Read Time 2 Minutes
Ron Jarzombek is pretty much a musical miracle worker. He’s mostly grounded in personal bands WatchTower, Spastic Ink, Blotted Science, and his own solo stuff, though his reputation has earned him several guest appearances with the likes of Jeff Loomis and Marty Friedman.
Enough of the boring introduction stuff. Jarzombek’s style can most easily be described as over the top. How over the top? He’s got enough complex shredding to make you crawl back to Malmsteen and a plethora of odd time signatures that would make Meshuggah seem down to earth. Odd time signatures isn’t accurate for him. I nominate the term insane time signatures. Why? Because I imagine most drummers would call someone insane if asked to play in 1/64.
Such is the case on his album Solitarily Speaking of Theoretical Confinement which is more like one really out there 45 minute song. Each track flows directly into the next and each one is some wackadoo concept put into music like playing segments of only B tones swapped with segments of everything but B tones. If you’re the kind of guy that prefers his music to be more sensible in design with a solid intro and a blatant outro then I would love to see you listen to this.
His various other bands, Blotted Science and Spastic Ink are very much so the same as his solo projects just with different members. Maybe a bit less girls-gone-wild with the experimentation. The boy loves his dissonant intervals, that’s for sure. At the very least his music would make for a good 101 for metalcore bands on how to use 2nds interestingly. WatchTower is Jarzombek with a vocalist. What more need I say?
To add to the cool flair of experimentation Jarzombek also builds all of his guitars. He buys guitars at music shops for parts and rips them to shreds in the process of building new ones. And he’s built quite a number of them including some double necks along the way. Based off the sound and his playing I’d assume he’s pretty good at it. I haven’t played one myself so obviously this isn’t a review on his building skill.
I wouldn’t recommend Jarzombek to just anyone unless I thought they’d enjoy it or I could get a kick out of the reaction. So go and check him out right this very second and if you’re repulsed by it let me know. I’ll give a hearty laugh.
Regardless Ron Jarzombek is pretty much the swimsuit calendar special poster boy of experimental guitar.
Here is some video of Ron’s Work:
wpDiscuz
Nicely done! I had the 1st Watchtower cd when it came out and really dig his playing – especially on the Blotted Science stuff.