ittle Matt can't be much more than 10 years old. But he's already had a tough life; cerebral palsy's got him strapped into his wheelchair and his pencil-thin body isn't coping well. But as he sits in the lobby of the Fox Theater on a Saturday night in downtown Atlanta, a guest of Children's Wish Foundation International, Matt seems to be doing okay. For one thing, he's gotten his wish: to meet his favorite band in the world, Atlanta's own Collective Soul.
...........In the lobby before the big hometown show, Matt's surrounded by his heroes: guitarists Ed and Dean Roland and Ross Childress, drummer Shane Evans, and bassist Will Turpin. Together, the band forms a circle around Matt and his family, exchanging smiles and jokes. They autograph a pile of Collective Soul discs and present them to the boy- who wouldn't lose his big grin even if he stepped on a tack- then they pose with the kid for a few photographs. It's a heartfelt gesture from a band that's as warm and humble as the South itself. For Collective Soul, it's a chance to give something back, to show their appreciation, to thank another one of the millions of fans who've helped make them one of the hottest rock bands in the country.
...........Out back in the tour bus, the band still has a few hours to kill before show time. Headliner Lenny Kravitz and his band, who showed up late for soundcheck, are going through their set piece by piece at a naggingly slow pace and they're beginning to cut into the time set aside for Collective Soul. Sipping on a frosty bottle of spring water, Ed Roland seems a little anxious. "We've gotta make sure we have chairs for E.J.," he says to Tiny, the band's road manager. "They should be right up by the side of the stage." Normally, Ed's a mellow, southern gentleman with a big smile and lots of friendly words. His is the kind of demeanor you'd expect from the son of a preacher-man. Right about now, though, those words aren't so easy to come by. He looks out the window at the venue. "What the hell's goin' on in there?"
...........Roland's anxiety is easy to understand. The band's show this night, sponsored by an important regional radio station, is the final and most crucial gig before the release of their new album, Dosage. To support the record, the band intends to embark on a major national tour and they hope to work out the kinks before the first date of that tour. This is their last chance and, as it turns out, they may have to break a leg without any soundcheck at all. Guitarist Dean Roland, Ed's brother, and Will Turpin hang around, playing with the satellite TV on their bus, alighting on Canada's music video channel Much Music. Dean seems a little more relaxed than his brother, though he can't seem to figure out if he's comfortable with the look of a wool scarf around his neck sans jacket. "Yeah, it's a good time for us. I'm happy," says Dean. At 26 he's nine years younger than Ed. "I'm happiest because I've watched my brother struggle to succeed for years. So to be a part of living his dream is real cool, and to have this happen to a bunch of good guys is really rare."
...........The guys in Collective Soul grew up together just outside of Atlanta. Ed Roland, the band's principal songwriter, accumulated most of his musical experience in the high school band and church choir. For years, he tried to make it in the pop industry, but had met with constant frustration and rejection. But just as he came to the end of the line, he caught a break. A college radio station in Atlanta got hold of Roland's demo tape and began spinning "Shine," with its radiant chorus and groaning guitars. The track tore up the charts, first regionally, then, seemingly out of nowhere, nationally. "Shine" made Roland and Collective Soul bigtime hitmakers and earned them a bigtime contract.
..........."Everything's been a step in the right direction so far," says Ed, still on the bus, discussing Dosage. "We wanna see growth each time and I think we see a lot of it on this record." Though the bands previous two releases, Collective Soul and Disciplined Breakdown, met with warm commercial but cool critical reception, Dosage marks the first occasion Collective Soul's fiercest critics have embraced the band's music. "It feels good," Ed smiles, as he watches a stream of people enter the bus. "We'll enjoy being liked; it's something new for us."
...........It's retribution time for Ed Roland, the former whipping boy, or rather, "poster boy," for the national trend to canonize bland modern rock bands who can drum up a decent melodic hook. Dosage is easily the most adventurous and accomplished Collective Soul album yet. "To me, there's no such thing as uncool music," says the ever-democratic Ed. "I mean, as far as I'm concerned, the Backstreet Boys are cool. As long as someone's being honest about it, no matter how out of tune or out of time, that's cool."
...........Backstage in the Collective Soul dressing room- a dark, paint-peeled box with a bad shag carpet- there's more milling about. Lenny Kravitz and company still hold the stage and the theater's sound system, eliminating the band's soundcheck, but there's no palpable bitterness among band members. "That's show biz," shrugs Ed. Meanwhile, the band and crew grab snacks and drinks, pull up a chair, share small talk. Showtime approaches and there's talk about "E.J.'s limousine pulling up."
...........In the meantime, Ross Childress, the band's lead guitarist and principal instrumental talent, shares some thoughts. "Yeah, I get a little nervous before the show," he admits, as the natural light from outside begins to darken the dressing room. "If I didn't have the anxiety that means I'd be gettin' too used to it and it'd start feeling monotonous. Now it's still very cool."
...........Over the years, Childress has blossomed from an uptight lead player held in check by tight arrangements to a manic improviser ready and able to explode at any given moment. Onstage, his trio of handsome PRS's (two customs and a McCarty model) by his side, he's nimble and superfast- a gifted talent in a sea of mediocrity.
...........Because much of what Collective Soul plays nightly is by now elementary for a player with Childress' skill, he spends his down time practicing more complex material, including work from the pages of Steve Morse's playbook. "Good night!" he says with southern affectation, referring to Morse's masterful technique. "The man's second to none." Childress says he likes to keep his chops up, not to benefit his onstage performance, but for other reasons. "It's my flip side to keep me going in a different direction," says Childress. "When I've got control of the more technical side of guitar, my ideas seem to flow better, and there's more originality and more confidence in my playing. The band's stuff is like ABC's; all I need to do is keep the tempos right. The real challenge is to get stuff exactly right every night."
...........A motivated and tireless student of guitar, Childress has only recently added songwriting to his oeuvre. On Dosage, he makes his writing and singing debut with "Dandy Life", a jangly, drum machine-driven ditty with a banging chorus. But for the most part, his job on the new record is about the same as it's always been: to round out Roland's natural melodies with a surging rock feel. "My strength as a player is that I don't have a fear of putting a part down when Ed comes in with a song," says Childress. "There's a hundred different parts I can play to any given song, so it doesn't bother me to throw a few ideas away in hopes of coming up with the best one. It's all rock and roll, but you can bring in styles from other places."
...........Given the band's past achievements, its present successes, and future potential, the only problem Childress currently has is deciding which amp to take on the road. He has always played through Fender Twin reissue '65s, but has toyed with the idea of jumping to Hughes and Kettner. "The advantage of changing over would be that I'd eliminate a couple pedals," he says. "Right now, I have an old monster Ibanez tube pedal thing, a floor model with a screamer, driver, delay, and chorus."
...........Since the band's success, Childress has also expanded his guitar collection, adding a rare cherry red Gibson Special, a prototype of the SG, which was issued a year before the company put out the Les Paul. He also recently picked up a Les Paul Jr. TV model '57. "PRS wants to refinish my guitars 'cause they're pretty banged up, but I don't want to send 'em back. I know where every single ding comes from on those these things. There's too much history," he smiles.
...........Onstage- soundcheck be damned- Collective Soul performs yet another crowd-pleasing set. With its three-guitar line-up spread across the front of the stage, the band packs plenty of power, but it's the finesse that's most attention grabbing. Childress tools frequently with his E-Bow, creating an array of dazzling sounds, while Ed Roland- on his brand new white McCarty semi-electric, semi-hollowbody pounds out rhythm chords and his brother Dean fills the gaps with secondary rhythms on his Les Paul standard. The set scans a bunch of Collective Soul standards, including the roaring "December," the brittle "Listen,", the Childress vehicle "Blame," and the anthematic singalong "Where the River Flows," but it's the set closer- the band's encore- that gets the most attention.
..........."This one's for Matt," screams Roland, smiling at Matt in his wheelchair down front, "and I wanna see every single one of you on your feet 'cause Matt wouldn't want to have it any other way." He doesn't mention the young boy's illness, and the band catches fire with "Shine," the song that helped them get where they wanted to go, which ends in a torrent of power chords and audience-led "whoa-oh-oh-ohs." Even the rather mysterious "E.J.,"- part-time Atlanta resident Elton John- approves, giving the band a standing ovation from stage left. Yeah, E.J., Saturday night's all right.

Sustaining Soul Ross Childress uses the E-Bow to swell effect ...................................................by E.D. Menasché ...........Quick: What do Robert Fripp, The Cars' Elliot Easton, R.E.M.'s Peter Buck, and Collective Soul's Ross Childress have in common? All have made use of the the E-Bow, the hand-held magnetic device that must rank as one of the most effective- and under-recognized- weapons in the battle to extend the guitar's sonic boundaries. You may have heard it without recognizing what it was: A couple of the most recognizable recorded E-Bow excursions include "Heroes" by David Bowie and The Cars' "Shake it Up," dramatic and somewhat unsettling as manipulated by Fripp on "Heroes." There are dozens of other well known examples. But few guitarists have integrated the E-Bow into their core sound as extremely as Childress, who grabs for the unit both in the studio and on stage. He's even rigged up a special, high-tech stand to keep his E-Bow handy at all times. Well, maybe not so high. "I have it attached to a string on a mic stand," he says. "That way I can just leave it on a ready to go and grab it when I need it." ...........According to parent company Heet Electonics' fun and informative website (www.e-bow.com), the E can stand for "Energy, Electronic, or Eunice." By any name, the E-Bow works like this: When switched on and held over a guitar string, the battery-powered E-Bow generates an electro-magnetic field that excites the string, causing it to vibrate for as long as the field is maintained. The sound is something of a cross between a cello, a synthesized square wave, and well-controlled feedback- round and big, but without distinct attack or much treble response. It's also very hot- in fact, one of the hardest things about mastering the E-Bow is learning how to control levels so that you don't overdrive your amp. Once mastered, however, you can emulate a string section and create beautiful swells worthy of a sci-fi soundtrack. The E-Bow also lets you see the fretboard in new ways by encouraging you to solo over one string at a time, an exercise that can yield results even when you're attacking the strings with more conventional tools. ...........Childress picked up the E-Bow out of necessity. "When we toured after Disciplined Breakdown, we wouldn't play "World I Know" live because the string part was so important to the tune," he recalls. "I decided to try to use the E-Bow to substitute for the strings. Now, I've developed enough technique with it to use in the studio as well as live." ...........Childress integrates the E-Bow into a conventional and relatively simple rig consisting of a number of Paul Reed Smith McCarty and Custom models driving a pair of Fender '65 Twin Reverb reissues via an ancient Ibanez PUE-5 Tube Reverb floor-mounted multi-effect, a Dunlop Crybaby Q-535 Wah pedal, and an Ernie Ball Volume pedal. "I use the bridge pickup most of the time because the neck is just too hot," Childress explains. "For the string sounds, I'll do volume-pedal swells with just a little bit of chorus." ...........One of the keys to effective use of the E-Bow is controlling the attack. Childress approaches the strings in a number of different ways: "In some cases, I get the string going with the volume pedal completely off, then just swell the volume up," he says. "Other times, I'll be playing [with the pick] and slide up to the note, then grab the E-Bow for the sustain- the E-Bow generates a much hotter output than picking so I really have to jump on the volume pedal. You can also get some slide effects by actually bouncing the E-Bow on the strings, and sometimes I'll go for some crazy harmonics. You can also do some cool bird sounds by combining the volume pedal with a little bit of delay." ...........It wasn't until after he'd been using the E-Bow himself that Childress discovered its rich heritage. "I never realized how long it's been around," he admits. "The Edge has done some really interesting stuff with it, and there's Nazareth's 'Love Hurts'. The E-Bow is definately a whole other avenue- it's a different beast entirely."

Copyright 1999 by Guitar Magazine. Transcribed by Sari Stein for the Collective Soul Link Website.