Julien Carayon jamming to Larry Carlton style track

Julien Carayon jamming to Steve Lukather style track

"A pretty dark sounding song going through ups and downs. There is a long passage in this song starting @ 03:19 where I could have played tons of shred guitar technique. I could have, but I didn't as I like to take the time to play the right note to tell a story instead of showing off shred guitar. That's my philosophy of guitar playing. Telling a story..."

"I think this song leans towards Metal territory and has a great progressive edge. You may notice that instruments play different time signature during the long alternate picking passage just before the main theme. The drums play 4/4 while all other instruments play 3/4, guitar included. The result is a real cool progressive edge that I enjoy a lot! My approach to playing the guitar always consists in practicing the following attitudes: Attitude 1: Playing like a machine, especially when it comes to playing challenging guitar licks such as sweep appergios. Attitude 2: Playing freely, more relaxed with a Rock 'n roll attitude in mind. (E.g Verse of the song) I try to mix the best of both worlds when playing. This video showcases as well my Ibanez RG3520Z-HBK guitar, which still has stock pick-ups as they produce a pretty bright and well balanced tone. I use the guitar to play Metal whereas my other Ibanez RG3120F-DAM is more suitable for mellow tone, Jazz-like songs."

"Watch this video and you'll get a big picture of my songwriting and playing style. Even though I used to play a lot of shred stuff on the guitar, I don't like to overplay now. That's all about evolution as a musician. Ok, I admit there are some shred licks such as sweeping and tapping. I tried to use these techniques to play the right note at the right time instead of showing off shred guitar technique. Music first. (that's the hardest part of the job) For example, there is somewhere @ 02:20 a super fast lick, which is a sequence of 32th note quintuplets that I can play using strict alternate picking or sweep picking techniques depending on my mood. This is where music comes: I'd rather use legato technique to play this lick as the guitar tone is smoother and has more musicality. I don't think this song can be labeled as a "right-in-your-face" tune with lot of screaming guitars and hi-speed drumming. That's the reverse. Calm, cool and relax. The song goes through ups-and-downs, changing music styles. Going from jazz-like melody to slight symphonic instrumentation, morphing from elaborate rhythm patterns to very basic riffing. Yes! This song is like a journey through various sonic landscapes! You will probably notice that I don't use bends a lot while soloing, I'd rather play grace notes instead. I'm a kind of jazz guitarist with shred, metal and progressive influences."

"I wrote this song to be played on an ovation guitar (hence the song title) using fingerpicking technique only. I'm not big fan of hybrid picking on acoustic guitar as I need to feel the strings on my fingertips. Something carnal...You'll notice this song has nothing to do with the guitar playing and songwriting in my "Lethal Alchemy" album. That's something VERY different. I just wanted to show my ability to write and play different style of music. I tried to record this song using a Takamine guitar and I ended up playing using my Ovation 2078 TX-5 guitar. I feel this guitar with a rounded-bowl back is more appropriate to perform this song. More low-mids and percussive tone. Enjoy!" ----- Better quality video link available for download at: http://www.juliencarayon.com/en/videos.html ----- Vidéo de meilleure qualité à télécharger: http://www.juliencarayon.com/fr/videos.html