Thanks mxmkr. Jeez, if you heard me play electric you'd be unimpressed!
I limited my elec playing to the school music assembly sing-alongs I used to do... because little kids like everything and are easy to wow.
...seems people record better than they can play around here too, as a trend... It is the 1 in 100 posts in the clinic that I would give a VERY good too, and then the rest follow with just "good" to ..."hey..you need to learn how to tap your foot and edit mistakes!!"
I know what you mean... I think it just hits me in a different way. The things that grab my ear when I click around in the clinic are usually more related to genuineness of expression than solidity of execution (sh*t, what pompous verbiage, huh?). I mean, on occasion it's ALL there... expression, confident performance, great writing and arranging, and skill with the gear that doesn't get in the way. But if I had to pick one thing that attracts me to a piece, it'd just be the expression. Maybe I’ve been desensitized by all the hours I've spent teaching beginners to play the guitar (HA!), dunno, but that's what does it for me.
An example that comes to mind is a song by the Handsome Nells called Rough Diamond. Good sounding ac gtrs first caught my attention but after a couple of phrases the vocal just had me by the throat... even though it had frequent intonation problems and a lack of finesse with mic technique. The sincerity was there and it came across in an unpolished way that actually heightened the effect.
From what I see around me, especially in my non-artistic friends, there’s a lack of creativity and self expression that’s, as a culture, sucking the life out of us. Sure, we’ve got endless great entertainment to see, but few of us actually DO it ourselves. To me that’s the bigger issue… and somebody who sits with their guitar and makes a song is breaking out of that.
So even though I’ve been paid to play on occasion, I consider myself an amateur in the true sense of the word – somebody who does what they do just because they love it – and I feel a connection with other amateurs who approach their music that way.
Tim