"Originally in Quicksand, my background was coming into music through a straightforward hardcore perspective, so I took on that simplified aesthetic, similar to Fugazi," says Schreifels. "Both our bassist Sergio Vega and other guitarist Tom Capone were adding in pedals, so I earthed the band playing the straight man and opted for the more direct tone."
The Quicksand quartet rose from the ashes of New York City's late '80s hardcore scene, featuring guitarist/singer Schreifels (Gorilla Biscuits and Youth of Today), Vega (Absolution and Carnage), Capone (Beyond and Bold), and drummer Alan Cage (who was in Burn with Capone, and Beyond). A self-titled four-song EP scored them a major-label deal with Polydor, where they released the seminal 1993 classic Slip. (It even landed in Decibel's Hall of Fame.) Both recordings are equally abrasive and melodic. Then the quartet moved to Island to release 1995's Manic Compression, an album unrelenting as a sledgehammer. But as quickly as they rose, the band dissolved into the time capsule of N.Y.C.'s once-rich alternative music scene. Yet they still influenced the Deftones (where Sergio now splits time playing bass), Thursday, Glassjaw, At the Drive-In, Torche, and many others.
Schreifels went on to form other two-guitar bands, including Rival Schools with Ian Page and Vanishing Life with Rise Against's Zac Blair. And he's continued to flourish as a frontman and the midrange mattress, allowing his fellow guitar mates to bend solos, color outside the lines, and leave the pocket.
However, life has a way of challenging us and putting us out of our comfort zones. (I mean, hello, 2020!) Ian left Rival Schools, Tom departed from Quicksand, and Walter formed the bluesy, psych-rock Dead Heavens, engaging in celestial spaces and thick, sizzling guitar parts.
"At that point, I sorta had to become the 'pedal' guy, so I was like, 'screw it, I'm gonna get a wah wah. [laughs] I've heard a lot of good things!'" That led to a delay, then a tremolo, then a phaser, and now he reserves a row on his pedalboard for experimentation and tone testing. "I slowly became an effects guy, still knowing I needed their applications to our music to be tasteful. And with Dead Heavens, I wanted to broaden my palette by getting better as a player and creating a space where I could really indulge the sounds in my head."
What sort of positives has Walter recognized from his pedal liberation? "Understanding how to use a piece of equipment that before was mysterious or intimidating, and now, by having broken through that mental barrier, you can get to some new shit and create something you otherwise might not have."
And his longtime straightforward, get-the-job-done, hardcore DNA has avoided any gear-snob blind-spots and pitfalls. "I sound just lazy, but I don't have any care or concern about how I get to a result if I'm happy with it. If it takes a long time, and there's something I have to shelve for a bit, that's fine. If it's with a Roland CUBE practice amp that inspires a song or tone, that's fine, too. I just don't care."
These new gear avenues and the rekindled Quicksand officially downsizing to a trio are creating new paths for Schreifels. "I'm just really excited to continue telling Quicksand's story, carrying on from Interiors, but also through our OG catalog, and a focus on growth has been improving my playing guitar and finding new ground to break."
In this episode, Quicksand's founding frontman details why oft-forgotten Fenders and a "spooky" gold-foil Harmony were 6-string cornerstones for Distant Populations. He explains how an 8" practice combo was an ace up his sleeve while recording, and chronicles his slow embrace of effects and how they've shaped his sound and vision.
[Brought to you by D'Addario XL Strings: https://www.daddario.com/XLRR]
Preorder Quicksand's Distant Populations (out 8/13 digitally; 9/24 vinyl)
And watch videos for their two singles:
1960s Harmony Holiday Bobkat
"The gold-foils in this Harmony Holiday Bobkat have a muddy, spooky, ghostly quality that really complements and fills out around the Fenders I typically use in the studio and onstage," says Schreifels. While speaking with PG in 2018, he mentioned that the above mid-'60s Harmony and a Fender Kurt Cobain Jag were the heavy hitters for 2017's Interiors, but the forthcoming Distant Populations saw it paired with a Fender Player Lead III (which we'll meet in a minute).
"Another cool thing about the Harmony is, even though I'm not a lead player, it's really comfortable and easy for me to get around the fretboard and sound like I'm doing something," admits Schreifels.
He's had the guitar for nearly 10 years, and beyond Quicksand he's used it in the studio for Dead Heavens and Vanishing Life. Typically, all of Walter's guitars take Ernie Ball Slinkys (.010–.046) and he usually lives in standard or drop-D tunings. However, "Fire This Time," off Interiors, has the low E string dropped to A, creating unison between the neck-top two strings—something he absorbed after seeing Baroness in concert.
Fender Classic Player Jazzmaster Special
During the band's original '90s heyday, Schreifels would get down on bucker-brandishing guitars like Les Paul Deluxes and H-S-S Strats. He saw losing his Gibson overseas (and his body deterioration from playing heavier instruments) as a sign. Eventually the transition dovetailed into a relationship with Fender, and he began bonding with their humbucker guitars, like the aforementioned Cobain Jag. He scored the above Fender Classic Player Jazzmaster Special, but didn't fall completely in love with its stock JM Special Design Hot Single-Coil Jazzmaster pickups, so he slammed a set of brand-unknown humbuckers in for a bigger, bolder sound. To enhance its playability, he swapped out the original bridge for a Staytrem.
Fender Player Lead III
Ahead of recording the new album, Walter spied the announcement of Fender's updated Lead II and Lead III instruments, and was instantly intrigued. He reached out to Fender and they sent over the above Player Lead III model finished in a stunning purple metallic and featuring Player Series humbuckers that can be split.
Fender Blues Junior
The band's last U.S. tour saw Schreifels using a 50-watt Marshall JMP 2x12 combo loaded with Celestions. He's gotten familiar with and fond of Orange half-stacks, too, but as with his guitars, he's been condensing amps—especially when it comes to the studio. Above is the Fender Blues Junior that resides at his N.Y.C.-based home, but it went recording with him for the new Quicksand album.
Roland Micro Cube
The shocker of his setup has to be this Roland Micro Cube combo. In the Rundown, he remarks that "it's just so damn convenient." Because of its basic layout and built-in effects, it allowed him to forget about the gear or tone, dial in some reverb, delay, or chorus, and try to usher out the ideas in his head. And when tracking overdubs with it for Distant Populations, he used its "cheap" sound as an asset to layer in another accent.
Walter Schreifels' Pedalboard
This is a pedalboard that's 20-plus years in the making. As he admits early in the Rundown, he shunned pedals for much of his early career. The cornerstone of his sparse stomp station is the Dunlop Cry Baby Standard wah. He'll engage the Cry Baby to create tension or lock the sweep to alter the guitar's EQ and voice.
The next two are industry standards and seen in countless Rundowns: the Xotic EP Booster and MXR Carbon Copy Delay. For a little wobble and wiggle, he'll kick on the Mooer Spark tremolo, which he's kept around because he says the depth control is special. And the Electro-Harmonix Mel9 still finds a home on his board, because of its role in Interiors. It usually toggles between the strings and orchestra modes, but he has found some inspiration in the flute mode, too.
Already rests on a Pedaltrain Novo 24 board and is juiced by the Voodoo Labs Pedal Power 2 Plus.
Walter Schreifels' Bonus Pedals
Here are some pedal provocateurs that made notable spotlights on Distant Populations. The EHX Synth9 creates the aerial-assault warning sirens on "Missile Command," the MXR Phase 90 headlines the song "Phase 90," and the DigiTech FreqOut adds eerie, phantom feedback.
Today's incarnation of Quicksand initially jelled on the band's second album, 1995's Manic Compression. It is, from left to right, bassist Sergio Vega, drummer Alan Cage, and guitarist Walter Schreifels.
While the band's first two albums, Slip (1993) and Manic Compression (1995), failed to meet the expectations of the major labels they were released by, they would go on to become seminal documents of a genre and a time. Those recordings were built on a bedrock of guitar that was brash, moody, and relied upon extended chord shapes and a vicious, groove-oriented intensity that made for a unique sound within the landscape of the period's aggressive music.
Quicksand disbanded under the weight of industry pressure and band politics at two different points in the '90s, but its second-album lineup has since reunited. Schreifels, with drummer Alan Cage (also of Burn) and bassist Sergio Vega, who joined the Deftones between his stints in Quicksand, has recently added a new chapter to Quicksand's story with the release of Interiors, the group's first studio album in 22 years.
Premier Guitar met up with Schreifels at the band's rehearsal space in Brooklyn to discuss Interiors, the restless musician's growth as a guitarist and songwriter, and how he was forced to eschew his former spartan philosophy regarding gear but found himself again as a player by embracing the wide world of effects.
How did you approach writing Quicksand material after so many years away?
It took a little bit of time playing with each other again to find ourselves. When we started playing the old songs for our [2013] reunion tour, we made a point of stretching them out and finding areas where we could improvise. We played with the arrangements of the old songs so we could make something happening and new, and that gave us an opportunity to feel comfortable with the band again.
Within those jams and improv sessions, we started to hear what we really sound like together now, and we started to identify what each other instinctively plays like now, and that was the genesis of understanding what elements might be present were we to do a new record. And we all felt really good about it.
Quicksand's new comeback album was recorded at producer Will Yip's studio in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania. Schreifels tracked with a Fender Kurt Cobain Jaguar, a Harmony Bobkcat, and an Akai offset solidbody, mostly plugged into Yip's amp collection.
How have you changed as a guitarist? You've been involved in a ton of other projects, from such varied musical places.
Yeah! I've been playing guitar for so many years, and like you said, I have been involved in a lot of genres and styles. I've developed a lot over the years with what I'm open to aesthetically, and have honed in on what I really like musically—all while carrying along the things that have always identified me as a player. So allowing all of that to live together is important to me, and the key this time around was allowing ourselves to be ourselves—as we are now. Obviously part of “ourselves" is that we were in Quicksand, so that part of the sound takes care of itself. The bigger thing was believing in the new things we all brought to the table as musicians and giving those things space to breathe.
A big change for me is that I never used effects pedals back then, which was ridiculous, because I've always been a huge My Bloody Valentine fan. Maybe it was because I was into Fugazi and they didn't use pedals. I still love Fugazi and Ian MacKaye—he was and remains a huge influence—but I do look back and think maybe I shouldn't have taken that stuff so seriously. So now I have this whole new skill set in using effects, which basically makes it a new instrument. It's amazing how adding in a few simple effects like a wah pedal and a delay can drastically change the way you approach the guitar.
I've always appreciated Ian MacKaye's using as little gear as possible, in that it forces you to think creatively with limited resources.
Coming from hardcore, there were so many rules, and I think that has a lot do with Minor Threat and Ian MacKaye being one of the top in the genre. To my ears, Minor Threat were probably the most musical, yet powerful, of the important hardcore bands, and they worked from a philosophical place that obviously connected to a lot of people. Those ideas and aesthetics, including Ian's simple guitar set up, were good at the time, and the “how many different things can you make with limited resources" ideal is something I'm into and love. But I've done a lot of shit within that and since the days when hardcore was my main focus, and I'm not married to that idea nor do I see a reason to hold onto any artistic orthodoxy at this point in my life.
During a stop at Hollywood's Fonda Theatre on Quicksand's 2013 reunion tour, Schreifels played his Gibson SG Custom. He also acquired a reissue 1962 Fender Telecaster during the same period. Photo by Debi Del Grande
You were forced to learn how to play lead guitar for the first time with your blues-rock band Dead Heavens, which started in 2013.
Oh, yeah! Playing with Dead Heavens got me into playing lead, and that's also where I really got into using effects. I don't have much technical prowess as a lead guitarist, but if you've got good feel and good ideas, you can do a lot with a single note. Obviously I'm not the first person to come to that conclusion, but when you get up there and do it and no one's pointing and laughing and calling you a hack, it's really validating after so many years of not playing lead. In Dead Heavens, being more in the blues realm, I'm aping people that are actually really awesome at guitar and just trying to capture some of that, but my deal with myself is that I don't need to be that good. I just need to convey an emotion. To me, there are a lot of people who are technically proficient but aren't really that great at guitar. They just don't know the difference.
Kurt Ballou of Converge recently told me he believes the things that make his playing interesting stem more from his inabilities and how he incorporates them into songwriting. Would you say that holds true for yourself?
Totally—and then pushing through those inabilities. It's in those wobbly places that you have the most opportunity to pull something great out of yourself as a guitarist. In most things in life, it's when you're unsure of whether you're doing something right that you find something within you that needs to get out. Guitar definitely allows me to do that. When I'm down in the dumps, I always remember that I play guitar—and that's really great! I can always get better at it. I can just kill some time with it. I can write songs with it and, via that piece of wood that I'm hanging out with, go somewhere and find something.
Walter Schreifels' Gear
Guitars
Fender Kurt Cobain Jaguar
1960s Harmony Bobkat
1960s Akai offset
Gibson SG Custom
Fender '62 Telecaster reissue
Amps
1970s 50-watt Marshall JMP 2x12 combo
Top Hat Emplexador
Effects
DigiTech Ventura Vibe
Dunlop Cry Baby wah
DOD Rubberneck Analog Delay
Boss Digital Delay
Strings
D'Addario EXL110 (.010–.046)
Do you have a favorite guitar moment on Interiors?
I love the first track, “Illuminant," and I love the solo I pulled off on that. I think it's really interesting and gives the sensation I was going for, and tells a story in this kind of interesting language, but it isn't difficult to play or complicated in any way. I think my tones were much better than they have been in the past.
What gear played an important role in tracking Interiors?
I used a '70s 50-watt Marshall JMP 2x12. That's my compromise from using half-stacks these days—which I just can't fuck with anymore, unfortunately. That combo was used on a lot of the album because it's my workhorse amp and I really feel like it's my sound, but we also used a lot of different things when we worked at Will's [Yip, producer], because he has a really serious arsenal of amps. Will favored an amp made by Top Hat, which is like a modified Marshall plexi. I'm pretty easygoing when I work with someone like Will, who is very into what he's doing when it comes to getting sounds and I feel has it covered. One thing I've learned over the years is if someone knows what they're doing and you trust them, just let them do their thing. At the time, I was much more focused on what I was going to play than what the amp was.
As far as guitars went, I used a Fender Kurt Cobain Jaguar, which has a pair of humbuckers in it. I also used a vintage Harmony Bobkat from the 1960s, which has those cool gold-foil pickups. Those two guitars saw the most use. Those gold-foil pickups are just so awesome. They're a little muddy, but in a cool way, and with this gold-foil magic I can't quite explain. For the more straightforward rock side of things, I used the Jag because I needed the power of humbuckers, but the more nuanced guitar sounds are the Harmony.
I also used this 1965 Japanese-made Akai that's an offset style but is its own thing. It cost me $125. It has weird old pickups that aren't like anything else I've ever seen, and it doesn't overdrive really hard, but if you dig in, it'll push in a weird way that I dig a lot.
When and how did you start getting into effects?
When I was in Rival Schools, the guitar player decided to leave the band when we had a tour booked. I didn't use pedals in that band before that, because the guitarist that left had this gigantic board of effects he used and he had it covered. So he left, and I had to cover those aspects of our sound. I set about getting the delay pedals I thought he was using, and a wah-wah and a few other things, and we went out as a three piece. While it wasn't the same thing as what he was doing, I liked my version of it and I felt like I got really good at it. I really looked at it like playing a new instrument. I've come to really enjoy the dance of using effects, and when it clicks and your timing is on and it works right … it's just the best. I'm much better at it now—especially after sort of taking the gloves off with Dead Heavens.
I'd wager that “Fire This Time" is now the heaviest thing in the band's discography. Let's talk about that track.
That song is in a weird version of A tuning, in which we drop our low E string down to a low A, which makes an octave with the regular A string. I copped it after seeing Baroness live because I really liked the super-low sound they get. One thing about Quicksand is that regardless of how we get there, Quicksand's music is heavy, and that's what our fans expect of us. So I feel like that song is a particularly good answer to that end of what we do, but in a new way.
When we decided to make a new album, we wondered “how can we possibly make an album that beats our old records people love?" Rather than try to compete with our past, we wanted to do something that is now and futuristic and represents where we're at currently, but acknowledges our past, and why people liked us in the first place, and attempts to elaborate on it and strikes a balance with it. If we strike that balance well, there's a lot of different musical places where we can go, and that gives this band a future.
YouTube It
In this 2017 performance, Walter Schreifels applies his lead guitar skills—as well as his Dunlop Cry Baby and some digital delay—to “Lie and Wait," from Quicksand's 1993 debut, Slip.
