Originally posted as a Facebook note, but since my blog hasn’t been getting any love lately, I’m double posting it here too. Sue me.
My 15 favorite guitarists list is unique in that there are 17 of them!
There are arguments for many others to be on or off my list, but these are my picks and I’m stickin’ to ‘em.
I may have passed over some who possess a great voice/guitar or guitar/songwriting or guitar in a great band but who I felt didn’t merit being on the list solely for their guitar work. I may have passed over others who I haven’t been exposed to enough to have an opinion, and may have left some off just due to my poor memory.
The biggest factor in my picks is how that person’s playing evokes feeling in me, so this is totally subjective. Yes, I gave points for historical context, technical wizardry, and where I was in my own life when I heard them.
Roughly in this order:
1. Stevie Ray Vaughan – A transcendent guitarist. Major influence not just the players coming up after him but the older players who he derived his inspiration from. Speed, innovation, wizardry, but at the same time 100% pure emotion. From the first time a friend handed me a cassette tape of Stevie’s playing, up until the present, he continues to amaze and inspire me. The only time outside of John Lennon where the passing of a famous person I didn’t know personally brought me to tears.
2. BB King – Can say more with a single note than most can say with a thousand. Influenced his peers and his successors. Even in his sad notes there is somehow an undercurrent of joy and hope.
3. Jimi Hendrix – Threw the rule book out the window and reached into his soul to create something totally new. To borrow a phrase from Van M. – All the people passing by stared in wide-eyed wonder…
4. Freddie King – One of those rare people who did not play the music – he WAS the music. Many a time I have picked up my guitar, dialed in a tone to approximate what Freddie used, played the same notes that he did, and it sounded like ass – yet when he played those notes it sounded like the perfect thing, the only thing that made sense in that space and time.
5. Eddie Van Halen – Took rock guitar and shook it by the neck until it became something else. Spawned a whole generation of imitators, yet where many of them came off sounding cold and mechanical, Eddie’s playing was 100% balls.
6. Mark Knopfler – Clean, melodic, beautiful tone. Borrows from many different genres but always comes off sounding like himself. At a time when popular music was turning toward heavy rock histrionics, chaotic punk, electronic, edgy New Wave, Dire Straits was putting out some of the most down to earth, tasteful, guitar music of all time.
7. Tab Benoit – His Louisiana roots are evident in everything he does. I’ve seen Tab perform several times, and he never plays a song the same way twice. Sometimes seems like he’s headed off a cliff, but always manages to pull everything together. Lesson learned from Tab: If you break a string in the middle of a song, don’t just try to get through the rest of the song – make it the best song of the night.
8. Danny Gatton – An absolute master among masters. His jazz/country/blugrass/rockabilly fusion was unique and awe-inspiring. It was a major loss when Danny decided to take his own life.
9. Duane Allman/ Dickie Betts – While I could have made a fine case for inclusion of either of these two here on their own, the combination was greater than the sum of its parts. They were the peanut butter and chocolate of guitar duos. When they jammed it was not just two guys taking turns soloing, but two distinct styles forming a synergy of mind and purpose.
11. Buddy Guy – There is a take-no-prisoners, fuck you attitude to Buddy’s playing that even the hardest rockers usually fall short of. In an interview with Buddy, he tells of a time back in the ’60’s when his son thought dad’s kind of music was old-fashioned and that he preferred the “new” sound of guys like Hendrix. It wasn’t until some time later that his son found an interview with Hendrix where he was asked who his major influences were – and there was dad right at the top of the list.
12. George Harrison – It is my humble opinion that without George’s guitar the Beatles never happen. A talented guitarist who just got better and better, yet was always dedicated to making those around him sound better. The right notes at the right time, and the rests are as important as the notes. A study in taste and subtlety.
13. Eric Clapton – I’ve heard some digs against Eric Clapton, and the fact is you either get it or you don’t. At a time when every guitarist was borrowing bits and pieces from the blues and applying it to their pop music, Eric took it upon himself to become a blues master – and then bring that back to his rock music. From the outset, other guitarists studied him,emulated him, integrated his style into theirs, until a few generations of guitarists later the things he brought to rock guitar were ambient and became part of everyone else’s style. Ask Van Halen or a thousand other guitarists who their major influences were.
14. Carlos Santana – Soaring, climactic guitar solos on top of Latin rhythms – what’s not to like?
15. Django Reinhardt – Way back in the day Django was playing guitar riffs that would make your toes curl. Wonder if he ever smashed up any hotel rooms?
16. Jimmy Page – The riff-master. Loud, crunchy, heavy guitar riffs that whack you in the head over and over until you have to buy a new needle for your turntable. Zep’s music defined the line between what would become hard rock and progressive rock.
17. Tom Morello – How does he get those sounds? I’m a big RATM fan and I think his playing lifts that band and sends it flying through the air at 1000 miles per hour, breaking glass all the way. BUT he can also play it pretty and does stuff that is more musically intricate in his other projects. BTW – he builds his own electronic effects.
In the Wall Street Journal article Rick Warren, Obama and the Left (no by-line), they come to the conclusion that the objections from the left over the choice of Rick Warren to deliver the inaugural invocation is an example of the same intolerance that some on the left are supposedly fighting against. This raises some interesting questions. What is intolerance? When is it okay to be intolerant? Can a victim of intolerance negate their own credibility if they are, in turn, intolerant of another group?
In this case, the objection to Rick Warren stems from his organization’s intolerance of gay and lesbian people. By all accounts he is tolerant on a personal level, but draws the line at admitting unrepentant gays and lesbians as full members of his organization. Of course, those who support equal rights for gays and lesbians – including their right to marry – take umbrage at this. It has been reported that some will withdraw their support of Barack Obama for his inclusion of Warren in the inauguration ceremony. Now, Barack Obama has supported full rights for gays and lesbians, with the exception of using the word marriage to describe their unions, but otherwise affording them identical legal protection – a distinction that many can write off as mere word-parsing.
So, do people who are intolerant of intolerance cede the moral high-ground in this situation? What about people who are intolerant of people who tolerate intolerance? Kind of makes your head spin. Is it more righteous to be tolerant of people who preach intolerance while remaining intolerant of intolerance itself? What about the people who belong to the organization that preaches intolerance but may not preach it themselves? Woooeeee this gets complicated real fast, folks!
Can we agree that all intolerance is not created equal? Most everyone would likely be intolerant of people who kick puppies – do they need to recuse themselves from opposition to other forms of intolerance based on their intolerance in this area? Does all opposition to intolerance then fall into this category due to opposition being a form of intolerance itself?
One thing is for sure – even thought they lost the elections, the conservatives still hold the language advantage. Their ability to toss out a language grenade and, if nothing else, leave people confused and reeling about words and concepts is unmatched. I doubt I’ll ever untangle this one, and the time I’ve spent on it is time I’m not thinking about the other important issues of the day. There is also beauty in how they all sing in unison, no – more like an orchestra with many parts. Whether you are listening to the President, a member of Congress, Fox News, Limbaugh, Colter, Pat Robertson, a guy carrying a “God Hates Fags” sign at a rally, or reading a chain-email from your conservative buddy, you can recognize the different melodies as being part and parcel of the same underlying composition, though they may use different words.
I choose to hold out hope that we can someday all live and work together without the need to look down on groups we disapprove of. I believe President Elect Obama (President Electro-Bama) holds this same hope. I will try to find a balance between fighting for what I believe, while showing tolerance and good-will towards those I disagree with. We all need each other in the end.
Good to see these big names lending their voices to fight the hypocrisy.
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I don’t much like the current version of the Republican party, but there have been some things I have liked about them in the past. Being thrifty, avoiding foreign entanglements, supporting the rights of the individual over the state, and pushing decision-making down to the local level where appropriate have all been Republican principals at one time or another. So, in that spirit, here are some things you can do to make your party viable in the 21st century:
1. Tell the truth.
2. Admit when you’re wrong.
3. Value people over profits.
4. The economic dogma that prescribes deregulation and trickle-down theory for every single scenario doesn’t work. People are the bottom line – not religious adherence to an economic principle.
5. People do not want ANY religion shoved down their throats. Stop trying to.
6. Science is not always infallible, but it the best approximation we have about how things work. Look to science to inform your opinions, don’t cherry-pick science to support the opinions you already have while suppressing other viewpoints.
Try these things and let me know how it goes. Or don’t. It might be healthy for our democracy for a major party to bite the dust now and then.
Desperate Measures was a band that met weekly for music, wine and food. We played a few gigs, spent a weekend in a recording studio, and had a lot of fun.
President-elect Obama emailed me to ask for my thoughts on a long-term plan for the economy. Instead of riffing on bailouts, public-works programs and the like, I went with something else that has been bouncing around my head lately – the hoarding of intellectual property. While not a fully-formed plan, I believe it is one of the meta-issues that is preventing new ideas and technology from fulfilling their greatest promise to our society. Here is what I wrote to him:
When the race was called for Barack Obama last Tuesday I was happy, no – more like relieved. The October Surprise never materialized, no message from Bin Laden, no new war with Iran, Syria, Russia or N. Korea, no new lie from the right-wing hate machine that went viral, no gaffe or slip of the tongue that gave people a reason to vote against their conscience. What I did not feel was the emotional catharsis that seemed to grip people all around the country.
I spent most of the weekend in a recording studio with my band, Desperate Measures. None of us had any experience in this environment and it was quite a learning experience. We recorded 6 songs, but only finished mixing 2 of them. We had to book some more time to finish up. More later on the details of what it was like, but for now here are 2 songs we recorded. I would’ve liked to tweak a lot of things, but we were short on time.
To the 110th Congress,
On the 100 hour agenda: it’s a good start, but we need to go much further to re-establish our government as by the People and for the People.
