TG Icon – Brian Setzer
HE’S THE ROCKABILLY TWANGER WHO LED THE STRAY CATS TO GLORY IN THE 80S, AND HE’S STILL SEARCHING FOR NEW SOUNDS – WITH INFLUENCES RUNNING DEEP FROM JAZZ TO BOSSA NOVA. BUT WHEN BRIAN SETZER PLUGS IN, HE ALWAYS HAS ONE THING ON HIS MIND: “YOU GOTTA HAVE T
Born in 1959 and raised in Long Island, New York, Brian Setzer fell in love with the slapback twang of Sun Records artists such as Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins, and soon found his lifelong idols, rock ’n’ rollers Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran. He modelled himself on them and their era, styling his hair into an impressive quiff, hunting down his own copy of Cochran’s trademark Gretsch 6120. He has his own signature Gretsch now, but the 6120 is still one of Setzer’s main guitars. It’s the one he played in his rockabilly trio The Stray Cats. In the 70s, they played venues such as NYC’S famed CBGB Club, and when they moved to London their uncompromising attitude and greaser/teddy boy aesthetic chimed with the UK’S punk scene. Rocking hits Stray Cat Strut, Runaway Boys and Rock This Town made them pop stars and propelled them into the 80s, and Setzer quickly became a poster boy for a new generation of fans of that retro sound. The following decade – after a solo career and stints with Robert Plant and Bob Dylan – he doubled down on the neo-nostalgia with the Brian Setzer Orchestra. Combining rockabilly with swing and jump blues, this big band won two Grammys in 1998 for their covers of Louis Prima’s Jump, Jive an’ Wail and Santo & Johnny’s timeless Sleep Walk. And if all this wasn’t enough, he has even appeared in The Simpsons, as Homer’s guitar teacher at summer camp.
Setzer’s latest solo album, Gotta Have The Rumble is a masterclass in songwriting and rockabilly guitar playing. Songs such as Checkered Flag,
Stack My Money and standout track The Cat With 9 Wives come packed with tasty, twanging licks that draw on blues but also whole-tone, diminished and phrygian-flavoured scales, while Setzer’s clever chords hark back to his early exposure to jazz. But as he tells us, while he’s glad he learned to read and write music, the golden rule of guitar playing is that there are no rules...
Theory’s useful, but the good stuff comes from elsewhere.
Growing up in New York, all the local guys who taught guitar were jazz guitarists, so I’m sure a lot of that rubbed off on me. I actually learned how to read and write music from a saxophone teacher, then when I got advanced he said, ‘I can’t really teach you anymore’, and he recommended me to a guitar guy. I would take two buses to get to his house, and he taught me, expanding on the theory I had learned, so I suppose that’s where I picked up a lot of my jazz chops. But I don’t want to freak people out about theory because, I gotta be honest with you, a lot of this doesn’t come