Mirador guitarist was worried Greta Van Fleet would think he was “defiling” Jake Kiszka by starting a band with him
Between Jake Kiszka and Ida Mae’s Chris Turpin, Mirador sounds like the guitar dream team you didn’t know you needed. But Turpin admits he was once worried fans might think he was “defiling” the Greta Van Fleet guitarist by starting the band with him.
The pair first crossed paths backstage in Detroit in 2018, when Ida Mae were opening for Greta Van Fleet. And now, with their self-titled debut album out last month, they’re reflecting on those first impressions in a chat with Classic Rock.
“Chris was this Zorro-like figure,” Kiszka says. “Like Strider sitting at the end of the bar. I was immediately struck by his playing. It was really incredible. And some of that earlier blues and folk stuff, it’s really rare to find players who can do that.”
READ MORE: “We knew there was going to be quite a bit of scrutiny”: Jake Kiszka felt “pressure” at what Greta Van Fleet fans would think of his Mirador side project
Turpin, meanwhile, was equally impressed by Kiszka. “I’ve grown up with those hyper-classic guitar heroes; I loved Cream, Hendrix, Paul Kossoff from Free,” he explains. “And all of a sudden this… prick was there, going to the front, the guitar behind the head, and to these screaming people. I remember catching him topless backstage and being like: ‘Where the fuck have you guys been?! I’ve been waiting for a band like you for ten years!’”
Their first Mirador gigs only confirmed the chemistry. As Kiszka puts it, “it was like a nuclear reactor going off!”
“It’s incredibly exciting,” says the guitarist. “Because when you play in a band for years and years, there comes a point where the change in evolution becomes a bit more incremental. But what’s really exciting about this band is that everything is so fresh. Every single night is drastically different. There’s constant change, constant growth, constant communication.”
For Turpin though, that excitement came with its own set of anxieties.
“It was sink or swim,” he says. “Like: ‘Are these Greta fans gonna love this? Or are they gonna think I’m Beelzebub taking their precious baby away, breaking their hearts and defiling him?!’ But to see them get invested in it has been amazing. Tickets went so quickly. Mainly Jake fans. Ida Mae fans aren’t that quick off the mark. And there aren’t as many.’”
For now, despite ongoing commitments to their respective groups, the pair remain drawn to Mirador, describing the band as a creatively exciting project that will likely demand significant time and energy.
“This is such a time of creative excitement that I’m drawn to Mirador as often as I can,” Kiszka says. “It’ll be interesting to see what we develop as time goes on, and how we pace this thing.”
“Mirador feels like it’ll turn into this raging beast that’s going to take up a lot of time,” Turpin adds.
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Source: www.guitar-bass.net
