Six years ago, when Todd Whitener walked into a pawn shop and laid down 50 bucks for a cheap Dixon acoustic, he never imagined that one day he'd be opening for the band that inspired him to buy his first axe. "My biggest influence was definitely Metallica," Whitener recalls. "When I first picked up the guitar, I was all about lead guitar. I wanted to play lead before I played anything. I kept listening to Metallica and all the Kirk Hammett solos. I'd try to play them, but I couldn't even play chords yet. And even for Days of the New as a band, Metallica was probably our biggest influence." Needless to say, several years of practicing have brought Todd and company a long way. They've achieved a goal and a gig most bands only dream of. Guitar Shop caught up with Todd during a short break, just before Days of the New hit the road again as the opening act for their heroes.
What steered you to the acoustic style, instead of doing what you do on electric?
Well, all of us have kind of done the electric thing since the day we started playing music in bands. I was always into heavy electric bands, especially in the music scene around here. Everyone was doing the same thing and everything was sounding the same. All of us were really searching for something that was just different and we wanted to do it for ourselves, just to give our ears a break. Travis [Meeks, DOTN frontman/guitarist] came up with this idea about still playing rock ‘n' roll, but switching it over to acoustic guitars and making it totally acoustic. So we just pursued that as far as we could and came up with the sound we've got now. We got together about three years ago. The other three guys in the band grew up together, so they've been in bands together off and on for the last eight or nine years.
As a player, how does your style differ from Travis'?
I come from a little more of a jazz-type background. I had a lot of jazz guitar lessons in the last couple of years. Travis comes from more of the heavier guitar background, but our styles of guitar playing don't differ that much. It's just pretty much in our influences where we differ.
What kinds of guitars are you using live?
I use a Takamine, and Travis floats from guitar to guitar, but his main axe is a Tacoma [PM20E or PM15E]. I've pretty much found that Takamines have really done me some justice up there on stage. They're loud and I haven't gotten any feedback from them, and they just play really good. The ones I like best are the Santa Fe models and the limited edition models they make each year. I've been using a lot of those, with the cutaway bodies so I can play high notes, and they all have the Takamine piezo pickups in them with the onboard electronics. For strings, I usually use medium to medium-light gauge D'Addario strings. The only things I really switch gauges for is for the low B tunings; I use heavy low-end strings do they stay in tune better. And I'm playing with the lighter-gauge Jim Dunlop teardrop picks.
How do you plug in when you play live? Do you use an amp or just go straight into the board?
We really haven't gotten an exact formula yet. We've done it a couple of different ways. We've plugged right into the board and just jammed like that. Another way is to have an amp behind me, like a Fender Twin, just so I can have more stage volume. I've also plugged into that and plugged in direct at the same time, then mixed the two signals together to make one fat sound.
Do you use any signal processing or outboard effects for playing live?
No, not really at all. We've got a distortion pedal, an Ibanez Tube Screamer, that's used for heavier parts, but that's about it.
What guitars and effects did you use when making the record?
There's pretty much no effects. They threw some reverb on the guitars to fatten them up. But that's about it. I used a lot of Takamines, but we used a couple of Martins on there, too. They had some pretty fat sounds, but I don't know which models they were. We borrowed them from a store for a bit, then they were brought right back, so I really don't remember which ones they were.
How did you record the guitar tracks? Did you use any unusual techniques to get different sounds?
In a sense, we did it kind of like how we do it live. We had different signals going on. We had the direct signal, and then we put two different mics in front of the guitar, so we'd have those three different to play with and mix and match, whatever. That seemed to work pretty well on most of the album. We did fool with a couple of different amps, but we didn't really use amps too much. They were usually tube amps–I think there was a Matchless and a Marshall.
Have you used any of the newer amps for acoustic guitar?
We've played with traditional acoustic amps, but for me personally, I'm kind of into the sound of plugging into a tube amp that was originally intended for an electric guitar. It gives it a natural kind of dirty sound, which is a good thing for us, and it gives us a unique tone.
Several of your songs use different tunings. How does that affect live performance?
Actually, we haven't played a few of the songs live because we've had a complication with having to retune. We've had so many different tunings and we hate to have to switch guitars after each song, so we had a problem trying to fit them into a set. "Whimsical," "What's Left For Me?," and "Cling" are probably in the weirdest tunings, none of which I can remember off the top of my head. "Whimsical" is in a weird low B tuning, where the low E string is turned all the way down to a B, and "Cling" is set up the same way. "What's Left For Me?" is in D, but it's tuned to a minor chord. If we were to play those songs live it would mean a lot of guitar changes. And for a lot of these shows, if we only have a 40-minute set, we don't want to take up five minutes of that to switch guitars. Lately I've been using only one, and I do quick tune-up for myself between songs. But in longer sets we've used about three guitars each.
Do you change many of the songs arrangements for live performances?
Yes, every night is just a little bit different. We like to ad lib, just to keep it fun for us. We'll get more instrumental and break a few parts down just to have fun. Besides that, songs are basically the same with a few changes.
What have been some of the highlight shows you've played so far?
I'd say opening for Aerosmith. Being able to met those guys was awesome and playing in front of 25,000 people was pretty nice. Marty Friedman of Megadeth has always been a pretty big influence to me and I got to meet him at a show, when we opened for them in Chicago. That was cool. We're going to be opening for Metallica on the next tour and I can't wait for that. I've been jamming to them since I was eight years old. Before I ever got on this band and all this started happening, if there was anyone in this world I'd want to meet, it would be Metallica–it still is. They've always been a huge influence, so it's going to be like a dream come true when it happens.
What advice would you give to other players who are trying to develop their own style and improve their technique?
I know what's worked for me. I've listened to a lot of different kinds of music, like hip-hop, reggae, classical, jazz, and heavy metal. I think one of the most important things is to stay open-minded in your playing and in what you listen to. Be versatile, so you can pick up your instrument and groove to whatever the groove is. I think that's what matters in the long run. Even if you're only playing heavy music, you can still incorporate elements from other styles. It would be silly to close your self off and listen to only one kind of music. But one piece of advice I always give people is to have your heart into what you're doing, because then you'll always be lead in the right direction.
By: Lisa Sharken