George Lynch, Interview – Inside Sweet & Lynch
Michael Sweet & George Lynch – Story by Anne Erickson, courtesy photo
George Lynch, Interview: The legendary Dokken guitarist joins Anne Erickson to talk about Sweet & Lynch, religion and more
George Lynch always has a plethora of projects going on. The longtime Dokken guitarist has releases dropping almost every month this year, and one of the most anticipated is his new album with Sweet & Lunch.
Sweet & Lynch brings together the guitarist with Stryper singer Michael Sweet. Their third collaborative album, “Heart & Sacrifice,” is due out May 19.
As Lynch explains, when writing music together, he and Sweet aren’t really in the studio together. It’s a very common way of recording these days.
“Like most of these remote projects in the last three years, except for the first record, we haven’t worked together in the same room for these records,” Lynch tells Audio Ink Radio in a new interview. “I’m sure you’ve heard that a lot. It’s pretty common now.”
He adds, “I would say that the reason I agreed to do this initially was because, the way the record company explained it to me, is that this fills that gap, with the melodic rock-Dokken kind of things. It’s a little bit heavy but has the Don Dokken melodic side.”
What keeps Lynch motivated to do so many musical project? There’s the creative aspect and the practical one.
“I’m not a billionaire, so it’s like, it’s still work,” he says. “So, there’s that practical side, too. I really like to stay busy. I mean, what else am I going to do? This is my job. I like being busy. You can sit around and do one record every five years, or you can do three records a year, which honestly, I work pretty fast and pride myself in work efficiency, which you’re forced to do nowadays because record budgets aren’t what they were.”
Lynch is a vocal atheist, while Sweet it a devout Christian. These days, the two sides often don’t get along. But, Lynch says their differences in religious beliefs have never been a problem.
“I’m actually not sure about Michael’s politics. We never really got into that,” Lynch says. “Because it really doesn’t effect our work, because we don’t address it in our music. And I’m obviously not the voice of the band, so I’m not writing the words, So, I’m not getting the message across. I’m not involved in that. So, it’s not in my realm of even- we discuss things, but at the end of the day, ultimately, it’s up to Michael what he wants to sing about and what he wants to write about.”
He adds, “We have discussed religion, but almost in a funny way. It’s sort of a running joke that I’m the atheist and he’s the Christian, and of course we can play with that. And we’ve discussed the idea of doing a record where it’s a kind of yin and yang approach, where half the record is the point of view I would address and the other half is the point he would address, and we kid around about doing that. But, we couldn’t really do that, because I don’t sing, and I couldn’t ask him to genuinely sing something he doesn’t believe in. How would he sing a point of view that he doesn’t agree with? … But the idea of doing a concept record like that, we’ve talked about.”
“But, Michael is a wonderful guy, and he knows I’m not a bad person, so we’re fine,” he adds. “It’s not really an issue. I take some of the religious content of the messaging- I take it with a little bit of a grain of salt. But, it’s okay. As long as you’re not hurting anybody. I just think as long as you’re not doing any harm. If he were a more extreme religious kind of person who was advocating for things that harmed people in the name of religion, yes. I would have a huge problem with that.”
One of Lynch’s other projects, of course, is the 1980s rock band Lynch Mob. After abandoning the name a few years ago (and telling Audio Ink Radio first), Lynch has brought it back. As he explains, “I am a little conflicted about that. I just have to kind of go with the flow, and it’s a brand I built, and it’s my last name. So, I mean, I understand the negatives for sure, and I agree with the negatives. But, it’s on my driver’s license.”
He added that the label is working on reissuing and repackaging Lynch Mob’s “Rebel” album. “When we initially came out with that record, there were big problems with the label at the time, with their distribution … for whatever technical reason, the record did not get distributed well or people weren’t even aware it was out there, so they mishandled it pretty badly.”
For the latest on Sweet & Lynch, visit the band’s Facebook page. For more on Lynch’s many projects, go to the George Lynch website. Listen to Audio Ink Radio’s interview with George Lynch on Apple Podcasts here and Spotify here.
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