I would have to give the nod to Moore over Gallagher. Moore was just so damn versatile. Hard Rock, Blues, Blues Rock, Fusion, Metal, he did it all over the course of his career.
I would have to give the nod to Moore over Gallagher. Moore was just so damn versatile. Hard Rock, Blues, Blues Rock, Fusion, Metal, he did it all over the course of his career.
As for me, it's got to be Rory Gallagher.
Moore even manages to make a bunch of great old blues players look like has-beens in one of his videos.
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"The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!"
Never saw it, but I can't agree with that premise. Is it necessary for one player to dumb down his/her playing to make another one look good? Not in my book. When you're onstage improvising, you're not thinking about such right side of the brain things; it's a different sort of consciousness. Ideas just come to you and you play them. You can think about what and how you want to play when you're at home practicing, but in the heat of the moment in a live setting, all of that stuff flies out the window.
Wow, that can be no further from what I posted. It has nothing to do with "dumbing things down." Playing the blues is just as much about the notes you DON'T play than it is about the ones you do play. Gary Moore showed quite often that he could play understated passages that were every bit as effective as the blistering ones. If you heard the recording I'm referring to, you might agree that his fire was very misplaced during the performances he shared with Albert Collins. It was overpowering instead of complementary, which is everything when playing with a fellow guitarist.
Dumbing down to make Albert Collins, the Master of the Telecaster, look good?
"The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!"
Maybe "dumbing down" wasn't the right way to put it and maybe I'd have to actually hear it. All I was saying was that when you improvise, you play whatever the spirit motivates you to play. If Gary was playing loud and aggressive rhythm guitar behind Albert, that would be "overpowering" and non-complimentary, but if they're just taking turns soloing, each man should play whatever they feel like playing. It could be they each just had very different things to say that day.
In principle I would agree with you. In reality, I think if you saw this video you might feel differently. Maybe later I'll see if I can find some clips, although I'm not sure one will be enough. As I recall this was not a case of one isolated incident in the entire video but a pattern. It was over 20 years ago when I saw this. I was watching with another guitarist who felt the same way.
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There is an Irish guitarist besides The Edge? Shows you how much I know about Irish music. But I'll bet there are Celtic-style guitarists who are better than anyone mentioned in this thread so far. Some Celtic music is amazing.
It saddens me that I'm the first one to mention Johnny Fean of Horslips...
You say Mega Ultra Deluxe Special Limited Edition Extended Autographed 5-LP, 3-CD, 4-DVD, 2-BlueRay, 4-Cassette, five 8-Track, MP4 Download plus Demos, Outtakes, Booklet, T-Shirt and Guitar Pick Gold-Leafed Box Set Version like it's a bad thing...
Some of Doran's recordings are exceptionally well recorded and are mind blowing on par w/ Marc Ducret, Sonny Sharrock or the most intense McLaughlin stuff, (especially Race The Time, the ADD stuff and the Hat label releases). The same can't be said for Moore or Gallagher. I dig all three guitarists a lot and can't really play the who's best game. Gallagher may have had more unexplored territory in front of him than Moore or Doran and his playing sometimes seems to have a raw sense of discovery that lots of really good players lack.
...When it comes to players like Doran, Gallagher and Moore the notion that there are "better" players not mentioned in this thread is ill informed. What these guys communicate as artists isn't easily measurable. We're not looking at a track and field performance or a weight lifting event. Kind of agree w/ FZ's..."rating guitarists is a stupid hobby" statement, (even tho' I been guilty plenty of times).
Moore was a poor hamfisted blues player, he always sounded like a hard rock\fusion guy that didn't really have a lot of feel for the music.
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