Guitar Playing...The faster the better??

Having been looking around youtube.com a bit recently , I have had a chance to see just how many excellent guitar players there are in the world today. A couple of names that have stuck in my mind are Monte Montague and Antoine Dufour (put either of these names into a search in youtube and you will not be disappointed).

But I have to say that so many of the guitarists out there are really only attempting the same thing, and that is to play as fast as is physically possible. But they all only manage to achieve the same thing, which is not much! It is of course fantastic to have a platform for us all to show off what we are capable of, be it guitar playing or anything else that you care to mention. People should be entitled to post whatever they like, and long may it last. But my point is this, music is all about expressing something, be it a mood, an emotion, or a message, or to communicate something that words cannot. Is it not true to say that so many films are made by there score, and could even have flopped without it.

If you were to memorise the dictionary and recite it quicker than anybody else, the words would not tell a story or mean anything at all. Like wise, the alphabet is not a word or a sentence. If you can say it fast, or backwards, it again says nothing at all. But those words and letters arranged with talent and artistry are what make great scripts, great novels or convey an idea or some vital information to the world.

There are a couple of guys on the web (who shall remain nameless) that are playing so fast that you can’t actually hear what they’re playing. Is this not entirely pointless? Could it be that they simply have nothing to say? What else could be the reason for this kind of “playing”. The likes of Beethoven, J.S. Bach and Mozart, who are with out doubt 3 of the greatest musicians humanity has ever seen, did not write music that consisted solely of fast flurry’s of notes, in fact quite the contrary. Knowing every scale and every chord does not make you a great musician, it is the artistry and vision of these composers that set them apart from everyone else. They did not try to show everything they knew, or how fast they could play it through intense and frenzied bursts of music. Beethoven himself is quoted as saying "Slow is great"

Another travesty in the world of modern electric guitar is the attempt by certain "Heavy Metal" guitarists to play the classics of say Paganini or Vivaldi. Let’s not beat around the bush , these composers, along with those mentioned above knew infinitely more about music than we could ever imagine. Nothing sounds worse than a guitar saturated in distortion getting the “Malmsteen” treatment. It is beyond belief that these guys can even begin to consider themselves anywhere near equal to these giant musical intellects.

This is of course only my opinion and I'm not so conceited to think that it be the only one that is important.

Cheers folks,

Paul

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www.paulrose.co.uk

Guitars, Amps, Gear & Gadgets!!

OK, an anorak sport it may be, but there's certainly no shortage of us out there. Here I have posted some pics and information on the guitars, amps and various bits of stuff that I use. It's a work in progress that may be of interest to some people, to others it may not. Who cares? Certainly not me. JEEZUS!! there's a whole lot worse stuff going on out there, so cheer up for Christs sake.

To cut a long story short, I'm obsessed with American Fender reissiues, better if from the 1980s. This red strat is one. It's a '62 model, in salmon pink (aged fiesta red) from the Fullerton plant. Probably the best strat I have owned to date, a real bute!!

This is the guitar that all the questions are about. The 1962 reissue strat from Fender USA presented to me by Rory Gallagher in 1991. This guitar has seen some action. It is almost worn out now having been on just about every trip/gig/recording session I've done over the past 16 years. It's been dragged around on buses and trains. I have walked all night around London with it in the rain, I've seen it (in it's tweed case) chucked around by luggage handlers on the tarmac of Los Angeles airport. I have seen it soaked in the rain on the tarmac at Zurich airport. It was stolen from a flat in south London by addicts and used as a deposit for heroin, then retreaved and returned 7 days later in somewhat dubious circumstances. I will never know the real truth of what happened that week.

But it's been played to death and is on every CD I have released so far, including the front cover of Magic City and Slideaway. The frets have really worn flat now and the saddles are cut from the friction of years of string bending. As a result strings break constantly. I will probably get it repaired/restored at some stage, although I do feel like it should remain all original. But the guitar in its current state is pretty much unusable, wich is a bit of a waste. I also think it may be quite collectable and so should stay at home for safety sake.

I inverted the jack socket one Sunday afternoon. I also burnt the back of the headstock with a lighter one beery bleary night. Very foolish, but at least it didn't damage it's playabilty. The guitar was also signed by Rory, but I failed to follow the advice of Fender and have it laquered over. I believe just spraying it would have done it, but it stood in a sunny room on the 14th floor of a London tower block for 8 years, and the light faided the ink. Still, at least the guitar remains. Note: genuine aged vol/tone knobs etc. Not the cheesy ones you get on new guitars.

This Tele is a '52 USA Fender reissue that I bought in Newcastle after having given up on it as too expensive. It found its way into the hands of a different dealer and I snatched it from him for a far better price.

I have recently come across these Crate 50 watt combos. They are all valve and frankly the best little amps I've heard. They are now discontinued and hard to find. I have read a couple of dodgy revues around them being unreliable, but I reckon that for every amp that fails there are 1000 that haven't. But that aside, they just sound so good. I know Mark Knopfler and Billy Gibbons are both happy with them, which is what drove me to seek them out. After having Marshalls for a long time, I've found these to be far more flexable, and have a clean sound that the Marshall is a long way off. They are called the VC5212, and are a 2x12 50watt. If you see one give it a go, if you don't buy it, I will.


I got this AC30 about a year ago. It's a "Custom Classic reissue" and although made in China, it's an all valve job that sounds fantastic. I put it thru a Marshall 1936 2x12 cab and use an old Marshall Guv'nor pedal to add a little more sustain. I also love to link it up to the Crate 50 to blend the two tones, but when I do this I leave the Guv' pedal out of the loop. I think it's as good a sound as I've had. Fingers crossed they all last. I also have this thing called a Morley Tripler, that splits the guitar line into 3 and at the same time boosts it, as it can sometimes weaken the signal when you do this. A very useful thing indeed.

This cream strat is another '62 reissue from '89. The neck on this guitar is so nice it makes me wonder why anyone would want to sell it. In fact that goes for all the used gutars I've bought (and kept). Some people think I have about a thousand guitars, but the truth is, if a guitar interests me enough I'll buy it. I hold onto it for a while and make a decision as to whether or not I'm going to keep it. I actually only have 4 electric guitars, having bought about 10 in the last 2 years. I just keep trying to refine it down until I have the best I can find. This cream strat is definately one of those. An absolute classic!!

I have once again sucumbed to the Fender American
reissue drug, and bought this extremely fine 1952 telecaster.
It weighs a ton and has a really chunky neck. Reminds me of the Custom Shop models. It's a great guitar. I will say no more about it, and just let the pictures speak for themselves.

Writing, Recording and Mixing.

I suppose you could say that I have been writing and recording my own music for over 20 years now, off and on. Here are some pictures of my current set up for this. It has come a long way from the Phillips reel to reel I did my very first multi track experiments on about 25 years ago. With that machine it was bouncing down tracks all the way. Not much use to someone like me, who at that time had no idea about composition, arrangements or production. Not that I know that much about it now, compared to a lot of guys out there, but I have learnt something at least.

So basically...I now use NUENDO 3, from Steinberg. This is a fantastic piece of software. I doubt if I use more than 5% of its capabilities. I use a lot of the Waves plugins for effects etc. These are mind blowingly high quality, especially for guitars and so on. And I use Acid Pro and occasionally Ableton Live 5 for making up drum parts from loops. There's the debate about tape sounding better than digital, but the flexability of this far out weighs the argument... only in my own opinion at least.


I have a pair of Rode NT1 mics. These are wonderfully warm and pick up a really BIG sound. Terrific for vocals and acoustic guitars etc. They cost about £140 each and are worth every penny. I was amazed when I played back the first acoustic guitar experiments I did with them. I owe a lot of the quality of The Learning Curve to these mics and the Waves effects.

I have a Bheringer BCF2000 mixer too, with motorised faders for automated mixing. This makes things so much easier than trying to mix with the mouse. Again, I'm probably nowhere near maximising its capabilities.


For listening I have a pair of Fostex PM-1 montors, some good Eltax hi-fi speakers and a couple of ghetto blasters. It's a good idea to switch now and again to get an idea of how things are progressing. And wise to remember that most people aren't listening as closely as I am, and they probably aren't using a £250 pair of speakers either. So I "cross reference" to more common domestic systems to evaluate how it might sound to people who are hearing it at home.

Then there's the laptop, to produce the podcasts and edit/compile these blogs. More or less all my web stuff is done with this. I just love the way technology has advanced in our time to make all this creativity and communication possible.

More soon

Paul

Big Joint, Glasgow, August 25th.

Here are some pics from our "Big Joint" gig in Glasgow last Friday night (click on images to enlarge). We had a great night, how could you not with a Glasgow audience to play to!!

We would like to give a big thanks to Jake and all at the venue, and of course to Lawrence who worked tirelessly to record the show.

We'll keep you posted while mixing and if the show or recordings are up to it, we'll post samples for you to check out as soon as we can. (click image to enlarge)


More news on future projects will be appearing either here, or at the main website soon.

Please keep checking back

Bye for now

Paul

Acoustic Tour of Western Scottish Isles.

Hi to all who came to my recent acoustic gigs on the Isles of Arran, Bute and the Merrick Hotel in Seamill. I have thoroughly enjoyed the weekend, both for the music and the crack. The hospitality over there is tremendous. I’m getting so much pleasure from my solo acoustic gigs, it is an experience that I would not miss for the world. And it's a real challenge for me as a player. People who are hearing me play for the first time in this environment have no idea the damage their ear drums are being spared.

I’m very much looking forward to future dates in that area and may be bringing a small band with me for the next lot of shows. This will hopefully include percussionist extraordinaire Finn McArdle. Finn is a tremendous talent and a real gentleman who has worked with Sting and Paul Weller.

Proposed dates for these return gigs are Sept 15th/16th at the McAlpine Hotel on Arran and sometime during the first 2 weeks of November for the Regents Hotel on Bute. These dates and more will be posted here as soon as they are confirmed.

Also note, that anybody interested in the planned “Guitar Workshop Weekend” should take into consideration the photographs included in this post, as they were all taken around the location for the event. It is surely one of the most beautiful spots in the country and will make a great place to get a load of people together and obsess about all things guitar related!!. Click on the images to enlarge.

And finally.....for those of you who are regular visitors to my main website you may want to keep checking back to this page from time to time, as I intend to use it as a kind of tour diary as well as for news updates, pictures, mp3s and eventually some video links.

Look forward to seeing you all again soon....Cheers

Paul

Some New Ideas

Hi all, and welcome to my first blog, where I'm hoping to keep people interested in my work up to date on a semi regular basis from where ever I may be from week to week.

I'm fascinated at the moment by being able to share music and pics with people from all over the globe, from anywhere in the world. I have a huge amount of pictures from the road of gigs, motorway service stations, airports, hotels and B'n'Bs, views from train windows and countless freinds and aquaintences. I always thought over the last few years that it'd be a nice thing to post these as sort of an on going history/diary of my travels, so I'm now finally having a go at doing just that.

There's no major importance attached to this, but if you might be interested then please keep checking back, as some of these ideas may even evolve into reality.

Paul