Great effort, great playing though he's unable to replicate the bends and vibrato of the great Doc. This video really makes on thing really obvious: with all the ups and downs Queen had musically through the years, one thing remained constant: the sheer quality of Brian's lead guitar work - the ability to find beautiful melodies in even the worst of songs. What a body of work!
Oscar J wrote:
This video really makes on thing really obvious: with all the ups and downs Queen had musically through the years, one thing remained constant: the sheer quality of Brian's lead guitar work - the ability to find beautiful melodies in even the worst of songs. What a body of work!
Spot on. There are times when I hear Brian playing live and I think he's just doing the same stuff over and over, but when you see something like this it is a reminder of the quality of his compositional skills and playing.
Oscar J wrote:
This video really makes on thing really obvious: with all the ups and downs Queen had musically through the years, one thing remained constant: the sheer quality of Brian's lead guitar work - the ability to find beautiful melodies in even the worst of songs. What a body of work!
Spot on. There are times when I hear Brian playing live and I think he's just doing the same stuff over and over, but when you see something like this it is a reminder of the quality of his compositional skills and playing.
The two are not contradictory. Someone like Glenn Gould essentially did the same thing over and over again when playing, but that does not make him any less of a great performer (quite the opposite, although his humming was a definite flaw, but I digress).
Brian May is/was not a great live improviser (cf. the famous Frank Zappa-encounter, which illustrates May's attitude to improvising - too insecure for it to go well), but he was and is a master at creating melodic guitar phrases, and his delivery is unique - there are no legions of Brian May copycats because it's just too difficult.