Mr. Doobie's Alcoholic, Rolling Stone, Carnival of Pain

So, for those who haven't kept up to date with my posts in "Something Bad" (wouldn't say I'd blame you), one of my friends lungs collapsed last night. My friends and I went to see him, and I made the mistake of asking him if there was anything I could do to make him more comfortable. He had three requests...

#1 - Finally review Human Centipede II
#2 - Finally review Rolling Stone's new 100 Greatest Guitarists list
#3 - turn both experiences into a drinking game

I hope his other lung collapses.

I haven't eaten all day. So now I'm sitting here with an empty belly, two full vodka bottles, a shot glass, and a couple of my so-called friends here making sure I follow through. Why do they want me to do this so badly? All I can think of is that they hate me and want to steal my wallet when I black out. Life's hard.

So. Rolling Stone's 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time Part 2: Electric Boogaloo.

Here are the ground rules...

#1 - Mr. Doobie will take a shot every time the words "blues", "raw", or anything similar to "raw" are used to justify why a guitarist should be on the list.
#2 - Mr. Doobie will take a shot every time something like "he wasn't very technically proficient, but that didn't matter" is said about any guitarist on the list.
#3 - Mr. Doobie will make a short list of guitarists he thinks should be on the list, but probably won't be on the list, and at the end of his review, he will take a shot for each one that isn't on the list.
#4 - Mr. Doobie will take a shot if Zakk Wylde, John Mayer, or Slash appear anywhere on this list.
#5 - Mr. Doobie will take a shot every time he rages.
#6 - The ground rules are subject to change. If Mr. Doobie, his friends, or any poster here notices something in the list Doobie should start taking a shot for, Mr. Doobie may add it as part of the ground rules.
#7 - Mr. Doobie retains the right to take a break from the list, lest he die of alcohol poisoning.

Mr. Doobie's list of guitarists he thinks should be on the list, but probably won't be...

#1 - Richard Thompson
Richard Thompson is an obscure treasure that's been playing since about the early 70's. Yeah, Rolling Stone put him on their last list, but he's far too obscure for Rolling Stone to give a shit, so I imagine they took him off this time around. Also, Rolling Stone hates me and is on a mission to give me an aneurysm at a young age. Just look at their three star reviews of Chickenfoot's first album, Lulu, and both the Black Eyed Peas latest albums if you don't believe me. So why does Richard Thompson belong here? Just listen to this...



Compared to electric guitars, which have the advantage of sheer volume and effects pedals to help them, it's pretty hard to do incredible things with the acoustic guitars. Playing an acoustic is what separates a great guitarist from a spectacular guitarist, in my mind. When I heard this song for the first time, my jaw dropped. To show all that skill, yet still put that much emotion, vulnerability, and heart into it as well is something to be applauded. If Richard Thompson isn't in the Top 50 I'll shit a castle.

...anyone want a castle?

#2 - Carrie Brownstein (Sleater-Kinney)
Carrie Brownstein's style is instantly recognizable to anyone who's ever listened to Sleater-Kinney. She's unique, and not only is her tone great, it's versatile, going from sounding sweet and poppy, to anxious, to upset, to atmospheric, oftentimes all in the same song. Her guitar is the perfect match for one of the greatest bands of all time. Rolling Stone won't put her on the list. Everyone knows Rolling Stone doesn't give a shit about women unless they're a pop princess or are constantly trying to apologize for their femininity by putting on black leather pants and trying to play up all those rock n' roll cliches Rolling Stone creams themselves over.

#3 - Omar Rodriguez-Lopez (At the Drive-In/the Mars Volta)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, predictable coming from me, I know. But this guy is easily one of the top five best guitarists of the last decade. He's creative, unique, and incredibly technically proficient. I don't think I can post more than one video in a post. Look him up.

#4 - Robert Johnson
A blues guitarist, and arguably the most important to popular music, when you consider almost every guitar god in rock's foundations is influenced by him. Maybe I should start taking a shot every time I say blues or raw.

#5 - Jeff Hanneman and Kerry King
Both the guitarists of Slayer. Their sound is so linked with each other, you can't really separate the two, which isn't a bad thing. In fact, it's kind of a cool thing. They've got really great chemistry, and a really great sound. It's chaotic, frantic, wild, everything you'd expect from a band called Slayer. Just listen to the guitar work on "Raining Blood" and tell me it doesn't want to make you beat something to death with a sock full of wood screws.

It's not even three o' clock, and I'm already going to start drinking. Let's get this over with.

Quote :

#1 - Jimi Hendrix
#2 - Eric Clapton
#3 - Jimmy Page

FUCK. Not only are these the three most predictable guys you could possibly start a list like this with, but all three are blues guitarists that have, at one point in their career, had a thing for playing "raw". I can already tell this list is going to be worse. At least the original list had the surprise donkey kick of putting Duane Allman as number two. And what a good donkey kick it was, I fucking love Duane Allman. Does he deserve to be #2? Probably not, but it was a nice surprise.

And Jimi Page as number three? He's a good guitarist, and probably deserves to be in the top 100, but not the top three. Two out of three of this group are ex-Yardbirds, so I'm going to say it, even though I hate to compare the three ex-Yardbirds guitarists like everyone else does. Jimmy Page should not be ahead of Jeff Beck. Jimmy Page is incredibly versatile, but Eric Clapton had better tone and feel, and Jeff Beck is far more creative. Most of Jimmy Page's best known riffs are stolen from older blues songs, how is that top three material?

I'm trying to tell my friends I'm not raging, I'm just very disappointed, but it's a hard case to make when you consider I started writing my "stolen riffs" sentence in all caps. Fine, I'll take my first shot.

Your top three doesn't include Chuck Berry, father of modern rock guitar. I've already subtracted one letter grade from your final total, Rolling Stone.

Shots: 1

Jimi Hendrix wrote:

Jimi Hendrix exploded our idea of what rock music could be:

snrrk. What?

This sentence kinda speaks for itself. Nothing I say about it can be funnier than that.

Quote :

He manipulated the guitar, the whammy bar, the studio and the stage.

He was able to make them believe he was having a loving, faithful relationship with each one, even though he was secretly boning all four at once. You should have seen the tears when whammy bar found smelled the perfume of that cheap harlot stage on his neck. Then guitar found out he had given her AIDS.

Damn Jimi Hendrix was a slick, evil bastard.

Quote :

His playing was effortless.

... actually, by all accounts, Jimi Hendrix practiced a lot. They still haven't found all his lost, recorded jam sessions. There are people who have said he would spend weeks in Electric Ladyland, practicing and recording.

That's effortless?

Quote :

His riffs were a pre-metal funk bulldozer, and his lead lines were an electric LSD trip down to the crossroads, where he pimp-slapped the devil.

What the [/i]HELL does that mean? Exploding rock music? Pre-metal pimp slapping? Was Tom Morello high[i] when he wrote this? Well Tom, I guess if this little blurb about Hendrix isn't enough to get you in as a staff writer for Rolling Stone, you could always take your talents to reviewing Radiohead albums on Pitchfork Media.

Also, you can't mention good rock music without having some statement about the devil, can you? *sigh*. Looks like I'm adding two ground rules...

#8 - Mr. Doobie will take a shot every time Rolling Stone describes music in a way that makes no goddamn sense.
#9 - Mr. Doobie will take a shot every time Rolling Stone pops a boner for overused rock cliches.

So I guess I'll retroactively take a shot for cliches (Hendrix, Clapton, Page as top three), retroactively take a shot for exploding rock music, and take two for that horrendous sentence Tom Morello just wrote.

Shots: 5

If this kills me, someone here is going to have to take over my duties as godfather, I don't trust any of these dicks sitting next to me right now.

... ugh that burns. Wooooooooo.

I would keep going, but I got one more class I gotta go to today, I'll be back in about an hour. I can't get shitfaced for this class.

I'm not even through Hendrix and I've already had 5.

So my friends aren't here any more. So I really have no reason to keep doing this. Why am I? Because I've already had five shots, I'm tipsy, and I'm a belligerent, competitive drunk. So I'm going to continue making poor, masochistic decisiosn, just to spite Rolling Stone.

Tune in three years from now, when I review their third incarnation. I'll buy a gun and one bullet, and instead of taking shots I'll just spin the chamber, put it to my head, and pull the trigger.

Jimi Hendrix...

Quote :

he took what was to become Seventies funk

Except his music didn't sound anything like seventies funk and I don't know why you keep insisting it is. It was funk-y, but saying Jimi Hendrix is funk is like saying AC/DC and Aerosmith are funk because they had some nice grooves in their songs. Oh wait, Rolling Stone have said those things in the past!

#2 - Eric Clapton...

Quote :

The basics. The blues.

Shots: 6

Does Rolling Stone even care that there's a discernible difference between blues and blues rock?

Dumb question. Rolling Stone doesn't care about music.

Quote :

What I really liked was Cream's live recordings, because you could hear the three guys playing.

As opposed to their studio CDs, which were just recordings of Ginger Baker snorting lines of cocaine off his high-hat.

Quote :

After Cream, he changed. When he started doing "I Shot the Sheriff" and this and that, and when he hooked up with Delaney and Bonnie, his whole style changed. Or at least his sound. He focused more on singing than playing. I respect him for everything he's done and is still doing – but what inspired me, what made me pick up a guitar, was his early stuff. I could play some of those solos now – they're permanently imprinted in my brain. That blues-based sound is still the core of modern rock guitar.

Jesus Christ Eddie Van Halen you're boring. I felt like it took at least three years to get through that one paragraph. I'm not even convinced that was about Eric Clapton. Seriously, if you took out any references that explicitly said this was about Eric Clapton, you wouldn't know.

#3 - Jimmy Page...

Quote :

He had this vision of how to transcend the stereotypes of what the guitar can do.

By ripping off older blues artists that no one gave a shit about because they were black.

Quote :

He was writing the songs, playing them, producing them – I can't think of any other guitar player since Les Paul that can claim that.

Jimi Hendrix. Jack White. Omar Rodriguez-Lopez. Stop me any time.

#4 - Keith Richards

See, this one is going to be controversial because Keith Richards isn't very technically proficient, but I'll defend his spot on this list (though probably not that high), purely due to his tone, his awesome riffs, and, as the article says, his talent at using alternate tunings. Despite some wonky writing, the articles on him is ok too, it makes sense, it tells us about his style. Nothing to see here.

#5 - Jeff Beck

I love Jeff Beck and this is ok but HE'S STILL NOT HIGHER THAN JIMMY FUCKING PAGE!

Shots: 7

It's not worth sacrificing your health over, you know. Otherwise, you're going to end up in the same hospital room with your friend with the collapsed lung, except you'll be suffering from acute alcohol poisoning.

Sorry bout your friend, BTW. My older son had the same lung collapse twice when he was in his 20s. Is your friend, by any chance, a really skinny guy who smokes a lot?

Mr.Doobie wrote:

So, for those who haven't kept up to date with my posts in "Something Bad" (wouldn't say I'd blame you), one of my friends lungs collapsed last night. My friends and I went to see him, and I made the mistake of asking him if there was anything I could do to make him more comfortable. He had three requests...

#1 - Finally review Human Centipede II
#2 - Finally review Rolling Stone's new 100 Greatest Guitarists list
#3 - turn both experiences into a drinking game

I like how your friends think. Hope he gets better~!