Old school vs the 64th note crowd

J

jeff0633

Member
Alright, the vague guitar debate thread, can you compare how "GOOD" one guitarist is to another? I have been thinking about this stuff for years, and the last couple weeks it has been in my mind again.

This all started while walking at the park a few days ago. I had my mp3 playing jamming while I walked, and a song came on, it was larry carlton, love him, but on this album, a blues song came on, and I'll tell ya, I literally felt SORRY for larry. His blues was so technical, so digitized, so mathmatical, I could see him thinking music theory trying to play those blues. Just sad, but technically wonderful, just ZERO feeling.

Then, Stevie's brother Jimmie Vaughan coms on, (and no wonder he was Stevies' favorite musician, not just because they are brothers). Every song he did, he guitar just screamed from the heart, yet you could tell that Larry Carlton knows a THOUSAND TIMES more about music theory, what thousand notes he can hit over which chords, far more than Jimmie Vaughan ever could dream of knowing about the guitar neck, yet I would rather hear Jimmie express himself ANY DAY OF THE WEEK on his guitar than i would larry carlton trying to play feeling blues.

Now i realize that i love to hear Larry and other like him do their jazzy thing, it's impressive, but I realize it's impressive for a different reason. He impresses me with the technical, with the usic mathmatics, but he does not talk to me directly from the heart to my heart, he is not talking in a raw, emotional language like Jimmy does, or Clapton does, or Becj does.

When I see Steve vai ripping up and down the neck, I am impressed, but the notes themselves DO NOT talk to me in an emotional way, they do blow my mind because of the agility, knowledge, technicality, hours of practice it must have took, and how impossible it seems to do, but that is different than what Jimmie Vaughan or Eric Clapton do. Stevie ray, Buddy guy, beck, Gilmour, I would rather hear these guys play guitar any day when i want to be moved emotionally, yet they probably know so much less than Steve vai about music and theory it is just insane.

So, this makes me see that really, you can't compare how good a guitar player actually is if he is expressing himself on the guitar. Now you can say mistakes are something to define if someone is good at expressing themselves. If someone is trying to express themselves and can't do it because they are making mistakes all over the place because they haven't practiced enough to express themselves properly, then that's one thing, but if someone is able to express themselves without fumbling all over, they are hitting the notes they intend to hit and are able to release their emotions through the guitar, then, I don't think that guitar players who can do that can really be said to be better or worse than any other guitar player.

I remember a few of the techno famous guys coming off as condecending to the feeling style of guitar, Steve vai as one example, even kind of hinting that Frank Zappa, was somehow just a limited guitar player, old school, hinting that somehow anyone who plays like Frank was, well, somehow less of a guitar player. that's what he came off as when discussing frank. Yet, i would rather hear one of Franks 10 minute solos, (Watermelon in Easter hay) any day than to hear Vai sweeping arpeggios up and down the neck in a dizzying array of notes that he 'allowed to hit mathmatically in theory"

Then i can't help thinking, well, I may feel this way because I am the same type player as Jimmie vaughan, so is it just that i am closing ranks with my style players and that's why I like it best? I don't know.
Anyway, Vai and a few others come off as condescending about old school players, yet give me Gilmour and that incredible, emotional lead in the live version of Shine On You crazy Diamond over watching Steve vai ANY DAY.

Is this because guys like Zappa, beck, and others, since they are not thinking of theory but rather thinking of emotion, can go off sort of OUT OF BOUNDS and stretch the limits of just simple notes and scales, and that guys like Vai stay in the theory world while they are soloing? I believe this may have something to do with it. i feel that, yes, Vai and Carlton know tons about the theory, but in a way, i feel it limits them to the theory, so they have knowledge of the dozens of notes they can and can't hit over a string of chords, but in a sense, this knowledge imprisons them and won't let them outside that prison where Frank Zappa Exists and is able to EXPLORE, transfer emotion, in other words, Franks playing sounds like his singing and song writing. His lyrics are strange, his songs and melodies very twisted, and when you hear him play gitar, IT'S THE SAME THING, you can hear his incredible mind in his actual soloing. yet, when I hear Vai and Malmsteen, they could trade their guitar knowledge and play like each other and no one would ever know the difference. they are both perfectly imprisoned in their music theory

But, are their guys that take the theory and still like to play with emotion? I believe there are. I saw Joe Satrianni playing with Vai on stage, and satch DID HAVE SOME EMOTION in his playing, it was different somehow, and he clearly, to me, was better than Vai, more moving, more tasteful. Eric Johnson as well. So is the secret to learn the theory, and yet try to not be imprisoned by it? To still play as you feel, without the theory in your head?

Would love some comments here from others.
 
I stopped reading when you said something about Larry Carlton not having a lot of feeling in his blues. He knows music, but the way he plays it (the feeling) is amazing, better than anyone I've ever heard. I saw him a few years ago playing with just his son on bass, and nephew on drums (or maybe the other way around), and it was the most incredible thing I've ever seen live.

So, I think your point about theory vs emotion is not necessarily a valid distinction. When they go together it's the most amazing thing.
 
Sorry, I love Carlton too for a certain vibe, a certain jazzy thing, buthis blues are as cold and clinical as it gets. Even the way he teaches, watch.

Blues Guitar Lesson - Blues Motifs - Larry Carlton - YouTube

Talking of "Motifs" and such. I think he is locked in a prison of music theory. Now, i watched a live song of larry's Blues and there was some feeling, but no more feeling than the theory allows. It still feels like he is within a set of walls that he has locked himself in to.

Now watch this JV vid, way less technical, less PERFECT, rudimntary, but absolutely packed with feeling. Listen what he says in the quick little interview at the beginning, "players that play from the heart". No motif, this is straight from his soul to the guitar neck and out, no theory, no digitizing, just raw emotion.

Jimmie Vaughan - Texas Flood - Tribute To Stevie Ray Vaughan - YouTube
 
Can you post some clips of your playing, jeff0633, so that we can decide whether Larry Carlton has more feeling in his playing than you?
 
If you really stop and think about it, who is the final arbiter and decider of what is and isn't feeling ? Just because something may be 'technical' doesn't mean the person playing it is not doing so with feeling. Similarly, an old blues master may knock out a solo that has the crowd foaming at the mouth, yet he may have just played it by rote with no feeling at all, knowing the crowd would lap it up and possibly just thinking 'suckers !'. This is an argument with millions of opinions but really, it's an arrogance on our part to suppose we know what is and isn't feeling.
 
I guess that's true, grim. It just seems like these different types of playing effect me in different ways, is all. This could lead us to the big question, what is art? I guess what I am saying is simply that knowing a bunch of theory doesn't automatically allow you to do anything better than players who know squat about theory. (like me). It's all in the expression of yourself for me and either the player moves me, speaks to me through his instrument, or he doesn't, and I can be moved by the simplest of string bends, done at the right time, with deep feeling.

Again, I do love the jazzy type stuff too and get in moods for that as well, I have always enjoyed listening to Carlton and guys like him.
 
Thanks for the link, Jeff.

As well as individual players do you think that you can pigeonhole musical genres? Is death metal lacking emotion? Does country or jazz have any feeling? Is blues the ultimate expression of feeling, from a guitar player's perspective?

I am with aaronmcoleman in thinking that Larry Carlton was the wrong example for you to pick for all theory and no feeling.

Perhaps those players that we may individually decide are devoid of feeling are in fact those whose music we do not yet fully connect with.
 
jeff0633 said:
Alright, the vague guitar debate thread, can you compare how "GOOD" one guitarist is to another? I have been thinking about this stuff for years, and the last couple weeks it has been in my mind again.
Click to expand...

Maybe you should not think about this stuff at all...as it serves NO purpose, and it's even more dumb to debate. :D
There are all kinds of good players out there and each of them have their audience, otherwise they would be total unknowns.

I have to say...the Jimmy Vaughan reference gave me a chuckle, 'cuz the guy gets laughed at on most forums.
I'm not saying he can't play (though certainly not like Stevie), but he's just not that interesting to listen to, for blues or anything else.
But agian...who cares what I think. If you like Jimmy Vaughan, then listen to him...and don't listen to anyone you don't like.
It's that simple. :)
 
Good post. We are definitely in to some subjective reality here. One persons trash is another mans art. Thrash metal, with emotion, the I associate would be anger. But is there a difference in the songs as an entirety and the licks of the guitar player in a solo playing in it?

I would think there could be great songs that could impart an emotion to you, yet still have a guitar lead in it that is not doing the same thing while it's playing.

Here we go, what is art? So if someone said to Rembrandt, your paintings would have more artistic content if yu had wheeled around and slopped pain off your brush a bunch of times. if someone, (60's Hippy, lol) saw it and said, "My god, that's the greatest art i have ever seen, so moving", does that then make it legitimate art? And if so, then anything can be art because anyone could say anything moves them in an artistic way. So if anything can be art, does that mean there really is no art at all?

Remember the model of Jesus in the jar of piss years ago, country was up in arms about it, and yet it was what was called art by the creator of it.

One thing i will say is that I have seen more of the "looking down the nose" by those players who use theory more than those who don't. And to me, really, as long as anyone expresses themselves and can do it without mistakes all over (haven't practiced enough to do what they want to do), then I see it as them being good at what they do.

As for Not understanding carlton, sorry, i just don't buy that. I am moved in a technical way by what he does. Music surrounded by theory can still sound good. What i mean is he is not going outside those boundaries, and i can clearly hear when someone steps out there, they do things, play notes in a UNIQUE emotional way. I don't believe that if we had Gilmour and Vai standing in front of us, playing lead licks by themselves, and if Gilmour played "Shine on you crazy Diamand", and Vai just ripped down the neck in blazing 64th notes that very many people at all would say Vai's ripping had more emotion. I believe they could be blown away by it, obviously. You would see how difficult, how much practice he must have done, you would wonder how a human being could do such tricks with 6 strings, so I am not trying to say they would be LESS impressed, I am saying i doubt you would get too many people saying it had more emotion than what Gilmour did in front of us, call me crazy, but that's the way I feel.

I think the teaching vid of Carlton shows a bit of what i am talking about. the blues licks are beautiful and precise, perfect, theoretically, that is. No, I don't believe anyone is seeing anything that i am not seeing in it. music guided by theory can have good feel to it, after all, it's perfect, really. Now listen to Zappa in this link
Frank Zappa - Black Napkins - YouTube

His playing is, well, you can tell it's his strange mind playing that guitar. Am i looking for the word, melody? Is it that his playing is a string of small melodies, and he is making up the melodies AS HE PLAYS, feeling the melodies, and it seems to me that maybe the theory guys do strings of notes, within the boundaries of the scales they know. It doesn't feel like there are unique, expressive melodies in the playing itself.

I am simply searching for what the difference is, why it's there, and where it comes from. Now his son dweezel, he is the same as Vai, and when he plays, it SOUNDS EXACTLY like stuff I would hear vai play. If vai played the same thing, I would never guess that he did the string of notes that dweesel thought up. But i assure you, if I heard Clapton do a lead that Zappa thought of, I would INSTANTLY know something was up. I would clearly hear zappa's playing in what he was doing, because their playing is so unique to themselves, but I CANNOT say the same about Dweezel and Vai. It feels like they are in the same box. Why is this?

Anyway, enjoying the back and forth
Peace.
 
Brilliant. You lot have all pwnd each other and you don't even know it.:laughings:

Hey jeff... way too much thinking man, way too much thinking.;)
 
I agree with muttley on the rambling...

My opinion on why the theory shredders turn their noses down is that they're constantly being compared and elvaluated by guys who can't shred.Always having to defend themselves and their choice of playing style.These type of forum boards are always filled by non shredders blasting shredders for their skills.Same old argument has been going on for years.No emotion,etc.
If you don't like it,don't listen to it.Just stop the judging.
 
I think terms like "soul" and "feeling" and "emotion" are nothing more than securities placed and simple blues licks that are put to faces that are placed in an imitating sate of pain so to say (see Vai if you don't understand the face thing).

And "technical" or "mechanical" is placed on shredders as some sort of defense of said "emotional" playing. This especially seems to hold true in the hobby area where players are even more insecure about their skills or lack of skills.


The way I see it, both styles of playing are good and I don't see how one is any better than the other. It just different, not necessarily better.

I pretty much rage when I see some idiot on a shredders video (who is just playing fast) and says "now play it with soul." Which apparently means slow it down and make weird faces to it. :rolleyes:
 
Again, though, tell me why that if malsteen and vai were on the same stage, if you closed your eyes, most people would not know whch one was playing? why is it that if Robby krieger of the Doors were on stage with Jeff beck, the difference would be EASILY detectable, closed eyes or not?

I believe it's because when you learn guitar by theory it kind of robs ypu of a certain amount of individuality on the instrument. Vai and Malmsteen would sound far more similar, BECAUSE they are both locked in the same prison. Their theory based laying doesn't allow for much individuality.

When you actually learn guitar in that theory way, that's the way your mind sees it and it conform to those rules. Individuality is what you have more of when you learn by ear, by yourself, just jamming, you learn to play YOUR THOUGHTS and feelings in a much more direct way from your inner self to your guitar, and you express it in a much more unique and individualistic way.

Learn by theory, and you think by theory, you are confined by theory.

Yes, both styles are cool, but one is more emotional and more conducive to expression of one's self--ART, and one is mind blowing technical music that can give emotion in the context of the entire song, and still blow you away with a thousand notes in multiple scales with supreme knowledge of what is possible theoretically. Painting by the numbers, you can still make some nice feeling music, but it's still painting by the numbers in my opinion. Vai and Malmsteen sound FAR more alike than players who didn't learn by theory. There's a reason for that, unless someone wants to deny that they sound more interchangeable.
 
I think I get what you mean now.. A good analogy would be writing a passage of text to convey a point as opposed to playing a passage on guitar. In both cases too many notes or words randomly thrown out there can render the tune or message completely meaningless.. Correct.:confused:

Here is an example of what I mean...

jeff0633 said:
Alright, the vague guitar debate thread, can you compare how "GOOD" one guitarist is to another? I have been thinking about this stuff for years, and the last couple weeks it has been in my mind again.

This all started while walking at the park a few days ago. I had my mp3 playing jamming while I walked, and a song came on, it was larry carlton, love him, but on this album, a blues song came on, and I'll tell ya, I literally felt SORRY for larry. His blues was so technical, so digitized, so mathmatical, I could see him thinking music theory trying to play those blues. Just sad, but technically wonderful, just ZERO feeling.

Then, Stevie's brother Jimmie Vaughan coms on, (and no wonder he was Stevies' favorite musician, not just because they are brothers). Every song he did, he guitar just screamed from the heart, yet you could tell that Larry Carlton knows a THOUSAND TIMES more about music theory, what thousand notes he can hit over which chords, far more than Jimmie Vaughan ever could dream of knowing about the guitar neck, yet I would rather hear Jimmie express himself ANY DAY OF THE WEEK on his guitar than i would larry carlton trying to play feeling blues.

Now i realize that i love to hear Larry and other like him do their jazzy thing, it's impressive, but I realize it's impressive for a different reason. He impresses me with the technical, with the usic mathmatics, but he does not talk to me directly from the heart to my heart, he is not talking in a raw, emotional language like Jimmy does, or Clapton does, or Becj does.

When I see Steve vai ripping up and down the neck, I am impressed, but the notes themselves DO NOT talk to me in an emotional way, they do blow my mind because of the agility, knowledge, technicality, hours of practice it must have took, and how impossible it seems to do, but that is different than what Jimmie Vaughan or Eric Clapton do. Stevie ray, Buddy guy, beck, Gilmour, I would rather hear these guys play guitar any day when i want to be moved emotionally, yet they probably know so much less than Steve vai about music and theory it is just insane.

So, this makes me see that really, you can't compare how good a guitar player actually is if he is expressing himself on the guitar. Now you can say mistakes are something to define if someone is good at expressing themselves. If someone is trying to express themselves and can't do it because they are making mistakes all over the place because they haven't practiced enough to express themselves properly, then that's one thing, but if someone is able to express themselves without fumbling all over, they are hitting the notes they intend to hit and are able to release their emotions through the guitar, then, I don't think that guitar players who can do that can really be said to be better or worse than any other guitar player.

I remember a few of the techno famous guys coming off as condecending to the feeling style of guitar, Steve vai as one example, even kind of hinting that Frank Zappa, was somehow just a limited guitar player, old school, hinting that somehow anyone who plays like Frank was, well, somehow less of a guitar player. that's what he came off as when discussing frank. Yet, i would rather hear one of Franks 10 minute solos, (Watermelon in Easter hay) any day than to hear Vai sweeping arpeggios up and down the neck in a dizzying array of notes that he 'allowed to hit mathmatically in theory"

Then i can't help thinking, well, I may feel this way because I am the same type player as Jimmie vaughan, so is it just that i am closing ranks with my style players and that's why I like it best? I don't know.
Anyway, Vai and a few others come off as condescending about old school players, yet give me Gilmour and that incredible, emotional lead in the live version of Shine On You crazy Diamond over watching Steve vai ANY DAY.

Is this because guys like Zappa, beck, and others, since they are not thinking of theory but rather thinking of emotion, can go off sort of OUT OF BOUNDS and stretch the limits of just simple notes and scales, and that guys like Vai stay in the theory world while they are soloing? I believe this may have something to do with it. i feel that, yes, Vai and Carlton know tons about the theory, but in a way, i feel it limits them to the theory, so they have knowledge of the dozens of notes they can and can't hit over a string of chords, but in a sense, this knowledge imprisons them and won't let them outside that prison where Frank Zappa Exists and is able to EXPLORE, transfer emotion, in other words, Franks playing sounds like his singing and song writing. His lyrics are strange, his songs and melodies very twisted, and when you hear him play gitar, IT'S THE SAME THING, you can hear his incredible mind in his actual soloing. yet, when I hear Vai and Malmsteen, they could trade their guitar knowledge and play like each other and no one would ever know the difference. they are both perfectly imprisoned in their music theory

But, are their guys that take the theory and still like to play with emotion? I believe there are. I saw Joe Satrianni playing with Vai on stage, and satch DID HAVE SOME EMOTION in his playing, it was different somehow, and he clearly, to me, was better than Vai, more moving, more tasteful. Eric Johnson as well. So is the secret to learn the theory, and yet try to not be imprisoned by it? To still play as you feel, without the theory in your head?

Would love some comments here from others.
Click to expand...

jeff0633 said:
Sorry, I love Carlton too for a certain vibe, a certain jazzy thing, buthis blues are as cold and clinical as it gets. Even the way he teaches, watch.

Blues Guitar Lesson - Blues Motifs - Larry Carlton - YouTube

Talking of "Motifs" and such. I think he is locked in a prison of music theory. Now, i watched a live song of larry's Blues and there was some feeling, but no more feeling than the theory allows. It still feels like he is within a set of walls that he has locked himself in to.

Now watch this JV vid, way less technical, less PERFECT, rudimntary, but absolutely packed with feeling. Listen what he says in the quick little interview at the beginning, "players that play from the heart". No motif, this is straight from his soul to the guitar neck and out, no theory, no digitizing, just raw emotion.

Jimmie Vaughan - Texas Flood - Tribute To Stevie Ray Vaughan - YouTube
Click to expand...

jeff0633 said:
I guess that's true, grim. It just seems like these different types of playing effect me in different ways, is all. This could lead us to the big question, what is art? I guess what I am saying is simply that knowing a bunch of theory doesn't automatically allow you to do anything better than players who know squat about theory. (like me). It's all in the expression of yourself for me and either the player moves me, speaks to me through his instrument, or he doesn't, and I can be moved by the simplest of string bends, done at the right time, with deep feeling.

Again, I do love the jazzy type stuff too and get in moods for that as well, I have always enjoyed listening to Carlton and guys like him.
Click to expand...

jeff0633 said:
Good post. We are definitely in to some subjective reality here. One persons trash is another mans art. Thrash metal, with emotion, the I associate would be anger. But is there a difference in the songs as an entirety and the licks of the guitar player in a solo playing in it?

I would think there could be great songs that could impart an emotion to you, yet still have a guitar lead in it that is not doing the same thing while it's playing.

Here we go, what is art? So if someone said to Rembrandt, your paintings would have more artistic content if yu had wheeled around and slopped pain off your brush a bunch of times. if someone, (60's Hippy, lol) saw it and said, "My god, that's the greatest art i have ever seen, so moving", does that then make it legitimate art? And if so, then anything can be art because anyone could say anything moves them in an artistic way. So if anything can be art, does that mean there really is no art at all?

Remember the model of Jesus in the jar of piss years ago, country was up in arms about it, and yet it was what was called art by the creator of it.

One thing i will say is that I have seen more of the "looking down the nose" by those players who use theory more than those who don't. And to me, really, as long as anyone expresses themselves and can do it without mistakes all over (haven't practiced enough to do what they want to do), then I see it as them being good at what they do.

As for Not understanding carlton, sorry, i just don't buy that. I am moved in a technical way by what he does. Music surrounded by theory can still sound good. What i mean is he is not going outside those boundaries, and i can clearly hear when someone steps out there, they do things, play notes in a UNIQUE emotional way. I don't believe that if we had Gilmour and Vai standing in front of us, playing lead licks by themselves, and if Gilmour played "Shine on you crazy Diamand", and Vai just ripped down the neck in blazing 64th notes that very many people at all would say Vai's ripping had more emotion. I believe they could be blown away by it, obviously. You would see how difficult, how much practice he must have done, you would wonder how a human being could do such tricks with 6 strings, so I am not trying to say they would be LESS impressed, I am saying i doubt you would get too many people saying it had more emotion than what Gilmour did in front of us, call me crazy, but that's the way I feel.

I think the teaching vid of Carlton shows a bit of what i am talking about. the blues licks are beautiful and precise, perfect, theoretically, that is. No, I don't believe anyone is seeing anything that i am not seeing in it. music guided by theory can have good feel to it, after all, it's perfect, really. Now listen to Zappa in this link
Frank Zappa - Black Napkins - YouTube

His playing is, well, you can tell it's his strange mind playing that guitar. Am i looking for the word, melody? Is it that his playing is a string of small melodies, and he is making up the melodies AS HE PLAYS, feeling the melodies, and it seems to me that maybe the theory guys do strings of notes, within the boundaries of the scales they know. It doesn't feel like there are unique, expressive melodies in the playing itself.

I am simply searching for what the difference is, why it's there, and where it comes from. Now his son dweezel, he is the same as Vai, and when he plays, it SOUNDS EXACTLY like stuff I would hear vai play. If vai played the same thing, I would never guess that he did the string of notes that dweesel thought up. But i assure you, if I heard Clapton do a lead that Zappa thought of, I would INSTANTLY know something was up. I would clearly hear zappa's playing in what he was doing, because their playing is so unique to themselves, but I CANNOT say the same about Dweezel and Vai. It feels like they are in the same box. Why is this?

Anyway, enjoying the back and forth
Peace.
Click to expand...

jeff0633 said:
Again, though, tell me why that if malsteen and vai were on the same stage, if you closed your eyes, most people would not know whch one was playing? why is it that if Robby krieger of the Doors were on stage with Jeff beck, the difference would be EASILY detectable, closed eyes or not?

I believe it's because when you learn guitar by theory it kind of robs ypu of a certain amount of individuality on the instrument. Vai and Malmsteen would sound far more similar, BECAUSE they are both locked in the same prison. Their theory based laying doesn't allow for much individuality.

When you actually learn guitar in that theory way, that's the way your mind sees it and it conform to those rules. Individuality is what you have more of when you learn by ear, by yourself, just jamming, you learn to play YOUR THOUGHTS and feelings in a much more direct way from your inner self to your guitar, and you express it in a much more unique and individualistic way.

Learn by theory, and you think by theory, you are confined by theory.

Yes, both styles are cool, but one is more emotional and more conducive to expression of one's self--ART, and one is mind blowing technical music that can give emotion in the context of the entire song, and still blow you away with a thousand notes in multiple scales with supreme knowledge of what is possible theoretically. Painting by the numbers, you can still make some nice feeling music, but it's still painting by the numbers in my opinion. Vai and Malmsteen sound FAR more alike than players who didn't learn by theory. There's a reason for that, unless someone wants to deny that they sound more interchangeable.
Click to expand...
 
jeff0633 said:
Again, though, tell me why that if malsteen and vai were on the same stage, if you closed your eyes, most people would not know whch one was playing? why is it that if Robby krieger of the Doors were on stage with Jeff beck, the difference would be EASILY detectable, closed eyes or not?





I believe it's because when you learn guitar by theory it kind of robs ypu of a certain amount of individuality on the instrument. Vai and Malmsteen would sound far more similar, BECAUSE they are both locked in the same prison. Their theory based laying doesn't allow for much individuality.
When you actually learn guitar in that theory way, that's the way your mind sees it and it conform to those rules. Individuality is what you have more of when you learn by ear, by yourself, just jamming, you learn to play YOUR THOUGHTS and feelings in a much more direct way from your inner self to your guitar, and you express it in a much more unique and individualistic way.

Learn by theory, and you think by theory, you are confined by theory.

Yes, both styles are cool, but one is more emotional and more conducive to expression of one's self--ART, and one is mind blowing technical music that can give emotion in the context of the entire song, and still blow you away with a thousand notes in multiple scales with supreme knowledge of what is possible theoretically. Painting by the numbers, you can still make some nice feeling music, but it's still painting by the numbers in my opinion. Vai and Malmsteen sound FAR more alike than players who didn't learn by theory. There's a reason for that, unless someone wants to deny that they sound more interchangeable.
Click to expand...


I've seen both Malmsteen and Vai live.I could close my eyes and tell them apart anyday.Obviously you're not a fan,so you couldn't.If all four of them where on stage together,i'd be able to tell all of them apart from each other.

That's your belief.You can believe whatever you want.Stop pushing your beliefs on everyone else.

Show me the facts or evidence.There is none.Art,emotion,feel,etc.,is a personal choice.Van Gogh didn't sell a single painting in his lifetime.The buying public at large thought his work was crap and he was a bit of a weirdo.He didn't get much recognition til after he died.I'm still not impressed by his work but it is what it is...

No one is denying anything nor do we have a reason to.Not everyone shares your opinion.That's all you have.Your opinion means nothing to anyone else.People like what they like and all your posts on why,what,where,and how are meaningless.Most commercial modern rock nowadays sounds the same,theory or not.That's MY opinion.I'm not trying to convince anyone.If you don't like shredders don't listen to them.Why do you feel the need to justify yourself or your own playing ability by blasting on the theory players?
 
Whatever. What a waste of time to try to rank musicians. If you like it it's good. I thoroughly enjoyed seeing and hearing Vai and Dweazil do their solos on Stevie's Spanking and Sharlena, so it was good.
 
I'm not a big fan of shred...but I do think that guys like Vai and similar, at the upper ranks of shredders, actually DO play with feeling an emotion from their perspectives. It's not the same perspective as a blues guy or a jazz guy...etc.

That said, I think at the lower ranks, many young/new shredders do tend to focus heavily on the gymnastics and have yet to learn how to play with emotion, but then, same can be said about young/new blues players who are still getting their licks sorted out.

It's OK to NOT like shred just like it's OK to NOT like blues or jazz or whatever. Play what you like and listen to what you like...and there's an audience for just about everything these days.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top