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Joren

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Posted: April 16 2007 at 09:01

Baza wrote:

There is of course this map by Jerry Lucky:

http://mitkadem.homestead.com/files/map.html

He put Zappa in an interesting spot... Ermm

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Posted: April 16 2007 at 09:56

Atavachron wrote:

I would concur that Zep's musical focus was on expression through blues rock rather than technique as a centerpiece, and whatever influence on technical playing they had peaked by about 1972. andu's point about 'Achille's Last Stand' is valid, but by '76 the real techies were in full swing and had begun to leave Page in the dust.

One of the key junctures was the first two Ozzy albums, as Certif1ed has noted. Randy Rhodes' rhythmic attack is deeply felt throughout this school and though Iomi, Schenker, Roth and others had influence, none had the impact that Rhodes would turn out to have on those who followed.

I'm not convinced - I think that both Schenker and Roth had profound influence in both lead and rhythm styles - you can hear most of the techniques in use in Kirk Hammett's soloing - and while no-one would argue the case for Hammett being the greatest ever, he did have lessons from Satriani (who in turn had lessons from Billy Bauer and Lennie Tristano - but more of that later).

Schenker was considered by Ozzy as a suitable replacement for Rhoads - whose early Quiet Riot material shows a fair amount of influence from both Schenker and Roth, as well as Blackmore, Van Halen, Brian May and a host of other great guitarists - and while it takes a great guitarist to have so many influences, it does indicate that Rhoads evolved existing technique rather than innovated: There is more evidence of those other guitarists having exerted influence on successive generations than Rhoads himself.

Rhoads was unique in some ways (witness this great solo from his Quiet Riot days in the late 1970s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxN0mQgQdPM) but the Scorpions' founder guitarists appeared to have done a lot of the groundwork for him to build on - that much seems evident in the heavier parts of his soloing; checkout his sweep-picking technique, string bending as part of repeated figures, and use of the whammy bar for dive-bombing - all characteristic of Roth/Schenker.

While the quieter more melodic parts using harmonics and such like are pure Randy, observe also that he was given to using a fair bit of bluff for showmanship - in the older blues tradition. Nothing wrong with that - until the mid 1980s, just about every guitarist used it - but we're discussing technique, and bluff is not a technique that any teacher would pass on, not something that's particularly evident in the Scorpions music, and it's not part of technical metal as anyone thinks of it.

This is why I still think that Roth and Schenker stole a march on all technical guitarists and remain more overlooked than they should be - simply because they were at the cutting edge - developing these techniques to fit the music they wanted to write, instead of crowbarring the techniques into showy solos...

...that came later for Schenker with his own group (just for fun, compare Ozzy's "Steal Away the Night" with MSG's "Armed and Ready") - while Roth went off on one, beyond astral skies... this is what he was doing in 1979; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekDkd0oUxzQ (and it's supposed to play tribute to Hendrix - Uli became friendly with Jimi's ex-girlfriend, and legend has it that she imparted the spirit of Hendrix to him... not sure if that's true, but that's the story!).

I'll stop now, and try to focus on 1981-83 (pre-thrash).

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Tony R

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Posted: April 16 2007 at 10:06

Cert wrote:

Uli became friendly with Jimi's ex-girlfriend, and legend has it that she imparted the spirit of Hendrix to him... not sure if that's true, but that's the story!).

I think that's two tales mixed up - it was Frank Marino who claimed to be imbued with the spirit of Hendrix, Uli was just sha**ing his ex-girlfriend...

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Posted: April 16 2007 at 12:49

Atavachron wrote:

andu's point about 'Achille's Last Stand' is valid, but by '76 the real techies were in full swing and had begun to leave Page in the dust.

You need to visit the Knebworth Fair again, David. Wink

Anyway, the riffing I noticed there was not from the guitar, but from the drum & bass. It's when the lead guitar is soloing, that the drum and bass put down down this supporting riff. Here you have two samples (there are actually four such moments in the song): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xBdsRs857E and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GLoTznrdSA
The difference with Metallica and thrash metal is (imo of course) that this riffing is not back-up support but lead structure, and the guitar(s) follows it instead of flowing over it. However I still say it was revolutionary at the time of 1975-1977 and I haven't seen anything like it at any of the 70s bands that I know. Of course this doesn't make Zeppelin technical oriented, nor a part of the development of shredding and other related metal issues.

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Posted: April 16 2007 at 13:12

I would put the Core of Post-Metal now, but Post-Metal began much earlier in the 90's with Neurosis evolving it from hardcore.

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Posted: April 16 2007 at 16:08

Tony R wrote:

Cert wrote:

Uli became friendly with Jimi's ex-girlfriend, and legend has it that she imparted the spirit of Hendrix to him... not sure if that's true, but that's the story!).

I think that's two tales mixed up - it was Frank Marino who claimed to be imbued with the spirit of Hendrix, Uli was just sha**ing his ex-girlfriend...

Could be - I don't have access to the source, only 3rd-party stuff like this;

http://www.houseofshred.com/features/shredhistory/history_1201.htm

http://www.ulijonroth.com/sky/lux_artis/monika_1.htm

http://www.artists2events.co.uk/artists/ulijonroth.html

I guess that anyone who comes within a sniff of Hendrix's socks is bound to feel his spirit imparted to them - there's something very universal about Hendrix's music that makes you feel like you understand it, even if you can't play it.

Personally, I think that Stevie Ray Vaughan got closest - but I'm catching up - I once had a mate who had Lemmy crash on his floor for a month - and Lemmy was Hendrix's roadie, so that counts...

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Posted: April 16 2007 at 16:50

Speaking of great shredding blues guitarists ... check out Greg Koch and Scott Henderson! Big%20smile

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 03:08

Certif1ed wrote:

and Lemmy was Hendrix's roadie, so that counts...

Lemmy was everyone's roadie

.

I think you're on the right track, Certif1ed, just remember not to overestimate the impact of Schenker/Roth. The Scorpions could be as much a pop band as they were cutting edge metal.. a melodic power group that knew how to thrill teens. As great as 'Sails of Charon' was, there were many more 'Speedy's Comin', 'Robot Man', 'Dark Lady' and many anthemic love songs.

Edited by Atavachron - April 17 2007 at 05:24

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 03:34

MikeEnRegalia wrote:

Speaking of great shredding blues guitarists ... check out Greg Koch and Scott Henderson! Big%20smile

Neither of those really falls into the time period I've looked at so far - but the Miles Daivs/Chick Corea links are of interest - shredding ultimately came from jazz, but tying the style down to specific musicians is not easy. Billy Bauer is the top man, as far as I can see, with Allan Holdsworth playing a later important role in the development of shred.

Stevie Ray Vaughan is important from the blues perspective, as a Hendrix revivalist he was peerless, even compared to Frank Marino who it was claimed, as Tony pointed out, was rumoured to be Hendrix re-incarnate in the early 1970s.

These two strands bring together blues and jazz, to form the ultimate root to the timeline;

Summary so far of the timeline to technical metal and shred

I've greatly simplified this to 3 core periods - or 5, if you consider that Progressive Jazz then Progressive Blues gave way to late 1960s hard rock acts, some of which became technique-oriented. From Jazz came techniques such as modal harmonies and scales, not to mention shredding itself (alternate or sweep-picking), and from Blues came riffing and "emotional" techniques such as string-bending. From both came soloing techniques such as double-stopping, intervallic leaps, octave runs, chromaticism, etc - and crucially for metal, use of effects pedals.

The devil is in the detail, as they say - but I think these 3 periods are accurate, even if there are other genre definitions for most of the bands. I've made a few revisions

Proto-technical-metal bands (1968-1972);

Jimi Hendrix, Cream, Spooky Tooth, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Budgie, Wishbone Ash, King Crimson, Frank Zappa, Groundhogs, Pink Floyd, Hawkwind, Pink Fairies, Uriah Heep, Ten Years After.

Technical hard rock/early heavy metal (1973-1978)

Rush, Queen, some Bowie, the Scorpions (crucially, for shredding!), UFO (because of Schenker), Rainbow, King Crimson, Jethro Tull, Boston, Judas Priest, Thin Lizzy, Motorhead, Kansas, Budgie, Blue Oyster Cult.

Technical New Wave of Heavy Metal (1979-1982)

Diamond Head, Raven, Iron Maiden, Samson, Riot, Twelfth Night, Hawkwind, Uli Jon Roth, MSG, Van Halen, Blizzard of Ozz (Rhoads), Frank Zappa (was joined by Steve Vai at this time), Metal Church, Black Sabbath, Blue Oyster Cult, Venom (for sheer dumb right place, right time luck rather than skill).

That simplifies the overall timeline for technical metal as a whole, up to 1982 - but it's always possible to overlook stuff, so please feel free to point out important omissions - and documentary evidence always goes down well (I love watching old videos and listening to old music that I haven't yet "discovered").

I've sneaked a few into each period - any comments?

paolo.beenees wrote:

I think you've totally forgotten Krautrock

Can you think of any specific Krautrock bands that were technically oriented in a manner that's relevant to the development of technical metal?

It seems logical to assume that the Scorpions arose from the Krautrock scene, so there must have been others that focussed on the "how" a little more than the "why" - ie, most Kraut I've heard tends to be about the expression itself, using existing techniques (e.g. Pink Floyd, Hawkwind, Hendrix) rather than developing unique and measurable methods of expression.

Kraftwerk, Faust and Can are notable exceptions - but while their technical focus is beyond question, I'm not sure of their place in the metal scheme of things. As I mentioned earlier, Necronomicon were almost insanely dark, and could qualify - but again, they were exceptions.

Edited by Certif1ed - April 17 2007 at 04:01

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 03:41

Don't forget the influence Kevin Heybourne and his 'AngelWitch' record (1980) had on Metallica's formative period-- we know this because Hetfield stated it as being vital to their early music.

Other great Hendrix channelers were of course Randy Hansen and, to a lesser degree, Robin Trower. But SRV took the cake.. live he was astounding in his ability not only to replicaye Hendrix but to capture the spontineity of Jimi's style.

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 03:54

Atavachron wrote:

Certif1ed wrote:

and Lemmy was Hendrix's roadie, so that counts...

Lemmy was everyones's roadie

That's the thing about the Scorps, and technical music in general in this period - it's hard to extract the technical bits, because the songs are so strong.

Speedy's Comin', for example, contains some amazing technical bits and pieces; listen to Roth pound that whammy bar... sorry, tremolo arm with no advanced locking system or nice things to make it easy to play. Robot Man too, if I recall correctly.

I don't remember the technical sections of Dark Lady - but the anthemic love songs didn't really come until later in the Scorps career - even then, there tended to be only 1 or 2 per album, e.g. In Trance, Lady Starlight, and both have nice vocal harmony techniques, tempo changes, and strong suggestions of modulation and somewhat advanced harmony writing - they're a bit above the average for this time period (Styx, Journey, REO Speedwagon, etc).

I appreciate what you're saying about the pop-oriented songs, though, as that is what ultimately split the band - or rather, scared off the technical players. MSG and UFOs songs weren't exactly radio-unfriendly either - and I think that is why Schenker ultimately stopped developing.

Ultimately, Roth appears to have brought shredding into metal - which is hugely significant, and both Roth and Schenker were ahead of their time in terms of other techniques both in the Scorpions and in their later projects - but it's the 1974-1978 time frame I'm looking at - who would you say was more/equally advanced in the world of metal at that time and why?

Atavachron wrote:

Don't forget the influence Kevin Heybourne and his 'AngelWitch' record (1980) had on Metallica's formative period-- we know this because Hetfield stated it as being vital to their early music.

Maybe so - and it's tempting to include AngelWitch, but while they had a unique sound and great style, there wasn't anything specific in their technique that I can identify as being significant.

We can't really include all of Metallica's influences - don't forget that they were also influenced by Crass, Killing Joke and the Misfits

Edited by Certif1ed - April 17 2007 at 04:04

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 05:21

oh there's no doubt Uli was and is hugely important.. more so than Schenker or possibly even EVH, so you are quitre correct (Yngwie may not even have picked up a guitar without him). And he was much more significant to shred with the Scorps than his work on the Electric Sun records (Earthquake, Firewind-- '79/80).. great albums and very progrssive but more organic psych than tech.

Edited by Atavachron - April 17 2007 at 05:24

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 07:16

I guess it's all proto-tech until the mid 1980s and the emergence of Vai and Malmsteen as major players - it's conclusive from his approach that Roth was an organic player, but also an incredibly technical one.

I'm not looking at "technical" as an overall style - I dislike meaningless genre labels intensely - I'm looking at it from a practical and provable point of view by asking the question; Did the musician(s) use and develop specific and demonstrable techniques that were later used as a (demonstrably) fundamental element of composition?

The problem I'm having finalising the early 1980s is with bands like Night Ranger and Bon Jovi, in which whammy bar (Brad Gillis - notably ex-Ozzy) and shredding (Jeff Watson), pinch harmonics and muting (Sambora) were regularly used as an integral part of solo writing. It's interesting that some sources state that Bon Jovi opened for the Scorpions in their early days.

Who would see these bands as contributors to a technical genre, given the standard pop songs they put out?

The other problem with the early 1980s is sorting out the technicians from the bluffers in the thrash metal camp - at the time, most of it seemed incredibly technical - but in perspective, only a select few really developed techniques that had staying power.

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 07:27

Certif1ed wrote:

The other problem with the early 1980s is sorting out the technicians from the bluffers in the thrash metal camp - at the time, most of it seemed incredibly technical - but in perspective, only a select few really developed techniques that had staying power.

right.. like Viv Campbell with Ireland's Sweet Savage, later with Dio-- great early shredder, but more from a blues tradition (Gary Moore, Jimmy Page), and did few things we hadn't seen from Moore or Rhoads.

Edited by Atavachron - April 17 2007 at 07:28

Angelo

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 15:04

Never expected that a thread about a timeline could become so interesting. Keep this up Mark & Mike & others, this could be material for part 3 of ProgLucky's Prog Rock Guide....

Mike: did you attempt an update of the figure already?

Edited by Angelo - April 17 2007 at 15:06

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 15:29

Angelo wrote:

Clap

No, unfortunately I'm currently very busy with work ... I might have some time to update the timeline next weekend, but it's more likely that it'll have to wait a while longer. Embarrassed

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Posted: April 17 2007 at 15:33

Know the feeling. I spent the day at home today because I was ill, but tomorrow it's back to the trenches. I'll keep an eye on the thread - this is great stuff.

Edited by Angelo - April 17 2007 at 15:35

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