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ivan@stellysee.de
| From | Road Angel <samsmith@colorado.edu> |
| Subject | Objective? [was Another List] |
| Date | Thu, 28 Aug 2003 12:10:44 -0600 |
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>But really, how could any list of this sort hope to be objective? It's more
>a popularity poll than anything else.
>
Well, here we go again. No, you couldn't hope to be objective, nor would
you WANT to. But just because something is subjective doesn't mean it
can't be thoughtful, reasoned, and defensible. Our culture has spent a
lot of time and effort convincing itself that anything out of the right
half of the brain is somehow fluff.
What you CAN do, and SHOULD do, is begin by asking yourself what the
term "best guitar player" means. If it means technical virtuosity, then
ain't gonna be nobody named Ramone or Edge or Cobain on the list. Does
it mean influential? All of a sudden Clapton is right and Edge is maybe
the greatest guitarist of his generation. Does it have something to do
with the ability to improv? In that case, Jerry Garcia moves up the list
and all of a sudden people like Chan Kinchla and Trey Anastasio have
some cred. There are a lot of things that go into the equation, and
ultimately it's not going to be about one factor, but about who rates
the highest across the most categories (and I'm not saying it turns into
a quant-fest, either - we don't need to start rating people on a scale
of 1 to 10 to acknowledge that Eddie Van Halen is probably more
technically adept than Kurt Cobain was). If you could identify a player
who was technically brilliant, Malmsteen quick, incredibly influential,
wildly popular, a great songwriter (which may or may not be a valid
criterion), and so on, then you've probably got your best guitarist ever.
It's not a perfect science - it's not a science at all - but that
doesn't mean you can't discuss the subject intelligently. Whoever did
this silly list might as well have pulled names out of a hat, though.
--
___________________________________________________________
Sam Smith
1020 Jersey St. #2
Denver CO 80220
303.321.0515 /h | 303.981.4398 /c
orb@colorado.edu | sam@lullabypit.com
http://www.lullabypit.com
...it's a lonesome thing to be passing small towns with the
lights shining sideways when the night is down, or going in
strange places with a dog nosing before you and a dog nosing
behind, or drawn to the cities where you'd hear a voice
kissing and talking deep love in every shadow of the ditch,
and you passing on with an empty, hungry stomach failing
from your heart.
- John Millington Synge
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