Today is Father’s Day in some parts of the world. Not in my father’s house, though; he’s not one for these kinds of things. Nonetheless, I am going to pay a small tribute to my dad, Eamonn, without whom…etc.
The sound of my dad playing guitar was a constant throughout my childhood. From him (among many other things), I developed a fascination for the guitar. He would—and still does—play beautiful folk-infused fingerstyle with the hint of a warm West Coast breeze drifting through the chords.
When I am puzzling over a problem (musical or otherwise), I often find myself noodling away on the guitar as a sort of meditation. With guitar playing, you can get into a similar state as with physical exercise; your mind is focused on what you are doing while your subconscious ticks over on the problem at hand. And though we’ve never really discussed it, I believe I picked up this habit from my dad.
As kids, my sister and I would pick up my father’s Hohner1 acoustic guitar and strum away at it tunelessly. Over the years, we got steadily better, and our guitar playing became less tuneless (well, except during our atonal post-punk phase).
Anyway, when I was over in London a few months ago, while staying at my dad’s house, I recorded a quick demo in his study. This was a lot of fun for me, as I got to play his Fender Telecaster, his 12-string acoustic, and also that same old Hohner steel string. The results are fairly loose, but I quite like the 1960s feel that the 12-string acoustic brings to mind.
I actually re-recorded the lead guitar line today on my Epiphone Casino as my original take, which was recorded on my Fender Stratocaster, was too loose even for Demoitis! Also, I felt that it needed a little Tube-Screamer mid-range bite to cut through the mix.
One last note on this one: my father is also (among many other things) a brilliant poet. This instrumental piece is named after one of his poems from his collection ‘Only More So.’
So, here’s to my dad - and to all the other non-Father’s-Day-celebrating fathers.
Cheers,
JCV
Hohner (now sadly no longer in production) is probably most well-known for having been the favoured guitar brand of Prince, who famously used a Hohner Mad Cat telecaster as his axe of choice during his imperial phase.
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