Chris Brooks: Shred Knowledge interview and a chance to win a t-shirt

Chris Brooks:

Now that my new album "The Axis of All Things" is out (available athttp://chrisbrooks.com and iTunes), I've got 10 CB Tshirts to giveaway to the 10 most-viewed video reviews of the album. To get one, you need to:


1. Review the album (on your camera, web cam, phone, whatever)
2. Upload it to youtube (put my URL www.chrisbrooks.com in the description)
3. Submit your video as a response to this video
4. Share your video (facebook, email, forums, wherever)
5. Get your video into the top 10 viewed.
Unfortunately we cannot permit use of the album songs on your video, but perhaps as a faint background tune you'll get away with it. Keep your review tidy and as short as it needs to be.
We'll check the view counts on November 10, officially close the comp here when that's done, and inform winners by November 13th. Have fun and good luck!
"The Axis of All Things" - hear it, buy it at http://chrisbrooks.com
Please note: Judges decision is final, no correspondence entered into. This contest is for promotional use and therefore trolling will be excluded and reported. Tshirts in L size only unless other stock is available.

Chris Brooks - "Axis..." review competition - win a Tshirt!

Q1. Thanks for taking the time to do this interview Chris. Your excellent sophomore album, ‘The Axis of All Things’, has been receiving great reviews and more people are sitting up and taking notice of you and your playing. How has your approach to music changed since the release of ‘The Master Plan’ back in 2002?

The Master Plan was a fairly conceptual sort of album with prog-metal structures and a certain “tightness” to it, whereas the new songs are more like jeans and a t-shirt; easy going with more freedom for improv and variation from night to night in live performance. Besides the normal things I want in a song like melodies, hooks and creative arrangements, I wanted these songs to be great songs to play live first and foremost, and also to have lots of cool guitar parts that other guitarists might find fun to learn or jam on. “The Master Plan” is quite keyboard-busy as it draws on prog and melodic rock influences, but on “The Axis Of All Things” there’s hardly any. I used guitars to create more layers but It’s more spacious. There’s more groove and variation in the style of the songs I feel, with some fusion, funk, and acoustic stuff for good measure.

Q2. Lets take it back a bit. What made you decide that you would head on pursue a career in music? Was there a turning point?

When I was about 14 or 15 I’d made my mind up. It would be several years later before I would find ways to do it, but I had the resolve to be a musician pretty early on in life. My Dad worked as a professional drummer for many years so there was no escaping the bug!

Full interview

New album out now at http://www.chrisbrooks.com. Velvet Claws is the first single from the 2nd Chris Brooks solo album, entitled "The Axis of All Things". It's available from http://chrisbrooks.com/velvetclaws.html and iTuneshttp://itunes.apple.com/album/velvet-claws-single/id405427506 . Deluxe edition on http://chrisbrooks.com includes the song, a backing track, 18-page transcription and the promo video!

Chris Brooks - Velvet Claws [OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO]