Today is the 26th anniversary of the death of Randy Rhoads. What better way to remember him than an 8 minute guitar solo from the Quiet Riot days? You’ll find a lot of familiar pieces in this solo. Enjoy – and RIP Randy.
I also have pictures of the grave site from a trip I took back in 2005. You can find a lot more at the Diary of an Axeman web site – the definitive site on the net for Randy Rhoads “stuff”.
Something cool for a Sunday. We picked up the Frank Zappa: Dub Room Special DVD yesterday and I enjoyed it quite a bit. I guess I’ll be back on a Zappa kick for a bit.
Photo by rbieber
Kelsi has always had a problem for some reason with Vai having a fan blowing on him while he was playing. This excerpt from a Guitar World (October 2007) article cracked me up and immediately made me think of her.
I thought she would get a kick out of it.
Dave B, the creator of the Guitars Suck video series has started the InstruMental Case podcast, a podcast dedicated to instrumental guitar music. The pilot episode (episode 0) has been posted and I have to say, I like it!
I just ordered our EVO Experience tickets for Steve Vai’s stop in Chicago in September. Now I’m jazzed! This will be the second EVO Experience that Jonna and I have attended.
Photo by rbieber
One of a bajilliion shots I took of the mini-stack today. For some reason, the lighting just wasn’t working at all today.
Picked up a Marshall Mini-Stack this weekend. Cute amp and sounds great. Now, if only I could play …
Steve Vai now has his own MySpace page. Head over to listen to songs from his Real Illusions: Reflections, Passion & Warfare, and Fire Garden albums.
The October 2005 issue of Guitar One Magazine features the article How To Develop Monster Chops. Also included, Rhoads style soloing in the Soloing Strategies column.
Browsing around the web this morning, I performed my monthly scan of the Vai.com news page. Hidden under August 5th is a small section titled “One of the Coolest Sites We’ve Seen” pointing to a site called The Guitar Shred Show, a Flash based site in which your guide, Mr. Fastfinger teaches you to shred on guitar.
The first place you have to go is “The Exploding Guitar – Show Off Solo”. The playing in the show off solo sounds suspiciously like Mr. Vai, and I’m curious as to whether he is actually involved in this project. If he isn’t, whoever is playing has his sound and style down.
Since writing this, I found the credits area of the site, which credits the site and all of the guitar playing to Mika Tyyskä. No Steve Vai on the site, but damn, this guy can play!
The first installment of lessons is called “The Mountain of the Tapping Dwarves”. This lesson allows you to press and hold down keys on the keyboard to hear different phrases, accompanied with the tabulature to play them. The things covered are tapping, fast picking and legato runs to name a few.
At the end of everything, you get to participate in a “head cutting” (a la Crossroads) against the Demon Accordian player. As he plays his accordian, you tie together the different phrases by pressing and holding the keyboard keys. An excellent addition to an excellent site.
This is a hard site to describe. You have to see it to believe it. I do agree with the folks at Vai.com though — this is probably the coolest site I’ve ever seen.
Bieber Labs 