More Malmsteen

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braintheory said:
Joe Stump never did anything for me either. By modern standards Becker is I think a bit sloppy. Like if you listen to those fast sweep arpeggios in Serena, while it’s impressive the speed he plays them at and his great feel, his note spacing is quite uneven, the downward sweeps rush a lot and aren’t in control and so also many of those inner notes of the arpeggios get glazed over (not clean). Some of these really precise modern players wouldn’t do that and so are more impressive to me from a purely technical point, but most are pretty sterile
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I would never call Becker sloppy .. I think he just got excited at times and jammed too many patterns in. Marty and him were ridiculous with that on Cacophony. Stump to me is sloppy. If you listen to him live and compare him to YJM, it isn't even close. Yngwie is still the " best" mainly because he effortlessly coined the neoclassical shred unlike anyone else before him. All these guys we post up and who came after will admit that as well. At the time, none would. I remember Vinnie Moore doing a Guitar Player column where they make him listen to a song and then comment on the lead guitar. As if he didn't know who Malmsteen was when he listened to " You don't Remember" off Trilogy. Silly.
 
psychodave said:
I use to think this until I found this guy. I purposely chose a live solo (copping yngwie) and his picking sounds just like old yngwie.

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That does sounds almost note for note like old Yngwie live stuff. Stratovarius has always been a really good player but he's full on Yngwie here and sounds like his chops have gotten even tighter. That was a good listen. It just brings us back to how damn incredible the Maestro really is.
 
Kapo_Polenton said:
I would never call Becker sloppy .. I think he just got excited at times and jammed too many patterns in. Marty and him were ridiculous with that on Cacophony. Stump to me is sloppy. If you listen to him live and compare him to YJM, it isn't even close. Yngwie is still the " best" mainly because he effortlessly coined the neoclassical shred unlike anyone else before him. All these guys we post up and who came after will admit that as well. At the time, none would. I remember Vinnie Moore doing a Guitar Player column where they make him listen to a song and then comment on the lead guitar. As if he didn't know who Malmsteen was when he listened to " You don't Remember" off Trilogy. Silly.
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I don’t know Joe Stump well enough to say since I just a heard a few things by him and didn’t like it and moved on. No doubt Yngwie and other early guys deserve props for starting it, but that’s independent from who’s actually the best player. As for Becker, by modern standards I maintain that he’s sloppy, but brilliant for his time. It’s not his excitement, it’s more actual technical issues, but they’re not at all unique to just him. Even a lot of modern players have some of the same issues. Consistently he rushes a lot the downward part of his 5 string sweep patterns (making the note spacing uneven) with many of the inner notes being glossed over (not clean). Slow it down on YouTube when listening and you will hear it. This comes from a lack of control in technique. Some of these very clean modern players wouldn’t have that issues even if they were very nervous. They just have higher level baseline technique as we can expect with successive generations of players. Not saying I prefer them (I don’t), but for pure technique there’s no question
 
TheGreatGreen said:
Yep. Yngwie's playing has an almost vocal quality to it. Not the tone that comes from his equipment, but his phrasing and those high note bends he does that end in wide but controlled vibrato and literally sound like a human vocalist really reaching for it and screaming out high notes. It's really cool.

The worst vibrato comes from those people where you can practically hear them thinking to themselves "ok now is where I shake the note because that's just what you do with notes that you hold for a while for some reason" and they squeeze as hard as they can and forcefully shake their whole arm back and fourth as rapidly as possible, and it sounds like hyperactive yodeling or something. It just ruins whatever they were trying to convey. Totally takes you out of the moment.

I'd actually rather hear wrong notes than bad vibrato, because at least you know the artist knows wrong notes are mistakes. Bad vibrato is much harder to forgive because it tends to be consistent with the player. It feels like the player is fully aware of it but simply doesn't recognize how emotionally dissonant or vacant it is, otherwise they wouldn't keep doing it. And if they can't even hear or understand that, then how low must their capacity for interesting ideas be at all?
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I hate to be th vibrato police but there are some bad YouTube offenders lol
 
braintheory said:
I don’t know Joe Stump well enough to say since I just a heard a few things by him and didn’t like it and moved on. No doubt Yngwie and other early guys deserve props for starting it, but that’s independent from who’s actually the best player. As for Becker, by modern standards I maintain that he’s sloppy, but brilliant for his time. It’s not his excitement, it’s more actual technical issues, but they’re not at all unique to just him. Even a lot of modern players have some of the same issues. Consistently he rushes a lot the downward part of his 5 string sweep patterns (making the note spacing uneven) with many of the inner notes being glossed over (not clean). Slow it down on YouTube when listening and you will hear it. This comes from a lack of control in technique. Some of these very clean modern players wouldn’t have that issues even if they were very nervous. They just have higher level baseline technique as we can expect with successive generations of players. Not saying I prefer them (I don’t), but for pure technique there’s no question
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I'm eager to hear that.. do you mean he rushed the low string to high string sweep or the high to low? So the down or up? I will go have a listen, maybe I can answer that myself. I think personally, Becker's best playing is on Lil ain't enough. It was more about the song and he brought the chops where he needed to but they were musical. The ALS was slowing him down there but it resulted in some awesome rythm and lead playing. I like his solo album but find there is too much sweeping everywhere. For me it gets old after a while. I like the way YJM does his 2 and 3 string sweeping/arpeggio/ whatever he says it is or the slower longer arpeggios in stuff like Far Beyond the Sun and Disciples of Hell. That to me is musical. In fact, that's sort of another unique aspect of his playing.. the 3 string stuff. Like Eclipse, Demon Driver, Liar etc. So good. To me Yngwie is tops and always will be. He is the king.
 
Kapo_Polenton said:
I'm eager to hear that.. do you mean he rushed the low string to high string sweep or the high to low? So the down or up? I will go have a listen, maybe I can answer that myself. I think personally, Becker's best playing is on Lil ain't enough. It was more about the song and he brought the chops where he needed to but they were musical. The ALS was slowing him down there but it resulted in some awesome rythm and lead playing. I like his solo album but find there is too much sweeping everywhere. For me it gets old after a while. I like the way YJM does his 2 and 3 string sweeping/arpeggio/ whatever he says it is or the slower longer arpeggios in stuff like Far Beyond the Sun and Disciples of Hell. That to me is musical. In fact, that's sort of another unique aspect of his playing.. the 3 string stuff. Like Eclipse, Demon Driver, Liar etc. So good. To me Yngwie is tops and always will be. He is the king.
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He rushes the low to high strings parts of the sweep figures and a few other places where it almost creates a dotted rhythm. If we were to subdivide on a metronome where each note within the group of 6 got a click a lot of his notes wouldn’t line up (uneven note spacing) and some of the inner notes aren’t that cleanly played. I’m being nitpicky though because at speed it basically sounds clean and it’s not like any other players I know from before the 2000’s could’ve done better or myself. In general, not many players even today have good control of the downward part of their sweeps (even Rick Graham). Becker is still better than most with that. I like Yngwie’s 2 and 3 sweep figures too although they are even less precise technically. Both are players for me with excellent feel/soul, but really none of these shredders I felt had musical content with that much substance/depth behind it. I think it’s the playing and feel itself that makes it stand out
 
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braintheory said:
He rushes the low to high strings parts of the sweep figures and a few other places where it almost creates a dotted rhythm. If we were to subdivide on a metronome where each note within the group of 6 got a click a lot of his notes wouldn’t line up (uneven note spacing) and some of the inner notes aren’t that cleanly played. I’m being nitpicky though because at speed it basically sounds clean and it’s not like any other players I know from before the 2000’s could’ve done better or myself. In general, not many players even today have good control of the downward part of their sweeps (even Rick Graham). Becker is still better than most with that. I like Yngwie’s 2 and 3 sweep figures too although they are even less precise technically. Both are players for me with excellent feel/soul, but really none of these shredders I felt had musical content with that much substance/depth behind it. I think it’s the playing and feel itself that makes it stand out
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Ok I get it now. Also you are right about the Yngwie 2 and 3 string patterns. They also sound out in spots too especially when you slow them down. I used to do that with an old real to real tape machine ( so much work just to get solos) and today, if you just slow it down on youtube, you hear where lord Malmsteen rushes or lags or they aren't clean and they are chording a bit. On the album it's still pretty alive and good. Live though, he def takes liberties. Rising force for example, he's sloppy as hell now with it.
 
Kapo_Polenton said:
Ok I get it now. Also you are right about the Yngwie 2 and 3 string patterns. They also sound out in spots too especially when you slow them down. I used to do that with an old real to real tape machine ( so much work just to get solos) and today, if you just slow it down on youtube, you hear where lord Malmsteen rushes or lags or they aren't clean and they are chording a bit. On the album it's still pretty alive and good. Live though, he def takes liberties. Rising force for example, he's sloppy as hell now with it.
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Yes and don’t get me wrong, this doesn’t take away or make me like them any less, I just like to learn what I can. My background is mostly classical guitar, where it’s the same story with the old school legendary players like the Segovia or Bream vs guys today. Those guys had a lot of soul in their playing, but in today’s world lacking those kinds of details in technique will usually not allow players to advance past the first round in most competitions. I’m working on this a lot too and it’s for me at least very hard to fix. I have to revise a lot of fundamentals in technique and it’s not a fun time lol
 
Kapo_Polenton said:
I'm eager to hear that.. do you mean he rushed the low string to high string sweep or the high to low? So the down or up? I will go have a listen, maybe I can answer that myself. I think personally, Becker's best playing is on Lil ain't enough. It was more about the song and he brought the chops where he needed to but they were musical. The ALS was slowing him down there but it resulted in some awesome rythm and lead playing. I like his solo album but find there is too much sweeping everywhere. For me it gets old after a while. I like the way YJM does his 2 and 3 string sweeping/arpeggio/ whatever he says it is or the slower longer arpeggios in stuff like Far Beyond the Sun and Disciples of Hell. That to me is musical. In fact, that's sort of another unique aspect of his playing.. the 3 string stuff. Like Eclipse, Demon Driver, Liar etc. So good. To me Yngwie is tops and always will be. He is the king.
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Perpetual Burn album is perfection though
 
Kapo_Polenton said:
Ok I get it now. Also you are right about the Yngwie 2 and 3 string patterns. They also sound out in spots too especially when you slow them down. I used to do that with an old real to real tape machine ( so much work just to get solos) and today, if you just slow it down on youtube, you hear where lord Malmsteen rushes or lags or they aren't clean and they are chording a bit. On the album it's still pretty alive and good. Live though, he def takes liberties. Rising force for example, he's sloppy as hell now with it.
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In some places it’s not totally perfect some of the note spacing, but this guy plays it technically better than Yngwie (much cleaner) :
 


I saw him back in the day. Mind blowing to say the least.
He was in a bad car accident late 80's / early 90's it really messed him up bad.
 
Devin said:
Just a couple weeks ago I was astonished to find that Cerman is still out there to this day crafting cringe of the highest order.

This upload is just like 2 months old :LOL:

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"Want to play guitar, but have no discernable musical talent, feel for the instrument, or even know how to tune it? Don't let that stop you! Introducing the Peter Cerman Guitar Method."
 
TheGreatGreen said:
This guy's shredding and alternate picking stuff is amazing, but man his vibrato and sense for bending in general is just unreal. Wow.

To me, a player's vibrato has always been the truest indicator of their skill and relationship with the instrument overall. Good vibrato makes a player sound almost magical, like they're actually expressing themselves through another voice. Bad vibrato makes a guitar sound like it's just some gadget a player is trying to "operate" by following steps they've read in a manual, without fully understanding the whys and hows of what they're doing.

Not to get too lofty and fart sniffy but this guy is a great example of a player who knows exactly what he wants his instrument to convey, and who makes his instrument sound more like an extension of himself than some external piece of equipment.
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I would agree and also say that a great vibrato is what gives the shreddy parts some purpose.
 
shar-vell Dan said:


I saw him back in the day. Mind blowing to say the least.
He was in a bad car accident late 80's / early 90's it really messed him up bad.
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Looks like he was on fire this tour. Any of the shows I have seen from this era have great energy and killer playing. It's so effortless for him as well. He doesn't need to stand in one place to pull off those runs, he moves around. Sotto sounds great too. What a set of pipes. I don't care what anyone says, those songs were also great. He often gets the " lousy song writer just a shredder " but I don't hear that at all. Great songs up to Fire and Ice even. ( with some after as well)
 
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