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Baker's Dozen

Planets Of Sound: Joey Santiago Of Pixies' Favourite Albums
Laurie Tuffrey , May 22nd, 2014 10:43

With Indie Cindy out and their headline slot at Field Day on the horizon, Joseph Alberto Santiago, Pixies' lead guitarist-cum-noise implementer, rocks us with his 13 defining records

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The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Are You Experienced
That's pretty obvious. When I got turned onto it, I was like, "Okay, I'll pick up the guitar!" My favourite parts of it are the sonics. It's nothing like anyone's heard. Pete Townshend was like, "Alright, I quit the guitar." [laughs] That instrumental, 'Third Stone From The Sun', boy, how good is that? There's a video of Stevie Ray Vaughan - have you seen that? He did it fucking note-for-note! It's incredible! It's like, "Who the fuck is this guy?!" I just love it.

I would say around 12 years old when I bought it. Then, I loved the poppier ones, like 'Fire' and obviously 'Purple Haze', had to learn that riff. I figured out what he was playing through a painful process. I'm not as fluid on guitar as my little brother, who can hear it once and just do it. That song has a chord, an E7#9 - I use it a lot! I use it on 'Tame': it's the one where everyone's hitting three chords and I'm hitting that chord and that's all I'm hitting. It's one of those chords that's either a question mark or an answer. It's very neutral, but more interesting than a major chord.