Your favourite musician, with links?

There's so much stuff available on YouTube that I thought I'd invite people to post links to their favourite musicians and link to a cool video that illustrates why you like them.

I have so many favourites it's really hard to know where to start, but I think I'll post this link to the video section of Charlie Hunter's website.

This is someone who plays guitar and bass on the same guitar at the same time. Plus he's funky and jazzy. There is no-one out there like this.

Then there's Jeff Beck. This clip also features Jennifer Batten (no slouch herself - she was Michael Jackson's touring guitarist and had to do EVH's "Beat It" solo every gig). You might note that JB doesn't use a pick.

There's also this, plucked at random from the hundreds of YouTube Jeff Beck vids. How many different techniques is he using in this solo? It's not great recording quality, but the playing is just awesome.

This is probably not the best (for you kids out there) clip to show of the incredible Dennis Chambers, because it's him playing in a big-band context. This is someone who also played with the P-funk allstars (now that's a gig I'd like to have seen) and Steely Dan, the Brecker Brothers, John Scofield and John McLaughlin... but the drum solo (at around the three minute mark) is a tour de force of fast and swinging playing that never loses sight of the groove. The other great thing about Dennis is that he never breaks a sweat no matter what he's playing. He's always got this "mmm... whatever" look on his face. The ultimate cool drummer. If I can find a better example of his playing, I will.

I'll be back.

[edit on 3-12-2006 by rich23]

Dear oh dear. Only seven views and no replies... nobody cares, no-one loves me... (sniffle!)

I found this video of Guthrie Govan just hunting around for some good stuff. If you've never heard of him, he's getting very well known among the cognoscenti in the UK as an astonishing and versatiel guitarist and teacher.

This video is just of him playing solo. Check out the incredible number of styles and tones he manages with just one guitar, one amp, no FX, all he does is change volume and pickup sounds on the guitar. You'll hear echoes of everyone here - Eric Clapton, Tuck Andress, James Burton, Eric Johnson, Nuno Bettencourt, Joe Pass... I kid you not. He's just doing a demo, so it's not like he's playing with a band, but... unbelievable.

I don't know if anyone out there knows Tommy Emmanuel.

This is 1.23 of astonishing solo acoustic playing. The tune is "Classical Gas" which was a hit back in the seventies. TE has basically supercharged it and painted big white go faster stripes along the side.

Watch and marvel.

I don't know if he is your kind of artist rich23, but here is a link to the Foetus website and a link to The Need Machine.

OK I'll just keep this thread going on my own. See if I care bwahahaha!

Miles Davis, trumpet player, bandleader, composer. This clip is taken from the end of his career. He'd had hip surgery and was in a lot of pain... and he wasn't going to go and do the old stuff, always moving on, always finding great new players.

This is a tune called "New Blues" and is a real favourite of mine. It's a nice, fairly traditional-with-a-twist progression, great to play over, and the band really have fun with it. His alto player in this band was the amazing Kenny Garrett, who is a real successor to Cannonball Adderley and Maceo Parker in that while he plays jazz, he puts a LOT of soul and funk into his playing. The track also features a young man called Foley playing something he calls "octave bass", which is a bass but with all the strings tuned up an octave.

Those of you familiar with the guitar may notice that this is in itself something of a bizarre concept. Basically what you get is exactly the same as a guitar but without the top two strings. Why not make the extra effort in learning the other strings? Why call it "octave bass" when this is basically an oxymoron? These are questions I pose without ever expecting to know the answer. Or caring.

And it cuts Foley's solo out, which is kind of a drag because it's pretty good. So for those of you who want to hear what octave bass sounds like, listen to this, which is the second half of the track, featuring Foley's solo. Is there a difference between this and guitar? Not so you'd notice, frankly.

Yay! The first reply, and a good one too!

Wow... it's really nice to know that Mr. Thirwell is still going. I remember Scraping Foetus off the Wheels, You've Got Foetus On Your Breath and Screaming Foetus Under the Wheels from when I was a kid. Not something I'd necessarily go and buy, but I do like this stuff, and I am massively impressed by Time Marches On: huge sound, good song, nice art direction on the video. I really like the layers of dissonance and the instrumental section in the middle.

The videos are exceptionally slow to load, though, which is a bit of a drag.

I loved The Need Machine, although I thought the video was a little one-dimensional. Nice though. I shall be coming back to this thread and every so often I'll be going back for more Thirwell.

Next on my list is Little Feat, specifically with Lowell George, their frontman who was one of those tragic rock and roll casualties. This track is "Rock'n'Roll Doctor", and it showcases the funkiness of their feel and the beauty of George's voice. I was very, very sad when he died. I was lucky enough to see them support The Who in 1976 and it was one of the best gigs I've ever been to. Another song of theirs I particularly like is:

Fat Man In the Bathtub

Funnily enough about the same time I was getting into Little Feat, the Pistols were breaking, and I still think that John Lydon is a unique and exceptionally charismatic vocalist. This track, Rise, even features Steve Vai on guitar. How about that? This version of Death Disco is also quite extraordinary. For those people who've never seen Top Of The Pops, it was the weekly TV show through the late sixties, seventies, eighties and nineties that was devoted to basically top forty music. It had its ups and downs, and when this was on it was full of drossy pop bands miming. Now I'm not totally sure, but I actually think that this lot were playing live, which is a real departure for that programme in that day and age, and I'd bet the farm that Lydon said that that was the only way he'd play TOTP. It's also quite shockingly un-user-friendly for a cuddly teatime chart show. Go Johnny go!

If you like uncompromising noise music, then this clip from 1969 of Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band might intrigue you. It's two tracks, She's Too Much for my Mirror and My Human Gets Me Blues.

But this performance of Click Clack from Paris in 1971 is an absolute stormer! Wow... just finding this has made starting this thread incredibly worthwhile. Unbelievably intense.

This is a more conventional video of Ice Cream For Crow, but it's still cool and worth a watch and a listen.

"A Squid eating dough in a polyethelene bag is fast and bulbous."

Love that Beefheart. Thanks for those links rich.

Can't have Beefheart without mentioning that other musical genius from the Mojave:

I Am The Slime (Live on SNL)



[edit on 3/12/2006 by Beelzebubba]

Oh, I was so getting to FZ!

Thanks for that Beelzebubba - it was wonderful seeing that performance because it featured Don Pardoe, whose announcement for The Illinois Enema Bandit on Live in New York was very much a part of my youth.

And for all the other people in the world who might enjoy the music of Frank Zappa, but might not appreciate its, uh, statistical density in its basic form.... there is

Punky's Whips (part 1) and part 2
Saint Alfonso's Pancake Breakfast
Approximate

And they seem to have removed a gorgeous version of Montana by the mid-seventies band, otherwise I'd have posted it too... shame.