“It’s in a tuning that I call ‘Lazy Keith Richards’”: Melvins’ Dale Crover invents a new guitar tuning – and lands a Kim Thayil guest solo – for his new single

Melvins drummer Dale Crover has released the single I Quit from his upcoming third full-length solo album, Glossolalia. The track sees Soundgarden's Kim Thayil lend his guitar skills to the brooding track, which sets the tone for the rest of the album.

Speaking about the song, Crover says, “It’s about trying to control people and thinking that you’re right about everything. It’s in a tuning that I call ‘Lazy Keith Richards.’ It opens in G, but you can only tune the A string to G. I thought it would be cool to get Kim to do a guitar solo on the track.”

“That’s him after the second chorus,” he adds, referring to Thayil's warped lead guitar, which punctuates the track and amplifies its somber and disconcerting aura.

Throughout the years, Thayil has consistently expressed his admiration for the Melvins, which makes this collaboration even more special.

“At the time, they [the Melvins] were very risk-taking in their approach to both slow, heavy music and fast music. It's guitar-oriented, so it's going to appeal to my sensibilities and my instrument,” said Thayil in a 2011 interview with the Dallas Observer.

Dale Crover - I Quit (Official Audio) - YouTube

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“They don't have a badly-arranged brass section behind them, which is very popular these days. A lot of the bands that I listen to these days sort of sound like the Melvins and perhaps would cite the Melvins or Soundgarden as an influence along with various other bands.”

Thayil also credits the Melvins for introducing drop-D tuning to hard rock. “I remember Buzz [Osborne] and I going to see St. Vitus in around 1986, after which we went back to Mark Arm’s apartment. We were spinning records and talking about how Kiss tuned everything to E-flat,” he recalled in a 1995 Guitar World interview.

“Mark and I planned to just drop everything down a half-step, but Buzz said that all you had to do was just drop the E string down to D. It was like, ‘Really?’ At that point, I played everything in regular tuning. I didn’t bother with different tunings because I was having a hard enough time figuring out the regular one. I mean, barre chords were my staple. And when we D-tuned and started experimenting. We’ve never stopped.”

Dale Crover's I Quit, featuring Kim Thayil, is out now. His album Glossolalia arrives September 13 via Joyful Noise Recordings.