PAUL GILBERT Releases New Video For Title-Track of New Album ‘Werewolves of Portland’

Guitar virtuoso PAUL GILBERT will release his brand-new album, Werewolves of Portland, on June 4th via The Players Club. Today he has revealed a video for the title-track, watch it below.

Paul Gilbert tells us: “My song “Werewolves of Portland” is actually two songs, put together. The first song is based on a short lyric, “I’ve got to look out for the werewolves… I’ll take a deep breath… ah-woooooooo!” which allows me to play some dramatic slide guitar.

The second song was originally titled “Dad Metal.” It’s full of fast guitar riffs, percussive picking, and modulating dominant sus4 arpeggios. This section is very “busy” musically, so I was happy to join it with the sustaining “ah-whooooo” howling part for contrast.

I played a melodic blues guitar solo, with some jazz chord changes in the middle, to let the song breathe even more.

For the video, I brought the idea of “Dad Metal” to life by having my 6-year-old son, Marlon, play guitar, drums, and dance together with me. Marlon brought great energy (and mischief, in general) to the video, and I tried my best to keep up with him. I’ll admit that my legs were sore for about two weeks after the shoot. Dancing is hard!

Of course, we stayed true to the “Werewolves” theme by wearing wolf masks and tails, and doing plenty of howling.

I decided to play my Ibanez double neck guitar for the silhouette sections of the video, and Ibanez built a matching double neck (in two days!) for my son to use. He could barely lift it, but he tried his best! (It’s an awesome guitar, that I plan on using myself, at least until he’s old enough to play it.)

Since I played all the instruments on the recording of the song, I also wanted to play some drums in the video. I didn’t own a drum set, so it gave me a good excuse to buy a small kit, which I now use for jamming in my studio.

I’m thinking that the wolf masks and tails will come in handy around Halloween.

Mostly, I’m happy that I could make a video of my “Boy Wolf” and me rocking out and having the best time.”

“Ah-wooooooo!!!”

Recorded at Opal Studio in Portland with co-producer and engineer Kevin Hahn, Gilbert pulled out some of his current favourite guitars for the job. “I mostly used my Ibanez Fireman guitars,” he says. “I’ve been collecting vintage Ibanez guitars lately, too. I brought some models from the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s like the Ibanez Artist, Roadstar II and Ghostrider. I also brought and modified a ’60s Epiphone Olympic. I used to play those in the early days of Racer X, so it was fun to have a guitar that reminded me of my early shredder style.”

Track list