Tristan Gianola - guitar
Maxwell Boecker - bass
Moses Eder - drums

Composed and produced by Tristan Gianola.
Mixed and mastered by Mell Dettmer.
Artwork by Tristan Gianola.

Guitarist and composer Tristan Gianola reveals the eponymously titled debut album for his project Guitar is Dead, the New Orleans-based punk-jazz trio featuring Gianola (guitar), Maxwell Boecker (bass) and Moses Eder (drums). This album vents the musical aggression of three malcontent New Orleans musicians with blazing guitar solos, spiteful rants and ferocious riffs bridging the fed-up rage of punk and musical finesse of experimental jazz.

With a vast array of musical ventures under his belt from conducting classical ensembles to maintaining a busy schedule as a sideman guitarist, Tristan Gianola needed an outlet solely for his gluttonous fretboard impulses. He formed Guitar is Dead in 2016 and completed their debut album, meanwhile setting up tours in the South and Northeast, filming a music video for their single Tip Bucket and holding down a monthly residency at Sidney’s Saloon featuring New Orleans’ wildest performers.

Guitarist Tristan Gianola (Wayne Horvitz, Mike Dillon) leads his New Orleans trio Guitar is Dead in energetic performances of his own breed of shredding loud-jazz, punk, metal and heavy rock. Described as “flagrantly virtuosic” (Dave Segal, The Stranger), Gianola wields his guitar with the energy of a young rock n’ roller who just picked up their first axe and is ready to smash it into pieces. His musical instincts are embellished with unpredictable imagination as an improviser, composer and band leader. Backed by drummer Moses Eder and bassist Maxwell Boecker, Gianola pushes himself to the edge of his musicianship, risking admirable precision for raw intensity, and lightening the energy with fun-filled stage banter. Guiding him are the influential guitar stylings of John Mclaughlin, Sonny Sharrok, Marc Ribot, Even Hermansen, Bill Frisell, Van Halen, Frank Zappa and many more.