Albern
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please do enlighten me....how exactly is he overrated? he is one of the greatest guitar virtuosos of the decade. he has played alongside the likes of Eric Clapton, Billy Gibbons, Slash and BB King. how many other "great guitarists" have had the opportunity (let alone dream) to share the stage with the Cream of the Crop of the guitar world? exceptional musician, yes. overrated? not even close.Originally Posted by casual_tuga
- peace
Mayer's "skill" has been discussed in another thread already. I agree that he is completely overrated and his abilities are no better than anyone other professional guitarist. Virtuoso is a very big word and shouldn't be easily thrown around like that. He is essentially a blues guitarist that has a pop music fan base and to them playing the language of blues would wrongly associate such ability as talent.
Compared to other western styles of music blues has a very limited musical vocabulary (don't get me wrong I too like blues music). 12 bar blues is the foundation of the style and for obvious reasons it is very limited on what one can do within the structure to maintain the style. How else do you think all of the other uneducated guitarists get by (there are exceptions of course - Hendrix and SRV for example)? Isn't it odd that most of them end up playing blues? It's simply because it's the easiest style to pick up.
Also, the cross section of the genera is quite short nearly leading to the "you've heard it once, you've heard it all mentality". Mayer cannot and will not do anything beyond what he already does, which in of itself is nothing new or worthy of applying talent-association to.
