Alastair Greene on grasping opportunities with both hands

When speaking with Greene over Zoom on Saturday, prior to flying to the UK for a five-date run of shows, which begins in Leamington Spa this evening, Greene was in a reflective mood as he discussed his three-decade career in fine detail, ranging from his seven years as a guitarist in the Alan Parsons Project to attending Berklee College of Music as a scholarship student to launching the Alastair Greene Trio in 1997. However, a core theme in Greene’s journey to date has been his relentless work ethic.

Throughout his career, Greene has grasped every opportunity he’s had with both hands and routinely learned different styles, techniques and genres of music to keep refining his sound and adding another string to his bow. “I recommend this for all you youngsters out there playing music. I said yes to every opportunity that came my way. I was in a fairly small town, Santa Barbara. I mean, it's not tiny, but there's a music scene and stuff. And that was my thing. It's like, I said yes to everything,” Greene admitted.

“It's a blues gig, cool. R&B, funk, Latin band, cool. Like I'll learn. I just wanted to play. I just wasn't so concerned with what it was. I just wanted to play my guitar and learn things,” Greene finished.

Prior to launching the Alastair Greene Trio, the artist earned the opportunity to attend the prestigious Berklee College of Music in the early 1990s, leaving Greene around a number of musicians who he described as “amazing”. Among those in attendance at Berklee included Abe Laboriel Jr, who is widely known for being Sir Paul McCartney’s drummer for the last 20 years. Collective Soul’s Johnny Rabb; David Steele, who was a part of the Dukes when they toured with Steve Earle in the 1996 and 1998 tours; and Wes Wehmiller, who went on tour with Duran Duran as their bassist.

“If I were to sit down and make a list, I'd be like, yeah, man, there were a lot of guys that I went to college with that have gone on to do some pretty amazing things,” Greene admitted. As for Greene, he went on to leave Berklee after two years studying, but what came into the decision to depart?

“What I do and have always really wanted to do musically didn't really require a lot of schooling,” Greene explained. “I mean, it's nice to know these things, and it's gotten me some really good opportunities because I can read a little bit of music and I know how to dip in and out of different genres a little bit. But I really wanted to get into playing in bands.

“A music degree probably looks good when you're applying for some jobs. It's obviously really good if you want to teach. And I do some teaching. But I felt that what I wanted to do with my life was going to be writing songs, playing in a band or having a band and trying and touring and doing all that. But I had a great experience. I met a lot of amazing players. It was very inspiring to be around these guys that were so, so good. And that was really a plus for me. It really raised the bar as far as what I thought, you know, was possible and attaining at a young age, really,” Greene finished.

As far as guitar playing goes, Greene attended Berklee at the time of “the shredder era”, which was driven by guitarists such as Eddie Van Halen, Yngwie Malmsteen, Joe Satriani and Berklee alumni Steve Vai, who had released his ‘Passion and Warfare’ at around the same time as Greene started his chapter at the prestigious school. However, being in an environment with equally talented musicians helped Greene thrive.

“What I found is because so many guitar players were going to that school, you got a lot of guys that (are) maybe the hometown hero from wherever they're from, and you show up there and there's guys that are your age that are light years beyond,” the guitarist explained.

“You have one of two choices at that point. And this is how I felt. I had, fuck this, I'm going to go do something else because there are guys here that are just blowing me into the weeds, or I'm going to work really hard and really try to raise my game. And so that was what I chose to do. But there were a lot of guys that didn't.

“I mean, I heard, this could be completely false, but I heard that the dropout rate after the first semester for guitar players at Berklee was astonishingly high because these guys would show up and be like, 'Oh my God, I'm nowhere even near the league, and these guys are my age or a year older. It can be a little bit intimidating, and it really is: how much do I love doing this and how much work am I willing to put in? And thankfully for me, my roommate, both years I was there, was a couple years older than me, so he knew a lot of these great players already.

“So I got to start hanging out with and jamming with these guys. (David) Steele and some other of these musicians that were really good. And so it sort of forced you to raise your level of playing. It's like if you're in a room, if you're in a room with a drummer and a bass player and five other guitar players and you're all taking turns soloing over Little Wing and it's getting passed around and it comes to you, it's like, man, I have got to step up and play something good,” Greene finished.

You can catch the Alastair Greene Trio and The Southern Rock Band at Barnoldswick Music & Arts Centre on Monday evening, with tickets available at https://www.barnoldswickmusicandartscentre.com/the-southern-rock-band-alastair-greene.