Slash Says New Album is "Raw"

Slash has been talking about his new in-progress album. It will feature singer Myles Kennedy for all tracks. After the festive break, Slash and Co. return to the studio to continue recording and mixing the as-yet-unnamed album, and the Les Paul-toting star predicts an April release.

Slash tells Total Guitar magazine, “We’re just going for the one take that sounds good, so my solos are more raw, probably sloppier in a way, because they’re very spontaneous to the point where it’s in the heat of the moment.”

Slash and his band – Kennedy on lead vocals and second guitar, Todd Kerns on bass, and drummer Brent Fitz – have completed mixing three songs with another 14 to go. The album is being recorded live, Slash saying the main challenge is “rehearsing the s--t out of them.”

Of the completed individual songs, Slash says, “There’s one song at this point called ‘Bad Rain’ which is a mid-tempo, very heavy and dark song. It’s in a drop-D tuning – and we’re already playing a half-step down – and the solo has a kinda chromatic feel.

“There’s one very uptempo song with a cool riff called ‘Halo.’ The third song is called ‘Standing in the Sun’ and it’s very melodic, mid-to-uptempo… just a rock ’n’ roll song! All three of these songs are relatively short, they’re all in a rock mold, and I guess I always come from that pentatonic point of view. For me, any time you go too far out of that, it ceases to be rock. It has to have a basis around that, otherwise it no longer has any essence of that Chuck Berry kinda deal.”

Slash says he is “pretty excited” about making such a raw album with “natural tone” everywhere. “Everything is being played live with the music tracks: the solos, everything. We’re trying not to overdub extra bits. So if there’s a solo, I’m playing on one side, Myles’s rhythm track is on the other.”

Myles Kennedy adds that the album is “real stripped-down and simple,” saying his own favorites so far are “Standing in the Sun” and another song called “Far and Away.”

Despite “sharing” singer Kennedy with Alter Bridge, Slash insists, “I’ve been happiest in my career these last couple of years.”