Isaiah Mitchell onstage with the Black Crowes. Heās been a member of the band since their 2019 reunion tour.
The modern twisted-blues-rock hero and his long-jamming power trio, Earthless, take cues from vintage Japanese psych and folklore to tell the epic musical story of Night Parade of One Hundred Demons.
Thereās no lack of instrumental, improv-based guitar music being made these days, but few bands in that niche exude the muscular power, cosmic intrigue, and impressive blues-rock bite of San Diego-based power trio Earthless. The bandās records undulate through melodies and hypnotic grooves that are fresh yet familiar, and breathe new life into many of the rock guitar tropes that have inspired so many players to fall in love with the instrument.
Since forming in the early 2000s, Earthlessā psychedelic-tinged explorations have channeled the energy and fire that made the first wave of English blues-rock such potent stuff, with the same captivating vitality as Cream, Hendrix, and Peter Green-era Fleetwood Mac. At the core of the bandās sound is Isaiah Mitchell, a full-fledged guitar hero whose undeniable chops and creativity are matched only by his penchant for conjuring the kinds of killer tones many of us have spent small fortunes chasing. Bolstered by groove guru Mike Eginton on bass and powerhouse drummer Mario Rubalcaba (Rocket from the Crypt, OFF!, Hot Snakes), Earthless is the ideal vehicle for Mitchellās unfiltered, incendiary playing. Outside of the band, his work includes the coveted lead guitar slot in the Black Crowesāa gig he landed during the groupās unexpected 2019 revival and perhaps the ultimate testament to his ascending status as one of todayās absolute finest blues-rock players.
Earthless from left: bassist Mike Eginton, drummer Mario Rubalcaba, and guitarist Isaiah Mitchell.
Photo by Marta EstellĆ©s MartĆn
While Mitchellās commitments with the Crowes have sadly been consistently stymied by complications from the pandemic, Earthless have recently returned to the recorded form with a sprawling, hour-long instrumental adventure: Night Parade of One Hundred Demons. The sinister subject is the musical translation of a story pulled from Japanese folklore about a chaotic night in which the supernatural world collides with our own and a cavalcade of demons runs rampant through the streets of Japan. While the record is entirely instrumental, itās the bandās first to feature a specific sonic story conceptāand itās one of the most musically intense releases in their discography.
Mitchell explains the albumās unexpected direction: āThereās a darker vibe to it. It could be some frustrations from the pandemic, but weāre pretty light, happy people for the most part. Itās just the music that came out.ā The concept came from the bandās bassist. āMike and his son are really into Japanese folklore and art,ā Mitchell explains, āso he brought in the idea of calling it Night Parade of One Hundred Demons and explained the story, and it just made perfect sense with the music we had been writing. Then we were like, āWell letās actually tell that story!ā
Night Parade Of One Hundred Demons, Pt. 1
āWhen we started writing, we noticed that the music was reminiscent of Japanese bands that we loved, like Flower Travellinā Band, Blues Creation, and Shinki Chen. We just ran with that sound,ā explains Mitchell. Those esoteric hard-rock and proto-metal groups that came out of Japan in the late ā60s and early ā70s filtered Western heavy rock through a uniquely Japanese lens, making for music that was fundamentally familiar sounding yet totally exotic, relative to the British and American bands that influenced it. For Mitchell, no one does heavy guitar music quite like the Japanese, and the concept of the album āopened up the possibility of really getting inside of a Japanese scale approachā and guided his note choices in a new direction.
Mitchell says the recording experience āwas a fun challenge to try to pay homage to that musicā and explains, āa lot of what was going on in my mindāif we can talk in intervalsāwas like root, flat second, minor third, flat sixesāall of these weird combos that arenāt in your blues scale or your Mixolydian or Dorian things, but more Locrian in nature. Itās a totally different thing.ā He adds that he was inspired by traditional Japanese music and instruments like the koto as well.
Night Parade opens with a positively lush six-minute guitar intro that Mitchell says is meant to paint the picture of a Japanese village at sunset. Itās an idyllic, tranquil scene thatās conveyed through passages of delicate, Hendrix-informed clean-toned guitar work. āWe paint this pretty picture and then ⦠boom, all hell breaks loose and these demons show up!ā Mitchell explains. āThe idea was to have more of a direction with it, trying to tell a specific story and putting the music to that story. Nothing else weāve done has ever had any greater meaning or specific subject attached to it, so this was totally different and was a lot of fun.ā
āI try to go into each improvisational section or solo by telling myself, āHereās this moment that is for you. Be very present in it and mean what youāre doing!āā
The arrival of the demons from the Japanese legend is marked by a churning, turbulent, and downright evil-sounding riff fest that puts all of Mitchellās gifts on full display. On the latter half of āNight Parade of One Hundred Demons, Pt. 1,ā his guitar work bridges the chasm between Claptonās sense of melody and feel and the extreme intensity and hellish string-bending and whammy-bar theatrics of Slayer. Across the albumās three long tracks, the band still has a foot firmly in the blues-rock world, but thereās fuzzed-out mayhem, searing proto-metal lead work, and an element of adventure and danger that is sorely missing from much of todayās improv-based rock ānā roll.
Dramatic trem-bar moves havenāt been a calling card for Mitchell in the past, but theyāre an important facet of Night Paradeās sonic storytelling. Mitchell explains that aggressive whammy-bar techniques were something heād avoided in the past, opting to block the bridge of his battered main Strat for years because he could never get the stock trem system to stay in tune. However, for the new record, he says, āWe wanted to evoke a feeling, a mood, a sensationāand that required overbearing whammy bar! Totally Jeff Hanneman or Neil Young trying to break his strings at the end of a set, just freaking out! Itās perfect for making a song sound like hell and murder and death and chaos. Itās frantic and itās anxious and paranoid and a mood of terror.ā
Mitchell credits his friend Phil Manley (Trans Am, The Fucking Champs), who recorded the bandās From the Ages album, with changing his attitude. ā[He] turned me on to Callaham Guitars, and I got a whole new trem system for my Strat from them. I just slapped that thing on and had it floating a little bit, and all of a sudden I was throwing bigger Hendrix dives into my playing and it wouldnāt go out of tune. I was amazed.ā He adds that āitās like having a totally new guitar. The thing with Earthless is Iām not going to be able to retune in the middle of an hour-long song. Youāre fucking out to sea swimming and thereās no stopping.ā
Isaiah Mitchell, wielding his go-to Strat, tweaks his Echoplex as Earthless jams.
Photo by Marta EstellĆ©s MartĆn
Night Parade was tracked to tape and a key part of its charm and immediacy is its organic production aesthetic. While the album tells a tale of the spirit world, it still sounds like three humans in a room attempting to blast their way into the void. Thereās 60-cycle hum in the clean parts, thereās the obvious sound of air hitting mics, and Mitchell confirms that amps and speakers were indeed harmed in its creation. āWe wanted to keep it as real as possible,ā he says, ābut we also wanted to make it sound great and not deliberately mess it up, but also not over-polish it.ā
Rig Rundown - Earthless
As a player whoās spent the lionās share of his career in improvised music, Mitchell knows how to pull something out of nothing with his guitar. āI try to go into each improvisational section or solo by telling myself, āHereās this moment that is for you, be very present in it, and mean what youāre doing!āā he says. āI donāt want to just shoot notes here and there. I want to really try to play off what everyone else is doing and listen.ā
TIDBIT: The concept for Night Parade of One Hundred Demons was inspired by a story that bassist Mike Eginton and his son found in a book of traditional Japanese ghost tales.
Itās no surprise that his inspiration comes from the classics: āWhat really got me into that approach was listening to Live Cream and Hendrix just taking off forever, really feeling what guys like Clapton and Hendrix, or even Neil Young, had in their phrasing. Itās like theyāre breathing, you know? Thereās an intention in everything they played. Theyāre trying to convey something. They want to make you feel something, and itās just very tasteful and about presence in the moment. Thatās the best place to come from when youāre improvising. Building and trying to tell an interesting story melodicallyāthatās my approach. Tasteful phrasing is about not laying all your cards on the table right away or blowing it all up right out the gateābuild it, build tension!ā
Mitchellās dedication to his craft as a player and tone-shaper naturally helped him land his high-profile spot with the brothers Robinson in the revived Black Crowes, and heās still drinking the experience in. āI was a fan growing up and watched their music videos on MTV, so itās a really surreal experience,ā he ruminates. āIāve been friends with Chris [Robinson, Black Crowes frontman] for maybe 10 years now, but itās so cool to be brought into the fold and to play with people that love music like they do. The whole band is fantastic and getting to hear Rich [Robinson, Black Crowes guitarist] and Chris together is a sound and itās powerful. Itās a wonderful experience musically and getting to play those songs that I grew up withāand being able to put my stamp on it and still honor the songāis important to me.ā
āWe paint this pretty picture and then ⦠boom, all hell breaks loose and these demons show up!ā
He approaches his position in the Black Crowes with the same level of care he brings to his own band. āThe fans are used to a certain thing,ā he explains, āand you can do too much to bring yourself into it. I donāt think thatās always the right choice.ā Contrary to Earthless, which is built around his own creative instincts, Mitchell points out that in such a classic, established band, itās of utmost importance to know āwhere and when to be yourself.ā And while Earthless calls for a more maximal, up-front guitar sound, playing in the Black Crowes alongside another guitarist and keyboardist is āa totally different way of filling musical space. I love being in different places and playing different roles and trying to be as selfless as possible for the sake of what the music needs.ā
As both the longtime lead voice in Earthless and now the guitarist in the Black Crowes, Mitchell has risen from unsung underground guitar hero status into the mainstream. Itās a position he revels in, but he brings respect for the history of the bandās guitar chair. āMy favorite part about the Crowes growing up is that the songs were fantastic,ā he says, exclaiming, ābut I really fucking loved Marc Fordās playing. He was one of my dudes, growing up!ā
The Gear Behind Isaiah Mitchellās Heroic Tone
Mitchell performs with Earthless in Berkeley, California, at the Cornerstone on February 20, 2022.
Photo by Samuel Cuevas-Coria
Guitars
- ā50s-style FenderĀ Stratocaster
- Gibson Custom Shop 1956 Les Paul Goldtop reissue
- Prisma Guitars custom build (made from recycled skateboard decks)
- Ian Anderson T-Style
Amps
- 1971 100-watt Marshall Super Lead
- 1979 Marshall 2203 JMP
- 1968/1969 Fender Super Reverb
- Vox AC15 head
- Orange Custom Shop 50 head
- Satellite Amps 2x12
- Orange vertical open-back 2x12 with Celestion Creambacks
Effects
- Strymon Flint
- Make Sounds Loudly Klon clone
- Make Sounds Loudly Tone Bender clone
- Make Sounds Loudly Night Witch
- Carlin compressor/distortion clone
- ā90s Fender brown-panel Reverb unit
- Tym Guitars Seaweed Isaiah Mitchell Signature Fuzz
- Maestro Echoplex EP-3
- Dunlop Cry Baby
- Vox wah
- Xotic EP Boost
Strings & Picks
- Dunlop (.010-.046)
- Dunlop .88 mm Tortex
Mitchell has some of the best tones in rock ānā roll. On Night Parade of One Hundred Demons, he kept things relatively simple and turned to some classic pieces.
For a clean tone, Mitchell relied upon a Fender Super Reverb from ā68 or ā69, which he sometimes mixed with a Vox AC15 head played through a Satellite Amplifiers 2x12 cab, paired with an Xotic Effects EP boost. He embraced his rigās natural hum: āThat tone just sounds so good and thereās something about hearing that hum that feels organic, and it doesnāt take away anything from the music for me. If you listen to Stevie Ray Vaughanās āLittle Wing,ā you can hear his amps humming. Itās organic and I think thereās something beautiful in keeping the recording what it is. Youāre getting this beautiful tone and hearing that hum is a piece of that tone.ā
To create the recordās burly-but-dynamic distorted soundsāthe āfull-blown stuff,ā as Mitchell calls itāhe used his primary 1971 100-watt Marshall Super Lead until it released the magic smoke that all tube amps run on and was placed on the injured list. āIt sounded fantastic until it blew up!ā the guitarist exclaims. āIām not sure what happened, but luckily the transformers were fine.ā He borrowed a friendās ā79 JMP 2203 as a replacement. He also occasionally used an Orange Custom Shop 50 through an Orange 2x12 vertical open-back cab loaded with Celestion Creambacks.
For guitars, a thrashed but beloved Fender Strat (with its new Callaham trem and the ā50s style deep-V neck it came with) that Mitchell bought from a friendās father as a teenager did the heavy lifting. That guitar now sports a set of signature Stratocaster pickups Mitchell concocted with Australian builder Mick Brierley. While Mitchell says the process of arriving at the desired sound involved many prototype sets with too many different spec recipes to recall, he says the pickups they ultimately arrived at are ādialed-in to have a lot more midrange than most Strat sets and are very clear, clean up nicely, and add a lot of warmth to the sound.ā
āWe wanted to evoke a feeling, a mood, a sensation, and that required overbearing whammy bar!ā
Backing up the Strat was a recent ā56 Gibson Custom Shop Les Paul Goldtop reissue loaded with P-90s, which Mitchell used for the albumās beefier riffs. For some of the cleaner sounds, the guitarist also employed a custom build from Prisma Guitars that was made from recycled skateboard decks.
Mitchell shaped his tone with a stash of effects that included a tried-and-true Echoplex EP-3, a standard Vox wah, a Cry Baby wah, a crew of overdrives and fuzzes by Make Sounds Loudly, Mitchellās signature Tym Effects Seaweed fuzzābased on a Triangle Big Muff circuitāand a reissue of a little-known compressor made by Carlin in the ā60s. āReine Fiske of Dungen is probably the top dude for me right now. Heās an amazing guitar player and his tone is just impeccable. I was reading interviews with him, and he spoke about the Carlin compressor, so I got a remake of one of those. Thatās a really cool pedal thatās noisy and kind of shitty, but in a vintage way that isnāt trying to clean up a bunch of stuff, and you can overdrive it like a fuzz.ā
To represent the sound of demons āswirling around each other,ā as he puts it, on āNight Parade of One Hundred Demons, Pt. 2,ā āI used a Leslie cab to be the sound of one of the demons and then the regular guitar rig to represent the human. Creating a different personality with the Leslie was a fun way to get there.ā
EARTHLESS Los Angeles, CA. 2-25-2022
In February, Earthless ripped a blistering set for nearly two hours at the Echo in L.A., presented here in all its psychedelic glory.
The Red Hot Chili Peppers' Josh Klinghoffer, Living Colour's Doug Wimbish, Neal Casal, and others show off their stomp stations.
This signature Falcon-style guitar features a 3-ply maple body with solid spruce top and 1959-style trestle bracing with a spruce block under the bridge.
Scottsdale, AZ (October 20, 2020) -- Gretsch is proud to honor the immensely talented Rich Robinson with the all-new G6136T Rich Robinson Signature Magpie with Bisgby.
Rich Robinson has been at the forefront of rock ānā roll for nearly three decades, ever since his high school days when he co-founded The Black Crowes. Heralded as one of the best live rock acts, The Black Crowes went on to sell over 35 million albums and churn out several charting singles including āHard to Handleā and āShe Talks to Angels,ā which Robinson wrote the music for at the tender age of 15. Robinson continued to forge his indelible music legacy as the founder and guitarist for the Magpie Salute, whose 2018 studio album debut High Water I earned instant critical acclaim, while also reuniting with his brother Chris for The Black Crowes Shake Your Money Maker 30th anniversary tour in 2021.
Summoning the light and dark of thundering tones, the G6136T Rich Robinson Signature Magpie with Bigsby pays homage to an artist who commands the utmost respect.
A veritable hollow body cannon, this signature Falcon-style guitar features a highly resonant 3-ply maple body with solid spruce top and 1959-style trestle bracing with a spruce block under the bridge, and oversized F-holes for explosive sonic projection and maximum feedback control. A 12ā-radius ebony fingerboard with 22 medium frets and mother of pearl Neo-Classic inlays tops off a maple neck for playability as impressive as its style.
A TV Jones Classic humbucking bridge pickup provides pristine highs and stout lows with balanced harmonics, while a BroadāTron BT65 neck pickup drives the guitarās unique voice with a robust and punchy midrange and an uncommonly smooth high-end. The control layoutā separate bridge and neck volume knobs, three-way position toggle switch, master tone and master volume with treble bleed circuitāallows for infinite tonal variations.
The G6136T is the epitome of style with a Ravenās Breast Blue gloss lacquer finish, silver pickguard adorned with Magpie logo, silver sparkle body and neck binding and nickel hardware.
Other premium features include Grover Imperial tuning machines, amber jeweled G-arrow control knobs, bone nut, Adjusto-Matic bridge with pinned ebony base and string-thru Bigsby B6 tailpiece. A hardshell case is also included.
For more information:
Gretsch Guitars