I don’t know what changes, maybe the weather, maybe my diet, but I am always torn between admiring Joe pass and looking up to him and a sense of "eh. Could take it or leave it."
He is systematic and predictable. The chord structure, the sound, the melodies and the walking thumb lines.
And yet…. He IS a genius. A genius that chose a style that doesn’t really "do" it to me.
it is sad but it is true. I appreciate his masterful technique, his compositions , the colors he manages to weave into the lines and all that.
I just wish he had some balls.
All that said, let's see why I do like him when I do. What is it that makes me turn my head to the side, like an attentive dog trying to understand what was said.
First, it is the feeling, or apparent lack of. There is something very controlled and kept back in his style of playing, always doing chord calculations, planning lines, nothing left to chance, nothing gushing out of the parameters and the wired fence, but then again, sometimes, just sometimes you can get a glimpse of that beast in the cage, you hear a bull puffing restlessly under a diminished chord change, you can feel energy trying to break free.
And for that restraint, I give him credit.
taming beasts is a noble profession. |