Neal Casal
Guitarist with a cult following who was admired by his peers
NEAL CASAL, who has died aged 50, was a self-confessed guitar obsessive, a soulful singer and a thoughtful songwriter with a successful 10-album solo career.
But it was his devotion to the guitar and the ease with which he switched styles – dynamic hard rock electric guitar one moment, tender acoustic the next – that earned him the admiration and respect of his peers.
Equally comfortable playing rock, blues, country and folk, Casal was in constant demand for musical collaborations and just two days before his sudden death he was jamming on stage with Bob Weir of Grateful Dead at a festival in Arrington, Virginia.
Born in Denville, New Jersey, on November 2 1968, Neal Casal had a fractured childhood following his parents’ divorce, growing up in different parts of America.
At the age of 13 his father gave him a guitar for Christmas and his brother gave him a copy of the Rolling Stones’ Exile On Main Street LP, and from that point on all he wanted to do was play guitar. By his early teens he was playing in local groups in Rockaville, New Jersey, with his friend Todd Schofield.
Working at a music store, he met Davis Jaynes – “my primary mentor” – and they played locally together in various bands before Casal got his big break as lead guitarist with the Florida southern rock band Blackfoot, under the leadership of Rickey Medlocke.
Five years touring with Blackfoot honed his technique and, after a series of abortive attempts to launch a solo career, he met the producer Jim Scott and in 1995 made his first solo album, Fade Away Diamond Time.
The album was acclaimed, its emotional folk and country spirit earning comparisons with Neil Young and, although it was not a commercial success, it was the first in an impressive series of solo albums.
These included Basement Dreams, which went on to be Mojo magazine’s Americana album of the year in 1998; his covers album, Return In Kind, which paid homage to his early influences; and the melancholic No Wish To Reminisce. His versatility as a songwriter and musician stretched from introspective
ballads like Death Of A Dream, bittersweet country pop like The Losing End Again, and his dreamy Grateful Dead tribute, Gilbert’s Groove.
He gained a cult following, especially in Europe; but, with less impact in America, he joined Ryan Adams & the Cardinals, touring and playing lead guitar on five albums with them.
In 2012 he joined the country blues band the Chris Robinson Brotherhood, and was regularly asked to play on other artists’ albums, collaborating with musicians as diverse as Grateful Dead, Tift Merritt, Shooter Jennings and Willie Nelson. Yet Casal was an uncomfortable rock star, who never felt he merited his status as a guitar hero.
He was musical consultant on the films Starsky & Hutch (2004) and Country Strong (2011) and was also a keen photographer, shooting cover shots for other artists’ albums, including Tift Merritt’s Tambourine and the Danny & the Champions of the World Streets Of Our Time. In 2010 he published A View of Other Windows, a photographic documentary of his tours with Ryan Adams & the Cardinals.
In later life he formed an “accidental” group, Circles Around the Sun, to record the pre-show and interval music for farewell concerts by Grateful Dead. These recordings were later released under the title Interludes For The Dead, and the band became a touring unit, gaining popularity with their retro psychedelic sound.
They released their second album Let It Wander in 2018, and Casal was working on a new Circles Around the Sun album the week before his sudden death.
He was unmarried.
Neal Casal, born November 2 1968, died August 26 2019