Off Topic Question about so-called "Feel Players"

[sixtyfour]

Thought Jeff Beck is an EB artist as he's listed on the EB artist page

He's probably a string endorser or something. I've never seen him with an EBMM.

Anyways...anyone interested can search Youtube for Jeff Beck's Ronnie Scott's performances. There's a few out there.

 

[kissmyaxe]

and you can always learn to play buckethead - but can one "learn" to play Beck or Gimour?

Really tell me how,cause ive been trying for years and ive never heard anyone come close to emulating Buckethed. I sound more like Beck when I play Cause We Ended as Lovers then I will ever sound like Buckethead when I attempt to play the Nottingham Lace solo,that has more soul in a shred then alot of Claptons stuff. I get what your saying but Buckethead is the worst example to use, Micheal Angelo Batio, now there is your guy.
I try to be open to alot of styles, and yes unless you are truley elite and unique shredding will soon become redundant and boring, I have grown sick of most mainstream metal except truly original artists,the same can be said about the more traditional blues players, Beck Clapton Allman Knopfler ect are truley in a league that most players will just never devolop into, people will try to mimick them rather then learn from them and create their own style. its true no matter how much money you spend and hours you practice you will not sound just like Gilmour he is the most mystifying of them all

 

[Astrofreq]

So am I imagining all this?

Yes.

 

[tm21]

all blues solos sound the same...there i said it. pentatonics, bending, heavy vibrato...whoop-dee-doo! i think there was a quote from yngwie, i'm paraphrasing here, but he said he developed his style to escape "the incestuous nature of blues-rock"...every player comes out sounding alike, because theres only so much you can do with a five note scale. all the licks are recycled and then re-recycled. a lot has been done with the pentatonic scale, yes....but i think its pretty much been milked for all its worth.

 

[tm21]

are these the dying gasps of an aging generation? dave gilmour is fat and balding now...floyd is irrelevant...influential but more on a subconscious level, absorbed through osmosis more than anything...filtered down through each successive phase of music. jeff beck keeps dying his hair...the stones have to be rolled out in wheelchairs...in a way, i'm glad john lennon is dead, because it prevents a beatles reunion tour from ever happening. the beatles have cemented their legacy as greatest band ever now, without ruining it by some 2010 album...i can just picture mccartney singing with autotune, and a bevy of half-naked harlots behind him in the video. the past is history...

 

[ScoobySteve]

all blues solos sound the same...there i said it. pentatonics, bending, heavy vibrato...whoop-dee-doo! i think there was a quote from yngwie, i'm paraphrasing here, but he said he developed his style to escape "the incestuous nature of blues-rock"...every player comes out sounding alike, because theres only so much you can do with a five note scale. all the licks are recycled and then re-recycled. a lot has been done with the pentatonic scale, yes....but i think its pretty much been milked for all its worth.

The following bolded excerpt can only lead myself, and anyone else with an expansive level of exposure to Blues that, you have simply not listened to enough Blues. AT ALL. Not only does various sub-genre's of blues exist (each with their own, and very distinctive features) commonality in the utilization of similar scales, and techniques does not elicit the same sound.

In order to obtain a proper and objective sample, the sample must be taken from a large population with broad scope. What you have conveyed with your text is that you simply have not said so. As I have mentioned earlier, it is ok to have opinions, however, to draft your opinions as assertions and to state them as facts (sardonic or not) you not only contradict the validity of your claims but you also substantiate a perspective that is bias in nature. It's ok not to like blues solos, but to draft an opinion regarding them, state a distaste, and attempt to assert it as an immovable point is sheer asinine. Particularly when the the assertion is simply not true and confined to a limited level of exposure.

This is a place is a place of discussion. It's hard to discuss things with you when you're adamant to post assertions without willingness for any other individuals to contend with your points. It's hard to fill a glass that is already full. I won't even begin with the second post.

The only possible deduction you're giving me is that you're an adolescent with nothing better to do, and you're on the computer with the premeditated intent to start a fire for the sake of amusement.

Please, prove to everyone else otherwise.

 

[robelinda2]

I just dont see what any internet comments matter to my life and my musical tastes. If it sounds good i like it.

 

[tm21]

i think your argument rejects the spirit of the very music you revere. weren't the sixties all about violent change, revolution, willful destruction of the past? it seems ironic that old timers cling to music that expresses the notion of change, when the notion itself dictates that you don't cling to it. i've not stated anything as fact, this is simply my opinion and everyone is free to express theirs. and if my cup is full, then yours runneth over. the passage of time has galvanized your opinion into fact.

"commonality in the utilization of similar scales, and techniques does not elicit the same sound." -- really? it doesn't? you mean to say that a 1-4-5 doesnt always sound like a 1-4-5??? i'm not sure i agree :S

by that logic nobody should be calling shred redundant if common scales and techniques do not produce the same sound. using the same chord progression does, however.

is this how the establishment reacts to the forces of change? like a salmon furiously swimming upstream, against the current? now i guess i understand why those hippies ran away from home and dropped acid.

 

[beej]

Forces of change? You're forgetting this is art, people are allowed to have their own opinions. Knocking something because it's old is both juvenile and ignorant. (It's like saying you never want to go to Rome and see the coliseum b/c you've got a nice pizza joint around the corner.)

I hope as you go, you'll learn that listening to a wide variety of musical styles makes you grow and appreciate everything else you hear that much more. You're welcome to stay closed-minded, of course, but it will only get you so far as an artist and a musician.

 

[ScoobySteve]

"commonality in the utilization of similar scales, and techniques does not elicit the same sound." -- really? it doesn't? you mean to say that a 1-4-5 doesnt always sound like a 1-4-5??? i'm not sure i agree :S

by that logic nobody should be calling shred redundant if common scales and techniques do not produce the same sound. using the same chord progression does, however.

This is exactly the crux of the original assertion you made on your original post.

There is more to the way humans perceive and receive sounds outside of the tones they recognize. There are various factors outside of the tones themselves that make us appreciative of music.

Let's take your inquiry for example. I can take any key, play the 1st, 4th and 5th root on my guitar. Then I can play the same progression with a clean sound. Then medium gain. Then high gain. Then add in effects. Then I can choose to use an abrasive plectum. Then finger pick it. Use a brass slide, then maybe a glass one. Then I can go play it on the piano. Then my ukulele. Then the keyboard. Add some synth, so on and so forth (I assume the repetition has made its point).

The point is they are all playing the same "notes" yes, but the way the listener perceives it, and absorbs it can be entirely different. Your initial inquiry regarding the "feel" players addresses this very issue, and the reason why you resist it, (or resent, I can't tell which) is because you're not willing to be open about it.

I can play a whole note. I can choose to add a mild vibrato. Or maybe a strong vibrato. I can choose to start the note as a staccato, or I can choose to crescendo the note, or decrescendo. I can strum the strings near the bridge, over the pick ups, or even on the fretboard. Each permutation the player implements can elicit an entirely different sense of music, even when playing the exact same notes.

So to answer your indirect question of "you mean to say that a 1-4-5 doesnt always sound like a 1-4-5?" Yes it doesn't. Because if your criteria for music is the identification of tones on the 12 tone western scale and identification based on those qualities alone, then yes you will be savagely confined to a narrow perspective on music. Fortunately, music isn't like that. There's more than the note itself. It's the methods employed in delivering them and the mediums used to create them.

Also, please don't put words in my mouth. I never discredited the nature of shredding. If you read anything I wrote earlier, I have stated that I like shredding, and never devalued it in anyway. Don't take your reaction towards other individuals and pin them on me.

I have allotted you the courtesy of answering the questions you have presented towards me. However you have conveniently disregarded any inquiries or challenges made in your direction, and substituted them with half-informed retorts.

All I am saying to you is that, there is more value in saying "Hey I don't like the blues I've heard, it sounds very repetitive and redundant. What do you guys think?" as opposed to "blues is over done, their 'feel' and emotion is overrated and is a thing of the past."

One method actually invites an individual to contribute and perhaps enlighten your experience with music. Hey, you don't have to like it, but at least you'll be more informed. The latter response makes it seem like you're an embittered individual with too much angst against music that he hasn't fully investigated.

The Best,
Steve

 

[tm21]

i'm not knocking anything because of its age, I just said the beatles are the greatest band ever. I am knocking the blues because its three-chord structure makes it predictable and boring. I am also knocking the flimsy excuse of "feel" that is used to defend the blues and weak playing. can you name me a song that is not written with "feel" or the expressed intent to elicit feeling from the listener? all of music is predicated upon this notion. to say one artist has more "feel" than another is thus foolish. its like saying one song has more music than the other.

scooby steve your paragraph on medium-gain, high gain, abraisve pick etc etc, does little to damage my argument. those are merely frills used to mask the childish simplicty of the blues' three-chord structure. boil it down to its most basic elements and its just that...three chords played ad nauseum, three chords flogged tirelessly, sapped until its totally desiccant. the blues is dying for this very reason... arent you tired of listening to the same three chords? dress them up all you want, but they're still the same, repeated over and over and over again.

jeff beck's idiosyncratic playing, applying vibrato almost at random to any note he chooses and plucking them with his fingers (because you get more "feel", man) is as much art as a jackson pollock painting....randomly scattered dots on a canvas. some may call it art but i reject it. i call it BS masquerading as greatness. I think a lot of this silliness about feel is promulgated by rock journalists. people who don't play and mythologize players as they wax poetic about the legend of so-and-so. i guess it sells magazines. unfortunately players themselves seem to have bought into this nonsense and use it to justify boring, insipid, redundant music. imagining that a single bend from clapton can catapult you into the sublime is telling a lie to yourself. a bend is a bend is a bend. i cant tell the difference. clapton bends with as much feel as any guitar player who emotes through his instrument. please dont ascribe him superhuman powers, because of the specific and almost unnoticeable way in which he wiggles a steel string. he does not have a direct line to god. neither does jeff beck. although i wish god would tell him to put on a shirt with sleeves for once.

I admire technical proficency and great songs with great lyrics. the subtle (dare i say invisible) dynamics of a single note do not tingle my spine, chill my bones or warm my heart. and i am hardly embittered, nor am i juvenile or even ignorant for that matter. i would appreciate if i wasnt psychoanalyzed or stereotyped based on a few comments i've made about a genre of music. i've not mentioned my age, i could be 45 for all you know.

 

[Dizzy]

are these the dying gasps of an aging generation? dave gilmour is fat and balding now...

How do you know buckethead isn't just a wildly eccentric bald old bugger ??

 

[ScoobySteve]

This is where you're missing the point, as I have stated already in my post.

You're boiling down music to the basic premise on the 12 tone structure. That's the thing that boggles my mind about what you say. If all music boils down to numbers for you, I don't know what to tell you. Music is about the way it moves on. What you stated is what is the essential problem.

You're looking at music as an argument. You're worried about what people's opinions and suggestions mean to your "argument." There's no need for one to be defended. You think technique, mediums are all covers and childish costumes.

What more can be said to you?

There really can't be anything said to you. Your cup is already full. What use is expressing your opinions if you're not willing to consider anything else? What's the point in posting here?

 

[robelinda2]

So what exactly do you want us to say?? All blues is crap? Whatever music you like is superior to what we like and listen to? What is your purpose to this thread because I dont see where it is heading.

 

[tm21]

pot calling the kettle black. you're rejecting my perspective as flippantly as i'm supposedly rejecting yours. you're not willing to consider what i've said. please re-read what i said about clapton and beck and their bending. my ears do not detect a difference between the way clapton, beck, page, hendrix, bb king, buddy guy or any one else bends. and i think if you do detect a difference you're being intellectually dishonest. it reminds me of a scene from The F-Word with Gordon Ramsay. Some bourgeois wine connoisseur swaggers into the dining room with his custom made signature merlot. Ramsay offers him a blind taste test. He places three glasses of wine in front of him and asks him to taste them all and declare which of the three is his. After a shameless amount of sniffing, swirling and gargling the guy chooses a wine he thinks is "the best"...turns out it was the cheapest of the three and bought at a convenience store down the street.

"Music is about the way it moves on. " this is my point. the blues does not move on. it stays within three chords and the pentatonic scale. it stays there till it becomes stagnant, then rotten, then rancid, until it needs to be excised like a benign tumor. and please stop all this mention of cups. your posts are hardly the sermon on the mount. its rather presumptuous to think my "cup" needs to be filled with the divine nectar of your wisdom. your opinion on music is no more valid than my opinion. i have read what you wrote with an open mind, just wish you'd extend me the same courtesy. i just happen to disagree, amicably at that.

 

[ScoobySteve]

Then why don't you simply state that. The "presumptuous" nature in which you received my text is subjective to you.

I've never dismissed anything you've said. Nor did I indicate that your cup needed to be filled with my wisdom. It is rather presumptuous of you to assume that. Please don't put words in my mouth and attempt to dismiss any other attention through the use of superfluous rhetoric.

I've considered, everything you've posted. And what I have offered you in return is that you're going to inherent a significant level of resistance when you view the blues uncompromisingly as a system of numbers (which to a certain degree it is) and judge it solely on that criterion. That's not music.

While we're not going to delve down any post-modern avenues to discuss what constitutes music, I will say, that everyone here has posted what they can for you, and you offer nothing back except elaborate schemes of structured retort with no progressive aim in mind. You don't inquire, you don't suggest, you assert, blindly with no courtesy in mind.

You're isolating the blues down and judging it in your example based solely on the bends. (And on slight other mentions penatatonic scales) It's about the accumulation of their methods and mediums that gives them their distinct sounds. If you're saying that Hendrix, Page, Beck, and Clapton phrasing is all the same, it is you sir who are being dishonest. Not intellectually, because this is not an intellectual issue. It's about being able to discern between two distinct qualities, by observation.

 

[Tung]

IF:
no blues, no Clapton, Hendrix, the Kings, etc..= no Van Halen, Blackmore etc..= no Yngwie, Vai= no Gilbert, Buckethead, Petrucci
It's all relative in music. Everything came from somewhere, it's good to check out everything and develope your own thing. I dig all schools of playing, really...

 

[Slingy]

Wow this thread went to crap. I'm not even gonna read all that nonsense, I get the jist of it. Not a fan of people who like to enforce their opinions, especially on something as subjective as music. People like different stuff and feel passionate about the music they like, whats the big deal?

 

[tm21]

stop prosthelytizing.

talking about music is like dancing about architecture. your posts say far less about blues than the music itself, which i've listened to in spades. this is the conclusion i have reached. i've tried to force myself to like it, i've tried to understand why other people like it, but it just doesn't do it for me. i expressed that opinion to stimulate discussion, not to be converted into a bluesman. i dont need a conversion, than you very much. i'm quite happy listening to to what i like.

also, stating an opinion is not blind assertion, i'm afraid. just as you stating your disagreement is not blind assertion. also i dont think i've been discourteous in any way. but you've not convinced me of anything. if you get your rocks off on the blues, more power to you. if you think you can discern the difference between the vibrato, slide or bend of a particular player from another, then thats wonderful. those differences are imperceptible to me. a slide sounds like a slide, a bend like a bend, vibrato like a vibrato. vague and inconclusive language, however flowery, about tone and feel bore me, as do vagaries of the soul, plucked heartstrings, and the same three chords repeated for 80+ years. all very boring to me, personally.

we've hit an impasse here so lets just agree to disagree. if you can stomach a 1-4-5 for the rest of your life, i admire you. i need more variety, however. to be satisfied by three chords and five notes, to build a whole career on that is astonishing. i don't understand how bb king hasn't died of boredom yet. perhaps its the steady paychecks that keep him going. he's punching the clock just like the rest of us mere mortals. there is a stunning lack of curiosity about music inherent in the blues. i think thats why almost every kid starts out playing the blues then moves on to jazz or metal, or something more interesting. the blues bores me for the same reason that punk bores me. i dont care how many sub-genres there are, droning three-chord punk all sounds the same to me. i cant tell the songs apart on nevermind the bollocks.

also, the raw "observations" that you make about those so-called distinct qualities are processed intellectually, whether you admit it or not. thats how your "discernment" is achieved. there certainly is an intellectual aspect to music. its not just primal, visceral emotions blazing through your speakers. theres a lot of logic and theory involved. if you dont understand that, try moving out of the blues to something a little more complex...try jazz for example.

lastly, referring to the chords in a song by their numerical, tonal values is not reductive in the slightest. its a convenient way of understanding a song and being able to transpose it to any key. the blues is unarguably based on the 1-4-5 progression. calling it as such, is not a pejorative. nor does it imply a failure to "feel" (theres that word again) the blues. i've felt it, many times and its left me bored to tears. those clapton, page, hendrix, jeff beck licks have been heard time and time again. i just need more, i'm sorry.

 

[robelinda2]

Mate I dont love blues either, its gets to me sometimes too. I like the more sophisticated blues of Larry Carlton and Robben Ford etc. I like country and tons of people/players cannot understand why. I still dont understand why someone elses opinion about blues means anything to you?