As artists like Jeff Beck, Jimmy Bryant,
Ali Farka Touré, and Adrian Belew
have proven time and again over
the past few decades, the electric guitar is
capable of an amazing array of tones with
just a pick, fingers, a few pedals, and an
amplifier. Still, some artists feel this is not
enough. In fact, in the 1960s an entire
scene of avant-garde music was spawned by
off-the-wall British guitarists Keith Rowe
and Fred Frith, both of whom approached
the instrument with what has come to be
referred to as “extended techniques.” In
essence, this translates into using unorthodox
implements and processing to coax
strange, unheard-of new sounds from the
instrument. Rowe gained fame as a founder
of the free-improvisation AMM, while Frith
first gained notoriety for his work with
Henry Cow.
Much of the music created by players who
follow the avant-garde-ist philosophy may
sound like noise at first—and it is. But the
best of this music is organized around the
core principles of every other style: dynamics,
tension and release, and repeated themes.
However, practitioners of extended techniques
focus on pure sound rather than notes to create
an emotional impact with their music.
Perhaps the best way to approach players
like Rowe, Frith, and their acolytes is
to think in terms of visual art: “Regular”
guitar playing is analogous to a visual
artist painting a lifelike, realist portrait
of a person or a vase of flowers, while
extended-technique guitar playing is closer
to abstract and conceptual art—a world
where anything goes. For instance, Rowe
has been known to route the electronic
chatter from his Bluetooth mouse through
his guitar pickup.
Both Frith and Rowe deserve an entire
article about their vast and captivating catalog
of aural and performance arts, but here,
we’ll focus on some of the unique tools and
techniques used by them and fellow individualists
Hans Tammen, Roger Kleier, and
Stian Westerhus.