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Guthrie Just Keeps Getting Better and Better

 
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Sun Sep 07, 2014 7:38 am    Post subject: Guthrie Just Keeps Getting Better and Better Reply with quote

Greetings from a plush hotel room in China as I embark on another round of visiting the mega guitar factories in Asia. I have a few days of downtime and one of the things I'm doing is listening to all the recorded live material of the Aristocrats shows during the 'Culture Clash' tour over the past year or so - the best of which will make the upcoming 'Culture Clash Live!' album to be released later this year.

I caught the band's SF show in Feb which was the last of the West Coast tour after NAMM. Since then the band played a huge 45-date tour in Europe and recently completed a tour of Asia and six more dates in Europe to conclude the 'Culture Clash' World Tour. The SF show was awesome and I was struck by how tight the band had gotten and how Guthrie continues to get better and better as a player as time goes by, as unbelievable as that seems.

Then I listen to these tapes of the most recent shows and I'm again blown away by how much better Guthrie and the band had gotten since that show at SF in Feb. The interplay between the band members is air tight - virtually telepathic. I'm a pretty jaded guy now when it comes to this kind of stuff but it really is amazing that my jaw drops to the floor every time I listen to this band and Guthrie play every six months or so.

Without a doubt, what makes them get better and better is that they're playing live together night after night for months at a time. There is no substitute for live performance in front of an enthusiastic audience. Practice and rehearsals aren't the same. It's through live performances that the band jells and grows and the individual members continue to improve.

As for Guthrie, having been on tours with him and with the Aristocrats, I can assure you that he only gets to pick up the guitar for a quick soundcheck and then the show itself. It's very rare that he'll have the time to pick up the guitar any other time during a tour. I've never even seen him warm up before a show. The guitar is left on the stand after the soundcheck and then he just picks it up and plays when the show starts.

So how does he do it? How does he keep getting better and better? I think it's really in how he internalizes the music and his approach to it when he starts playing. He's listening to what the other band members are doing and is very critical about his role and how he plays night after night. It's not very often Guthrie says that he liked how he played on a given night even though everyone else thought he was typically mind-blowing. He's that self-critical.

I think it's really about getting what he "hears" in his head and is feeling over to his hands to play on the guitar and out through the speakers. So much of the music is improvised but it isn't a jam band kind of thing at all. There is solid structure to every song but there are sections that leave room for spontaneous "modifications" that develop organically between the band members. I don't know how else to really describe it. It's something that advanced jazz musicians do but this would be in a very aggressive rock-fusion setting.

And, then, there are Guthrie's solos... I've seen and heard him hundreds of times now over the past decade or so and he still makes me break out in laughters of utter disbelief. Laughing Just when you think you've seen or heard everything he could do, he drops your jaws with something mind-blowing that you haven't heard him do before. And you know that he's just going for it - fearlessly playing stuff he hasn't tried before. And when the ideas and inspiration are flowing freely and his mind and hands are connected as one, then the magic happens.

You guys are in for a real treat with the upcoming live album. You thought 'Boing, We'll Do It Live!' was good? Yes, it was very good but you'll see and hear how much better the band and Guthrie have gotten since. They're entering a totally rarefied zone now. And it's scary to think just how much better they will continue to get... As I keep saying over and over again, I don't think Guthrie has even entered his peak years yet... We are truly blessed to observe him grow as a player, musician and artist.
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Fri Sep 12, 2014 2:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

During my business trips to Asia, there are the inevitable downtimes when I'm just looking for ways to kill time besides listening to music or reading something on iBooks or the Kindle app. Internet access to sites that I frequent often aren't available or too slow to be nothing but an exercise in frustration.

So I ended up wandering to a well-known gear forum that I hardly ever bother to visit anymore and saw a thread called 'Who has better command of the guitar than Guthrie Govan?" Rolling Eyes It seems that it was an old thread that got "revived" for some reason. I thought, "Okay, well, I have some time to kill so let me read through this." And as I read through it all I could do was vacillate between Rolling Eyes and Laughing. Geez...

It really is perplexing why people would always want to try to quantify what is "better" or "best" about something that is so subjective. I certainly wouldn't bother to send the thread link to Guthrie as he would have absolutely no interest or the time to read through it. Life is short, you know?! Wink But I ended up reading through all of it and couldn't help but think that some people really don't have better things to do with their time.

I also find it funny and somewhat unfortunate (if not outright pathetic) that people would "judge" Guthrie based on one or a few YT clips they see. Then they say it's just "shred" devoid of soul, feel, creativity, blah-blah-blah and how it leaves them "cold", etc. Again, it's a combination of: Rolling Eyes and Laughing

People seem so quick to judge something based on a very limited amount of information these days. They see some little thing on the Internet (basically YouTube) and think that they've seen all they need to make a final judgment on something. It's this thumbs-up or thumbs-down culture. I notice that in my teenage son when I play something for him. He's so quick to say whether he likes the band/artist or not and I'm thinking, "Look, it's just one song, okay? Sheesh!" Rolling Eyes

But I guess that's the reality of the world we live in now: instant gratification or bust - especially amongst the young but in the old geezers as well. Truly sad and pathetic... There's very little appreciation for the big picture or the long-term. It's all about now and a very narrow and close-minded view based on what little tid-bits that people see on the Internet. People don't seem to really listen to music anymore. They look at videos on YT and judge based on that.

Oh, well... I'm not going to fight reality. For me, it's about finding the people who do get it. It's a very small percentage but the world is big - very big, much bigger than most people can imagine. Find the niche and then dominate it. Guthrie and the Aristocrats are doing just great with this approach. Very Happy
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Sun Sep 14, 2014 6:08 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Another side subject that developed in that thread was about "innovation". I think Guthrie is a very innovative and unique player in how he mixes various techniques and musical ideas into a seamless whole and a style that has his unmistakable personal stamp on it.

But I think someone said that what Guthrie is doing has all been done before - speed picking, tapping, legato, slapping, blah-blah-blah... Rolling Eyes Geez, does someone need to play with his toes to be considered "innovative" now? This is another example of - as Allan Holdsworth once said - how many guitar players listen with their eyes, not their ears. They're so focused on what a player is doing with his fingers than the music that's being played.

Musical innovation is about ideas. It could be the way harmonies are applied, the way the chords are superimposed, how rhythmic patterns are used, etc. There have been many innovative composers and instrumentalists throughout musical history and it had nothing to do with what kinds of physical techniques were used. But so many guitar players don't seem to see it that way. Again, it's all about what they see on YT of a player's fingers doing on the fingerboard.

When I say Guthrie is getting better, he's certainly not getting any faster. or applying some new mechanical techniques that he hasn't used before. He's coming up with fresh new musical ideas that I hadn't heard him do before. Guthrie's wide ranging vocabulary of certain techniques, licks, and patterns are often re-used but he's always playing lines that are new, not a regurgitation of what he played the night before.

That's musical innovation as far as I'm concerned. It's internal. It's about thinking, listening, feeling... and then applying the techniques to get the musical ideas played on the instrument and out through the speakers. As much as I've seen him over the years, I'm always excited about what new things I will hear from him before a show. That's why I sometimes prefer not to see him during a performance and be in an area where I could just listen to what he's doing. Had that happen quite a few times during my tours with the Aristocrats and sometimes I enjoyed that more.
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Carlo



Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 408

PostPosted: Wed Sep 17, 2014 8:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

yeah, I kinda despise the Youtoob guitar community these days. It's like the equivalent of watching the Special Olympics, ugh!
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frankus



Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 1100
Location: Chelmsford/Arachnipus

PostPosted: Thu Sep 18, 2014 2:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hello, sorry for the prolongued absence - I thought this place had ceased to be for soem reason!

The other day my mate from London Guildhall, who shares my commute says "you've been talking about that chap Guthrie for years, so our latest intern put some music on and it was this guy ripping through jazz and country and all sorts of fusions with absolute ease - turns out it was Guthrie"

I note with some sadness that the band at the bassment, now playing quarterly doesn't include Pete, Seth or Guthrie
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Thu Sep 18, 2014 8:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hey, great to see some "old faces" in here again. I know it's pretty quiet here but I kinda like that and I like to drop in every now and then and post some blogs that may be of interest to some. It'll keep going. Obviously, you can see that I'm seeing to that. Smile

Yeah, it'd be great if Guthrie could still do the Fellowship gigs more often but he's hardly ever in UK anymore it seems. The world has taken him away from you Brits! Wink
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frankus



Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 1100
Location: Chelmsford/Arachnipus

PostPosted: Fri Sep 19, 2014 2:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well we deserve it Wink but it's good to know we can still export something of worth Very Happy
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Carlo



Joined: 13 Sep 2004
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PostPosted: Fri Sep 19, 2014 3:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yeah, I've been really busy with work. And I have moved work locations the past two years (first San Francisco then Chicago). But now I am back in NYC, yay!

But always thoroughly enjoy reading your posts Ed. They are always insightful stuff! And I learned so much about guitar, techniques, and gear thanks to you, Guthrie, and this forum. Cool
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
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Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Fri Sep 19, 2014 8:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Carlo wrote:
Yeah, I've been really busy with work. And I have moved work locations the past two years (first San Francisco then Chicago). But now I am back in NYC, yay!

But always thoroughly enjoy reading your posts Ed. They are always insightful stuff! And I learned so much about guitar, techniques, and gear thanks to you, Guthrie, and this forum. Cool


Glad to hear it! Very Happy I do enjoy sharing some insights I get from being an insider in a very interesting industry doing interesting things. I can honestly say that I cover the gamut - from working with factories in Asia on sourcing of lumber that will be used in mass volumes of entry-level guitars to working on the distribution of the Aristocrats' music worldwide or working with the soundguy at a venue to make sure Guthrie's tone is being heard properly by the audience. And I have covered every point in between in this industry and continue to do so with my various job activities.

Working with artists I really love is definitely like living the dream. That's the aspect which I guess can be deemed "glamorous" but it's a lot of hard work as well - especially since I handle all the "behind-the-scenes" logistics and operations kind of work as far as dealing with what the Aristocrats and Guthrie are doing. I'm basically doing the same kind of supply chain logistics and manufacturing QC work for GC (here and in Asia) and it's all good. It's what I've started doing as well for Strandberg on the opposite end of the scale and that's an awful lot of fun as well. I hope to get more involved with artist relations with Strandberg as time goes by. The artist roster that Strandberg is putting together is insane.

I'm thinking of another topic for a thread and that will be about logistics - the backbone of any sort of enterprise. It's what I do best and what I enjoy the most. I've done the sales, marketing, and customer service kind of thing during my decade in the boutique realm and I can't really say it's what I liked doing. I learned a lot from it as it gave me a much broader perspective of the entire supply chain all the way through distribution, retail and interfacing with the public, but I found that the backend is where I belong and am much happier at. I source and do QC for high-volume guitars and do the same for CD's as well as online music distribution for the Aristocrats. I work out the logistics of clinic tours for Guthrie. Very different "products" but the work is generally the same. Now I'm advising and consulting Strandberg on the same logistics kinds of stuff and the principles are the same there as well. Fun stuff! Twisted Evil Smile
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.strandberg* Guitars USA
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Carlo



Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 408

PostPosted: Sat Sep 20, 2014 2:20 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Logistical and supply chain aspects of business are definitely not talked about enough, esp in the guitar community. These days people, including myself, don't fully understand where our stuff comes from, how they are made and how much work it truly takes for a product to get developed and finally brought to stores, and who are involved and how many. Sounds really daunting.

I hope things are going really well with you and Strandberg. I know it's a lot of hard work, but it must be really cool to be completely immersed in the toys we love to play Very Happy
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