Oakland, CA-based multi-instrumentalist Leila Abdul-Reif told us about her love for a Mercyful Fate lick...
Leila Abdul-Reif: You know how when you’re in a music instrument shop, you have a go-to riff or two when you try out a guitar? For many folks, it’s “Stairway” or “Freebird”, but for me it’s the intro riff to Mercyful Fate’s “Curse of the Pharaohs”. The whole song is sick, but for some reason that intro riff has stuck with me since I first listened to it some decades ago. The riff starts out catchy and heavy, like a classic Sabbath or Priest riff, and then adds those cool harmonies, then it goes into that slow lurch-y gallop that continues into the vocals. Still blows my mind to this day.
In 2003, I moved to San Francisco, driving cross country from New Jersey by myself, with only 3 CDs in the car (this was before I had an iPod and before bluetooth and all that): Mercyful Fate’s Melissa, The Cure’s Disintegration, and Queensryche’s Rage For Order. These three were on continuous shuffle because all my tapes and other CDs were packed away and there wasn’t a cassette player in the car. Sometimes I’d throw on a random radio station, but for the most part it was those 3 discs, which at the time was all I felt I needed to make it though the drive – I think I made it in about 5 days. I’m sure doing that drive alone is what drilled those Fate riffs – especially that Pharaohs riff – into my skull that probably influenced a good number of guitar riffs I’ve written since in Saros, then later in Vastum. Sometimes I think my whole musical trajectory might have changed if I had picked other things to listen to on that drive!
Leila Abdul-Reif's album Andros Insidium is out now. She's on tour in September and October -- find dates online.
Photos by Samuel Foster.
