The Best Thing To Learn In Order To Play Like Ed

[garbeaj]

here is the secret: when clapton plays blues licks, it sounds like blues. when ed plays the very same blues licks, it sounds like VAN HALEN.

Nah...it sounds like Eddie Van Halen playing Eric Clapton's live Cream licks very fast which is what Eddie Van Halen sounds like.

[rgorke]

here is the secret: when clapton plays blues licks, it sounds like blues. when ed plays the very same blues licks, it sounds like VAN HALEN.

EXACTLY!!!!

[rgalpin]

here is the secret: when clapton plays blues licks, it sounds like blues. when ed plays the very same blues licks, it sounds like VAN HALEN.

Nah...it sounds like Eddie Van Halen playing Eric Clapton's live Cream licks very fast which is what Eddie Van Halen sounds like.

very fast? is that all you hear? clapton very fast? you are missing the signature that i hear on every note ed plays. it's his signature. i am always surprised to find out that VAN HALEN licks turn out to be just blues licks because he is putting something in them that isn't in the notes themselves. color. angularity. personality. ed uses a blues lick as a medium to paint a picture. the SECRET to painting like Rembrandt is not in using the same paints.

[vanhalen5150]

The secret to making a grilled cheese like me is to not use the same cheese.

[vh junkie]

Nah...it sounds like Eddie Van Halen playing Eric Clapton's live Cream licks very fast which is what Eddie Van Halen sounds like.

[vanhalen5150]

I loaded some Cream licks into Audacity and speed them up. Laptop stopped after about 20 minutes. My tech said those Cream licks turned to butter and jammed the hyper drive.

[garbeaj]

Nah...it sounds like Eddie Van Halen playing Eric Clapton's live Cream licks very fast which is what Eddie Van Halen sounds like.

If you read the rest of this thread you will see how Ed sped up the Clapton licks from the live Cream recordings, specifically from the cadenza of "Sitting On Top Of The World" from Cream's Goodbye album. He does this all over the place throughout the Van Halen catalog. It is a fundamental building block to being able to play things like the solo to "Hot For Teacher", the solos to "Outta Love Again", the ending cadenzas from "You Really Got Me" and "I'm The One", the solos to "Panama" and "When It's Love"...the list goes on and on...He even explains that he did this and demonstrates how he did it in the YouTube clip of his interview with Steven Rosen. Ed has said this all along, it's just that for some reason people don't believe him

[garbeaj]

Here is yet another example of the influence that Eric Clapton had on Ed from the new Popular Mechanics article that Greg Renoff posted earlier in another thread. Even the whole idea of customizing guitars came from Ed's desire to sound like Clapton during Cream.

EVH
My first real guitar was a Les Paul Goldtop. I was a total Eric Clapton freak, and I saw old pictures of him playing a Les Paul. Except his had humbucking pickups, and mine had the soapbar, P-90 single coils. The first thing I did with that guitar was chisel it out in the back and put a humbucker in. When we were playing gigs, people kept saying, "How is he getting that sound out of single--coil soapbar pickups?" Since my hand was covering the humbucker, they never realized that I'd put it in.

[EVH]

There's really nothing random going on in Ed's playing. He plays the same licks in a regimented way nearly every time. And the key is Clapton's live Cream playing, specifically the licks from the cadenza at the end of the live version of "Sitting On Top Of The World" from Cream's Goodbye album. If you don't understand this you will never understand how to actually play the most difficult and fastest passages in Ed's playing.

Ed is really not a swing feel, improvisational jazz guitarist and approaching learning his playing from that standpoint is an exercise in futility in my opinion.

We can agree to disagree. It is afterall only our opinions. Anyone's opinions on this forum are just as valid and probably better guitarists than us, too.


Ed might love Clapton, that's cool and everything.... but I have never and still don't hear 'Clapton' in Ed's playing. If anything, possible influences from the 60's-70's, I would say Ed sounds a like a combo of Jeff Beck & Hendrix - not only solo techniques, but approach to rhythm and yet Ed has never even mentioned one of them as an influence. But, Ed never has really given credit to Rhandy Roads despite Randy being DIRECT competition in the day on EVERY show interview and print media....yet Ed gave credit to other players as amazing new up-and-comers.... young Ed was a lot more immature and drunk or high a lot of the time though... Ed's 2015 interviews are the most honest, no BS interviews I think he has ever done.

[fivecoyote]

Probably different people hearing things different ways too. I can see both POVs, but will always feel like Ed is blues based with rock speed and jazz feel...or something like that.

[garbeaj]

There's really nothing random going on in Ed's playing. He plays the same licks in a regimented way nearly every time. And the key is Clapton's live Cream playing, specifically the licks from the cadenza at the end of the live version of "Sitting On Top Of The World" from Cream's Goodbye album. If you don't understand this you will never understand how to actually play the most difficult and fastest passages in Ed's playing.

Ed is really not a swing feel, improvisational jazz guitarist and approaching learning his playing from that standpoint is an exercise in futility in my opinion.

We can agree to disagree. It is afterall only our opinions. Anyone's opinions on this forum are just as valid and probably better guitarists than us, too...

Ed might love Clapton, that's cool and everything.... but I have never and still don't hear 'Clapton' in Ed's playing. If anything, possible influences from the 60's-70's, I would say Ed sounds a like a combo of Jeff Beck & Hendrix - not only solo techniques, but approach to rhythm and yet Ed has never even mentioned one of them as an influence. But, Ed never has really given credit to Rhandy Roads despite Randy being DIRECT competition in the day on EVERY show interview and print media....yet Ed gave credit to other players as amazing new up-and-comers.... young Ed was a lot more immature and drunk or high a lot of the time though... Ed's 2015 interviews are the most honest, no BS interviews I think he has ever done.

It really isn't a disagreement. Have you tried the specific fast lick from the "Panama" solo and the "You Really Got Me" cadenza ending solo and the last fast part of the "When It's Love" solo that wjamflan and I have shown come directly from Clapton's ending cadenza from the live version of "Sitting On Top Of The World" from Cream's Goodbye album? If you were to try it and then you still don't hear it, then I would say we have a disagreement. But if you try comparing these solos that we have pointed out I think you would hear exactly what we are talking about.

You can actually hear Ed playing these licks and saying specifically where he got these licks in the Steven Rosen interview:


Ed keeps telling everyone how to play his licks in nearly every interview he's ever given. Eric Clapton's live Cream playing is exactly where these fast licks come from...the licks that no one gets right. The fast parts of the "Panama" solo, the "Hot For Teacher" solo, "Outta Love Again", the ending cadenzas from "You Really Got Me", "I'm The One", the ending cadenza from the live version of "Unchained" from the Oakland '81 video...the list of Ed solos that use this licks goes on and on and on...wjamflan and myself have transcribed many of these solos and posted them here and compared them to each other and the ending cadenza solo from "Sitting On Top Of The World".

It's just plain as day if you actually sit down and learn how to play these instances in Ed's solos that we mentioned and you sit down and learn the cadenza from "Sitting On Top Of The World" as wjamflan has transcribed it. I'm not saying this for any other reason than to help people understand how Ed plays these parts and where it comes from. I'm not trying to be wrong or right, I'm just pointing out what IS.

When wjamflan pointed these things out to me, it really was like a Rosetta Stone to understanding the most difficult parts of Ed's playing...it was a big "A-ha!" moment for me that made a huge difference in my understanding of how to play these parts and I hope to help others have a similar experience.

This is specifically about these parts. NOT the longer passages that are influenced more by Holdsworth, not the tapping, not the harmonic tapping, not the artificial pinch harmonics, not the whammy bar use, etc. This is specifically about these specific licks.

[garbeaj]

Here's an example of a comparison of the last fast part of the "When It's Love" solo and the "You Really Got Me" cadenza that wjamflan posted to make the point clear:

YOU REALLY GOT ME - cadenza

-----H/SL---------B1-----------H----P----------------------H----P----------------H----P----------------
E------------12---------12--------------------------------------------------12-----------------------------
B------------------15--------12---15---12---------12---12---15---12---------12---15---12------------
G---7/13--------------------------------------14-------------------------------------------------14------
D------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
E------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------D----U----D----U----------------U-----D----U----------------D----U----------------U-------

--------------------------|------ Lick 1 -------|-----|---- Lick 2 ---|-----|------- Lick 1 ------|--------




WHEN IT'S LOVE - lick

------B1-------------------------H----P----------------------P----------------P----------H----------------P-----
E-----------------------10--------------------------------------------10------------------------------------------
B----13----------------------10---13---10---------10---13---10---------13---10---------------10---13---10-
G----------------------------------------------13--------------------------------------10---12-------------------
D------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
E------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
------D-----------------D----U----------------U-----D----U----------D----U-----------U----------D----U-------

--------------------------|------ Lick 1 -------|---------------------|------Lick 1-----------|-----------------


---------------P-------------------B.5^^^R---P---------B1---
E----10--------------------------------------------------------
B----------13---10---------10--------------------------------
G---------------------13----------12-------------10---12----
D---------------------------------------------------------------
A---------------------------------------------------------------
E---------------------------------------------------------------
------D----U----------U-----D----D---------------------D-----

-----|-----Lick 1------|---------------------------------------

Now here are the "Sitting On Top Of The World" ending cadenza licks:

--------------H----P-------------------------------------
E---15----------------------------------------------------
B---------15---18---15----------------------------------
G--------------------------17----------------------------
-----D----U----------------U-----------------------------

-------------------H----P
B--------15---15---18---15----------------------------------
G-17----------------------------17----------------------------
---U------D----U----------------U

Do you see the relation? Be sure to listen to the tracks (the fast part of the "When It's Love" solo, the "You Really Got Me" cadenza/"fast part at the end" and the ending solo (cadenza) at the end of "Sitting On Top Of The World" from Cream Goodbye) and follow along closely...learn all these parts as has been shown here and the relation becomes crystal clear...It becomes even more clear when you hear Ed playing these licks specifically in the above Steven Rosen interview

[Strat78]

Yeah, I think people get it, Ed played an 8 note widely didely thing ad nauseam that he picked up from EC. I've been playing this stuff for years and still find the most challenging thing about Ed's playing is the swagger and swing propelling his riffs and solos for the most part. His solo playing is more about all the slipping and sliding that occurs between the notes. After Outta Love, Ed should have 86'd that lick because it was getting old (like this subject).

[garbeaj]

Yeah, I think people get it, Ed played an 8 note widely didely thing ad nauseam that he picked up from EC. I've been playing this stuff for years and still find the most challenging thing about Ed's playing is the swagger and swing propelling his riffs and solos for the most part. His solo playing is more about all the slipping and sliding that occurs between the notes. After Outta Love, Ed should have 86'd that lick because it was getting old (like this subject).

I know and I agree...but I post this stuff for the people that don't get it or haven't figured it out yet. Especially for the folks that think Ed was some improvisational jazz swing guitarist...that's just not true and thinking that is true prevents people from trying to learn the stuff the way it was played. People just think "Well Ed was just some alien that came up with improvisational licks off the top of his head and I'll never be able to figure out how he did it so why bother trying?" and they give up.

[mapat]

Yeah, I think people get it, Ed played an 8 note widely didely thing ad nauseam that he picked up from EC. I've been playing this stuff for years and still find the most challenging thing about Ed's playing is the swagger and swing propelling his riffs and solos for the most part. His solo playing is more about all the slipping and sliding that occurs between the notes. After Outta Love, Ed should have 86'd that lick because it was getting old (like this subject).

Thank you for saying what everybody that's read this thread is thinking.

wflanjam will say something once to put it out there and after that leave it up to the reader to either take it or leave it.

garbeaj will belabor the point until it's been completely beaten into the ground...

Then he'll dig it up, and beat on it some more, for good measure.

Also, garbeaj, I know you have to get the last word in so, please, i will now cede the floor to you..