"Guitar Pornography" - powerful and funny!

[Augustine]

Just for starters I have to point out one thing... how much freakin' material is on guitarprinciples.com!!!

I just started working through the "Practice Theory" section on the main site when I noticed the Display filter at the top of the list set to 20, and changed it to "ALL" to see if any more articles would appear.

Paying attention paid off (oh, and the deeper I go, the deeper it gets... ho ho ho).

http://www.guitarprinciples.com/practice-theory/231-guitar-pornography.html

Guitar pornography. Yes, I've spent a few hundred dollars on it over the journey. I think I had every Guitar Player mag from about 87-90, and every Guitar World from about 88-92. I still but one every couple of years or so, to see what's going on intellectually in guitar geekdom, what the "hot" guitars and hardware is supposed to be, and who's making waves. To quote, "Everything is there...except something that will actually enable you to become a better guitar player!"

Powerful because it's true, funny because no-one wants to admit it! To themselves, (damn I spent all that money! and time!) much less anyone else...

Reading guitar magazines introduced me to a lot of wonderful music - I was the only person I knew who was into King's X, and I only knew about them courtesy of guitar mags - and helped me broaden some of my theory knowledge. But, better guitar player? Not me, at least.

What's really intriguing is the editor's comment. "I doubt many people ever really learn to play the music in our magazine." Of course the pretense sells magazines. But it would bother me if I was that editor. Why not seek to redress the situation?

It occurs to me that there's no ruthless self-inquiry going on here - and that would be the common thread.