 Jim “Kimo” West is best known as long-time guitarist for the world’s most successful musical satirist, “Weird Al” Yankovic and his work with Al has resulted in three Grammy’s and many platinum records over a period of over twenty years. Their most recent release, “Straight Outa Lynwood” was in the Billboard Top Ten and the single, “White and Nerdy” reached #2 on I Tunes.
After a very successful summer tour of the US, Canada , Australia and New Zealand-120 shows in all-Jim is back to wearing his other “hats”-producer, composer for film and television and session guitarist in Los Angeles, where he works out of his personal Mac-based studio.
Besides production, arranging and guitar work with “Weird Al”, Jim has a lengthy list of composer credits-network and cable television, advertising and feature films. He has produced a number of CD’s for independent artists and other record labels in LA but the most unusual hat Jim wears is his “coconut hat”-“Kimo” is known as one of the world’s foremost Hawaiian “slack key” guitarists and has a number of self-produced CD’s to his credit.
“Composing for television is challenging and the deadlines are very tight-I have to crank out top-quality cues and demos very quickly and have come to rely heavily on BFD to give me convincing drum tracks when tracking live drums is out of the question. In fact, it’s often almost impossible to tell the difference!”
FX -How did you first get involved in playing Hawaiian “slack key” guitar?
JW - I made my first trip to Hawaii way back in 1985 and the town I first visited was Hana, Maui. It's a very small, isolated and rural town, and also one of the most Hawaiian places in the islands. That's where I first heard records by legends like Gabby Pahinui, Atta Isaacs, Sonny Chillingworth, Sons of Hawaii and others. I have been a guitarist all my life and was always fond of playing in alternate tunings. When I heard the gentle sound of "ki ho'alu" and realized they were using different open tunings, something just clicked. Of course it didn't hurt being in paradise as well!
FX - What led to your gig as guitarist with Al Yankovic?
JW - As a young guitarist seeking to better my career, I moved from Florida to Los Angeles in 1981. I was playing in several bands and working a day job, just getting by. My band mate, bassist and long-time friend Steve Jay called one day and said he was doing a record with a guy named "Weird Al" who was also looking for a guitarist to complete his band. As my heart sank I said, "oh no, you mean that guy with the accordion?” I had barely heard of him and from what I knew he was sort of a clown but, well, a gig is a gig. I auditioned and got the job, which initially were just a few gigs around LA. During that time, I realized how brilliant Al was and how his craft was so refined. And such a nice guy, to boot.
Soon afterwards, the video for his single "Ricky" started playing on MTV, which was in its infancy. It was probably the first comedy video ever played on the network. A tour ensued so I quit my day job and the rest is history. The next album "In 3D" had the single "Eat It", the Michael Jackson parody, which made Al a household name. Here we are more than twenty years later-our last CD was in the Billboard Top Ten and the single "White and Nerdy", which I produced the music track for, was #2 on I Tunes for a while. Crazy!
FX - What projects are you currently working on?'I was blown away with BFD 1.5 and now with BFD 2, the sonic quality is tremendous and I don't think anything else out there can touch it.'
JW - I just completed composing 12 tracks for Universal Music. The job was to write intentionally corny "hapa haole" Hawaiian music like the stuff you would hear in a Waikiki hotel lounge. It was a lot of fun and I got to play all the parts, including ukulele and steel guitar. I'm also composing music for a DVD series that features high def video images of Hawaii. It's designed to create a relaxing environment and is really quite beautiful. In the performance arena, I recently played at the very first Southern California Slack Key Festival on January 20th-it was a tremendously successful and fun event!
FX - What was the first software instrument to really excite you?
JW - My first experience with software instruments was with some of the Spectrasonics software. Unfortunately, my computer at the time was just not up to the task of running multiple software instruments and there was way too much latency. Now I have a MacPro quad-core system and I'm able to run quite a few instruments including BFD 2 without any problems. That's very exciting to me!
FX - What FXpansion products do you own and how do you use them, are there any tricks that you find you use all the time?
JW - I was blown away with BFD 1.5 and now with BFD 2, the sonic quality is tremendous and I don't think anything else out there can touch it. My enthusiasm is, well probably pretty annoying- I'm always boasting about it to my composer friends! It's an amazing system and I'm just learning to dig in a little deeper.
FX - Has BFD had an impact on the way you make music and if so in what way?
JW - Well, when I needed "real" drums I often would create a rough drum track with whatever that was easiest and then go back and replace the sounds. Now, I don't have to search around for sounds-it's all covered by BFD 2. Now I just start with BFD and refine the part a bit as the piece develops, then dial up the mixer and adjust levels, pans, ambiences, etc. when it's time to mix
FX - In your opinion what have music software manufacturers done right and what have they done wrong?
JW - Some of the early instruments were not very CPU efficient, designed as though they were the only instrument one would use. And user interfaces were pretty baffling sometimes-I think more effort was put into the look than actual ease of use. I think most of the manufacturers have improved these things a lot in recent years, and they look better than ever too!
FX - What music projects do you have planned for the rest of the year?
JW - I am also producing a CD for Donovan Chapman. He's half-Hawaiian and was born in Louisiana. He recently had a couple of songs in the US country music Top 40 but became disillusioned with the madness of the Nashville "music machine". This project is more about his Hawaiian surfer roots, kind of laid back Jack Johnson vibe. He's an awesome singer performer and songwriter and I have utmost confidence that he'll be well known for his original music. I'll be giving BFD a workout on that one! I'll be touring with my 'slack key" project this spring as well and the with Weird Al's multimedia show this summer!
FX - Thanks very much Jim for your time and insights!
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