on this new album, some new areas I've gone to with my music. Like the song "It's a Great Life" is the first time I've done a jazz guitar solo. That and my instrumentals, stuff like that, I wouldn't have been able to do as a member of KISS. That's why I had to do my own solo stuff because there were avenues musically that I wanted to explore that KISS wouldn't have allowed me to do. I had some great times with those guys. We made some great music, and it was a lot of fun and I'm glad I got to be a part of that.
Matt: Now that you've got the new solo album out, do you have plans to follow it up?
Ace: Absolutely. It's definitely not going to be 20 years between this record and the next. [Laughs]
