Saturday, June 30, 2012

Truth

Here's a repost of a piece about Angus Young.  I post it again because a few days ago Angus Young won Guitar Player magazine's playoff between himself and his hero.  Anyway, this is what Young had to say a while back  in a story where guitarists picked the top guitarists:

CHUCK BERRY by Angus Young


When I was growing up, everyone used to rave about Clapton, saying he was a guitar genius and stuff like that. Well, even on a bad night, Chuck Berry is a lot better than Clapton will ever be.

Rock music has been around since the days when Chuck Berry put it all together. He combined the blues, country and rockabilly, and put his own poetry on top, and that became rock and roll. And it’s been hanging in there.

I looked it up.  Young is a year older than me. 

When I was a teenager and first enamored of people like Chuck Berry and B. B. King friends used to say Eric Clapton was better.  In those days it made me gag.  Since then-- well, it seems to me that Mr. Clapton has come into his own as a grownup.  He plays well.  (On the Chuck Berry side, his solo on Wee Wee Hours in the movie "Hail! Hail! Rock and Roll!" is stupendous.)  He has one great song, born of tragedy.  He did some interesting twists on the blues with Cream.  (He killed reggae.) 

But he's no B. B. King. 

And he didn't change the world-- like you know who.

Picture by "Steady Rollin' Bob Margolin"
 

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Thanks Peter!!
Angus Young telling it how it is!!! I have always thought Clapton's comment laughable on the movie Hail, Hail Rock & Roll about Chuck's showmanship of being a sign of Chuck not being to sure of his own guitar playing capabiltities. I see just the opposite. Chuck can truly play guitar like ringin' a bell and the "Showmanship" Is were you step into Super Star status!! I know the term is thrown around loosely nowadays - Superstar, American Idol, and so on but Chuck truly is way beyond anyone else as far as live performances. There are tons of great guitar players most of them standing there playing stiff as a board while playing, and alot don't sing they just play guitar. Chuck write's them, sings them, and performs them live - has a ton of great moves, the most famous The Scoot, Duck Walk, and the Splits!! Every swing and sway of the guitar seems like Rock and Roll poetry in motion. He's not sure of his guitar playing? - Ha - Ha - He's simply the best and he does it with ease....

Doug
CB Forum ID - Busseybootlegger