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Shredding Is Stupid

September 6, 2010 10:40 PM

s a guitarist myself, I appreciate guitar virtuosity--or extreme proficiency on any instrument, really--probably more than most people. I know how hard it was for me to learn how to play the most difficult, fastest, most intricate thing I can play, so I respect the amount of talent and hard work that goes into completely turning an instrument into an extension of yourself. Learning an instrument is something like learning a new language: I'm conversant in guitar, but seeing someone who can play guitar as well as Shakespeare could "play" English is extremely impressive.

To a point.

As in writing, context is extremely important in music. In order for any particular moment of music to have any emotional resonance at all, it has to have some sort of relationship to the music before and after it. A chord can have a completely different effect depending on what chord it follows. Everything from tempo to phrasing to what key you're playing in and what tone you're using matters.

In the right context, a guitar solo can make a song. "Comfortably Numb" and "November Rain" would be decent songs without the solos, but the musical interludes--at least for me--define them and make them some of my favorites. On the other hand, though, those same solos--played in the same way, over the same chords, by the same people--wouldn't be very impressive at all if they existed only as unconnected snippets of music. In order for solos to be something other than just musical wanking, they have to be part of a cohesive whole.

Shredding sucks because it represents the elevation of a solo--even if it's ten minutes long--over the song. It's the climax without the backstory. At the end of the day, it doesn't matter how impressive someone's playing is or how extensive his skills are: it's all just bullshit unless there's some reason for it. People don't generally get excited by the prospect of watching someone show off just for the sake of showing off.

I sometimes get annoyed at how wanky some fairly mainstream music is. But today I saw something that blew my mind in terms of the disparity between the talent on display and the artistic merit of the end product. Frankly, you have to see this thing to believe it:

It's insulting that he rips off a Randy Rhoads given that Ozzy's former guitarist was, in my opinion, one of the most technically proficient guitarists ever but he almost always ensured that his soloing served the song.



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