Alex Lifeson Disease (ALD)

metalchurch · Post by **metalchurch** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 6:49 am

Lifeson begat this atrocity. Back in 1984, he contracted the disease that now bears his name. Alex Lifeson's disease afflicts the great guitarists. It shrinks their testicles from the size of grapefruits down to BBs, or smaller. (Other notable sufferers of Alex Lifeson's Disease include Eric Clapton, Gary Moore, and Vivian Campbell). Mr. Lifeson went from wearing long hair and clogs and playing in front of several Marshall stacks, to wearing borderline flock-of-seagulls haircuts and ballet slippers and playing in front of tiny solid state combos.

Guitarists:
DON'T LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU!
Before ALD****************************After ALD

(note:amp size in pictures are proportional to ball size)

He went from being a natural progression of Jimmy Page meets Steve Hackett to Andy Summers meets the Edge. His last vestiges of guitar hero-style lead guitar work were on 1983's Signals. Since then, Lifeson became an accompanist. It's not like he doesn't have chops anymore — he simply chooses not to use them. That's the definition of ALD. If you see Rush live doing old material, he can still cut ripping solos on stuff like Freewill. He just chooses not to play that way on new music. He's become a big pussy. My prescribed treatment for ALD sufferers is call them a bunch of denigrating names like "big pussy" in hopes that they'd snap out of it someday. Unfortunately no one has yet.

songsmith · Post by **songsmith** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 3:28 pm

Wow, that is a pretty gay picture. I remember Thin Ice's guitarist, Scot Randall went through that phase... he cut his hair and wore blazers with the sleeves rolled up, and Keds, while the rest of us were glamming it up.
I have to admit, the little GK amp was pretty sweet. It was 100 solid-state watts into 2 8" or 10" spkrs. I worked with a guitarist at one of those Jaffa oldies shows who had one... it sat on a mic stand, had a nice tight clean sound, and was loud as f&*k for it's size. He had a small FX rack he fed it with, for light dirt and reverb mostly (oldies show), and I never forgot how focused and giggable it was. The older you get, the more you wish for a full-stack sound from something the size of a pack of cigarettes. Back in the day, however, we'd have carried guitar cabinets into a dive-bar all day long, just to make it look cool that night.--->JMS

metalchurch · Post by **metalchurch** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 5:06 pm

Very true Johnny!
I didn't make this up about Alex, I saw it online and copy/pasted the text, and uploaded the photos that were there.
I thought it was humorous anyway.

I think the OP of this article was more or less making fun of guys who are 'trendy' and go against their whole playing style for what's in style at the time.

I've never heard of ALD, I sure hope that I dont catch it.

Banned · Post by **Banned** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 5:25 pm

What recordings did Gary Moore fail to play his guitar with balls to the walls tone?

metalchurch · Post by **metalchurch** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 5:36 pm

Good point Joe.
Maybe he played smaller amps on stage or something?

songsmith · Post by **songsmith** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 6:05 pm

Eh, you can't please everybody. Maybe the writers bust on Gary Moore for going blues after being pretty metal in the early 80's. I personally think he kicked ass at both styles. And, yeah, he's got awesome tone. Listen to his Thin Lizzy stuff, or Still Got The Blues. So dimensional and woman-like. You gotta love that tone that sounds like a woman's voice.--->JMS

bassist_25 · Post by **bassist_25** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 6:39 pm

Funny stuff there, Joe.

Though if you want to get technical, I wonder if all of those Marshall cabs are even loaded. The "real" cab is probably backstage with the SM57 pointed at it.

Lifeson's still one of my favorite guitarists, though.

Collective Soul's one of my favorite bands from the '90s, but damn did they get metro later on in their career.

metalchurch · Post by **metalchurch** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 8:26 pm

bassist_25 wrote:Funny stuff there, Joe. Though if you want to get technical, I wonder if all of those Marshall cabs are even loaded. The "real" cab is probably backstage with the SM57 pointed at it.

Yeah, didn't Geddy Lee have washers and dryers set up on stage for this years' tour?
I am willing to bet that ALOT of guys arent using what they endorse.
I know that there's alot of players who endorse stuff that you never see them using or even holding for that matter, except for the advertisement itself.

Moore has a great tone, and so does Lifeson, so who's to really say otherwise?
When I saw Vivian Campbell on that list, it made me laugh, cause he is taking on an entirely different aproach to his playing style and sound than he did with Dio and Whitesnake.

I took this article very light heartedly, because most all players and bands go thru transition periods in their career, but what is undeniable is their skills. Sometimes the tone and overall sound changed, and we argue if it is for the better as music fans and critics, but in the end they still rock.
They have been the top players and idols of many for generations because they are arguably the best of the best.

Good points by you guys!

ps I love old Thin Lizzy stuff!

VENTGtr · Post by **VENTGtr** » Sun Nov 30, 2008 2:10 am

Joe,

Woah, woah, hey now. Back off of Alex. Alex is always great. ALWAYS,
MAN! To be honest...and go ahead, I can take it...PERSONALLY, I prefer
his playing from "Hemispheres" on up until, and this kind'a goes for all of
Rush, second favourite to only The Beatles, "Test For Echo" to the "older"
stuff. His more textural stuff was really cool his use of harmonics is
awesome.

ANYWAY, my friend, if you notice nowadays, he has 6-8 H&K stacks behind
him.

Ya, Geddy was goin' direct, but his techs said it looked empty in the backline.
SO, for a while he had washers and dryers goin' behind him, Rob said at one
point he had these big rotiserie chicken things, and most recently he had
the washers/dryers and a coupl'a big sandwhich vending machines, with the
selection things rotating.

Oh yeah...and the jacket, etc. It was the 80s.

metalchurch · Post by **metalchurch** » Sun Nov 30, 2008 4:22 am

Dave, I'm sorry. I really didn't mean anything by the post. Like I said I didn't write it, I only thought it was funny.
Please accept my apology. I consider you a good online friend and I wouldn't want to lose your friendship over a stupid post that I made.
Once again, I'm sorry.

pm sent.

Blue Reality · Post by **Blue Reality** » Sun Nov 30, 2008 4:45 am

I think it's the cash actually. Many of these guys make a shift in order to keep sales going and keep in touch with current trends. I talked to a guy who interviewd Clapton in the 90's and this guys was an old Cream/Bluesbreakers fan. He asked EC straight up about the shift in his approach to music and guitar. Old EC had gone Pop. EC looked at him and said that he enjoyed the music and the lifestyle = "cash" being a pop musician brought him. He made his statement early in his career and he felt no need to satisfy expectations other than his own.

I also remeber an interview with Dave Mustain and they asked him about success and the pressure to write one successful album after another. His reply was that once you made money, you felt and internal pressure to continue making the cash and not take a huge cut in pay. So there was a risk. He took a risk in making a statement with music and it paid off. But there was no gaurentee that making a statement of sorts with next album would be received like the first. So in the back of his mind he would question whether the material would sell and he knew he couldn't write just to sell albums. That would failure too.

They say staying on top is acutally harder than getting there in the first place and I think these shifts are all about staying in a descent cash stream...

MoonManTom · Post by **MoonManTom** » Sun Nov 30, 2008 12:03 pm

I know that there's alot of players who endorse stuff that you never see them using or even holding for that matter, except for the advertisement itself.

Alot of people know that I grew up loving Ace Frehley of Kiss, I wanted the Marshall Stacks he used, then whenhe left Kiss and was endorsed Laney I wanted them too! Turns out to this day, he always plugged into his Fender Twin Deluxe somewhere and the other amps were for Show!

Songsmith is right though, I would have carried a 100 Marshalls into the Hill Valley Hotel/William Penn Inn to look cool!

mistikalvalkrie · Post by **mistikalvalkrie** » Sun Nov 30, 2008 3:29 pm

yeah, but dude....it was the 80's....give the guy a break.
Just about everyone -other than those in metal bands- looked like pussies in the 80's....of couse,some of those in metal bands started dressing like Leather Daddies (a la Halford) so that wasn't really much better when you think about it.