The Power of Steel - 5/5/06

There are so many misconceptions about play acoustic guitar.

1. It's strickly for strumming.

2. It's for quiet nights at the coffee house.

3. It's for 'stripping down' your sound for those VH-1 Storytellers moments where the electric just seems to cloud the essense of the song.

... and it's not that it isn't for that. It is.

Here's my point. Guitar is guitar. The boundaries are self-imposed.

The guitar is a concert instrument, like piano. It has the ability to play single notes, chords, or both at once. You can tune it EADGBE and completely learn how to shred. Then, you tune it DADF#AD, and the game changes all over again. It is a limitless landscape of possible expressions.

The second point is that, in today's world, acoustic is a myth! If you're going to be heard anywhere other than the street corner, and even then, you need at least to have your acoustic plugged in or have it miked.

Now what? You're playing an electric with a huge body, steel strings and a big old hole in it... and the sonic possibilities therein are enough rope to hang anyone.

We've always been dubbed 'power acoustic,' which probably means at one point we played a lot louder than we probably should have. Either that, or it speaks to the idea that I, personally, always thought the steel string had BALLS! It vibrates. It shakes. It has a huge, gritty voice.

Where are we going next? I would like to name the players who really rock my world on steel string, in no apparent order of importance. They're all great.

1. Michael Hedges

2. John McLaughlin

3. Timmy Reynolds

4. Chet Atkins

5. Leo Kottke

6. Pete Townshend

7. Jimmy Page

8. Zak Wylde (this guy is a MASTER acoustic player, and I'm not sure people realize it).

9. James and Livington Taylor

10. Dave Matthews

This is my desert island steel string list. I've learned something from all of them. If you don't know Timmy Reynolds, then find him here. He played on "Live at Luther College" with Dave Matthews. Both of their guitar performances were stunningly chopsy and understated. The deathrow Hedges album for me is Live from the Double Planet. If Hendrix played steel string, he would have been Hedges. Then, there is McLaughlin...

I'm rambling because these folks expanded the vocabulary of a specific instrument. I feel I need to genuflect to them here and now.

That's all for me. I was doing some listening on my IPod last night and just wanted to share the experience.

Regards.

TW