JAYE FOUCHERBy Nicky Baldrian
JAYE FOUCHER
By
Nicky Baldrian
New York guitar shreddess Jaye Fouhcer has been pumping out her
mighty compounds for sometime now, in 1997 she released her debut
solo album "Infectious Licks" where literally every
song rivaled her contemporaries on put her on the name on the map
next to the likes of Jennifer Batten etc. Jaye's music is
creative and stylistic. Three years on and she has finally
released the highly acclaimed "Contagious Grooves"
album on her own label Fuism Records.
Jaye grew up in a musical household "My mother was a
professional musician and taught piano lessons from our home.
Piano was, in fact, my first instrument and my main one until I
took up the guitar at age 17." remembers Jaye fondly, Jaye
had already started to compose her own original material, "
I could already read and write music, had a strong understanding
of theory, and was able to learn by ear so learning guitar came
quite easy to me."
Jaye then took private lessons from various tutors including one
guitar virtuoso Gary Hoey, who is best remembered for writing the
music to the motion picture The Endless Summer 2."Gary was
the first teacher to really challenge me. I was also steadily
learning on my own, through books and magazines and learning the
songs & solos of my idols (at that time it was Eddie Van
Halen, George Lynch, Vinnie Moore, and Yngwie). In 1988 I
attended GIT (Guitar Institute of Technology) in Hollywood
California." She then started to play with other bands and
musicians, Jaye then auditioned for her first band " I'd
only been playing 6 months, for a position as lead guitarist!
While I did not get the gig, I look back on that now and think
how amazing it was that I actually went through with the
audition. I had to learn a Van Halen song for the audition --
solo and all. Yet I did it
(although my rendition of the solo was probably hideous!!)"
Five months later Jaye auditioned for another band "this
time for rhythm position in an all-girl metal band -- and this
time I got the gig. That was the start, and since then I've
played with a variety of rock & metal & prog bands,
including Lord Bane and Plaid Dragon."
After Plaid Dragon disbanded in 1994 Jaye begun writing
instrumentals "primarily to use at the upcoming NAMM
convention in LA in January of '95, " explains Jaye "I
was scheduled to perform for Celestion Industries. The
instrumentals got such a good response there, with fans asking
for recordings of them, that I decided to pursue that route for
awhile until I came across or started another vocal project. It
just sort of took off from there! Next thing I know it's five
years and two CDs later and I still haven't started or found that
vocal project (though I always keep an eye and ear out)."
Jaye's skillful technical power is inspired by other pieces of
music "Sometimes I'll hear a certain guitar sound, or a drum
groove, or a vocal line that will get my creative energy flowing.
Other times it's watching or hearing a really good guitarist. The
latter inspires me to go home and practice, the former inspires
me to try and write something just as hip as what I heard, or to
add something to my music that I may not have considered before
(like a different effect or sound or songwriting technique).
I find also that as a new song grows I get more and more fueled
by it. When the song or melody really begins to take shape, I get
excited by it and work on it more and more. Which of course
causes the song to grow further as I write new parts. I may sit
on an initial idea for a song for weeks before it goes anywhere,
but once the riff or idea turns into part of a song I can work on
it for hours at a time because I'm so enthused by it." she
says enthusiastically.
Jaye continues to decrine the song on her new record "What
Comes Around" is the first track, and is very proggy. It
starts off in 9/8 and changes time signatures frequently. It's
one of my favorites on the CD because I love the melody in the
chorus section, and because it's fun to play. It's a very upbeat
or "happy" song. "Angst" is next, with it's
huge acoustics. This recording turned out to be one of the
fattest. We layered guitars, both acoustic and electric, in
different sections to add depth. So some sections have only 2
rhythm guitars
while others have 5 or 6 with different sounds on them. There's
really no repeating melody in this song, which is kind of odd for
me to do, but I think it works nonetheless. This is also one of
my faves to play because it's an
emotional song.
"Zombieland" is played on my 7-string guitar, and has
that nice deep dark low-B growl happening. It's a slow groove
song, and another one where I absolutely love the melody. It's
also got one of the wackiest solos I've
ever written in terms of notes. Don't ask me what scale it's in
-- it never stays in one long enough to name it! It actually was
a tough solo to write because no one scale fit over it for very
long -- it had to be tailored to fit the notes of the rhythm
parts beneath it, and yet I still wanted to retain a sense of
melodicism to it. In other words, I didn't want it to sound
completely "out" even though it was.
"Surreality" is another really proggy song, with
multiple time-signature, tempo & groove changes. "Up Up
& Insane" has a lot of techno stuff going on beneath it
-- we layered synth drums on top of the real ones, used a synth
bass for about two thirds of the song, and just added a lot of
extra techno-y percussion things to it.
This song is also played on my 7-string, and uses a wah pedal for
parts of the solo-melody lines. It's a song with a lot of
contrasts -- it starts off sounding a bit like a dance tune, then
in comes this low-B riff on the guitar so you think "ok,
this is going to be heavy", but then the melody comes in and
it's light and bouncy and upbeat.
"My Own Abyss" is a ballad-sort of song, with a mix of
electric and acoustic rhythm guitars. The melody of the chorus in
this song really lies in what the rhythm guitars are playing and
not the lead, although the lead guitar echos the notes of the
melody. It's got a nice slap bass funk section in the middle
which revs the energy of the tune up a bit before bringing it
back down to the melody.
"Transition" is another tune with prog-roots. Has a
really cool piano part in it that I like, and a catchy melody in
the chorus. The verses have two guitar parts that sort of call
& answer each other over a very groovin' bass & drum
riff. Lots of people have been telling me this is one of their
faves, yet it's not one of mine! Go figure!
The last two songs on the CD, "The Untamed" and
"Hippo Groove", are older tunes and have both been
recorded before on prior tapes I released. They were re-recorded
for this CD, with minor changes on the first and a major facelift
to the second. I kept much of the main melody for "Hippo
Groove" but completely revamped the rhythm parts to make
them more current. Rewrote part of the solo section chord changes
as well. This particular song ("Hippo Groove") is over
10 years old but I decided to include it after one of my friends
hummed me the melody despite the fact she hadn't heard the song
in many years. I figured if it was that memorable it deserved to
be resurrected!!
Overall, I think the songs on "Contagious Grooves" are
way better than those on my first CD. But then, hey, maybe I just
like 'em more because they're fresher to my ears!" concludes
Jaye. I must say that I totally agree with her, she is perhaps
one of the best and nicest guitarists to emerge over the last
decade, she has her own style which is incredibly rare these
days. For the future Jaye makes lists that she wants to achieve
" I've got so many goals I've made lists to keep track of
them! But I'll narrow it down to a few short-term ones here,
naturally i'd like to have much better sales on this album than
on the first, get some radio airplay and licensing deals, and
hopefully tour a little in Europe. To score a decent label deal
for the next instrumental CD (instead of self-releasing it on my
own label). To do a lot more live shows in the coming year. And
I'd like to finally find or form that vocal-oriented project I
mentioned earlier!"
Jaye Foucher is a very gifted guitarist, she also puts together
an annual event called Guitarapalooza, which lands itself
normally in L.A. and is a showcase for musicians to shred their
hot stuff. "Contagious Grooves" is out now, and can be
obtained from Jaye's website http://www.jayefoucher.com