Ryan Roxie Interview: Secrets, Guitars And What It's Really Like Working With Alice Cooper

Ryan Roxie photo @ Nottingham Confidential

Rock guitarist and singer-songwriter Ryan Roxie is the founding member of Roxie 77 and has played with Alice Cooper, Slash and Gilby Clarke of Guns N' Roses. He spoke to Nottingham Confidential ahead of his solo acoustic gig at The Old Angel in Nottingham.

"This is the first time I've been to Nottingham under these circumstances, just me and a guitar and my solo stuff. I've been here before with Alice (Cooper) I know we've played Nottingham, I've seen it on the itinerary!
The tour I'm doing now, it couldn't have been done without the help of friends and fans from my previous bands, whether it was Alice or Roxie 77, I had some really great guys who stepped up and helped make these dates possible for this tour after the sponsor pulled out of another tour I was doing. I work with Gibson guitars as my 'normal' gig and do clinics all round, but in order to do the tour I had to take some time off so this was the first time I was booked to play in England for five years so I thought, I've got to come here, there's no way I'm not coming!. We're going to come and a do another set of gigs again really soon, hopefully in the next couple of months or so and next time we'll try and come with big electric guitars because much as I love talking and being intimate with an acoustic guitar, there's something about an electric guitar that I'm just more comfortable with.

Ryan Roxie photo @ Nottingham Confidential 

"My set is a collection of everything I've done and have been influenced by over the years. I got my influences from the 'real guys', there's a lot of bands who are influenced by newer bands, who were influenced by older bands. I was influenced by The Beatles, that was my ultimate favourite band from day one and then another band named Cheap Trick and through that I have these power-pop, melodic roots, but there's something about that electirc guitar, that loud guitar, playing big chords, it allured me and so I have always tried to blend those two together. And it's quite conicidental that Alice Cooper who I played with does the same thing, he blends very pop melodies with heavy guitars, which is what I'd been trying to do my whole life anyway so it was a great fit for me and Alice to play together for as many years as we did.

"I always said Alice Cooper was pretty much the best boss you could ever have, seriously! A long, black- haired rock & roller as your boss is not a bad thing. He taught me so much, not just about music, but about the music business and to be honest with you, to this day, the lessons that I learned from playing with him and the things that I see him doing business wise, from being a radio show host and doing all the things he does with his charity work, I really tried to emulate all those things, like Splitting the Profits- half of the money from downloads from Roxie 77 goes to charity. So all of this was influenced by how Alice used music as a foundation, but also how he always branched off into other facets, very cool and inspiring."