BB Tour Schedule: Satch/Vai Tour in March through May, The Aristocrats DUCK Tour in North America in the summer, and Dethklok plays the Headbanger’s Boat in October. Whew! Watch the LIVE page for details. For remote recording sessions, you can reach Bryan using the CONTACT page.
BB’s double progressive concept album “Scenes From The Flood” featuring Joe Satriani, John Petrucci, Guthrie Govan. Mike Keneally, Ray Hearne (Haken), Gene Hoglan (Dethklok) and more – available in the Shop!
SHRED MAKES STRANGE BEDFELLOWS: I had a very special guest at the Satch-Vai show in Indianapolis - Sean Trende. I realize that the overwhelming majority of folks following this account are like, “Uh, who?” But there’s probably a few politically minded people out there who are rubbing their eyes and saying, “How exactly did THAT happen?” (Alex Skolnick, I’m looking at you!)![]()
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I’ll stop hiding the ball here: Sean Trende is the Senior Elections Analyst for the political website Real Clear Politics. For the politics followers out there, that means he manages and maintains the RCP Poll Average, one of the leading (and the original) “poll of polls” that averages a selection of available polls on the presidential (and many other) races together to produce one true average that reflects the polling state of a race at any given moment. A lot people in this country watch that average very closely. It’s kind of a big deal. ![]()
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And that’s just what Sean does now. Previously he worked in Big Law for a while (with firms/clients all the way up to the Supreme Court); he’s served as a Special Master that helped draw the Congressional district lines of the State Of Virginia (among others); he’s an author, a political science expert, and a very smart guy. ![]()
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He also is a big fan of Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, and many other artists in the guitar-driven instrumental rock genre. He *gets* this stuff (and plays a Flying V!). We stumbled across each other nearly five years ago in a Twitter thread about Eddie Van Halen. Me being a super duper politics nerd, I recognized him. We’ve had an incredibly rich correspondence about music and politics and all sorts of things ever since. ![]()
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But it wasn’t until this Joe Satriani/Steve Vai tour that we actually met in person (along with his two sons, one of whom plays guitar and owns an Ibanez Jem Jr.!). So this in-person meeting was years in the making! And my friendship with Sean is something I really treasure. ![]()
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Confession: I love political writing. Just the craft of it. (For example: I don’t agree with George Will on much, but for my money he’s the most gifted political writer I’ve ever read.) I used to read The New Republic and National Review and The Nation and The Weekly Standard and the editorial pages of the New York Times front to back, religiously. I’ve been following it all closely for 35 years now. There is an alternate timeline of my life where I stayed on the honors course in high school, probably went to Harvard (like my father, brother and sister!), and went into the back end of politics. Not as a candidate (god forbid), but working as an operative or a writer. I didn’t do that, and both myself and the world are probably a lot better off for it. ![]()
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Now, anyone who has followed me for a while online knows that, every once in a while, I’ll throw something political out there. I didn’t do it for a while, but in this day age, I felt compelled a few times. I have been strident on occasion. (It’s definitely cost me followers here and there. That’s fine. It’s just, like, my opinion, man.) I’m a lifelong liberal/progressive, and Sean is a center-right libertarian. We don’t agree on everything, but we don’t disagree on everything. But that’s besides the point. We have great conversations, he’s a good and decent man, and I respect him immensely. Music brought us together. And I’m grateful for that. ![]()
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The funny thing is: To me, *he’s* the rock star. Imagine having the gig *he* has!
VINTAGE GUITAR MAGAZINE GOES TO THE ARISTOCLUB: Check out this little video of “Aristoclub” I did for my friends at Vintage Guitar Magazine. They did an article on me for The Aristocrats’ new album DUCK in this month’s (April) issue. Thank you VGM!
HELLO MILWAUKEE: It's amazing how you can still find new and gorgeous parts of cities you've seen over and over. Locals will know where this all is. My god, the ribs at Pat's were amazing. I recommend the Mad Dog BBQ sauce. ![]()
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See you tonight for a Satch-Vai show, M'waukee!
SLASH, BEAR & ME: Hard to imagine any scenario where I would have ended up on a track with Slash, but thanks to Bear McCreary it happened on "The End Of Tomorrow", the climactic track from his concept album "The Singularity". It's a great song over 10 minutes long, and earns its place in the pantheon of epic concept album peaks. Check it out!
BIRTHDAY BASS SOLO: Not for my birthday, but the 44th birthday of the awesomely talented Rai Thistlethwayte! We did a special breakdown/solo section of Joe Satriani's classic "Ice 9" in Cincinnati to celebrate the occasion. There was a cake and candles. And a lot of notes. And a killer groove thanks to Kenny Aronoff. Happy birthday Rai!![]()
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(Video courtesy of RB Satriani Multimedia, LLC, ESQ, INC)
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