"'Cause I've Stopped Listening"

So this article fills me with rage.

I waited several days to talk about it. I hoped my anger, my righteous indignation, would lessen with the passage of time. But no, there it is, still boiling the blood and turning my thoughts to crimes against humanity.

I've mentioned this before, I'm sure, but I think John Mayer is a freakin' hack. He's played with Clapton, Buddy Guy, and B. B. King. So what? He's got decent technical chops, but anyone who wants to practice a bit can do what he's doing. The man thinks he's Stevie Ray Vaughn reincarnate; but sorry, John Mayer, Stevie Ray Vaughn had genius to go with the skill. The Guitar Gods were greats not because of their technical abilities--hell, Jimmy Page and Jimi Hendrix are among the sloppiest guitar players in rock history--but because they took the basic elements of guitar solos and guitar leads and twisted them into something new and different. Page and Hendrix made guitars do things people hadn't ever dreamed of. Stevie Ray took Hendrix's style, planted it in Texas boogie, cleaned it up, and came up with a twist on it that revitalized blues guitar in the 1980s. John Mayer just apes Stevie Ray Vaughn's style, even down to the vocal affectation he does to try to sound like Stevie Ray. It's absurd.

Technical ability does not equal greatness. While I'll admit that Mayer's grasp of the mechanics of blues guitar are excellent--he's obviously studied this stuff and worked hard at it, and I don't want to take that away from him--he's not a "guitar god." There's nothing original about what he's doing, there's no twist of his own (except that his lyrics are still facile and trite sugar pop, and I don't know that I'd call that a "twist"). And that's really all I want to say about it. The other two guys on the cover are good. I could see giving the label of guitar god to them, but that's because they've put their own particular stamp on the genres of their choice. Plus, Derek Trucks is playing guitar with the Allman Bros. Band. You know that requires some damn fine chops.

Took Michelle shopping for clothes yesterday. It was like some sort of stereotypical marital rite of passage, sitting in Lane Bryant while she tried on lots of clothes for her new job (which she starts on Monday!). Then she took me shopping and made me buy some new shirts and a new pair of jeans (apparently she's sick of me wearing the same half dozen shirts to work all the time). We then proceeded to go grocery shopping for the first time in about three weeks. I think we spent close to $1000 yesterday, when it's all said and done.

Earlier this week, I bought Michelle a new wedding band. The ring she had before was...inadequate, I felt, because it was the 10K loaner ring we got from the jewelry store until her real ring arrived. Since the real ring never arrived, I got fed up and decided to get her a better ring. So she got a band with some channel-set diamonds (about a quarter karat in total weight). I'm much happier, and I think she is as well.

Well, gotta go get ready to go out with the in-laws. Woo.

~chuck

Song of the Moment: The Beatles, "Chains"