Music - Tribute to George Harrison

January 19, 2006

The sweet, ineffable electric slide guitar sound is unmistakable. Thirty six years after the song was recorded, one listen to the song and you know who the lead guitar player is. Yes - I am talking about the late lead guitar player of the most popular band of all time - George Harrison of the Beatles, who died four years ago of cancer.

All great guitar players have an unmistakable signature guitar playing style and sound that reflects their personalities - from the muscular, lean, rhythmic sound of Pete Townshend of the Who, to the rough bump and grind of Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones to the bluesy, caterwauling, wah-wah steel pedal of Eric Clapton and of course, the spacey, intergalactic style of the greatest of them all - Jimi Hendrix.

Great guitar playing is not about technical brilliance or how fast someone can play - it is about developing a style that is distinctive and unique - and George had this in spades. His guitar playing style was very different from everyone else's - it could be sweet and ringing - listen to his first solo album in 1970 ("All Things Must Pass"), or it could snarl, bite and cut as deep as a switchblade knife - listen to his guitar solo on John Lennon's song "Gimme Some Truth" on John's second solo album "Imagine" in 1971.

Incidentally, 'Gimme Some Truth" is one of the greatest rock songs of all time. For three straight minutes, John Lennon raves and rants about everything wrong about post 1960s society - from his own heroin addiction, to the breakup of the Beatles and the end of his friendship with Paul McCartney, to the US presidency of Richard Nixon and the death of his own idealism. It is a song that shakes listeners out of their complacency. And, George's guitar work on the song is exemplary - it matches Lennon's impassioned singing blow for blow, and the stinging, sweet guitar solo takes your breath away.

George made some lovely albums in the 1970s and then faded from view, only to resurface in the late 1980s in a supergroup called the Traveling Wilburys with fellow old farts and 1960s legends Bob Dylan, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison and Tom Petty. Hanging out, having fun and making music with such eminent personalities reminded him of how enjoyable rock music could be, and the results show in his rejuvenated guitar playing on these albums. His songs on that album are self-deprecatory, funny, profound and poignant - all at the same time.

George was a mystic and an avid student of Hindu philosophy. He spent months up in Rishikesh and in a little town above Almora in the Uttaranchal Himalayas back in the 1970s.

The next time I am up there, I am goin' trekking up to that town. The town itself has become like a New-Age spiritual center. There is a small artists colony and a few meditation centers promising you a short-cut to nirvana. I will sit on a green mountainside on a beautiful, cloudless autumn day, forward to the song "My Sweet Lord" on my beat-up old Discman, turn up the volume, and raise a toast to George Harrison, the quiet Beatle.

If there is an afterlife, George's spirit will be somewhere in those beautiful mountains, looking down and smiling at me.

Amen