A man of all genres
Guillaume Metz dishes on mastering your own sound

Greetings, readers! Can we just take a hot July minute to acknowledge the musical magic of Lyle Lovett crooning his heart out at sunset on July 4? Never have I felt more proud of my Texas roots than watching my state-brother execute this selfless act of interstate diplomacy. It could have just been my row, but it felt like a worship service from back home, just a little sexier. Truly, we can live and love and sway together, Durango and Texas. Who do we petition to get more concerts on those softball fields? Who’s with me? Thanks to y’all over at the Fort Lewis Community Concert Hall for creating so many magical memories to help sustain us as the world continues to overdose on late-stage capitalism.

For this month’s installment of Between the Beats, I sat down with the Nile Rodgers of Durango – Guillaume Metz. Raised in a first-ring suburb of Paris, with family roots in Durango, anyone who has had the pleasure of meeting Metz knows that the man is a polymath. Pilot, writer, boxer, web developer, chef and one hell of a guitar player.

If you haven’t met Metz, you will recognize him as the humble shredder who plays lead guitar in J-Calvin, Hello Dollface, Nu Bass Theory and Elder Grown. If I was going to book a funky session guitar player or recommend a master instructor for private guitar lessons, he’d be le mec. Since moving full time to Durango about 10 years ago, he is musically aging like a fine pinot noir – versatile, medium-bodied, complex and with a fresh, velvety finish.

Metz is celebrating the second volume release of his book “Music Theory for the Self Taught Musician.” Both volumes are essential reading for anyone with an interest in learning, as Metz says, “how music works under the hood.” Get your copy at Amazon, eBay or Target!

How did you discover your passion and love for music?

My dad was very musically inclined. He taught me the piano when I was 5 or 6. But the way I really discovered my love of music was because of my mom. She had great, varied musical tastes. AC/DC, Led Zeppelin, Chick Corea, even Alanis Morissette. That’s what she listened to every morning, mostly on CDs. I feel lucky that I was the last part of a generation that didn’t have YouTube and the internet. The only way I had to figure something out was by listening, guitar lessons or buying a book for that specific album.

How did you learn to play music?

Mostly by ear, because I didn’t have a lot of tablature books. So, that was my first introduction to music. And that’s how languages are learned, and I think that’s the most important thing about music. I write books about music theory, because I think it’s super important, but anything before that should be like language – all by ear. When you learn how to speak, you listen to your parents. You can learn how to speak without any grammar lessons and still speak well.

What advice do you have for musicians?

Forget everything you think you know about music. Most likely, what you think you know about music is preventing you from moving forward, because you’re not seeing the picture clearly.

Listen to lots of music, and that’s what’s going to feed your musical tank of ideas. Your ears are going to naturally hear those licks and little grooves and use that to create. It’s like a well. Anything you hear, feel, have heard/think of that as this giant tank of ideas. If you’re singing it, humming it and no one is helping you, that means it’s in you. Most people have that well underneath, but they don’t have the tools to go grab it. I think my books can help with that.

The best musicians are people who have a range of passions and can bring them into their music. It’s good to be able to not feel dependent on music for your happiness. Go out in the world, do things, be interested, be passionate, and when you come back to music, you’re gonna do great.

What are your thoughts on playing in Durango?

I’m shocked by the amount of art and music here. The fact that I’m able to be in four different projects that feel amazing and creative in so many ways, and build friendships and earn a little bit of income, that’s amazing.

Durango is a really cool town to test the waters on what your passion is, because it creates this environment where you can easily get some exposure and try things out, and there’s really big support for that … Really, it’s about where you can be where there’s a lot of big cities nearby. And Durango is actually great for that. It’s hard, but it’s possible.