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is it me or do the best songwriters aren't super proficient on lead guitar


Still.ill

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it seems all the songs of the great guitar bands who had a guitar virtuoso in them, they never wrote the songs on their own, they just came up with the riffs but not the rest of the vocal melody...

 

but the guys who come up with the complete song are always rhythm guitarists...

 

so their comes my dilemma.... should i spend more of time practicing pinch harmonics/tremolo picking and technique instead of songwriting

 

cuz it seems just dumb to be a guitar player and not be able to tremolo pick proficiently... even vampire weekend can tremolo pick

 

actually the only lead guitarist i know who can write a really good pop song is billy corgan from the Smashing Pumpkins

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Neil Young practically invented pinch harmonics. And he can write a tune. (I'll admit I've drifted out of touch with him a bit in the last couple decades but both his lead guitar playing and his songwriting from the 60s and 70s was pretty damn cool, I still think. Just don't be throwing, say, his work from the 80s in my face; it's not what I'm talking about, from what I've heard.)

 

And there are probably few rock players as sophisticated as Richard Thompson. As far as I'm concerned, anyone who can write a song like "1952 Vincent Black Shadow" deserves a spot of honor in the Songwriting Hall of Fame just based on the one song, alone. But he's written loads of other great songs, too.

 

 

One thing I've noticed is that a lot of the more accomplished songwriters I've known tended to be pretty good lead guitarists, even though they may not have considered themselves as such. But one thing those guys and gals often did was subordinate the solo to the song.

 

Lead guitar solos that "pop out" of a song tend to impress the perennial-14-year old air guitarists out there (many of whom, of course, grow up to be lead guitarists ;) ) but other folks may see it as a distraction from the rest of the song, as even undercutting the song. That said, there are some real killer solos from the two guys I mention above -- but I think, at least in part, those solos may work specifically because they seem in some ways to emotionally parallel the lyrics.

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Neil Young practically invented pinch harmonics. And he can write a tune. (I'll admit I've drifted out of touch with him a bit in the last couple decades but both his lead guitar playing and his songwriting from the 60s and 70s was pretty damn cool, I still think. Just don't be throwing, say, his work from the 80s in my face; it's not what I'm talking about, from what I've heard.)


And there are probably few rock players as sophisticated as Richard Thompson. As far as I'm concerned, anyone who can write a song like "1952 Vincent Black Shadow" deserves a spot of honor in the Songwriting Hall of Fame just based on the one song, alone. But he's written loads of other great songs, too.



One thing I've noticed is that a lot of the more accomplished songwriters I've known tended to be
pretty good
lead guitarists, even though they may not have considered themselves as such. But one thing those guys and gals often did was subordinate the solo to the song.


Lead guitar solos that "pop out" of a song tend to impress the perennial-14-year old air guitarists out there (many of whom, of course, grow up to be
lead guitarists
;)
) but other folks may see it as a distraction from the rest of the song, as even undercutting the song. That said, there are some real
killer
solos from the two guys I mention above -- but I think, at least in part,
those
solos may work specifically because they seem in some ways to emotionally parallel the lyrics.

 

forgive me for my ignorance but i dont recall neil young being much of a solo player. than again i only have rust never sleeps and couple of other 70's albums... i know he did do a 1-note solo though

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Here's comes the What Makes A Guitarist A Good Soloist SMACKDOWN @ HCSWF!11!1!1

 

First round: JJ Cale vs Neil Young

 

Upcoming rounds feature Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughan and -- last year's champion -- John Mayer. There will be a panel on the songwriting merits of such guitarists.

 

Does Yngwie write songs?

 

:snax:

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forgive me for my ignorance but i dont recall neil young being much of a solo player. than again i only have rust never sleeps and couple of other 70's albums... i know he did do a 1-note solo though

I told you not to throw that stuff in my face. :D (Although I note that it was released in '79. But that's precisely the kind of thing I meant.)

 

I had Rust Never Sleeps for a while and I thought it was kind of charming and brave for him to try to address the punk thing (that I'd been involved with for a few years by then) but I thought it was also kind of embarrassing. Still, I'd rather hear that album any day over most of the bloated crap that was passing for rock in those days (your Starships, your Bostons) or the carefully packaged pseudo-new wave of bands like the Police, Cars, U2.

 

 

But, no, I'm thinking of Young's work as lead guitarist for Buffalo Springfield or his early solo albums, particularly Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere which had two roughly ten minute guitar workouts, "Down by the River" and "Cowgirl in the Sand" -- and had what some have called the single greatest electric guitar part on rock song, ever, "Cinnamon Girl." (That's not me saying that, mind you. But I like the part.)

 

Of course, Neil has always been all over the map, veering from confessional folk to aggressive rock and roll to nightmare bar rock...

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Here's comes the
What Makes A Guitarist A Good Soloist SMACKDOWN @ HCSWF!11!1!1


First round: JJ Cale vs Neil Young


Upcoming rounds feature Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughan and -- last year's champion -- John Mayer. There will be a panel on the songwriting merits of such guitarists.


Does Yngwie write songs?


:snax:

Long odd match-ups so far... I wouldn't want to be JJ Cale and get in the ring with Neil, or EC and get in the ring with Stevie Ray.

 

Even dead, Stevie Ray could whup EC with one hand tied behind him -- even back in the day when EC could play.

 

That said, I'd much rather listen to Cream, most any day, than a typical SRV album. With Cream, you had 60s Clapton, arguably at the top of his form, and two guys who in his own words could play circles around him, doing real improvising, with a real jazz approach to rock -- and one of the more interesting lyricists in 60's rock, Pete Brown. With SRV, you had a truly fabulous guitarist -- a study in technical excellence, elegance, and jaw-dropping feel and timing -- but not a particularly inventive guitarist -- along with some other guys -- usually doing woefully uninspired songs.

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Or Ry Cooder. A fine songwriter and a really fine acoustic and electric roots player. Not too bad with a slide, either.

 

And Rory Gallagher may have stretched himself a little thin as a songwriter in a few places in his career (so have some unassailably 'great' songwriters, imho, as well), but there's no question about the man's ability to play the hell out of an electric guitar, and he has some really nice songs to his credit, too. ("Tatto'd Lady" is a personal fave; "Calling Card," is a great little song about the blues, though it strays from the trad blues form, and some razor sharp guitar.)

 

And then there are guys like Bill Nelson (of BeBop Deluxe), virtuosic playing welded to an arty sense of humor just a little too hip for most rooms. Or Tom Verlaine from Television: haunting songs, haunting, sometimes scorching guitar.

 

 

I feel like there's a whole flood of names about to come to me... ;) But, I have to admit, they're not coming as easily as I thought they might. Maybe the ill one has something there.

 

 

EDIT: You know, I have to stop here and back up and put in a word for a guy who may not have been pegged as the next Bob Dylan but nonetheless wrote some monster hits and more than a couple pretty good songs: Jimi Hendrix.

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.... should i spend more of time practicing pinch harmonics/tremolo picking and technique instead of songwriting

 

What gives you greater satisfaction when you get it right?

 

Me? I'm a sucker for a song but I can't play guitar for beans. Of course now that I think of it, the more I write the better my playing gets even though my pinch harmonic and tremolo picking skills have yet to reveal themselves.:wave:

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I thought of another songwriter who's pretty serious about his guitar playing, I think: Willie Nelson. While he probably doesn't leap to many minds as a fret-grinder, he plays solos in a fair number of tunes, and he's quite lyrical, a very nice player. And he's got the coolest guitar in the world: Trigger, a Martin N-20 with a huge hole worn completely through the top just below the sound hole. And rule-breakers note: he plays the nylon string guitar with a flat pick. ;)

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I thought of another songwriter who's pretty serious about his guitar playing, I think: Willie Nelson. While he probably doesn't leap to many minds as a fret-grinder, he plays solos in a fair number of tunes, and he's quite lyrical, a very nice player. And he's got the coolest guitar in the world:
Trigger,
a Martin N-20 with a
huge hole
worn completely through the top just below the sound hole. And rule-breakers note: he plays the nylon string guitar with a flat pick.
;)

 

Willie is my litmus test for any guitarist -- or musician for that matter. If someone thinks he's {censored}, then I know that player is probably {censored}. If someone thinks he's the {censored}, then I know that player can probably play.

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I can think of one great songwriter who is also a super proficient lead guitarist.


Mark Knopfler.

Excellent call.

 

___________

 

 

 

Stack, that's a pretty good litmus test, seems to me. I started paying attention to Willie's guitar playing back when I was trying to play faster/harder/something-or-other and it really brought me up short... I think he was one of the biggest single influences on my change of direction as a solo/lead player. When I saw the simple elegance with which his little nylon string solos didn't just fill up time but actually moved the song forward emotionally, I thought, yeah, he doesn't play many notes, but he really makes them mean something.

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What about John Fogerty, Pete Townshend, or Bruce Springsteen? All have written some absolutely unforgettable, set-in-stone classic rock songs, and all can play smoking leads when they want to (Springsteen more so live than on record).

 

I agree with a lot of the other responses on this thread. But I also don't understand why being a "guitarist" and being a "songwriter" are mutually exclusive.

 

If you compose on the guitar, you should have a level of proficiency on it and know what you're doing with it (although I think that lead guitar histrionics of obsessing over pinch harmonics and speed picking, etc, are overrated, and for the most part matter little to most audiences). It's like trying to make a great-tasting pizza and not knowing how to make good dough.

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... (although I think that lead guitar histrionics of obsessing over pinch harmonics and speed picking, etc, are overrated, and for the most part matter little to most audiences)

 

 

More importantly, they matter little to most songs, and a songwriter knows better than to spray them all over their carefully constructed songs.

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With all due respect, you're blinkin' nuts. :D

 

 

Of course, when we start talking about lead guitar work, there's going to be a wide range of opinions. I've been biting my tongue a little, since what one listener might dismiss as mindless, soulless, uninventive fret-grinding or flat-footed guitar 101 playing, someone else is going to think is sublime guitar poetry.

 

But you and I, CM, are comfortable with each other enough, I think, that I can tell you you're nuts on that one. ;)

 

iZaZqx9v3dU

 

I've heard guitar players from Jimi Hendrix and John McLaughlin to Joe Pass and Nels Cline, been playing for decades, and, I gotta tell you, I aspire to Willie's level of "crummy." ;)

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I added a live Willie video to my post... he's sitting there in front of some of the greats of old school country (including, if I'm not mistaken, Chet Atkins*) playing utterly live and doing what I consider a fine job of accompanying himself. (Listen to his lines early on between his singing, and, of course, there's a pretty richly complex little solo, too.)

 

Willie's never been what you'd call slick -- he doesn't have Chet's supernatural technique (who the hell does now that Chet's jammin' in heaven?) but his playing really talks to me.

 

You haven't heard all the takes I've deleted
:o
.


Anyone can sound good on the 100th try.

Only one way to settle this, CM, a 6 string throwdown... your pick of classic forms: blues, country, tin pan alley. I'm warming up the Blues, Jr. :D

 

*edit: yeah, that boyishly good-looking silver haired guy is, indeed, the master guitarist, just a few years before his passing in 2001 -- I can't even imagine playing a guitar while Chet Atkins watched...

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