Paul Masvidal knows why his range of influences is so diverse. “I’ve always felt a bit like a witness here on Earth, quietly observing,” he tells Guitar World. “The people that hooked me were those who blended strong melodic continuity with experimental, envelope-pushing ideas. They sounded free and I wanted to understand how to tap into that.”
In Chuck Schuldiner’s Death and his own band Cynic, Masvidal has demonstrated the results. Death’s Human (1991) and Cynic’s Focus (1993) became pillars of the progressive-meets-extreme metal genre. “The more emotional weight and mystery something carried, the more it connected,” he says.
