Against the backdrop of this frenzy, with almost every guitarist rushing to promote their own vision by going instrumental, the straight-forward rock values often become obscured, and foolishly so, because the further away we get from the roots, the less chance we have of inventing new forms. When in rare cases we do get to hear forthright, direct rock executed with insight and imagination, what immediately strikes you is how modern it sounds and how, amazingly, it is still possible to continue to experiment with the old paradigm.

So what is it about blues and hard rock that continues to sound so fresh to this day? Vinnie Moore is the perfect man to answer that question, as his latest album, To The Core, is a self-assured mixture of both old-school rock and blues and modern impressionistic, unrestricted approach.

A career which began at the age of 12 with playing bars and clubs and then brought Moore’s name universal recognition through his soundtrack to an off-the-wall Pepsi ad in 1985—the pinnacle year of mainstream’s obsession with rock guitar—later led to release of several highly-acclaimed solo albums, and Moore playing in Alice Cooper’s band on the Operation Rock’n’Roll tour as well as on his Hey Stoopid album. All this, together with Moore joining UFO in 2003, served as a perfect platform for making a well-versed and at the same time up-to-date statement about the path walked by rock from Moore’s career start in the mid-‘70s to this day.

An all-the-rage hotshot chopsman in the ‘80s, a sought after guitar guru in the ‘90s, these days Moore can draw from his experience to start exploring things he hasn’t yet managed to do before. While remaining rooted in the first postulates of blues and rock, the new album also shows how the two genres can be taken a step further and remain valid in the 21st century without being compromised.

The audacious pairing of swaggering grooves and splendid melody is the bread and butter of all rock that has ever managed to survive the test of time, and on To The Core we have plenty of both—from the cock-strut of opener “Fly” to the sprawling, transparent melodic elegance of “Over My Head”—executed in Moore’s distinctive full-bodied, deep-voiced tone. Sometimes it is hard to tell where composition ends and improvisation begins as Moore extrapolates his thematic lines ad infinitum from tight flow to dramatic sweeps to spontaneous, unrestrained instrumental hard rock utopianism. And the best part of it is that he still always manages to retain a perfect sense of shape despite limitless expansion of his complex melody lines as they run atop of the rolling thunder of pulsating rhythmic grooves.

Despite occasional futuristic sounds and a dash of fusion here and there, To The Core is a guitar burner which not only reinstates the main postulates of rock but proves again what lies at its heart—direct emotional connection with the listener and a firm belief that real rock should not only kick ass but serve as a springboard for musical insight and invention.

ALISSA ORDABAI: Vinnie, thank you for taking time to do this interview with us.

VINNIE MOORE: No problem at all, thank you for calling.

AO: And congratulations on the new album.

VM: Thank you very much.

AO: I'd like to jump right in and talk about the process you went through to create this album. It seems to me that compared to other instrumental guitar records that have been coming out lately the mood on this album is different. It's refreshing, it's uplifting, and it's so balanced. The word I'm looking for is probably "harmonious". Is this the place you were finding yourself emotionally at the time when you were recording it? Was everything balanced out, everything in harmony?

VM: In my life you mean?

AO: In the creative aspect of it.

VM: In the creative aspect—definitely, I think I was firing on all cylinders, so to speak, and I think that's the one thing I get better at over the years—being creative and expressive, letting emotions come out in my guitar playing, and also the songs. I'm probably not as good a guitarist as I used to be when I was 22 technically, but I'm think I'm way better as a musician and a songwriter now. Yeah, I wrote this stuff over the period of a couple of years as I was playing with UFO and we were on the road so much and recording so much, and just being constantly busy so I couldn't set aside one big lump of time to do it. So I had to do it in intervals, in between things and in retrospect maybe that helped, I don't know.

AO: Was there an initial concept for this album or did it all happen spontaneously as you went along?

VM: The concept was two things. One was to be adventurous, no matter what I did I wanted to be adventurous, and two, I just wanted to experiment with different things musically that I haven't done in the past. And that's what's making it so exciting for me—exploring a new territory. If I come up with a song idea, I go off in a particular direction, and if I haven't treaded on that ground before, then yeah, that really gets me excited.

AO: How do melodies in general come to you? Do you have to create an atmosphere to write them, do you have to isolate yourself from the outside world, or do they come to you unexpectedly?

VM: It happens in all kinds of ways, actually. Sometimes I'm just sitting around playing guitar and something comes out, without me even intending to come up with something. That's always great because it's like a gift, you feel almost like you didn't work for it, it comes out of nowhere. And sometimes you come up with a song idea, maybe a rhythm or just a basic mood for a song and I find that things start playing in my head sometimes when I'm not even consciously thinking about music. Something would be going through my head and a melody would just come out. That's always great too, because that also is easy. [Laughs] And then there are times when I'm playing the guitar in my own studio with all the gear turned on and I'm sitting there TRYING to come up with something and I come up with a melody. It happens in different ways. Whether it just pops out in your head, or it pops out when you're playing or you kind of work a little more, you're consciously thinking about it.

AO: It is something that is difficult to achieve—to reflect the kind of mood you are in, the way you are inspired in your music, with a certain degree of accuracy? I guess my question is, how accurately do you think those particular tracks convey what you felt at the time when you were inspired to write them?

VM: Well, as good as they possibly could, I guess, given the limitations of a musician. [Laughs] Yeah, I think they definitely convey what I was feeling at the time. As best as one can convey something that is in the ethereal world into the physical word, so to speak.

AO: Do you spend a lot of time crafting your melodies from the initial idea into a complete piece or does the main melody come to you spontaneously?

VM: A lot of times they come spontaneously and sometimes you labor over things a little more. Sometimes you can come up with an idea effortlessly and then take it somewhere, to a part that comes with it, and that may take a lot of work. In those cases I have to sit in my studio with a guitar and experiment and then try different things, and it's a little more tedious. There is no set one way that things happen for me, it's just all kinds of different ways. Sometimes it's easy, sometimes it's more difficult and requires a lot of work, and I'm willing to do whatever it takes to get a good song.

AO: A lot of guitar players, when they do an instrumental album, are still holding things within a song format, whereas your approach was to take the music out of the regimented song structure and really go for exploration—really taking those melodies out there. How difficult or how easy was it to do that?

VM: Well, I don't know, that might be a thing that just happens more naturally when I'm really thinking... I try not to think too much when I'm creating music because I think that being conscious of what you are doing is almost the enemy sometimes. When I just get lost in the music and go with the flow and stumble upon things almost what seems to be accidentally, that's always when I do my best work in my opinion, and that's always when I'm most excited when something comes up that's unexpected. And so I kind of get lost in the music and go with the flow, really trying not to think about it too much.

AO: Would you agree if I said that the album proves that the basic hard rock and blues principles are still valid today? Of course, you have some futuristic sounds on this record, you have bits of fusion there. But would you agree that this is one formula that is still valid in the 21st century? As opposed to prog rock that aged pretty badly and now sounds rather dated, or head-on jazz fusion that kind of lost its popularity over the years?

VM: Yeah, I've always basically been a rock guy. I'm into a bunch of different styles of music and I try to incorporate that in what I do. I think that just seeps through what I do--there's stuff I'm inspired by and there's stuff that I listen to. But yeah, my foot has always been in rock and blues, and that seemed to stand the test of time, luckily, where other styles of music have gone through being popular and not popular. Rock forever! [Laughs] And blues, I mean, for how long has blues been around?

AO: Did you challenge yourself technically on any of the tracks on this record? Was there any track that you had to practice to get it right in the studio?

VM: There were things there that were technically challenging that I had to sit there for quite a while to get it as good as I wanted it to be. So I spent time on a couple of parts doing that. I remember sitting there thinking, "How am I going to do this live?" [Laughs] But I try not to be limited by that thought, "Am I going to be able to pull this off live?" Because usually you can. Usually you go back and just practice the stuff and figure out how you can do it live. But sometimes when writing something and you are doing it for the first time, it's more challenging because it's new, so recording something that you are just learning may be tricky, but usually by the time you do go out and play live, you are more familiar with it, you've had time to practice, so it’s easier.

AO: Are there plans to take this record on the road?

VM: Yeah. There are no concrete dates or anything, but we are looking into it. It's been a long time since I've toured as a solo artist and I definitely want to go out and do some shows.

AO: What elements, in your opinion, need to coincide for a good live show to happen?

VM: I think it's gotta be in the moment, the guys on stage playing together. You have to be reacting and bouncing off one another, and that's what makes live things exciting to me, that there are some elements of improvisation where you are playing within a certain song structure. But just the fact that from night to night little things can be different based on what any individual might play and how it may impact on everybody. That's what makes things exciting for me. Even when I'm on the road with UFO, a lot of the solo sections are totally improvised and to me that's the excitement of playing live, that tonight is going to be different from last night, and tomorrow—who knows what's gonna happen in a minute from now.

AO: Playing in UFO, do you think that impacted on your style at all?

VM: I don't really think so because when I play with those guys I show more of my straight-ahead rock style. Because you can't be throwing in those different elements like fusion into UFO. It's a rock gig, there's always blues and a little bit of certain elements here and there, but for the most part there are a lot of things that I'm capable of and they are a part of my style that I don't do with those guys because it wouldn't fit. I always try to play what's right for the song, so my stuff is a lot different and it's not as... I don't want to say "limited", but it's much more open—I can go anywhere. It's more free in a way because I can experiment with anything and be really adventurous, and I don't have to worry about borders or anything holding me in.

AO: It's like with any band of huge legacy—be it the Rolling Stones, or Deep Purple, or UFO, it can be quite limiting, can't it?

VM: Yeah, no matter what I do, I always try to play what's right for the song. And if you're playing in a rock'n'roll band, you play rock'n'roll, you can't be throwing in things that don't fit. Both things have been great for me—playing with the band and doing that type of thing, and then doing my solo stuff where I can just go off and wander aimlessly anywhere I want. [Laughs]

AO: How do you maintain your technique these days? Does it still require everyday practice?

VM: I play every day; I play a lot. But I wouldn't really call it practicing, I would call it "noodling around". When I was first learning to play in the early days, I was doing exercises and working on specific things, and now I don't do that kind of regimented practice at all, I just take up the guitar and play. And usually that's enough to maintain my overall level of playing.

AO: Do you ever spend time playing not for practice, not for anyone else, but for yourself, for your own enjoyment?

VM: It's pretty much always that way for me. I just pick it up and get lost in the guitar. I just love doing it. I almost think, in a way, I'm addicted to it, to be totally honest. People have all kinds of different addictions, good or bad. Some people are addicted to drugs, some to alcohol, and there are other more healthy ones. I personally think I really am addicted to playing the guitar.

AO: Would you say that being a musician has changed in any significant way since the time when you were just starting out?

VM: I think I kind of got better at expressing myself and tapping into the creative element, just got a lot more experience in doing it and I just think I've improved in that direction.

The UFO European tour starts on May 31 with dates in Germany, UK, Sweden, Italy, Holland, Northern Ireland and Belgium.