good rock guitarists

[johncomic]

I find myself at something of a loss...

Paisley tells me that she doesn't get what makes someone a good (or great) guitarist or not. (And this from someone who plays guitar herself, but at more of a punk rock level, I'd say...) She says that to her, rock guitar soloing all sounds pretty much the same, quickly becoming tedious, and yeah she can hear that some of it is really fast but so what?

I'm not really sure how to respond to that. To me, there is some obviously great guitar playing out there, and while technique is part of it, it isn't the whole story. (Example off the top of my head: Jimi on Red House: not the most technically cutting-edge of all time, but undeniably one of the greatest.) And I also realize how much subjectivity is involved, where someone else will declare so-and-so The Greatest but I think he's nowhere near as great as what's-his-face.

But I can't clearly describe how I know these things, I just feel them. Is guitar greatness nothing more than an inarticulate subjective gut feeling? Can it be measured on a speedometer? Is it something that you either just get or you don't? What say?

Comments

[jaymarcy.livejournal.com]

For me it's a gut feeling Kurt Cobain could shred a mean guitar, and you felt it in your gut what he was trying to communicate emotionally, his lack of technical prowess never came into play. Then you have your virtuosos like David Gilmour, who could take that axe and wring amazing pieces of beauty out of it, seemingly effortless yet obviously with skills honed over decades.
I have my favorites, and surprisingly Eric Clapton isn't among them. Not that I don't admire or like a lot of his work (some of his work with Cream blows my mind...)...
I think to put it all on technique is to not do it justice. You can as techically perfect as you want, but if there's no soul or feeling behind it, gut emotions thrown into it, it's cold. If Angus Young wasn't doing his crazy little skip hops across stage while soloing, it just wouldn't have the same feeling (and if you listen to an AC/DC track, you can see him doing this in your head when he solos...), though he'd still be anamazing player, the expression would be lost.
Speed means nothing to me. Eddie Van Halen can burn the fretwork, but I'd rather reel John Mayer's groove on "Gravity". It reaches into my guts with more effectiveness then some dude wailing away with manic fingers flying over the strings.
As for punk well, asshole that he is, Greg Ginn was one hell of a grinder in Black Flag. Listen to his soloing on "Slip It In" or "Annihilate".He's got it.
This answer was long, and I hope I made sense...

[ginsu.livejournal.com]

She says that to her, rock guitar soloing all sounds pretty much the same, quickly becoming tedious, and yeah she can hear that some of it is really fast but so what?

I assume she doesn't feel this way about singers. Why not?

If you think of a solo as an expression of melody and ideas related to melody, soloing is much the same sort of thing as singing, except the guitarist has many more variables to choose from in the melodic expression: not just speed, but tone, effects, articulation, legato vs. picked notes, harmonics, double-stops, chords, etc. Even pick thickness and wrist attack has a tremendous effect.

One way to develop an ear for solos is to begin with something simple like a given melody and pay close attention to how a given guitarist develops it. Jeff Beck playing "'Cause We've Ended as Lovers" is a good example of that; he is remarkably skilled in this area.

Or play her a basic chord progression and ask her to improvise interesting and original melodies that would sound good on *top* of it. If she can't, well, she has begun to appreciate what good guitarists can do.

Here I'm thinking of something like "Always With You, Always With Me" by Satriani -- it opens with a simple chord progression before the solo begins. Play just that part and see what she comes up with for the melody. Then contrast that with the solo Satriani actually plays. I think she will see a difference.

[johncomic.livejournal.com]

I assume she doesn't feel this way about singers. Why not?

Well, to put it in context, I'm pretty sure she does feel the same way about scat singing: all pretty much the same, etc etc...

[ginsu.livejournal.com]

Well, never mind scat.

If she can listen to any two singers deliver any melody she is familiar with, and tell the difference between them and prefer one to the other, then she is already, in her head, separating melody per se from the stylistic choices in rendering it. A more developed version of that ability will eventually leave her with a general appreciation of improvised melodies (i.e. solos).

You mentioned "Red House." This video features Eric Johnson, Steve Vai, and Joe Satriani improvising solos over that song, and I suspect the blatant differences in tone, articulation, vibrato, etc., would be obvious to her.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTWenQVUL3E

If she herself tried to improvise a solo over that progression, she would see the difference there, too.

[theanswer42.livejournal.com]

It's not that I don't understand that there is skill and technique and other things involved in guitar solos, it's just that, as an element of a song, I don't place as much value in it personally as many other people do. It's not really important to my appreciation of most songs. There are some where I notice and like the solo, like many Crush Luther songs, but "great" guitar players don't impress me because I don't put as much value into guitar-playing (as evident by my "punk rock level" of guitar-playing myself).
I do put more personal value in vocals, and I'm not sure why. It's not the lyrics, because I don't usually listen to the lyrics right away (unless it's Arrogant Worms or Tim Minchin where the lyrics are comedy). It's just something I place more value in, not as a conscious decision.
I'm not saying "What's the big deal about guitar solos? I could do that!" because I know that I can't, it's just that they aren't as important to me as other things. I dunno.