Friday Nite Retro - GTR

Welcome to Friday Nite Retro - The weekly feature where we bring back the bands you're happy to have forgotten! GTR was a mid-eighties supergroup founded in 1986 by ex-Genesis guitarist Steve Hackett and Yes and Asia guitarist Steve Howe. Despite their great sound, the band turned out to be not so super, spawning a mere two hit songs and a career spanning just over one year!

GTR were notable for attempting to create a band with guitar and synthesiser sounds, but without the use of conventional keyboard synths, using guitar/synthesisers instead. Hackett and Howe's guitars were outfitted with Roland synthesiser trigger pickups, which used the vibrations of the strings to create MIDI signals used to play the synthesizers. While this may have worked in the studio, they were forced to take a keyboardist on the road because of the poor tracking qualities of the guitar synths.

When the Heart Rules the Mind


The Hunter