Flesh Guitar (10 page)

However, some generations ago, a Ph.D. student and part-time disc jockey called Lenny Detroit came across a set of compact discs, more challenging and abstract than most. He listened to them repeatedly and claimed to have discovered the secret of the Record Library.

He observed, reasonably enough, that all the recordings, that is all the guitar solos, in the Record Library were comprehensible in terms of the same elements: notes, intervals, rhythms, duration, harmonies, counterpoint and so on. However unusual or different the solos sounded, and even if they consciously avoided or excluded some of those elements, they could still be analysed and described in terms of them.

He also postulated that in the vastness of the library there were no two identical guitar solos. Since
nobody had ever heard every disc in the library, not even visited every listening booth, this could not be proved, and yet there was something about the postulation that made sense and appealed.

From these two premises Detroit then deduced that the Record Library is total and that the compact discs within it contain all possible combinations of guitar-playing elements. In other words, the discs in the library contain everything that it is possible for the guitar to express. Everything.

Somewhere on disc in the infinite vastness of the Record Library is every guitar solo that ever has been or ever will be played: all the blues solos, all the jazz solos, all the country and western solos, all the rock and roll, all the mainstream and all the avant-garde, all the technically brilliant and all the totally incompetent. The library must contain all the great, pithy solos and all the tedious rambling ones, the self-indulgent as well as the finely honed, the deeply flawed as well as the nearly perfect, all the absolutely right notes and all the totally bum notes. Everything.

(Fandom is full of talk about solos being ‘unbelievable', or ‘incredible' or ‘impossibly good', but the literally impossible is obviously excluded from the Record Library. On the other hand, it suffices only that a solo be possible for it to exist and be present.)

When the Detroit theory was proclaimed, the first reaction was one of extravagant happiness. All guitarists felt themselves to be masters of a secret treasure. They belonged to a great tradition. Their guitar solos, even the most modest of them, were part of the vital fabric of the universe. It felt good.

But, as was perhaps inevitable, this happiness was followed by a general, universal depression. The certitude
that some compact disc in some far distant listening booth already held every solo the guitarist was ever going to play seemed intolerable. What was the point in trying to be original or inventive or experimental, if the result was already foregone and foreknown? What was the point of perfecting new techniques or of trying to experiment?

Some suggested that all further attempts at inspiration or composition or improvisation should cease and that guitarists should simply juggle notes and chords at random, possibly using computers, until, by an improbable gift of chance, they created great guitar solos; although, of course, these solos too would already exist somewhere in the Record Library.

The belief that everything had already been played transformed some guitarists into phantoms. I know of listening booths where young men sit and listen to certain recordings over and over again, bow down before them, learn them note for note and say, ‘We are not worthy'. They get into arguments, into fights. There are warring factions and fan clubs. There are even attempts to form ‘tribute bands'.

Others said it was time to apply some quality control. What was the use, they insisted, of keeping solos that were hackneyed, repetitive or downright unlistenable? The Record Library, by definition, must contain much that was bad or second (indeed tenth) rate, and it therefore needed purifying. They started a secret campaign and managed to erase hundreds of hours of heavy metal guitar solos before their ruse was discovered. The damage they had done was, in the strictest sense, irreparable, but it could also be said that, given the size of the Record Library, the damage was infinitesimal. Certain solos had undoubtedly gone forever but, as is the way with heavy metal, there
were plenty more where they'd come from.

So what are the consequences of this for someone like myself, a fanatical Jenny Slade enthusiast? I know that the Record Library must contain everything she ever has or ever will play. It must contain her greatest solos and her worst (although even at her worst I still find her guitar playing utterly compelling). I know it must also contain any number of variations on these solos; solos that in some cases must vary by just one note, or which are played at a minutely different tempo. The library must contain solos by other guitarists whose playing either accidentally or deliberately sounds like Jenny Slade. There will be imitations, parodies, pastiches of her work. Equally the library must contain solos that she would like to have played, that she might have played given enough time. It must also contain slightly improved and slightly worsened versions of each of her extant solos, although I would argue that much of her work is incapable of improvement.

There is another set of scholars I heard of recently who have begun a new enterprise within the listening booths. Somewhere in the Record Library, they reason, there must be one CD that contains better guitar solos than any of the other discs, a sort of greatest hits collection. Not only that, this disc would contain the essence and the heart of the whole Record Library and of the universe. They have searched for it for years, and they are still searching even now. They are supreme optimists, and their faith is touching.

Some say this is a foolish, even a dangerous enterprise. Some say the task is impossible because it relies too much on subjective matters; others say it is a sort of blasphemy, a challenge to God and infinity. I recognize these problems, but
in the end I think they're entirely solvable. I believe, indeed I would be prepared to say I
know,
that Jenny Slade is quite simply the best guitarist who's ever lived, who's ever going to live. The quintessential disc that these scholars seek would be identical to and synonymous with the best of Jenny Slade.

I realize I may be alone in this opinion but I have profound reasons for holding it and I truly believe that sooner or later the world will agree with me. My solitude is lightened by this elegant hope.

Reprinted from the
Journal of Sladean Studies

Volume 2 Issue 6

‘So what is that exactly?' Kate asks, when she's read the article.

‘It's a post-modern appreciation of Jenny Slade,' says Bob humourlessly.

‘Is it indeed?'

‘Yes. It has to be. You see, Jenny Slade's not only the best guitarist in the world, she's also the most Po-Mo.'

Kate is a tad confused. Maybe Bob doesn't quite share her feelings about Jenny Slade. That needn't be so terrible, there are many different ways of appreciating something, yet she suspects that Bob would insist that his way is the only true path.

‘You don't say,' Kate replies.

‘I do,' says Bob. ‘Really I do.'

The bar is all but empty. There's one drunk sleeping contentedly by the jukebox and the manager
has gone, telling Kate to lock up when she's had enough of her new-found friend.

Kate says to Bob, ‘I don't suppose you've got the time to explain post-modernism have you?'

Bob looks at his watch and shakes his head sadly.

‘That's what they all say,' Kate complains.

‘But I've still got plenty to tell you about Jenny Slade.'

Kate cheers up at this news.

‘All right,' she says, ‘you can tell me about post-modernism another time.'

The promise that she's prepared to spend ‘another time' with him soothes Bob's wounded heart.

‘Now I think we should talk about instrumentation,' he says.

A hot, humid bedroom in a shack in Greenwood, Mississippi, in August 1938; bare walls, bare floors,
the cracked windows repaired with duct tape, a bed thin as a tortilla. It looks like ancient history, but it's not so long ago.

He's unsure how he got here. Maybe someone from the club brought him home when they saw just how sick he was. And still is. In this rare moment of sense and clarity he looks around the room, sees the empty moonshine bottle beside the bed, his own sharp suit and shiny shoes arranged on a chair like a wraith. No sign of his guitar.

The sheets are tangled and wet with sweat, and swathed in them is Robert Johnson, blues singer and guitarist. He's sick as a dog; pains in his head and stomach, in his very bones. In fact sometimes he howls like a dog, screams, sees visions, bays at invisible moons, talks to ghosts and demons. He hears music, not his own; strange stuff, from another country, or maybe another planet, like Mars or some such place.

It could all be worse. He could be in a tar-paper but in the middle of a swamp somewhere. He could still be on the plantation, or being worked over by smiling deputies. Being able to sing and play guitar hasn't kept him out of trouble completely, hasn't made his life a breeze, but without his gift he knows that everything about his existence would have been twenty times worse.

But why exactly does
he feel so bad? It was just another weekend gig. He sang and played just like usual. All he did different was take a drink of whisky, from a bottle given him by the club owner. The guy sure had a good-looking wife and she sure did flash a nice smile poor Bob's way, but he didn't do anything about it. There were nights when he would have done, but not tonight. And he certainly couldn't do anything once he'd started throwing up his guts. He certainly hadn't done anything that you'd poison a guy for. Was he being punished just for his thoughts?

And suddenly, oh shit, there's a woman in the room. Not the club owner's wife, much worse than that, much scarier: a white woman. He's in enough trouble already and this woman looks like really bad news. She's wearing the weirdest outfit he's ever seen, like fancy dress, like she's a show girl or a specialized kind of harlot maybe. It's pretty indecent the way her clothes hug her body, and show off her legs and breasts. She isn't strictly his type. He prefers something more homely, someone older and more comfortably reassuring, but he can definitely see the attraction. And although he doesn't exactly know how, there seems to be some sort of connection between this woman and the infernal outer-space music he keeps hearing.

That's when he realizes he must be hallucinating. Oh sure, she looks solid and real enough, as though you could reach out and grab yourself a handful, but he knows she must be the product of his sick imagination. What manner of woman would be here with him at a place and a time like this? What the hell was in that moonshine that created such visions?

‘Hi, Robert,' she says.

‘You know my
name?' he asks, but then why should he be surprised? That's the way it is with hallucinations. They know everything.

‘I know all about you,' she confirms.

‘And who the hell are you?'

‘I'm Jenny Slade.'

‘And what do you want from me?' he asks.

‘I don't want anything much. I just want to tell you about the future.'

‘You mean I got one?' he says, as a stab of pain twangs through him.

‘Well, yes and no. That moonshine whisky the bar owner gave you, I'm afraid it is going to kill you.'

‘Oh Jesus.'

‘But that's OK. That's not the end of the story.'

No? It sure sounds like it to me.'

No, you have posterity on your side.'

‘Post what?'

Jenny smiles indulgently. She knows he's not as dumb as he's pretending.

‘Fifty or sixty years from now you'll be known as the “King of the Delta Blues Singers”,' she says.

‘I sure don't feel like no king right now.'

‘Maybe not, but that's what they're going to call you.'

‘Who's going to call me that?'

‘Blues fans, and record companies and journalists, and radio stations.'

‘You mean
white folks, yeah?'

‘Mostly white folks, yes.'

‘Well, I ain't prejudiced,' he says, and he laughs through his sickness and stomach pain. ‘And what about my guitar playing?'

‘You're going to be very popular for your guitar playing too.'

‘Hell, lady, I don't see that I have to wait fifty, sixty years. I'm popular right now, you know. I recorded my song “Terra-plane Blues”, and it sold maybe five thousand copies. If that ain't popular then I don't know what is.'

‘You're going to be even more popular than that.

‘For sure?'

‘For sure,' she confirms.

Johnson doesn't seem inclined to believe her. He says, ‘You see, these guys came down from the American Record Company. I recorded twenty-nine sides for ‘em. I made big money out of it.'

‘Big money for here and now, maybe.'

‘Yeah, well here and now's where I'm at.'

‘That's true, but things are going to change, Robert.'

He looks at her slyly, squinting through half-closed eyes.

‘Hey,' he says. ‘You ain't some kind of devil woman, are you? Come to take my soul away?'

‘Is that what you think I am?'

‘Well, no, can't really say that I do, but you sure are a weird one.'

She looks at him disapprovingly, like a school teacher trying to chastise a pupil with a single look; an evil eye, maybe.

‘What is it
with you and the devil, Robert?'

‘What you mean?'

‘I mean all this stuff about having hellhounds on your trail and having Satan knock on your door. What's the point of all that?'

‘Say, you must've heard me sing. You must've paid attention.'

‘Yes,' she says patiently. ‘I've heard you play many times, and I always wonder what's all this nonsense about you having made some sort of pact with the devil.'