Guitar solos - how long? Phrasing? Quieeeet!!!!!

Anyone familiar with my tracks and occasional comments knows that I don't approve of 5 minutes of continuous guitar solo (or any instrument for that matter). Don't get me wrong, I will put on a backing track on a loop and solo the **** out of it for an hour until I either had enough, or I see the disgust on Mrs. Gee's face if the poor thing happens to be at home. So it is fun fun fun to solo, but nobody likes listening to more than a minute of guitar solo. Unless you are Frank Zappa or Robert Cray or one of the few guitar geniuses. (I did slip on the odd occasion - I am a sinner. But I try.

So I came across this article today, and hold and below Albert King and Gary Moore agree with me :D :

Gary Moore when asked about how to work on one's phrasing:
“Well, I can tell you what worked for me. The best piece of advice I ever got was from Albert King. He was leaving the studio after we tracked 'Oh, Pretty Woman' for Still Got the Blues, and right as he was walking out the door, he turned to me and said, 'Gary, play every other lick.' That’s all you need to know, isn’t it?
“It’s quite simple, yet it’s the best thing anyone could ever tell you, because, let’s face it, guitarists are like those guests at a dinner party who think they’ve got the most important thing to say, so they never shut up!'
“So try and leave some big moments of silence in your solos – at least twice as long as what comes to you instinctively. After a while, you get in the habit of hearing those spaces, and the waiting comes naturally. And if you’ve got a good tone, you’ll create this anticipation where the audience can’t wait for the next note. I remember feeling that way when I’d see Peter Green. I was hanging on every note he played. And then, when he would hit the note, it would just go right through me.“ From Guitar Player magazine.

I try (and sometimes fail) to leave space, almost never solo over a singer and twin solos only when they are somewhat planned Thin Lizzy style.

So if TeeGee, Albert and Gary all agree, it can't be wrong, eh? :D


Here is one of my first tracks ever on Wikiloops where I really got the balance between fills and solo right. https://www.wikiloops.com/backingtrack-jam-32980

[wl]32980[/wl]

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TeeGee attached the following image:

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Edited by TeeGee on 22 agosto 2024 alle ore 10:01

Your article is thought provoking, TeeGee. You’re right. For my part, (even if I don’t play guitar), I put all my heart and guts to try to play on songs and I certainly do too much and it must become boring to listen. Which is very frustrating. You make me think... Thank you. :)

You says "Here is one of my first tracks ever on Wikiloops where I really got the balance between fills and solo right."

What is the track number you’re talking about?

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The article doesnt seem to take into account the drug and how long its effects take to wear off.

[youtube]ZCkHanF4v1w[/youtube]

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Then theres situations like Lynard Skynard. They really did intend to keep Freebird down to six minutes but then those ladies at 6:17 showed up and well ya know...not to mention a thousand woman in white sweaty t shirts jumping up and down...Another 5 minutes for them to cool off the cardio.
I mean...lets be reasonable about this.
Also without solos how does the vocalist get cocaine breaks?
Solos serve a purpose sometimes!
[youtube]QxIWDmmqZzY[/youtube]

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:D LittleWings, the Blues is a hard drug too, it’s hard to calm down.:|

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The emergence of the extended guitar/bass/key/drum solo started approx around 1970 as a concert moment.|The Stones didnt do solos. You had the Who who despite Moon really didnt abuse solos.
So the two culprits were Deep Purple and led Zeppelin but ..okay it was Led Zeppelin who started the epic solo during concert.

The guitar in HJeartbreaker was strategic to show off Page was capable of playing all styles but then there was the infamous 25 minute Bonham drum solo.The solo was put in the show as Bonham was becoming legendary allowing 25 minutes of Bonham run thru a very loud PA system was like hiotting very stoned teens in the chest with a mallet. And teens loved it. Better then eating Tide pods I suppose.

The book Hammer of the Gods discusses how extended solos were developed for the show and how other bands started doing it after Zeppelin.Think it said Black Sabbath Bill Ward was next

My drugs joke above really wasnt a joke. In them days you were stoned. Period .It was the Yang to the Yin . The solos especially drums were a rythmic pounding very loud to amp up the kids.

PAge also had a 25 minute violin bow solo with very hypnotic lasers that part was designed to basically entrance the audience into a hypnotic state.

Other then that you had iron Butterfly two years earlier but it was Zepperlin who developed them to showcase a memeber, allow the others a cig/cocaine break and additionally put the mind altered audiences brain state into a Theta hypnotic state.

What does a band do for 25 minutes while the drummer bashes away?


Its documented the band used the time for three things smoking, drinking and cocaine.

There is a very interesting article from 1976 featuring a conversation between Led Zeppelons Jimmy Page and William Borroughs the author of Naked Lunch. The entire conversation is how rock music can be used to enter higher realms of consciousness and how Zeppelin in particular does the "Stairway to Heaven" using laser lights , popunding drums and LOUD REPETITIVE BEATS and how voodoo music is similiar . The use repetitive beat to whip themselves into a different brain state allowing voodooey things to happen but more importantly whip uo the collective energy of a crowd of people and focus it.

You get a large crowd theres a energy factor and musicians are conscious of harnessing it.

I remember on a particulaly electric night where the entire band was on fire, I walked to the end of the stage looking into a small sea of a few hundred people and reaching out into "the sea" and the energy from my arm extended outward createing a ripple thru the people. It was pure energy.

Ive also seen where a band is playing and all of them are just entranced and on fire and its one of those electric nights and the amps start smoking but nothing is on fire. You create energy when you play music. Serious energy and then you add thousands of people into a collective mental orgasm thats the Stairway to Heaven. Anyone whos toured understands "Electric Nights, they are rare but when they happen the entire evening is magical and the energy is off the charts.

Everyone should have “Walk out on stage Infront of over 20,000 people and feel the energy “ on their bucket list in life. It’s an experience like skydiving

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Long but interesting interview. :)

Different, but interesting too. https://youtu.be/vgvdZsxc8fM

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Voodoo drums similar to a John Bonham drum solo. There’s actually nothing ominous to concept of whipping a large group of people into a hypnotic frenzy in order to use the collective to focus that energy on something .

Even a vanilla Roman Catholic mass is structured to ritualistically build toward ds an energy climax . The reward is always the end . This has been done since the dawn of time . Dancing and pounding drums were used by the Nazis playing Ride of the Valkyrie’s to vibrate energy into the pilots and amp them up.whether it be church or a concert or satanic ritual …it’s always warm up to get the crowd feeling good and on the same page , build some more energy and everyone becomes more awake , rhythmically start exciting the crowd keep working on building energy , crowd starts getting into frenzy dancing eyes roll back of head , the feeling of the room is electric then finally present to crowd what it is that needs to be accomplished . Cro d build into an orgasmic state , energy released , mission accomplished. Church’s do it on a very subtle and gentle level but the communion. Is the climax of the mass.

[youtube]tNOE4iiLxh4?si=-bq1TGzuUjdKgJ1C[/youtube]That formula is as old as man himself

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The Trance has been in us since the dawn of time. I could listen to your last video for hours. 😆 It allows us to escape the level of the real world, towards an alternative world and consciousness. We enter a world without Ego, a world of collective humanity without borders. As you say, it is only pure Energy. As much as I love this trance in music, as an individual, as part of humanity, as I don’t like his expression in the crowd, where everything becomes possible, even the worst. Thank you for this discussion! :)

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Energy isnt good nor bad.`Infact theres concrete universal laws that apply to using it. Someone with nefarious purposes would get a massive backlash of the worst fortunes and its happened in history.

Look at Jeffrey Epstein and his ritual island. Dont think there werent rituals going on there to build energy. Killing a child...Im just saying brings energy and power to the wicked.That why they do it.

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This is my boy! My man said this
[img]https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-4fc99a721b4037d4c52da2ab77457d3e-pjlq[/img]

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The Rolling Stones film "Gimme Shelter movie is a fascinating archive of how energy of a large crown can go negative.

Basically the Stones and other bands wanted to do a free concert to rival Woodstock. The Grateful Dead however decided to hire the HElls Angels for security. the Angels drunk and hi started beating people too close to the stage and even punched two members of the Jefferson Airplane who tried to stop a beating.
By the time the Stones came on the energy became really dark and negative and you see it in the crowds faces, Bad scene . The climax of the fikm is the Stones captured a guy named Merideth Hunter being stabbed to death by the Angels while trying to protect his girlfriend.

Its a was meant to be a Woodstock type fi, but ends up being a documentory on how crowd energy can go very wrong and evenm deadly (mob mentality) The film is studied for how crowds react to stimuluses and mob mentality can grow quickly in large groups in psychology classrooms .

Theres video of people at the concert trying to describe the atmosphere and they go ghostly white and say "It was bad,,,very dark and you just knew something bad was coming".Even Santana cancelled minutes before he was to go on because he felt a creepy bad vibe but unknowingly contributed to the events leading up the murder. Santana cancelling last minute made everything turn angry.
Theyy said the same things of the evening of the 1979 Who concert tragedy which was one of the wrorst concert tragedies, People said they could sense something was bad.Many people were trampled and some died.

You can literally feel the bad ebnergy watching the film and crowds faces as they watch the Angels whip out pool cues nd start beating people while standing next to the musicians on stage. It was THAT bad and disturbing

But its safe to conclude despite murder and mayhem and rioting , none of it was from long extended guitar solos.

[youtube]IZ9Vfn8W22U[/youtube]

The one positive thing about this film is that often critics will say this concert was the official end to the 60s.

What theyre refering to is The Manson murders totally shocked everybody , then Woodstock while more positive was a technical nightmare with mass overdoses, poor planning mud , dirty unwashed hippies etc...
Then this was the third major national nes story and it completley killed Americas interest in the hippie movement. All that peace and love crap was wiped out as it was just an excuse to do drugs . Haight Ashbury was a heroin den of homeless junkies in a span of 2 years. All those 1967 peace love and flowers hippoes all turned into junkies and theyre still there to this day in Golden Gate Park at the Haight.All that remained was the violent radical movements. So if any positive, it got rid of hippies....and the long extended guitar solos of the seventies became the new scoorge.

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https://www.wikiloops.com/backingtrack-jam-32980

:)

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I always thought that Cream with Eric Clapton started the whole long guitar solo thing.

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Apologies for dragging the thread so far off original topic.

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An example of what audience energy does to a performer:

Ive shared this before.

This is my friend Jan in 1974 with The Who.
This photo was taken not even minutes after the Who performed at Long Beach Arena in front of 14,000 people.

Everyone always notices Petes eyes .

Thats NOT drugs.

He is amped from the audience energy which is like the energy rush you feel from skydiving.

Imagine yourself on stage. Next imagine a sea of people as far as the eye can see. Just a sea of thousands of faces all looking at you.

Next imagine those people roaring their love and approval all at the same time into your face.

That energy amps you.You become feeling ..Ill dare say ...LIKE A GOD.

When you are on stage the more you give of yourself into "the ocean"(The ocean being the sea of people). When the last note you play or sing dies off , and you you put everything you had into the performance, you gave it your all..... there will then be a 1 -2 second silence before the audience erupts like a volcano.If you want to know if the audience likes you, the 1 second delay before the eruption is a dead give away.

Then the audience ERUPTS AND CHEERS AND POUNDS AND STAMPS their approval and love for you....Erupting so loud its like a volcano and earthquake is all around you.The evry ground and walls tremble and shake violently from their voices all erupting for YOU

Thats is Energy
That is Power.

Petes eyes are amped from the audience eruption of 14,000 people.

Its a high no drug could ever replicate.

Rock Stars do drugs because its a sad substitute for the high they get from the audience energy

[img]https://janstraps.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/jan-and-pete.jpg?w=549&h=548[/img]

Why do the Rolling Stones still do it at 80 years old...THIS ENERGY. THE MONEY IS SECONDARY

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STAR IS BORN

Lady Gagas character is pulled onto the stage to perform a song she wrote and she experiences her first audience high infront of 50000 people.

Really liked this version of the movie.Anyone who plays music for money should see this as its a cold hard lesson of what happens when you love for music is replaced by drugs and fame.

[youtube]eWupm_cePX8[/youtube]

Any artist that gives 100% and shows love to the "The Ocean" will be around along time and have longevity.

If your doing it for the drugs, fame , sex whatever...you will disappear, your band will fail etc.Your fans will leave you.

The Stones keep rolling from their love of playing their music to their audience. The money just comes effortlessly for them but its not why they do it. They LOVE the music and the fans.

That is the ONLY way an artist remains .The energy keeps you going and it is a two way give and take.

Wikiloops is an ocean. A cyber Ocean if you think about it.

When your sitting infront of your little Focasrite DAW and computer in the bedroom , basement , garage whatever...

If you do a halfassed performance and upload, you will get halfassed likes, halfassed adds, halfassed comments.How come nobody adds to my songs boohooohoo.

If before you upload , you give it your absolute best with the intention of touching a faceless audience online youve never met and you do it because you do it out of love and respect for THE MUSIC AND YOU RESPECT THE MUSICIANS HERE ENOUGH NOT UPLOAD A HALF ASSED LAZY ATTEMPT JUST BECAUSE YOU WANT TO BE SEEN ON A POPULAR TRACK.. The 3,000 likes and pages of comments come effortlessly.

Without that passion and effort into giving your listener your 100% you are this guy:

Why dont people add to my tracks? Booh hoo hoo!
[img]https://media.tenor.com/CtYpo6xORqEAAAAC/ugly-cry.gif?t=AAYgRhOixqQB_1EtuCLg3Q[/img]

Do you think a Moonchild or a Shi even think "I hope i get alot of adds"?

Nope I can guarantee you neither even thinks or cares about that. They sing out of love for singing and they want to do their 100% before hitting that upload button.The adds come effortlessly without even thinking nor caring about them.



We Wikiloopers want to give back the love and care FOR THE MUSIC they are putting out.
When Moonchild or Shi are singing they are like Lady Gaga above in demeanor and passion.They are singing OUT TO US with everything thery got with the intent to move us in some way.

They RESPECT us enough to not give us something that isnt their best effort.

If Dick had a "If you like this track donate a $1" button on their songs the money would flow to them effortlessly and without and need to care about it too.All of us , as the audience ,would gladly and willingly send that.

If that concept doesnt make sense I dont know what else to tell ya.


You get what you give out for the right reason.Whether onsatge in front of 150,000 or here on Wikiloops.

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Wow... :)

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In my experience, a guitar solo can take time to emerge and it is not uncommon for it to mature after playing it over and over again.
Each time we add or remove a note, we accentuate this or that note, we speed up or slow down this or that phrase... but is this solo really necessary?
Jeff Beck is one of those guitarists who have been haunted by these questions because it is out of the question for them to play the same thing as others...

[youtube]1mqxG-mazYY?si=hblkA008p_nRQAHa[/youtube]

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Very good piece !!! 💗💗💗 !!!

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