A Guitarist Who Plays A Lot Of Notes Is Considered To Have No Taste, Herman Li Answers

JAKARTA - While appearing in the latest episode of Music Is Win's Guitar Villains podcast, Dragonforce's Herman Li was asked for his opinion on criticism that guitarists who play multiple notes have no taste or emotion. What is Li's answer?

Launching Blabbermouth, Thursday, December 17, Li said he had heard statements or criticism like this for years. To be precise, when Li first started playing guitar and got to know Jason Becker's work.

"This was back in '92 or '93 - I went to my music teacher and I said, 'Listen to this guy.' I played the song Altitudes from the Perpetual Burn album. And my music teacher listened to it and said, "This is bad. This guy can't play. No music there. Just masturbating. Terrible. You shouldn't listen to these kinds of things," recounts. Li.

"Some people just don't have ears for certain things," Li continued. "That's why there is a type of music for everyone to consume."

Li went on to say that he likes to play fast because he finds it fun. However, he emphasized that he is not the type of musician who likes to differentiate between types of music. He listens to various music and it's not a problem for him.

"The first time I heard a guitar solo, which is Richie Sambora on a Bon Jovi song, I thought, 'Man, I like this sound. What's this?'" Li recalled.

"And some people are never going to like lead guitar solos, and things like that. And you can see the trend how it goes - there's numetals, there's metalcore, and everybody's, like, 'Oh, we don't play guitar solos. We're writers. song now. '"