Part II:
Around this time I put up a band called No Class, with whom I still keep in contact, and the drummer even today plays in two of my bands, Project-43 and Whobody…I went to USA to work for a while, and brought home some gear and loads of song ideas, and we made some nice demos. There started to be nice gigs, but at the height of things the bassist moved to Swizerland, and being such a tight-knit band of friends, it just wasn’t the same without him, and it slowly faded. I started looking at other projects, including gigging with a 70’s rock band as a singer (Eagles, Purple, Heap etc…) but that started to be tiring with up to 2 gigs a week. Even tried putting up an acoustic Pearl Jam tribute group too.
http://deeaa.pp.fi/DecadenceSong.mp3
One No Class tune.
Finally we put up a band Brutaali Magneetti with my buddy Juho, and it ended up meaning gigging all around the country hauling my gear (at that time mostly a Fender DeVille, still could not afford a Marshall), in a small trailer behind my old Ford Escort. Man. I don’t know how I managed that, it was hard sometimes…but loads of fun. We got quite used to playing very drunk, and then had to come up with a plan that everyone limits it to one sixpack per head before a gig and no hard liquors. Oh, BTW I started as a bassist and bought a 5-string bass too, but swapped to guitar soon enough and the guitarist from No Class become our bassist. (which was fun because he was actually way better a guitarist than either of us guitarists, LOL. Likely the best guitarist I’ve ever played with. He also was an absolutist so he often drove, but after a few years he was also downing whiskey.)
But then the time finally came that I realized I’d spent 7 years already studying at the Uni, got married and quit the band, just as we were tentatively offered a record deal, won a video contest and had loads of gigs awaiting. The other guitarist and the primus motor of the band didn’t speak to me in a few years due to my decision. But I was fed up with gigging, and deep inside I realized fame and such was not what I wanted to get with music, and I had no choice but to quit. Sold off pretty much everything. Except the Les Paul. (.11 to .52 set then, BTW).
Again a year or so passed with no music, but then I ended up singing for a hardrock band aura.K, and again found myself gigging as a singer. And again after a while I turned a singer/guitarist/songwriter. I guess I have a habit of hijacking bands, because I’m very prolific and can spit out songs very easily, so soon all the bands I’m in tend to turn into my bands mostly, in a way. Unless there’s another very prolific guy like in Brut Mag.
Anyway, I could finally afford a Marshall so I got a JMP-1 rig with midi control and a very complex D/I system which I used live. I had a 4x10” cab for personal monitoring. STILL had the SE-50, plus a HUSH unit and whatnot. Still preferred the Gibson, but I was starting to feel its weight by then. This band also started to go well, we even got to play warmup on a huge ice-rink stage and had a video on TV rotation nationally…but again I felt I might get famous this way, so I broke the band up while on gig at some festival in southern Finland. BTW by then I also had a Chevy Van G20 for gig ‘bus’.
It took me a year..again…to put up D/A and start gigging again. The only problem was I no longer had any desire for band promotion, and despite we released two EP’s for a record company, I was happy with just gigging now and then and didn’t promote it at all. I also bought a Korina Explorer (Epihone) and upgraded it with a PA-2, and a strat (Fenix) and a Mosfet Marshall, and, um, some other stuff I forget.
Then we started expecting my first son…and once again I weighed the joys of playing w/a band and the scare of maybe becoming famous and the difficulties within, so I quit the band, just as we were invited to take part in a national band competition, LOL. I have a knack for selecting just the perfect time to quit before I ’make it’, luckily.
Anyways, while we broke up I made a solo release, again, never promoted it any…but still got a release/remix deal for it by an US record label…which turned sour however as the company went bust. Oh well. It also is available on the internet. Around this time I sold away the Gibson and joined Project-43, which entails NO gigging and such, and now we’re on our 4th album already.
http://www.mikseri.net/artists/d-a.31986.php
http://www.project-43.com/
I bought and sold some guitars, like a Jackson with a trem, and around this time I found the EMG’s and the 85 in particular, and one by one they made their way into all my axes. Amps and boxes a plenty; TriAC, H&K Cream Machine, ValveJr. and mods, Tech-21, Boss GT-6, POD XT, weird cabinets, some boutique tube amps…. Marshall 2203 combo…JCM800 for a while..did studio sessions, sang on a few album releases, Dogdays for backing, Refrain as lead singer…got excited again and put up a band named Crankenhaus. Wanted not to sing for a change, so just a guitarst. I ’built’ my best guitar to date; Davette; EMG85 and whatnot.
That Charvette-based Davette is really the best guitar I have played yet. I gave it a V-shaped neck by sanding down the original deep U, reshaped the headstock and whatnot…took out the trem and installed a fixed Schaller roller bridge. Slowly I had evolved my playing to less heavy-handed and had arrived to what I use still – 9,11,17,32,40,48. Allows for crazy bending wails but also stiff nice chords.
JMP-1 I swapped for a Peavey Rockmasteriin & Classic 60/60 rig with a 4x12” / greenbacks. We had a bunch of gigs and readied an album release but this time it wasn’t me who shut down the band, but the singer and the guitarist’s other band Bone 5 made it quicker and they had no time for Crank. Too bad. BTW the lyrics for Crankenhaus were almost all written by Keith Adams, a character I got to know from alt.guitar around the same time I met the P-43 guys ther.e But before that happened, I had acquired a Ceriatone 36W head, which I thought I’d never sell, such a nice head it was. It was a pretty straight-up 18W Bluesbreaker-clonew/ 4 EL84. You know the amp. Te cab is 4x12" with G12M & G12L 25W & 35W speakers.
These were times I tested a huge number of pedals, tubescreamers, you name it, sonic maximiser, Ibanez pedals, DOD…. Marshall Jackhammer however was always my favorite. At some point I got a Carl Martin Octaswitch which was great too. Built another strat with a luthier, as well as a Flying V but with maple neck…and so on. Now I have:
- Char...Davette (strat-scale) / EMG85 + SA
- JJ/custom strat, EMG 85 + SA
- Squier strat, EMG85
(Classic Player I ripped apart with a hacksaw…great rocker!).
- Yamaha RG, EMG81 + PA2 booster (gibson scale)
- Epiphone Propechy GX (more like EX now, EMG81TW + 89).
- D/A Model-X scratchbuilt, Tesla AS-2
Then the stone guitar, Ibanezin SGR bass…Landola nylon… Ibanez Artwood…and Superbiore of course, LOL...(http://deeaa.pp.fi/superbiore/superbiore). And the stone guitar.
I haven’t mentioned all my amps either in between, like Vox AD30VT, Tech-21 TM-10, Uraltone.
Now I have a Marshall JVM with the same old Boss in loop and I’m happy for a change again!
And I’m getting the urge for building something soonish…so maybe I’ll design something funky again soon.
JVM and Davette, which I play in my current live band 'Spookbox'
http://www.mikseri.net/artists/?id=129754