sorry but that's just wrong on so many levels. There have been plenty of talented black guitar players since Jimi Hendrix: Ernie Isley, Eddie Hazel, Michael Hampton, Vernon Reid, and those are just some of the more famous ones. I'm sure my bros TA and pali could really set you straight but I'll just give you one shining example of how the racism and taxonomizing segregration of the corporate music industry and their unwillingness to promote black music is the real cause for the seeming lack of high profile black guitar virtuosos. You're probably familiar with Eddie Van Halen and how he introduced "tapping" to the rock world (although there were undoubtedly jazz and prog guitarists who'd used that technique before). Well, a few years later a jazz guitarist by the name of stanley jordan recorded some albums using tapping but not in the comparatively simple, gimmicky way that Eddie used it (and that's not intended to be a diss on Eddie either). The dude plays the guitar like a piano, striding and chording with one hand and doing runs with the other or executing two simultaneous lines at the same time (he could even play two guitars at once). this is a very unique and innovative way of playing the guitar and practically nobody's heard of him and I'm sorry but there's little reasonable explanation other than 1.The suits don't promote jazz and 2. They don't care about black musicians.

I'd like to hear you tell, Greg Howe, Tony McAlpine, Eric Gales and the cat who plays in Sammy Hagar's band that to their faces...

I understand exactly what you're saying.

The guitar solo will find more acceptance if it's a more melodic one and an integral part of a good song.

An artist that has also managed to utilize this technique successfully in the past is Bobby Womack...



...True be told, this brother can really play guitar.
And is also a member in good standing of the lefty-upside down club.

On tunes like That's The Way I Feel About 'Cha, I Can Understand It, Lookin' For A Love, etc, he doesn't play the "big solo" but injects very melodic licks/lines using a sinewy singing tone as opposed to a raw raucous rock tone.


tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...dID=182431

Preach B...You've hit the nail on the head. Hell, Starpoint's "Object Of My Desire" had a quick rock solo on it (lol). Lenny Kravitz even said it on that Band Of Gypsies docu: "Sometimes R&B radio will think that Black people don't even know what a guitar is."

Let's get real folks.
Lack of talent killed the black guitar player.
nothing more nothing less

Bobby Womack is a great guitarist, I love his licks on the songs you mentioned and I LOVE his understated playing on his remake of Close To You from the Communication album.

Let's get real folks.
Lack of talent killed the black guitar player.
nothing more nothing less

Hey Dax, why in the fuck are u even on this site? U have made racist ass comments on here on other threads as well. U don't know shit about what you're talking about and on top of that, your comment exposes how jealous u are of black musicians and more specificly, black rock musicians. Again, I must ask; Why in the fuck are u even on this site at all?

Talent has no color.
If it's jamming it's jamming.
What black rock muscians?
Give me a break with that.
People always looking to blame someone else for the lack of talent.
YAWN

Let's get real folks.
Lack of talent killed the black guitar player.
nothing more nothing less

so,are you saying that there are no talented Black guitar players?

Yes he is.



On a Prince site.

I was thinking about this during the "Everyone hates Blackguitarists" thread. Blackguitaristz brought up the point that in the music from the 70's and 80's, black kids loved material that happened to have "TONS of guitar in it".


It IS interesting... Can you imagine "Voyage To Atlantis" without Ernie Isley's beautiful guitar--or, for that matter, "Who's That Lady", or the Isley's version of "Summer Breeze", ...without guitar solos?

Can you imagine Slave's "Slide" without Marc "Drac" Hicks' six string explosion? or
Prince's "Let's Go Crazy", "Purple Rain", or The Time's "777-9311" without Jesse's axe?
or how about Earth Wind and Fire's "Shining Star" without Johnny Graham's breakout?

...and If you went to a P-Funk concert and didn't hear "Maggot Brain", something was very wrong, indeed!

These were all staples of R&B Radio and on everyone's turtables at home....and yet the general perception is that Black folks hate that "electric guitar stuff"...we even laughed about it on the Dave Chapelle skit...


What do y'all think?




...

Prince is talented on the guitar
but I was not speaking of him because he is not of this time

Prince is talented on the guitar
but I was not speaking of him because he is not of this time

He is of this time in that he's still actively making music. He may not be of the current generation but he's still of our time. Besides, we've hardly been talking about prince in this discussion. I mean c'mon dude, I'm not accusing you of being a racist and perhaps you came across differently than you intended when you said what you did but saying something like "lack of talent killed the black guitar player" is A.a HUGE unsupportable generalization and B.is just wrong when there ARE talented black guitar players out there and still working (many of whom have posted on this very thread). It's a pretty well documented fact that the corporate music industry has had a huge impact on what genres certain people "belong" to and don't really promote black music unless it's part of a trend that they can control e.g. hip-hop. Once again, look at all the great guitar players of funk-rock that most white rock fans probably have never heard of like Eddie Hazel, or the black hard rock bands that got overshadowed by their white counterparts like Living Colour, or the blues masters where all the pioneers of rock lead guitar as we know it learned everything they know, or jazz guitarists that are unheard of because jazz is no longer part of mainstream popular music.