Steve Vai is in complete control of his instrument, and is an amazing guitar player. You have to admit it. Instrumental wankery may not be your cup of tea, but you have to admit his mastery.
I propose that he is a modern-era Hendrix. Is there another guitarist that fits that billing?
Please watch all the way through. This is not some technical accomplishment more than it is a supreme musical manipulation of sound processing technology.
He is a guitar master - one of the most technically proficient players out there. But he’s no Hendrix. Not even close. Hendrix had songs.
Steve has songs! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKivHjIcya4
Vai is a technical virtuoso, but has never been a good songwriter. The same is true of Yngwie.
Eddie Van Halen hasn’t done much lately, but he’s a guy who has complete mastery of the instrument AND he can compose real songs.
Steve Vai’s playing is a supreme musical manipulation of sound processing technology in the same way that Transformers is a supreme manipulation of video processing technology. There are a lot of parts that are technically impressive but overall it’s just not very good.
The late Michael Hedges beats them all.
I’d rather listen to one song’s worth of playing by Paul Weller, Johnny Marr or Norman Westberg than the entire combined output of Vai, Malmsteen or anyone like them.
That Hedges guy was quite pleasant, though.
Well, yeah. But I meant that comparison to mean more about how completely in control of the guitar they both are (were), that they are guitar gods that stride the Earth amongst us mere mortal geetar pickers and that they literally can play anything they want to.
Vai has other examples on the internet that are vastly superior to the one I presented here from a technical standpoint, but I chose this one because of the profuse and obscene manipulation of feedback and the tremolo bar that he exhibits here (which is where the Hendrix comparison was originally founded, because Jimi was profoundly good at those things too).
I often wonder what kind of weird music Hendrix would be making were he alive today and the beneficiary of modern technology. He was pushing the envelope back then as it was.
Johnny Marr is the technical equivalent of Yngwie or Vai, just in a completely different approach to the guitar. They shred; he uses a complex thumbpick + fingers approach + partial chords to create sonic landscapes in support of his band’s songs.
Hedges was awesome…completely different style than guys like Vai, obviously. Are there any other modern-era big name players that use the two-handed technique like in the Hedges video besides Stanley Jordan?
Stanley Jordan breaks the rules, plays “Stairway”!!: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8A_IP5YB2g
Yeah, I get that. It’s all good and again, Vai is a freakin’ master.
From that standpoint, as I have said before on the Dope, in a lot of ways, Hendrix was NOT a master. Very sloppy player. Jeez, listen to his intro on Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) vs. Stevie Ray’s - SRV nails the timing of the notes and wah much more cleanly and crisply. But it’s Jimi’s song and he created that lick ;). IMHO, that’s a key differences between the Vai’s and the Hendrix types - Vai gets the sound perfect; Hendrix hears the songs in there and uses the effects and volume, etc., to deliver the songs.
So if Jimi were alive today, I suspect he’d be using today’s tech to do the same thing. He would have slop in it - I could totally seem him uploading his latest jam session with amazing friends up to Youtube…
Many - **Kaki King **is the current hot buzz two-handed tapper, but there are dozens of others.
Hedges was special - I would equate him with Hendrix in that he used his innovative approaches in service to interesting songs. Most of the other tappers come up with fancy tunings that sound interesting at first, but ultimately all blend into each other…
Eric Johnson, Cliffs of Dover
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6833529017668510290#
One of the best tones in all of guitardom. He’s not a two-hander though. Unless of course you’re posting it because its just awesome!
You missed the point completely…
No I didn’t - you were saying that you would rather hear guitarists with quality songs vs. techno-shredders. I agree, as I stated in Post #2 above. I only want to make the point that Marr, unlike Weller (never heard of your third guy) actually IS as good as Yngwie and Vai, in his way, but applies his mastery in service to great songs.
IMHO, that is often a problem with the type of mastery that Vai and Yngwie epitomize - it feels like it is best featured on top of a song, not as part of a song’s fabric. Marr’s technical mastery - and again, he is every bit of a master as those shredders - is much, much better suited to being woven into song…same with Andy Summers or even Eddie Van Halen, who can shred that way, but also includes a lot of partial-chord rhythm work and an emphasis on pop melody…
Maybe you could explain your point for us idiots.
OK, that was it. Sorry, it looked like you were focussing on technical details. And I’d say Weller was as good a guitarist as Marr in his genre, as Westberg (guitarist for Swans) was in his.
That’s cool. But do you play? Don’t get me wrong, Paul Weller is an EXCELLENT songwriter and musician and a really good guitarist, but he is not even close to Marr, Vai or Malmsteen as a technician. I think even **An Arky **- a Ric-playing, Jam / Weller nut of a Doper, would agree with me here…