Craig Goldy recalls almost being scared by George Lynch because he was so good during Hear ‘n Aid

Craig Goldy recalls almost being scared by George Lynch because he was so good during Hear ‘n Aid

Guitarist Craig Goldy (Dio, Giuffria, Resurrection Kings, Dio Disciples) was recently interviewed by Yiannis Dolas for Greece’s Rock Pages. Goldy was part of the historic and ground breaking Hear ‘n Aid sessions that resulted in the album of the same name and included many of the ’80s biggest hard rock and heavy metal stars.

Goldy was asked about his memories of those sessions to which he replied: “I was on tour with Giuffria, so I didn’t really get a chance to socialize that much. But, it was a great experience because Ronnie actually had me go first with the solos because him and I actually had worked together already in the studio together when I was in Rough Cutt. So, he knew that I would start out with a theme, rather than just start playing a bunch of fast notes. So, when I did, he would always grab my arm and go: “that’s right… That’s right” Like whenever I’d say something that had a meaning, or he felt that he was understood, or somebody cracked his code, he would grab their arm and go: “Yeah, that’s right!” And he would do that to me a lot. And so, when I started that little thing he grabbed my arm and said: “that’s why I made you come first! Because, I knew you’d start with a theme”…”

Little things like that made that whole thing so special. Neal Schon gave me a compliment. You know I was thinking to myself: “I shouldn’t be getting a compliment from Neal Schon. I should be giving a compliment to Neal Schon”… I didn’t get a chance to tell him how great I thought he was and how great I thought his music was, but those things, those memories are just amazing… But, I’ll never forget… George Lynch! He scared me! Because he was so good. He made me realize there was a lot of things, at that time, missing in my development as a guitar player. I was nowhere near some of those guys at that time…

He was doing something. He was kind of warming up, because I guess he was up next and whoever was playing was on deck already playing, so George’s on deck and warming up and I heard him do this thing… something like he was using a wah-wah pedal. So I look down just to see what kind of wobble pedal he was using and there was none! It was just the way he was playing and I was like “oh my God, how do you do that?” – I gotta learn how to do that! And so I call them “vowel sounds”. Blackmore would do it too by switching pickups. Sometimes from the treble pickups you get a sound like “wooaahhh”. But, I wanted to figure out the way to do that, to get a vowel sound, but you had to pick the string right. So, thank you George for scaring me (laughs) almost! Because I finally figured out how to how to get vowel sounds. Because, you can’t communicate very well if all you use is consonants.”

Dolas noted that his favorite guitar solo on the song “Stars” was from Lynch to which Goldy indicated: “Yes, yes… George Lynch and even Yngwie Malmsteen. Usually, all he does is he plays everything and nothing at the same time. But, he was great. Everybody was great… Because, I think it was the spirit behind it, you know, everybody just kind of dropped their ego.

And that’s where I met Rudy Sarzo and Tommy Aldridge. I’ve met Rudy before, but he had just left Ozzy Osbourne, and eventually, I was able to become the guitar player for their band, for a year and a half (ed, he is referring to the project “Project Driver”, which was finally released by M.A.R.S., Tony McAlpine, Tommy Aldridge, Rob Rock, Rudy Sarzo), before I joined Dio and that was a great experience.”

You can read the rest of the interview with Craig Goldy at Rock Pages‘ website.

Hear ‘n Aid‘s “Stars” video: