Coolest Shit Ever: Les Paul – How High The Moon

23 Mar, 2009 in Coolest Shit Ever, fnord, music by

Youdopia, Les Paul is amazing. His playing is amazing. His impact of music is virtually unparalleled in the 20th Century. He invented multitrack recording (as demonstrated in the video above) and overdubs, he perfected the solid body electric guitar, he played with some of the greats like Bing Crosby, Chet Atkins, and of course, Mary Ford. He’s still alive and in his mid 90′s. This video (below) was from a couple of years ago, when he was in his early 90′s. There’s not much playing, but there’s lots of playfulness. Les’ solo on How High The Moon is still one of the best ever recorded, and he did it on acoustic gauge strings with a wound third. All hail the man. Coolest Shit Ever.

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4 Comments

  1. August
    23 March, 2009

    Nice, Mark! I know someone who sat in w/Les a few months ago at his NY spot. He said Les was as generous and lucid as can be. Have you heard Joe Pass’ rendition of HHTM off his “Virtuoso” album? It’s a must-hear. Astounding is an understatement.

  2. TelevisionSux
    24 March, 2009

    A music genre is a categorical and typological construct that identifies musical sounds as belonging to a particular category and type of music that can be distinguished from other types of music. – Wiki

    Les Paul created his own music genre, recording genre and design genre. He is a world changing “triple Threat” Of Immense talent. To this day few understand how much he has influenced music in every way. I only know of one other guy, who maybe comes close. Raymond Kurzweil. I am sure there is a myriad of heavy hitters out there, but Les Paul takes the Award for Best Ever. Oh, yea…. He can play Geeetar Damn gooood tooo.

  3. admin
    24 March, 2009

    Les Paul is the shit. Yes. One thing that is not as well known is that Les Paul got his hands on the first reliable, biased magnetic tape recorders, from the Nazis. Bing Crosby snagged a nazi tape deck (he was playing for the boys in the USO, and Les was his guitarist) and Les… did everything else.

    There is a tangible before and after. Les Paul did it all. And he can fucking WAIL.

    August, and Eric, thanks for the substantive comments, my brothers. My posts are light and fluffy, but I like my comments to have some meat.

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