Copyright Miller Freeman Inc. Sep 1997
THROUGH FOLLOWING
David Ryan-Harris, the 29-year-old former leader of Follow for Now, knows what he wants to be doing when he gets older. "I saw Pops Staples on television, and he was still singing Staples Singers songs from back in the old days," he says. "Those are the kind of songs I want to be performing when I'm 60. I don't feel the need to be as visceral as I was with Follow for Now." This helps explain the more nuanced soul-rock stylings of his self-titled debut album, mixed by Brendan O'Brien.
Whereas Follow for Now went for the groovadelic jugular vein, RyanHarris is now happier exploring the smoother side of the R&B spectrum, with a sound that echoes Seal, Prince, Joni Mitchell and Stevie Wonder. "If I Had a Dime," "Sleep" and "Change" unwind slowly, fleshed out by floating vocals and understated electric and acoustic woven into dreamy, funky textures that, he says, separate him from the "urban alternative" crowd. "None of the artists in the popular arena are approaching their material from a guitar point of view," he says. "Prince was the last artist from that style that people identified as being a guitarist."
After Follow for Now ended its five-year run in 1992, Ryan-Harris, a transplanted Georgian from Evanston, Illinois, backed up singer Dionne Farris for a year. He started work on his album last summer, continuing the exploration of acoustic guitar he'd begun in the final days of Follow for Now. He tuned his 1966 Gibson Country and Western four different ways for the album, including open D and the C, A, ES, C, F, high F heard on "Genie." "What I like about alternate tunings," David says, "is how you can broaden your palette by just hitting a tuning peg."
He ran his PRS McCarty solidbody through a Roland VG-8 guitar synth into a Fender Pro Junior, a Fender Vibroverb and Matchless DC-30s, using the combos' internal speakers or a '70s Marshall 4x12. A self-confessed "pedal whore," Ryan-Harris also hauled out an Electro-Harmonix Micro Synth and a Prescription Electronics Experience Pedal, as well as an E-Bow. "There are a million boxes you can plug into that make you sound like a beer commercial, but I like things that make you sound like you don't know how to play. They give you personality."
***Thanks to Furious Rose for submitting this interview
