The First Cut Is The Deepest

When you’re huge, you’re huge, and after you’ve been around a while, your entire body of work tends to morph into one, uh, huge, thing.

So it begs the question, who would we still view – years later - as huge if they had stopped after only one album?  Hendrix, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, The Cars, Buddy Holly  …

After that, I dunno.  Adele?  The Band?  The Byrds?  Crosby Stills and Nash?  Dire Straits?  Eagles?  Elvis?  Jeff Beck?  Steely Dan?  Maybe.

There are a lot of names from the rock pantheon missing, a lot of acts that took a couple or three albums to really establish a place in music history.  The Beatles, The Stones, The Who, U2, Pink Floyd, Chuck Berry, AC/DC …

Maybe we’d remember them all, but more as flashes in the pan than big influencers.  But not many artists nailed it the first time out.

The Circle of Love

In Guitar World’s 30 on 30, 30 great guitarists pick their favourite axemen.

All the cats you’d expect to see are there:  Green, Clapton, Blackmore, Beck, Hendrix, May, van Halen, B.B., Rhoads, Malmsteen …

As are, thankfully, a few guys you worry might be all but forgotten, like Leslie West, Alvin Lee and Mick Taylor.  And there are a few names you might not expect to be the idols of guitar wizards, for example Neil Young or Pete Townshend or George Harrison.  Not that they weren’t/aren’t amazing guitarists, but you don’t realize the hotshots feel the same way as you do.  So that’s cool.

But what’s really interesting is to see who the guys on the list like.  So:

• Tom Morello likes Steve Vai, and Steve Vai likes Brian May.
• Joe Perry likes Angus Young, but Angus likes Chuck Berry.
• Ron Thal likes Zakk Wylde, whereas Zakk Wylde likes the Judas Priest duo of Tipton and Downing.
• Richie Kotzen digs Eddie van Halen, who in turn thought Clapton was the man.

Sometimes you can clearly hear a guitarist’s influences in his work; other times, not so much.  So it’s instructive to see what they actually think.  And sometimes surprising.

Blown On The Steel Breeze

It’s what notes you play, not how many of ‘em, as aptly illustrated by Guitar World’s Top 10 Slow Guitar Solos.  The list features masterful, expressive, passionate solos from greats such as Clapton, Page, Beck, Gilmour, Knopfler, SRV and Gary Moore.

With the exceptions of George Harrison and B.B. King, all these guys are revered for being able to tear it up, but this list shows they also knew how to make their guitar cry and sing.  They knew a guitar solo should make the song better.

Just Get On Board

I could never figure Jeff Beck out.  I mean, his talent is undeniable, and, in many respects, I’ll admit maybe even unsurpassable.

And I get that not everyone has the same taste, but I have always struggled with his choice of tunes.  And his choice of notes is usually, well, baffling – at least to these blues-rock, minor pentatonic-conditioned ears.

So when I hear songs like, People Get Ready, which has some of the tastiest guitar work in the last 60 years, I can’t help but wonder how much larger Jeff Beck would be in our collective psyche if he’d been more, well, mainstream.

But he’s obviously his own man, and for that he will always have my respect.

Hoochie Coochie Man

Q: What do Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, Cream, Led Zeppelin, The Doors, Steppenwolf, the Allman Brothers, Otis Rush, Gary Moore, Koko Taylor, Canned Heat, the Stones, Steve Miller, the Animals, Tom Petty, Sam Cooke, Little Walter, Bo Diddley, Elvis, and the Everly Brothers all have in common?

A: Willie Dixon.  They all recorded Willie Dixon songs, per Gibson’s 10 Great Willie Dixon Songs.

Oh, and Paul Butterfield, Savoy Brown, Ten Years After, Etta James, the Pointer Sisters, Jeff Beck, James Cotton, Hendrix, Megadeth and the White Stripes.

That’s quite a list.  A hall of fame, who’s-who, Desert Island, best-ever-playlist kind of list.

You can make your case for Robert Johnson, or Muddy or B.B. as the most influential blues musician of all time, but when it comes to blues songwriting, no one else comes close.  It’s Willie Dixon that make the world wanna know what this all about.

Eruptions

Gibson’s 10 Great Rock Instrumentals nicely illustrates at least one reason why instrumentals tend not to be as popular as songs: there are no words to sing along to, so that melody had better be extremely catchy.

Here’s the list:

Beck Bolero – Beck, Page et al

Black Mountain Side – Led Zeppelin

Jessica – Allman Brothers

Sparks – The Who

Rebel Rouser – Duanne Eddy

Frankenstein – Edgar Winter Group

Walk Don’t Run – The Ventures

Maggot Brain – Funkadelic

Mood for a Day – Steve Howe

Eruption – Van Halen

Make that two reasons:  you can’t dance to a lot of this stuff.  I mean, Mood for a Day is an impressive display of virtuosity, but does it get your toes tapping?

Maybe there are three reasons.  There’s a line somewhere that divides “appreciation” and “participation.  You listen to and appreciate a Brahms symphony or well-done bit of prog rock.  You sing along to a good folk song.  Pop/soul/rock ‘n’ roll?  You get up and dance while you’re singing.  While you might appreciate all the pieces on this list, you’re only going to participate in a couple of ‘em.

From These Failing Hands

You can’t develop a style without studying someone who came before, says Gibson’s 10 Guitar Greats and Their Influences.  Truth.

Surprising revelations, though.  OK, so Zakk Wylde digs Randy Rhoads, and Joe Bonanassa adores Paul Kossoff, and – duh – Derek Trucks was influenced by Duane Allman.  And Clapton and Beck get mentioned more than once.

But Slash was influenced by Cat Stevens and Cheap Trick?  Trucks was into Coltrane?  Townshend thinks he sounds like John Lee Hooker?  Frampton practiced Shadows tunes?  Holy b string.

What surprises me, though, is that not many of these guys seem to go back very far.  Most of the influences were immediate, the stuff heard when they were growing up.  One reference each to Scotty Moore, Chet Atkins and Jimmy Burton.  Only Hooker and Elmore James mentioned from the 50’s Blues greats.

No T-Bone Walker, no Freddie King?  no BB?  no Lightning Hopkins, Son House or Robert Johnson?  No Chuck Berry?  Are you kidding? 

Frampton mentions Django Reinhardt, but no one seems to be digging into the past to learn where their heroes learned their stuff.  That is indeed curious.  I mean, how do you study your idol and try to understand what they’re doing without studying what they were trying to understand?

It’s a short article so maybe lots got edited out.  I hope so, ‘cause it feels like we’re loosing our connections with the past, and that would not be a good thing.  Music has changed rapidly over the last half century, and most of it has been exciting and positive.  But it was also built on a solid foundation that goes back countless generations.

If we lose that the thrill will be gone.

Speechless

The main thing that jumps out at me as I scan Gibson’s 10 Great Rock Guitar Instrumentals is that it would be hard to build on.  The list apparently features pieces known for their “pioneering impact” as opposed to virtuosity or popularity.

But, like, what else would you add?  Is there much else out there to debate?  We’ve got Beck, Page, Edgar Winter, Van Halen, Duane Eddy and The Ventures – like you’d expect.  And we have to dip into The Who’s Tommy to get to 10.

The genre has a major handicap: no lyrics.  Kinda hampers the singing along, which makes it more difficult on the memory, which reduces the odds of a tune being popular.  Not to mention the emotional impact that lyrics can add to a great song.

Make that two handicaps, the second being that instrumentals tend to be vehicles for showing off.  With all due respect to Mssrs. Beck, Satriani, Malmsteen, Johnson and McGlaughlin et al, chicks don’t dig it.  You can’t dance to this stuff.

These guys have an audience limited to mostly other guitarists, which is why the list is brought to you by Gibson as opposed to a popular culture magazine.  The guitar has dominated popular music for over half a century, but it works best in a supporting role.

Alien Blows

Gibson’s 10 Albums That Changed Rock Guitar shows that virtuosity covers a pretty wide spectrum.  Here’s the list:

Jeff Beck - Blow By Blow

Jimi Hendrix – Are You Experienced?

Van Halen – Van Halen

Black Sabbath – Paranoid

Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin

Robert Johnson – King of the Delta Blues Singers

Chuck Berry – After School Sessions

Joe Satriani – Surfing with the Alien

The Allman Brothers – At Fillmore East

Boston – Boston

A huge variety of styles, and so many disparate techniques - not to mention tastes (which we shouldn’t mention lest I go off on a rant about where is Eric Clapton and you’ve gotta be kidding about Black Sabbath).

It’s interesting how many of these albums are firsts: Zep, Boston, Hendrix … which doesn’t necessarily mean that subsequent albums didn’t measure up – just that the shock and awe were done.

It’s a good list because every one of these records inspired a million players to say “I wanna play like that!”  New ideas, big changes, epic influence. 

Hats off to Robert Johnson, by the way, who managed to make the list 23 years after his demise.  Which is proper, because if you look at the list in terms of influencing the influencers, Mr. Johnson winds hands down.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun Too

Gibson recently published The Top 10 Female Guitar Players Of All Time.

Here's the list:
1. Joan Jett
2. Lita Ford
3. Mary Ford
4. Jennifer Batten
5. Sister Rosetta Tharpe
6. Orianthi
7. Kaki King
8. Nancy Wilson
9. Bonnie Raitt
10. Joni Mitchell

All big names, for sure.

Dunno about Joan Jett @#1, though. Great rocker chick image and all, but wasn't it really only one song? Doesn't really compare with the multi-generational influence of Mary Ford or Sister Rosetta Tharpe, does it? Doesn't stand up to the career longevity of Nancy Wilson, Bonnie Raitt or Joni Mitchell.

By the way, where is Chrissie Hynde? Talk about rocker chick!

Nice to see Jennifer Batten and Orianthi up there. Not that they're my favourite male guitarists, but, you know, if you're good enough to go onstage with Jeff Beck and Carlos Santana, then you're good, right? I would have liked to see blues gals like Deborah Coleman or Sue Foley on the list - but then this is a Gibson list, not a Fender list.

Maybe that's why Bonnie Raitt is down at #9, when she belongs on top?

Where The Shadows Run From Themselves

Back, as they say, in the day, the great who's-the-best-guitarist debate centred around Clapton, Hendrix, Page and Beck.  Similarly, the who's-the-best-band debate centred around Cream, Hendrix, and Led Zeppelin (no one seriously considered Beck in the band category, now did they?).

The Beatles, by the way, where not part of the discussion.  You either set them above such trivial discussion (as I did), or you discounted them as has-been pop artists - which is hilarious.

By the way #2, many people included Ritchie Blackmore and Deep Purple in the debates, but not enough, sadly.

Anyway, I chose Clapton and Cream.  I've already covered that in my mind Clapton was more versatile and way more musical than his rivals.

With Cream, though, it's a different story.  To be sure, the guitar work was a big part of it, as was the fact that Hendrix's bizarreness sometimes neutralized his flashes of astonishing genius.  And Page's questionable taste sometimes took away from his unparalleled talent for both riffs / hooks and production.  While Clapton was #1 primarily because of his work, he was also the last man standing.

But it was more than the guitars.  Plant was arguably a better singer than Jack Bruce, and Hendrix was probably a better songwriter, but there was something about Cream's sound, it's feel, it's impact that was more appealing to me.

The balanced talent was part of it, the constant jousting, the co-operative competition, yes.

Maybe it was the heavier blues influence.  In these heady days before we were overtaken by labels, all three bands could be trippy in a psychedelic way.  All three could do hard driving rock.  All three contributed to the births of heavy metal and classic rock.  And all did the blues just fine, thank you very much.

But Cream was darker, more soulful, maybe more vulnerable.  They touched a deeper nerve, a raw spot, a menacing feeling that could not be named  ...

Oh, I don't know.  I just liked them better.  Too bad they lasted the shortest length of time.