In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

[JBH3]

I'm not an overly huge fan, but am really starting to dig John Mayer's music. Was at Target last week, and saw Continuum on sale for $9.99 so said what the hey. Haven't taken it out of my CD Player (car/work) since.

There's some amazing guitar work done on this album, and I can only imagine what the does live w/ songs like "Bold as Love", or "Gravity".

He definitely has a Chicago blues melded w/ Jimi Hendrix thing going on, w/ a modern take. I think his work on this album is amazing, and I'm sure there's plenty other songs, old and new, that I've missed.

Probably going to be checking out his entire collection and some live performances, but I think -- just from what I've heard -- he's probably one of the better guitarists of my generation.

[Beantown]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

Talent-wise, he's definitely near the top.

He's at "Kanye"-level on the "needs to keep his mouth shut and focus on music" scale, though, which will keep me from caling him great until he turns it around.

Disclaimer: I haven't kept up with Mayer's interviews/comments and such the past few months, so I don't know if he already has been getting better.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

Personally, he's not in my top 100. If he were to fully embrace half of whatever it is he is half-assing right now instead of splitting time with his "blues-rock" and his soft-rock/pop based stuff then he could be really great.

[RAZRr1275]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

Personally, he's not in my top 100. If he were to fully embrace half of whatever it is he is half-assing right now instead of splitting time with his "blues-rock" and his soft-rock/pop based stuff then he could be really great.

I'm with you. He has the skills but he needs to pick a genre and go with it and personally his blues-rock style better shows off his skills

[JBH3]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

I'm with you. He has the skills but he needs to pick a genre and go with it and personally his blues-rock style better shows off his skills

I disagree. What I feel sets him apart is his ability to produce good tunes within seperate genres. For instance, off of "Continuum" I love the variance from track #7 to track # 8 to track #9.

"Stop this Train" is a great little ditty finger picked on an acoustic guitar reminiscent of a James Taylor song, and "Slow Dancin in a Burnin Room" is a bluesy rock tune, and then track #9 ("Bold as Love"), Mayer channels his inner Jimi Hendrix/SRV.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

That's because Bold As Love is a Jimi Hendrix song.

[JBH3]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

That's because Bold As Love is a Jimi Hendrix song.

Right you are.

[Trevytrev11]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

Gravity is his best work (he's admitted it more than once) as far as a complete album.

But listen to both John Mayer Trio and his Live from LA albums. You get to hear a lot more of him just jamming and free-styling a bit more on the guitar. He plays a lot of Gravity stuff on the Live from LA album and it's very good.

The Live from LA album is especially cool because it's got a set of him on the accoustic, one with the trio and one with the full band.

[Bornindamecca]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

John is a good player. I don't think he "ranks" anywhere though. He's not a special player. Just a good, tasty blues-rock guitarist. You can find him in any guitar store if you hang around long enough. Really, there are a lot of guitarists in rock who borrow heavily from Hendrix and SRV but...."smooth it out" for a more modern sound. I think it'd take a week to replace John Mayer as a guitar player, even on the songwriting end.

That having been said, I like his playing a lot, but if guitar players were NBA players, Mayer would be Steve Blake or something.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

LOL @ Steve Blake. I agree, though; maybe I haven't listened to enough of his stuff, but he just sounds kind of bland.

[Scottdau]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

No he is very very good! Listen to some of his jam sessions. The guy is very talented. He did a great job with the "Beat it" solo in the Fall out boy version of the song.

[Bornindamecca]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

No he is very very good! Listen to some of his jam sessions. The guy is very talented. He did a great job with the "Beat it" solo in the Fall out boy version of the song.

He is very good, but when you rank guys you tend to be talking about greatness. He's not great. Look no further than the Herbie Hancock documentary for John's musical limitations. Even John himself probably knows no less than 50 guys behind the scenes at or above his level just hanging around NYC doing various things.

[Guffers]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

He is very good, but when you rank guys you tend to be talking about greatness. He's not great. Look no further than the Herbie Hancock documentary for John's musical limitations. Even John himself probably knows no less than 50 guys behind the scenes at or above his level just hanging around NYC doing various things.

Yep, he is a musical player with nice phrasing. But harmonically he is very, very limited.

As a guitar teacher myself I see a ton of teenage boys who are almost as accomplished in terms of being able to rip out a blues solo. But it takes years of concentrated study to reach the level of a guy like Herbie Hancock. There are many, many guitarists out there who eat Mayer for breakfast and I'm sure he would admit it.

[Beantown]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

I'm sure he would admit it.

Pretty sure he called himself the "Eric Clapton" of this generation.

[Scottdau]

Re: In Your Opinion: Where Does John Mayer Rank Amongst Guitarists?

I don't know, some people are just natural at playing the guitar. My brother was really good and if he practice more he would have been great. Joe S taught him in Berkeley and said the same thing, but my brother was hooked on drugs. I think John is up there in guitar playing. I think if I read it right Eric C didn't even play the guitar that long, and was very good. I have friend that our like that too. I like the Cross Road show with John M and Brad Praisley. Both were really showing some talent in that show.