“HOCUS POCUS”
FOCUS | MOVING WAVES, 1971 | GUITARIST: JAN AKKERMAN | STORY BY CHRIS GILL
TRIVIA QUESTION: WHO was the first Dutch guitarist to record a song called “Eruption”? The answer is not Edward Van Halen, but rather Jan Akkerman, who recorded “Eruption” with his band Focus in 1971 for the album Moving Waves (titled Focus II in Europe), although Focus’ song was a sprawling 23-minute prog-rock concerto based on the tale of Orpheus and Euridice instead of a blazing solo showcase. Akkerman’s performance on “Eruption” is certainly dazzling, but the song that mesmerized fans of Euro shred guitar long before Schenker, Roth, Van Halen, Malmsteen, et al. is the album’s scorching opening track, “Hocus Pocus.”
Driven by a heavy distorted guitar riff punctuated by jazzy major 7th chords and ripping hyperspeed solos that explored harmonic minor and Hungarian minor scales, “Hocus Pocus” was a showcase for Akkerman’s proto-shred style back when Ritchie Blackmore was still noodling around the pentatonic box. In between the riffs and solos were a bizarre assortment of auditory oddities, including yodeling, flute playing and whistling accompanied by accordion. An edited version of the song became a Top 10 hit single in the U.S. in 1973 and was certainly the last time an instrumental guitar song with accordion, flute and yodeling charted on the Billboard 100.
Despite using a rig that was better suited to mostly clean jazz-inspired tones, Akkerman crafted a wonderfully gritty distortion and razor-sharp treble that was as heavy and metal as Blackmore, Iommi or Page back in the day. Surprisingly, Akkerman created his glorious tones by using a solid-state Fender SS1000/XFL1000 Super Showman, from Fender’s much-reviled solid-state line of amps that were largely to blame for the CBS era’s bad reputation. The Super Showman consisted of a three-channel preamp head with built-in effects like fuzz, tremolo, reverb and Dimension IV “oil can” rotary and a power amp/speaker cabinet unit. Akkerman’s distortion didn’t come from the built-in fuzz but rather from a Colorsound Power Boost — one of the very first overdrive pedals ever produced. Akkerman’s ax for the sessions was a late-Sixties Les Paul Custom with stock humbuckers (he later installed Gretsch Filter’trons) and ultralight .008-.038 strings.
Tube amp purists may scoff at Akkerman’s rig, but by running the Super Showman clean and getting distortion from the Power Booster, he was able to dial in a wonderfully aggressive grit and grind that maintained perfect clarity and note-to-note definition for the major 7 chords. The amp’s bright switch and high treble settings on the amp and Power Boost make Akkerman’s Les Paul almost sound like a Strat. A few overdubs were recorded with the guitar plugged into channel 3 to exploit its lush spring reverb.