George Clinton told him to play like his mother just died.
This is the founding legend of “Maggot Brain” — the ten-minute guitar solo on the 1971 Funkadelic album of the same name that is regularly cited as one of the greatest guitar solos ever recorded on any instrument, in any genre. Clinton’s specific instruction: “I told Eddie to start the tune and play like his mother had just died. Really just let it out. Then let it get happy, like thinking it was all going to be fine. Just go through all the emotions.”
The result: Eddie Hazel playing a pentatonic minor scale in the key of E through a fuzz box and a Crybaby wah pedal, for ten uninterrupted minutes, the solo beginning with stark, individual notes that cry in isolation and slowly building through controlled grief to something that transcends grief entirely. Clinton added the ghostly echoes after the recording was complete. United Sound Studios, Detroit, late 1970 or early 1971. Clinton was on LSD at the time.
George Clinton: “Eddie Hazel colored the style of Funkadelic. All the stuff leading up to Maggot Brain and afterwards — he set the style.”
Eddie Hazel was twenty years old when he recorded it.
He died December 23, 1992, of liver failure related to a drug overdose. He was forty-two years old. He left three Funkadelic albums on which his guitar defines the band’s identity, one solo album, and some legendary live performances. It is not much, on paper. What it contains is immeasurable.
Background: Brooklyn, New Jersey, P-Funk, and the Three Albums That Changed Everything
Edward Earl Hazel was born April 10, 1950, in Brooklyn, New York. He grew up in New Jersey, where his musical gifts were evident from childhood — he had a way of playing rhythm where he used his fingers as well as the pick, a technique that his bandmates at Funkadelic said he got from his grandmother. This mixed pick-and-finger technique — playing rhythm with the physicality and responsiveness of fingerstyle while using a pick for lead — became one of the distinctive qualities of his playing.
He met George Clinton and the musicians who would become Funkadelic as a teenager in New Jersey. The original formation of Funkadelic was the backup band for Clinton’s vocal group The Parliaments — itself a doo-wop group that had been operating since the late 1950s. The legal dispute over the name “Parliaments” forced Clinton to relaunch the band under the Funkadelic name, and the specific musicians he assembled — including Hazel on guitar, Billy “Bass” Nelson on bass, Tiki Fulwood on drums, and Bernie Worrell on keyboards — had absorbed the psychedelic rock of Hendrix and the acidic experimentalism of the late-1960s alongside the soul tradition Clinton had always inhabited.
The three Funkadelic albums that Hazel defined — Funkadelic (1970), Free Your Mind… and Your Ass Will Follow (1970), and Maggot Brain (1971) — were recorded in a two-year burst of creative intensity. They represent the moment when African-American popular music most fully absorbed the psychedelic rock tradition and transformed it into something that neither genre could produce alone. The heaviness of Cream and Hendrix, the rhythmic discipline of soul and R&B, the cosmic mythology of George Clinton’s emerging P-Funk universe — all of it converged in the three albums that Hazel’s guitar defines.
After 1971, Hazel’s relationship with Funkadelic became complicated by his drug problems and erratic behavior. He was in and out of the P-Funk organization, contributing to subsequent albums but never again in the central, defining role of the first three. He recorded one solo album, Games, Dames and Guitar Thangs (1977), with Clinton producing — a record that contains some of his most controlled and beautiful playing, particularly his guitar interpretation of the Mamas & Papas’ “California Dreamin’.” He died in 1992.
Tone note: He was twenty years old when he recorded “Maggot Brain.” Twenty. Clinton told him to play as if his mother had just died. He played for ten minutes. The emotional range he covered in those ten minutes — from isolated grief to tentative hope to transcendence — is what twenty-year-old guitar genius sounds like when given the right instruction and the right context. Clinton gave him the emotional direction. Hazel gave everything he had. The fuzz pedal, the wah, the pentatonic minor scale in E. That’s the technical description. The rest is what happens when music works the way it’s supposed to.
The Rig: Eddie Hazel’s Guitars, Amps & Gear
Guitars: Stratocaster and Les Paul
Fender Stratocaster — The Maggot Brain Guitar
Eddie Hazel is most closely associated with Fender Stratocasters — and while it cannot be confirmed with absolute certainty, a Stratocaster is widely believed to have been his instrument for the “Maggot Brain” solo. Sweetwater’s profile confirmed: “a Strat is widely believed to have been played by Hazel for his defining solo on ‘Maggot Brain.'”
Reverb News documented his Stratocaster collection more specifically: “Eddie is probably best known for playing Fender Stratocasters, ranging from a late-’50s Sunburst Strat to a small hoard of 3-bolt ’70s models.” The range — from late-1950s vintage to 1970s production Stratocasters — reflects both his chronological span (active from the late 1960s through his death in 1992) and his practical approach to instruments: he used what was available rather than maintaining a precious collection.
The Stratocaster’s qualities that suited his playing:
- The whammy bar: Hazel used the Stratocaster’s tremolo system for expressive pitch variations — the same function it served for Hendrix, from whom Hazel absorbed much of his approach. The sustained notes of “Maggot Brain” would have included specific pitch inflections from the tremolo arm
- The single-coil clarity: The Stratocaster’s single-coil pickups provide the specific open, present character that sustains emotionally through a fuzz box without losing note identity. A humbucker through the same fuzz produces a thicker but potentially muddier sound; the single coil’s clarity preserves the individual note even at extreme fuzz settings
- The Hendrix connection: Hazel was one of the guitarists most directly influenced by Hendrix, and the Stratocaster was Hendrix’s instrument. Using the same guitar was a conscious alignment with that tradition
Blackbyrd McKnight (another Funkadelic guitarist) described Hazel’s technique at Premier Guitar: “He had a way of playing rhythm where he used his fingers as well as the pick. I understand that he got that style from his grandmother.” The mixed pick-and-finger technique — unusual on electric guitar — produced a specific rhythmic personality in his playing that pure-pick technique doesn’t achieve.
Gibson Les Paul Custom (Black) — The Other Primary
Alongside the Stratocasters, Hazel was closely associated with a black Gibson Les Paul Custom. Sweetwater noted: “Hazel was also heavily associated with a stark, black Gibson Custom Les Paul — an elegant complement to the colorful, extravagant outfits he would regularly wear onstage.” The visual contrast — black guitar against the psychedelic costumes of P-Funk’s theatrical stage presentation — was as deliberate as any of Clinton’s cosmic imagery.
The Les Paul Custom’s contribution to his tonal palette: the humbucker’s thicker, more sustained character suits rhythm playing and the heavier, more compressed lead tones that appear on the Funkadelic records. Where the Stratocaster provides the clarity for the “Maggot Brain” emotional expressiveness, the Les Paul provides the weight and body for the harder funk-rock material.
Other Gibson Models
Reverb News noted the breadth of Hazel’s Gibson use: “While Hazel could frequently be seen playing a number of different Gibson guitars — Firebirds, Les Paul Standards and Customs, and a couple different semi-hollows.” The Firebird’s specific character — longer scale, different pickup orientation, the banjo-style tuners — adds another tonal dimension. The semi-hollow Gibsons provided the acoustic resonance and feedback sensitivity appropriate to specific Funkadelic contexts.
Complete Guitar List (Key Instruments)
- Fender Stratocaster (late-1950s Sunburst) — Vintage Stratocaster; widely believed to be the “Maggot Brain” guitar
- Fender Stratocasters (3-bolt, 1970s, multiple) — “A small hoard” of 1970s models
- Gibson Les Paul Custom (black) — Primary Les Paul; visual contrast with P-Funk costumes
- Gibson Les Paul Standards — Various
- Gibson Firebird — Documented live use
- Gibson semi-hollow models — Documented use
Amps: The Fender Dual Showman
Fender Dual Showman — The Primary Amp
Hazel’s preferred amplifier was the Fender Dual Showman — the high-powered Fender head that provided the clean, powerful platform for his fuzz and wah explorations. The Fender Dual Showman is a powerful tube amplifier head released in the 1960s with the guts of the powerful and clean-sounding Twin Reverb in head form. Equipboard confirmed: “Eddie Hazel used the Fender Dual Showman amplifier as his preferred amp in the 1960s.”
The Dual Showman’s specific qualities that suited Hazel’s approach: enormous clean headroom (the Dual Showman was one of the most powerful Fender amps produced, driving a matching 2×15 cabinet) with the Twin Reverb’s characteristically clean, neutral frequency response. This clean platform was essential for the fuzz box and wah pedal to operate at maximum expressiveness — a compressed or tonally colored amp changes the character of both effects in ways that the Dual Showman’s neutrality preserves.
His later-years amp: Equipboard also documented a different amp for his later Parliament-Funkadelic work, though the specific model is less precisely documented than the Dual Showman.
Pedals: Fuzz, Wah, and the P-Funk Effects Philosophy
The Maggot Brain Effects Chain — Documented
The specific effects used on “Maggot Brain” are documented from a reliable source. Excerpt from “GEORGE CLINTON & THE COSMIC ODYSSEY OF THE P-FUNK EMPIRE” by Kris Keeds, in a chapter discussing “Maggot Brain”: “Eddie played his solo in a pentatonic minor scale in the key of E, putting it through a fuzz box and Cry Baby wah-wah pedal, glazed with dub-style delay.” The delay — the “ghostly echoes” — was added by Clinton after the recording was complete, not part of Hazel’s live signal chain during the recording.
So the actual recording signal chain: Stratocaster → Fuzz Box → Crybaby Wah → Fender Dual Showman. The delay was added in the mix.
Big Muff Pi — The Primary Fuzz
George Clinton identified the specific fuzz boxes that Funkadelic adopted: “Eddie started right out learning the pedals — the wah wah, the Big Muff, and phasers and shit. We bought all the gadgets in the world, [especially] once Bootsy got with us.”
The Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi was one of the primary fuzz boxes in the Funkadelic arsenal. The Big Muff’s specific character — massive sustained fuzz with a characteristic mid-scoop and the singing sustain of silicon-transistor clipping — suited the long, expressive “Maggot Brain” solo approach. The mid-scoop that critics of the Big Muff identify as a mixing problem is, in the context of a long solo, actually an asset: the treble and bass presence of the Big Muff carries the note through a mix even when the midrange is recessed.
Dunlop Crybaby Wah — Always Present
The wah pedal — specifically the Dunlop Crybaby — is the other essential Hazel effect. The combination of fuzz and wah is the specific sonic identity of “Maggot Brain”: the wah sweeps the frequency content of each sustained note, providing the vocal, human quality that makes the solo sound like speech or crying or singing rather than a mechanical instrument. Hazel used the wah with specific control — it is not swept randomly but positioned and moved to emphasize specific emotional moments in the melodic content.
Phase Shifter
Clinton’s quote — “phasers and shit” — confirms that phase shifting effects were part of the broader Funkadelic effects arsenal. The specific phaser used by Hazel is not documented with the same certainty as the Big Muff and Crybaby, but MXR Phase 90 or similar phaser units were common in the early 1970s P-Funk context.
Strings, Picks & The Mixed Pick-and-Finger Technique
The mixed technique: Blackbyrd McKnight’s description at Premier Guitar — “He had a way of playing rhythm where he used his fingers as well as the pick. I understand that he got that style from his grandmother” — identifies the most specific and unusual element of Hazel’s physical approach. The mixed technique produces a specific rhythmic personality: the pick provides attack for specific notes while the fingers provide a softer, rounder attack for others. The result is a rhythmic variety within a single phrase that pure-pick or pure-finger playing cannot achieve.
This technique connects Hazel to the Piedmont fingerpicking tradition (which also used both pick and fingers) but applied to electric guitar in a psychedelic funk context — a synthesis that was entirely his own.
The Hendrix influence on technique: Hazel absorbed Hendrix’s physical approach — the whammy bar use, the feedback exploitation, the sense of the guitar as a voice — and combined it with the rhythmic discipline of the soul and R&B tradition he inhabited. The result was a guitarist who could play ten minutes of improvised emotional expression without losing the rhythmic foundation that funk required.
Playing Style & Tone Philosophy: Hendrix Meets James Brown
Eddie Hazel’s playing philosophy is the synthesis that defined Funkadelic’s musical identity: the psychedelic rock tradition (Hendrix, Cream) combined with the rhythmic discipline and emotional directness of soul and R&B (James Brown, Sly Stone). Bringing the aggressive rock and roll sound of Jimi Hendrix into the funky world of James Brown and Sly Stone, Eddie Hazel’s contributions to P-Funk’s legacy and sound would go onto inspire generations of guitarists.
The Hendrix Foundation
Hazel’s debt to Hendrix is total and acknowledged: the wah-and-fuzz approach to electric lead guitar, the exploitation of feedback as a compositional element, the sense that the guitar should speak rather than play. But Hazel was not a Hendrix imitator; he absorbed the Hendrix approach and integrated it with the rhythm-section discipline that Hendrix — who always had great rhythm players but whose own rhythm playing was more oriented toward chord texture than groove — didn’t always center.
The specific difference: Hazel’s rhythm playing was funky in a way that Hendrix’s wasn’t. “Maggot Brain” ends with a fadeout; but the same album contains rhythm guitar work that locks into the bass and drums with a precision that reflects the James Brown tradition as much as the Hendrix one. He was both a psychedelic lead guitarist and a funk rhythm guitarist of the first order.
The Emotional Approach to Lead Guitar
George Clinton’s instruction for “Maggot Brain” — “play like your momma just died” — reflects a specific approach to lead guitar that is emotional rather than technical. The solo is not a demonstration of scales or technique; it is a sustained emotional statement that uses the guitar as a voice. The pentatonic minor scale in E is the simplest possible melodic vocabulary; the wah and fuzz are the coloring agents; the emotion is the content.
This approach — prioritizing emotional expression over technical display — connects Hazel to B.B. King, to Robert Johnson, to the blues tradition that underlies everything in this series. The electric guitar as a voice that speaks directly to the listener’s emotional state, without mediation through technique for its own sake. The “Maggot Brain” solo is ten minutes of that approach at maximum power.
The Brevity and the Legacy
Hazel’s active recording career was brief: three Funkadelic albums, one solo album, some significant live performances. The drug problems that limited his output were also the context that gave “Maggot Brain” its emotional weight — a musician operating at the edge of his personal resources, given the right instruction at the right moment, producing ten minutes of music that outlasted everything that surrounded it.
Funkadelic’s Maggot Brain remains one of electric guitar’s ultimate trips. It has got a lysergic energy all of its own. This is funk-rock as mysticism, the sound of Eddie Hazel seeing through the third eye.
How to Sound Like Eddie Hazel: The Funk-Rock Psychedelic Tone
The Guitar
Fender Stratocaster — the single-coil clarity and tremolo system are essential to the “Maggot Brain” approach. Gibson Les Paul Custom for the heavier rhythm tones.
- Fender Stratocaster — Any Stratocaster with original-style single-coil pickups and tremolo system; the vintage character is more important than the specific year
- Gibson Les Paul Custom — For the heavier, more sustained rhythm tones
The Amp
A clean, powerful amp with a lot of headroom — the Fender Dual Showman or equivalent. The clean headroom is essential for the fuzz to operate at maximum expressiveness without the amp adding its own compression and saturation on top of the pedal’s character.
| Control | Setting | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Volume | High — approaching amp’s working level | The Dual Showman’s enormous headroom means “high volume” is still relatively clean |
| Treble | 6–7 | The fuzz and wah provide frequency color; amp treble maintains clarity |
| Bass | 5–6 | Full bass response; the fuzz’s low end benefits from the amp’s bass extension |
| Middle | 5–6 | Neutral midrange; the Big Muff’s mid-scoop provides natural midrange contour |
The Essential Effects
- Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi — The primary fuzz; maximum sustain setting; the specific singing quality of silicon fuzz sustain is the “Maggot Brain” character
- Dunlop Crybaby Wah — The primary expression pedal; the wah provides the vocal, human quality of the sustained notes in the solo
- Tape delay (added in mixing on the original) — Clinton added the ghostly echoes after recording; a tape echo pedal (Maestro Echoplex, Fulltone Tube Tape Echo) approximates this in live contexts
Budget vs Authentic
Budget:
- Guitar: Any Fender Stratocaster
- Amp: Fender Twin Reverb or any large clean tube amp
- Pedals: Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi (current production) + Dunlop Crybaby Wah
Authentic:
- Guitar: Vintage Fender Stratocaster (late-1950s sunburst preferred, or 3-bolt 1970s models as alternatives)
- Amp: Fender Dual Showman head into 2×15 cabinet
- Pedals: Vintage Big Muff Pi (1970s) + Dunlop Crybaby Wah
- Delay: Added in mix (Maestro Echoplex or similar tape delay in live contexts)
The Emotional Technique
Clinton’s instruction is the technique. Find your emotional reference point. Play the simplest possible melodic vocabulary — pentatonic minor in E. Put it through the Big Muff and the wah. Let the emotion shape every note choice, every wah movement, every sustained pitch. The note count is irrelevant; the emotional authenticity is everything.
Practice sustaining single notes for as long as possible while controlling the decay with the fuzz and the wah position. The “Maggot Brain” solo’s power comes from the patience to stay on a single note when the emotion requires it, rather than moving to the next note as soon as the previous one has been stated. That patience — which requires emotional commitment to justify it — is the central technical skill.
Influence & Legacy: The Solo That Launched a Thousand Guitarists
Eddie Hazel’s influence on guitar playing runs through everything that connects psychedelic rock to funk, R&B to hard rock, emotional lead guitar to rhythmic groove. “Eddie Hazel colored the style of Funkadelic,” George Clinton says. “All the stuff leading up to Maggot Brain and afterwards — he set the style. Garry Shider — who was like his little brother — kept the tradition going.”
The documented direct influences:
- Michael Hampton (Funkadelic) — Earned his place in Funkadelic specifically by playing “Maggot Brain” note-for-note at a party. His successor role confirms Hazel’s centrality
- Jimi Hendrix (reverse influence) — Hazel synthesized Hendrix and soul/funk; subsequent guitarists who cited Hazel were indirectly citing the synthesis, not just the Hendrix component
- Ernie Isley (Isley Brothers) — The psychedelic-funk guitar tradition that Hazel helped establish runs through the Isley Brothers’ guitar evolution
- Lenny Kravitz — The retro-psychedelic rock-soul synthesis of the 1990s has Hazel as a primary ancestor
- Fishbone — The Los Angeles ska-punk-funk-rock band absorbed the P-Funk guitar tradition
- The entire psychedelic funk tradition — Every guitarist who has tried to synthesize the emotional power of psychedelic rock with the rhythmic discipline of funk is working in the space Hazel defined
He died at forty-two. He left three great albums and one solo record. George Clinton said he colored the style of Funkadelic. “Maggot Brain” is regularly cited as one of the greatest guitar solos ever recorded.
He was twenty when he recorded it. Clinton told him his mother just died. He played for ten minutes. The fuzz box and the wah and the pentatonic minor in E.
That is the complete technical description. Everything else is the music.
Tone note: Clinton added the ghostly echoes after the recording. The echo that gives the “Maggot Brain” solo its spectral quality — the sense that the notes are haunted — was not part of Hazel’s performance. He produced the emotional content; Clinton added the sonic environment. The collaboration between the performer’s emotional commitment and the producer’s environmental decision is one of the more perfect production partnerships in rock history. Hazel gave the grief. Clinton gave it a ghost.
George Clinton told him to play like his mother just died. Eddie Hazel was twenty years old. He played for ten minutes. The solo used a pentatonic minor scale in the key of E, through a fuzz box and a Crybaby wah pedal. Clinton added the ghostly echoes in the mix.
The guitar was almost certainly a Fender Stratocaster. The amp was the Fender Dual Showman. The fuzz was a Big Muff Pi. The wah was a Crybaby. Clinton had been taking LSD.
The result was “Maggot Brain” — one of the most discussed guitar solos in the history of recorded music, from a guitarist who died at forty-two having produced three albums and one solo record.
George Clinton: “Eddie Hazel colored the style of Funkadelic. All the stuff leading up to Maggot Brain and afterwards — he set the style.”
He played like his momma just died. Everything after that was the style.
If Eddie Hazel’s psychedelic funk guitar — the Stratocaster-and-Big-Muff approach, the emotional wah technique, the Funkadelic synthesis of Hendrix and James Brown — has you exploring the P-Funk guitar tradition, check our complete guide to Kurt Cobain’s guitars and gear — who inhabited a completely different tradition but shared Hazel’s specific philosophy of emotional directness over technical display, and whose pawn-shop approach to guitars would have made perfect sense to someone who played through a Dual Showman and a Big Muff on principle.
And for the next guitarist in this series — whose approach to slide guitar in a rock context shares Hazel’s commitment to the guitar as a voice — don’t miss our breakdown of Lowell George’s complete gear guide.
FAQ: Eddie Hazel Guitars & Gear
- What guitar did Eddie Hazel play on “Maggot Brain”?
- Almost certainly a Fender Stratocaster, though this cannot be confirmed with complete certainty. Sweetwater’s profile stated: “a Strat is widely believed to have been played by Hazel for his defining solo on ‘Maggot Brain.'” Hazel used Stratocasters throughout his career, ranging from a late-1950s sunburst model to a collection of 3-bolt 1970s models, and his primary association is with Fender single-coil guitars. The Stratocaster’s single-coil clarity and tremolo system suited the specific expressive approach of the solo. He was also heavily associated with a black Gibson Les Paul Custom, which he used for heavier rhythm tones and live performances.
- What was George Clinton’s instruction for the Maggot Brain solo?
- Clinton told Hazel: “play like your momma just died. Really just let it out. Then let it get happy, like thinking it was all going to be fine. Just go through all the emotions.” The emotional instruction — not a technical description but a feeling — directed the entire ten-minute solo. The technique is documented: “Eddie played his solo in a pentatonic minor scale in the key of E, putting it through a fuzz box and Cry Baby wah-wah pedal, glazed with dub-style delay.” But the delay was added by Clinton after the recording was complete; Hazel’s actual recording signal chain was guitar → fuzz → wah → amp.
- What amplifier did Eddie Hazel use?
- The Fender Dual Showman — a powerful tube amplifier head from the 1960s with the circuitry of the Twin Reverb in head form. Equipboard confirmed: “Eddie Hazel used the Fender Dual Showman amplifier as his preferred amp in the 1960s.” The Dual Showman’s enormous clean headroom provided the neutral, powerful platform for his fuzz and wah explorations — allowing both effects to operate at maximum expressiveness without the amp adding its own saturation and compression on top.
- What effects did Eddie Hazel use?
- George Clinton identified the core effects: “Eddie started right out learning the pedals — the wah wah, the Big Muff, and phasers and shit.” The primary tools were the Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi fuzz (for the massive sustained fuzz character of “Maggot Brain” and the heavier Funkadelic recordings) and the Dunlop Crybaby Wah (for the vocal, expressive quality of the lead tones). Phase shifter effects were also part of the P-Funk arsenal. The dub-style delay on “Maggot Brain” specifically was added by Clinton in the mixing process, not part of Hazel’s original recording signal chain.
- How did Eddie Hazel’s technique differ from other guitarists?
- His most distinctive physical approach was the mixed pick-and-finger technique for rhythm playing. Blackbyrd McKnight described it: “He had a way of playing rhythm where he used his fingers as well as the pick. I understand that he got that style from his grandmother.” This technique — using both pick and bare fingertips for rhythm — produced a specific rhythmic variety and dynamic range that pure-pick technique doesn’t achieve. Additionally, his synthesis of Jimi Hendrix’s psychedelic lead approach with the rhythmic discipline of the James Brown/soul tradition was entirely his own — he was both a psychedelic lead guitarist and a funk rhythm guitarist of the first order.
- Why is Maggot Brain considered one of the greatest guitar solos?
- Because of the emotional range it covers and the patience with which it covers it. The solo runs for ten minutes using the simplest possible melodic vocabulary — pentatonic minor scale in E — through a fuzz box and wah pedal, and covers the arc from isolated grief to tentative hope to transcendence that Clinton’s instruction described. The technical simplicity is part of the achievement: Hazel didn’t use complex scales or rapid runs; he used sustained notes, careful wah placement, and the emotional commitment that Clinton’s instruction demanded. The ghostly delay that Clinton added in the mix gave the notes their spectral quality. The solo influenced a generation of psychedelic-funk guitarists and is regularly cited in lists of the greatest guitar performances ever recorded.
- How do I approach Eddie Hazel’s guitar sound?
- Fender Stratocaster into a large, clean tube amp (Fender Dual Showman, Fender Twin, or equivalent). Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi (sustain at maximum) and Dunlop Crybaby Wah as primary effects. Tape delay added in mix or by a tape echo pedal (Maestro Echoplex or Fulltone Tube Tape Echo) for the “Maggot Brain” ghostly character. The technical approach: pentatonic minor in E, single sustained notes, wah position controlling the emotional expression of each note. The essential non-technical approach: find your emotional reference point. Clinton’s instruction works for practice as well as recording. Play like something important was just lost. Let the music carry the emotion. The fuzz and wah will do the rest.
