Yngwie Malmsteen
Yngwie Malmsteen takes his neoclassical shred to new extremes on Parabellum.
WHEN YNGWIE MALMSTEEN spoke with Guitar Player earlier this year to reveal how he composed “Far Beyond the Sun,” his signature song, it was clear that his love for the 1984 track was practically eclipsed by his enthusiasm for his latest creation, Parabellum (Music Theories Recordings). “It is extremely neoclassical,” he said of the new album. “People will think I’ve lost my mind. It is like my Concerto” — 1998’s Concerto Suite for Electric Guitar and Orchestra in E Flat Minor Op.1 — “but metal. I went totally over the top.”
Malmsteen has often liked to joke that as far as he is concerned, “more is more,” and the new album exemplifies that philosophy in spades. “What is exciting is when something comes to me, makes me think, Wow! and then I go straight to record it,” he says. “The new album is full of those moments.”
Now that Parabellum has been released, it’s clear that his enthusiasm was not misplaced. For fans of the neoclassical metal style Malmsteen pioneered, if not downright invented, Parabellum is the album of their dreams, packed with the Swede’s trademark arpeggios, pedal tones and insanely fast scale runs, but without ever letting technique take precedence over musical content. The album will not convert non-believers, but Malmsteen is only concerned with the integrity of his music. The global shutdown of live music in 2020 allowed him to bring an intense focus to the recording process, and that has resulted in him delivering one of the strongest releases in his catalog.
“I’M NOT PRETENDING TO BE SOMETHING THAT I’M NOT. THIS ALBUM IS EXACTLY WHO I AM, AND I’M EXTREMELY HAPPY WITH IT”
Interviewing Yngwie for the release of Parabellum, it was clear he was filled with excitement about the album and how his hardcore fan base will respond to it. Malmsteen takes nothing for granted, and as far as he’s concerned, he’s making some of the best music of his career.
Parabellum is possibly your most full-on neoclassical album. Was it a deliberate statement of intent, a way of embracing your style?
Although that’s what it turned out to be, I didn’t plan it like that. It was just a very natural thing for me to do. For so many years when I was young, I worked on arpeggios and scales in much the same way that many guitarists work on blues scales or whatever. As a result, whenever I play something, it automatically sounds like me. With Covid and the cancellation of tours, I had a lot of free time, and that gave me the chance to bring a laser-like intensity to the recording process. My approach to the album became extremely focused, which can be both good and bad. There is always a danger of being overanalytical, which is something I really strive to avoid. What you hear is what you get, ultimately. This album is exactly who I am, and I’m extremely happy with it. It’s like I’ve gone full circle back to when I was 15 and had no distractions to interfere with my playing. That was what last year was like for me.
Given how well it turned out, would you intentionally use the same method again?
I’m fully confident that I can work around touring commitments to deliver a great album in the future. Trilogy [from 1986] was the last time I recorded with so much time blocked out purely for the recording process, but I think the intervening albums have all been strong, even though I often had to record between tours or whatever. I think you just adapt to whatever circumstances you find yourself in. I’m pretty flexible. I don’t have to lock myself into certain ways of doing things.
What were some of the advantages of working so intensely on Parabellum?
I could put the stuff on and listen to it in the car and get ideas for different tempos or approaches. I might have a track that I didn’t think was working, but then I’d listen to it again a couple of days later while I was driving, and I’d hear something that I really liked and that maybe I could change. I had the time to review what I’d done and live with the tracks — the luxury of time to let the music evolve and develop.
Did you play everything on the album?
Everything except the drums. I played guitar, obviously, plus bass and keyboards, although a lot of parts that you might think are synthesizer were actually guitar parts. I did plan to have some guys come in to do backing vocals at the start, but I had such a great time recording the vocal lines that I didn’t feel the need to do that.
Your vocals have gotten stronger from album to album. You must be very happy with the way that your voice has developed.
Thank you so much for saying that. I am very pleased. My mother sang jazz, and my family was full of great singers. I was always singing when I was younger, but not because I had to for my music. Over the past 10 years that I’ve been singing on my records, I’ve reached the point where I’m very happy with the vocals, and I don’t plan to take a singer out for live shows anymore. This time I really made sure I was comfortable with everything vocally.
“Eternal Bliss” is the most radio-friendly song on the album. The harmonies are especially strong.
I had such great fun doing those. I kept trying to add extra layers and ended up with about 40 voices on it. The song went through a lot of changes in the arrangement. It originally started with an acoustic guitar, but then I thought of using the a capella voices on the chorus for the opening. That is a deep lyric on there, but I really mean what I say. I thank God every day. I must be the luckiest guy in the world. I’m such a grateful person. I just walk around smiling.
“I WATCHED THIS JAPANESE GIRL PLAYING ‘FAR BEYOND THE SUN’ ON THE VIOLIN. IT SOUNDS EXACTLY LIKE IT WAS COMPOSED FOR THE VIOLIN”
“Magic Bullet” has some blisteringly fast guitar harmonies. Did you hear the completed piece in your head, or was there a lot of experimentation with harmonizing lines and so on?
It’s funny how that one came about. I developed it on the road; I had it on an iPad with a number of tunes that I’d been working on, and I thought, I’m just going to mess around with this and see what comes out. So that came from just playing around with ideas. I came up with the cool bass line for it later on.
“Sea of Tranquillity” has a very different feel from the other tracks, with its acoustic opening. There are so many layers of guitar parts that it takes repeated listening before everything is revealed.
I like to build texture with the guitar parts. Whenever I solo, I improvise. I always make solos up; I never work them out. If it feels good, I leave it, but if not I might do one more take. I don’t like to do things over and over; I like it to capture the feel on the spur of the moment. When I listened to it in the car though, I started to hear the different ways that it could have gone. A lot of times I hear something later that makes me think, Shit, that part is really good, I’ll put some harmonies on that line. That’s how some of the textures will evolve, after repeated listening and getting new inspiration.
So would you never punch in a part on a solo?
I have done it sometimes, if the solo feels very inspiring. If there’s a very small part — maybe a couple of notes — that I’d like to change, I’ll punch it in, because I wouldn’t want to listen to that for the rest of my life. [laughs] Really though, I generally record the whole solo in one pass. I will usually like what I do, warts and all. [laughs]
You’ve previously said that if you slowed your solos down, they would still sound like music and not just a collection of licks. Presumably, musicality is always your primary consideration.
I think that is just the way that I approach the guitar. No matter how fast something is, I need it to be very musical. A lot of times I will play something really fast that is a fairly simple line if you slow it down, but it will be a strong melodic statement. I watched this young Japanese girl [Unlucky Morpheus] on YouTube recently playing “Far Beyond the Sun” on the violin, note for note, absolutely perfectly. It was really great, and what was so interesting is that it sounded like it was a piece of violin music, not just a string of guitar licks. It is so crazy that it sounds exactly like it was composed for the violin. I was amazed by that. It was like it had gone full circle from me being inspired by the violin to hearing it played by a great violinist.
How much work does it take to maintain your level of ability?
I have a guitar in my hands whenever I’m watching TV or whatever. When I’m on tour, it’s a lot of playing, and when I’m in the studio there’s a lot of time spent playing. Everything I do is about improvisation though. I never play solos the same way, and I am always trying to capture a special moment. I don’t think playing a lot is important; it’s about playing the right thing.
Where does inspiration come from for you?
I don’t really know. Any outside influence can have a good or bad influence. When I play, I’ll find something that surprises me, and then I’ll work with it. If you told me to write a country song, I could do that, but it wouldn’t be something that excited and inspired me if I just did it to order. Now and then, something happens though, and a spark of an idea appears, and that is the moment that I try to capture and work to develop. I never play the songs the same way live. I often don’t even follow the setlist. I’ll just change the order or throw something new in. Everything I do is spontaneous and improvised.
I saw you playing a vintage Les Paul on a YouTube clip recently. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you play anything other than a Strat. Do you feel out of your comfort zone on such a different instrument, and does it change the way that you play?
That was a clip that was filmed in a music store. It was a nice ’59 model that they had. I do have a couple of Les Pauls, but I don’t play them a lot. I can drive any car that I want, and I drive a Ferrari. In the same way, I can play any guitar that I want, and I choose to play a Strat. That’s who I am. My Strat with the scalloped neck and the Seymour Duncans is like a finely tuned machine. I could play everything that I play on the Strat on a Les Paul, but that doesn’t mean that I’d want to. I do like Gibsons though. I’ve always liked them.
What would take you outside your comfort zone in terms of equipment?
Well, music is stronger than the gear you use to make it, but having said that, the Les Paul isn’t ideal, and of course if you were to play an electric guitar totally clean for example, that’s a very different proposition. If I had to play something like a Tele through a Twin Reverb, I’d probably play in a more acoustic-like way. The sustain and the great sound of an overdriven guitar is something really special. I found what I like in terms of guitars and amps many years ago, and I don’t like to experiment with that.
I guess for the new album, your gear choices were business as usual, with your signature Strat, Marshalls and overdrive pedals?
“ARPEGGIOS ALWAYS SOUND BETTER ON THE NECK PICKUP. THEY ARE MUCH SMOOTHER SOUNDING, MORE LIKE A VIOLIN TONE”
Yeah, that was exactly what I used. [laughs] And my signature Ovation and my signature picks.
When soloing, you often change rapidly from the front to back pickup as you move up the neck. Is that to maintain the consistency of your tone?
To a degree. I think arpeggios always sound better on the neck pickup. They are much smoother sounding, more like a violin tone. I do really like the neck pickup a lot, but I guess I mix and match.
You rarely use positions two and four on the five-way switch.
On my last blues album [2019’s Blue Lightning], I did use those positions for the Hendrixy stuff, and I do think it is a really great, cool sound. I think I prefer the clarity and volume of the front and back positions, though. Those Hendrix tones are the very distinctive essence of the Strat sound.
Are there any styles of music that you’d like to explore that you haven’t previously recorded in?
No, because I’m very pleased with the music that I make. I have a natural way of writing and playing; I don’t pretend to do something that isn’t who I am. Everything that I write and perform is exactly what I am intending it to be, and if I wanted to play in a different style or something, then I would. All the musical choices and decisions that I make are entirely mine, from the music that I make to who plays on my records.
What do you work on in your own playing?
There’s always room for improvement and development in any musician. For so many years, particularly when I was a lot younger, I was such a fanatic about playing guitar. I wouldn’t accept any limitations. I wouldn’t stop playing or working on something until it was perfect. I’ve gotten to the point where I know that what really matters is the note choice, not the technique or the difficulty in what I am doing. You need to know a lot to be able to be free to express yourself. You need to understand what notes work with different keys, arpeggios and so on. Once you understand how everything works, you are free from thinking about the details and you can play with complete expression.
Have you seen any “reaction” videos on YouTube? There are a ton of them that feature people who presumably have no idea who you are, and they’re blown away by your music.
I have actually, and I find them pretty funny. The greatest thing it reveals is that music really is a universal language. The other thing is that if you are very passionate about your music, that is conveyed in what you do, and that passion is something that people will pick up on and respond to.
Do you still get the same buzz from music that you did 40 years ago, when you sent Guitar Player the tape that led to your breakthrough?
I think that has remained the same. I always challenge myself by improvising, and obviously that can go both ways; it can make you very frustrated sometimes. I can be very unforgiving with myself and I won’t allow myself to fail. But as I said, I give thanks to God every day that I am so fortunate to be living this life. I don’t take anything for granted, that’s for sure.