Barking Spiders

As a drummist myself I found his playing pretty heavy handed. I think he was trying to release his inner Bonham

And that's the problem with pretty much all 'greatest guitarist/bassist/whatever' lists , that rock and blues are the default genres and others count for pretty much nowt. Even old Rick Beato's channel is largely geared towards rock and blues although there's the occasional article on / interview with a jazzer e.g. John Scofield and Keith Jarrett. I wonder how highly rated rockers like Hendrix, Beck EVH, Vai, Malmsteen and young guns like Abasi and Henson would able to match top jazz, flamenco or country players.

Yeah but mainly because he was active in a music genre made popular by radio and other music media in English speaking countries. If classical, jazz, folk or country had the same degree of mass appeal then we might be talking about Segovia, Joe Pass, John Fahey or Chet Atkins instead as the GOAT Sort of related in a blues rock vein. I've never much cared for blues rock guitar but I've come across two young guys who've converted me a bit Kingfish Ingram and Gary Clark Jnr. Excellent stuff they're doing.

I've checked out a lot of unfamiliar names outside the top 50 whom I'd never heard of, mostly happened to be indie bands,women and bluesy/folk players from way back in history. I gave a fair listen to recommended tracks but all those in the indie/punk/alt bands and soul/funk are IMO 100% mediocre. Nothing in their playing made my jaw drop or sit up and think 'wow'. On the plus side I give 👍to Etta James and Molly Tuttle, both of whom are excellent but then there are many other ground breaking fingerstyle and flatpicking players respectively that are even better. Dare I say it but the list smacks of wokery. E.g there's some non-binary person called El Kempner from some pretty dire indie/punk outfit called Palehound. Not impressive. There are some blind players but then Jeff Healey smokes all of them and he's not included. Unsurprisingly, the list of contributors includes no players of any note. They're just music hacks for an increasingly irrelevant rag that's decades past its sell-by date and clearly are trying to get attention with their clickbait lists. And it's working to some extent though I won't be subscribing.

I guess you might've just woken from cryogenic freezing if you weren't aware of Rolling Stone's latest opus of $hyt3, its 250 Greatest Guitarists list 😁. When it comes to these there's only one criterion that should be a qualifying factor, and it's not 'influence', the most overused word when it comes to make any judgement about anything. Adolf was 'influential'. Kim Kardashian's 'influential'. That criterion is how well someone can play which encompasses technique, feel, tone, clarity, fluency, choice of notes in improvisation, the whole kit and caboodle. My own 'mental' greatest players list include the likes of Danny Gatton, Chet Atkins, Leo Kottke, Albert Lee, George Benson, Paco de Lucia and Tommy Emmanuel. BTW Hendrix isn't even in my top 50, which is topped by this guy. In a just world he'd top all greatest guitarist lists but as it is he's not really known outside of country music.

Tried the Bjork album. Listened to the first two tracks and then 30-60 second bits of the remaining ones. I really didn't like it, not one bit. Then again I don't like Bjork's solo stuff or the the Sugarcubes other than the Play Dead track done with David Arnold. For some reason her odd voice works really well there.

When you're playing bass at a gig ...does your face err more towards ... this or ....this

Off the top of my head, these tunes in particular tug at the ole heart strings

Not bad at all but then again the post punky vibe is right up my street. Reminds me of 80s 'Peel' bands like Josef K, The Room and The Sound. One listen through so far but I give 7/10.

but that's just life innit, a (not so) merry-go-round of routine, the repetitive and the overly familiar. Sure we repeat much of the same old BS but that's for the benefit of BC newbies rather than the old lags who've been around here a few aeons 😉

The Stranglers have been a fave band of mine from the time I half-inched my older sister's 45s till the departure of Hugh Cornwall. I couldn't warm to anyone else in his role. The great thing about the Stranglers is that long before they got too aged, they ditched their aggressive style in favour of the more radio friendly mellow material, which is still largely great. If those other bands I named and others had done similarly I might not be so harsh in my POV. And a Buzzcocks without Pete Shelly is pointless IMO. As for the Undertones, I wish they'd had more luck when they partly morphed into the excellent That Petrol Emotion.

Ha ha you've rumbled us......to an extent, well at least me anyway. I've never liked the Stones, Who, Kiss, Aerosmith, Foreigner, Queen, Rod Stewart and many other classic rock bands still on the legacy circuit. That said I'm a tad disappointed to see some first generation punk/new wave and 80s synth/pop/new romantic acts still at it. Viz punk I thought one of the ideas was to burn bright and then burn out quickly but no as the likes of the Undertones, SLF, Ruts DC, Buzzcocks, Stranglers - or rather new iterations with maybe just 1 or 2 original members - still tour.

Ch***t almighty but now we know who's to blame. Bowie and Ferry were/are terrible singers but this bloke is even worse

I've pretty much got to a point where any progress I make is tinily incremental. Over the years my target has been to nail such and such basslines. After 35 years I think I've now exhausted my list of 'musts' to get off pat. Not sure where to go from here now

No Yes indeed. That's what happens in an industry with no quality control. BTW who was the first to sing in that very affected way of Bowie, Ferry, Jim Kerr?

Maybe because TJ has some dignity about him, something Madge has never had at any age

Yup, I just don't geddit. Ha ha not just a lipsynching granny in a basque, but a lipsynching granny in a basque and fishnet stockings. Hmmmm nice!! It was either this year's Glasto or last least year's where the combined age of all the people in the headline and second tier acts was over 1,200 years!

from the many I've seen and heard ...yes unfortunately

If these ageing bands were coming out with interesting and different material then fair dos. Thing is, in the vast majority of cases it's the same old same old.

I like this track. Checked out a bunch of other tunes of theirs but they're too US type rock for my taste

I likes me some 70s dub -Lee Scratch Perry, King Tubby and Scientist in particular -and like some regular reggae e.g Toots &b The Maytals, Black Uhuru. But you're right, within the BCverse, like electronica, it seems to be a niche thing with just a few followers. Anyway, this guy sure isn't niche and this is one hell of a reggae-ish bassline

are they in fact pretty s*** hot and are comparing themselves to Victor Wootten. Time to come clean 😁

I can think of few but here's a couple of big faves. OK so the guy on bass isn't Anthony Jackson and it's played faster here than expected but it's live and my 3rd fave New Order track

Viz my own playing there are some techniques I've never bothered learning - e.g tapping - as they're mostly used in genres that don't interest me. So in that respect I'd say my playing is limited due to my taste.

restricted? narrow? diminished? incommodious?. Another way of putting it is guess is playing within your own b 😲😧🤯😱😰