Joey Santiago - Musical Style

Musical Style

Santiago describes his guitar playing as "angular and bent," "all derived from guitar moments that perk my ears up". Notable in his style is how he uses distortion and feedback to leave spaces open. A good example is the intro of There Goes My Gun. He attributes much of his style to songs he enjoyed when first learning the guitar, such as The Beatles' "Savoy Truffle", where "George Harrison played that bent note that I fell in love with and later milked it for all it was worth." He used such techniques with the Pixies: Doolittle's "Dead" begins with Santiago's guitar "squawking" on an E-flat like "a wounded animal". As Santiago was learning the guitar, he saw himself as a self-conscious amateur, and still speaks of a lack of confidence in his playing.

Santiago, rather than listening to popular radio, borrowed rock and roll records from the public library as he was growing up; he first discovered Les Paul and Jimi Hendrix, who led to jazz guitarist Wes Montgomery. Santiago later commented on Montgomery's influence: "And that's when I said, 'Ah, that's a hook. That's some hooky stuff in the jazz world'". He discovered jazz and country artists such as Joe Pass and Chet Atkins after studying the liner notes of albums. Santiago was directly influenced by the "Hendrix chord", the sharp 9th dominant chord which, in the words of author Ben Sisario, "tapped a hidden rage that matched the horror of Thompson's scream". As a teenager, Santiago also listened to classic rock and protopunk artists such as The Who, The Rolling Stones, The Velvet Underground and Iggy Pop.

The stage antics of Santiago often contrasted with his generally quiet demeanor; he often experimented with his guitar and equipment during songs. Deal's husband, John Murphy, said that during performances of "Vamos", which features guitar feedback throughout, Santiago used to "whack the crap out of his amp", often picking up the amplifier and moving it around. During some solos, Santiago would often pull the guitar up to his mouth and break guitar strings with his teeth.