jaw@ames.UUCP (James A. Woods) (08/23/84)
# "...and we'll wait for this to roll around on the guitar again"
-- Arlo Guthrie
Want lists-cum-reviews sorta like this !gtaylor? (A reposting for
newcomers, repeated from April 19.)
______________
An "fgrep" through the guitar file has failed to reveal the following
personages. Matter for obscurantists, I suppose.
Joseph Spence: Bahaman legend. Adopted his own uncategorizable style after
finding a guitar on the beach and learned music from old
hymnals. Told interviewer from Folkways, when asked how he
could play so demonically when he couldn't even read music,
"I's talented." Incomparable, still going strong in his 70s.
Zoot Horn Rollo: Under remote control from Captain Beefheart.
No great shakes, but known for the "long lunar note"
on Big Eyed Beans from Venus. "First I'm gonna zip up
my guitar, then I'm gonna zip down my guitar."
Come to think of it, the Capn's high school pal F. Zappa
wasn't too bad on "Speed Freak Boogie", one of those double
face slap wonderments that makes you question whether the thing
was processed in real time. In the geek category, there's
always Wild Man Fisher simulating guitar on paper bag.
Martin Carthy: English baladeer. Rhythmic style picked up from playing for
Morris dancers (you know, the bells-on-toes stick pounders).
Another Richard Thompson (Roll Over Vaughn Williams!)
contemporary, who incidently prefers the Byrds' McGuinn
as well as those manic 7/9 Bulgarian rhythms. Carthy was
probably in the studio when actor Peter Sellers played
ukelele for Steeleye Span.
Roy Smeck: Hawaiian bottleneck great. Steel is not for everyone,
but we must not forget that an electric dobro is a guitar,
too. Snakefinger knows.
Henry Kaiser: Graduate of Nikola Tesla High School. Local experimentalist.
A lot of bad albums which sound like "Music for Gerbils,"
but he's getting better all the time.
David Lindley: Banned from Topanga Canyon fiddle, banjo, and guitar contests
for being too good. Was with the brilliant psychedelic
Middle Eastern rock band Kaleidoscope, before wasting some
years as Jackson Browne's guitarist. Now back on track
with El Rayo X (the name labeling his guitar cases so
they won't get stolen in Mexico).
Leo Kottke: Already mentioned on the net, but anyone who has 13 guitars
made by a Chicagoan luthier named Bozo, and drinks Everclear,
can't be all bad! Saw him with Doc "Texas Gales" Watson
once. His voice self-described as "geese farts on a muggy
day", he's finally learned to just shut up play his guitar.
-- James Alien {hplabs,hao,philabs}!ames!jaw