Name That Riff
How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice. Practice. Practice. This guy, Brodie Cumming, might not be playing the Hall, but he’s cornered the internet with almost five million views of his video, “100 Famous Rock Guitar Riffs – one take”, so maybe a new standard has been set.
It’s pretty impressive how Brodie strings together a medley of 100 of Rock’s most memorable licks (the ones that have been lodged in your brain since childhood) into a single ripping guitar demonstration. What it really drives home is just how expressive an electric guitar is in the right hands. There’s soul, crunch, menace, heart, sorrow, pain and love residing on every fret board. It’s modern, but timeless. Our own six string maestro, Stephen Arnold, composes all the themes he writes on guitar, matching the tone he’s seeking with the perfect instrument from his extensive guitar collection.
When you watch this video, you will realize how music creates such a powerful connection to our emotions and memories, not to mention this could probably be the beginning of a new Rock ‘n Roll trivia drinking game: “Name That Riff”. It could work like those spelling bees where you keep guessing until you miss, then you have to drink a shot (we suggest tequila). This would continue until one person could get through the entire seven minutes of this video without making a mistake (okay, Stephen already scored 100!).
So, good luck guessing. And remember kids, like Ron Wood says, “If you’re going to drink, do what I do… take the limo”.