During a conversation with UG’s Justin Beckner, Seether frontman Shaun Morgan talked about his switch from Schecter to Ernie Ball, while also looking back on his youth and the beginnings of his musical journey.
Seether has a new album out titled “Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum.”
When asked, “I recently saw you playing an Ernie Ball Music Man guitar, I think it was a Stingray… What sparked the switch from Schecter to Ernie Ball?”, Shaun replied:
“It was a couple of things. I think I was kind of reaching the end of my relationship with the Schecter guys. Over the years it had soured a bit, for some reason, or maybe it just mellowed and dwindled out, I don’t know.
“It just came down to me not being happy with the way I was treated and I had said as much on a couple of occasions. I just didn’t feel like they cared about me as a player. So I said, ‘Fine, I’ll go somewhere else…’
“My tech and I were talking about other guitar brands and as I was looking around, he reached out to somebody at Ernie Ball about strings, and they wanted to know if they could get me for a video.
“So he asked them about guitars and they were interested, and I got a deal with them about a year and a half or two years ago.
“I love the guitars. I really enjoyed the Schecters. I thought they were really great guitars and they gave me my own signature model, which I don’t think I deserved, but it was cool, it was a Mosrite shape.
“I will always love those guitars, but when you play a Music Man next to a Schecter, it’s a very big difference, as I’m sure you know. It’s a vast jump in quality.
“Music Man is American-made, they’re beautiful guitars and they sound incredible. So yeah, I just thought it was time for a move. I felt that something was off and I needed a change in scenery.
“You know, oftentimes, things just sort of crumble and I think that’s unfortunately what happened there. But I’m now very happy with the guys over at Ernie Ball – they’ve been really great to me.”
Has there been any talk of a new signature model with them?
“No. I don’t think that’s something I’m interested in at all at the moment. I never thought I deserved a model over at Schecter either. It was kind of cool to say you had one.
“I just don’t think I’m a virtuoso enough to deserve something like that but maybe in the future. If anything, it’ll just be something that’s more customized to what I like. Things like removing the neck pickup and just having a kill-switch and a volume knob. I keep it quite simple.
“I’ve had them customize a couple of guitars like that for me. That would be the only reason I would think there would be another signature series. Other than that, I’m very happy playing what I have now and I’m very grateful that I get a chance to play those guitars.”
Did you ever go through that ‘shredder’ phase that a lot of guitarists go through?
“No, it was honestly not something that ever interested me. When I was in school there were two camps of musicians: there were the Metallica guys and then there were the Nirvana guys and the grunge guys.
“The grunge guys played guitar in that style with power chords and stuff like that and the Metallica guys learned how to shred. I’ve never been interested in it. It doesn’t excite me in any way.
“I like melody. For me, some of the best solos are like Pink Floyd solos where it’s just haunting and memorable.
“There’s just so much talent that is required to shred and so much time and energy that goes into it. I never saw the reason for getting into it if I didn’t enjoy shredding. For some guys, it’s like a badge of honor if they can get 1,500 notes into 30 seconds or something.
“Look at a guy like Mark Tremonti. That guy is an incredible player. That guy shreds for real. I love the guy. I’m friends with him. But to me, it’s not something that has ever interested me.
“So, I’ve never had any shredder phases. I have had experimental phases where I’ll try to teach myself to fingerpick or something like that. I’ve always been more interested in melodies and creating something that is catchy and interesting and haunting and as memorable as possible when I write solos.”
The thing that always hit me about your music was always the raw emotion behind it. When did you realize that music could be a therapeutic outlet for you?
“Oh, wow… Probably when I was sitting in my bedroom at my parents’ house. There was just no form of communication with them that made any kind of headway; they didn’t understand why I wanted to play music.
“They thought I was just this melancholy kid. They even took me to a therapist and put me on medication for depression. Back then, I used to write a lot of poetry, and I would have these binders and books where I would scribble things down and draw pictures.
“I was in quite an artistic circle. There were a couple of us that would sit in class and we would write a story. We would write the first paragraph and hand the story off to the next guy and he would carry on with a paragraph and we’d just keep going around in circles.
“Those were great times. I really enjoyed it. I was a jock, at the same time, I played rugby and cricket and all the sports. But I had these friends who didn’t, and they were the artsy kids. That was therapeutic for me.
“I knew when I was a kid, sitting in that bedroom, every time I wrote a song or played guitar, it just made me feel better.
“I could have had the worst day and I could pick up a guitar, and there were plenty of times when I was really on the verge of doing myself some serious harm, and playing guitar was really what got me through that.
“So around when I was 15 or 16, I realized that this wasn’t something I was doing just for fun, it was something needed to do.”
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