Is Zakk playing live in this video?

[topekatj]

Pretty impressive if yes.

I’ll just be over here playing my blues box patterns….

ETA: Gotta let my thumbnail grow out a bit.

Edited June 22, 2024 by topekatj

[tbonesullivan]

Jeeezzz. It's amazing that those nails aren't hitting the strings. I'm assuming he keeps them that long for playing acoustic / classical? He also uses a lot of chicken pickin style licks, though I don't know if country guys keep their talons like that.

[HoboMan]

Yep, looks like he's really playing.

[scottcald]

Looks like he's really playing to me too.  The nails look long for classical/acoustic.  Looks a little Howard Hughes to me. 

[RobB]

He gets those expressive bends going, and then crashes into the wall with all that chromatic horseshit. Plus that 80s od/chorus/wah tone is awful. 
 

I’ve seen BLS live. Not my thing, but I know Zakk can play. This video is beneath his abilities. 

Edited June 23, 2024 by RobB

[cynic]

He's super skilled and a far better player than I could ever hope to be, but I'd rather listen to me.

[Joe mama]

over 4 minutes of wanking off.. I got the point in 15 seconds , he should of mixed it up a bit

[Feynman]

I'm certainly in no position to criticize, but that's never stopped me before.   My favorite YouTube comment is "I don’t think he was even listening to the backing track."

I feel like Zakk Wylde is becoming a caricature of Zakk Wylde.

Those are pretty incredible chops though - some really impressive bits throughout.  I liked a lot of it.  I think he's better than I thought he was.

[Disturber]

I guess Victor Wooten is right.....

 

[princeofdarkness56]

Always had mixed feelings with Zack. Can’t deny his talent and his contributions to heavy rock but his tone on his leads is usually to shrill for my ears as in this video  I remember reading years ago he preferred Les Pauls with maple necks and old MXR distortion plus pedals. I think that contributes heavily to his shrill leads. On the other hand I love the tone and heaviness when he plays rhythm. Hence the mixed feelings. 

Edited June 23, 2024 by princeofdarkness56

[RobB]

5 hours ago, Feynman said:

I'm certainly in no position to criticize, but that's never stopped me before.

Wrongo! You are ALWAYS in a position to criticize. That’s why web message boards were invented, pal. 

[topekatj]

FWIW the clip is from 9 years ago.
I’d always thought of Zakk as “the guy after Jake E” in Ozzy’s band, as well as the guy that popularized the low E pinched harmonic move. I appreciate that his tone in the video may not be universally praised but if nothing else I appreciate the drive in his solo. 

[tbonesullivan]

7 hours ago, princeofdarkness56 said:

Always had mixed feelings with Zack. Can’t deny his talent and his contributions to heavy rock but his tone on his leads is usually to shrill for my ears as in this video  I remember reading years ago he preferred Les Pauls with maple necks and old MXR distortion plus pedals. I think that contributes heavily to his shrill leads. On the hand I love the tone and heaviness when he plays rhythm. Hence the mixed feelings. 

I've always wondered about the Maple necks on his Les Pauls. Was his original guitar a Norlin Era one? Just seems like a strange choice considering what most people use, but he's definitely stuck with it.

I did find it funny how they often called it a "raw unfinished maple" neck but then added that it was oiled, which means it was finished. Having watched some videos on long term use of a truly "unfinished' maple neck I definitely wouldn't want to own one.

Edited June 24, 2024 by tbonesullivan

[Jakeboy]

I agree with @RobB. His tone is awful but OMG his level of precision picking and speed is ridiculous..,but those expressive bends speak to me more…much more. They convey emotion and a vocal connotation. 
 

But damn, dude is fast and precise. I am happy with tremolo picking clean single note lines…lol…he rips….even if it’s not my cuppa.

[princeofdarkness56]

51 minutes ago, tbonesullivan said:

I've always wondered about the Maple necks on his Les Pauls. Was his original guitar a Norlin Era one? Just seems like a strange choice considering what most people use, but he's definitely stuck with it.

I did find it fully how they often called it a "raw unfinished maple" neck but then added that it was oiled, which means it was finished. Having watched some videos on long term use of a truly "unfinished' maple neck I definitely wouldn't want to own one.

I believe his Holy Grail guitar was a Norlin era 1981 Les Paul and it had the maple neck. I’m pretty sure his signature line with Gibson all have maple necks too. 

[LucSulla]

He was more interesting pre-BLS. @Feynman is right IMO; he has become a caricature of himself over the last two decades. I have a good friend who briefly worked with him around 2010 and another acquaintance who was in BLS and, based on their comments, do not think it’s an accident. 

[VECTOR]

I always liked Zacks playing but this is a little over the top. Maybe it needs the restriction of a real song with its own harmony and only 20 seconds for a solo to play the notes in the right phrasing and tempo. In this video I see too much noodling.

[Biz Prof]

16 hours ago, LucSulla said:

He was more interesting pre-BLS. @Feynman is right IMO; he has become a caricature of himself over the last two decades. I have a good friend who briefly worked with him around 2010 and another acquaintance who was in BLS and, based on their comments, do not think it’s an accident. 

I never understood his morphing into the faux biker gangster persona and the pivot in style.  His playing on the first couple of albums with Ozzy seemed strong, but the BLS stuff just doesn't interest me at all.  Seems cartoonist.  YMMV.

[RobB]

43 minutes ago, Biz Prof said:

I never understood his morphing into the faux biker gangster persona and the pivot in style.  His playing on the first couple of albums with Ozzy seemed strong, but the BLS stuff just doesn't interest me at all.  Seems cartoonist.  YMMV.

That was after he morphed into a Southern Rocker (from the swamps of New Jersey), flared denim bellbottoms and all…

[LucSulla]

2 hours ago, Biz Prof said:

I never understood his morphing into the faux biker gangster persona and the pivot in style.  His playing on the first couple of albums with Ozzy seemed strong, but the BLS stuff just doesn't interest me at all.  Seems cartoonist.  YMMV.

His wife is basically a b-tier Sharon Osbourne and polices his image. Everybody involved has to do that faux Hells Angels thing or they don't work for BLS. 

[Biz Prof]

5 hours ago, RobB said:

That was after he morphed into a Southern Rocker (from the swamps of New Jersey), flared denim bellbottoms and all…

A la Kid "Pride of Dixie via Detroit" Rock. American consumers can be so pathetically gullible.

Edited June 25, 2024 by Biz Prof

[LucSulla]

I was a huge Zakk fan all the way back to the No Rest for the Wicked album. I dug P&G and Book of Shadows a lot, and I gave him a bit of a pass for the southern rock thing because it seemed an honest interest. He's also far from the first Yankee to decide to play redneck dress up. At least that album was cool.

I was so excited about his releasing new stuff in the late 90s that I ordered a Japanese copy of the first BLS album because it was released like six months earlier there than here. I had the original album cover too that later got changed due to Johnie Walker threatening to sue. I went and saw them in Nashville in Fall of 1999. The beard hadn't really shown up yet, and the biker aesthetic wasn't nearly as prominent as it would become. 

I haven't listened to that album in a hot minute because, despite liking some songs on it, I remember it sounding like shit. Listening to it today for the first time in awhile through some studio monitors, that memory is correct. Zakk also played bass on that album, and he chose to run it with distortion for the whole damn thing. The guitars are too out front, and they are too hot. Digital clipping with bass fuzz makes for a pretty tough listen. The gate on the snare is pretty awful too, which I never noticed until today. I'm also pretty sure the album was recorded on a shoestring, so it's understandable. Dude was pretty much a has-been by 98, when this band was formed. 

It's an interesting listen though (contingent on you interest in Wylde's playing). It's a lot more like a heavy P&G album than what BLS would become with some definite Book of Shadows-esque moments. It contains more pinch harmonics than BoS (which has almost none), but not nearly as many as his albums would have later. There are still several songs with none, and even the ones that have them, I don't think they are too over the top. He actually used to be able to finish a bend in a solo without hitting a harmonic, lol.

I remember overall liking this direction and hoping the next album would be similar with better production. I guess somewhere between here and the next one, he started leaning more into the biker thing and being as Zakk Wylde as possible. My tastes changed a bit too, and I just didn't find the later albums that interesting. Looking back now, it was probably because that, while Sonic Brew sounds pretty rough, it's not really trying to be anything beyond returning to heavier music after the whole singer/songwriter attempt in the mid-90s went bust. It also does a pretty good job of integrating aspects of the two prior solo efforts while doing some different stuff. Later albums seem to have honed in some very specific sounds from this first album and just worked them to death. 

At the time, I was doing a degree in music business and a cognate in music production. I had become a bit of a snob about recordings and had to grow out of all of that. At the time, I couldn't see beyond the production to the performance sometimes. Listening 25 years later, it's a bit of a mess, but I think it's the last album of his I enjoy because it's the last thing he did before working toward becoming Zakk Wylde Inc.™

And I have to give it to whatever combination of him and his wife that worked that angle. He wasn't getting anywhere really prior to turning into beared/biker Zakk. I think he became far less interesting as a player and songwriter, but he started pulling a helluvalot larger crowds by the mid-00s than he was playing for when I saw him in 96 and 99. 

T.A.Z. off that album is also his last bit of playing that really made my ears perk up. It was interesting to hear him continuing to workshop the hybrid picking and pentatonic stuff with those diminished runs and a couple of other modal ideas. Not exactly world-changing, but a good example of his being more than squeals and pentatonic boxes at one time. But squeals and pentatonic boxes make the money. 

 

[tbonesullivan]

On 6/24/2024 at 3:21 PM, RobB said:

That was after he morphed into a Southern Rocker (from the swamps of New Jersey), flared denim bellbottoms and all…

"Central Jersey Southerner" is really a thing, especially from the area Wylde grew up in. I know a few, and even in high school they were like that.

Reminds me of this video of Wylde from 1993, complete with the  Civil War cavalry hat and "Star and Bars" on his guitar. I think it may be more that the Ozzy Camp wouldn't let him display his Southern affectations.
 

 

[LucSulla]

On 6/29/2024 at 5:20 AM, tbonesullivan said:

"Central Jersey Southerner" is really a thing, especially from the area Wylde grew up in. I know a few, and even in high school they were like that.

Reminds me of this video of Wylde from 1993, complete with the  Civil War cavalry hat and "Star and Bars" on his guitar. I think it may be more that the Ozzy Camp wouldn't let him display his Southern affectations.
 

 

That's the southern cross. 

The Stars and Bars was the original CSA flag with three stripes, an blue canton, and a circle of stars. 

My lingering experience from years in dabbling in being a history major in undergrad and grad school brings out my "well, actually" guy, lol. 

I also found that a little humorous. 

According to Zakk, he had battle flag guitar made due to being a southern rock fanboy. After seeing Bret Michaels with a similar guitar, he started nailing beer caps to the front. Ozzy subsequently had someone light it on fire due to his hatred of southern rock and wanting the guitar gone. 

I have to admit never completely understanding the fascination musicians not from the south had with CSA vexillology back during the hair metal era. 

Edited June 30, 2024 by LucSulla

[Brooks]

I saw Zakk wipe the stage w/ what was left of Skynyrd when Pride & Glory opened in the early 90s. The whole trio was killer! I liked that album better than the Black Label Society releases that immediately followed, and I'm more of a metal guy than southern rocker. After a while the production got much better, I do like a handful of later BLS tunes;

 

Edited June 30, 2024 by Brooks