Eric Melin will compete in the US Air Guitar Nationals in Washington, D.C. He demonstrated one of his more challenging moves, sliding on his knees and playing the air guitar behind his head.
Photo by Jennifer Hack
To prepare for the U.S. Air Guitar Championships, Lawrence musician and movie critic Eric Melin has grown out his hair, taken up running and crafted a list of moves he can toss into his routine, including the Chuck Berry, the Angus Young and something called a “low layback.”
He even has air roadies — a couple of buddies who will plug in air amps and shoot him up with invisible smack.=
Melin, 38, snatched the regional title at the Record Bar back in June, and will compete against a couple dozen air guitarists at the finals Aug. 7 in Washington, D.C. The national champ wins a free trip to the World Championships, held in Oulu, Finland.
No, seriously.
When he plays, his fingers curl around an imaginary neck and his face screws up into a badass snarl. After a minute or so, he’s winded and glistening with sweat.
“It’s hard work,” pants Melin, who has played drums for The Dead Girls, Ultimate Fakebook and Truck Stop Love. He fills us in on how to be an air ax grinder.
Ink: Tell us how and when you started playing air guitar.
Eric Melin: Honestly, I’m a real latecomer to competitive air guitar. I’ve been playing in my bedroom probably since I was 13 or 14. There’s a documentary called “Air Guitar Nation,” and I saw that this spring and thought, “Wow, I didn’t realize this was an organized thing.” I didn’t know there was a U.S. Air Guitar Championship, much less a world championship. So, when I saw that movie, I’m like, “I can do this.” I mean, I do it anyway, so I might as well get up in front of people and do it for attention, you know, competitively. And I don’t have any shame, so I jumped at the chance when I found out they were coming to Kansas City to do the regional. I signed up pretty early and starting working on my routine.
How have you been preparing for the championships?
To prepare for the regional, I watched a lot of YouTube, especially the current world champion, Hot Lixx Hulahan. I figured since he’s the world champion, that’d be a pretty good place to start. I have been checking out the competition from the regionals already and just kind of looking at everybody else, and it’s really helpful. I want to make sure my routine is not too reminiscent of everybody else’s and that I have a couple extra surprises and signature moves and whatnot in there.
Tell us about your technique.
Everyone knows it’s a stupid thing. The way I look at it is, for me, it’s the ultimate expression of rock ’n’ roll fandom. So, when I’m at a show, I play air guitar. That’s how I enjoy music. But when it comes to competitive air guitar, you have to have stage presence, technical merit and airness. Airness, of course, is undefinable. Either you have it, or you don’t.
For the technical side of things, I kind of have my own ideas of what is technically right on the guitar. I’m a drummer, so I’ve never actually played guitar. So, all I know basically is that the high notes are up here and the low notes are down here and everything has to be bigger than life. Air guitar is more fun to watch than real guitar. One of my favorite solos of all time is a solo on “Wake Up Dead” that I’m doing, this Megadeth song. When I finally saw Dave Mustaine play the solo, I was bored. I was like, “This sucks.” In my mind, it’s way cooler than the way he plays that. So, I always try to work out what the solo or what the song looks like in my mind, how cool it can be, and then I just try to be as big as possible and get that out.
What music lends itself to air guitar?
Anything with a lot of energy. Heavy metal kind of works as a default for air guitar. I mean, you don’t want to see someone air guitar to Paul Simon. Usually a lot of people do hard rock or heavy metal.
What’s the story on your alter ego, Mean Melin?
I’m not really known for being a mean person, except when I drink tequila, so I actually have this nickname. It’s been with me for a long time.
What would it mean to you to be the national champ of air guitar?
It would be awesome. It’s actually this weird little underground world that I didn’t know existed, and as soon as I started to see the other people who were doing it, I felt an immediate kinship with them. So, to be the national champion would be huge. I think the deck might be stacked a little bit more towards people who’ve been doing it a long time. This is my first time. But I’m definitely going out guns blazing.
