GUITARIST GEORGE LYNCH DISCUSSES “WICKED SENSATION (REIMAGINED),” THE END MACHINE AND RETIRING THE LYNCH MOB MONIKER

Ruben Mosqueda of KNAC.com spoke with guitarist extraordinare, George Lynch. Highlights from the interview appear below.

KNAC.com: What inspired Wicked Sensation Reimagined? I know you and the band were performing the album top to bottom live. You could have easily done a live recording of the album.

George Lynch: Right, I didn’t see treading over old ground serving any purpose, I just couldn’t get excited about that prospect. Doing something that was more creative sounded more interesting and fun, which is why we did it the way that we did it. We wanted to make everything a little more interesting. We didn’t do that with every song, I’d say that roughly half of the songs are significantly different. I’d say that the other half are pretty close to what you have been accustomed to, same tempo, same key and the same approach, we have just brought them up to today’s technology and given them a fresh, new perspective. And they’re very “stripped down,” I have to point that out.

KNAC.com: How challenging was it to take songs that you’ve performed for the past 30 years and give them a fresh coat of paint like that?

George Lynch: No, no, it actually takes more effort to perform things the same way for the past years as opposed to just having fun with it. Songs are just a product of a moment in time, to pretend that time doesn’t continue to march on and to try to recreate that moment over and over again…it seems counterintuitive. To do something that is more reactive like we did on this album is much more natural for me.

KNAC.com: Think down the road and who knows how long that will be, do you plan on injecting some of these new renditions into the set list?

George Lynch: Well, like you alluded to, there’s a lot more building blocks that need to be added to the equation to have the luxury to consider that. Assuming all of those things happen and we have some resemblance of normalcy, then I’d consider it. Having said that, I have no idea what the answer to your question would be. I would guess that we’d get together, we’d talk about it, we’d probably try it with a couple of songs, we’d do Hell Child with the more punk, manic intensity and we’d see how people dig that. If they dig it, we keep doing it, if they don’t then we’ll go back to the old version. It’s almost like when they do these test groups for movies to see what people think. That’s kind of what we’d be doing in a way. I like to remain flexible. We played some shows that were controversial, we did five shows back to back, we try to make every show different night to night. There are some songs that are found in the set from night to night, but overall, I’m a huge fan of keeping things interesting.

KNAC.com: You took a big risk tackling this classic album, no?

George Lynch:  I’d say so. It was also a bit of work, but it was fun work, from a creative standpoint, it was very gratifying. We talked things through collectively as a band and we worked through some arraignment ideas and approaches. We did that with half the songs and the other half we freshened up some and stripped them down. Then [drummer] Brian [Tichy] and I talked about potential tempos and grooves and we brought that to the band. I think there were a lot of people screaming “Don’t touch Wicked Sensation”, don’t do it!” [laughs] It’s just so strange to me that people think that way. We’re not replacing anything, the other version is still available. I wrote it, why can’t I have fun with it? I don’t know what the big deal is? Dude, I think we have other fish to fry right now, other than George Lynch doing a “reimagined” version of Wicked Sensation. F–k!!! [laughs] I think people might be channeling their angst and frustration from areas of their lives and bringing it to something like this record. It’s so silly, I can’t even believe it. [laughs].

KNAC.com: …Another well received project was T&N which has a Dokken connection. The album was part Dokken material and part new material with guests. Any thoughts on doing the second album like you guys envisioned?

George Lynch:  Well, T&N evolved into The End Machine. We are working on the second The End Machine record. [Bassist] Jeff [Pilson] and I just finished writing the songs for the record, [singer] Robert [Mason] will be working on vocals, melodies and lyrics. We’re bringing in [drummer] “Mild” Steve Brown [laughs] who is the brother of  “Wild” Mick Brown, who as you know is retired. Steve is wonderful, he’s younger and he has that same “wild” Mick personality and he plays in the same style. He plays just like his brother [laughs] It’s amazing! On the new The End Machine album we went more Dokkencentric, which is what the label requested. The label is Frontiers [Records], and they wanted something that was a little bit more geared towards the Dokken sound. When you hear it I think you’ll agree that we were very successful in achieving that.

On the subject of George retiring the Lynch Mob band name, the guitarist said,” [Wicked Sensation Reimagined] will be the last thing that I will release under the Lynch Mob name. I’m done with it and I’m moving on from it. I don’t know what I will call what I do from here forward, but it won’t be Lynch Mob. We’re retiring the name and retiring the project. When the pandemic hit, we canceled shows and looks like we won’t be doing anything until sometime in 2021. Also in case you’re wondering, I won’t be calling it something like The George Lynch Experience or something like that. It will be something that encompasses my entire career and stuff that I have done over the years.”

Read more at KNAC.com.

Click here to read more about Wicked Sensation (Reimagined), and to stream the title track , please go here.