BILL HARKLEROAD (WITH MALLARD, "BACK ON THE PAVEMENT" )

Here's Bill Harkleroad, aka Zoot Horn Rollo, with his post-Captain Beefheart band Mallard. While I don't like this nearly as much as I like the Magic Band, Mallard is a great ensemble with some unusual ideas. Harkleroad's solos and background riffs under the vocals are a lesson in how to incorporate Beefheart guitar ideas into a more conventional context. Great Telecaster sound-- trebly, slightly overdriven. Harkleroad can't really be called underrated, because most people, even guitarists, haven't heard of him. He's one of my heroes, though-- anyone interested in the traditional/avant-garde kind of playing Tom Waits featured on his records (esp. guitarist Marc Ribot) should listen to Harkleroad's work to hear one of the guys that pioneered it.

The music here is somewhere in or around bluesy/funky Little Feat/Joe Cocker territory, with just enough off-kilter rhythms and phrasing to distinguish it from the mainstream. (Some of the other youtube cuts have more of a prog-rock flavor, and some of the keyboard soloing sounds Cecil Taylor-esque.) I suspect the band wasn't accessible enough for the mainstream, yet too connected to roots music to please the prog crowd.
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ROY BUCHANAN, "SWEET DREAMS"

Here's Roy in a clip from 1974. (I believe it's from the Musik Laden program.) The person who posted it says he has more material from the famous PBS tv special, some of it with Merle Haggard and Roy Nichols.
(see earlier post, karlstraubcountryguitar.blogspot.com/2008/12/buchanan-rides-alone.html)

If I see that around, I'll put some of it here. I had it on video, and have no way to transfer it and post excerpts as of yet--

Anyone who has the "Snake Stretchers" album knows that "Sweet Dreams" is one of Roy's great performances, and any version of it is welcome, especially on video.
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JIMMY BRYANT (WITH TENNESSEE ERNIE FORD)

Jimmy plays a great short solo here, a great example of how he can go from western swing boogie licks to bebop-type lines, and then wrap it up with some double-time fiddle tune style playing. Killer, as always-- (and, as usual, a great Speedy West solo too.)
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USING HALFTIME IDEAS TO PLAY LINES AT FAST TEMPOS

My style revolves around shifting positions, shifting between major-scale ideas and blues ideas, varying rhythms, articulation, etc. It works well for me in slow and medium tempos, but in fast tempos I flounder-- mainly because at a tempo like 200 quarter notes per minute, eighths are hard to sustain. I've been frustrated that tempos like that tend to make me play bad ideas; I fall back on treading-water licks, repeated notes, and all the lame stuff that even great players sometimes use at fast tempos.

I came up with an approach that is starting to help. It involves thinking of the tempo in a different way. It's based on my theory that fast tempos intimidate me, causing my hands to tense up. Anything that helps you relax is good, and thinking in half-time seems to help.

1. If you are at a fast tempo (like quarter note equals 200), think of the quarter notes as eighth notes. (Tapping your foot on two and four in the half time tempo can help. This is the equivalent of tapping foot on three in the actual tempo. Practice the transition back and forth along with a metronome.)

2. Once you're thinking in half-time, play eighth-note lines. These are the equivalent of quarter notes in the actual tempo.

3. When you have the eighths together, switch to "double-time" runs for half a bar at a time. Now you're playing eighths for half a bar, and sixteenths for half a bar. (This means you're playing quarters and eighths in the actual tempo.)

4. If you can keep this up for eight bars or so, you've probably got something that will do the job when you have to solo. You can make it more interesting by making it less a rigid ratio between eighths and sixteenths, mixing it up a bit and being less symmetrical. Using some rests is also good-- practice starting ideas on something besides beat one.

5. Eventually, you'll be able to sustain the half-time sixteenths longer; in the meantime, you'll have a solo that sounds more musical. Ideally, by the time you can keep the half-time sixteenths going, you'll be using less treading-water ideas.

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ROY NICHOLS WITH HAG, "BOTTLE LET ME DOWN" 1978

This is the best Roy Nichols playing I've seen in a clip. It's a great example of how Roy mixes western swing ideas with chicken pickin'. Also, (although some may balk at this generalization!) Roy's playing here shows an approach to melody that is all too rare today. I spend many hours studying the work of today's Tele hotshots, and I learn a lot from them, but it does sometimes feel that the goal today is to play hot licks and move around the fingerboard fluidly. I'd like to hear more playing that puts the hot licks where they should be-- part of the discussion, but secondary to melody.


I should confess that now I'm just poaching clips from the Telecaster Forum. I hope no-one objects!
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LEON RHODES WITH ERNEST TUBB, "I'LL TAKE A BACKSEAT FOR YOU"

It occurred to me that the Troubadours stuff I've been posting was more the "hot" kind of number than the typical Tubb style. Here's Leon Rhodes playing some lines in his modified Billy Byrd style. As on the Tubb live 65 album, (essential!) in this context you get more guitar than on a lot of the studio stuff. Tubb's studio recordings often used session players to augment his touring band. This means great playing by Nashville cats, but less Rhodes and Charleton. Live, those two guys played tons of great background fills along with the solos.

interesting detail-- Leon plays the original Tubb signature quarter note triplet on the intro, then for his solo he plays the modified Leon version with eighth note triplets.
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more sick THUMBS CARLILLE "MYSTERY TRAIN"

Here's more of Thumbs.
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more THUMBS CARLILLE, WITH BRENDA LEE

Here's young Brenda Lee's cover of "Hound Dog," with Thumbs Carlile on guitar. Nice fills, but wait til the solo-- definitely the hottest guitar solo ever played by a guy wearing a dog suit. After the solo, more hot fills.
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JAMES BURTON "TRUCK DRIVIN' MAN"

Here's a cool clip of Ricky Nelson on the "Ozzie and Harriet" show. A bit of tasteful "steel guitar style" backup from James on the first number (a ballad), but on "Truck Drivin' Man" you get to hear some of the earliest examples of Burton's chicken pickin' style. Unfortunately, there's some dated sitcom dialog obscuring part of Burton's solo, but plenty of great fills.

Here's my two cents-- if James Burton ever released a followup to his excellent first instructional dvd, and he demonstrated more of this kind of playing, I'd buy a copy and talk about it ad nauseam on this blog. If it will help, I'll buy two copies.
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ALBERT LEE "COUNTRY BOY"

Albert is one of the progenitors of modern country lead guitar. He's more or less in the Joe Maphis tradition-- rapidfire fiddle-tune eighths are the fundamental element of his style and that's mostly what he does here. He's got a lot more going on, too, of course-- "banjo" rolls, rockabilly comp patterns, double stops, bending, chicken pickin', etc. but his basic approach is built mostly on the rapid run style. I'll confess i prefer the players who are more "melodic" and play with time a little more (Roy Nichols comes to mind) but Albert is sure a gas to listen to.

(thanks to Marv Egolf for posting this clip on facebook.)
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