Ghosts in the wires

There’s a negative connotation that goes with the word “ghosts”. It conjures images of frightful things, trapped or angry spirits who can’t move on.

There are all kinds of ghosts, though. Some are happy, some are sad, some are angry. Most are not ready to let go, or if they are, they just don’t know how.

My head — all of our heads — are full of ghosts.  They span the emotional spectrum, from those we happily visit from time to time, to those that come at us out of the blue, bringing a sudden and unexpected shower of tears.  Ghosts of yesterday, of long ago, and even of tomorrows that are no more. They’re wispy and ethereal, impossible to grab when you want.  They’re there and gone, and you’re left with a shadow of a ghost, nothing more until it comes back to visit again.

Every one of my ghosts has a soundtrack.  Sometimes, when I am visited, the appropriate song pops into my head; more often, the song triggers a visit from the spirits in my memory.

I try to remind myself that it’s all about perspective: if you can change the way you look at something, the definition shifts. Good becomes ugly becomes inspiring becomes wrong becomes the way forward. But sometimes, these damn songs force a point of view on me, the emotional memory that goes with each one.

And some ghosts, fresh as they are, have a lifetime of music to play for me.

And for a rare moment,I find myself praying, wishing, begging, for just a little silence. At least until I can find the perspective that makes this look not so painful.

The best…

Articles like this bother me to no end. Well, this one less than others, but still…

There’s something that smacks of wrong about presenting lists of “greatest” things about art of any kind.  Favorite, maybe, but without proper qualification or explanation, there’s no real rationale behind the idea.

Some people make lists that are positively laughable, obviously nothing more than preference or personal taste.  Which isn’t necessarily a problem, until a high-profile publication like Rolling Stone promotes that list — and when you have the backing of a logo that stands for pop culture and music, you have instant credibility that you haven’t necessarily earned or deserved.

I think one of my biggest issues is that these lists are written by fans or critics or writers, with bias but no knowledge of what they are writing about, whether it’s best instrumentalist, best film, best painting, or whatever.  It’s a given, understood that my listening tastes are going to come into play if I compose a best-of list.  Not necessarily known might be the added weight of my twenty-five years of playing guitar, an understanding of the instrument and the underlying difficulties of mastering it.

Sure, there are some critics who have an inherent, almost prodigious understanding of their subject matter.  Roger Ebert and films comes to mind, or perhaps David Fricke at Rolling Stone, perhaps. But maybe not.  Is there any way of knowing, for sure? If the American Film Institute  tells me that there are 100 classic films I should see because they are the best, I assume that the committee that put that list together is probably composed of people with expertise and understanding.

Maybe it’s just part of my genetic make-up, but semantics are a huge issue for me.

All this being said (he typed with a smirk), my own list of the ten greatest guitarists:

10. Mikael Akerfeldt (Opeth) (see Porcupine Tree’s ARRIVING SOMEWHERE BUT NOT HERE)

9. Michael Hedges

8. Albert Lee

7. Christopher Parkening

6. B. B. King

5. Joe Satriani

4. Edward Van Halen

3. Jeff Beck

2. Jimi Hendrix

1. Steve Vai

Take it for what you will.  That was composed considering technique and mastery over the instrument, feel and passion behind the playing, innovation in the respective genre or over the instrument, creativity, and of course my own preferences and experiences.