Billy Howerdel initially started his musical career as a guitar tech, working with various rock acts such as Fishbone, David Bowie, Nine Inch Nails and Tool. It was during his stint with Tool that he and Tool mainstay Maynard James Keenan began working on ideas which would eventually lead to the formation of alt-super group A Perfect Circle in 1999.
With
A Perfect Circle currently on hiatus since 2006, the multi-instrumentalist and producer turned his attention to writing and recording his own album -
Keep Telling Myself It's Alright - under the moniker of
Ashes Divide. After the recording was done, Howerdel put together a proper band line-up and as
Ashes Divide is currently undertaking a lengthy U.S tour behind the release.
As Howerdel prepared to hit the road, Joe Matera sat down with Howerdel to discuss his new project, whether drugs play a vital role in the creative process and working with Guns & Roses.
Ultimate Guitar: Since Ashes Divide is more of a solo album in many ways, how did you approach this record differently from the way you approached A Perfect Circle previously?
Billy Howerdel: I wanted to write songs that were a little bit faster. It was one of the things I set out to do as a parameter from the start. I think that when you get into faster music, for me at least, it doesn't sound as heavy. That slow dirge thing is easier make it sound eviler. And that is a big tone changer for me at least, even if nobody else can hear it. So because of that it meant I had approach playing guitar differently too, like whether things got to be half-time or whatever. Some of the stuff is a little bit more upbeat and uplifting because of the way I approached the chord structures. So it is a little bit different and has some of the things I wouldn’t have brought to the table with A Perfect Circle and which I can exercise to the fullest in this band. Looking back, I don’t really think A Perfect Circle was that heavy, though it did have its moments.
The music is highly emotive and dynamic, how do you go about creating it in the studio environment. Do you envisage a sound in your head first or do you experiment with many effects until you find what you’re looking?
It is a little bit of both but for the most part I see what comes into play. The effect can really write the song for me. A riff might come into play but I would not even have kept it if for the fact it wasn’t the right sound. So a pretty important part of the process for me is having that element. I’m not one to just sit around with an acoustic guitar and just start jamming on a riff or something. I mean it happened more on this record than it had in the past where the acoustic guitar had given birth to some kind of melody or chord structure. But for the most part the songs are written around some kind of texture.
This is the first time you’ve found yourself writing all the lyrics?
Pretty much so, I mean I’ve always written lyrics before, but this is the first time I’ve actually really concentrated on them, in the way that it was my duty to pull it off.
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| "For the most part the songs are written around some kind of texture." |
Many will compare your work this album with your previous work with A Perfect Circle even though the two are different musically. Will the comparisons bother you, in any way?
No, I’m proud of the Perfect Circle stuff. I think it is a natural thing that we do as human beings that when you hear one thing it is hard to break away from that set of rules that your eyes and ears put together. I’m still writing the music from the heart and in the same way as I do with A Perfect Circle. And because of that here will be things that come across musically the same. But I’m just a big melting pot of the influences that got me to play music in the first place. So it will obviously spill out in the same way as it has done before. The biggest difference this time though is that I am singing, so I had re-approach the songs, even musically, different because of my singing. So I write the music and get it in 40% capacity and then the lyrics will bring it up to 50% and when you get back to the music and start tracking it, you’ll have a see-saw effect where it will go back and forth, to the point where eventually the things, that I normally do, or have done with A Perfect Circle, has now become Ashes Divide.
Aside from being the artist, you have many hats that include that of producer and engineer. With so many roles, do you find it difficult when it comes to being objective with your work and in what you want to achieve both musically and sonically?
It can definitely get tricky but it is how I have kind of always worked. I’ve always worked on my own. When I’m engineering, I am setting it up ahead of time so I can just go and play and so I don’t experiment as much because I am engineering. You tend to do very little changes as s far as the production goes too unless it is the drums. Because then I’m literally behind the board as I have Josh [Freese] there playing. So I can go in and tweak and run back and forth and do all that kind of stuff. But as far as the guitar goes, it is a pain in the ass a lot of the times to do it all yourself sometimes. But I tend to do more of it inside the box, inside the computer and then experiment with it once the tracks have all been laid down.
Danny Lohner is credited as co-producer of the album, was that more because you needed to have someone else you could bounce ideas off from?
Yes, bringing Danny into the process half-way through was great as it was nice to have the input and having him kind of in the executive producer role. A role where he could hear the whole thing and then have him hear other things that maybe I couldn’t hear. And that way, I’d try and figure what he’s talking about and would go and try for what it was that he was hearing. He was really helpful on things like Defamed, a song that I didn’t even have a chorus for. And he was like, “I hear something else here”. I was “alright” and went back to the drawing board and tried to figure something out.
Your sound is very distinctive and you can hear that whether it’s in A Perfect Circle or Ashes Divide.
Yeah it is because I use the same equipment. I’ve always used the same Marshall Head and I also started using this little Gibson combo a few years back when I was starting out Thirteenth Step where I used it a bit but I used it a lot on this record for the rhythms. And I use the same Super Lead 100 Marshall Head that I’ve always had and my Gibson Les Paul.
When it comes to the live environment what gear will you be using on this current tour?
For the two amps we will basically be doing the same thing, I’ve got four onstage with me and my guitar player Andy Gerold are both playing through the same Marshall. And I have him switch between the Gibson and the Marshall live. So I basically go either into the pre-amp of the Gibson or the Marshall and then take the pre-amp send and put it back into the power section of the Marshall so that we both always come through the Marshall’s 4 X 12s.
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| "I don't really think A Perfect Circle was that heavy, though it did have its moments." |
Having worked with such highly creative people as Maynard James Keenan obviously influences your work ethic?
Yeah man just having that bar risen so high just from working with some one like Maynard is important to me. I don’t want to go backwards, I want to go forwards. He was gracious enough to put me on the map in the first place and that was the biggest thing that could happen to me. Even though I knew a lot of musicians, I wasn’t asking around as it wasn’t in my personality to go in there and hassle as I’m just not that kind of guy. I’m pretty shy by nature. But it was nice that he saw something in me and was pro-active enough to mention me and to try and make the thing go forward with A Perfect Circle. From which gave me the ability to do Ashes Divide today.
Do drugs play any sort of role in the creative process for you?
No, they’re not for me. I drink occasionally and that is about it. I’m really better off because I don’t think I could get a lot of work done if I was drinking or taking drugs. I would go off from a lot of the focus, since I am sitting in front of the computer for long periods at a time. To me you’re already in this whole inebriated state when you’re sitting in front of your computer for hours upon hours anyway. It’s almost like a hallucination of sorts I suppose. And I’m not saying that is a good thing too. But imagine trying to get messed up in that way with the drugs too? I recently got turned onto this Transcendental Meditation and I would say that it is more along the lines of what I do. Where I can really go under or whatever you want to call it, and it is closer to what I feel, when I get into that zone in writing the music. It is a place where everything else has been suppressed around you and there are other senses that are dulled too except for just the one thing that is the focus. I don’t know exactly what that is but, it is sort of like that with meditation too. And I’m probably too much of a control freak to get too inebriated in a lot of ways.
About ten years ago you spent a considerable amount of time doing some programming work with Axl Rose on the still-unreleased Guns & Roses album Chinese Democracy?
Yeah it was a long time ago. I worked the night shift with Axl. At night the band, the crew and the producer would go off and I would come in and work with Axl on the guitars and sometimes the vocals. And the music sounded great then and so I’m curious to hear it like everyone else is today too. I can’t imagine what they’ve done since then. What I did on that record isn’t going to be anything significant though. The only thing that I did that was of significance was work on things that were so obscure I don’t even know if they’d made the record.
Interview by Joe Matera
Ultimate-Guitar.Com © 2008
i hope his next one is better
