Adrian Belew

Perhaps best known for his long stint as frontman and co-guitarist for the progressive rock group King Crimson from 1981 to 2009, Belew is widely recognized as an "incredibly versatile player" who has released nearly twenty solo albums for Island Records and Atlantic Records, blending or alternating Beatles-inspired pop-rock with more experimental fare. Belew is a member of the intermittently-active pop band the Bears, and fronted his own band GaGa in the late 1970s and early 1980s. He has worked extensively as a session and touring musician, including periods with Frank Zappa, David Bowie, Talking Heads, King Crimson, Laurie Anderson, and Nine Inch Nails, as well as contributing to hit singles by Paul Simon, Tom Tom Club, and others. Belew himself scored a Top 10 hit single in 1989 with "Oh Daddy," and his 2005 single "Beat Box Guitar" was nominated for a Grammy in the Best Rock Instrumental Performance category.\n', ' Belew has also worked in instrument design and multimedia, collaborating with Parker Guitars to help design his own Parker Fly signature guitar, and designing his own iOS mobile apps, "FLUX by belew" and "FLUX:FX, the multi-effect audio processor app."\n', ' Belew was born in Covington, Kentucky, to a middle-class family. Initially known to friends and classmates as "Steve Belew," Adrian Belew played drums in his teen years (playing with the Ludlow High School marching band) and later with the high-school cover band The Denems. Inspired by Jimi Hendrix, he took up guitar when he was bedridden for several months with mononucleosis. Not inclined to formal music study, Belew was nonetheless a quick developer and rapidly became a high-school guitar hero. Mostly teaching himself by listening to records, he was ignorant of the studio trickery and sound manipulation used to create particular guitar lines, and so found ways of replicating them himself manually using unusual playing techniques and a growing interest in effects and treatments. While maturing as a player and mastering various playing styles, Belew became increasingly preoccupied with ways to avoid "sounding like everybody else." He eventually found his own sound and style by learning how to make his guitar mimic sound effects such as car horns, animal noises, or industrial sounds and then applying those sounds to relatively standard songs.\n', '