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Has the Electric Guitar taken a backseat in todays music?

4K views 109 replies 31 participants last post by  pjp 
#1 ·
Today many modern artists have an increasing preference for electronic instrumentation. There is a feeling that the Electric Guitar has gone as far as it can and Electric composition is unlimited. Songwriting software can do some excellent work. However can a synthesized guitar equal a Clapton, Hendrix or Duane Allman? The human creativity. Your thoughts and opinions.:)
 
#63 ·
Guitar has taken a bit of a back seat in modern music, but what's far worse is that, even when guitars are featured (in pop or modern "rock"(ish) or country), it is almost always generic emotionless crap playing. Screaming guitar may be out of fashion for now, but a well played guitar can whisper even more impactfully than a screaming guitar (Mark Knopfler wrote the book on that), you just don't hear great meaningful emotional guitar playing almost at all today.
 
#66 ·
I was never in the Van Halen days, those have better technique, but after a while, it's like aerobic, who can pick or hammer faster, just a lot of notes. Their technique is very different from the old timers like me, I remember in the late 90s while I went back to guitar a little bit, I was in the store testing guitar, there was a young kid there shreding on the guitar like nothing else, I was quite amazed by it. I said to him I like it. He said back to me " I was listening to you playing and I like it!!!" Funny I didn't know a thing how to play his style, nor he knew how to play mine!!!


I was on Fender Forum a few years back when I was designing the noise cancelling circuit for Fender Strat, people there did not like the new shreding style, they all go back to the old Eric Clapton, Hendrix stuffs. I don't know it's just that forum or it's the trend.


Last check, Clapton is still quite famous and still killing it at his old age!!!
 
#73 ·
#72 ·
Continuing the thought above using a trumpet analogy, Wynton Marsalis is 10 times more technically skilled than Chet Baker ever was, but Chet was 10 times more musical than Wynton. Everything Chet played was simple, but every note meant something. I don't hear that musicality in music today almost at all, whether its on guitar or trumpet. That's why Chris Botti has done well, and finding success on trumpet today is even more difficult than it is with guitar. Chris is not a technical master, but his playing is emotional and musical in a world of instrumental music today that lacks musicality.
 
#77 ·
Music business is very different, most singers use studio recording musicians, musicians are all in the background. Band is no where as important as in the 60s to 70s. Guitarists have better luck working as studio musician than in the band. Studio recording is a completely different kind of work all together. Now that kind can have a little more steady jobs as you are just in the background. You spend majority of the time in studio, a lot of time alone just recording your track into the song. You might never see other musician, singer, just put on the headphone and record your part. It's not fun, just a job.


But still, there are a lot of people fighting for the job. Too many musician, dime a dozen.......ten dozen!!! Everyone started out with a big dream, but end up doing this.....in best case 99.9% of the time.
 
#80 ·
I'm going to throw my 2 cents in here.

I played in bands during the late 1970s and up to the mid-1980s -- new wave, garage or what have you. I played guitar and bass although I wasn't all that good. I did write and records songs though by myself and with others. The quality varies because that was the advent of home recording with some cassette 4 tracks of varying quality and also a lot of bouncing tracks from cassette deck to cassette deck.

The idea that guitar has taken a backseat in today's music is too broad of a question because it could mean what's on the radio, in the top 40 or jazz or alternative/indie stuff. I can tell you that the guitar is quite alive and well in alternative and indie music.

The guitar is a very expressive instrument with its quick attack and sometimes long decay. It is a voice that can be angry, overpowering, empowering, melodic, arty or whatever you want from it. For bands, the guitar is almost a weapon on stage that roars out to the audience and anyone can wield it. In the 70s, people learned that you didn't need to be a great guitar player to get attention or make a statement. It essentially was shown that anyone with the attitude, guts, charisma and musicality can start and play in a band.

I do want to add something here. Being in the circle of musicians in a town makes you realize how difficult it was for any musician (usually a guitar player or drummer) to focus and stay on task. I can't tell you how many great guitar players I saw who couldn't hold a band together. There is something about a lot of those people that just cannot stay with things.

If anyone is interested, I can link a few different types of songs I recorded (for myself -- not for any label).
 
#81 · (Edited)
This is my believe, but just remember I have been out of the music scene for 4 decades.



I think taking a back seat is not limiting to guitarist, in general, other instruments and even bands has taken a back seat. Remember bands really made popular by the Beatles, before that, a lot of them are singers, in the 60s to early 70s, the bands became popular, then it died down and back to singers. Musicians have to work more in studios instead of standing in front of the stage. Even live concerts, singers hire different musicians to go on the road, no specific band or anything. There are good Jazz musicians that work for famous singers, then in their off time, play their own kind of music. Dave Grusin's band are mostly those kind of musicians. His drummer in the 80s Carlos Vega was a fantastic drummer, he was on tour with James Taylor....sadly he committed suicide in the 90s.


Not too many bands that are famous, very few that last a long time like the Queens. Well, at least thanks to the Beatles that made a lot of musicians' dreams came true for a few years. It's Beatles that started the combos, then to Cream, Hendrix, Santana, Allman Bro. etal that brought guitar and other instruments to the fore front. but in the mid to late 70s, it really die down and back to singers. I don't know the band scene after the 70s, so I can't say much after the 70s.


After I quit in 1979, I completely change the kind of music I listen, no more Rock and Funk, all Jazz, piano and singing.
 
#82 · (Edited)
To make it into the big time on guitar, both today and in the past, you have to have your own sound. There are tons of shredders and great guitar players, but without a unique sound, it's impossible to go anywhere because the overall talent pool is a hundred miles deep. Stevie Ray, Santana, Mark Knopfler, BB King, Neil Young, Gilmour, Clapton all have/had their own unique sound -- you can single them out in almost any recording. Having a unique sound (and being musical and emotional rather than technical) is far more important than technical skill for significant commercial success in guitar.

Which guitarists today have their own sound? Not many, I would say. Most modern guitar players are either too technical/nonemotional/uninventive or too derivative (in other words, they are blend of everything from the past -- they sound impressive, but nothing distinguishes them or their music). Is the problem that record producers are abandoning guitarists or are modern guitarists failing to distinguish themselves? I think it's a bit of both, but more the latter than the former.

.
 
#85 · (Edited)
My most favorite guitarist back in the days was Carlos Santana. Do you mean Neil Schon of the Journey instead of Neil Young?

I don't want to sound like a sour grapes and said the newer style of shreding are just a lot of notes only because I don't know how to play those. It's just not the music I would sit and listen for extended period of time. It's boring. Don't get me wrong, I admire good technique and difficult lines. I went to Jazz because of that. Not only people have to have good technique, fast picking, the progression of Jazz is more complicate and people have to think of the progression to solo into the music. This not only requires technique, also understand of music progression and "ride" on it. People just cannot shred and "walk" into jazz music. It just require a whole lot more. That I really appreciate.
Just listen to the piano of Pat Coil that I link a few posts before, how his solo "ride" with the progression of the song, the solo sounds like melody but still a lot of fast notes.

Those days I liked Santana, his solo is like a melody also, of cause it's not difficult to play, but it's pretty.
 
#83 ·
As stated there are these YouTube stars like guitarist Buckethead. Also all sort of guitar players, even children and woman, get lots of hits on YouTube. There is the G tour which is a tour of guitarists started by Satriani in 1996. The ''old'' guitar stars also get plenty of attention these days.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G3_(tour)

In music in which guitarists are prominent bandmembers there seems to be a decline, rock music, hard rock, metal etc...
https://spinditty.com/genres/rock-music-comeback
 
#84 ·
I wouldn't consider Buckethead a YouTube star. I mean he has toured with several bands, and it's not like he has a channel of his own. I still argue that he is probably one of the most technically proficient guitarists I have ever heard. I will fully grant you that much of his stuff is well shall we say hard to listen to. But you would have trouble finding anyone else who could play it. He is and always has been in my top 5 guitarists along with Dimebag Darrell.
 
#92 ·
John Mayer is a great guitarist -- his idol was Stevie Ray (and has an SRV tattoo on his arm to document that fact) -- you don't hear enough of John on guitar.

Keith Urban is in the same vein -- a great guitarist also, but you don't hear enough of it. I saw him live at Grand Ole Opry in Nashville -- I'm not a big fan of his vocals or music, but he is a great guitarist.
 
#95 ·
I listened to a few those new style guitarists, I cannot say I enjoy it. It's like they just show off their fast picking and running up and down the neck for like 12 measure non stop. It's NOT hard to fast pick, it's the control when to start and how it end that is difficult, not just run and run. Before I quit, I practice fast picking and I could run up and down the board at 20 notes/sec. That's plenty fast. Just how to use it in the music that is hard. You just don't run and run in the song. That sounds awful!!! A whole bunch of nothing.



I look at it as 100 yards dash in Olympic. Yes, you can almost fly. But it's very different from NFL wide receiver, basket ball player type. You need to be fast and explosive if needed, but you have to be able to finese. Go fast when needed, transition, change direction and all. It's the control that's important, not a machine gun.


Here is one of the old recording by Al Demola in the 70s. Believe me, he is FAST running up and down the board. Listen to his playing, mostly slower, but notice occasion fill in some really fast licks and stop before you know it and land on a perfect landing.





Here are three guitarists listen to the fast picking, at the same time, listen to their control, when to go fast, when to slow, transition from slow to fast or fast to slow. This is technique.





Nothing more difficult playing on acoustic guitar, nowhere for you to hide, you make a mistake, it is very obvious.
 
#101 ·
Since we’re also talking acoustic.......

https://youtu.be/XmNPXqG6ovg
Thanks for posting! I never knew what Charo did -- I just remember her shaking, and speaking broken English, on various talk shows and game shows a million years ago. It turns out she speaks 5 languages, she won a scholarship at age 14 to study with Segovia, and she was twice voted Flamenco Guitarist of the Year by "Guitar Player" magazine.
 
#103 ·
Since we're throwing examples out there, I want to point out that the best guitarists are likely to be completely unknown to non-guitarists. Again giving credence to the OP's original question. Obviously the guitar has taken a backseat or the dozens of YouTube guitarists with the following level of skill would be well known.

 
#107 · (Edited)
The video below of Leon Russell playing "Song for You" with John Mayer while being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is pretty touching for few reasons. First, Leon had been a bit down and out for a while prior to his being inducted -- it was Elton John (who idolized Leon very early in his career) who lead the effort to get Leon inducted. Leon described it as Elton "pulling him out of the ditch".

To go from "being in the ditch" to being inducted into the Rock Hall of Fame and playing on this stage was hugely emotional for him. John Mayer's solo in the middle is beautiful and Leon is fighting off tears for just a second or two immediately after it. I don't know of any other live performance video that moves me as much as this one.

 
#109 ·
The video below of Leon Russell playing "Song for You" with John Mayer while being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is pretty touching for few reasons. First, Leon had been a bit down and out for a while prior to his being inducted -- it was Elton John (who idolized Leon very early in his career) who lead the effort to get Leon inducted. Leon described it as Elton "pulling him out of the ditch".

To go from "being in the ditch" to being inducted into the Rock Hall of Fame and playing on this stage was hugely emotional for him. John Mayer's solo in the middle is beautiful and Leon is fighting off tears for just a second or two immediately after it. I don't know of any other live performance video that moves me as much as this one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ODzUvFQvK0
Coincidentally, I don't regularly watch America's Got Talent, but I just so happened to stumble upon this last weekend (just might be worth your time)...

https://youtu.be/pDPdRYF7hTQ?t=4
 
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