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Link Wray


RichCI

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rich' date=' what was the reason for this post? did you think is was good or bad? tbh i thought it was cr*p, iv'e heard of link wray but never heard him play...bloody awful, bland, boring, mind numbing [bored']

 

Not as bad as your bloody obnoxious signature billboard.

 

Or are we compensating?

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Rich...

 

I think you nailed it with the comment about when the late Link was pickin'.

 

By current standards... probably yeah, boring. It was darned innovative in its day, and yeah, I remember it. <grin> But figure that his "Rumble" is the only instrumental I'm aware of that was banned by a number of radio stations.

 

Another point - and Buchanan is perhaps an example of a more talented musician in the same boat - is how fickle consumer opinion can be on a musician and his or her work.

 

Link was very innovative, yup. So was Les Paul, the icon we all speak well of whether we've heard his pickin' or not. Yet don't forget Les was forgotten in ways by the "pop music scene" in terms of buying his stuff the way they had in the 1950s.

 

My personal opinion on Les is that had he not gotten the deal going with Gibson on his basic guitar concept, far fewer people today would know much about him as either a guitarist or recording/guitar innovator.

 

That latter isn't to downgrade Les as a picker, believe me. It's just the cynic in me. Some of us here would likely have known about him and his work, but likely as a "back in the old days, there was this guy..."

 

Wray is pretty much similar. He, and thousands of other musicians from the early rock and post WWII era country/pop world did well, perhaps had stuff on the radio enough that a few remember their names, but just plain couldn't keep making a living at music. Style? Personality? Politics and gamesmanship? I dunno.

 

m

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Wray' date=' and thousands of other musicians from the early rock and post WWII era country/pop world did well, perhaps had stuff on the radio enough that a few remember their names, but just plain couldn't keep making a living at music. Style? Personality? Politics and gamesmanship? I dunno.

 

m[/quote']

 

The Beatles virtually shut down the American rock and roll scene, including Link Wray. He was known to disdain the Beatles for not being a rock and roll band, yet being attributed as such -- and I couldn't agree more.

 

Wray pioneered the regular/frequent use of the 5th chord and he championed a dirty, lo-fi sound with the Rumble record (he cranked his amp & cut his speaker cones all up with a switchblade to get the guitar sound he wanted on the record). He was vastly influential because he was able to make the 5th chord the centerpiece of a song, which nobody else was doing. To a lot of people his music represents rebelliousness, delinquency, indecency... a back-alley, "F U" type of vibe. He was the first to go there and embrace & champion that attitude. It may seem subtle but Link Wray made tremendous breakthroughs and put a lot of things on the map that were uncharted territory before he came along.

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Yup. He was influential enough to have caused Pete Townshend to start playing guitar after he heard Rumble.

 

"He is the king; if it hadn't been for Link Wray and 'Rumble,' I would have never picked up a guitar'," Pete Townsend of The Who wrote on one of Wray's albums. Neil Young once said: "If I could go back in time and see any band, it would be Link Wray and the Raymen."

 

http://www.rockabillyhall.com/LinkWray.html

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In the movie "It Might Get Loud" I got a kick out of seeing Jimmy Page play air guitar along with "Rumble"

and grin like a schoolboy working up the courage to say F U to his teachers who don't like his music.

 

Link Wray is certainly an acquired taste, and absent the perspective of his era one is challenged to get it.

 

Milod nailed it right on the head - a banned instrumental?

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Rumble to me - yeah, I'm old - is a batch of times I played the thing I won't even talk about, but I did have company and it was a lotta fun.

 

And I still have this "thing" in my head to put on a plain white or black T and tight black jeans (I'm lucky at my age I think I can kinda get away with it), grab the solidbody and the big dual 12 tube amp, push it up to 10 and crank it out.

 

<grin>

 

Hmmmm. I guess as the saying goes, I'm old - not dead.

 

m

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Rumble to me - yeah' date=' I'm old - is a batch of times I played the thing I won't even talk about, but I did have company and it was a lotta fun.

 

And I still have this "thing" in my head to put on a plain white or black T and tight black jeans (I'm lucky at my age I think I can kinda get away with it), grab the solidbody and the big dual 12 tube amp, push it up to 10 and crank it out.

 

<grin>

 

Hmmmm. I guess as the saying goes, I'm old - not dead.

 

m

[/quote']

 

And I'm still eagerly waiting for it. [cool][lol]

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