How do you define Joel Hoekstra?

First of all, it's important to know that he can kind of play anything.

Yeah, yeah, the guy could play anything.

Dude, he also can explain anything, dual citizenship as far as talent goes.

This man can explain and play anything.

I appreciate a lot as somebody who teaches you teach too.

Being able to explain what you're doing and then doing it and doing it a level he does, it's just really wild.

If I were to ask ChatGPT and I would AI Guitar Hero, I would think about Joel with his like absolute long hair almost comic book character as Guitar Hero and with everything he does, he has this swagger and this vibe.

Whether he's playing with Whitesnake, Cher, trans-siberian orchestra or Night Ranger, whoever he's with, Joel brings the heat.

And don't be mistaken, this guy might have these characteristics of or this personality like, oh, I just do my thing man.

He is an absolute guitar Slayer.

We're getting good at podcasting because I was going to say we should go over Joel's resume, but you already nailed the the finer points there.

He's done so much with so many legendary musicians, and that makes him a legend in our eyes.

Just a really lovely dude.

He flew down here from New York to be here and spent his time with us.

So we really hope you enjoy this incredible episode full of Nuggets and wisdom and good times.

Joel Hoekstra.

Joel's also putting out a new album called from the Fade in February.

Jared and I kicked off the podcast by learning his latest single, which you can pre save link in the description called The fall.

So I did this for a Jared.

What did you do for me this?

Is a little backing track.

Oh cool, but.

We can just learn this really quick.

And then jam it.

If you want to jam just like, that's a really cool progression.

So play it one more time for me.

The.

The I was dying, Amanda, my wife, before we came in, I was like, I was pumping you up.

I was like, Joel is like a guitar ninja.

I was like, he's done so much stuff.

And she's like, oh, that's awesome.

And then she goes, I bet you I saw him when I saw TSO.

And I was like, yeah, you probably did.

And I said he also played with Cher.

What's this Cher guitar line that we might recognize?

I know the one.

Come on, dude, that's so good.

I remember being a little kid, man, and my friend's parents owned a bar.

And do you believe in life after love, you know, would come on.

And that little guitar line dude was one of the first guitar lines I remember as a kid.

The.

Yeah, but that guitar line, dude.

You end up finding things that you never would have expected.

I mean, I was like, Jared posted the other day a picture of him as a young man in the Midwest.

And dude, I felt like I was like, well, we might be different ages, but we were, we're the same guy.

Oh, yes, I, I, I learned like, you know, paranoid and like, you know, my parents are classical musicians, right?

So they were like hoping they would breed like this classical virtuoso kid.

And I just didn't really take the Chile man cello when I was 3, to give you an idea, and piano when I was 7.

And I just wanted to be a baseball pitcher at the time.

And then I saw Angus Young is like you guys aren't old enough, but the early days of MTV, like when it was first on and they only had like 8 videos that they were just kind of running around the clock and cable TV was kind of a new thing right when Back In Black was coming out.

So perfect timing really.

I made a great album to be inspired by to start.

Rock guitar still stands the test of time.

I mean I consider that to be 1 of if not the greatest Hard Rock album of all time.

It's like an incredible record and I don't really play a whole lot like Angus.

I was mainly as a kid attracted to all the energy and trusted the around him in the stage presence.

He's going crazy and I just looked at him and I was like that, that I want to be that guy and I didn't know I was going to be a foot taller.

Maybe.

More You didn't wear the schoolboy shorts.

Maybe more, but he was he was, you know what made me want to pick up a guitar?

And thankfully, a friend of mine had a teacher at a local mall.

And I grew up in suburban Chicago.

So, you know, that was our culture.

Like, go to the mall for lessons.

And I had a great teacher early on, and he taught me nothing but songs.

And to give you everybody an idea how long ago this was, this was like nobody was writing a tab.

This is a guy with a cassette player.

He'd listen to the, you know, teach you the riff.

Pre tab world is horrifying I.

Remember like leaving the guitar lesson and like frantically practicing waiting for my mom to swing around and pick me up for from the lesson to go going.

Like, Oh my God, I can't forget because I forget it.

It's a waste of a lesson, right?

So great, great way actually to to get going in a very blue collar neighborhood in Chicago.

Like we were not well to do.

We had like no money to put it.

I had the work ethic thing from that, like the the ability to work hard.

But my parents were always insisted upon that we were, you know, special and we were meant for something.

And that was that was good too.

A great era to grow up in.

Because the guitar scene, it was cool to dig on.

Like, you know, that early 80s stuff, if you were listening, like as a kid, dude, I was starting out like, OK, Black Sabbath, Ozzy, Iron Maiden, Dio, you know, ACDC.

I mean, it was just like Hard Rock.

Even.

I remember the first time hearing Van Halen thinking they sounded country to me.

That's whoa.

Wait, which song sounded country?

Kind of country.

Playing in that Davie Lee Brocker.

Diver down was out at that.

Point.

OK, yeah, yeah.

So I think.

I could see that, you know, like, don't ask me why, but like, they'd had that vibe to me.

And even at that time, like, Rush was a little bit much for me.

And Rush eventually became my favorite band, like over the course of my lifetime, like everything that they went through, all the different styles, I tracked it all and really enjoyed everything that they did as a band.

But it was a great era for wanting to be a technically proficient guitar player.

But also there was an open mindedness in that that hair band scene was there.

That scene, that term was nowhere to be found at the time.

There was no such thing as like a hair band scene.

We were just we were the outcasts.

Like we were no was not cool.

And the term shred was nowhere around.

That became a thing in the 90s is like a derogatory thing like, oh, he's a shredder.

Avoid that guy So.

It was.

Watch out for the shredder.

Man, go for the.

Shredder yeah, yeah, as as a kid in that I could go from listening to Rat to listening to Stanley Jordan to listening to Christopher Parkening.

You know, I was taking classical lessons too, even in that time and did then actually did a couple years of school for that and so studied that and listening to Al Di Meola and, you know, even Joe Pass and things like that.

It was a great era because it was like, look, you know, the cover of Guitar Player at that time was still about like those people who were like virtuosos in whatever they were doing, Alan Holdsworth or whatever.

Your journey as a sideman or insert whatever word you want there that isn't just.

You get 1 gig and then you get another gig and no gaps.

What happened in the gaps between all of these accolades is really what I want.

To know they all kind of overlapped, I sort of like, I realized that the key was kind of collecting multiple gigs and then always having a backup plan per SE or a way to stay busy 12 months out of the year.

I've never really been able to understand how people like, man, you're so hard working if you go on a tour and you work like four months out of the year and people are like, don't most people work like 12 months out?

Yeah, always major hours, so.

40 hours.

You're like an NFL referee.

As musicians, I feel like sometimes we're expected to just be like, I guess not productive or lazy or sitting around and just going like, whatever, man, I'm going to do what I feel like today.

So I had some success in the Chicago local scene, had my own bands gigging on weekends.

And then I joined up with Kathy Richardson's band who sings for Jefferson Starship.

She had a nice following locally already.

I mean, that was the first time where is like people wanted your picture after the gig or wanted your autograph.

And I was a local musician.

And Jim Petrick was also a local musician who founded the band Survivor, you know, founded ides a March.

So he had written a lot of hits.

And so he had these events called World Stage where he would play some of his own music, but there were guests that would come out.

And so here I was just this local Chicago kid and they would come out one after the other.

Man, it's like, here's Kevin Cronin from Mario Speedwagon, you're going to play the hits of them.

And Next up is Rick Emmett from Triumph, and he comes out and you play the Triumph.

It's a Rick.

And so I got to meet a lot of people through that.

There's so many steps to the way things occurred for me.

But that was a big one because Kathy, then Kathy Richardson, the aforementioned Kathy Richardson and got a role as Janis Joplin in a a theater piece called Love Janis.

And that was going to New York.

And I landed in the band for that.

And so that's what brought me to New York City.

Jim Petrick still wanted me to come be in his house band for these things.

So I would learn like 36 songs, get off the plane and play the showdown.

And and that's probably been one of my strengths, I'd say over the years is that I always cared enough or, and, or stressed enough, quite frankly, like I'm, I'm just like kind of.

That's a lot of songs.

I just want to.

Make sure I like, you know, I nail everything.

And and a lot of these guys weren't just like the old 80s classic rock guys.

They were like Blues guys like Anthony Gomes.

Oh, yeah, Anthony.

Anthony was always a guest.

Come on, play his stuff with them.

So I I got to meet a lot of people, but one of them every year was the Night Ranger drummer Kelly Kegey.

And so while I was in New York doing this theatre thing and kind of carving that out and we did, I must have done 1314 hundred performances of that show, 8 a week while I was getting the 36 songs together to go in and get off the plane.

But anyway, at the time, when it came to Night Ranger and the availability that was, I kind of learned Jeff Watson was no longer with the band backstage talking with Kelly and his wife.

And I said, man, you should have called me like, you know, we've been playing the Night Ranger stuff.

I have a gold top.

I do the 8 finger thing like Jeff.

And that would be a a cool fit.

And lo and behold, Red Beach, my white sick bandmate, was doing the gig in the interim, got a call about a week later and they're like, Reb needs to miss a show.

He's got to play with Winger.

So do you feel like you could do what you do?

A gym?

We need you to learn like 25 songs, no rehearsal, show up and do a gig with us.

And they're like, you should know that Reb is going to have to go back to Whitesnake and we're going to need somebody.

So I like went after it and wow.

And that's really the story of how I kind of ended up with those guys.

I was only in for five or six shows or something they said, but our bass player is quitting.

Do you play bass?

And I was like, I do now because I needed I needed a gig.

I see when Love Love Janice was the the theater piece that closed and there I was in New York City.

I was like, dude, I got no gigs.

Rent this through the roof.

You took a gig from a defenseless bass player.

No, no, he left.

He he left, he left.

So I ended up playing bass for those guys for like 2 years and then it worked out that right at the time that Tristan needed to actually leave the gig, the bass player had an interest in coming back.

He missed it.

So I transferred over to guitar.

So that, oddly enough, what led to the Night Ranger was a combination of all those little things.

I'm gigging in the oldies scene little bit more.

And I love, I cherish all that stuff because it's not like the standard story for, like, you know, dude joints.

Whitesnake Yeah.

Yeah.

This is the advantage to, you know, if any players who are trying to find their way to something, it's kind of this mishmash of, like, trying everything.

So I had a guy about two blocks away from me that was a legit pit musician on Broadway.

He was like, hey, would you ever want a sub for me?

And so I started learning his books.

You get like 300 pages of sheet music and you know, you need to learn tenor, banjo and capacino to cop it.

And it's not easy doing those so.

You're reading the sheet music and deciphering it that way.

Yeah, Yeah.

So I mean, it was, you know, it was a lot of work.

And I like to say I can trace back most of my success to doing work for like, like, what must have been like a nickel an hour or something.

Even prepping for those Peter.

Rick Giggs was like, man, I mean, Jim paid great for the show, but it was like, you'd have to work for weeks to get those 36 songs together and get off the plane on no rehearsal and do it.

So same with this pit stuff.

And then the pit stuff led to Rock of Ages, the musical.

Like when that opens, suddenly they're like, hey, we've got this 80's rock musical coming to town.

And just so happened that the last show I'd done filled in for my friend JJ, the keyboard player from that show, Ethan Pop, that was the music supervisor and he was like perfect.

I know this guy that comes in and Subs on Tarzan was the show I was doing that Phil Collins worth the music for.

He's like a long haired guy.

He's like a, you know, he's like a Hard Rock guy.

Let's get him to do it because we were an on stage band and that led to A6 plus year run of probably.

I would say I must have done seventeen 1800 performances of that show over the course of that time.

Joe, how many shows do you think you've done?

How many performances do you think that you've done?

Because most people I don't think could even fathom being on stage 1000 times.

Yeah, like people say 300 shows a year and I'm like, that's like almost every day you're playing.

Yeah, but you're saying 1800?

That's a different thing in fairness, because you're not traveling when you do these.

Like you're just you're commuting to the theater and you're doing 8 a week, so there's two a day.

On it's a different kind of endurance.

It's a different kind of endurance.

It's Bill Murray and Groundhog Day.

You're like, Oh my God, like we're playing the same exact set.

And it gets to the point where you feel like if I change from a medium to a heavy today, I might end up in the back of an ambulance.

Oh my God, Something about Mary or something like that, where you're like, Oh my God, like how did I end up here?

So, but that was a great, that was a great change in my career.

I'd say at that point in time, like I, I had about maybe six months in Night Ranger a year.

Their song was in the show, perfect marriage.

Sister Christian was in the show.

And so for me to be able to get that and have the ability to sub out when you're on Broadway, you can leave to go do things.

And then the thing that really kind of came along next was, you know, we were doing all kinds of national TV appearances for Rock of Ages.

We were on America's Got Talent, Long story short, kind of landed me in trans-siberian orchestra.

Alex Skolnick wanted to take a year off to do his jazz trio thing and they needed somebody.

A couple of guys in the band were like this guy and recommended me audition very much.

Actually, I got auditioning for a normal band even though TSO is like this giant, giant monstrosity.

Huge tour and.

I just it's this whole entity.

Yeah, but.

Everyone from my parents all the way down to like kids and everyone in.

Between it's it's an everyone show man TSO is just like.

I feel like it's as the years have gone by too with that, what's happened is that that gig has become more and more cherish to people because you see a lot of the the retro acts getting too old to perform anymore or on their way out or slowing down.

And you've got this show that's still going like this in one of the top billboard tours.

I mean, we sell at arenas twice a day on that.

Well, you being in the band TSO has this sort of enigmatic feel where it's the it's more about the music than necessarily the people performing it.

Not to undermine what you do, but like people are coming for the entire wall of awesome orchestral meets neoclassical shred.

This dude, Paul O'Neill he so I don't know if you guys remember the band Sabotage.

I might be taking you back too far, but you know, they Paul was really managing and producing Sabotage and he had this idea.

And I guarantee there are a lot of people going like, what are you talking about?

Taking this metal band and putting them in tuxes and playing Christmas music on the stage and like you and he was like, we're going to play Madison Square Garden.

Paul always had the vision.

I could see people being like no.

Way I that it was going to it was going to work and his vision from the beginning was this is going to be I mean he Paul thought big like beyond big.

He was like, this is going to be a holiday tradition.

This is going to be like.

How incredible.

Man, what people go to see and it's, you know, we Paul departed, we lost him about I'm going to mess up how many years ago now?

But I don't know, 5-6 years ago.

And he was just incredibly eccentric.

Did the Einstein thing where we wore the same clothing every day, leather jacket, white shirt, and would propose ideas that would leave management in a panic.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

And all the players going.

What do you mean?

Word?

What?

What?

Wait, what?

But it it was just something about his passion for it and the vision that he had that really is responsible.

I mean, and when you launch something like that and he put as much money into the production with the pyro and the laser light show that that is the star of trans Siberian orchestras.

Like the show itself, the production is really the star.

And as long as you're somebody who comes in as a musician and understands how to stay in your lane and is happy, which I am like, there's no ability like a no, no problem with me like feeling like gratified doing the game.

I love doing the game.

I feel like I know a lot of great players that can go into different circumstances, but I think you're the ultimate guitar chameleon to me, dude.

Like you can do.

Guitar chameleon.

Yeah, like you have such a signature sound to me already that you can marry yourself to whether it's Night Ranger, Whitesnake, the TSO thing, whatever you do, I still feel like you rang true with who you are.

Every gig has its own little dynamic that you have to adjust to.

I mean, my best story from that because I had been gigging with Night Ranger for a couple years and it's a little bit more into, you know, the rock scowl and, you know, making all the mean.

Faces and getting a little dirty.

And when I'm on when I started TSO, I'm like doing that stuff and I'm looking up and I'm seeing like an 8 year old kid.

Scared.

I just wanted to hear.

Carol.

The bells, the grandparents looking at you like, what the heck is this guy's problem?

So I was like, oh, I get it.

Maybe smile a little bit more and just be happy and relax.

And but I'll tell you, man, I'm a father.

You know, I got kids and it's just, it's wonderful.

One of the coolest things about that is that you get to actually kind of roam out into the crowd, play directly in front of a kid, hand him a guitar pick.

But you'd be shocked at the amount of emails you get from people that are like, we can't believe you did that.

That changed my son's life.

He was having a hard year at school.

He wasn't, you know, doing well socially.

And that changed everything.

Or they start guitar.

Oh.

Yeah, I guarantee that.

Like you create rock stars in that moment.

There's a lot of really fun things that Paul fell upon on with this crazy, crazy vision.

I think of the everything he put into it for the first few years probably made it like, is this going to work?

And then suddenly it just went.

And you know, like I said, it really continues to do that.

And that's amazing in this day and age where you find most gigs kind of dying out or like struggling people have health issues and.

Well, you were describing some characteristics of what I consider to be just successful musicians, and a lot of it has to do with the being agreeable part.

And you find things that you have that others don't that have allowed you to get gigs over others.

You know, I operate out of fear and stress and desperation.

Oh, come on.

Those are very, very.

Potent look, I'm being totally honest and they're motivating factors, you know, like so when it comes to prep, like I'll usually I find that I have prepped harder for people on like structured gigs because I'm like in such a panic because and living in New York City is not exactly like the cheapest place to reside.

And it's like you've got a, you know, especially when you started to have kids there and everything and you're like, Oh my gosh, like I need to be playing.

Like there is no like I'm going to take six months off and find myself kind.

Of oh, you can't.

You have to have found yourself by now.

Well, you you find yourself through just constantly working.

And then yeah, I think what happened with me is I did find my niche.

Like there's all kinds of sub stories to this, like playing in acid jazz bands and playing in hip hop bands.

And I mean, I was open to everything and anything.

Some of it still exists.

Like playing with Cher, it was I the kid playing the Black Sabbath.

Thrift's going like, dude, someday I'm gonna play with Cher.

Like, absolutely not.

Say that.

But like, and by the time you get to the age where something like that happens, you go, wow, this is incredible.

Like I, I just played with her at her Rock and roll Hall of Fame induction and I think that's an incredible honor to have.

You know, when you get up there at, you know, at the time was potentially like, you know, you don't know if it's her last gig ever and you're like, I might be the guitarist on her last gig ever.

And I, I mean, I did tour with her for three years and then ended up doing that.

And I just recently did the SNL 50 Homecoming concert with her too.

Coolest thing about it for me was that was a time period where I was ready with Whitesnake and it was with TSO and any outside sessions.

I was getting hired for records.

Everything was like, OK, Sky's an 80s shredder.

And the reality is, is I had done all these different kinds of gigs and it was a little bit of a bummer that I was never getting to do anything else.

So she's got 5 decades worth of music.

So you're going, all of a sudden I was up on stage with her playing disco, you know, and playing what?

And you know what people don't understand, I guess if they're not players like the rock fans are like, ah, but he's just back there.

I'm like, you don't understand how much fun I'm having doing that man.

That must have been a blast bro.

A blast and then, you know, you take any, any of the, you know, the Sonny and Cher stuff where you're, you know, raking the big cords on the silver tone or whatever the the sparkle clean.

And for me that was a lot of fun because I hadn't had the ability to do anything like that in a while.

I just kind of, you know, people like to and that's and that's all fine.

And Danny, man, you find your niche and you don't.

It's not like I I'm super glad that like what ended up working out for me is the music that initially inspired me, which was like 80s Hard Rock.

Yeah, yeah, like no complaints.

And, and in general that things worked out for me period, because there's let's face it, man, I mean, we all have our phones.

We all look at the 9 million people that can like, play incredible stuff that.

You I can't do any of.

It if you look at my fingers and go, why these don't work, you know, just have the the ability to be employed through that process and to play with, you know, another great example through that is being able to fill in for Mick Jones and foreigner and and playing with that band and most recently filling in with accept, which is probably the most metal thing I've done.

But there's all there's been all these other little opportunities that have spawned off of things like, you know, getting to know Debbie Gibson through Rock of Ages and her asking me when she was doing Celebrity and Apprentice.

Will you come down and play acoustic with me while I on the air while I do this?

And then Wyclef was on the set and end up playing with Wyclef and like, wow.

So the more you can kind of roll these into like, just look, if you're just open minded, you know, I think that that's a big thing.

Have your love, have your passion, but like, whatever you go after to try to be respectful of like what people are looking for, right?

You know, never be afraid to acknowledge your limitations with things like, OK, I'm going to do my best to the, you know, like it's, I've never really laid claim to be like, you know, one of the top dogs in many ways.

I've just always done my best with like whatever gig I've had and.

I think you're extremely humble and I also think that your work ethic and obviously your chops have taken you so many different places that obviously when you were a kid, like you said, you never thought you'd play with Cher or do all these things.

But I think that speaks volumes, man, of how cool you are as a guy.

But also the fact, you know, when you go, oh, he's just an AD shredder, It's like the dude was in a pit in New York City reading music, you know, like.

That's, well, that's I didn't emphasize that point enough that you were sight reading because what do you think?

1% of guitar players 1.

Percent.

I don't.

Even know brother, it's just a weakness of all guitar players.

So yeah, the pit band, that sort of reading is the highest level.

And also the fact that it wasn't like you just went, OK, cool, I'm going to try this for a minute.

If it doesn't work, I'll just go back to Chicago.

You made it work and and that's the thing that what were.

The down moments in those days, uncertainty at any point, you know, going through all these different.

I had, I had one like very early on when I cuz I, what I had done when I was 19 is that my dream was to go to GI T and be in Hollywood and then that was going to be where I, you know, I, dude, I didn't have a clue.

I was like suburban Chicago.

We didn't have YouTube back then or Instagram to look at all these amazing guitar players.

You only could like go off of like who you had locally.

Yeah.

And go like I think I do pretty well.

Like so I went out to GIT and did a year there and I didn't want to go home.

I was like, I'm going to stay in Hollywood, man, Try and like make something of myself.

And I worked at Cherokee Studios out there for a year, which is a great life experience, 5 rooms and met a lot of, you know, great people through doing that.

And matter of fact I should mention my GIT class I had Pete Thorne was in my.

Oh, wow, that's cool.

Oh, Pete.

Man, that's awesome.

Yeah, enjoy Basu.

I don't know if you know Joy as well.

Yeah, yeah.

So we, yeah, we were, yeah, yeah, we.

So we were kind of like the rock guys and there there were a lot of jazz guys At the time.

I was not as open minded.

I had gotten lucky at the mall going rewinding to take it at the mall.

So I had the teacher who was teaching me songs and then he kind of ran out of like, you know what he was showing some of us that were advancing, we were wanting to learn the shred and the solos and the modes and whatnot and how that all worked.

And they hired this guy named TJ Homer.

And TJ was incredibly proficient with the 8 finger technique.

So he was, I think probably out of want to just practice during the lessons like showing the eight finger technique when I was like.

He was actually like, yeah, check this out.

Hold on one second.

1314 years old when?

Meanwhile I probably couldn't hold 8th notes steady still or something, you know?

But nonetheless, that didn't end up paying off, man, because when it came time for Night Ranger and it was like, you know, you got to do Jeff Watson's eight finger technique.

It was like.

They, I remember the moment going to the initial gig with them, it was like I had to fill in for Reb that I was in the back seat of the car and Brad Gillis was kind of up in the front seat and he's giving me the skinny on, you know, what to do.

And you know, so this solo mandible ball, you know, and it comes to the 8 finger thing, man, just, you know, do something, just do some tapping or something.

I said no, no, I, I got it.

And he no.

No, I'm going.

To he looked at you.

What?

He was like, well, get out, get your my guitar is next to me to the back.

Let me see, get it out.

He's like, let me see it.

And then, you know, he so he saw me do that.

And then he was like, oh, wow, OK, cool.

I, you know, I saw the light bulb go on and go, hey man, this guy might be.

Good, that must have made you feel pretty.

Good.

What a full circle moment.

Yeah, I mean those guys, literally both those guys, Jeff and Brad, I used to do the thing where you take the guitar players.

This is when the mags were the thing, you know, we couldn't just pull up the stuff on the Internet.

So I had guys out of Guitar World or Guitar Player or what have you Guitar for the practice musician at the time and had them all up on like, you know, the cork wall, you know, the pictures of them.

And I distinctly remember Jeff Watson and Brad Gillis up there, man, You know, Brad was a a pleasure to play with in a guitar duo because he has a very identifiable style.

I think of him as a more Hard Rock slash.

Night Ranger's not really a heavy metal band, but he was heavy metal with Ozzy.

But the whammy bar thing was very Jeff Beck inspired for him.

And so to fit in with Brad and have distinctive styles is really as as easy as just don't use a Floyd Rose.

Just just don't do that.

And then you have your identifiable styles and you guys, are you guys old enough to remember hearing aids?

Stars were stars.

You guys remember it was a Dio written song that was for it was like right around the time of We Are the World, right when they released that.

And so the metal guys got together.

They did one.

Oh, a metal.

We are the world.

Yeah, we are.

We're stars.

And so Ronnie James Dio basically organized this.

And so they had everybody taking a solo at the time.

And this was right when INGVI was like coming through and it was like, so everybody on the recordings was trying to ish do like the INGVI thing a bit.

And INGVI was still the stand out most.

Yeah, identifiable guy.

But the other guy was Brad Gillis because he didn't give, he didn't care.

And he was, and he was doing all his tricks with the Floyd Rose, you know, the, the cricket and all the, you know, and all this stuff.

And that was the, the two guys you could really listen to that were like, well, those guys are highly identifiable.

So I, I was thinking of Brad.

We had a great thing with my time at night.

Ranger, man, he just was a pleasure to work with as a, as a, as a guitarist and a team.

Super nice guy.

We, we ended up with a real Big Brother, little brother relationship.

You know, I was coming into a difficult situation there where Jeff Watson was very identifiable.

I mean, they had a great guitar team in the 80s.

You know, arguably depends on what you're looking for in a guitar team in the 80s, but arguably the best like, in terms of like proof, like lead playing and identifiability.

They each like, you know, Jeff is pioneering this eight finger technique and Brad, Brad was doing all this Floyd Rose stuff and it was like, you know, they were a pretty sick combo.

So I ended up through that doing like 7 years with them while I was doing Rock of Ages and landed Trans Siberian during some of that.

So having the the few gigs, that was where I started to feel like OK I.

Think this music?

Yeah.

It's actually working.

Three pretty big irons.

Like all on top of each other.

It took like that long for me to feel like though like that.

Like I think this might actually work.

Like, I think I might be able to do this.

Like Roca Beaches was big for me with that man because it was like that you'd come home and and it was not only that, but all the bands whose music were in the show were coming to the show.

So you got to meet everybody.

And that that played a big role in me filling in for Mick Jones with Foreigner, because Foreigners manager Phil Carson is a dear friend of mine and wonderful guy, absolute legend.

I mean, Led Zeppelin played at his daughter's wedding, man well.

That's a pretty good.

When I, I couldn't get an audition at first with Whitesnake, when Doug was leaving the band and I was like, you know, the early bird gets the worm guy.

I was like the first guy like sending it, sending an e-mail cuz I knew Reb and I thought I'll be able to get an audio.

I just want an audition.

Like I didn't know if I'd get it.

But I initially, in retrospect, I should have recorded myself playing Whitesnake stuff, but I was just like, let's just get stuff to him.

So I sent him the Night Ranger videos and other videos that I was a part of and nothing, didn't hear anything.

And I went, oh, shit, Like, I'm not going to get an audition.

Can I swear on your show?

Is that a oh, yeah, she's not going to work?

And I thought, well, who would know him?

And I thought, you know, David's obviously a Brit, thought Phil Carson's a Brit.

I bet Phil knows him.

So I emailed Phil and Phil wrote David an e-mail as it would happened.

David was coming out of meditation wondering like who's going to be my new guitar player and Ding.

And it was the e-mail from Phil Carson saying, whoa, I highly advise you check this out because I I went in for Mick under duress.

I mean, I had 24 hours notice to get their set together.

We were we were all together was Night Ranger, foreigner journey.

So it was a very big tour and so I ended up like learning the set overnight, flying and being on stage, and not only that but playing the Night Ranger set.

How?

Did you feel when you were walking on that stage?

I was like out of my mind stress, dude.

Oh.

I feel prepared, no or you're like, I hope my fingers do what they.

I couldn't imagine.

We we did a really funny thing.

So as it turned out, my tech from Trans-siberian Orchestra, Chris Leperage was mixed tech and he said I said, dude, I got, I understand all the changes, but sometimes things pop up at weird times, the structure of the foreigners.

Oh oh, I love foreign like.

Verse pre chorus chorus it's.

There's a lot going.

On so it was like, if I miss when the solo comes into that, that's what I was paranoid about.

So we wrote the song structures and it's of course Windy is I think the crowd was like I 17,500 that night.

I was on like, you know, off a flight and I just learned it the night before.

And so Chris took these big poster cards and he wrote the song forms and marker on it for me.

And what was great to keep him from blowing away was we Velcroed them all together.

So after we'd finished the song, Chris would come out and go RIP up this big Velcro, you know, card and go walk it off with it and we'd be on to the next one.

But I mean, that what an honor for a guy like me, man.

I came from an area where we had no money and none of this was supposed to happen for me.

I got, I kind of view it all like it's house money for me at this point in time.

I just try to like, work hard and you know, pay the proper respect to getting this far because it's like, hey man, you never know where it will go.

The Broadway thing was never in the cards either for me, man.

That was not dude.

We were the same and we were playing Sabbath songs and it was like, that's what I want to do.

Then as it turned out, where I was finding my success, I got Night Ranger, got Rock of Ages, got TSO, got Whitesnake, and people were buying my solo albums and it was this kind of like fusion Y stuff.

And they were like, dude, like, why don't you record like a soul on this rock?

And so that's when I started the Joel Hocher's 13 albums and the one we're speaking about releasing going to be the 4th one of those.

So of at least like I don't do those necessarily for making a living.

I think I would have starved to death a long time ago if I that's been the difference.

I was, I was saying to you when you were calling me about doing this, I was like, dude, Are you sure?

You've got a lot of guys on that are like, no, no, no successful recording artists like when we're talking about.

We don't care if you're successful.

We just care if What do we care about Jared?

Honestly, the thing I care about with you more than anything is your humanity.

You're obviously a kick ass guitar player but your story dude, you are more than deserving of any of the dudes.

I don't even think it's like that on a recording artist levels.

You never stopped and you held onto the dream and look where it's taking you.

So many different.

Places my favorite thing is the multiple hat wearing because crazy, I have to wear a lot of hats.

You've like we all do so many different things and so I mainly the people that I like to talk to are the ones who have the same hustle and the same vigor to succeed.

It can get you retty inspired and pumped U to hear other likeminded people talk about this and also give you some courage to push a little further in a different direction on some things and people giving you like life changing advice.

At certain point where you're like, I'm going to rethink it all.

I, I always feel like, like I'm a, I'm a good inspiration for the kid right now who's sitting in a small town somewhere in the middle of nowhere that doesn't necessarily have to take the route of like content creation to try and get clicks and views and roll it into sponsorships in the modern day of trying to make it there.

But just like kind of get out and play, stay really open minded, try and knock everything out of the park.

And that's all I've ever done.

And then some things stick, some don't, you know, like certain things fall away.

But like, it's amazing like how many full circle moments come from this.

Like, you know, when I was doing the hip hop band, as I told you about, like we we opened for Kanye West for a while.

We opened for Ludacris and the Roots.

And as it turned out, when I got the call to play the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with Cher and the SNL Fifty thing that just happened, the band was The Roots.

And so Kirk, their guitarist, he's the New York guy as well.

So he was so cool to me when I had nothing going on, like nothing.

I don't have any gigs.

We just had like a producer who was like a mutual friend and that was it.

But he was always so good to me.

The Roots were not on Fallon yet.

The but the Roots were big.

And so when we were opening for them, he always was really, really kind to me.

And then there just became this moment where, you know, we're playing the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame together and, you know, I'm teaming up with them and I'm, I'm looking nice to you.

And I'm smiling, going like, like, dude, Can you believe this?

I created an entire culture of.

I mean, obviously talk show hosts had bands, but just the importance of the band in the talk show circuit.

I think the roots are above all like the, oh, they're Bono.

They're the ones that I think of, you know, there's the Max Weinberg 7.

Yeah, Jimmy Vivino, right.

Jimmy Vivino's bad.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So I keep thinking about you having 24 hours or whatever it is to prep for a gig with Foreigner.

Where do you start, man?

How do you What did you start?

Solos.

It's kind of funny because the call the night before we had played Jones Beach, which is a New York City area venue.

Those that don't know, and this is back when I was still a wild guy, I went on partied all night, just played Jones Beach and I was like, I'm going to take the day at home or the night at home and play Rock of Ages, go into the Broadway show and and play that.

And then the next morning I'll fly to Virginia Beach and I'll be back with the tour.

But I got the call as I'm leaving the parking lot at Jones Beach, getting ready to party it up with my buddies.

And it's Phil Carson saying, you know, Joel, Nick's not feeling great and I might need to purchase some insurance.

I might need you to take like start taking a look at the set.

But it was very like low key made it feel like this isn't going to happen.

But maybe if you'd be willing to learn our set.

OK, cool.

So do me a favor, call Jeff Pelson tomorrow because Jeff functions as the music director for foreigner at.

So dude, I was out all night.

I thought nothing of it.

Called Jeff at like two in the afternoon.

Hey, Jeff, like what's going on?

He's like, hey, nothing much, man.

Are you all set?

And I said.

Oh.

I said are you all set question.

Your heart drops.

I.

Talked to Phil and he mentioned, you know, maybe he'll like, Start learning.

So he goes, oh, nobody told you.

He's like, you're on tomorrow.

And I was like, dude, I was like, get me, get me a board tape.

Like right now, like a board tape.

Don't mess around with like.

You don't have time to go back and be like oh on the original version, no.

Board tapes now.

This is like what, what was, what was your guy playing last night?

What was Mick playing last night?

I'm going to play it on his gear.

I got to play through mix amps on mix guitars and try and keep everything as is.

And that's always I, I think the respectful thing to do when you join something new is try to recognize that you're just part of what's happening.

Same when I, when I came in to Cher because Dave Barry was her long time guitar player and I got, you know, the, the recordings and I reassured Dave, I think there was some reservations.

Justin Jericho.

I'm sure you guys know it was the guy that recommended me to Dave.

They were sharing the the guitars on The Voice and Dave was like, I need somebody to fill in and share.

And Justin was like, you know, Joel Hoekster from Whitesnake is like, I know it sounds kind of weird.

And I had to reassure Dave.

I'm like, dude, I do pit stuff.

Like I know how to like if they're, if you're glistening in this direction, I'll glisten that, that you tell me what pickups you're on and what guitars and I will play it and I will not mess around like with what you're doing and that.

And and then as time goes by, once you've landed and you've kept everybody comfortable, I think it's a main thing when you go into something new is like, what are they doing right now?

What are they comfortable with?

You keep them comfortable.

And then as time goes by, you sort of inherently find your spots to like spread your wings a little bit or do your own thing with it gradually and then see if people like it or not, you know?

Yeah, that's important.

Actually.

It's important because sometimes people don't want to come to you.

Be like.

Just keep doing the other thing.

Yeah.

Hey, can we talk about that?

I actually have a really funny story about that going back to the pit stuff because I had learned the Boy from Oz from my buddy, which was Hugh Jackman.

And then I learned this song called musical called La Kasha Fall, which half of it was on tenor, banjo filled in from on there.

And then I was doing Tarzan.

Phil Collins wrote the music.

And so I was the first person to go into the pit.

It's very early on in the run.

I'm stressing my ass off.

I'm there early in the little station working on me.

It was all kinds of stuff you do and you do a pick egg.

Like you have to swing the condenser mic out from a swivel, turn it on.

Otherwise, you won't be in the house if you're playing an acoustic instrument.

Whoa, you got to mic yourself up your.

Own mixes and it's all and it's all in the book.

So it's like you got to get used to pressing.

OK, I'm on this headphone mix and you know, down to like what pedal gets pressed where, what pick up you're you're on all kinds of stuff.

And there was 1 lick out of the whole thing that my friend JJ was playing where I thought I might do this.

Yeah, kind of kind of cool.

I might just change one lick.

But anyway, as I as I'm rehearsing it, I see somebody next to me kind of hovering and I'm just thinking, please go away, man, I'm stressing my ass off right now.

Go away.

I look up and it's Phil Collins.

I was like alone in the room with Phil Collins sitting there watching me go through the book.

And I was like, oh, hi, He's like.

Hey, Phil.

Hey.

There's this one lick, Phil.

I don't know.

Well, actually, as it turned out, as it turned out, so I did the, I did the show and I got a note.

Then the way they do this is they pass it on to the conductor or the music director.

And I got one note and it was that one lick that I changed.

The one lick that I changed like all night long it was like, and my friend JJ called me.

He's like, yeah.

And I guess there was like 1 lick you did different than me.

Unbelievable, man.

They knew it.

Oh my.

Wow.

Do you remember?

Was it like an egregious change or was it just stuff fingering?

It was like a major pentatonic thing.

And I think I just decided to do like, I, you know, instead of maybe.

Yeah, that's it.

Yeah, you know, it's a little embellished.

I just did like the little Grateful Dead.

Yeah, that little bit.

And that was enough.

And and that was enough to like draw their ire.

They're like, how dare you?

So anyway, no, it was, you know, Broadway was a great experience for me with that.

And like I said it, it, it did pay off with the Rock of Ages thing landing that.

That's the way it works when you're in that Broadway scene in New York, which has a way of coming to get you.

They find out guitar players are in town and like, hey, you want to, you know, this show and you got to sub shows to be able to like do a show.

And the way things have worked out for me lately is I just can't justify like going around and learning like 3 different books.

They each take about like 3 weeks I'd say to get together like in 300 pages of music or something and and to really learn it and feel like, yeah, I can go in and not train wreck this or make a total fool of myself so.

Where do you where do you reside now with your anxiety and stress levels?

Because it seems like you've got it all figured out now, no?

No, dude, I'm like an anxious wreck here.

Like suddenly he.

Goes he goes.

The more I learn or the more I do, the less I know, I guess, right?

Yeah, it's the the Dunning Kruger effect.

Like I vividly like going to GIT at 19 and like, you know, having the the tapping chops together and sitting in the room with the instructors, the open counselings where they pass the cable around, you jam with them.

And I remember thinking, you know, I'm great, man.

Like I'm, I'm ripping.

And now I look back and I go, Oh my God, they were a million times better than me.

And I just had no idea.

I had no concept of time tone.

It's like I I need to continue to evolve always and I could just see.

More of the bottom of the iceberg the more you learn.

You're like, oh shit, it's it's even bigger and deeper than.

Oh.

It really is infinite and it's and nothing reminds you these days more than like just opening it up and watching like, you know, the the content creator guy who's like not having to do the travel and just like like working 10 hours a day on getting the most wicked reel you've ever seen in your life.

Yeah, 100%.

I only work 5 hours a day on that.

I still to this day, man, I mean, it's like you're going out to play the arenas and it's like that's a very structured gig you know you've got.

And not only that, it's not a typical like noisy rock crowd.

So there's times where, you know, you've done the thing with the pyro and everything and then you've got a 10 minute song where it's me sitting on a stool playing fingerstyle with one singer singing high energy level.

And I think it was my first year where I was, you know, just playing like AG chord and I felt my hand start to go like this and I'm going fuck me, you know, like, please not like not now, man.

And you know, that's something that I've battled with my whole life, man.

It's like, I think that it's something I didn't recognize until I was older, but it's almost like you, you, you're an adrenaline junkie because you feel it.

The stage fright thing is part of the same charge and how you get from it.

Right.

I'm totally an adrenaline junkie.

It's the same.

100% same substance as fueling the fear and the awesomeness that well, do.

Dopamine, even when you plugged in earlier, I got excited like I, I, my dopamine levels are always going off.

Like when I, you know, like when I knew we were going to play guitars and then all of a sudden we play it and now we're in this and it's like this.

But once we start playing again, I don't know, I just feed off it.

Man, I I really really loved your set on the Monsters Rock.

Cruise Oh, it's so much fun, man.

You're I wasn't able to watch you that much at Shanker.

I watch you a little bit there, but I got to watch soundcheck.

But then it was kind of like, all right, sit in the dressing room and go wait until I'm going to go to those that don't know.

I got sitting with Michael Shanker.

God bless him, man.

Thank you, Michael for having me do that.

That was amazing.

Some of the some of the people that have had me up in recent years are all part of that coming full circle.

I mean, Joe Satriani had me up, I believe it was the year before on the cruise to jam with him.

And that was sort of surreal for me.

Somebody had given me nod of this Earth on vinyl.

And then, you know, we're out surfing and flying in a blue dream.

Wait.

Was was that what had hordes of locusts live?

Yeah, dude.

That's not subtle.

So get, you know, getting the opportunity to be accepted by the guitar community in my own niche.

I mean, we all have our own like journeys with this thing.

But I think, you know, the, the one thing that we all share in common is we've given our lives to it.

Like I've really, truly given my life to it.

It's heartbreaking when people, you know, like, I know you guys probably had a, a blast with Joe talking about trolls 'cause you know, I, I'll never figure out why he'd ever get one out to 8.

I think Joe Bonamassa is just brilliant and such an incredible player and performer and and just a wonderful guy to boot.

Anytime I've ever spoken with Joe, there's no ego tripping.

He speaks to you like a human being who's on your level.

Oh yeah.

And you know, I thank you, Joe, for that.

I appreciate that.

It's heartbreaking when you get the guys online that are just like, you know, take your life's work and are just like and blah, blah, blah.

You know, it's like man, like.

Just so you know, everything you've ever done is worthless.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Your whole life is a waste of time.

Go kill yourself.

I mean, it's like, man, you know, have some sensitivity to the fact that we've all given our lives to.

We all do.

We do have our own journeys.

I think it's very important to like, understand and find clarity in what other people's journeys were and find respect in that.

Like I really truly admire that when we're talking about, you know, a lot of the guests you've had on the show, I don't know how many will air before this one.

So I don't want to name necessarily some of the guests and blow the cover.

But you know, when you're talking about some of the guests you're having on this show, I said to you, I'm like, you're having a lot of successful solo artists, like people that could like book their own show and draw a gazillion people.

I'm not necessarily that guy.

I've, I've had an, I'd like to think I've had an artistic career, like career as an artist, releasing my own music.

But the predominance of my success has been through being a side man and being somebody who's been able to fill in in various bands and play different music.

I'm typically with my guitar like 810 hours a day.

That's now that's different than the guy who's working on the Shred Lakes 810 hours a day.

I'm rarely doing that.

So there's times where like my chops are down and you're like, oh man, I, I suck right now.

Like, I wish my chops were so much higher because you're, you know, more concentrating on like an exact double on a record and stuff like that, you know?

But that being said, rhythm guitar goes a really long way.

And I bet that's something that I think a lot of other people should understand.

I want to show you a couple things here that will really, yeah, fill in some gaps in your career and we'll talk a little bit about each one.

It's a diminished 7 run.

It's a tapping fundamental that I have.

So I, I, I have like several things that I'll do that yeah.

This will take you into like a, some of the virtual lesson stuff that I do.

Like let's say you have your five patterns of a minor pentatonic, right?

Those that don't know of you guys before you're back at the end.

So what I do with these is I break down little fundamentals.

I found a long time ago that yeah, it's cool to be able to use all four fingers on the right hand or whatever, but shorter groupings leads to a little bit more rhythm in it, rhythmic phrasing.

So I got like different fundamentals.

Rather than hold this in my teeth while I do this, I'm just going to sit down a second.

But so there's several different ones I'll teach if I let's say I'm leaving this in pattern 1 and I'm taking pattern three with my right hand and I'm doing sixes.

Now what sucks about that is not a lot of rhythm.

Everything sixes, so I get people A4.

And then eights would be like.

Then I have one called zigzag sixes, which is what you are seeing there.

That's so I'm going to show you what that would be in pentatonic.

That's so if I have.

So I was putting that in diminished 7.

That's the basic idea of that run.

Dude, that is so cool.

That sounds so cool.

What's?

Neat.

I think about the the tapping thing more so than like playing fast or I, I try and encourage people to find like different fundamentals in a scale system so you can improv a bit rather than just be the guy who goes and finds a triad and twiddles as fast as he can, right.

So if I have minor pentatonic and I think about freelancing between those things that we were talking about like.

And then finding your way off to a money note, I always call it like, yeah, I like the runs are great.

But until you like find your way off to a band or you know, it's that's great.

But then it's going to be the note that you play afterwards that people connect to do.

You have like a certain exercise that somebody who would want to tap like that, like where they would start.

I mean, obviously I'm using like a high fair amount of gain when I'm doing it, you know, so like the saturated be having damage gain kind of, you know, turn the waveform into that as opposed to the spiky thing.

Yeah, compression is great.

Like if you if you don't want to go that far with the gain thing.

It just depends what style you're playing with it and cursed be able to to find like notes to end on when they're doing them.

So whatever fundamental it may be, you're not the guy like stuck on the treadmill.

That is like how do I get off it on right.

So if I let's say I'm doing some of those like the sixes ending on the a or.

Whatever it may be to put some, I guess rough edges around that concept.

Stank on it.

Well, I think, yeah.

Put some stank on it exactly.

Otherwise it gets it gets a little slick.

But I like the, the thing that's always appealed to me about the tapping when it's shorter like that, like 2-2 per hand, as you get a little bit of rhythmic element to it as opposed to like the more note, the more notes it is.

When it's 6 or 8, it just kind of becomes like these long meandering phrases.

At least for me, you know, that that's been I, I definitely will still stretch out and do some of that stuff occasionally.

But for me, that's always been great fun to be able to do that.

And I have all kinds of, you know, similar looking at legato things that I'll teach.

But I think the important thing for people to realize is like, look, once you have the fundamentals together, that's that's applicable in any scale system or anything you want to take it to, you know, even if I just went total gibberish.

Whatever it may be.

Outside kind of stuff, whatever it may be, you know, rules, dude, it rules.

I think I understand some of that smooth stuff, but still the ability to take a band and go.

The.

The.

The.

All all of them have names man if I had like you know my main one is whether call sticks is number 2 like.

My main legato rock, whatever that may go into, if it goes into a miner or whatever, you know, it's, it's that same fundamental.

And I always tell them like, look man, you know this, this can be applied anywhere.

It gets almost back to that.

So they all have names and then you find that they play well off each other.

You know, if I have a six is #2 so if I have a run that's combining those botch the bend Joel, or just going across.

Makes the run more interesting to listen to.

Just having two different fundamentals like applied in there.

You know, runs in general can't carry on that long.

I feel like unless they have that it gets it gets kind of tired if you're playing like 1 grouping the entire way.

None.

That chord progression which is from your latest music.

Do you want to speak a little bit about that and what we can expect?

Because that's going to drop when this episode comes out that will have been released.

This album is called From the Fade and it's probably like the darkest and the harder rocking one that I've done out of all of them.

So if any apps, you loved it.

Yeah.

So anyway, people can expect that later this year.

And obviously with Frontiers, I do a couple other project albums that I'm a part of.

I'm a part of Revolution Saints with Dean Castronovo from Journey and Jeff Pelson from Foreigner and there's just got done tracking that record and people can expect that, I believe early 26.

And then there's another project I do called Iconic with my White Tech bandmate Tommy Aldridge on drums and Michael Sweet from Striper playing guitar with me and UK vocalist named Nathan James.

I don't know if you guys know him.

He's an amazing singer.

He's got his own band in Glorious that's been doing really well.

And so yeah, that stuff.

And I'm always doing sessions, lessons, the gigs of every shape and kind.

But you know, TSO right now is really the big tour that I'm about to embark upon.

So it's eight shows a week, big arena shows, lots of high pressure situations, lots of scales.

It sounds can be a better man for the job.

Yeah, you.

You have found your exact spot in 75 different things.

It's really inspiring to talk to you in a real privilege, man.

Like, thank you so much for taking your time.

No, no, no.

This goes the other way around.

I really appreciate you.

It's very validating actually, to have you guys invite me on.

I really do appreciate it, man.

Everyone, dude, really, truly.

I mean, I feel like not worthy all the guests you're having on, but you know, to hang and and just get to talk guitar with you guys for a day and then share my experience with everybody.

And I feel like it it.

I'm the kind of player and have the story that should touch a lot of people that are out there that are struggling that wonder how to get there that maybe don't have the immediate success.

I did not it came late to me.

So it is possible you just kind of keep going and I feel like devote yourself to it as much as you can on a daily basis.

And if it's your passion, you know you will find your way through the hard times with joy in the simplest of little things.