the GEOFF ACHISON interview April 2001 with Kevin Crossett from

the GEOFF ACHISON interview

Q: Geoff, thanks for joining us! How long have you been in the States?

GEOFF: Let’s see, it's a pretty quick trip. It has been three weeks. We had a couple of opportunities that we really wanted to grab. There’s a beautiful festival in Atlanta that we were asked to do, and I said “Look, just grab it, and try to work out a little trip around it.” So I didn’t know then if I could do Jorma’s Guitar Ranch this weekend, but that made it a worthwhile trip.

Q: I was wondering how you ever hooked up with Jorma Kaukonen, and becoming an instructor at his Fur Peace Guitar Ranch. That’s a long way from home for you.

GEOFF: Oh, yeah. To be perfectly honest, the first time his name was mentioned to me–it was through Gibson Guitars–I hadn’t heard of him. I didn’t know who he was, although I had half an idea that Hot Tuna was a band in America, but my mate Robbie Johns up at the Gibson factory, this was the same weekend I went up and picked out my guitars for my endorsement, he mentioned, it might be worth my going to Fur Peace Ranch as an instructor, which blew me out and I said “Oh yeah, yeah reckon?” And I’d never done any teaching before, either, but Jorma and Vanessa took me on under Robbie’s recommendation. That was four years ago, and I’ve done it every year since.

Q: Wow, that’s great! What kind of format do you teach? Does Jorma have a program that you follow?

GEOFF: No. It’s pretty much up to the instructor. The interesting thing is that all of the people that they invite to come along and do a workshop, like John Hammond and Roy Bookbinder, fantastic people, so everybody plays for everyone. It’s a really good opportunity for the players that come along as students to get an idea of how different performers approach their art, I suppose. There have been a couple of fellows that have gone several times just to get another perspective from a different artist; and it’s a lot of fun.

Q: That’s great.

GEOFF: It’s the best gig in the world: All you’ve got to do is sit there and talk about guitars.

Q: Are there any jam sessions that go on with Jorma as a result of the workshops?

GEOFF: Well, you see they’ve got one of the rooms set up with a stage, and what we’ve done the last couple of times is on a Saturday night, they do a concert there, and it’s generally Jorma with whoever else is there. Last year it was Alvin Youngblood Hart and myself, and, so we did a concert–just the three of us up on stage–swapping songs and having a yarn, and this weekend Jack Cassidy was there, so they did a Hot Tuna show and I opened up the set, and at the end we had a jam.

Q: Now I think that Nancy, your agent here in the states, told me that the jam was broadcast on the Internet as well?

GEOFF: I think it's from Ohio University, or it might be Public Radio. It’s going to go out in NPR network somehow. I’m not entirely sure; that went in one ear and out the other. It's definitely the local Public Radio down there; they recorded it, and what they are aiming to do is a radio show of all these types of concerts live from Fur Peace Ranch. I’m sure they’ve got a lot of really good stuff in the vaults.

Q: What Gibson instruments are you using?

GEOFF: Well, I’ve got my working acoustic guitar, that was from the endorsement, and I’ve got a Bluesking Electro BC30, which is just beautiful. It’s the perfect working guitar as far as I’m concerned. For me, it’s just great. And I’ve also got a beautiful J-45 from Gibson as well, which is my “sofa” guitar.

Q: And what are you using for electric guitars?

GEOFF: I’ve still got my old beat-up Les Paul Goldtop which I've had for about sixteen years, it's a 1969, horribly modified. Collectors look at and say “What have you done?” But it’s just great. I have yet to find something to replace it, but I’m afraid I’m going to have to do it one day because it’s getting a bit long in the tooth. It has been around the block one too many times already.

Q: Kind of a great old friend, though, huh?

GEOFF: Oh yes, yes. It’s especially nice. That was my first professional instrument, and it's going to be kind of hard to put down.

Q: Are there any specific effects or devices that you rely on, or are you mostly amp into guitar?

GEOFF: Yeah, I’m pretty much just straight into the amp. It’s my approach to it . . . it’s developed over the years, and I really appreciate the art of creating different sounds without embellishments electronically. At the same time I really can dig someone who can work their effects properly.

Q: But there is something really special about just getting the guitar with the amp and looking for all the voices in there, you know?

GEOFF: Yeah, just exploring, like extending the acoustic playing thing, I suppose.

Q: Yeah, you obviously do a great job with that. You get great tone. I noticed that you are also a string endorser for JVB. I don’t think that that’s a brand that is available in the States.

GEOFF: No. There’s a fellow, his name is John Van Boxtel, and he has been importing his strings, I think they go through the Dean Markley factory, and he makes up his own set; the difference is, like in Australia, usually, when you buy strings they are sea-freighted, so his whole idea is that he air-freights them so his are factory fresh, which is kind of hard for us to get. Just to go up and buy strings in the shop and they could be twelve months old already.

Q: What gauges do you use on electric and acoustic?

GEOFF: I use .012 to .052 on both.

Q: Wow, good hands!

GEOFF: And the only difference with the electric is that it is an unwound G, which is a .020.

Q: That’s a tough gauge to use on electric; I commend you for doing that. That’s great.

GEOFF: Yeah, well I built up to it. I would generally go up a gauge at a time. I would find that if I started to break strings a lot that it was time to go up. I suggest that for a lot of the students that we get, too. Some of them have string breakage and start filing the bridge and fixing the nut and all that sort of stuff, but if it’s happening a lot, it’s probably time to go up a gauge. You get better tone, it might be a bit stiff for a week or so, but it’s better for you, and you’re getting stronger. The biggest strings you can stand and the highest action you can get around.

Q: Do you use pretty much the same gear for stage and for studio?

GEOFF: Pretty much. That J-45 acoustic is the one I usually take into the studio. I prefer to mic up the acoustic in the studio. I’m still looking for something I can take on the road that’s acoustic . . . the pickup I’ve got for the Gibson acoustic is fantastic but again, you’re still at the mercy of the sound guy and, you know, sometimes you can get someone who’s not really on your side.

Q: They’ve almost got to be another musician themselves; you know they’re almost as important as another member of the band.

GEOFF: Absolutely. The piezo pickups that have been so popular for so long, I’m sure that there are a lot of sound engineers out there who really think that the sound of a piezo is what the sound of an acoustic guitar sounds like, and it’s not. I battle with some of them sometimes, and they sort of take out the bottom end and make it all thin and scratchy, and man . . . that’s not it!

Q: Right. I know exactly what you mean; I’ve heard the same thing over and over again. In your guitar style, you seem to have influence from so many different places; I was curious if there is one, or maybe a couple, of particular artists by whom you feel you’ve been most influenced?

GEOFF: Certainly Freddie King and Albert Collins, because they were the first two “blues” records that I owned; and records . . . blues albums were very hard to get where I grew up in Australia, and so Freddie King’s Texas Cannonball was the first one I actually got, and I listened to that for about six months. It was all I had, and I like wore it out, and I guess the neat thing about that is that, if you’ve got only one record, at least you do get to know it inside out, back to front, but there are a lot of different players who I admire–lots of styles of music that I really like. And I immersed myself in “blues” music for about five years ‘cause I figured if I really want to get this in my system, I’m going to have to listen to this and nothing else, and I was fanatic about it, militant about it, like to the point I wouldn’t go anywhere where there was a danger I might hear something else. But once that process was over and I felt like I’d mastered it okay, I started to delve into other styles of playing and styles of music. There’s a bunch of them: Jeff Beck is probably my most favorite electric guitar player of all time. Again, for his approach: He uses very few gadgets and he’s managed to stay with all these amazing sounds, by manipulating the strings of the guitar itself. And it may depend on what mood I’m in, as well. Sometimes I’ll get in a mood and think “I just really want to hear some Muddy Waters” and I’ll play Muddy Waters and nothing else for a week.

Q: Do you bring “The Soul Diggers” to the States?

GEOFF: Well, the way it has developed over the last couple years, I’ve been able to meet musicians at different places that I’ve gone so we have a line-up of “The Soul Diggers” in England, we have another one in Portland, Oregon, where I lived for about nine months, through ‘98, and we’re just getting some guys together in Atlanta to do the shows as well. So I guess I’m building an international league of “Soul Diggers”. And it’s working well. Especially since I’m an independent artist, and so we’re on a shoe-string budget for a lot of the time, so, if I’m traveling by myself, it’s really what makes it possible because at the worst, I can park on somebody’s sofa or just go out and do it with an acoustic guitar . . . and it’s the way to open up new territories, and just so long as I can look after myself, I can go out to a few open mic nights and jam sessions if we’ve got nothing else happening and that’s how we build it up, region to region.

Q: How often are you touring the States now?

GEOFF: Well, last year and this year it looks like I’m coming out of it twice a year, some trips longer than others; we’ll just see where it goes from here, but when I first took off–when was that?–in 1997, I went to England, and was in London for three months and then I came over to Oregon, and I was there for quite a lot of the year. I was away from home for twelve months, and the whole mission was just to try to get a foothold or get some, you know, musicians, or booking agents, or somebody interested in what I was doing. In Australia, because the market is so small, that we’ve got a really nice little scene there; Melbourne’s got a great music scene, but eventually you play for so long you kind of hit the ceiling: You know, there’s nowhere else to go, so this has worked out well, and my whole aim was just to be able to have somewhere to go once or twice a year, and do a little tour, see new folks and just see if my music would go over.

Q: That sounds like this is a good place to do it.

GEOFF: Oh yeah. I'm amazed at the East Coast, because I travelled with Hot Tuna last year, opening up the shows for them, and man, there are so many cities, and so many people, so much music that’s unbelievable.

Q: How has the U.S. been for you for radio airplay?

GEOFF: It’s building. Each time I come over, I get a little bit more and a little bit more and it’s usually somebody in the crowd, or it might be some of the musicians I interact with both stear me towards a radio station that will play this kind of stuff. So bit by bit, people are getting more and more, and then we get a few emails after I’ve been playing in a certain region, usually from DJs with a blues radio show, so you know I send them a CD. And the nice thing then, is that I usually write back and say, “Look, do you know anybody else who might be interested?”, so it gives me a few moren addresses, and it’s building up. We’re getting there.

Q: Is it five CDs you have out now?

GEOFF: I’ve put out six with Jupiter Two which is my own little label, but we’ve deleted the first two, because we’ve moved on a bit. They went well; the CDs were good. The music has changed a bit, the band has changed . . . so we’ve got four available on our website at the moment.

Q: And are any of those CDs available commercially in stores in the U.S.?

GEOFF: We do have one title on Amazon, which is “Getting Evil," and we’re doing that as kind of an experiment. The most difficult thing with having a web site is promoting it, so that people absolutely find it and go on there and order an album. The other problem we have is that I’ve spoken to a few people here in the United States, and they go to the ordering section on our site, and of course, it puts Australian dollars first, and it’s $25 Australian, and a lot of folks, as soon as they see the dollar sign, I guess they figure that’s American dollars.

Q: Yeah, we’re not use to seeing the difference in denomination here.

GEOFF: Yeah, but it’s just a regular $15 bucks American, so people just have to go to the next column. It’s good to have them available on Amazon; we’ve sold a handful. It would still be nice to get a distributor, or maybe even get a record deal over here, but for the moment I’m not in a hurry. I think it’s important to lay the ground work first.

Q: I can’t help but notice that some of your vocal styles remind me of Joe Cocker.

GEOFF: Ah! Yeah, it’s really neat. A lot of people say that; I can’t believe it. Cocker was definitely a huge inspiration. In fact, I can still remember hearing Joe Cocker on the radio in the kitchen on my Mum’s radio, as they played the live version of “The Letter” followed by “Delta Lady,” and I’d never heard anything like it in my life, and I think that was my first memory of truly being moved and excited by music. That would be my “dream” band. It sounds like they’re just having an absolute party on stage Anyway, I find that very flattering.

Q: I think one tune that really does it for me is “Hold On To What You’ve Got” on the “Live at St. Andrews.” I can almost see Joe up there on stage doing that dance thing when I hear you sing it, you know?

GEOFF: I think that song, probably more than a lot of others is probably directly influenced by that “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” album.

Q: Yeah. It’s a good feel.

GEOFF: Same kind of thing, yeah. And it’s just a good time . . . funky rock’n’roll. That’s cool. Thank you.

Q: Are there any of your CDs that stand out as being your own favorite?

GEOFF: My personal favorite is “Live at St. Andrews.”

Q: It's a great piece!

GEOFF: I think for the first time we truly captured what had happened on the night. The studio albums I’m pleased with, and I’m proud of, because we did the album with a very small budget and limited time. I’ve been wearing a few hats when we’ve done those, so I’ve not only been part-financier and producer and studio coordinator or you know, whatever, so I’ve spent so much time trying to get the best results out of the players and arranging the songs for them, so we found that by the end of it, I’ve got two or three hours to put down my vocals and guitar parts. Which is not perfect, but it’s probably good in another way because I’d just have to take one or two passes at it and accept it. That’s probably a good thing to do in a way because it stops you from messing with it too much. But that “Live at St. Andrews” recording . . . it just captured a really good night, and Rob Howe really got the sounds.

Q: Are there any new recording going on now or coming up soon?

GEOFF: Well, I’ve got a few songs in the can, but, I’m just going to put the brakes on it for a second and sort out what I really want to do for the next one. See in the last two years, I think it was in April of 2000 and April of 2001 we put out two live CDs: “St. Andrews” and the “Soul Digger” in the U.K., and they’re cooking along, but I don’t want to put another one out too soon. I think we can afford to take our time a little bit and just really sort out what I want to do. I certainly want to do a studio album next because I’ve got some new songs that are floating around.

Q: Do you work with standard tuning, or do you use any altered tunings?

GEOFF: I use standard tuning exclusively. And now and again . . . I’ve sat down a few times and tuned the guitar to record and messed around but I just haven’t found anything that has really stood out worth pursuing. From a creative point of view I just haven’t fallen on anything that I think is worthwhile. Oh, the very interesting thing is that now and again I’ll find a chord in tuning that I reallly like and I’ll work out a way to do it in standard tuning.

Q: Do you play strictly with a flat pick, or do you do any kind of fingerstyle?

GEOFF: It’s either the flat pick or the flesh of my fingers; I do a lot of finger picking on the acoustic, but I don’t use any finger picks or thumb picks or anything, so it’s kind of easy to spot from the flat pick to the fingers. I sometimes tuck the flat pick up with one of the fingers on my right hand and finger pick, and then I can slip the flat pick out and just go to flat picking.

Q: Do you do that when you’re playing electric as well?

GEOFF: Yeah, I do.

Q: Geoff, thanks for talking with me this evening. Have a good trip home to Australia.

GEOFF: Okay. It has been nice talking to you, mate.

Q: When are you coming back to the States again?

GEOFF: We’re looking at Fall; we’re looking at September, October.

Q: Will you be on the East Coast again?

GEOFF: We’re hoping so, we had a couple of bites of interest up around the New York area. So, we’d really like to try to do some work up there. I’ve played with Hot Tuna up in that area; and the gigs went great.

Q: Geoff, when you get back to Vermont again, I’ll certainly come out to see you and hopefully get a chance to say “hello.”

GEOFF: Yeah. Absolutely, mate! 

See www.souldigger.com.au/ for Geoff Achison's tour schedule, biography, news and reviews, and to purchase CDs.