7 posts tagged “guitar”

In need of a Les Paul or Strat? Perhaps you'd like one with prog-rock provenance? Look no further.

Show us your guitar.
Submitted by Sean J. O'Rourke.

I can't believe I'm not putting my Vox here--so appropriate, especially with that subject line--but it's late and I grabbed what was closest. Maybe later.

Early 90s American Stratocaster. Hum-cancelling Duncan bridge pickup, stock Fender Lace Sensor, Jackson neck pickup, and Roland GK-2 synth pickup. Whammy that I seldom use, with roller nut. Pretty blue metallic finish that is lost in this half-assed picture. I also have a black one.

Just a few days ago I posted this song as a free-associative response to a mention of a girls' school.

On further reading this evening I learned that guitarist Kelly Johnson (front left in the photo) died last year of spinal cancer at the age of 49.

Ms. Johnson was the hot-in-more-than-one-way guitarist playing the screaming riff on the Les Paul in "Race with the Devil," another of those early-80s MTV vids from back when they played vids.

Just one more reminder that there just isn't that much damn time--and sometimes it's even less than you expected.

Robert Fripp: "If I spent as much time practising guitar as I do computing, there’s a chance I might become a very good guitarist."

("Very good" means something rather different for Mr. Fripp than it does for me, but the point is well taken.)

On December 2, 1997, the brilliant and inventive guitarist Michael Hedges was found dead following a car accident. I was lucky to have seen him perform twice; I would certainly have seen him again were he still alive.

Here he performs "Ragamuffin," one of my favorites, less than a month before his death. (Don't ask me about the dog collar. I have no idea.)

 And here he tears it up on "Hot Type":

Oh, yeah, he sang, too. This is his adaptation of the e.e. cummings poem "i carry your heart with me(i carry it in", including David Crosby and Graham Nash on backing vocals.

I could go on and on. Let me leave you with the heartbreaking "Nevermore," a piece for solo acoustic harp guitar. This is from the soundtrack to The Shape of the Land, which commemorates the Japanese explorer Naomi Uemura who died on a mountain expedition.

We miss you, Michael.

These arrived in my inbox today.

I almost peed myself.

I'm presenting my two favorites, but there are more at the creator's YouTube page. (Check out his Star Wars vid, too.)

Enjoy.

 

Summer is ending--and it's about damn time!

Perfect day for blaring this song obnoxiously out the car windows.

The blaring-obnoxiously version in question came from this album: