So, what have you been listening to lately?

[uwe]

I loved Vai with Alcatrazz, I thought he was ok with DLR (with the latter's inherent vocal limits), his solo album with Devin Townsend (Sex & Religion) was brilliant, I even bought his newest solo release which is, well, interesting if acrobatics are your thing:



Frankly, the (too) many guitar tracks and an odd sound on Slip of the Tongue sounded plain weird and clinical to me upon its release. With Alcatrazz, Vai had co-created something sounding fresh,



with DLR he didn't distract (unlike with Whitesnake) and played some noteworthy solos, with Whitesnake it was: "What the flying f***?!" Any B league guitarist could have produced something that would have sounded more organic with Whitesnake. And while I never thought that Adrian Vandenberg is the Dutch Jimi Hendrix (I prefer George Kooymans), he would have created a more fitting sonic landscape as well.

Vai, a perceptive and reflective man, has admitted in interviews today that he went overboard on Slip of the Tongue (Sarzo had to rerecord his complete bass parts because his sound didn't gel with Vai's layered overdub approach), that he overshadowed Adrian Vandenberg too much on the subsequent tour (who took it with grace) and that he really wasn't steeped enough in blues and English blues rock to have been up to the task at the time.

But the majority of the blame must be laid on Coverdale himself. By then, his criteria for hiring Whitesnake members had become totally superficial. Whitesnake had transformed from a band where excellent musicians played notwithstanding their looks to one where you had to be poster material and flavor of the month as well as offer star quality, lasting benefits to the music coming in a distinct second.

[Basvarken]

And while I never thought that Adrian Vandenberg is the Dutch Jimi Hendrix (I prefer George Kooymans),

Hmmm...I don't know about that Uwe.
I'll just leave this here 

[uwe]

Adrian is a very skillful guitarist (and painter), no doubt. I don't think he's a force of nature though. His playing always sounds a little to well-behaved and learned to me, perhaps he is too controlled, you know him better, he is probably anything but a wild or reckless man, right? He's like a Dutch Matthias Jabs - a man who is technically no less skillfull than Michael Schenker or Uli Jon Roth, but just not as idiosyncratic as the other two.

To console Adrian: I always liked his stage persona and when he played with Vai in Whitesnake at Monsters of Rock in Germany, his solos were the only thing that reminded one of the Whitesnake of old. Vai was breathtaking, but basically a solo artist that had stumbled on a Whitesnake stage by accident and was now doing his thing and strutting around.

Or to put it differently: Adrian is (and looked a bit like) Claudia Schiffer,



he's not Kate Moss or Naomi Campbell.




And that is nothing bad, life generally has harsher things for us in store than just being "more the Claudia Schiffer type".

[Basvarken]

I agree he's not a game changer like Jimi Hendrix of course.

He used to be a great guitar player.
But ever since he made his comeback with Moonkings, he's been struggling playing the guitar parts he wrote himself in the past.
Painful to watch at some moments...

[gearHed289]

I didn't want to be the first to jump in, but I have to agree with the Cozy comments. He's a legend (and he's dead), but I have to say, he was stiff. A few years ago, I revisited Robert Plant's first three solo albums (which I love). Cozy played on a couple of tracks on the debut, and they stand out like a sore thumb, especially up against Phil Collins' tracks on the rest of the album. He had his style, and there are places for that style, but not everywhere.

[Dave W]

Wynn Stewart would have been 88 yesterday. Maybe you all don't want to listen to him, but I do. Bakersfield music, backed by the great Ralph Mooney on pedal steel.

[uwe]

Who played the regular guitar?

[Dave W]

Who played the regular guitar?

Roy Nichols, who later played for Merle Haggard.

[Dave W]

Now here's one I hadn't seen before. Lip synched.

Bassist is J.W. Brown, father of Jerry Lee's 13 y.o. cousin who he married.

[westen44]

Here is Bill Haley doing a country song.  It's hard for me to think of him outside of the rock and roll context, but he seemed to be good at everything.  The Eddie Arnold version of this song I guess was the best known, but I like the Marty Robbins version the best.

[uwe]

Now here's one I hadn't seen before. Lip synched.

Bassist is J.W. Brown, father of Jerry Lee's 13 y.o. cousin who he married.

I still think Matthew McConaughey should play him in a biopic before he (Matthew) gets too old for the role.

"Bassist is J.W. Brown, father of Jerry Lee's 13 y.o. cousin who he married."

Now that's a relief to hear, so it was all contained in the greater family. And sharing things is good band practice anyway.



That said, some people still have nice things to say about the Killer, here at 5.34:

[Dave W]

I still think Matthew McConaughey should play him in a biopic before he (Matthew) gets too old for the role.

"Bassist is J.W. Brown, father of Jerry Lee's 13 y.o. cousin who he married."

Now that's a relief to hear, so it was all contained in the greater family. And sharing things is good band practice anyway.

...

For the record, J.W. is Jerry Lee's first cousin, Myra Gale is his first cousin once removed.

It's still all in the family. Jerry Lee's current wife (#7) is the ex-wife of Rusty Brown. Rusty is Myra Gale's brother/J.W.'s son.

[Dave W]

Here is Bill Haley doing a country song.  It's hard for me to think of him outside of the rock and roll context, but he seemed to be good at everything.  The Eddie Arnold version of this song I guess was the best known, but I like the Marty Robbins version the best.

...

Bill was a country musician before rock & roll. The Comets were originally called The Saddlemen.

[uwe]

I was always aware of his C&W background, he sure didn't look the part of a thoroughbred rocker either, nothing youth-deforming and unsettling about him like with Elvis and his pelvis, Little Richard, leering Chuck Berry or the Killer either.

How unlikely then that he of all people elicited riots in Germany when he first toured there in 1958 - German post-war youth was starved for rock'n'roll.



BTW: Of all the initial rock'n'roll classics, I think that sonically the production/engineering of Rock Around The Clock has held up best. It still sounds great and is immaculately played. And the swing of it is not that easily replicated which is why there are a myriad covers of Chuck Berry numbers, but only very few of RATC. I've never really heard a good modernized version of it, even Ringo's failed,



but I've seen it ruined by bands attempting it quite often. Those guitar/horn syncopations in the verse are extremely catchy and drive the song forward in an infectious manner before they climax just before the final verse at the end.

The original (from 1953 as opposed to Haley's NYC recording from 1954) is nowhere near as captivating as what the Comets did to it.

[westen44]

Bill was a country musician before rock & roll. The Comets were originally called The Saddlemen.

I was aware that Haley had some kind of Country & Western background, although to my mind he sounds more western than country.  The same goes for Marty Robbins.  Neither one of them has a twang to their voices which in my mind I associate with a lot of country music.  But I really don't think I've ever understood the nuances between country on one side and western on the other.  People seem to use the term C&W like the whole thing is interchangeable.  But to my mind at least it doesn't all seem quite like the same thing. 

Jimmie Rodgers is also someone that to me sounds more western than country.  But he was from Mississippi.  That's about as Southern as you get.  It's certainly not western.  Also, I've heard Rodgers referred to as the father of country music.  I don't know much about his background, but Rodgers must have had some influences that went quite a bit beyond Mississippi.  Of course he is known for working on the railroad and I suppose that could explain at least part of it.

Based on what I've read, stuff like this at one time was quite popular.  However, my knowledge about these things is incomplete.