Amen to that, Sara.
I play the guitar because I love the sound. That's what drew me to rock and metal from the start. Its a gratifying, uplifting, aggravating, and frustrating experience all at the same time. There are days when you can't miss a note, and days when you have difficulty staying in tune and in key and on time. I was playing this Satruday past and I happened to get both Adrian's and Dave's solos right while playing Prodigal Son. Not note for note, because I know I don;t have the musical knowledge or wherewithal to do that, but it sounded like *me* playing the solo. I'm not heavy into playing solos either, but when I do, its always going to sound a little different. I come at it from a different approach, though I try to keep the context of it.
I said in my yahoo360 page that my ambitions of playing in a band and playing out died a long time ago, simply because I couldn;t find the right people to play with, but I play the instrument because I love it. Hell, I bought two guitars in the past year after owning three for over 15 years. Hell, I'm trying to desperately avoid starting the downward spiral that is buying effects. But I do it for the love. I don;t think I am very good at all, even though I have been told otherwise (and I still haven;t forgotten, Jenna, I'm going to have to get a Guitar Port to be able to play through my puter and have it sound right; mic'ing my amp is just not working). I'm still learning to say through what I play "This is me."
I feel for you, Sara. It should be all about the music, no more, no less. That's why I appreciate you and the Maidens so much; you're earning that respect person by person, making them listen to the music that you play, and basically saying through that music, "This is who we are, this is what we do, we're good at it, and by the end of the show, you're going to agree with us" without being belligerent about it.
As to Nancy Wilson and what she said, it does take a certain kind of humility to not want to solo. As has been said in previous threads, too many guitarists want to masturbate instead of doing what fits the song. There are precious few players that can put themselves out there and keep within the context of the song. But considering that Nancy is also much older now than she was when she was shredding (and yes, you can pay rhythm and shred), her thoughts on that most likely have changed. When I see early Heart videos, she is out there and in your face, while in later ones she is much more subdued. Getting older kinda does that to you.
I remember there was a band that I hung out with in the early 90s called Shotgun Serenade. I took lessons from one of their guitarists, I used to hang out at their practices all the time, I went to their shows, and I pimped them whenever I could. Looking back on it, it was a band that played a style of music that just outright died after the emergence of grunge and alternative. They were about three to five years too late, which is why they never really went very far.
Anyway, the guitarist who was teaching me had really good ability, but sometimes he tended to want to show that off too much. There was a song where he had a solo that fit the song perfectly. It was simple, right in the pocket, and expressed what the lyrics of the song were saying. But, in a fit of ego, because one day I (who could barely play a pentatonic scale at the time), played that solo note for note, he changed the solo to something faster and more technical. The song lost its impact, to my ears.
