June 26, 2004

Snippets of Stanley. Yes, that is one guitar player.
posted by Jerry Garcia 20 years ago
  • Great post! As a young guitarist in high school, someone played me a video of Jordan playing Stairway to Heaven on two guitars simultaneously. It blew my mind all the way apart. [musicgeek] IIRC, he tunes in fourths all the way across (which means the B and high E strings are tuned a half-step higher than normal). That way, he can lay one finger down across the fretboard and get cool, quartal-sounding chord voicings (very idiomatic in jazz) without having to concentrate on too much as far as the "comping" hand goes, which leaves him free to go hog-wild tapping out a solo line on another guitar. [/musicgeek] But still... he's fucking amazing. Another badass guitarist with completely nontraditional technique: eight-string warrior Charlie Hunter. I first heard him when he was with Michael Franti's hip-hop outfit "Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy," and couldn't believe that it wasn't a bassist and guitarist playing simultaneously.
  • I can remember buying "Magic Touch" not long after it's release, and being amazed by the complexity of what he can do, but wishing there was a bit more actual music in there. I found that once the novelty had worn off and I was just listening to it as music, rather than a display of viruosity, it left me cold and often bored. I mean, okay it's a neat trick, but if 2 guitarists played exactly the same tracks, would you be so impressed? I certainly wouldn't. For me at least, it all comes down to the music, and stripped of the novelty of his technique, the music was so-so at best.
  • yummy stuff!
  • I can see (hear) your point of view, Gamecat. To be honest, I haven't listened to a lot of his albums over the years, but I did see him live at the Ottawa International Jazz Festival a long time ago and it was a very impressive performance in terms of technique and music. I think he is closer to a piano player than a guitarist (indeed piano is where he started). And I've always loved his version of Eleanor Rigby (mp3 sample via WalMart, of all places...).