Greta Van Fleet guitarist Josh Kiszka GQ
Sir Elton John told Greta Van Fleet they’re “the best rock band I’ve heard in 25 years”, but that didn’t stop him passing on a word of advice when he met them in London.
“He said, ‘You boys are young. You’ve got to flaunt what you’ve got,’” remembers 22-year-old guitarist Jake Kiszka. “That’s when I went from wearing T-shirts to wearing half-cut jackets with nothing underneath. If Sir Elton John says ‘flaunt it’, no one else can tell us otherwise. We’ve got permission from the knight himself.”
“You’ve got to look backwards to go forward,” says Jake about their music. “It’s not a resurgence of rock’n’roll. It’s more like a renaissance. We want to take rock into the future.”
He also discussed the band’s stage production as they continue to tour. “We’re increasing the production this time around,” says Jake, his voice crackling with excitement. “We’ve added a few pyrotechnics, but the details are still secret. It’s like we’ve hit the Spinal Tap ‘Stonehenge’ chapter of our career already.”
Jake discussed songwriting in a new Orlando Sentinel interview.
“We write in that sense because it’s what we like and what we’re trying to achieve, to make that sound big. But we’ve played in bars around our home and that’s something we expected to be doing a lot longer. But it’s cool to be in the larger venues. From my perspective, there’s nothing more powerful than being at a sound check at a larger venue and strumming a chord and hearing that ring out.”
