And... Every time I think Brian May is overrated..

stephen.wood125

horse said:

I heard this for the first time recently, and it reminded me of how Nuno was a big fan - to me this live track is almost an early blueprint for nuno's riffing style with extreme

Wiz'd I love how BM cites Nuno's solo on Get The Funk Out as one of his favourites, nice reciprocity.

Matt_McG

Dweezil Zappa has been making some kind of massive "every guitarist ever" track for years, and talked about it in the Guitar Wank podcast.

He mentioned May as being really uncomfortable improvising. Apparently he had to piece his take together in pieces, punctuated by cups of tea. He's clearly someone who likes to work out his parts (and he is a brilliant arranger of those parts).

He mentions that, by contrast, Angus Young did a string of effortless takes, beginning to end, each as good as the last. 

EricTheWeary

Matt_McG said:

Dweezil Zappa has been making some kind of massive "every guitarist ever" track for years, and talked about it in the Guitar Wank podcast.

He mentioned May as being really uncomfortable improvising. Apparently he had to piece his take together in pieces, punctuated by cups of tea. He's clearly someone who likes to work out his parts (and he is a brilliant arranger of those parts).

He mentions that, by contrast, Angus Young did a string of effortless takes, beginning to end, each as good as the last. 

May hasn't had a career improvising so if that was a rusty skill set it wouldn't be surprising. 

Reverend

There was a similar story about when Tony Iommi produced Quartz's album. May guested and also had to piece his contribution together.  No bad thing, not sure anyone could improvise those meticulous harmonies.

prowla

He's a good guitarist and I've got a couple of Queen albums, plus the one he did with Cozy Powell on drums and the Ford advert.

prowla

horse said:

I heard this for the first time recently, and it reminded me of how Nuno was a big fan - to me this live track is almost an early blueprint for nuno's riffing style with extreme

Who's playing bass?

Hattigol

axisus said:

Amazing guitarist. Some incredible playing and solos, great originality as well. I remember an EVH interview where he sat trying to work out what Brian was doing on one of the News of the World tracks (I think it was It's late) as it was so 'different'. Just listen to the unique guitar orchestration on 'good company' as well. 

Spot on. The solo in It's Late is fabulous. Sounds very unlike him but equally you can tell immediately it's him.

darcym

I've been a huge queen fan for a long time, and I flip flop in my "rating" of Brian May depending on what mood I'm in, please allow me to explain before shooting me against a wall. 

zero doubt he's an excellent guitarist, and as mentioned above did some really ground breaking things.

My flip flopping love with him varies depending on if I am thinking of him as a guitarist or a musician.

My greatest respect is of him as a musician, which encompasses his guitar work, as mentioned above, there are some stunning examples of writing playing just mind blowing guitar parts in terms of complexity, arrangement and fitting the song perfectly, he's written some spectacular guitar parts simulating full orchestra's I remember an interview with one track that had over 60 guitar parts to simulate a full orchestra and the backing guitar parts you hear on the album but you don't know are there, are just top drawer, so zero doubt in his quality or ability when I think of him as a musician that encompasses his guitar - plus writing some really great songs is just the icing on the cake, I enjoyed his solo stuff too mostly, quite enjoyed back to the light and saw that album toured live, loved star fleet due to being in the same age bracket as his son and the story of his son nagging him to play the theme tune to the TV show, plus it's "fun" too, wasn't a huge fan of the later stuff. 

my love affair sometimes fades when I'm listening to more traditional guitar styles and find myself tired of the 16 part solo which appears on a lot of Queen songs (not so much his solo stuff) especially the earlier queen stuff, say up to the works...maybe a little earlier than a kind of magic, I can't help but feel sometimes a guitar extravaganza is forced into the song, I fully acknowledge this is unfair critique as that sound is part of the Queen sound, so it's always going to be around, but if you consider how adaptable and changing Queens style has been over the years, I'd have liked to hear some more traditional style played guitar parts from May a little more, to say a one trick pony would be hugely unfair and inaccurate but I'm using the phrase to get the feeling I sometimes have when listening to a lot of Brians parts, and most likely that's down to my mood at the time when listening.

The detail he puts into writing these amazing guitar parts (not just the complex harmony parts) is often exposed live, where I imagine in the studio a lot of this will take a huge amount of takes for each part, live I'm never quite convinced Brian has the technical ability to pull off parts live, if you watch there is a huge amount of "rake the sixpence over all the strings into a huge bend" and parts are often over simplified, again I don't think that's poor, watch him play and the playing is great and really well executed, but there is often a (I'm ready for flame on this) a few standard runs/tricks put in place to cover some of the more complex guitar parts, much like say Kirk Hammett using the wah to hide some sloppy playing.

Always a huge fan, he's one of the reasons I picked up the guitar in the first place and an undoubted musician and guitarist who has well earned his place in history

darcym

Matt_McG said:

Dweezil Zappa has been making some kind of massive "every guitarist ever" track for years, and talked about it in the Guitar Wank podcast.

He mentioned May as being really uncomfortable improvising. Apparently he had to piece his take together in pieces, punctuated by cups of tea. He's clearly someone who likes to work out his parts (and he is a brilliant arranger of those parts).

He mentions that, by contrast, Angus Young did a string of effortless takes, beginning to end, each as good as the last. 

I hadn't seen this post and that's the feeling I was trying to explain when I said tricks to cover live playing, he's not a 'feel' player he's an excellent musician executing planned out parts player. 

I wish I'd seen this post before writing a 500 word ramble.

Hattigol

Uncomfortable improvising? Wasn't his Brighton Rock 15 mins of improvisation?

I wish I was that uncomfortable. 

darcym

that was sonically impressive, but it was really just moving up and down scales with a really clever delay - I'm of course not doing it justice.

fendergibson

Sorry, late on this....

Brian May is a legend. Talk about knowing who a guitarist is by their sound/playing - BM is it.

The reason people don’t acknowledge his skills is because he was in a proper band, he was just one of 4, he fitted in, he did what the song required every time. 

Any aspiring rock rock guitarist needs to study his riffs/solos and how to be part of a band. It’s as simple as that. Proper legendary guitarist of my time. 

Must also say (because he’s been mentioned) Vai is also legendary - any guitarist who is critical of his stuff just doesn’t understand it (yet) - composition wise he is a master imo, some of his songs are so deep/have so many layers that I’m still finding new stuff within. 

So, two completely different players....massive respect to both. 

My my personal faves of BM are Seven Seas and Another One Bites. Vai, Boston Rain and Voodoo Acid

Matt_McG

There's no big value judgement, there. May is a brilliant composer of guitar parts, and writer or co-writer of a ton of the best pop/rock songs of all time.

As it happens, I rarely (never, tbh), listen to Queen and/or May by choice, because it's not really my thing, undeniably great, though it is.

Phil_aka_Pip

If I could play like Brian May i'd be a long way from where I am now

Musicman20

He's a fantastic player. I'd rather listen to a guitarist playing for a song rather than being purely technical every single time. 

Hattigol

darcym said:

that was sonically impressive, but it was really just moving up and down scales with a really clever delay - I'm of course not doing it justice.

Your last sentence is spot on.

Rabs

Came across this interesting piece of footage

Kebabkid

I saw the Queen Extravaganza Show tonight (RT's & BM's X Factor band) and they were something else. It's a shame Mark Martel wasn't singing with them on this particular tour but fair play to the new singer, who did an excellent job.

Anyway, watching and hearing the guitarist tonight perfectly replicate it all from a couple of rows back , if I didn't know already, I do now realise the brilliance of the man. The easily identifiable sound, style, note choice, slow bends and the cleverly written, and tricky parts and that Red Special. Pure genius and one of our best musical sons