GG:
Well, it does all feel a little bit surreal: I hear myself playing guitar on a daily basis, so it all sounds pretty normal to me... and of course it's impossible for me to imagine what my playing might sound like to anyone else. On the other hand, it's a wonderful thing that certain people feel such enthusiasm for what I do, and I'm obviously really grateful for their support: without it, I'd have to go back to working in McDonalds - and I'm very keen to avoid that outcome, if at all possible..

WWG:
How would you describe the journey you have made thus far, the growth in your career,
coming from the UK and lighting it up in the US as a highly respected musician and clinician?

GG:
I'm not really sure! I've spent almost 20 years trying to pay the rent by doing something vaguely musical, and during that time I've tried all manner of approaches - transcribing, teaching, gigging and recording with bands ranging from the 80s-tinged melodic rock of Asia to the mad electronica of the Young Punx, etc etc. I suppose I've learned different things from each experience, and I'm sure it all counts in some way.

It's hard to say how much any one of those activities might actually have contributed to any kind of "bigger picture" in terms of my career, though.
Nowadays, I often get recognised by complete strangers in airports, many time zones away from home, and yet a surprising amount of these folks have no idea about any of the stuff I just mentioned... Invariably, they've stumbled upon my playing in the form of some random YouTube clip or another, which would certainly have been posted by someone else (I've never posted a YouTube clip of my own playing, just for the record...) and most likely without my knowledge or consent.

As a result of all this seemingly random online activity, it feels like my career - if you can call it that - has somehow taken on a life of its own, and it pretty much does whatever it wants to do, without any specific input from yours truly. The internet can be a strange and unpredictable thing, but in terms of the power it has to "spread the word" there's really nothing else quite like it. I'm slowly learning to acknowledge and embrace this
aspect of the internet, whilst resisting any futile urge to try to control it ;-)

GG:
Well, the US is obviously the spiritual home of bluegrass, jazz, country, blues, rock and all that good stuff - not to mention being the birthplace of iconic instruments like the Strat and the Les Paul - so being recognised in that territory is a pretty big deal for any guitar player, I think.

However... I'm not convinced that consciously trying to "make waves in the States" is necessarily a valid goal, and it's not one that I've ever pursued. I prefer the idea of just making music exactly the way you want to make, and then finding out which parts of the world respond to it... rather than compromising what you do in an attempt to please a particular music market.

Maybe the best approach (for any notional UK player trying to connect with the US guitar community) would be simply to play honestly, to focus on whatever makes your playing unique... and to accept that there's also a significant element of luck involved, too...

WWG:
What is your most memorable live performance? What perfomances stand out in your mind when you felt you could do no wrong? In your mind what is the key to achieving such presence and magical moments of greatness?

GG:
Generally it's the audience that makes a gig really memorable for me, rather than the way I'm playing... although of course the two things are usually connected in some way! I'm fairly sure I'v never come off stage thinking to myself, "Cool - I just achieved a magical moment of greatness" but I certainly remember coming off stage feeling good about, for instance, the fact that I'd just experienced the audience singing along with the melody from Wonderful Slippery Thing. (Nice one, Istanbul!)

I should mention that I had a great time doing a bunch of festival gigs with (chart-topping UK rapper) Dizzee Rascal - playing a song that everyone knows, and seeing a crowd of over 100,000 people reacting very favourably to it, is a pretty amazing thing ;-)

WWG:
What is your mental and physical approach to improving as a guitarist?

GG:
For the most part, I just try to play whatever I want to hear, really.

Being a self-taught "ear" kind of a player, I've always tried to reproduce the music I hear in my head. If I can't play something, I'll try to isolate the technical cause of the problem and remedy it. If I'm having a phase where I can play everything I hear in my head but the results don't interest or excite me, I'll try to feed my head with some new music. (Actively listening to music strikes me as a hugely important part of improving as a
player, so a rich and varied listening diet does seem like the way forward...)

In physical terms, I like trying to make everything feel as easy as possible, and being relaxed with the instrument. (Telling yourself that something is hard to play can sometimes actually make it hard to play: it might make your arms tense up in an unnatural way, or inhibit your way you're breathing, or some such...)

WWG:
Growing up as a kid in the UK, who were your musical heroes, and why?

GG:
Mostly the usual suspects - when I started playing, I was really into the raw energy of '50s-era Elvis and the seemingly unfathomable chord progressions of the Beatles. Cream-era Clapton helped to get me into the idea that the guitar could have a "voice" and I learned a lot about rhythm playing from some of the "prettier" Hendrix stuff - Castles Made Of Sand, The Wind Cries Mary, etc...

I was also a huge fan of Zal Cleminson from the Sensational Alex Harvey Band: there was a certain zaniness about his playing which I really liked, and his tone had a pleasing "bite" to it. The guitar tone I hear in my head, to this day, undeniably has an element of Zal about it...

Guitar Dept.

WWG:
You are an avid player of Suhr guitars. Please describe what you love about the guitars and why you feel so comfortable with those guitars.

GG:
They're incredibly well made, easy to play... and versatile. I like the fact that Suhr guitars "listen" to every detail in your playing, and that they respond so well to little variations in pick attack and such like, rather than homogenizing every note.

I'm aware that I get categorised as a "shredder" from time to time (I don't feel particularly good about this, but I'm kind of resigned to it now!) and yet I think it's my inner "blues guy" who really appreciates the Suhr gear.

WWG:
As for "The One That Got Away..." please impart a tale of a guitar that once was yours, but got away from you; the situation, the circumstance, the model/make of guitar, and if ever you were able to replace it to your satisfaction.

GG:
As a rule, I try not to buy any guitar unless it really speaks to me... and whenever I do find such a guitar, I generally try not to sell it. Consequently, I can only think of one guitar which I miss even slightly - it was one of those very early Ibanez JEMs, and it had an incredibly resonant and distinctive acoustic tone: the clean, single coil noises it made were wonderful, in a "Strattier than a Strat" kind of way. I sold it way back in my student days, and since then I've never encountered another JEM that sounded anything like it. I'm not sure if it was a "one off" or if perhaps they just changed the design of the guitars at some point, but... well, it's not the end of the world, I guess ;-)

WWG:
What is (are) your main Suhr axe(s) of choice and why?

GG:
Why, the GG Signature Moderns, of course ;-) You already know how partial I am to the Suhr stuff... but the GG signature guitars are made exactly to my specs, so there's really no reason for me not to play them: they do everything I want a guitar to do, really!

They actually come in three different flavours - the wiring and layout is identical in each case, but the wood combination varies, which gives each model a distinctive acoustic quality. The Suhr pickups really seem to bring out the character of the wood - which is precisely the way it should be...

Guthrie's Favorite Recipes

WWG:
Hailing from the UK, what food/drink do you miss the most?

GG:
That's the easiest question so far - decent Indian food and decent beer! To be fair, I now appreciate that you guys actually do have some good beers (though they're not immediately apparent to the first-time visitor!) but I have yet to find a really good curry in the US. This is a shame, because - contrary to that whole "fish and chips" mythology which you've doubtless encountered - Indian stuff is pretty much our national dish here in the UK

WWG:
What is your favorite meal here in the US? Is there something you have come to crave?

GG:
In general terms, it seems like you can't go far wrong in the US if you like eating cows...

The best thing I ever ate in the US, though, was in a Mexican place called the Red Iguana, in Salt Lake City: from what I can gather, the place is a kind of "best kept secret" among the tourbus-driver community, and the food rocked in every way imaginable. (Puzzlingly, it was also completely different from any other Mexican food I've ever had in the US...)

I do hope that place is still there - though I'm not entirely sure when I'm likely to be have another excuse to visit Salt Lake City ;-) Well, we'll see.

WWG:
Do you have a personal specialty in the kitchen, at the bbq, or the deep fryer, or in the
organic garden? Any food for thought that will make our readers better guitar players?

GG:
Alas, I'm no chef - my main concern when preparing foodstuffs is to keep the amount of washing up to an absolute minimum - so I don't think I possess any special culinary wisdom to share with your readers! Sorry 'bout that.

WWG:
One final question:

Please describe what the guitar has meant to you in your life - emotionally, physically, spiritually?

GG:
Well, I've played guitar since I was three years old (or so they tell me) so it feels like an incredibly natural thing. Maybe I take certain aspects of music for granted: I've played for so long that it all just seems normal to me. More than anything else, though, I suppose playing guitar feels like speaking another language - and a remarkably universal language, at that ;-)

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