Josh Sturgill
Abingdon, Maryland was a quiet town just north of I95 until the Sturgill's moved there in the early 1980's. And it wasn't just Josh making all the racket. The stereo would usually be blasting out AC/DC and Aerosmith long before the kids got home from school. For better or worse, there was no television in the house at all, just the gigantic stereo in the living room. Fortunately Josh's parents had a fairly diverse musical sense so there was, at any given time, a wild mix of Progressive Rock, Southern Rock, Jazz, Fusion, and yes, even classical music (although in synthesizer form thanks to Dr. Tomita) filling the house morning, noon and night. So it shouldn't have been a surprise when at age 13 he finally begged his dad to teach him how to play the acoustic guitar that he always brought to parties and get-togethers. It was around that time that the family finally bought a TV and of course, was constantly tuned to the then new MTV. That would explain most of the permanent damage done to the boy while growing up. Armed with a chord chart and the heavy influence of David Gilmour, Alex Lifeson, Dicky Betts and Randy Rhoads, Josh spent every waking moment learning everything he could about the guitar and music in general. During his sophomore year of High School Josh met Scott Watson who lived a few miles north in Bel Air and the two formed what would eventually become Dreamseed, a rough around the edges Prog-Metal band with a fairly Spinal Tap-ish situation with bass players. Out of necessity and desperation Sturgill was forced...ah, learned to play keyboards and sing. Neither very well though. Youth, Time and the shifting priorities of the music industry put an end to Dreamseed and Josh tried it again later with another Prog-Metal band Vision with a similar outcome. Having been fed up with dealing with the original music scene in Maryland Sturgill was perfectly happy sitting at home doing absolutely nothing at all or going to see his favorite Classic Rock cover bands. One of those bands was the Baltimore-based Awaken. In March of 2000 when things went south with their guitarist at the time, Sturgill was asked to join and has been performing with Awaken ever since. At about the same time, Sturg (as he's known to friends) had stumbled onto another technological marvel that had made a favorable musical impression on him....a computer. The family only ever had one computer, an IBM PS 2 (friggin' DOS, remember DOS?) that couldn't connect to a phone line. Josh had no clue what any of it did, it was a $2000 deck of cards to him. But he kept reading in Guitar magazines about Digital Audio Workstations and Computer Based Recording and this thing called Pro Tools whatever the hell that was. So he bought one. Not a great one, he had no clue what he was doing. Didn't even know how to turn the thing on. Yet this still started the years long search for the "Solo Album" he had been working on since Dreamseed. Now relocated to South Central Pennsylvania Josh is taking another stab at it. A little older, a little wiser. A little more focused on songs than shredding, Sturg is releasing a full length CD of new material and planning a small number of dates to get the music out. Josh is also available for session work in the Maryland/Pennsylvania area for anyone interested in using the wide variety of playing styles that he's learned over the years.Have you performed in front of an audience?There will be a few dates in South Central Pennsylvania once the Cd is closer to being finished.
Your musical influences
Rush, Dream Theater, Pink Floyd, Frank Zappa, Crack the Sky, Dixie Dregs, Franz Liszt, King Crimson, Al diMeola, Little Feat, UK, TotoWhat equipment do you use?
Line 6 gear for recording and live performance. Marshall Vintage Modern 50W and 412 Cab for live performance. Jackson Guitars, Peavey Guitars, Steinberger w/ TransTrem. Roland Keyboards and soft-synths by Native Instruments and Toontrack. Digidesign Pro Tools.Great sounding song Josh! I still can't believe you turned down David Gilmours offer to play on this track! That's what a solo album really means I guess. Dave did say to let you know that he'll still do the solo if you want him to for the song you tracked with Sting.All comments (2)
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jesturg
@jesturg
Nice! This one sticks in your head!