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The Real Reason I Play Guitar

hannaugh said:
... so when I'm am 87 year old blue-hair,
I can stroll into a guitar shop and do the guitar equivalent of what this lady did in this drum shop.
Click to expand...
Least your hair will match your LP and Bass  :icon_biggrin:

:rock-on:
 
Updown said:
hannaugh said:
... so when I'm am 87 year old blue-hair,
I can stroll into a guitar shop and do the guitar equivalent of what this lady did in this drum shop.
Click to expand...
Least your hair will match your LP and Bass  :icon_biggrin:

:rock-on:
Click to expand...

True. 
 
Yep, the old folks homes are gonna be scary. Supposedly, playing music is the last skill to leave ya... so when you can't can't talk, walk or hold your marbles, at least you can still rock. I was amazed to hear this seventy-year-old playing this, I didn't know he still had it in him:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXXUbhLBqIc

I spent some time memorizing the exact three solos he quotes - I have no idea when he first learned them, but he drills it.
 
Look at Jeff Beck (69) and Robin Trower (68) - right up there with Eric at 68, and they don't have any problem wankin' and crankin'. They still tour, which is a lot of work even if you have a crew. Some of it because of the crew. I know I'd rather take a beating than travel these days. Then have to work when you get where you're going? Fuhgeddaboudit.
 
Classical musicians & composers live a really long time, it's starting to look like jazzbos, hillbillies & rock stars will too - unless they die young! Which is kind of a dumbass thing to say, but you know? It's a dumbass world - and you have to take dumbass steps or get left behind.  :icon_thumright:
 
StübHead said:
Classical musicians & composers live a really long time, it's starting to look like jazzbos, hillbillies & rock stars will too - unless they die young! Which is kind of a dumbass thing to say, but you know? It's a dumbass world - and you have to take dumbass steps or get left behind.  :icon_thumright:
Click to expand...

I suspect it has less to do with whether or not you're a musician than whether or not you're happy. Hopeless, depressed, aimless people die early for a wide variety of reasons. People with something they're driven to do keep doing it until the engine has no choice but to seize up.
 
And since people in pain tend to want to share it with others, when nobody wants to hear your giddy excited I'm just so happy to be live music.. yeah it's not really surprising that people with something to write about die early at a higher rate than the general population.
 
I personally think the best music is a mixture of those two mental states. 

And yes, it is amazing that music is the last thing that leaves you.  They're finding more and more that people with terrible dementia and Alzheimer's never forget melodies, no matter how messed up their memory is.  There is even a guy in England who totally lost his ability to form new memories due to a virus that destroyed part of his brain, and he can still remember all of his music (he is a composer) and can improvise and write new music just fine. 
 
hannaugh said:
There is even a guy ... virus that destroyed part of his brain...and can ... write new music just fine.
Click to expand...

[insert manufactured teen icon, yes even the ones from my generation] explained!!


 
hannaugh said:
...it is amazing that music is the last thing that leaves you.  They're finding more and more that people with terrible dementia and Alzheimer's never forget melodies, no matter how messed up their memory is.  There is even a guy in England who totally lost his ability to form new memories due to a virus that destroyed part of his brain, and he can still remember all of his music (he is a composer) and can improvise and write new music just fine. 
Click to expand...

Memory is a strange thing. I had an accident years ago that resulted in traumatic brain injury that left me with severe retrograde amnesia. But, some things are still there. It's funny how it's almost selective. For instance, I remember playing techniques like they were instinct, but I can't remember how to play any songs. I mean, I can play them back in my head as if I've got a built-in CD player, but I can't actually play jackshit. I remember how computers work in great detail, but I can't remember how to program. Lots of stuff like that. Worst of the lot is my short-term memory seems to be shot, no matter what. I have trouble reading, because I can't remember what I just read less than a minute ago. Can't play chess, because I can't keep enough balls in the air. Stuff like that. So, between that and the loss of coordination on my left side and the loss of a lung, I'm almost useless.

Pisses me off. They used to let me design and play with some really neat toys, and pay me boatloads to do it. But, that's ok. I still got my guitars.

 
Cagey said:
Pisses me off. They used to let me design and play with some really neat toys, and pay me boatloads to do it. But, that's ok. I still got my guitars.
Click to expand...

Okay now I'm curious.... who is "they"?
 
If I told you, I'd have to kill you  :laughing7:

No, not really. But, I did have to sign a lot of NDAs over the years just to get into some of the places I've been to. Too many secret/tricky things to see that couldn't be revealed. Used to be what they called a "thousand-mile expert". In other words, a fixer. Somebody they brought in when all else failed. I could work miracles. Now, I'm just an idiot who at least remembers how to make guitars behave themselves.
 
I used to have a supervisor when I was building theater scenery who, if there was a machine acting up, would respond with "Wait, let me talk to it."  This was usually said as he was pulling a hammer or crowbar out of this bag. 
 
"Mystery Granma" LOL
Go get 'er Cagey!  :icon_thumright: lmao!  :toothy12:

Cagey said:
I can't remember how to play any songs.
Click to expand...

Seriously though, playing an entire song might be just as much of a technique (as as difficult or more so) as any of your blues rock lead tricks, especially if you haven't done so in awhile. Don't get hung up on your ego, friend, I was a beginner once, and I will be a beginner again, and so therefore, why not be a beginner everytim?.  :guitaristgif:

:icon_scratch: Now...if only I took more ensembles in school instead of trying to learn every technique, stupid stupid stupid... :sad:
 
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