Jimmy Herring

[JohnBlood10]

Has anyone heard of this guy? He's mainly a fusion player (which I know is not everybody's cup o' tea) but he's incredible. Think Duane Allman meets Allan Holdsworth.

He's a fixture on the jam band scene, but he's got a ton of great fusion stuff, too. The clip is from a band called Aquarium Rescue Unit (they're a little off-kilter, hence the singer's intro).

<iframe title="YouTube video player" width="480" height="390" src="YouTube - jimmy herring #2" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

[JohnBlood10]

Sorry about the messy embed code, by the way. I'm barely computer-literate.

[Flyin' Brian]

He's not a newbie. Been around for a long time. Saw him a few months back in Nashville. He gets around a lot of different styles, but he isn't quite my thing.

[Dark Star]

He's a monster. I mostly like his work w/Phil Lesh. He makes a great team w/Warren Haynes, imo.

[kenbennett]

Yes, Jimmy Herring. He's from my area. Guess he studied at AIM in Atlanta, maybe taught there. Played with the best in town. I've met him and have friends who know him pretty well. Hell, I turned on the TV late one night and there he was on Letterman with The Dead.

[JohnBlood10]

Originally Posted by kenbennett

Yes, Jimmy Herring. He's from my area. Guess he studied at AIM in Atlanta, maybe taught there. Played with the best in town. I've met him and have friends who know him pretty well. Hell, I turned on the TV late one night and there he was on Letterman with The Dead.

Yeah, I know he's from NC, Fayetteville I think. He's part-time faculty at AIM. He was probably the first guitarist to seriously get me into jazz; I'd been exposed to it before, but I needed something with more of a rock edge to get me truly interested.

[Jazzophobe]

Jimmy is the man! He plays with Widespread Panic in the summer time. He's also got a solo album that I need to pick up now..."Lifeboat"!!

[monk]

Herring went to GIT sometime in the 80s and later taught at the Atlanta Institute of Music. The Lifeboat CD is worth having just to hear his tone and phrasing on The Jungle Book Overture.

[Banksia]

I've got the Lifeboat album and I highly recommend it.

[Flat]

Yeah, Monk, get this: I went to GIT 1984/85.

One day I was walking the halls and took a shortcut through one of the small performance stage rooms. (This is when GIT was upstairs over the Hollywood Wax Museum.)

There was a guy in the room by himself with a long, reddish-blond pony tail, leaning against the stage playing the most spot-on Duane Allman lead I had ever heard through one of the Peavy combos that were scattered around the school in those days. I just stopped in my tracks with my guitar case in hand and watched for a few seconds, then went on through the back door, not wanting to interrupt the guy's practicing.

I later learned he was Jimmy Herring. Saw him around school now and then, but never got to know him, unfortunately.

Flash forward a couple decades and out of the blue I hear he's playing with the post-Jerry Dead! But you could tell this guy was an extremely talented, special player in 30 seconds of listening to his riffs -- even way back then.

[lotuscent]

i saw him twice with aquarium rescue unit. he was like a metal shredder with a jazz vocabulary. played a strat through a mesa dual rectifier.
haven't heard him in a really long time.

[monk]

flat,
I was there 1982/1983 above the Wax Museum. I remember Charlie Fechter or Eric Paschal saying the space had once been the Lee Strasberg Actor's Workshop. Oscar Cartaya was in my class and Frank Gambale was in the class behind. Another one of the guys in my class played with Sade for several years.
Regards,
monk

[Flat]

Small world, monk! I remember Charlie well. I really liked him as a teacher for sight-reading. Seemed super bright and was really good with students.

Was Scott Henderson in your class or with Frank?

And yeah..."Lifeboat" is excellent, imho.

[JohnBlood10]

"Lifeboat" is an excellent CD; there are a few swinging tunes on it in addition to the fusion stuff. It's a damn shame that all the ARU albums are out of print (although it's really not surprising; I get a lot of "What the hell is this?!" type of comments when it's playing in my car).

I saw the Allman Brothers and Widespread Panic (probably my two favorite rock bands) on a co-bill last summer, and as it turns out, Warren Haynes missed his flight for the second show. Jimmy played with ABB all night, on an ES-335, no less. I wasn't used to seeing him play a hollowbody, but man, was it a great show.

[monk]

flat,
Scott had already graduated when I got there. He may have been in class with Jennifer Batten which graduated when my class started. He was doing some teaching when I was there.

Ten or twelve years ago, the Nashville NAMM Show ran the same week as the Chet Atkins Appreciation Society Convention. Several of the teachers were in town for NAMM and dropped by the ChetCon. I got to see Eric Paschal, Chaz Grasamke, Steve Trovato and met David Oakes for the first time. Charlie Fechter came up from Birmingham where he's living and teaching Tai Chi. We had a great reunion.
monk

[RonD]

Thanks for the reminder.
I've been meaning to check out some of his stuff.
The only thing I had heard from him was a cut on the Steely Dan tribute "The Royal Dan". Kinda liked it.
I'm currently listening to his album, "Lifeboat" on grooveshark.
I like it. Definitely worth a listen.

Cheers, Ron

[Banksia]

He also played "Meeting of the Spirits" on Visions of an Inner Mounting Apocalypse, the J McL tribute album.

[kenbennett]

The last time I saw Herring--it was a long time ago--he was sitting in with Derek Trucks at the Midtown Music Festival in Atlanta. Jimmy play a PRS hollow body.