Steve Lukather on the Insane World of Studio Musicians

When did you go from people reading lists to people creating their own parts? Well, we always invented our own parts on the records, always from day one. I occasionally took a quote when I was a young

studio

musician. Someone goes. If you want a session at any

studio

, blah. blah, blah, yeah, I'll take anything because I want to get in the picture and you know, we all have stories written, everyone has stories, ask anyone who had to sit next to Tommy at Desco. Tommy would say RIT told me a great story when he started Tommy was the king, explain who Tommy Tesco Tommy Tesco is the grandfather of all the studio guitarists.

He had a photographic memory and could read anything and, in fact, he could sight read so well. Glen Campell told me that he turned the chart upside down and read it perfectly backwards, yes he was the great grandfather of the guitar and you know everyone, KN, he played on all the Rec monkeys, but he was a jazz player, did he? TRUE? The difference between them is all those guys from The Wrecking Crew and everyone. they were basically jazz and country

musicians

and then we were the rock, the next guys were mostly rock

musicians

who could do other things well and we were the upstarts, you know, personality wise, they were very quiet in the room and we just weren't us.

They were a little crazier and it was a lot more fun, not more fun, but it was a different kind of fun anyway. Tommy did things like RIT, he sat in at Guitar one CU, it was like the new Hot Shot in town and Tommy came along. I saw him sit on the guitar too and I just looked at it and I liked it, and you know, they played the first one, RIT played it really well. Tomy leans down and says. I bet you 100 dollars, this time the 10 counts, for sure. it's like you go to see Tommy and you meet Tommy at the house and you have to go to the musician or to pick up your checks, which were always like months after you did the session and it used to be the person who has the most of checks, stupid.

Teenager, although we were young, it was a lot of fun, but Tom, if you saw Tommy in it, be careful because he liked to bet a lot, so he would bet anything on anyone. Now these checks could be for record dates. for Jingles, who would like you to do a jingle for half an hour back then, it's 30 bucks, well how do you even keep track of these things? You have an agenda, okay, he says I'm here and then in a certain period of time, you know. they're going to pay you, if they haven't paid you then you have to move on oh my gosh but overall everyone was very cool and professional so not much really happened but Tommy was saying he put his hand on the CH a who bet you I'll bet you the whole stack of checks that my check is higher than yours do you want to take the bet now you're looking at Tommy going I've been doing everything record dates, so I know my checks are for Grand, a couple of Grand and his could have been like a movie date, you know, or a jingle for 25 bucks or something.

Jeff M. Carl lost to him a couple of times and Jeff was busier. The guy is like Tomy because he didn't want to not play with Tommy, he is the legend. If you let Tommy, you'll go, okay, I lost to Tommy, we'll do it again, but everyone lost to Tommy at least once and he was great. about it, he liked it, he made you pay, some guys leave, I'm just kidding, no, there are certain players, like when you lose, you pay. I'd like to take a second to talk to you about this channel, this is actually Rick Bato 2.

I've had it since the beginning of my main channel and many of you are not subscribed; In fact, 87% of people who watch this channel regularly are not subscribed, so I encourage you to hit the Subscribe button on this channel. and on my main channel, this will help me get better guests and help me continue to grow on both channels. Thanks brother. Talk about guys like Jay Gren Carlton, well these guys, the kind of guys that were there before when I first got there. I became interested in becoming a studio musician, obviously it was after I met the Picaro family and his father was his main calling.

God bless Joe, you know, you know, we spent a lot of time at his house, you know, rehearsing and stuff, and Jeff always shows up because we were still in high school Jeff was the drummer and Steely Dan when we were in high school, so They were making Katie lie wow while we were in high school and our high school band was Michael Landow and I on John Pierce guitar. on bass Carlos Vega on drums Steve Pararo on keyboards, plus we had three singers, Charlie Laoren and Gina, and um, Jeff and David P would come and sit with us, you know?

And then we were playing Katy Li stuff before the record. came out, you know, we were all inspired, this is what we want to do, so we followed all the musicians that were on these records. Well, now where I live in Los Angeles, I was able to go see Larry Carlton and Robin Ford play at this little jazz club called Dante's right down the street, yeah, and because I knew Jeff was playing with him and I knew that I got to meet these guys and you know when the Royal rip-off album came out, man, it was a life-changing guitar event, it's like Larry Carlton. playing the way he plays and using the notes and the way he plays with a rock sound, you know, with the distorted guitar sound that was like, whoa, yeah, that was one of those moments in my life, like listening to Hendrick, Jeff Beck, Clapton and Paige, he hit the peak of his powers, hit the same thing besides the Beatles, which is the first hit, you know, but that one just hit me CU, it was like he was saying I want do something different from the rest of the rest, so basically, I was sucked into that album.

Hard. I remember that Carlos Ríos was very young at the time he came to my house and he knew the solo. Show me that solo, so you know he's another great musician, great guy, but you know, that one really hit me. Then listening to Jay Gren play on these great Gino Vanelli records and he had some great solos on the early A&M records, not before he had the biggest success he had, but I loved all those early Gino records. Big changes and Jay RI Jay was doing everything he asked, so when I met Jay through the release of Jeff Baro David, I met David Foster, who was a big influence and helped me early in my career, but I met all these guys and Larry Larry used to leave me I went home and hung out with him and he was pretty tough on me, man, like I wasn't, you know what way he's not, he's not a lovey-dovey guy, I mean, like I know, doesn't mean he's not a Great guy, Larry is the Nic guy.

I will come closer, jump on you and hug you. He would never do that, would he? You know what I mean? Every

world

is different that way, but he's an incredibly cool guy, but he shared information that I want to say. I used to do it when we did it, when we did this tour together in 1998, it was one of those Japanese things where we got the guys together and they offered a list of people to try to come out here and see what's going on, just give it a try and we had It was a blast and every night, an hour before the show, I would walk into Larry's dressing room with the guitar and say, "Okay, what's my lesson for the day" and because I'm doing well.

I have a body captive here, after studying its stuff all these years. and I had already made a name for myself whatever it was. 1998 Larry was very kind in sharing his knowledge and part of that knowledge was that most people think in terms of scales and linear things like that, but with Larry what he taught me was some of the information that he taught me, I was able to, He didn't give it to me. Oh, I'm not smart enough to absorb all the information that Larry Carlton has, but he shared with me the way he thinks and thinks in terms of triads with different bass notes. like in the key of E, it's like people say, let's just improvise and modally, and yeah, and he goes, but if someone is just vamping, you also have to work up to the end of the scale or any kind of alteration, you know , it's still just a D flat, yeah. but if you think that if you come out of this, a lot of people get scared by oh 13 flat and what a game about that work without theory, that triad, well, this is what Larry opened up for me, okay, you can see it.

Likewise and technically that's what it is, but if you just look at it as a D-flat lead with an E right on the bottom, that opens up a lot more room for you to go, where can I go with that? Because everything we all did. What I always did when I was young was copy my favorite artist's solos and then, you know, sneak in as time goes on, all that stealing you've done, which we all do well if you do it long enough and you're not alone . you know, photocopy it, play it, you incorporate some of those ideas into your own plan, that's how you develop your own style, yeah, there's only 12 notes, I mean, how many have been played, maybe every permutation of a great melody was made 10,000 years ago. and here we're just trying to make sense of it