Buckethead Plays Disney
Good evening everybody, in the late 90's Buckethead began working on what was described as his most precious personal project to date. Buckethead plays Disney.
An album comprised of Buckethead playing his favorite Disney songs.
In case you've lived under a rock and don't know, Buckethead loves Disney.
He went there a bunch of times with Axl Rose and supposedly signed his GNR contract on a ride, once listed his favourite album as Disney's Main Street Electrical Parade, which he's also used during toytime, the numerous 1313 references which is Disneyland address, his music label is registered as hatboxghost music which is named after the character from Disneyland's haunted mansion ride, and is also on the cover of pike 222 'out of the attic', he's played tons of Disney songs live, bucketheadland and so much more. So yep, Buckethead loves Disney. But, what happened to the album?
The album was first listed as 'upcoming' on avant record labels catalog, which is the same record label that released Buckethead's debut album Bucketheadland.
Buckethead first spoke of the album in a 1999 interview with Philadelphia's city paper, using his hand puppet Herbie, stating:-
'He’s trying to bring back good childhood memories and recapture his youth a little bit. There'll be park themes, electric parades and weird narration stories about summertime's he spent there'.
And then in early 2000 in an interview with the website Riffage, when asked when the album was coming out he said:-
'Oh, I'm working on that right now --in fact, right when you called. Hopefully (it will come out) early in the year, because it's been a long, long time. I just was never happy (with it). I did it and I didn't like it and I just kept (working on it). But now I'm just gonna do it and let it be, and I'll just make another one if I don't like it.
The interviewer replied – You made a whole album and then just scrapped it?
Yeah, because it just didn't feel right to me. But one day maybe I'll go back and I might like it.
Shortly after this interview Buckethead officially signed with Guns N Roses and spend most of the year locked in a studio playing the same parts over and over, waiting for Axl Rose and his dog to show up.
All mention of the album was gone until 2006 when Buckethead released his Secret Recipe DVD, which contained a small clip from 1999, the same time as the interviews, showing a Buckethead titled Disney CD.
A lot people, including myself, assumed that this was the long lost 'Buckethead plays Disney'.
However, after looking into it, these were albums that you could buy from Disneyland for a brief time in the late 90's, choosing your favorite park songs at the kiosk and burning them to CD. False alarm.
So whether his GNR commitments sidelined the project in 2000 and he never went back to it, or he could just never get the album to 'feel right',or there was just too many hurdles when it comes to Disney and copyright, the album has never seen the light of day and probably never will.
And why he was never included on the 2018 guitar album 'Disney Super Guitar' besides the likes of Paul Gilbert, Zakk Wylde & Bumblefoot is beyond me. If its Disney and guitar, then who better than Buckethead?