Name a guitarist who has improved in the last 20 years?

andyt · #1 07-19-2008, 03:43 PM

OK who has actually improved in the last 20 years? Ok ignore the time frame & TASTE factor but its got me thinking, the wonder of youtube lets ..me watch every cool guitar video I never saw when growing up. Everyone I can think of since they released their first release, have they actually improved? I'll start with Satch & Vai - my faves, been buying their records since they both were comercially available in the UK - Not of this earth & flexible - any great leaps? Still love both records. But since the advent of youtube & I can watch every early vid of anyone - Yngwie, Gilbert, Moore, Howe, Tony Mac, Billy S, hell even VH, is there anything that they are playing now that couldn't have been on their 1st record? Is is just after x amount of years woodsheding they were ready to record? What do you think?

**GilkyBear** · #2 07-19-2008, 03:59 PM

Me, but only by a little

**GilkyBear** · #3 07-19-2008, 04:03 PM

Seriously though, I see your point Andy. I think it may just be that by the time they make it big they already have such a pronounced style. When Flexable first came out it was such a quantum leap forward (to me anyway). PAW was actually a bit more tame (albeit more 'anthemic' and conceptual) to my ears compared to the complete wildness and quirkiness of Flexable. I think by the time they get that big they have all the technique they are going to, from then on it is just about note choice and mood.

**Ayrton** · #4 07-19-2008, 04:13 PM

John Frusciante

On the first RHCP's album, John's style was more Hillel (Slovak) than John, and over the albums John's style has matured into his own. Granted you can still hear the Hendrix influence, but he takes it to another place.

andyt · #5 07-19-2008, 04:15 PM

Kevin, I agree with you completly & I've been playing the same **** for the last 20 years. But its really youtube that has amazed me with the huge wealth of 'vintage footage' I never got to see. I was just watching the satch Montreux DVD from 20 years ago. & a couple of years ago got Vai Alcatraz live DVD & he was playing the same stuff - tapping intro from Building the Church & the piece on the Coral Sitar was like the G3 tripple neck stuff. I'd never been a big Gilbert fan, but the old vids when he was 17 was just blazing & the list just goes on.

andyt · #6 07-19-2008, 04:22 PM

Is is just all the 'shredders' that reached a plateaux where they couldn't physically get any better (technically) when they were first heard, where as more feel players always had room to improve?

IANSPA · #7 07-19-2008, 05:49 PM

I WOULD SAY PAUL GILBERT HAS . IN THE EARLY DAYS HE WAS,NT STRING SKIPPING BUT KNOW HE,S GOT THAT MOTHER DOWN TO A FINE ART

**GilkyBear** · #8 07-19-2008, 05:57 PM

Yeah Andy, I have to agree, I have watched a lot of realllly old videos and hear a lot of riffs that became songs later.

shreddersymphony · #9 07-19-2008, 06:05 PM

Andy freaking Timmons!

When he played with Danger Danger in the 80s (he even said this himself when I met him) he was really limited in terms of his playing, just do your standard pentatonic box shreddy solos and power ballads and call it a day. With his solo albums he has become the best player in the world to me, just the composition and the tone and feel...EVERYONE owes it to themselves to check him out. (cry for you, electric gypsy, carpe diem, deliver us, gone, and pink champagne sparkle are great songs to start with).

Myst and rain · #10 07-19-2008, 09:12 PM

I remember Joe Satriani saying once, that at a certain point nobody really gets any better. One of the exceptions to the rule, so to speak, he said was Jeff Beck.

Alwin

JJEMMER777 · #11 07-19-2008, 11:05 PM

Guthrie

I hear ya Andy!! The way I see it is that everybody improves in one way or another, but they inevitably reach sticking points (because they know it all

) and cannot expand to new horizons

kotornut · #12 07-19-2008, 11:29 PM

I'd have to say that Satch has actually improved. Not technically, but his use of melody and modes has certainly improved. He is a better musician now.

I think it's easy to just think about a guitar players speed, seeps, string skipping, tapping and so on and not about the music itself. I think PG has improved too. In a similar way.

so I agree that people haven't improved in the hands but in the brain I can hear them improving.

JJEMMER777 · #13 07-20-2008, 12:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kotornut

in the brain

sWeeps = brain

Sorry koto, I couldn't help it

DEADTUNES666 · #14 07-20-2008, 01:33 AM

Al Dimeola!!!

His Return To Forever/Stanley Clarke/Chick Corea days, through his early solo stuff, classically tinged work, to the McLaughlin/acoustic styled stuff, and back home again...

Quote:

Originally Posted by JJEMMER777

everybody improves in one way or another, but they inevitably reach sticking points (because they know it all

) and cannot expand to new horizons

That's why Al is as brilliant and well rounded as they come, because he just grew and grew to encompass everything! IMHO