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[MadassAlex]

About shred guitar.

Now he was all like BLACK PEOPLE ARE BETTER AT EVERYTHING EVER and I was all like NUH UH NOT SHRED GUITAR and he was like WTF HENDRIX DUDE and I'm like YNGWIE RAPES HENDRIX AT SHREDDING and he's like YEAH BUT HE'S UNINTERESTING and I'm like SO WHAT THERE ARE LIKE A BAZILLION GUITAR PLAYERS OUT THERE WHO SHRED AND ARE INTERESTING LIKE STEVE VAI and then Patrick is like WHAT STEVE VAI IS AN EMOTIONLESS WANKER and this is kind of where he lost me.

I think we must be listening to different music because Steve Vai must be the least-wanky shredder I've ever heard. But I hear people talking about guys like Steve Vai and Joe Satriani a lot in a negative sense, as if they'll all technicality and no musicality. This doesn't make a lot of sense to me, since I hear those guys expanding the range of techniques at their disposal just so they can be more expressive. For instance, Steve Vai's uber sliding technique and whammy bar manipulation, Satch's incredible legato.

I can understand this kind of playing being somewhat inaccessible, but I think there's a trend right now to see it as less valid in an emotional sense, more disconnected. This is something that I do not understand, because as a guitar player I tend to speed up as the tension mounts. This is all failing to mention the pure melody that shredders bring to songs. Listen to anything by Jason Becker, Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, John Petrucci, ect. Despite what people like to say, they're evidently highly melodic.

tl;dr, why are people jealous of shredders' technique and why do they seem to completely ignore the more accessible sections of their songs/albums?

[Spluff]

I dunno, it boggles me too. People telling me how Joe Satriani has 'no feeling' just confuses the fuck out of me, and then they tell me to look at yet another mindless pentatonic soloer and how he's got 'emotion'. Reciting standard blues/rock licks isn't emotion - it's lack of skill guys.

Also, people going BLOO BLOO DAVE GILMOUR whenever they hear somebody playing even remotely fast confuses me.

[E. Spaceman]

I'm not jealous of shredders at all, i don't really have any strong feelings towards them, but I find most of their music utterly tedious. They can sure play some mean guitar but I don't find them very interesting at all.

[MadassAlex]

I'm not jealous of shredders at all, i don't really have any strong feelings towards them, but I find most of their music utterly tedious. They can sure play some mean guitar but I don't find them very interesting at all.

Well, that is totally valid. But I still don't understand why some people feel the need to belittle them.

[onewheelwizzard]

I think what it comes down to is that technical virtuosity doesn't actually make any statements beyond "look at how much I have practiced and how much I work on my playing!"  That's a hard message for a lot of people to relate to.  Shredders are so deep into the technical aspects of their music that whatever emotionality they're communicating gets lost in translation.  Hendrix was different because the emotionality of his music was simply and effortlessly present and his technical mastery was a means towards it and not an end the way it is for the shredders you're talking about.  Basically, whereas Hendrix played like he was thinking about the emotional subjects of his songs and not the actual piece of wood he was holding, shredders seem so acutely conscious of their own fretboard that they don't appear to be paying attention to anything else, which makes them very hard to get into for people who don't share that all-eclipsing desire to push the boundaries of technical playing as far as they can go.

[MadassAlex]

See, right there you're implying that shredders are less emotionally attached to the music which I believe is total bullshit.

[onewheelwizzard]

No, I'm sure that it's impossible to get as into music as a shredder must be without being emotionally invested in it.  I'm just saying that focusing on technical virtuosity is not a medium that *communicates* emotion very well.  For the rest of us, we can't imagine anything like a shred solo happening without the player's FULL ATTENTION being paid towards the fretboard and nothing else, and nobody (OK, not many people) wants to hear someone who they think is doing that because it seems like wankery.  Anyone who IS comfortable enough with a guitar to imagine how shredding works might understand how it can also be emotionally communicative, but everyone else is just sitting there with a dumb look on their face wondering how fingers can even move that fast.  It really doesn't matter to the listener how emotionally connected the artist is to the music, if the listener doesn't connect to it themselves.

[MadassAlex]

That's true, but that comes down to the subjective nature of music. As I said in the original post, I understand well how shredding could be inaccessible to a lot of people, and thus they have  harder time relating (as with any kind of technical music).

However, only in rock-related genres do we have this idea of "emotion" and the idea that it is negatively affected by virtuosity. You never hear a pianist have a go at Beethoven, for instance.

[Caspian]

Well, there's a lot of violin/piano wank from the romantic era that is recognised as just that- violin/piano wank. Pagaginni is the one that first comes to mind. I imagine that back in that day there was a lot of meaningless virtuosity on those instruments, however the ravages of time has obscured the more pointless wanky pieces from the baroque/classical/romantic era. Right now there's a bit of dislike towards the whole shreddy thing, but maybe in a hundred years or so the few pieces remembered from this era will probably (hopefully) be quite highly respected, similar to the way that some older wanky pieces of music are enjoyed by many. Worth noting that Beethoven wasn't really loved by the critics/some music fans in his day either.

Still, I get what you're coming from. I personally enjoy shred guitar and think that when it's done well it can cover a lot of different emotions. For the record, while I'd prefer Hendrix over Yngwie, Hendrix didn't shred. I would certainly not call him a 'shredder'. White People are certainly better then black people when it comes to shredding, but unfortunately Asian People are the best at it.

[MadassAlex]

Hendrix could be considered proto-shred (in the same way that he is proto-metal).

But you are correct, asians wreck everyone ever at guitar, Starcraft and academia.

[Caspian]

Hendrix could be considered proto-shred (in the same way that he is proto-metal).

But you are correct, asians wreck everyone ever at guitar, Starcraft and academia.

I don't really think you could call Hendrix proto-shred. To me shredding implies some sort of tapping action. Sure, I guess there'd be a bit of jazz fusion guitar that was undeniably shreddy, but Hendrix was never all that fast.

[MadassAlex]

Then let's agree to disagree because I don't think shred necessitates techniques such as sweep-picking and tapping (although it does offer free blowjobs to such techniques)

[Johnny C]

[Hendrix's] technical mastery was a means towards it and not an end the way it is for the shredders you're talking about.

This!

This quote right here!

THIS MOTHERFUCKER!

READ IT!

[MadassAlex]

So basically you're saying Hendrix was better because he's more accessible.

[Spluff]

The technicality is hardly an ends for people like Steve Vai, Satch. It's very rare that they actually play as fast as they possibly can, and if the speed was all they were trying to achieve, they wouldn't be anywhere near as famous - in their place you'd have people like Michael Angelo Batio being the reigning kings of instrumental guitar.

[gardenhead_]

All the times I've seen people belittle shredders have been when shredders/fans of shredders have tried the whole "music without technical virtuosity is meaningless and not as good as music with it" argument. I'm not saying this is the only time it happens, just from what I've seen it's been one extremely ignorant viewpoint for another. Personally I find shredding kind of boring. That's not to say it has no emotion or whatever, it  just doesn't really appeal to me.

[Spluff]

I disagree, I don't think he missed the point - he's pretty much spot on. Refusing to listen to music because it's technical is like only reading books that only uses words that are a maximum of three syllables long. It might still be good, but why limit your musical experience?

[gardenhead_]

Yeah, but what's the point of reading the book with big words if you don't know what the words mean? Why listen to technical music if technical music holds no meaning for you? Simple isn't always a bad thing.

[ruyi]

The difference with your analogy though is that the person is choosing to limit their own experience, whereas onewheelwizard has been saying that people who do listen to pure technical virtuosity are sometimes just unable to connect with it as opposed to actively choosing not to.

Why am I posting in this thread? Sorry, I really shouldn't be. I am not terribly familiar with shredding although I am familiar with different kinds of technical virtuosity in music, I guess?

[gardenhead_]

yeah I guess. I think I will leave for the same reason.

[MadassAlex]

Here, it isn't so much that you've missed the point.

It's that you have lived in the house next door to the point for some fifteen years without so much as nodding to it when you were out emptying the trash.

Well if you'd like to make the point more accessible then I'd appreciate it a lot (haw haw haw).

[onewheelwizzard]

I am really amazed at the number of levels on which you completely misinterpreted what I had to say.

First off, I never said Hendrix was "better" than anyone.  I only pointed out that more people seem to enjoy and connect to his music.  I'm pretty sure you can fit your head around the difference between judging an artist as "better" than another, and stating that many others seem to think so.

Secondly, I was not saying that Hendrix was more "accessible" than anyone.  "Accessibility" isn't even a real measure ... saying something is more "accessible" is the exact same as saying "more people like it" (OK, technically it means "more people are likely to like it") and we already went over the bit where you already know that that doesn't mean "better," so I don't need to explain that again.

So to rephrase my previous post, the distinction between Hendrix and shredders that makes Hendrix more "accessible," the thing that makes him easier for more people to enjoy, is that someone who listens to Hendrix does not get the sense that his focus is on his fretboard.  When Steve Vai plays, you KNOW that he is locked into an intense and powerful relationship WITH HIS GUITAR.  When Jimi Hendrix plays "Hey Joe," his passion isn't for his guitar, it's for his woman!  The piece of wood in his hands is absolutely secondary to the unfaithful bitch he's about to shoot down in the heat of a jilted lover's rage.

Now, if YOU have an intense and powerful relationship with YOUR guitar, then hell yeah, Satriani and Vai are emotionally intense!  You totally get where they're coming from and their music makes lots of sense.  But most people do not have intense and powerful relationships with guitars.  If they DO have relationships with guitars, they usually see the guitars as tools for helping them communicate their more-important relationships with people, or political philosophies, or other things that are not the guitar they are currently holding.  And people who don't have really intense and powerful relationships with their guitars are just not going to understand the emotion behind guitar playing that comes from that kind of a relationship.  So in a way, by agreeing that Hendrix is more "accessible," you're acknowledging a wider emotional spectrum within his music, because what you're saying is "Hendrix was able to make music that more people could relate to and enjoy as art and not just sound, for more reasons."

I'm sure that shredders are VERY emotionally invested in their music.  They clearly wouldn't have put as much work as they did into it otherwise.  But that emotional investment is in a domain that most people just don't have any window into, and it's lost on anyone who didn't already have a passion for technical guitar playing themselves.  And people who don't have a passion for technical guitar playing aren't Philistines any more than people who don't have a passion for Impressionist oil painting or traditional digeridoo playing.

[MadassAlex]

Actually, my asshole post was more directed towards Johnny C. I get what you're saying just fine, but I was taking issue with the implications Mr. C was laying out.

[onewheelwizzard]

Thanks for understanding, I guess, but "don't worry, I got it all along" is not a particularly convincing statement after you posted something that could not have been better engineered to make precisely the opposite point.

[MadassAlex]

I was just kind of pissed that after you made a balanced point it was simplified to the point where someone was using it to say THIS IS WHY HENDRIX IS THE BEST aRAGHSGKRSRSss;;.

I have to disagree, however, with the idea that more technical shred is all about the relationship with the guitar especially as songs have definite subject matter. You might be able to argue that for purely instrumental shred, but what about technical death/thrash metal where the guitar is just as technical but there are lyrics and opinions? And if you're right, what do the song titles mean? Is the guitar-shredder relationship the same as the violin-shredder relationship of 200 years ago (violinists are totally shred yo)?

And yes Hendrix is more accessible but I don't think it's due to his songs being more human-oriented than shred. I think it's down to the fact that his songs actually have lyrics. After all, a shredder doesn't just write a piece of guitar music, they'll think of a subject matter and try to express their feelings about it via guitar.

[ruyi]

(I think Johnny C was being a bit tongue-in-cheek?)

[MadassAlex]

(He does that a lot, that is true. If you were being silly, then, sorry Johnny C! I shouldn't have snapped! But if you weren't joking then, shame on you, Johnny C!)

[onewheelwizzard]

"And yes Hendrix is more accessible but I don't think it's due to his songs being more human-oriented than shred. I think it's down to the fact that his songs actually have lyrics. After all, a shredder doesn't just write a piece of guitar music, they'll think of a subject matter and try to express their feelings about it via guitar."

Songs with lyrics actually are more human-oriented than instrumental shred (generally, I'm sure there are exceptions).  Also, if the audience can't tell that it's not "just a piece of guitar music," it's just a piece of guitar music.  You're basically making distinctions that are only valid from your own personal perspective, which is fine until you try to universalize them, which you seem to be doing.

I'm not trying to bust your balls over it or anything, but you seem really intent on proving something to us that we couldn't or won't understand in the first place.  Besides, you don't need to like Hendrix more in order to acknowledge that his music is capable of reaching deeper into more people than instrumental shred.  "More people" aren't you.

[MadassAlex]

Human-oriented is dangerous ground. How, indeed, can you say that any music is more human-oriented than another kind?

I am aware that "more people" aren't me but I very much have to disagree with the idea that, by default, Hendrix has more emotion, since that's subjective to the individual. It's not like you rate musical emotion but adding up the feelings of everyone who gets something out of it, you measure it on an individual scale. If you don't do that, it ceases to be artwork and becomes entertainment.

So I have a very big problem with someone saying that one kind of music is deeper-reaching than another based on what is basically popularity and collective perception, because then isn't the most popular music by default the deepest-reaching and most meaningful?
You can't measure these on anything other than a purely individual scale. Therefore, even if only one person is touched by a piece of music, it is just as valid as if a million were touched by it.

What the hell else is shred going to relate to, anyway? Aliens? Kitchen utensils? It's music written for humans, by humans! Based on that fact alone I would argue that it's just as human-oriented as anything else because it's trying to communicate a feeling.

[Caspian]

Human-oriented is dangerous ground. How, indeed, can you say that any music is more human-oriented than another kind?

Quite easily, really. Lets pick Meshuggah's Catch 33 as an example. It's not particularly melodic, it's extremely repetitive, it doesn't have an easily discernable structure. People like melody, they don't like lots of repetition, they like structure. Compared to say, Neutral Milk Hotel, which is melodic, catchy and concise, it is  not very human oriented. Simple, really. And you can get that argument and apply it to the shred vs hendrix argument that you seem to be enjoying.

[ruyi]

one kind of music is deeper-reaching than another based on what is basically popularity and collective perception

actually,

his music is capable of reaching deeper into more people than instrumental shred

He does not claim that Hendrix is deeper-reaching because of its popularity, he said it is deeper-reaching for more people. This is different from saying that it's objectively better capable of touching people. He is not claiming that Hendrix's music is better, he is just trying to explain why his music might have a wider audience, which is a fact you seem to have recognized already. Also I realize now that I am basically rephrasing his earlier post where he explicitly says the same thing, but you still seem to be misunderstanding him.

I never said Hendrix was "better" than anyone.  I only pointed out that more people seem to enjoy and connect to his music.  I'm pretty sure you can fit your head around the difference between judging an artist as "better" than another, and stating that many others seem to think so.

Also what does human-oriented mean? Now I am curious. If music made by humans isn't human-oriented, what would it be? Nature-oriented?

Caspian I kind of disagree with your example because repetitious music that lacks structure still signifies meaning to humans, even if it doesn't utilize more popular musical ideas.

[MadassAlex]

Quite easily, really. Lets pick Meshuggah's Catch 33 as an example. It's not particularly melodic, it's extremely repetitive, it doesn't have an easily discernable structure. People like melody, they don't like lots of repetition, they like structure. Compared to say, Neutral Milk Hotel, which is melodic, catchy and concise, it is  not very human oriented. Simple, really. And you can get that argument and apply it to the shred vs hendrix argument that you seem to be enjoying.

With all due respect, that paragraph meant nothing to me because it has nothing to do with how human something is, just how accessible it is.

And ruyi, and everyone basically, I would be extremely careful saying that music x can reach deeper into more people than music y because that just translates to popularity. Maybe not because of popularity, but popularity is what it becomes. And popularity does not = human because, surprise surprise part of being human is individuality and personal acceptance and rejection of a given stimuli.

[ruyi]

I would be extremely careful saying that music x can reach deeper into more people than music y because that just translates to popularity.

But then what's the alternative? That all music is equally capable of reaching deeply into all people?

[Caspian]

With all due respect,

Hey sweet, I am due some respect. 

[ruyi]

I was going to respond but I just realized there is no kiss emoticon on these forums. Why.

[MadassAlex]

But then what's the alternative? That all music is equally capable of reaching deeply into all people?

I would argue that the number of people is absolutely irrelevant, and that a piece of music has the capacity to reach into a human being is the pivotal point. That is, all music is capable of touching a human being deeply, and that's enough because if you take large amounts of people into account, you're just judging from the perspective of a number of subjective opinions. And no amount of subjectivity makes a concept objective.

[ruyi]

Maybe. I'm curious though, do you agree that there is some music that does resonate with more people than other music? Nevermind what that other music is capable of. If this is true, why do you think it is so? Is it something to do with individual people as listeners not letting the other kind of music touch them?

[MadassAlex]

Maybe. I'm curious though, do you agree that there is some music that does resonate with more people than other music?

Definately.

If this is true, why do you think it is so? Is it something to do with individual people as listeners not letting the other kind of music touch them?

I think we should look not what at draws people to certain music, but what pushes people away from other genres. Take death metal, for instance. A great deal of people deny that it is even music, despite its growing fanbase and international support.

It's easy to see why, though. The growled, rhythmic vocals, highly technical, involved guitar and basswork, the unrelenting drums... death metal isn't a genre that lets your ears rest (and neither is shred, for that matter!). Most people who listen to music, I daresay, dislike the audio equivalent of being fucked by a Boeing 747.
The general idea is that the more classically musical a piece of music is, the more popular it will be. I don't refer to classical music, but rather identifiable aspects of music. Music that has easily distinguishable melody, harmony and rhythm will be more popular because it is easier to perceive. When you come to a scene of music, like rock, that has those things in abundance, the most exciting musicians will become the most popular.
In the case of classic rock, it was Hendrix and Zeppelin because they were the most unrelenting in their use of dissonance to create and release tension in a song. So they would abuse people's desires to hear easily accessible music by drawing them in with a certain aspect of music, creating temporary inaccesibility, and releasing back to a section of the song that is more easily listened to.

[onewheelwizzard]

Alex, I think you're kind of abusing this term "accessibility" that you're throwing around so much.  Maybe you should try to come up with another way of phrasing the idea that you're trying to communicate with that word, because you're starting to make less and less sense every time you use it.

I'd frame the discussion like this: music can be compared to a family of languages, and there are some dialects that most people speak easily and from early in life, and some that require serious study later in life in order to fully comprehend.  Artists like Jimi Hendrix and The Beatles knew how to speak the most common forms of music (or at least the dialects that are now the most common, after they popularized them) very eloquently and were masters at communicating to a very broad audience because they knew how to speak a musical language that almost everyone nowadays can understand.  Death metal is a dialect that needs pretty serious immersion in order to learn, and people who are unfamiliar with it won't understand anything that anyone says in it.  Does this make death metal musicians less musically eloquent?  Not any more than it makes James Joyce a poorer writer than William Shakespeare, but you sure don't see "Finnegan's Wake" on any 9th-grade lit curriculum ... nobody would come close to understanding it, and something that isn't understood can't be appreciated.

I think there is something to be said for knowing how to speak a language, musically or otherwise, that anyone (or at least most people) can understand, and anyone who can be understood by a very broad audience and still communicate really powerful emotions without watering down what they're saying must be recognized as an absolute master of their art.  I don't think their mastery can be compared to that of a more specialized, less conventional musician, though, because you're never going to find a judge who is equally well-versed in both languages and will still tell you that one is better than the other.  Anyone who actually understands the distinction between Hendrix and Petrucci is probably going to say that objectively measuring one against the other is impossible.  Why are we trying?

[MadassAlex]

Alex, I think you're kind of abusing this term "accessibility" that you're throwing around so much.  Maybe you should try to come up with another way of phrasing the idea that you're trying to communicate with that word, because you're starting to make less and less sense every time you use it.

I don't think so. I use accessibility as in "the amount of effort needed to perceive a stimuli", if that helps.

I'd frame the discussion like this: music can be compared to a family of languages, and there are some dialects that most people speak easily and from early in life, and some that require serious study later in life in order to fully comprehend.  Artists like Jimi Hendrix and The Beatles knew how to speak the most common forms of music (or at least the dialects that are now the most common, after they popularized them) very eloquently and were masters at communicating to a very broad audience because they knew how to speak a musical language that almost everyone nowadays can understand.  Death metal is a dialect that needs pretty serious immersion in order to learn, and people who are unfamiliar with it won't understand anything that anyone says in it.  Does this make death metal musicians less musically eloquent?  Not any more than it makes James Joyce a poorer writer than William Shakespeare, but you sure don't see "Finnegan's Wake" on any 9th-grade lit curriculum ... nobody would come close to understanding it, and something that isn't understood can't be appreciated.

That is not to say, however, that it is any less human.

I think there is something to be said for knowing how to speak a language, musically or otherwise, that anyone (or at least most people) can understand, and anyone who can be understood by a very broad audience and still communicate really powerful emotions without watering down what they're saying must be recognized as an absolute master of their art.  I don't think their mastery can be compared to that of a more specialized, less conventional musician, though, because you're never going to find a judge who is equally well-versed in both languages and will still tell you that one is better than the other.  Anyone who actually understands the distinction between Hendrix and Petrucci is probably going to say that objectively measuring one against the other is impossible.  Why are we trying?

But why must a musician seek to be popular? There is absolutely no reason that they should become more accessible in order to communicate to a wider audience if they feel happy with the music themselves. I don't see Hendrix as a better musical communicator than Steve Vai because, while Hendrix certainly has a larger audience, Steve Vai speaks a "dialect" that is just as meaningful to those who understand it, but there are fewer people who understand.
That is, if you want to compare musicians and how effective they are at communicating, they have to be judged according to the same "dialect" and since shredders and classic rock guys like Hendrix are communicating differently, saying that one or the other is more far reaching is ludicrous, because there's a biased and different audience. I'm saying that I'm sure that all the shredders out there are capable of speaking a more widely-recognised dialect (after all, you learn them during the formative stages of learning music), but they specifically choose a less accessible dialect because it makes them happy!

[Caspian]

I don't know, man. It seems that you enjoy punk a great deal (based on the women/men thread, anyway), and based on that you're not really in a good position to criticize another's music taste.

Also: I don't think he was just referring to Vai, more about using him as an example. And Rush? Rush are freaking EXCELLENT.

You lose 20 internet points.

[Caspian]

I guess here's perhaps were we disagree- while I don't think tech skills is essential for good music (I'm a huge drone doom/ambient fan, not the most technical of genres), I like it when bands show us their leet tech skillz. Perhaps it's just that my tastes are black and white and I either like really slow stuff or thrash/power, but, hell, if you're going to play over, say, 160 bpm, no reason why you can't make it a little bit difficult and fun to play. To use a really detestable cliche: "If you've got it, flaunt it", although I'd add some sort of "albeit tastefully" thing at the end. If you're playing stuff that's fast, why not make it difficult to play? It's one hell of a lot more fun, for one thing.

Edit: I'm also saying that this applies to punk. Punk w/leet tech skills >>> Punk w/o leet tech skills. Also: i think I missed your point, and this may be useless but whatever I'M POSTING THIS ANYWAY.

Music at its most detestably phallocentric.

What's wrong with phallocentric music? As a dude with a penis and two (count 'em) balls, I don't really see what's so wrong with phallocentric music. It is music designed with a "Hey I have a Penis" sort of viewpoint in mind, and as someone with that, it's certainly something I can identify with. Perhaps this is just my Manowar fanboyism coming out, again.

Obviously, people can listen to whatever they like with my blessing. I think I say that at least once in every thread and eventually I'd like to not have to.

There's no need to be nice to each other all the time. Evidently I like some music that you thoroughly dislike and vice versa. Why not have a laugh at each other's expense now and again? I'm sure we're both mature enough to handle a few jokes coming our way 

[doombilly]

guitar hero

I am so sick of people comparing a video game to actually playing an instrument.

[Dimmukane]

My issue with virtuosoes (spelling?) is that there is a difference between technical mastery and knowing how to write a good song.  Most people can't do both.  This is why I like barely any prog-metal bands.  So many prog bands are trying to write ridiculous concept albums to the point that very few people understand its original intent, and the songs sound like a jumbled mess.  Far more people enjoy cohesive, singular songs than concept albums that get too technical to comprehend.  I'm not saying concept albums are bad, but to me it feels like every time a prog band tries to do one, a kitten gets confused and walks into a wall.  Which is pretty often.

Then there are the virtuosoes who don't even do concept albums.  They just write technical songs that are barely connected to each other or themselves. 

The point I'm trying to get across:

The reason classical music is considered great is because it was technical music that was also easy to listen to (most of it, anyways) while still getting its ideas across.  Modern virtuosity rarely gets two out of those three criteria right. 

[Thrillho]

tl;dr, why are people jealous of shredders' technique

Whose ass did you pull this out of? We don't like shred music, and as such must be jealous?

Am I also jealous of Li'L Chris?

Shred solos, as a whole, do not appeal to me. I will freely admit that a lot of shredders put a great deal of emotion into their music, but it seems like too often it's not done tastefully, or with any variation. Please make note, I am not saying ALL SHRED IS SHIT BECAUSE I SAY SO. I am saying that as a whole, the genre doesn't appeal to me, even the good stuff.

I mean, would Satch or Vai be famous as songwriters or soloists if they didn't shred at 700mph? Shredding, even emotional, tasteful shredding, is all very well, but do you have the songs to back it up? Satch certainly has a couple from what I've heard, but really...

This is why I prefer people like Newton Faulkner, who writes great pop melodies and then builds the great guitar work around it, like on 'I Need Something,' where none of it feels unnecessary, in fact it enriches the song. However, without his technique, the chords and the melody and the lyrics are good enough to stand up on their own. This is what I'm looking for in music.

[Patrick]

Now he was all like BLACK PEOPLE ARE BETTER AT EVERYTHING EVER

Dear Alex,

Man way to take a joke out of context and make me look like some kind of racist cunt. I really appreciate it.

*dickpunch*,
Patrick

[karl gambolputty...]

Edit: I'm also saying that this applies to punk. Punk w/leet tech skills >>> Punk w/o leet tech skills. Also: i think I missed your point, and this may be useless but whatever I'M POSTING THIS ANYWAY.

I think the point you may have missed is that technical skills have little to nothing to do with how good any punk rock is, or even maybe how good any music is. 


Man Patrick, why you gotta be such a racist cunt?

[Patrick]

In a non-joke post, I would like to point out the fact that Hendrix played guitar with his teeth. You don't see that punk bitch Vai doing anything as rad as that.

[doombilly]

Well! Alas! Ladylike two-time loser. The ogreish jerk.

No. Never. Sorry I took your comment out of context. Never mind.

[Lummer]

Short answer - I think really interesting art comes from catharsis, which in turn relies on some sort of hardship. That's why a lot of really incredible music comes from people who have suffered persecution. Typically, this isn't white men because historically, they have had a comparatively easy ride. Women, the Irish, African-Americans - these groups have been continuously fucked over by the establishment, which is one of the reasons white males tend to mimic them in an attempt at authenticity.

There are exceptions but I maintain that the above is typically true.

So white people, Asians or Canadians who've been through hell on earth can't make valid music? I believe a rephrasing is in order, Tommy.