By Jeb
Wright
Howard
Leese is best known as an original member of the band Heart. It
is his backwards guitar that can be heard on “Magic Man,”
marking the first guitar solo in the band’s history. Nowadays,
Leese plays guitar with Paul Rodgers, a dream come true for the
guitar player, as his favorite band is the Rodgers founded
Free.
Leese is
known as one of rock n’ roll’s good guys; a fan friendly, down
to earth person, who simply loves music. He prefers to spend
time in the studio but ironically, with Rodgers and Heart, has
spent countless hours on stage. Away from the spotlight, Howard
lives a normal life and relishes in the roles of husband and
father.
Recently,
he put the finishing touches on his solo album Secret Weapon.
The album features Howard’s tasteful guitar playing, as one
would expect, but he also plays the bass, the keyboard and all
the orchestration. In fact, he plays all the instruments but
the drums, which he trusted to friend and virtuoso Mark
Schulman.
Part of
Secret Weapon is instrumental, but many tracks feature
amazing vocalists. His boss, Paul Rodgers sings on the poignant
“Heal the Broken Hearted.” Others making guest appearances are
Jimi Jamison, Joe Lynn Turner and Deanna Johnston, of Rock
Star INXS fame. Not all the guest are vocalists, however.
Leese also features Paul Reed Smith, Keith Emerson and, the bass
player in Rodgers’ band, Lynn Sorensen.
At the end
of the day, Leese’s biggest challenge with Secret Weapon
will be keeping it from remaining a secret. With no label and
little budget for promotion, the album could have a hard time
getting out there. That would be a shame as this is a testament
to Howard’s talent and creativity. Every song stands on it’s
own and every note comes from the heart. Do yourself a favor
and go to
http://www.myspace.com/howardleese to purchase Secret
Weapon.
Jeb:
You have made a very interesting guitar record. You have a lot
of different styles, as well as guest vocalists and some
instrumentals.
Howard: It
is not some big chops showcase like the shred guys, where every
song is showing off. I tried not to show off and show how fast
I could play, instead, I tried to play what was appropriate to
the music. The other thing that was fun for me is that I am
playing everything but the drums. I got to express myself on a
number of different instruments. It is not just a guitar record
because I am doing the orchestration and all instruments,
besides drums. Mark Schulman, who did an amazing job, played the
drums. Mark has toured with Billy Joel, Pink, Cher and a ton of
others. He is a very talented drummer.
Jeb:
You have been in no hurry to get this out there. Why?
Howard: It
has been done quite a while, although I just finished mastering
it. My friends, who formed the label this was going to be on,
ended up reforming the band Sweet, so the label dissolved
underneath me; it doesn’t exist anymore. I am just going to put
it out there and see what happens. I have some friends at
iTunes–Steve Jobs is actually a fan of mine. I will press up
some CDs and I am going to press up some vinyl. Vinyl is three
times more popular this year than it was last year. What I am
going to do is encode a digital download so that you can still
get the digital download when you buy it as vinyl but when you
are at home you can play it on your turntable. There are a lot
of guys who still have the $200,000 stereo and I figured that I
would press 1000 and sign and number them, for the collector
guys.
Jeb:
This is not music that you wrote with commercial intent.
Howard: It
is art, free of commerce. I wasn’t trying to make a hit
record. I just wanted to make good music that I was proud of.
I have had hit records and # 1 records and platinum and gold
records, and that is all fine and dandy, but most of these songs
are too long to be on the radio. I just wanted to do what I
thought was good.
Jeb:
You have Joe Lynn Turner on the first two tracks. He sounds
amazing.
Howard:
Joe has a great voice. He did a great job on “Alive Again.” I
wrote that track when I was down in Mexico with Paul Rodgers. I
was playing it for him but he said, “I like it but I am working
on something that is very similar and in the same key.” As I
got more and more into the song, it sounded to me like early
Heart. I sent it to Ann but I never got any response as to if
she wanted to sing on it or not. I, then, sent it to Joe, and I
am glad I did because he did a great vocal for it.
Jeb:
Did you give the guys the room to put their own melody on it?
Howard:
The singer was given the track and they were allowed to put
their own melody to it. I might give them a guitar version of
what I thought the melody should be, but a guy like Joe knows
how to write a good melody. One thing that I did was tell them
that this is the arrangement and I am not going to go back and
re-record it because you want to add another chorus here or
there. I told them that this is how it was going to go, so fit
your vocal to the track. Everybody went with the music and
really wrote appropriately to the tracks.
Jeb:
Joe Lynn sings the second song as well but he is doing a duet
with Deena Johnston from that television show.
Howard:
The song is “Hot and Cold.” She was on Singing Divas but
she is best known for being on Rock Star INXS. Joe
brought her in. I wasn’t going to have a girl on the record,
for obvious reasons—I didn’t want them to be compared to Ann
Wilson. I was really hesitant but Joe brought Deena with him
when he came over to do the vocal for “Alive Again.” He told me
that I had to listen to this song. She had already recorded a
demo vocal of the song. I thought it was a very average
sounding track until she sang on it.
There are
a lot of pissed off girls signing about things, like Pink and
Avril Lavigne. She was singing on it and sounding pissed off
about her boyfriend and I thought it would be cool to make it a
duet, but not a lovey-dovey one. Instead, it was the guy and
the girl being pissed at each other and having an argument. Joe
and her did it and it was great. She really rescued the song.
Jeb:
“Heal the Broken Hearted” is amazing. Do you ever get sick of
hearing him sing so perfectly?
Howard: I
get sick of him the way I get sick of breathing and eating. He
is amazing. I knew I had to entice Paul to sing on the record
because I knew he would only do it if he heard something that he
liked. I did a couple of blues type things that were in his
wheelhouse, kind of Free sounding, and he didn’t pick up on
them. I was surprised he didn’t go for one of those, but I
really wanted him to be on the album.
Paul is a
total artist and he puts everything he has into whatever he
does, but he has to feel it in order to do it. I thought about
it and I remembered that Paul loves my mandolin playing. We
play “Silver, Blue and Gold” with just piano and mandolin and it
is great. I decided to write a mandolin track. I sent it to
him and I didn’t hear anything from him for a couple of months.
I thought to myself, “Man, he is really being tough. He is not
liking anything that I send to him.” He called me a while
after that and he told me, “I wrote a song to that track you
sent me. I wrote it months ago and I lost the tape. I just
found it and I will send it back to you.” I got his demo and it
was amazing. He came into the studio and he was going to sing
it in his lower register, like he sings the first half. The
engineer that was doing the session with him said, “Why don’t
you jump up to your high range halfway through the song.” Paul
had to go up an octave from where he was doing it. He goes up
really high and, in my mind, it is one of his greatest vocals
because it shows him going from really low to really high. It
is different from a lot of what people are used to hearing him
sing, so I think that makes it very interesting.
Jeb:
“French Quarter” is a weird little piece of music.
Howard: I
had that on a cassette about seven or eight years ago. I was
producing a project for a friend a few years ago and they had a
decent budget. They brought in Slash and Steve Stevens for
guitar solos and, on one song, we brought in Keith Emerson. We
were just screwing around and getting ready to record the song
they were going to work on and we came up with that. I said,
“You were recording that weren’t you?” He goes, “Yeah.” I
said, “Make me a copy of that.” I have had that sitting around
for quite a while and I knew someday I would use it. We ran it
through a program to make it sound like an old record. I am
playing the organ and Keith is playing the piano. He is just a
frighteningly good musician. I always knew I would use this as
an interlude. I don’t know if it is really appropriate to put
on the album, but I like it.
Jeb:
What is “33 West Street”?
Howard:
That is the address of Paul Reed Smith’s original workshop in
Maryland, where my Golden Eagle guitar was built. Paul is on it
and all the instruments used are PRS.
Jeb:
This is the first instrumental on the album. Was there a
thought that you should just do an instrumental album?
Howard:
The first thing I wrote for the record was “Vermilion Border,”
which is an instrumental. However, I am known for working with
great singers. I actually wrote “33 West Street” with the idea
of having a vocal on it but I never got around to writing it, so
I kept it instrumental.
Jeb:
Tell me about your PRS guitar.
Howard: It
is the first PRS that has a maple top. It is what they consider
to be the first modern PRS. They made 100 copies of it and they
are for sale. It is the most valuable PRS. The maple for the
top was from a three hundred-year-old maple dresser that was at
his bass players mother’s house. There is actually a little
plug on the front of the guitar where the drawer pull used to
go. It was the bass player’s underwear drawer. Paul walked
into the house and saw this Stradivarius era wood on this old
piece of furniture and almost fell over. The mom says, “I have
always wanted some cherry drawers. Could you make me some
cherry drawers?” He said, “In a minute” and pulled off that
maple and made my guitar with it.
Jeb:
How long have you had the guitar and how much is it worth today?
Howard: I
got that guitar in 1980 and it was on every Heart record that I
did. I have to tell you a funny story. We were recording in
Los Angeles at Keith Olsen’s studio—he used to produce
Whitesnake and Rick Springfield. He had a disgruntled employee,
who, one night, came in the studio and stole all of our
guitars. He didn’t even put them in their cases, he just threw
them in the back of his car and took off. He held the guitars
hostage. My guitar was a victim of kidnapping. There were
negotiations with police and the whole thing. We finally got our
guitars back. It is still my main guitar. It is worth about a
half a million dollars.
Jeb: If
you had known that you may not have taken it on the road.
Howard: I
paid two thousand for it back then, and that was a lot at the
time. It was better than anything I had ever played. I loved
it so much that I had them make me another one, so I have the
first two ever made. Carlos Santana has number three and four.
It is a very significant guitar. Guitar One magazine had
a thing about The One Hundred Greatest Moments in Guitar
History. One of the top moments was when Paul Reed Smith
made the Golden Eagle.
Jeb: It
is a museum piece.
Howard: I
know. I still take it on the road.
Jeb:
Back to the album, is that you singing on “The South Summit?”
Howard: I
don’t sing on the record. That is Duke Fame on that one. You
know the movie Spinal Tap?
Jeb:
Yes, but when I saw the song was credited to Duke Fame I thought
it was a joke. I remember him walking through the hallway.
Howard: He
was the guy who was in town singing at the Enormo Dome. He used
to be the singer in Tap and he went on to be a big star. He is
a friend of mine. His real name is Paul Shortino; he used to be
in Ruff Cutt. He mixed the record with me. The challenge to
the journalists will be that you have to know your stuff to know
who Duke is.
Jeb:
“The South Summit” is amazing. You think it is going to be an
instrumental but then the vocals kick in.
Howard: I
love that song. I had the acoustic part for years. I had done
a demo of it for a movie soundtrack. I have always liked the
acoustic part. I call it “The Stretcher” because there is a
physically challenging stretch in the song. I was goofing
around with the Robin Trower type stuff in the middle of the
song and it hit me that I should put the two together. I don’t
have to worry about the song being on the radio. I really
enjoyed the freedom to do whatever I thought was cool.
They are
totally opposite ends of the spectrum but it really works. Paul
Shortino does a really great James Dewar type vocal on it. When
I do jams here in LA, I do “Day of the Eagle” and Paul gets up
and sings with me. Paul was perfect for this. I also love
reading books about these crazy people who climb Everest. The
first thing Paul does is sing, “The mountain is high” and I knew
we were going to write a song about a guy who is trapped on a
mountain. He is not going to make it to the top and he is not
going home. We thought, “What would that be like?” It is
powerful. I do that song in the Paul Rodgers show.
Jeb:
“The Vine” with Jimi Jamison was damn good. Jimi did a great
song.
Howard:
That is one of the only cases where the singer didn’t write the
vocal. Jamie Kyle wrote that. She is a singer in Nashville.
She wrote “Stranded” for Heart. She is a pro songwriter. We
get together when she comes to town. She came over one day and
she had a poem that was word-for-word what the song is. I sat
down and wrote the chord progression right then. It only took
me about an hour. She sang a demo of it and then Deanna sang a
demo of it. I wanted to get Steve Perry for it but no one can
find him and he doesn’t seem to want to do anything. He is also
my wife’s favorite singer so I thought it would be great to have
him on the album.
A friend
of mine is a drummer who knows Jimi and he played it for him.
Jimi loved the song and wanted to sing it. I told him I was
hoping for Perry but that I would love to have a guy sing the
demo. It is a high tenor type of voice that I was imagining.
He told me that if I would pay for the studio time then he would
like to go give it a try. He went in and he sent the vocal back
and I knew that was it. I didn’t even try to find Perry after
that.
Jeb:
Keith St. John sang “In These Eyes.” Who is he?
Howard: He
is mainly known for singing in Montrose. He has been doing
Sammy’s job in Montrose for a while. I wanted to have a couple
of unknown guys on the album. I wanted to throw a curve ball at
people who would only be expecting guys like Paul Rodgers and
Ann Wilson on the album. He is really good. The day he came
over to sing the song, he had just had a horrible breakup with
his girlfriend. He was on the verge of tears. We had to stop
the vocals in the middle because he is on the phone with her and
she is at the airport, leaving town. He is just a shell of a
man and I thought, “What a perfect time to record you. Let me
hear you bleed.” It was the worst possible condition to work
and I made him work anyway.
Jeb:
And everyone says you are such a nice guy...
Howard: I
am a nice guy but I am a tough producer.
Jeb:
“Vermilion Border.” What is that?
Howard: My
wife is a nurse and she works in a doctor’s office. The
Vermilion Boarder is the little part of your lips where your
lips meet your skin. She said that one day and I thought it was
really cool. I wrote it down because I thought it would be
really cool. It is a big soaring melody. I wrote it with Robby
Steinhardt of Kansas in mind. I wanted violin on the verses.
He agreed to do it but then he got kicked out of the band and no
one could find him. I never ended up getting him on the record
so I just did the violin part myself. I added some acoustic
guitar to it. Robby is on there in spirit. I love Kansas.
They are a great band that we play with a lot.
Jeb:
Andrew Black is an unknown singer. He did a great job on “I
Been Leavin’ You.”
Howard: I
played that for Paul and he said, “He reminds me of me.” I grew
up playing the blues and I love playing that stuff with Paul.
The song features the Paul Rodgers band as well. Andrew sang it
and just killed it.
This whole
record is made completely by hand. There are no computers on it
and there is no studio trickery. I wanted it to be completely
honest and feature actual performances. My own personal
standard is that no punching in is allowed. The solos are even
one pass. If I couldn’t get it all the way through then I would
stop and do it all again. I didn’t want to assemble a
performance. I wanted a historical performance of the song. I
am even tough on myself. At the end of the day, I want to be
proud of my work. There may be little imperfections on there
but that is okay. I didn’t want to put together a solo with ten
seconds here and then ten seconds there; that is crap in my
opinion.
Jeb:
You have been known with your time as Heart as being very
involved in the studio. I would say this is a studio album that
is not going to be played in concert.
Howard:
There are no plans to play this live. I considered this was
like being a painter. I would get up and paint on days I was
inspired to paint. I didn’t work every day. It was just me and
the canvas, or in this case me and the tape.
Jeb:
Can we expect more in the future?
Howard:
The best track is not even on this album. Bobby Kimball of Toto
promised me that he was going to sing on a track and a year went
by and he never did it. I decided to leave it off because he
had not done it. My favorite song is not even on the record but
I have a killer track ready for the next one. I am also going
to do another track from West Side Story.
Jeb:
You sent me the West Side Story “Somewhere” to me a long
time ago. I am talking about the one that is on this album. It
sounds like a rock song and not a musical song.
Howard: It
is in the same key and uses a lot of the same arrangement. I
changed the feel a little bit. The original one is a waltz and
mine is in 4/4. It is “Somewhere” from West Side Story.
I don’t like 99% of Broadway show music but West Side Story
is great stuff. I was ten when it came out. I saw the
movie. Ann and Nancy know the entire score and they can sing
every song in harmony. I consider West Side Story to be
the best music made in the 20th Century. It took me
a whole day just to figure out the chords in that song. It is
very complicated but beautifully done.
I was not
intending to put it on there because it is sacred to me. One
day, the movie was on and my kids, who were four and five at the
time, were in the living room. They were playing with their
toys and stuff, but every time a song would come on, they were
entranced by it and would start watching the television. I
think that shows how powerful that music is. I played around
with a few songs to try and figure out what would be good to
do. The song is in Eb and I wanted to do something with
harmonics like the Jeff Beck song “Where Were You.” In Eb, that
is not possible. So, I played it in D and I tuned my guitar up
a half step. It took me another day to figure out how to play
it with all harmonics.
Jeb:
Start to finish, this is a great album, every song is
interesting. You don’t follow a style but each song stands on
it’s own. There are no clunkers.
Howard: It
is a clunker free zone. I didn’t want it to be an album where
there were two songs and the rest are just okay. I wanted a lot
of textures and a lot of interesting things going on. There is
some straight rock music but a lot of it is more sophisticated.
I was not making music for teenagers.
Jeb:
Last one: You once told me that if you were not playing music
with Paul Rodgers then you would be retired. Is that really how
you feel?
Howard: I
was actually retired for one day. I did my last gig with Ann
Wilson on Saturday, flew home Sunday and retired on Monday. On
Tuesday, they called me up and said, “Pine Knob on Tuesday
night. Here is the set list.” I was never a big live playing
guy; I was a studio musician. I never liked playing in bars and
I never liked playing cover tunes. I ended up having a long
career as a stage-performing musician. Free was my favorite
band. When Paul Rodgers asks you to play then you say ‘yes.’
It is amazing to play next to someone with that much talent at
that level.
Visit
http://www.myspace.com/howardleese
to listen to samples and buy
Secret Weapon today!
