Instrumental Rock Guitar Godistry

[Magpel]

As you may know...I sit here writing and editing and if I want to listen to music, it needs must be instrumental. I've been all over the map, from minimalism to maximalism and back down through moderatism.

 

Last week and this, I have turned my attention to a genre that typically arouses my contempt: the G3-class guitar god.

 

One qualification: I have always, since I was 15, loved the compositions, and to a lesser extent the guitar wankery, of Steve Morse. There's always been a lilting Celtic melodocism in his stuff that I dig, plus a wonderful Bach-like contrapuntal playfulness in his (tyrannically precise) arrangements. So I checked in with a more recent vintage Morse album--Split Decision--really good! Really contapuntal. Yes, it has many of the trappings of guitar godistry, but his muse, whatever that thing is, still burns bright.

 

Then, just to see if I was softening to the genre, I checked out some Vai.

 

Nope.

 

Vai might be the most staggering technician of the lot, and not without taste, but I just didn't hear anything beyond a kind of faux mysticism in the composition. The tunes are vehicles for what he does so well, I'll give it that.

 

Then some Eric Johnson, whom my brother really likes.

 

Nun uh. Not here. Really textbook sports guitar rock with the requisite faux mysticism. His singing is a problem too. Can we give Morse a hand for never trying to sing? Hell, Andy West used to do all the talking at Dregs' shows, of which I have seen more than a few.

 

Dare I try Satriani, whom I have always held in the lowest regard without ever really paying him much mind? Ok, Satriani. Eeek. Hate the tone, hate the headband-rock grooves. Yikes. This is no place for me

 

I guess I just like Steve Morse...

 

...Any recommendations before I put the genre to bed and go back to Stravinsky Conducts Music for Chamber and Jazz Ensembles (killer record, btw)?

 

 

PS: I am already hep to Holdsworth, of course, which is about as alien as rock guitar technique has ever gotten.

[scud133]

i think you've been sniffing too many corks

 

just enjoy the music, man

[vintagevibes]

I dearly love Santana's intrumentals.

[PBBPaul]

check out Greg Koch. Wankery with a sense of humor.

[Magpel]

 

i think you've been sniffing too many corks just enjoy the music, man

 

 

What's your point, other than getting in the sniffing corks line? I was asking for recommendations, and at the same time narrating my tongue-in-cheek journey through the genre, which you are certainly entitled, and encouraged, to ignore!

[Magpel]

 

I dearly love Santana's intrumentals.

 

 

And I am at peace with this and do not doubt that there is other great music about which we would be in total agreement.

[Magpel]

 

check out Greg Koch. Wankery with a sense of humor.

 

 

Am checking out Radio Free Gristle presently...

[PBBPaul]

 

Am checking out Radio Free Gristle presently...

 

 

Hope you like it.

 

Greg and I grew up in the same 'hood and went to different schools together.

[Hard Truth]

I like a lot of instrumental guitar music, although not so much the 80s style shredders.

 

Some of my favorites are:

King Crimson (esp. from Discipline to the present)

Jeff Beck (he Keeps getting better, check out the new live at Ronnie Scott's DVD, or his recent studio albums which incorporate a lot of electronica influences)

Allman Brothers with Derek Trucks and Warren Haynes(saw them live recently and they are as good as ever and do a lot of instrumentals)

Hellecasters

Danny Gatton

Jimmy Thackeray (check out the all-instrumental Guitar album)

James Wilsey (El Dorado is the former Chris Isaak guitarist's instrumental album)

Freddie King (did two albums of all instrumental music)

Dick Dale (besides his classic surf albums from the sixties he recorded some great albums in the late eighties-early nineties)

BB King (not many people know that there is a BB King album with all instrumentals that is very cool)

 

Keeping jazz-funk-avant fusion fresh:

Oz Noy

John Scofield

Charlie Hunter

 

Not to mention many other favorites in the jazz and fusion camps.

[Magpel]

I like a lot of these too, with Scofield being pretty much my favorite living improvising guitarist

 

 

I like a lot of instrumental guitar music, although not so much the 80s style shredders. Some of my favorites are: King Crimson (esp. from Discipline to the present) Jeff Beck (he Keeps getting better, check out the new live at Ronnie Scott's DVD, or his recent studio albums which incorporate a lot of electronica influences) Allman Brothers with Derek Trucks and Warren Haynes(saw them live recently and they are as good as ever and do a lot of instrumentals) Hellecasters Danny Gatton Jimmy Thackeray (check out the all-instrumental Guitar album) James Wilsey (El Dorado is the former Chris Isaak guitarist's instrumental album) Freddie King (did two albums of all instrumental music) Dick Dale (besides his classic surf albums from the sixties he recorded some great albums in the late eighties-early nineties) BB King (not many people know that there is a BB King album with all instrumentals that is very cool) Keeping jazz-funk-avant fusion fresh: Oz Noy John Scofield Charlie Hunter Not to mention many other favorites in the jazz and fusion camps.

 

[angstwulf]

Of the G3 guys, I thought that Satriani wrote the best melodies. [insert snarky Coldplay wisecrack here] I tried to like Vai but I couldn't and except for maybe SRV, the Eric Johnson CD gets more play from the wife.

 

Satriani, from my perspective, gets too repetitive for me, but give Not of This Earth a listen. It's less "rawk" than the others and still sounds fresh.

 

+1 on Charlie Hunter - who was a Satch student

+1 on Beck

 

Maybe Adrian Legg? He's mainly acoustic but those pieces give most electric wankers a run for their money. And oddly enough, I think his electric pieces are good because they are so restained.

 

Give John Zorn's Spillane a listen. Track 2 and 3 feature Albert Collins doing about 20 minutes of instrumentals. It kind of sounds like Zorn took every tasty lick of Collins' and made a jazz-blues concerto.

 

Track one is a pretty cool sound collage of a typical Micky Spillane book that Barry Adamson fans will like. Probably too much talking for you to listen during your project.

[girevik]

I like Eric Johnson the best out of the 3 guys in G3. I like other guitarists even more than any of the G3 guys, but that might be out of scope.

 

Tuck Andress was also a Satch student. So that's two high profile former students who went totally fingerstyle. He also has a guitar-playing niece who performs as "St. Vincent".

 

[YOUTUBE][/YOUTUBE]

 

I know Magpel doesn't like Hedges and that sort of acoustic guitar playing but sorry, man, that's still what draws me more than the electric guys.

[Rudolf von Hagenwil]

Buy a violoncello !!!

[Alndln2]

Stravinsky Conducts Music for Chamber and Jazz Ensembles (killer record, btw)?

I absolutely love that album, but I lent it to someone and it dissapeared on me(). Anyway, as a guitar player myself I stopped listening to other guitar players by and large for some reason. I just can't seem to get inspiration from that source much anymore, especially compositionally. I'm not put off, just not attracted to that anymore.

[angstwulf]

Tuck Andress was also a Satch student. So that's two high profile former students who went totally fingerstyle. He also has a guitar-playing niece who performs as "St. Vincent".

 

I never realized that about Andress. Funny, Satch loved to name check his non-metal/rock students: always dropped Larry Lelonde and Hunter's names in interviews.

 

I was going to recommend his solo/instrumental album but I thought it too jazzy. He plays an L-5 so that does qualify him as an electric guitar god/wanker. He's not real big on the feedback, mind you.

[girevik]

Buy a violoncello !!!

 

[girevik]

 

Buy a violoncello !!!

 

 

Great instrument, but this relates to Magpel's posts how???

[Rudolf von Hagenwil]

...Any recommendations before I put the genre to bed and go back to Stravinsky Conducts Music for Chamber and Jazz Ensembles (killer record, btw)?

 

How about some young and wild Spaniards, or Oud players from Damascus?

 

 

 

 

That's for you in high resolution:

 

Artist Photos_Igor and Edgar.zip

 

You can use the following link to retrieve your file:

 

http://www.sendspace.com/file/sg1wie

 

 

Here a smaller resolution preview:

 

 

[Magpel]

Just to be clear...I don't mean to be so casually dismissive of the great guitarists I have been so...casually dismissive of. I don't think of them all as souless technicians, by any means--I know they've all cultivated both tremenddous technique and approach/vision. There are just some standard mannerisms of "guitar rock"--oftentimes having more to do with the grooves and the drum and bass sounds--that kinda turn me off.

 

Now, jazz, that's another matter to me. I think of my favorite jazz guitarists--Scofield, Wes, Django, Jim Hall--almost as storytellers as much as musicians

[sailorman]

if you're not locked into electric, John Renbourn plays some amazing solo acoustic guitar. The Black Balloon has a couple tracks I tackled back in the 80's; some of the most challenging stuff I ever tried to play (well except Bach).

[Magpel]

 

I dearly love Santana's intrumentals.

 

 

Ha! I thought you said Satriani! Disregard my previous comment. I am fine with Carlos.

[Hard Truth]

Of the G3 guitarists I prefer Steve Vai, his sense of humor comes out in his playing. The others, I admire, but don't enjoy listening to for very long.

[Rudolf von Hagenwil]

 

Great instrument, but this relates to Magpel's posts how???

 

 

The relation is pataphysical.

[Jimbroni]

I have heard some Dixie Dregs stuff that I like. But I liked from a band context. Overall, this Rock guitar superhero {censored} is insanely boring to me.

 

Frank Zappa is about as far as I can go before it just turns into wanker crap.

 

But since some of you went immediately into fusion territory, I will add John McLaughlin, mainly when he was with Miles and some of the Mahivishnu and Shakti stuff. But I really wanna say why is it George Benson never gets added to these lists, He is way beyond most of the people mentioned in this thread so far.

[Hard Truth]

George Benson did some good stuff before he became a Jazzlite vocalist. I haven't heard him since the mid seventies. Is he doing anything good these days?