In the best way possible, Marty Friedman is an anomaly within the musical world. He started off in the 1980s as a guitar-centric recording artist for Shrapnel Records,...
In the best way possible, Marty Friedman is an anomaly within the musical world. He started off in the 1980s as a guitar-centric recording artist for Shrapnel Records, which had also signed his metal band Cacophony. 1990 brought him into the Megadeth fold, in which Friedman would go on to sell millions of albums. But the success he experienced before leaving Megadeth in 2000 would only be a fraction of what was to come.
Friedman moved to Japan in 2003 and quickly found work as a sideman for several Japanese prominent recording artists. Nowadays, he is not only a prominent solo artist and session player, but also an in-demand host and actor with hundreds of television credits. Friedman is currently writing an autobiography and is the focus of a forthcoming documentary. However, the guitar hero chooses not to rest of the laurels of his stardom in Asia, instead opting to tour the United States every year or so for the past few years.
In support of his new solo album, Wall Of Sound[1], Friedman is kicking off a tour with Scale The Summer and The Fine Constant on August 2 in Philadelphia. The tour will be running through August 28, closing with a date in San Diego. Friedman recently sat down with Guitar World, entertaining a mixture of questions about Wall Of Sound, his history as a guitarist and what motivates him as an artist.
Who or what inspired you to pick up a guitar for the first time? Is anyone else in your family musical?
No one in my family is musical at all, and music wasn’t my first choice by a long shot. I was completely into sports. I loved all the major sports, football, baseball, hockey and basketball, I wasn’t