Ron "Bumblefoot" Thal
| Ron "Bumblefoot" Blumenthal (Thal) | |
|---|---|
Bumblefoot performing live with Guns N' Roses in Helsinki, Finland on June 5, 2010.
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Ronald Jay Blumenthal |
| Also known as | Bumblefoot, Ron Thal |
| Born |
September 25, 1969 Brooklyn, New York, United States |
| Genres | Hard rock, heavy metal, grunge, alternative rock, avant garde music, progressive rock, Film scores |
| Occupation(s) | Musician, guitarist, producer, photographer, actor |
| Instruments | Guitar, bass, drums, keyboard, vocals |
| Years active | 1982–present |
| Labels | Bumblefoot Music, LLC |
| Associated acts | Art of Anarchy, Cilver, Guns N' Roses, Lita Ford, Salem |
| Website | bumblefoot |
| Notable instruments | |
| Several Vigier custom models Gibson Les Paul |
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Ronald Jay "Ron" Blumenthal (born September 25, 1969), better known by his stage name Ron "Bumblefoot" Thal, is an American guitarist, songwriter, recording artist and producer. He adopted his nickname from the bacterial infection of the same name, which he learned about while helping his wife study for her veterinary exams. The name went from being just the name of an album, to the name of a record label, to a band name, to eventually his name as a solo artist. He was one of two lead guitarists in Guns N' Roses from 2006 until 2014 and performed on their sixth studio album Chinese Democracy.
Since the early 90s, he has released 10 CDs and a live DVD. He has appeared as a guest performer on other albums and on numerous compilation CD's. He has been the cover feature of GitarPlus magazine in Indonesia and has been featured in several foreign guitar magazines, as well as the subject of many print, radio and web interviews. Over the past twenty years, he has also worked with numerous bands and artists as producer, engineer, writer, arranger, and performer. He also writes TV jingles, theme songs, and background music.
Raised Jewish, Thal grew up in Brooklyn and then Staten Island, in the Bay Terrace neighborhood. Thal was inspired by Kiss and their album Alive! at age six, Thal claimed his earliest musical goal was to be able to play "like Gene Simmons if someone decided to do a Kiss version of Beatlemania". At the time his hands were too small to play bass, so he focused on guitar, while his brother, Jeff, played drums instead. Thal stated that he figured out multi-track recording by using multiple cassette recorders at age six.
By the time Thal was thirteen years old, he was playing cover songs in clubs, later focusing on creating original material on his home 8-track. By sixteen, Thal had started engineering and producing music. When he was eighteen, Thal won his first award, winning a Sam Ash Guitar Solo Contest after playing a spontaneous solo. He played in a New York-based band called 'Legend' in the late 1980s. Thal also played in a cover band called Leonard Nimoy that played songs by Guns N' Roses, AC/DC, KISS, and Aerosmith.
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