Johnny Marr in this months guitarist

[Jeztone]

I love Johnny Marr's playing, as a youth growing up, his multilayered chord voicings and use of effects and capo's always had me wondering how he did it too. You interviewed him in the 80's and he has a huge musical background in country & western music that his parents played him as well as his 60's pop influences.

So in your interview he has a knock at 80's widdlers....he has a point to be fair, many of them were rubbish. But some were interesting and some could be learned from....many were.

I love his playing, so do lots of people he's influenced. Ed O Brien out of Radiohead and John Frusciante are mentioned in the article

But no one talks about the others......the... legions of Johnny Marr fans that have used him for a totem for their own underachievement. You've seen these guys at every Indieclub and new band night in the country....

They always have an Epiphone Les Paul
They always have a haircut thats more expensive than their amp
They always have the amp that the bloke in the shop said to get because they never learned about tone, that was something mentioned in the NME.....how to be cool and distant about your guitar playing....cos of punk....its all about attitude right....learning about how the instrument works and practising is for wankers....right?

And this is the problem, somebody in your letters pages last month asked where the next generation of guitar heroes would come from?

We now have the most staid period in British guitar music for years. The Independant newspaper recently ran an article on "Landfill Indie". Identikit bands peddelling identikit records, we have a generation of careerist musicians who learn great leaps of technique in music schools and then come out and just write a load of strummy tosh because "thats what the industry wants?"

I somehow feel Johnny Marrs canonisation by the Indie Scmindie hoards is responsible for this.

I think Johnny plays it up too. In a certain American guitar magazine several years ago when Johnny was promoting his Healers debut, he talked fondly of John McLaughlin, the lack of melody in modern guitarists and there being nothing wrong with learning to play solo's. A bit at odds with his comments in your magazine I feel.

A good interview, but somehow a missed oppertunity. Does he realise that a huge number of British guitarists are in blissful underacheivement... treading water as players because they worship Johnny Marr?

[erictheweary]

i get dragged to a lot of teenage musical events and every time I see a yoof playing a guitar or a band playing ( as opposed to the light classical stuff and High School Musical performances) its pretty much heavy rock/metal, complete with solos. last thing I went to a 15 year old playing rather good jimmy page licks.

mebbe there is a generation of 20-30 somethings who grew up on the Smiths, punk, post punk,etc, and that's what we are suffering through now.the generation behind them, based on a very limited view I must admit, seem to find indie boring already and might start rocking it up a bit more.

or they listen to wallpaper RnB but that's a whole other thing...

[mellowsun]

I think that's an excellent analysis Jeztone.

I was disappointed that there was no mention of his excellent work with The The (which he described at the time as the best band he had ever played in) or with Billy Bragg. His work with these guys seems to have been airbrushed from history.

You're right about the landfill indie problem, but I'm not sure Johnny Marr is to blame for that. I think everyone is trying to be like The Killers or Arctic Monkeys. Few of the landfill indie bands attempt the intricate guitar work of Marr. It's just distorted riffs on Les Pauls, attitude and some whiny vocals.

[BucketheadRules]

You can't blame Johnny for the shitty indie out there now. This new crap isn't really indie anyway, more pop with three jangly chords. And they are ruining modern rock and the Telecaster's reputation.

[dafuzz]

There's always been rubbish indie about, peddled by middle class nobheads who can't play pretending to be working class. Yes you Ordinary Boys.

There's a lot of decent indie out there too, it's just a shame the average indie / punk consumer isn't really into music at all, so bands get big on some measure of 'cool' to which I'm no longer privy [/old]

A mate of mine is a big Johnny Marr / John Squire fan, and his playing is awesome. Funnily enough he plays an Epiphone Les Paul

[Jeztone]

Im just portaying a cliche Ive met many times I guess.

Ive written my comments as a letter to Guitarist mag so am curious to see if they even print it, or aknowledge it. But thought Id canvas some opinions on here to see if anyone else felt about the whole "indie scmindie" vs Rock debate.

[urbanpagan]

Are the Cribs not one of these bands though?

[dogload]

Originally Posted by urbanpagan

Are the Cribs not one of these bands though?

Hmmm... I've had a quick listen to their new album and I have to say I wasn't blown away, particularly. Admittedly it was at work, and I was working, so another listen might help, but still...hmmm.

[colski]

Uh oh, here comes the voice of dissent.... whenever one of those "most overrated guitarist" threads come up, I feel Marr should be at the top of the list.
Jangly jangly, echoey echoey, repeat ad nauseum....

[Jeztone]

But thats the thing

I dont think he's overrated

I think he's a genius

Trouble is our friend Mr Epi Les Paul owner thinks all he can do is namedrop Johnny Marr as some sort of justification for why theres no melody, content or technique in his playing.

"Johnny don't play solo's so I don't man" etc etc

I just think a load of "right on" music journalist Canonised him to such a point that in this country its had a negative effect on the creation of music by young british guitarists. I mean look at some of the indie music forums, if you can say you can tune a guitar your satan on some of them. I just think the balance should be addressed. I was hoping it was when I saw Muse a few years ago. But the Indie Scmindie crowd are the thing that needs tearing down now