Marty Friedman talks about Buckethead & Paul Gilbert

So you’ve done a ton of work in Japan and there’s this legendary clip of you and Paul Gilbert together on a show. When was the first time you met Paul?

Oh wow, I’ve known Paul forever. Even back in the Shrapnel records days. On this show I did a long time ago, Paul came around a couple of times. And it was always great to have him on there. Super great guy and great player. It was easy to do crazy things on that show, there was a lot of joking around and taking the piss. And if you’re a serious musician’s type of person, it’s not gonna be the show for you to be on. We were basically making fun of everything but with the best intentions. But it was like British humor in a lot of ways, like it can get quite nasty sometimes. But it’s all with a good heart, it’s funny, you know what I mean?

Like friendly roasting?

Yeah! A lot of that. And a lot of taking the piss at yourself. So if you go on a show like that and you have an agenda of promoting your album or tour whatever, it won’t work. But Paul was really good about going with the flow. There’s a lot of silly game playing and stuff, typical Japanese stuff. It was a really good show and we had a lot of good guests on that show.

Did you and Paul ever talk about doing a tour or something together? Because seems like a natural fit.

We probably have. We actually just played at the same event in Norway this year in March at the Norway guitar festival. But we probably have. I don’t even remember.

So there’s never been like a G3 talk with you two guys and somebody else?

Not that I can think of but we’ve probably done an event or something together.

I was going to ask you about Buckethead. Whether you’re aware of Buckethead or not? Because we do a lot of Buckethead stuff on our channel about him.

Not really. I’ve heard his music but I don’t know him, I’ve never crossed paths with him. But super guitar player though, that’s for sure!

So you’ve never considered putting a bucket on? Or a mask? Or getting some nunchucks on stage?

No…um…I’m not really that crazy. But it works for him. And what I heard him play was really super, so, it’s all good.