07/18/2025
This is so cool. interviewed Arad from The Whimbrels about their debut album. Arad described the guitar madness that is “Four Moons of Galileo” and how it was composed:
“There are four short sections. The beginning and the end are these kind of descending curtains played on one-note guitars. By that, I mean guitars where every string is tuned to the same note—so we might have one guitar with all E’s, or another with all B’s. Those parts are semi-improvised. There’s a scale that moves down the neck, and each player moves when they choose. If they like the resulting chord, they can pause; if not—whether it’s too sweet or too dissonant—they can move again. The only rule is once you move down, you can’t go back up. Eventually, we all end up at the bottom of the neck, at a drone B.
The two middle sections are built around rhythmic grooves. In the first, Norman takes a solo, and in the second, I take one. They’re very characteristic of our individual styles. Mine develops more melodically from a small fragment, while Norman’s just brings the house. He’s got this big, fat sound coming at you—it’s a gorgeous, soaring, distorted rock solo.
Then we close with a reprise of the descending guitar choir.”
Check out the entire interview by copying and pasting the link in the first comment.
