Eric Calderone is an American guitarist and

YouTuber A YouTuber is an online personality and/or influencer who produces videos on the video-sharing platform YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006. Influence Influe ...

. Calderone is best known for some of his videos on his YouTube channel "331Erock" in which he performs electric guitar renditions of songs from pop culture.

Background and career

Calderone began playing an

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gu ...

in 2001 at the age of sixteen. He learned about musical orchestrations as a student at Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. He also holds a degree in music from the

University of Tampa The University of Tampa (UT) is a private university in Tampa, Florida. It is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. UT offers more than 200 programs of study, including 22 master's degrees and a broad variety of majors, ...

. Calderone's composition process started by transcribing a rough

MIDI MIDI (; Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, and ...

version of the melody and the tempo of the song that he wished to cover in a

digital audio workstation A digital audio workstation (DAW) is an electronic device or application software used for recording, editing and producing audio files. DAWs come in a wide variety of configurations from a single software program on a laptop, to an integrat ...

. He then digitally added drum sections with layered recordings of his lessons. After adding an element of bass and sometimes other optional instruments such as electronic musical synthesizers, he played a real time version of his cover, followed by an

audio mastering Mastering, a form of audio post production, is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device (the master), the source from which all copies will be produced (via me ...

phase. A surge in Calderone's popularity on YouTube began when he uploaded a heavy metal cover of the

Lady Gaga Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta ( ; born March 28, 1986), known professionally as Lady Gaga, is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She is known for her image reinventions and musical versatility. Gaga began performing as a teenag ...

song "

Bad Romance "Bad Romance" is a song by American singer Lady Gaga from her third extended play (EP), ''The Fame Monster'' (2009)—the reissue of her debut studio album, ''The Fame'' (2008). Gaga wrote and produced the song with RedOne. Following an illegal ...

" on October 21, 2010. In December 2015, Calderone graduated from the

with a bachelor's degree in music. He has since then uploaded some videos of himself playing well-known songs (such as the

Gotye Wouter André "Wally" De Backer (born 21 May 1980), better known by his stage name Gotye ( ), is a Belgian-Australian multi-instrumentalist and singer-songwriter. The name "Gotye" is a pronunciation respelling of "Gauthier", the French cognat ...

and

Kimbra Kimbra Lee Johnson (born 27 March 1990), known mononymously as Kimbra, is a New Zealand singer and songwriter. Known for mixing pop with R&B, jazz and rock musical elements, her accolades include four ARIA Music Awards, two Grammy Awards and s ...

song "

Somebody That I Used to Know "Somebody That I Used to Know" is a song written, produced, and performed by Belgian-Australian singer-songwriter Gotye featuring vocals from New Zealand singer Kimbra. The song was released in Australia and New Zealand by Eleven Music on ...

", the Carly Rae Jepsen song " Call Me Maybe" and the

Psy Park Jae-sang (, ; born December 31, 1977), known professionally as Psy (stylized in all caps as PSY) (; ; ), is a South Korean singer, rapper, songwriter, and record producer. Psy is known domestically for his humorous videos and stage per ...

song " Gangnam Style") as well as also recreating music from television shows (such as '' Attack on Titan'', ''

The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air ''The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air'' is an American television sitcom created by Andy and Susan Borowitz for NBC. It aired from September 10, 1990, to May 20, 1996. The series stars Will Smith as a fictionalized version of himself, a street-smart ...

'', '' Pokémon'' and '' Game of Thrones''), movie series (such as the three '' Star Wars'' movie trilogies and ''

The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's b ...

'' movie trilogy) and video games (such as ''

Super Mario Bros. is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The successor to the 1983 arcade game '' Mario Bros.'' and the first game in the ''Super Mario'' series, it was first released in 1985 for ...

'' and '' The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim''). In 2018, Calderone formed the band Riptide with YouTuber and musician

Anthony Vincent Anthony Vincent (1939–1999) was the Canadian ambassador to Peru. He was a key player in the Japanese embassy hostage crisis of 1996, in Peru. He later served as ambassador to Spain. He is the subject of the 2008 book ''The Ambassador's Word: Hos ...

. One of his most popular videos was his cover of the

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

song "

Let It Go "Let It Go" is a song from Walt Disney Animation Studios, Disney's 2013 computer-animated feature film ''Frozen (2013 film), Frozen'', whose music and lyrics were composed by husband-and-wife songwriting team Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert L ...

" (from Disney's 2013 computer-animated musical fantasy film '' Frozen'').

Awards

In 2013, Calderone received the "Dimebag Darrell Shredder Award" at the

Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards The following is a list of the ''Metal Hammer'' Golden Gods Awards winners. Introduction The awards were conceived by Chris Ingham, John O'Sullivan & Dave Bianchi, and first held at the Kentish Town Forum in London 2003. The show was owned by Fut ...

Discography

Full-length albums

*"No More Heroes" (2012) *"Deadlights" (2015)

Extended plays

*"Hollywood Shred" (2010) *"Comics Meets Metal" (2015)

Compilation albums

*"Meets Metal Vol. 1 (The Early Year)" (2015) *"Movies Meet Metal Vol. 1" (2015) *"The 80s Meet Metal" (2015) *"Movies Meet Metal Vol. 2" (2015) *"Video Games Meet Metal" (2015) *"Pop Meets Metal Vol. 1" (2015) *"Pop Meets Metal Vol. 2" (2015) *"Video Games Meet Metal Vol. 2" (2015) *"Youtube Meets Metal Various Vids" (2015) *"Youtube Hits Meets Metal" (2015)

References

External links

331Erock
on YouTube {{DEFAULTSORT:Calderone, Eric American YouTubers American heavy metal musicians American heavy metal guitarists 1985 births Living people Guitarists from New York (state) American male guitarists 21st-century American guitarists 21st-century American male musicians Music YouTubers

Background and career

Awards

Discography

Full-length albums

Extended plays

Compilation albums

See also

References

External links