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I hate writing these fucking things. It's like
staring into a mirror with a magnifying glass and analyzing the upside-down
distorted reflection. Everything comes out stiff, factual and boring 'cause
I feel stupid presenting myself, like it aint my place. I HATE being a
salesman, and that's how I feel when I write my life story. Nobody's more
valuable than anybody else, and everybody's got some different skill - my
thing was guitar. So what. I always played guitar because it was my
medication. It gave me peace, sanity, stability, focus, distraction,
ventilation, a purpose, goals, identity, and a way to communicate 'cause I
was too shy to speak. But that doesn't define me, and I'll never feel like
it's a big enough reason to write some written dedication to myself. I just
always loved music, like everyone else, and guitar was my instrument.
Born in Brooklyn, 1969, missed the moonwalk by two months. Oh well. I was
this odd little brainiac kid, who could spell when I was 2 before I could
speak. I had this board and magnetic letters I'd move around to spell things.
For every birthday my parents would ask what I wanted, I'd answer "More
letters." I remember being 5 and sitting in the yard reading encyclopedias
on a sunny day when I should have been out playing football with the
neighbors. Didn't need other people, was happy just challenging my brain
with info and art, it was like a drug. I memorized all the Presidents of the
US and facts about them, and would be able to draw caricatures of their
faces. Knew every State in order that they joined the country, and their
capitals. Could draw a map of the world freehand. When I was 10 I read 3000
pages of world history and wrote a 300-page summary. All that and I couldn't
get laid, go figure.
It was 1975 and my family just moved from Brooklyn to "Staten Island." You'd
be surprised how intuitive a 5-year-old can be. I immediately had this
feeling like I didn't belong there and and I was pretty depressed. I had
REAL friends in BK - we had history. Here, I was an outsider, I sensed
people analyzing me, and I felt like I was under that same fucking
magnifying glass. For the 20 years I lived on that landfill, I never fit in,
and didn't care to. But ya do your time like a man. So I did. The
neighborhood kids I'd hang with all had older bruthas and sistas, and I got
to listen to their music - Beatles, Yes, Stones, Ramones, but it was hearing
the KISS Alive! album that turned a light on in my oversized bulbous
child-head. I knew I was meant to do what they were doing - make music and
dress funny. I wanted to be a drummer. But so did my brother and he was
older and could do a faster drum-roll on his knees than I could on mine, so
he won. I went to the nearest music store and enrolled in bass lessons. They
knew my hands were too small, and that there were no "kid-size basses" like
there were guitars, so they told me that 'the law says ya gotta start on
guitar and play for 2 years before you can play bass.' It was a crushing
blow, but I was willing to endure this if it was the only option. So I spent
my childhood years studying history, art, science and music, while all the
other kids with crusty dried chocolate on their faces called me a hermit.
Fuck 'em.
Yeah, so I did my time as a guitarist, and had a band with my brother on
drums and neighbor on guitar/vocals. We wrote our own shit, did cover songs
(Stones, Floyd, Zep, Ramones, Sex Pistols, and other 60's/70's stuff) and
played schools, parties, and outdoor concerts. We'd record by positioning
ourselves at different distances from a boombox at the other end of the room
and record the music, then overdub vocals by playing it back and singing
along while a second boombox recorded it. I got a taste of band bizz,
writing a lot and making demos, making homemade band comic books as merch
and tourbooks for our shows, etc... This went on till 1982 and we all
started doin' our own things. The whole time, I never stopped taking lessons.
At this point, I was 12 and had my rhythm and jazz theory down. All was
fine. Content. Then a kid asked me if I liked Van Halen. Who? To me it was
all about Angus, Ace and Jimi. He played me the intro to "Mean Streets" off
VH's "Fair Warning" album - it fucked my shit up. All this time playing
guitar I had no idea just how creative you can get with it. Everything
changed. Started getting into soloing and fancy shit after that. Made a
point of learning Eruption note-for-note by ear, then opened up the cassette
of it and flipped the tape reels, and learned it backwards. Started building
my own guitars, taking apart old one's, re-wiring them, cutting the bodies,
and re-painting them. I was also doing alot of art - canvas paintings,
sculptures, and painting album covers on the backs of dungaree jackets for
$20 a pop. That's how I saved up to buy this beautiful black strat-style
Ibanez Roadstar I wanted - with a vibrato bar! I was psyched! It was
beautiful! The first thing I did when I got it home was chip off the paint,
drill it full of holes, and paint it yellow. That was my main guitar for the
next 13 years.
Ok, so I'm 13 now and I start teaching kids guitar. Have a new band, and we
start playing bars. Writing and recording originals, covering Maiden, Ozzy
and Rush, this goes on for years. I get an 8-track reel-to-reel and start
making a home studio and recording bands.
15 - I'm in High School now, and it sucks. Everyone's divided into cliques,
and I choose to be part of none of 'em. Teachers take one look at my long
hair and decide I'm an idiot. I'd get high grades and they'd accuse me of
cheating. The only redeeming quality was guitar class, but even there people
treated me funny because I had 8 years of playing and gigging experience and
they were first starting out. So half the people acted like I should be
worshipped, and the other half like I should be killed for my sins. Both
extremes sucked - I just wanted to be unnoticed and unbothered by people, as
I was on the verge of murdering a good amount of them. People made up weird
rumors that I was a coke-head and would sleep with my guitar. Dicks. Having
a psychotic suicidal girlfriend that shaved her head didn't help either. So
when I turned 16, I quit school and stayed home where I wouldn't be a danger
to anyone.
Shrinks didn't help. They tried to medicate me - I threw the shit out. I
cured myself by doing the opposite of what I was telling myself to do. If I
didn't want to talk, I'd call a friend. If I didn't want to go out, I'd hit
the mall. It slowly worked me out of dangerous mental hole. I went and got
my GED. Surprisingly I never smoked or sniffed or swallowed or injected
anything my whole life - maybe it was because I didn't trust anyone and
needed to stay clear-headed to keep my defenses solid, maybe it was that I
thought the mind is everything and you need to take care of it, maybe it was
because I always felt stoned and tweaked and elevated and dropped and high
and low all the time already, maybe it's because I knew I was a timebomb and
didn't wanna set it off - maybe all of the above. I drank a little when I
was 16, and found it to be an emotional crush, it would ease the anxiety -
but I didn't want to be dependent on anything external for that, needed to
handle it from within. Plus I was taking care of a girl who's leg was ripped
into pieces and held together with some bionic gadget, ending her career in
dance - car accident with some kid showing off how hard he can fold a car
around a telephone pole. Given the choice between drinking OR driving,
wasn't gonna do both, I wanted to drive - had a '77 Camaro, then got a '76
Monte Carlo - the thing was like a fuckin' boat, got about 10 feet per
gallon.
In '89 I started writing some instrumental guitar music. I put together a
demo, and sent it off to the guitar magazines for review. Soon after, Mike
Varney (CEO Shrapnel Records) called me and put me in his Spotlight column,
where he reviewed unknown's in Guitar Player magazine. We stayed in touch,
and two years later, I had my first published work on Shrapnel Records'
compilation CD "Ominous Guitarists From the Unknown" - did a guitar version
of Chopin's Fantasie Impromptu piano piece. This led to work as a
transcriber for Inside Edge instructional videos and Shrapnel University
instructional tapes (never released), and more instrumental releases on
Legato Records' "Guitar On the Edge" compilation CDs, volumes 2, 3 and 4.
So I'm doing gigs with my original band, got some side bands goin' doing
cover shit, recording people in the home studio, and teaching out of music
stores, then at the Sam Ash Music Institute in Edison NJ (the building is
now a McDonald's), and at 24 became a school teacher (ironic for a High
School dropout, eh?) I figured I'd be responsible and have a "real" job to
"fall back on", get that "job security and stability", all that stuff
parents tell ya while you're trying to "make it" in music that just makes ya
work that much harder to prove them wrong. But I wanted to do it, I enjoyed
teaching. I set up a darkroom and taught the kids B&W photography, and set
up a music program for the school - jazz band, choir, music education, all
that. After a few months, the school broke contract and cut our health
benefits and salaries. I tasted reality: there's no such thing as "job
security and stability." I retired early and went back to being my own boss,
made a new demo, and 6 months later had a contract with Shrapnel Records.
Released "The Adventures Of Bumblefoot" instrumental guitar CD in May 95,
did the soundtrack for the SEGA CD-ROM game "Wild Woody" shortly after, and
released the "Hermit" CD in January '97. I had a 32-track ADAT studio in
Brooklyn and was starting to do a lot of producing, so I started my own
music production company Hermit, Inc. in late '97 and terminated the
Shrapnel contract.
I was always a singing guitarist, but the instrumental guitar stuff labeled
me as a shredding solo instrumentalist. I felt like GILLIGAN. The actor Bob
Denver from Gilligan's Island - no matter what he does, everyone will always
look at him and say GILLIGAN! That's what the "Adventures" CD did for me.
Gilligan. I've always been a team player into bands, and that's what I
always did long before any instrumental stuff. So the first thing I did on
Hermit, Inc. was get a band back together, starting with just me and my
brother on drums, and we released the "Hands" CD in April '98. Got the whole
band together, did some radio interviews and gigs, the highlight being a big
festival in Nice, France. In early '99 the drummer quit weeks before
headlining a festival in Europe, and it led to starting from scratch. Kept
on writing and producing meanwhile. Started work on the next CD, "Uncool".
Kept hoping for a band that would have a long life together but never could
find people that would dedicate as much as was necessary. Everyone had a
cut-off point where the dream became too real and they didn't want to
progress any further - and ya never knew where that cut-off point was until
you reached it and really needed them to stick to their obligations. One
would quit before an album release, another before a tour, never with any
warning... they'd go back to life-as-usual and I'd be fucked out of
everything I literally lived for, and start from scratch auditioning,
rehearsing, pulling teeth to do photo shoots so I can arrange new press and
promo, pulling teeth to get people to play on their own record, mediating
all their petty disputes, learning every new skill for designing album art
and making websites because no one else would, and making money however I
can to fund CD manufacturing and marketing (and supplying their clothes and
equipment), while only taking a quarter of the minimal money back because I
always believed in splitting band-related income equally even though nobody
shared in the expenses, even though my day-job was to make a living for
everyone in the band, even though they had their own day-jobs and did little
more than show up to some rehearsals... you get the idea.
In September 2000 I licensed an early version of the Uncool CD to a label in
France, and toured there in March and April 2001. Patrice Vigier (CEO Vigier
Guitars) had a lot to do with the success I had in France and I'll always be
grateful to him. And Julien Hugonnard (founder of "The Adventures Of Ron
Thal" newsletter.) They've always been there.
In the Summer of 2001, I started concentrating on the next CD - more like
the old stuff, more instrumental songs, was gonna call the album "Guitars
Suck." After the terrorist shit went down on September 11th '01, I decided
to make it a nonprofit CD and donate all of the money to disaster relief.
Released it in November 2001 and called it "9.11" to easily identify it as
the fundraising CD. After releasing 9.11, I stopped having my own band -
couldn't keep putting my fate in other people's hands that didn't care.
That's about the time that "Bumblefoot" went from my bandname to becoming my
nickname. Did some local fundraising shows jamming with friends and released
the final version of "Uncool" through my own company in February 2002.
Started donating proceeds from the 9.11 CD to the Red Cross.
Just to back up a little, there was a student of mine that I taught at that
music-institute-turned-McDonald's back in the early 90's, named Ralph Rosa.
We stayed friends, played together, he moved to Puerto Rico and played in a
cool up-'n-coming band. Just as things were getting good, he was diagnosed
with Multiple Sclerosis. He moved back to NJ, and decided to do something
positive. He started M.S.R.F., the "Multiple Sclerosis Research Foundation",
a non-profit org that puts together fundraising events, where all the profit
goes directly to the researchers working on a cure. I'm on the Board Of
Directors and help any way I can. We had the first Multiple Sclerosis
fundraising dinner/comedy show with MSRF in May 2002, donated $10,000 to
research. Been doing annual shows ever since. Ralph's the best friend anyone
could ever have, always was.
Toured Europe in late 2002, with musicians from bands in the countries I was
touring - members of prog-metal band Sun Caged in The Netherlands, members
of instrumental rock band Plug-In in France... These weren't sterile hired
musicians, they were real band folks... and for the first time in my life I
knew what it was like to work with musicians that understood. Before this,
there were always people that would come to rehearsal after their day-jobs
and treat the band with a level of disrespect they'd never attempt elsewhere,
inevitably killing the band. Music was my life, and I was finally working
with people that were the same way. The chemistry was great and the band had
its own sound like we played together all our lives. And no surprise,
everyone got along. And real friendships grew. Dennis Leeflang, the drummer
from Sun Caged, moved to NYC soon after the tour and we continued working
together. Touring was always tough. Conditions weren't the greatest. Sharing
hotel rooms sometimes with no heat or hot water, no sleep because we can't
afford days off and have a 10-hour drive to the next show, one person
sneezes in the van and everyone ends up passing the flu back-and-forth -
screaming on stage every night in smokey clubs, I'd get it the worst. And
after a month, ya come home with $300. Ya do what ya gotta do, and you
forget everything as soon as you hit the stage. I've had stupid label
assholes arguing with me about wanting to take ownership of my copyrights as
I'm walking onto the stage to play, I've had stupid tour-company assholes
laughing at how sick we were or how hungry and refusing to stop for food.
But you forget it all when you hit the stage. The audiences were great, we'd
play for an hour-and-a-half, hang out with everyone for 2 hours, load our
shit into the van, take turns sleeping on piles of equipment and do it again
the next night.
In 2002 I started licensing songs to TV shows, along with the bands I was
producin', also started working as a songwriter/producer for Carlin
Publishing and different artists. Got my own studio for the first time in
Sept. 2002 - an old house that I've since been gutting and renovating - love
doing that stuff. Building a house is the greatest feeling. It's good having
my own studio - needed it. Too much music to make. That's what I do, and no
matter how tough things are I don't quit.
April 2003, took all unfinished songs that weren't officially released and
put out the "Forgotten Anthology" CD. Meanwhile, had a manager that for the
past year screwed up everything he touched and got me to the point where I
was gonna sell guitars and get a paper-route to pay my bills. After years of
getting dicked around by half-assed bandmembers, labels, managers, tour
companies, being betrayed by the people closest to you in it all, I was
feeling pretty battered, beaten, and Bumblefucked. Was really considering
packing it in - life, that is. Went on meds. First two days, my spit felt
like sandpaper. Then they kicked in - I couldn't think a bad thought if I
tried. No more cravings to eat human flesh in large crowds or hang myself
with a guitar cable or swerve into every telephone pole I drove past.
Started writing my next album, called "Normal" - first line, "I just got a
new medication..." Then *click*, it was like someone hit the pause button in
my head. I knew what it was. The meds - they block *everything*. I couldn't
write music anymore, at least not my own. Was still able to collaborate with
other artists and wrote other stuff while producing people, could still play,
did a bunch of benefit shows, kept teaching guitar and bass and vocals and
recording, started teaching music production at SUNY Purchase College, did
some clinics, one which we put on DVD "Live At the RMA" - just couldn't
write my own stuff. I never felt better, I finally knew what it felt like to
be "normal". It was good. But good isn't enough. I stayed on for a
year-and-a-half, and decided I'd rather give up internal peace to make music
again. Went off the meds, with the experience of being normal that I can
draw from whenever needed. I couldn't tell that the meds were leaving my
system, but knew they were - people started saying, "What's wrong?" for no
reason - my face was slowly changing. I was becoming me again, whatever that
means. In July 2004, Joe Satriani invited me to jam at a nearby arena the
following month - was a personal highlight, he's such a cool guy. :) Then
got a call from some band about maybe playing guitar with them - will get
back into that. Played in Moscow, got myself a furry hat. Started writing
the rest of the Normal album, started laying tracks Jan '05, still writing,
finished recording in June, mixing and mastering was obsessive torture,
manufactured by Oct 2005. By that point I was working 140 hours a week in
the studio on 11 albums, for 2 years straight doing 40-hour days, and
teaching and playing in a cover band. And one day I went to get off the
couch and it felt like there was a finger in my chest pressing against my
heart. Tried to get up again and the finger pressed harder. I also looked
down and suddenly noticed I looked like Fat Bastard - that sure kinda crept
up. Bumblefat. Reached over to the phone, called 4 bands I was about to
record and canceled, quit the cover band, stopped teaching the private
lessons, and started hittin' the treadmill the next day. Dropped 80 pounds
since.
I've been recording and producing an electro-pop artist named Q*Ball since
'96, we're good friends. He started his own label "Bald Freak Music" in mid
'05, I put out Normal on his label. Toured Europe Oct/Nov 05, another tour
with the
worst-fucking-bird-flu-I-ever-experienced-that-we-just-kept-passing-to-each-other.
6 out of 7 of us got it, doctors and medicine couldn't fight it, one crew
member had to leave, had to cancel a show for the first time in my life, in
London, which fucking sucked ass-balls. We stayed sick for a month home
after the tour, it was that bad, it was fearing-death kinda stuff. Came home
with $700. I don't know, maybe I shouldn't be touring...? Six months later,
I'm touring the world with Guns N' Roses, throughout '06-'07. The first
concert I saw was Kiss at Madison Square Garden in '79. I can still remember
the feeling of the heat on my face from the flames shooting up on the sides
of the stage. A life-long goal was to play there, with the lights, the
flames, the bombs, the volume. In November '06, we played there - with the
lights, the flames, the bombs, the volume. Hey Axl - thank you bro.
Started writing songs for the next BBF album in October 2007, started laying
drum tracks with Dennis in November. Will keep ya posted...
Ya learn alot of shit along the way. Loyalty's so fucking important. If you
fill your life with decent people, you'll grow together and lift each other
to the next level. But don't just give it blindly. Honor it - save it for
the people who deserve it. Only time will tell who those people really are.
Source: www.bumblefoot.com [used
with permission] (Updated
December 10, 2007) |
Artist Name:
Bumblefoot
Real Name: Ron Thal
Born: September 25, 1969 in Brookyln, NY
Instruments: Guitar
Other Bands: AWOL, Ron Thal, Bumblefoot
Worked with: Jordan Rudess, Mike Orlando, Mistheria and
others
Nicknames: Unknown
Parents: Unknown
Siblings: one brother, Jeff
Children: None |