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Stefanos Alexiou – A Million Miles Away

Since I started playing guitar, 4 years ago, I’ve been asked to play something from Rory Gallagher, the man whom Jimi Hendrix once called as the best guitar player ever.

A while back I had made a video of the clean studio version of Rory’s “A Million Miles Away” played on one guitar over the original song as a backing track. That video was removed from YouTube almost as soon as it was uploaded thanks to Mr. Gallagher’s publishers.

A Million Miles Away (Dual Guitars & Drums)

Stefanos Alexiou - A Million Miles Away

Stefanos Alexiou – A Million Miles Away

This time, in order to avoid another video deletion, I added my own backing track by playing the drums, replacing the bass with a rhythm guitar and playing the lead guitar based on a mix of Rory’s several live performances and added my own flavor on the solos plus some volume swells for the intro.

During the final mix, the rhythm guitar was panned mostly to the left while the lead guitar solos & intro swells remained on both channels and made a bit wider.

The video remake of “A Million Miles Away” was uploaded on Youtube on January 16, 2014.

Stefanos Alexiou – Can’t You Hear Me Knocking

This Year for Christmas I got a record player and a few old vinyl records. Among them a couple records from The Rolling Stones which I’ve been listening on a daily basis.

I especially love their “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” song so appropriately this would be my first cover song for 2014.

Stefanos Alexiou - Can't You Hear Me Knocking (Dual Guitars & Drums)

Stefanos Alexiou – Can’t You Hear Me Knocking (Dual Guitars & Drums)

The Making of Can’t You Hear Me Knocking

Started by playing the Rhythm guitar on DSL’s crunch channel with no other effects present.

Stefanos Alexiou - Can't You Hear Me Knocking (Rhytm Guitar)

Stefanos Alexiou – Can’t You Hear Me Knocking (Rhytm Guitar)

Then I played the drums to keep the rhythm, each one of them individually miked and some reverb added to the snare.

Stefanos Alexiou - Can't You Hear Me Knocking (Drums)

Stefanos Alexiou – Can’t You Hear Me Knocking (Drums)

Finally, I played the Lead guitar improvising a lot, especially the parts where a sax is used on the studio version.

Stefanos Alexiou - Can't You Hear Me Knocking (Lead Guitar)

Stefanos Alexiou – Can’t You Hear Me Knocking (Lead Guitar)

This time I chose not to include bass guitar…

Can’t You Hear Me Knocking: Final Mix & Video

Mixed the Rhythm guitar 60% to the left, Lead at 40% to the right, added some stereo reverb to the whole track and here’s the complete video that was uploaded on YouTube on January 7th, 2014.

Stefanos Alexiou – Train Kept A Rollin

As my last cover song for 2013 I wanted to do a classic that has influenced and played by many other musicians but still not very well known to most audience. I found what I wanted to play in the 1951 jump blues by Tiny Bradshaw “Train Kept A Rollin”.

Stefanos Alexiou - Train Kept A Rollin

Stefanos Alexiou – Train Kept A Rollin

History & Credits

As mentioned above, Train Kept A Rollin was originally recorded in 1951 by Tiny Bradshaw and his band as a vibrant mid-tempo song with a boogie-woogie bass line and a shuffling drumbeat.

Then in 1956, Johnny Burnette and the Rock and Roll Trio recorded “The Train Kept A Rollin” using a rockabilly/rock and roll arrangement. The Trio’s version features guitar lines in what many historians consider to be the first recorded example of intentionally distorted guitar in rock music. (Reference: Gordon, Vince; Dijkema, Peter (2011). Rockabilly: The Twang Heard ‘Round the World: The Illustrated History)

In 1965 The Yardbirds recorded “The Train Kept A Rollin” during their first American tour. Their version is based on Johnny Burnette’s version, but incorporates instrumental breaks and different guitar parts. It opens with Jeff Beck simulating a train whistle on the guitar.
In 1966, the Yardbirds recorded a hard rock version with Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page on dual lead guitars to be used for their appearance in the 1966 film Blowup, but permission from the song publisher was not coming so singer Keith Relf wrote new lyrics to the band’s new arrangement and called it “Stroll On”.
After Jeff Beck’s departure from The Yardbirds, Jimmy Page kept playing all the guitar parts on the song.

In 1968, when the future members of Led Zeppelin rehearsed together for the first time, the first song they played was “Train Kept A Rollin”. According to John Paul Jones, the room exploded when they kicked it off and they knew they had something together as a band. The song was included in their early performances as the “New Yardbirds” and during Led Zeppelin’s 1968 and 1969 tours, usually being featured as their opening song and was included on several bootleg albums.

In 1974, Aerosmith brought “Train Kept A Rollin” into the hard rock mainstream. Steven Tyler, Joe Perry, and Tom Hamilton had performed the song prior to joining Aerosmith. Joe Perry has said that “Train Kept A Rollin” was the only song we had in common when we first got together.

The Johnny Burnette Rock and Roll Trio rendition of “Train Kept A Rollin” is included in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s exhibit of the “500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll“. Beside the most notable version of the song mentioned above, other musicians that have performed the song during the last several decades include: Jeff Beck, Bon Jovi, Paul Burlison, Dread Zeppelin, Alex Chilton, Hanoi Rocks, Colin James and the Little Big Band, Imelda May, Metallica, Motörhead, The Nazz, Shakin’ Stevens and the Sunsets, Skid Row, Screaming Lord Sutch, Sugarloaf, Ten Years After, The Tragically Hip, and Twisted Sister.

My version of Train Kept A Rollin: video

My version is based on the Aerosmith’s hard rock version and is done on dual guitars, drums and a regular guitar plugged into a POG-2 pedal to emulate the bass.

Here’s the video of “Train Kept A Rollin” with me playing all instruments:

Stefanos Alexiou – The Rain Song

Here in San Diego we rarely see rain throughout the year so when we got some much needed rain during the past few days, it inspired me to mellow down and cover Led Zeppelin’s “The Rain Song”. Initially I thought to even add some cello in it but I wasn’t happy with the way it blended so I ended up playing just the guitar with added drums.

Stefanos Alexiou - The Rain Song

Stefanos Alexiou – The Rain Song

The making of The Rain Song

As I always do, I started by playing the guitar on it…

Stefanos Alexiou - The Rain Song (Guitar)

Stefanos Alexiou – The Rain Song (Guitar)

… Then I added some drums.

Stefanos Alexiou - The Rain Song (Drums)

Stefanos Alexiou – The Rain Song (Drums)

The Rain Song: Mix & video on YouTube

Finally both guitar and drums tacks were mixed, added some reverb on the snare drum and guitar and uploaded on YouTube early Sunday morning!

Hope you enjoy my version of The Rain Song…

Stefanos Alexiou – No Quarter

For a while now I’ve been wanted to do a cover video of Led Zeppelin’s “No Quarter” but I was holding up because of the known YT issues I’ve been having with their publisher. Last Friday I finally decided to do it by changing it quite a bit and here it is!

Stefanos Alexiou - No Quarter (cello bow solos added)

Stefanos Alexiou – No Quarter (cello bow solos added)

How it Started

Stefanos Alexiou - No Quarter (on piano Thanksgiving 2013)

Stefanos Alexiou – No Quarter (on piano Thanksgiving 2013)

On Thursday evening after Thanksgiving dinner with family and friends, I got the chance to play some piano and without realizing I was hitting the notes of “No Quarter”. Since I don’t really know how to play the piano, I was playing it very slow and a bit darker than normal. So I thought… here’s how to change it (avoiding the YT issues) and still make it sound close enough to the original…

The Making of No Quarter

Stefanos Alexiou - No Quarter (rhythm guitar - piano & distortion parts)

Stefanos Alexiou – No Quarter (rhythm guitar – piano & distortion parts)

As always, I started by playing the rhythm on the guitar. I played the piano parts and the distorted parts.

Stefanos Alexiou - No Quarter (drums)

Stefanos Alexiou – No Quarter (drums)

Then I did the drums… which by the way I think is the best drums I’ve done so far. 😉

Stefanos Alexiou - No Quarter (cello bow solos instead of vocals)

Stefanos Alexiou – No Quarter (cello bow solos instead of vocals)

After the rhythm guitar and drums, I wanted to make it a little spooky and at the same time keep it sound close to the original… So I used a cello bow and did the vocal parts on the guitar as little solos…

Stefanos Alexiou - No Quarter (clean guitar solo)

Stefanos Alexiou – No Quarter (clean guitar solo)

And of course a regular solo had to be somewhere there, so I played a guitar solo too! If I’m not mistaken this solo is also my first one playing it clean without any distortion or a fuzz.

The Mix of No Quarter and video to YouTube

After all 3 tracks (rhythm, drums & solos) where recorded and a video was make for each track, during the mixing we also decided to add some kind of rotating flange effect to the last distortion part to make it a little different from the other distorted parts.

And here’s the completed video that was uploaded on my Youtube channel yesterday!

Stefanos Alexiou – Day Tripper

After taking a couple months much needed brake, yesterday I decided to do a video on The Beatles classic “Day Tripper” which is one of my favorite songs from them.

However I wanted to do a very different and original version of Day Tripper, so here’s how it the story:

Rhythm Guitar for Day Tripper

Rhythm Guitar for Day Tripper

Started by playing the Rhythm Guitar…

Stefanos Alexiou - Drums for Day Tripper

Drums for Day Tripper

Then played the drums based on the rhythm guitar…

After that recorded the bass guitar, which I did on a regular guitar with the help of a POG2 pedal since I don’t have an actual bass guitar. 😉

Stefanos Alexiou - Lead Guitar for Day Tripper

Lead Guitar for Day Tripper

Finally I played the lead guitar for it and here’s where most of the originality happens…

By the time I finished recording all these 4 tracks (taking a video as it went), it got late and I was already exhausted but the final mix to the trucks had to be done prior to syncing the audio tracks to the video track for a YouTube upload.

During the mix some reverb was added to the rhythm & lead guitars and also to the overhead truck of the drums. Also decided to put the rhythm guitar track to the left side at 60% and the lead guitar to the right side at also at 60% for what sounded as a better audio effect during the mix.

So here’s the final result as it was uploaded on YouTube early this morning:

Stefanos Alexiou – Stairway To Heaven

On March 26th 2013, Stefanos Alexiou along with SoZo-Led covers Jimmy Page and Led Zeppelin’s most radio requested and played ever classic “Stairway To Heaven”. Stefanos had first played this song at the age of 9. Below is the Stairway to Heaven guitar solo.

Stefanos Alexiou – Karma Police

On November 17th, 2012 Stefanos Alexiou covers on acoustic Karma Police by Radiohead!

Stefanos Alexiou – Double Talkin Jive

On October 4th, 2012 Stefanos Alexiou covered Double Talkin Jive by Guns N Roses using lots of Spanish guitar for the most part of his version.

Stefanos Alexiou – Creep

One of Stefanos Alexiou favorite songs, Creep by Radiohead, makes him to give a try on his vocals along with a dual guitar.