Rig Rundown - Albert Lee

introducing the daddario auto loan made with locking strap ends for an easy-to-use clip-on system when you're done just pull the latch and slide it off keep your guitar unlock with the derry-o auto lock [Music] [Music] all right this is John Bollinger here's Albert Lee thank you all right one of my all-time personal guitar heroes our can't thank you enough for joining us oh it's pleasure pleasure thank you well why don't we start I realize you're on the road right now so your rigs a little Spartan using mostly just background yeah you know I just I'm just holding a guitar and I brought the wrong effects unit oh yeah I do it I do it quite often I'll get you know yeah my favorite one is in LA so what well let's start with You Katara we'll get into that later so this is even playing this for like 20 years yeah I've got involved with the only boy well I you know got to know that the family in the company in the early 70s when I came over with their tans and feed and at the time they were just making acoustic guitars you know but then I think it was a couple years later they got involved with Tom Walker who had started music man company with Leo fender so and Sterling ball Ernie's son was Tom's godson so I ended up with a bunch of music man em so I was loving the exemption right but I guess it was a few years later the music man company kind of fell apart the original one you know Leo went off and did GNL and and then only bought what was left of them bought the music man name and then they started to design electric guitars and I was I was around at the time and I put in like my two cents worth what I thought I would be good in in electric guitar yeah so and then they made a couple of silhouettes and I played those and I you know I thought that so comfortable and nice and compact and yeah and well and they were new guitars my Telly's were old guitars so right you know so the I'd just love these guitars you know but how this one came about this this design was like a secondary model they decided to do and they they showed them at the NAMM show for one year and there wasn't a lot of interest they were mainly concerned with pushing the music man base because they carried on making that you know and and they had the silhouette guitar you know but I really like the look of this crazy thing you know it was kind of wacky looking you know I saw it was Nigel tough oh that's right yeah that's my guitar yeah he had one with like a crazy like odometer on this oh yeah and a-five pickups and names of the keys in like inlaid down the edge of the fingerboard yeah yeah that was my guitar yeah well my you know this sit so well it's sterling had one made it was all maple maple body and maple neck and we were playing together quite a lot at the time sure yeah yeah so he said oh we're doing he said I've got a new guitar gonna bring it to the gig tonight now you will you see it you will fall in love with it you know so you opened up the case and it looked very much like this I see nothing well I like that he said well alright it's your cinema and I played that guitar for a number of years and I was they'd only made about half a dozen of these guitars in that design you know so I was I was one of the only guys playing one of these things you know so I played it for not for a number of years but they they didn't really have production geared up enough to be able to put it on the market you know but eventually they did you know so we're gonna put your guitar out I said well great you know so and I've been playing them ever since right well is it was an interesting departure for you because you were such a Tele guy like with head hands and feet and Emmylou Harris yeah yeah 15:53 I'm most at home with Amy and then a little later on I got one I think it's I think it's a 51 I bought quite cheap quite inexpensively and as you could it then oh yeah he's you know so I've still got those guitars with the pole string on it too oh no I had others with with pull strings yeah I had a number of guitars in fact I probably got about five or six guitars with pull strings on her I got to a couple of two or three of these and I'm telling ya I've seen actually I saw the be bender on that it's like an arm that comes up right oh yeah the first one made for me and I didn't like it really it was it wasn't really comfortable okay it it came out of the plate here okay and it was like a little leaver and I said no I don't like that so then they're made like a curved one that would sort of so the guitar would hang right and that still didn't feel right so but then sterling said ah I'm going to I'm gonna have one of the guys at the factory where work on a on a new be bender for you which was more like the Dave Evans guitars oh I have so it was s he built into the back of the guitar you know and the little sure a little that way bridge piece here that the rocks like a steel guitar you know and so they're they're the ones that I have with the the with the museum hang guitars you know and and now you pretty much I haven't seen you playing a lot of B banners but you're using the whammy bar yeah that was by mr. chance really this a few years ago sterling said aha I want you to try one of these guitars with DiMarzio pickups him because I've been I've always been using similar Duncan's you know so he said so he sent me a guitar but it had a whammy bar in it I said well yeah I said well the pickups are great you know but I really like my my scene was I'd rather stick with those you know but I do like the whammy bar can I keep the guitar or can you send me another guitar with the whammy bar in it you know and I've been using them ever since I love it in your it seems like your primary sound is well what are you what are you doing pickup was like before that it seems like you're using that kind of traditional strat yeah it's very much the stretch setup this you know it says like 5 5 way switch you know and I'm not I I guess I favor these two pickups together you know the second position yes just got a volume volume and tone and that's it and I use that a lot and I'll use this one on its own or I'll use these two on their together or that one on its own you know so yeah that that's enough tonal variation for me sure now right now you've just back lined a fender twin and just going straight yeah yeah well my effects unit that I brought with me isn't working too well so tonight and last night as well I just went straight into the EM which I hadn't done for a long time I know when I see guys with like big pedal boards and I mean you know the the unit I use is that my favorites it's an old Korg a3 multi effects unit and I've probably got about five or six of them and in fact my wife just bought another one for me yesterday on eBay for a hundred and fifty bucks but who knows that that I was really missing the one if it was gonna be too difficult to send mine out you know so she bought one for me yesterday and it's going to arrive in a couple of days Oh one of the gig progress oh so I'll be happy then I'll finish out the tool with it it's old so I'm assuming it's working yeah so and that's primarily all you use yeah oh yeah well it's got everything in it it's got compression delay the course you know and that's that's all I need really reverb right you tend to yeah that when I've seen you use you know a little bit of coursing and then every now and then that like that cool dotted delay thing you do oh yeah yeah yeah yeah no I'll throw the in occasionally yeah if the tempos right right right right at the if if the drummer lets you yeah well that's great man it's it's uh it's I don't know it's kind of refreshing just to see a person plug straight in and yeah well I don't always do that you know but it seems like I do because I've got this little rack on top of my amp and people's hammer are using anything up there I said yeah I've got a multi effects unit you know I said I hate pedals all over the floor yeah I'd be tripping over so so when you you uh you had a head hands and feet and then you came to America with that bad yeah and then ended up being with Emmylou Harris and I think that's where most of us really yeah that was a turning point um you know I died I joined the crickets and I got to know Los Angeles a lot better you know and I started jamming a local bar and I was just astounded the people I was playing with you know this never would have happened in England you know so so well 73 74 so I I was playing with body Emmons barber line Doug Dillard and any night you might I think Emmylou came out there once a little later on Rodney crown Roseanne cash it's a Glen Campbell came out and played with this Jackson Browne and this is just close yesterday it was a tiny place yeah tell me please where was a little place called Calabasas in the San Fernando Valley huh old western town you know and that place is still there it's a nail salon now yeah that'll be music there for a long long time Wow but what was your rig back then just italiano well I was borrowing amps 20 amps and good question what was I using well I guess it was by 74 I got my first music man amp Oh which was like their version of a 14 basemen except it was 130 watts with four tens and gray em and I use I use one of those with the Emmy Lou oh yeah and it never quite cut it when I was with Clapton because he was using me music man at the time right the backless album were he seen with that music man up on the car yeah so I started to get bigger bigger amps in you know like with 12 you know and 130 what heads you know and another I used those for many years you know I still still got probably 15 or 20 20 of those exams you know Wow yeah so many things in some in LA I've even got one here in Nashville and I was thinking about maybe trying to get someone to drop it off for the gig tonight but I never got around to it yeah I actually I saw you back with Clapton in the day and you he'd let you you open with country boy before he came out it was a fabulous under board birds and then you came out with country boy and it's like my god it's just mind-blowing guitar play oh yeah he used to go and sit behind his amp there and with a glass of brandy and a cigarette he was a lot more fun then different kind of fun yeah yeah free Rehab fun yeah I mean that was a like a life-changing yeah now he was very generous I got I got to do quite a bit and I was I was the only for one at one point I was the only background singer so I was seeing harmony with him you know and like the tours before that and after I left he'd have background singers you know but I was I was the singing there for a while well right here I mean country boy because I mean that's that's great vocal what do you think of the Ricky Skaggs version of that oh great yeah oh yeah he did a great version yeah cuz we used to do it together in the hot band oh really yes were you guys ready yes playing mandolin and yeah and in fact he played fiddle on my version of it really yeah no not the hits hands and feet version but I recorded it again for A&M and so with the Steve official record that you did in Nashville oh no no this is long before that okay yeah long before that so this would just came out in 79 and then I remember Ricky calling me up we say hey I've recorded your song I said well what song he said country boy you said I want to do a video do you mind if I do a video I said no no no that's a really cool video and then their coach yeah yeah yeah yeah they're dancing through the subways yeah yeah mind blowing playing on that I mean but you're I mean your version is a definitive one they're just just great you know when you with Clapton you I remember watching your star likes video and you had an old 50's ear gibson les paul custom you know Eric gave you yeah he gave me that at the first rehearsals because I think it's a good boss yeah well we were talking about guitars you know NASA died I stabbed this Les Paul because I knew he played late sport you know I said it's Les Paul Custom and I sold it like it idiot you know I've got one of those at home somewhere you know and I didn't think any more of it and the next day the roadie comes in this case and that was it I was I was playing that guitar from there on you know we're playing it live oh yeah I used it on the road yeah really no it's it's what deal what year that is 79 another where's the the guitar is 58 58 yeah my my one that I regrettably sold was a 1960 yeah you know one of the last years of this broadcasting right right the original ones yeah before they went to the USGA yeah cut so how did that mean you're such a single-coil guy it's hard to imagine you on well you know here I was playing with Eric and plant Connie music though I wasn't usually playing so I was I was having to compete with or you know what he was doing you know and you know I'd to play the tele for a while there with him but the Gibson just had more Mead right were you using any kind of overdrive pedals around like that no no was from the music rounds yeah we just backed off the master volume and you know which is what he was doing - he did he didn't have any pedals except for a Wawa pedal you know really he switched onto that yeah you you guys were blisteringly loud I mean wow well I guess we única see it was pretty bad yeah I can see remember just hearing it off the stage yeah it's like you know peeling paint off though and you also have one of the Everly Brothers dattara yeah well prior to joining Eric I was cuz don't Emily was playing at this Sundance saloon in Calabasas that's where I first met dawn really and we became really good friends and I did quite a few things with him you know and I did a little tour with him and I think he and his wife were really grateful that he had a sidekick again because he was missing his brother Norway but at that time I was his sidekick sir you ever seen the army yeah I would say he put me in a at the deep end at the time yeah and then what what what the main gig that we did was a big country festival in England and I was there with Emmy Lou and he's gonna play with me tonight I see yeah sure course oh well yeah so we had a little rehearsal with English rhythm section and shortly into the first song he said how'd is it gonna sing with me young I want you to sing with me and what you have to realize is that this was being videoed for BBC television so it was an every brother on the BBC oh that's great oh and I imagine okay for Americans Eric Clapton one of the most prestigious rock bands in Iraq artists in the world but I bet as a guy growing up in Britain I imagined the Everly Brothers were like oh yeah I was a huge every breathless fan or not you know I first met them in 62 63 oh so they were just and they were just they to it over there a lot yeah they're in there yeah and I got to know the guitar player don't you know don't peek they weren't wrecking crew you know no I know a front of my Pat severs played steel well don't peek was it still is a really good friend and here he was with the Everly's 62 and 63 so he was he was came into a club and he playing with the band I was with you know and we became friends Geron and he said he said oh I'm here with the Everly Brothers and I thought wow that's when I first got to meet Phil and then met Don that the following year so whenever they came to England I I don't you know I tried to get to see them you know but I never really got to know Don well until until I went out to the Sunday and saloon in Calabasas you know and became his big buddy you know and I think he and his wife realized that he was happy had to have a sidekick and they knew how much I I love that black guitar with the white pit guards and I said what and anyway they decided to give it to me and it's just as well really because at that time he don't he just moved to Nashville and moved here and he had a lot of stuff in storage and he had three or four guitars stolen out of the storage well and he never did get him back and if that black guitar had been in there that would have gone - oh yeah so it's just as well we know that we know where that is yeah that's great great part of rock and roll his Albert hey it's such a thrill to meet you and my pleasure talk to you Jordie give us a little play out Oh [Music] [Music] you [Music] you

Channel: Premier Guitar

Views: 119,067

Keywords: albert lee, head hands & feet, emmylou harris, ernie ball, ernie ball music man, music man, eric clapton, everly, everly brothers, rodney crowell, country guitar, country boy, country music, guitar, guitars, guitarist, john bohlinger

Id: pQ30A3w5Mjw

Length: 22min 54sec (1374 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 04 2020