I can listen to guys like Metallica and Megadeth and their guitar sounds because they contribute to the songs they're playing and they sound great, but with these instrumental players it's as if the absence of vocals makes them feel they have to fill up every minute with a non stop barrage of meaningless notes. I just can't listen to it, it's like someone constantly smashing you over the head with a sledgehammer You feel like saying "slow down! slow down! play some slower more soulful stuff for a change of pace!"

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Luck won't do it and ignorance can't

George Van Eps.

I dunno satriani's version of "Sleepwalk" originally done by santo and johny is pretty slow and soulful, full of technique and no words

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Check out the riff @ 1:06 (if you're not already familiar):

http://youtu.be/kCOgUeyWelI?t=1m5s

To me, this is awesome, even if it doesn't weep with feeling. That's just some slick playin'.

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as long as it has SOUL. it needs SOUL and GROOVE. simplicity is great but look at eric. he isnt exactly slow. mark knopfler is all about the slow and controlled. they both feel, just depends on what you appreciate more i think. for example, my father loves brothers in arms and almost anything by the straits. when it comes to Eric, dad thinks that the speed is not so good...

i cant play that fast so i appreciate speed. a player needs to have and use both well to be appreciated.

Maybe yeah but i just get bored with instumental music. I really like to hear songs with a guitarist contributing to a good band sound. After a while, if there are no vocals, it go's in one ear and out the other with me. I can appreciate the skill level but it's boring IMO.

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Luck won't do it and ignorance can't

George Van Eps.

I'm rarely impressed with solos. Part of why punk rock is dominating my thoughts, and even beginning to interrupt my daily life.

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1984 Squier Contemporary Stratocaster
1986 Peavey Envoy 110
1967 Kingston Acoustic

I love the Frampton, Gilmour, Clapton school...right note right time..no need to try and show a ton of fireworks...let the song speak!
ABS

I'm least impressed with the Cirque Du Soleil outfits some of these bands are portraying...

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"C'est parti mon Kiki "

I agree with airbornestrat completely. Feel the same way about singers. I'll take Lucinda Williams and Bonnie Raitt over Mariah Carey and Christina Aguilera any day.

I'm the opposite. I like to hear what the instrumental artists are playing. I get distracted and sometimes anoyed with vocals but of course there are many many a tune that would be nothing were it not for the vocals. To me, a song that can balance the two well are rare. The bottom line for me is I like to let my mind get lost in music and I find it hard to do that with vocals. That's why I don't care much at all for folk, old country music, rap and hip hop and the like.

To each his own.

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...I for one, sure would appreciate the return of intelligent conversation, spirit of assistance and the simple yet effective ignoring of those who can't seem to hang with that...
Best regards,
rob

I've got a box set of about 20CD's or something of John Mclaughlin at the Montreux jazz festival. Great guitarist and a great technician but i can only listen to it in small doses. After a while you yearn for a song, just a good song with a good hook to it. To me this is what a lot of these guys seem to forget. It's all fingers and no song with them. A lot of it nowadays, for me, smacks of complete self indulgence and by the time they get to the end of solos everyone's relieved because they're bored rigid.

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Luck won't do it and ignorance can't

George Van Eps.

Tone is subjetive. There are people who love the tone of those million mile an hour scale players and they will argue that those scales are very melodic. For me, I want to hear the instrument and the amp. If the signal is proccessed to the hilt it could be God himself playing and I wouldn't be impressed. Speed isn't always a bad thing. It's oly bad if the whole point of the solo is about speed.

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Just think of how awesome a guitar player you could have been by now if you had only spent the last 10 years practicing instead of obsessing over pickups and roasted maple necks.