Five Great Guitarists, Part 2

Not every guitarist is fast and agile. They aren't all rock gods who try to live up to an image. Some of them are awful, even. In my eyes, a really great guitarist can be anything as long as they strive to establish their own style, within or without a genre. Last time on Five Great Guitarists (which was well over a year ago), I went over such six-string maestros as Tom Verlaine and Ron Asheton, each with a style all to themselves. Sure, Rolling Stone magazine can stick generic blues rocker after generic blues rocker and feverishly try to distinguish them from one another, but at the end of the day all they're doing is exhibiting their lack of real music knowledge. Now, I'm not saying I know it all. I'm not even saying I know anything, really, but what I am saying is that there's more to guitar-based music than the pentatonic scale and a fast fretting hand, and the guitarists I'm going over today are all beyond 'skill' and are moving into 'texture' and 'feeling' territory.

Alan Sparhawk takes 'less is more' to extremes at times. The leadman of 'slowcore' (a term he appropriately dislikes) band Low, who have been releasing beautiful and minimalistic music since their 1994 debut I Could Live in Hope, mixes sparse but tuneful arpeggios and almost inaudible palm muted chugs, sometimes drifting into more feedback-driven sections and ringing lead lines. Usually just riffing on a simple bass-driven progression, the central element to the music was his and drummer/marital partner Mimi's vocal harmonies, which are some of the most beautiful of all time. His real gift is feeling; the first time I heard Low, I thought of snow. They sound positively glacial at times, and with that comes that feeling of relaxed melancholy you get on the first day of snow. His guitar sound paints a picture, never fighting for the spotlight or raging into abandon, but holding its place in the bigger picture. To me, Low represent the other side in the punk spectrum; when audience members would taunt them to be louder, he would turn his amp even further down. Starting from their 2005 album The Great Destroyer, he began using distortion more, but not in a standard rock'n'roll way; it was the same patented Low sound, but this time around it got even more intense and personal, and with a bit more volume came more sonic variance. He has continued experimenting within his own, insular style since, with Low releasing their tenth true studio album, The Invisible Way, in 2013. Essential listening: check out 'Do You Know How to Waltz?', the culminating piece from The Curtain Hits the Cast, which starts as a typical Low piece but veers off further and further into heavy drone.

PJ Harvey has written some of the greatest songs of all time, and in my eyes is one of the greatest female vocalists since the punk era, if not of all time. But she backed up her unhinged and powerful singing in her early days with her guitar, primarily showcasing it on her first two albums, Dry and Rid of Me. Since then, she's moved more into a traditional frontwoman role, but continues to pick up the guitar for numbers from those two seminal albums, and has continued to write a lot of material on the instrument (such as Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea, and of course check out "Uh Huh Her", the live-only title track to her guitar-driven 2004 album, with it's outright monstrous central riff). But the sound she gets on those first couple of albums is something else; it's as savage, emotional, and powerful as her voice is. On Dry and Rid of Me, she was fond of playing around with odd time signatures, too, creating mesmerising and shifting riffs (Missed, Hook) and off-kilter and deceptively simple chord progressions. The fact she sings whilst doing all this is testament to her skill as a musician, if her expansive discography was not that already; and though she has changed her style so many times over by now, her most raw and stripped-down work remains her most vital.

Andy Gill has remained an incredibly influential guitarist ever since the release of Entertainment!. From American post-punk (see below) to funky heavy metal to modern 'indie' and all their variations, his reggae and ska-influenced—but entirely co-opted as his own—style, heavily rhythmic and incredibly trebly, can be found all over the music world. Gill was not only the guitarist of the seminal English post-punk band Gang of Four, but also served as producer and musical director of the band, as well as co-writing the lyrics to the songs alongside Jon King. Their sound—primarily on their first two albums—is unlike the reggae and ska they take some influence from; it's clear and un-dubbed, and at the centre of it is Gill's guitar, harsh and edgy in the most literal sense. His use of stripped-down chords gives the songs room to breathe, he rarely, if ever, used the power-chord chunk that punk was so fond of, and his work is full of irregular sounds and noises drawn from the guitar—from the sustained feedback in 'Anthrax', to the fast muted notes in 'Ether', to his off-tempo freakouts in tracks such as 'At Home He's a Tourist'. Whereas most of his contemporaries were edging towards heavy reverb and delayed notes—basically the style The Edge would cop off with not long after—Gill smashed 'em right in the face with a style as acerbic and spot-on as his band's socio-political lyrics. After Entertainment!, he toned down his tone, and aimed more for a texture-guitar style, best exemplified on their second album, Songs of the Free. Whilst still crucial to his development as a guitarist—and to the development of the band, who would take a more pop-centric route not long after—it never quite beat the punch of that seminal debut.

D. Boon was the frontman of San Pedro, California band the Minutemen, who served as the American equivalent to the funked-out post-punk bands of England. Indeed, they've stated before just how much influence they took from bands such as Wire, Gang of Four and the Pop Group, and it shows in their music; and it just so happens to sound totally un-derivative and as fresh as anything that came from England at the time. D. Boon, who tragically died in a motor accident in 1985, age 27, was not the world's most varied singer, but it was inconsequential when his playing was so unique for his era and location—favouring a Fender Telecaster to get an incredibly trebly sound not too dissimilar to Andy Gill's. The reasoning for this was mostly due to the Minutemen being a 'politically equal' band; the guitar and bass were separated to sound as different and unique of each other as possible—which meant Boon would cut all bass and middle out of his tone, with just the treble remaining. The interplay between him and the equally talented Mike Watt and George Hurley showed a band taking the hardcore punk formula and making something entirely different of it; they had no distortion, but also no pseudo-psychedelic elements—they were an incredibly straight band, and he was an incredibly straight guitar player, yet they remain entirely singular in their style. Boon didn't fuck around, and the further into the career they got, the more obvious it was what a talented guitarist he was, tearing into solos with wild abandon and not sticking to any rigid formula. He never took himself too seriously; he sometimes even used guitar solos as punchlines ('A Political Song for Michael Jackson to Sing'). And although his career was untimely cut short, what he left as a legacy is an inspiration to any aspiring guitar player. He had no lessons, nothing to idolise but his record collection, and from that still became one of the most noteworthy guitarists of his time.

Brian McMahan and David Pajo are the guitarists of Kentucky band Slint. Slint are often recognised as incredibly influential and as the innovators of a 'style' of music now known as 'post-rock', which is a daft phrase, but then again there are few subgenres which begin with 'post' that aren't badly named. In fact, none. Putting Slint into any kind of genre or subgenre is completely missing the point, and is too contrived to be taken seriously. Their music is singular; whilst it contains only the basic rock formula of guitar, drums, bass, and vocals, they were able to pull something entirely unique from it. Just from hearing the opening notes and harmonics of their seminal sophomore album Spiderland one can tell they are in for something different; it sounds eerie yet peaceful, and grounded in reality yet entirely ethereal. David Pajo is the de-facto 'lead guitarist', although that label again seems contrived next to his name. His approach to guitar and in particular harmonics and distortion is singular—just listen to the brilliant and creepy high-pitched riff from 'Nosferatu Man'—and set a template for countless bands in the 1990s and beyond who were more interested in texture than outright rocking. McMahan was the vocalist in the band as well a guitarist, mostly providing spoken word parts with some other shouted/sang parts, and his guitar style is pretty similar to Pajo's for the most part, probably a purposeful act to bring a specific sound to the band. As a pair, they play clean parts mixed with distortion, with a heavy emphasis on dynamics, something that has been present since their debut album, Tweez, a slightly rougher collection of tracks compared to the masterwork of Spiderland yet still an incredibly unique piece of work. One can hear a similar approach to guitar in the work of Steve Albini—who produced Tweez, and no doubt influenced Slint himself. Slint belong to a very special group of independent rock bands from the late eighties to the early nineties, a group who managed to create a new approach to rock music whilst still remaining within the basic structure, although Slint may well be the most unique of the bunch.

Underrated As Fuck, Part 1: Jazzy D.C. punk band Faraquet

The idea for this came from me wanting to write an article on the many 'overrated' things in the world. I thought on it, and what things were really so overrated they deserved their own page to more or less slander them. I realised that's just what so many people already do today on the internet, mouthing off about what they think 'sucks'; go to any music message boards, any site even vaguely related to music, and people will be senselessly arguing over what's better and what is overrated. Which band is better – the Clash or the 101ers? Oh, of course, the Clash are overrated so the 101ers are better. What about Gorguts albums? Well, Obscura is their most well-known album; it must be overrated! Their purist death metal albums must be much better! It's this kind of bullshit that's really bringing music down these days, and it's hilarious, too. If the musicians in question saw these people sat on their arses worrying about it all so much, they'd either laugh, feel really sorry for them, or kick their lazy arses into gear and tell them to learn a fucking instrument before they get so judgmental. People become elitist pricks behind their computer screens. So, I decided, talking about what bands, albums, or films are 'overrated' is both unnecessary and also just begging to open a can of worms of people arguing over the claims (well, if anyone actually read this, anyway). So, what I decided would be better is to talk about some of the less publicly acclaimed bands and films; give some classics their deserved attention. (Note: you may have noticed my fondness for the 90's post-hardcore music before; this serves as my final main work on it).

I'm starting this section with a band from Washington D.C. that started in the late 1990's, called Faraquet. Forming from another great D.C. band, Smart Went Crazy, they released just one full studio album (something so common with lesser-known great bands) and later on a collection of their singles and rarities, and afterwards two of the members formed another band, Medications, who, sadly, didn't quite fill the space of Faraquet and live up to their unique blend of jazz guitar, emotional and occasionally monotone vocals, really weird time signature shifts, and punk influence. Faraquet had a particularly singular sound; for all the great "post-hardcore" music of the 90's, you could usually see the influence of other bands seeping through. Fugazi had the band members previous projects (such as Embrace and Rites of Spring) fuelling their early work, Drive Like Jehu had a definite hardcore punk and riff-rock vibe, and Jawbox had a late 1980's Chicago post-punk feel all over their work; Faraquet are something altogether different. The guitar work is the central attraction here, especially since the guitarist is also the singer – a feat not to be taken lightly, as even singing a different vocal melody over power chords can be tough sometimes; this guy goes all out and all over the place. One only needs to listen to the opening track of their lone album (The View from this Tower), Cut Self Not – a track that lyrically seems to encourage living one's life – to hear the potential this band has and how much they live up to it. It serves as a great opening statement to the album.

The View from this Tower (2000, Dischord) is, in my mind, one of the best albums from the start of the millennium, and hands-down the greatest 'math rock' album of the decade. Everything that came after this seems limp and easy in comparison. The instrumental sections are astounding, whilst the lyrics are intelligent and somewhat cryptic without being pompous or smarmy, even chucking in the occasional 'fuck' for punk cred. Most post-hardcore bands, especially post-2000, seem to veer to either the soft side, i.e. the more 'emo' side of things, or to the dissonant and intense side of it all; Faraquet know how to balance themselves perfectly, with beauty and harshness sitting side by side, complimenting each other and never going too far into either. Track three, The Fourth Introduction, is a great example of this: it starts with a dissonant chord being hit repeatedly, with occasional (and incredibly fast and short) arpeggios in between for relief. When their reflective side goes all out though, the results are equally great – namely the fifth track, Conceptual Separation of Self. The longest track on the album, complete with brooding cello, is one of the most accomplished on the album, knowing when to abide by 'less is more' and just flowing on a lovely chord progression with small alterations (such as short extra sections or additional beats) throughout.

Guitarist/vocalist Devin Ocampo is clearly a highly trained musician, being proficient in more than just guitar (he added instruments such as keyboard, trumpet and percussion to various tracks in their career), but his guitar work is the highlight of the band. It's no surprise that King Crimson are listed as an influence alongside Fugazi and Nation of Ulysses; Ocampo's guitar work has some similarities, particularly to Robert Fripp's work on Crimson's 1973 album Red (and even more in particular it's title track). It's complex, seemingly muddled in parts, and often relentless, yet for the most part he keeps his tone clean and mellow sounding. If it were heavily distorted, and had some blast beat drumming to accompany it, it might sound like some fucked technical death metal, yet the tone and Chad Molter's equally jazzy drumming keep it firmly in it's indie/math/post-punk rock sound. From what I can tell, Ocampo plays with his fingers and not a pick, which would certainly add to the mellow sound he gets from the instrument, and also more closely associates him with a jazz style. But this is rock, not jazz; and at the end of the day, Faraquet rock. You wouldn't mosh to it, but it's as driving and exciting as any rock'n'roll, with the cerebellum to back it up.

Their lone album is luckily not their only recorded material; the collection of non-album tracks Anthology 1997-98 provides us with a more complete picture of the band, from the opening track, the soft and pretty Parakeet to the musically astounding single The Whole Thing Over, to the last track, an alternate version of TVftT track 'Sea Song'. For anyone who's heard their debut, they know finding this anthology is essential. As a long play album, it's as good as their debut, if not as cohesive, but thus is the nature of compilations such as this. Faraquet split up shortly after The View from this Tower for no reason I can discern, as it seems to go for most great DC bands. Ocampo and Molter formed Medications, this time with Molter on bass rather than drums, but have not released anything as influential or original as their work with Faraquet yet. Faraquet also reformed briefly in 2007 for a DC show and a tour of Brazil.

It seems unfair for such great bands to be washed under in a flood of generic music. It happens all the time, though; talent does not equal fame. Perhaps Faraquet were a few years too late and before their time equally; in a time when bands such as Foals can get such attention, Faraquet's remaining obscurity seems unwarranted. But then, maybe them and their loyal fans wouldn't want to be revealed to the kind of people who like those kind of bands. In a world of ever-growing musical ignorance and bad taste, it's important for real music fans to have something to latch on to. Hopefully, in the years and decades to come, Faraquet will be recognised not just as an obscure but talented math rock band, but one of the most singular, unique, dynamic, and most of all, interesting bands of the turn of the millennium.