By Carey Henderson
I’ve been playing guitar for nearly 31 years. I started like many people: my parents bought me an inexpensive guitar, because they were smart enough to start this way to see if I’d stick with the instrument first, I took lessons (from Jason Harlow himself), and spent a lot of time driving my parents nearly out of their minds playing the same chords and riffs over and over until I began to find some proficiency.
I can still remember the moment when I knew, however, that I wanted to be a serious guitar player. My parents were on vacation somewhere. At the time, we had one of those giant satellite dishes, not these tiny DishTV ones you see remnants of now. I was still in the early stages, and I happened across Van Halen’s ‘Live Without a Net’ special the night that they were gone, and at the moment just before Eddie took his prolonged solo. Sammy noted that this was the time during the show where he got to kick back and drink a beer, and Eddie went to town. I was floored by his grinning self, in those ridiculous pants and that wife-beater tee, as he began to rip the sky from the ground in the way only Eddie can. I’d already been a fan of bands like Stryper, and of course Van Halen, Motley Crue, and I had discovered players like Steve Vai and Satriani. But I’d never seen anything like the spectacle of Eddie doing what he does best.
From that moment on, I was hooked and knew that I wanted to be able to do what Eddie could do.
In those early years, I was mostly into hard rock, hair-metal, and some thrash, as well as instrumental guitar music. I can remember riding with a friend at the time to the local mall any time we found out that a shred guitar player had been released on the inimitable Shrapnel Records. Marty Friedman, Vinnie Moore, Paul Gilbert, Tony McAlpine, and then one day I heard Micheal Lee Firkins. Firkins became very quickly my favorite of the lot, with his wild but precise use of a whammy bar to mimic slide guitar, and his obvious blues and country influences. I cut my teeth, so to speak, on these players. Some years later, I discovered Zakk Wylde, and then Stevie Ray Vaughan, and to this day both remain my two biggest influences.
As my proficiency with the instrument grew, even in my younger years, I could see my own limitations. I’ve never been any good with arpeggios. I could tap well, and within a Pentatonic scale, I could do two notes per string fast and with precision. In those early years, as well, I used a Floyd-Rose set up, and learned to work the whammy bar with some precision, though I never came close to achieving the skill of Michael Lee Firkins. One thing that I credit to being a good player today is coming to terms with my own limitations early on, and working within them, stretching when and where I could, but never pretending to be something that I wasn’t. I’ve always enjoyed serving the melodic sensibilities of a song anyway, so my limitations didn’t hinder me terribly when it came to making music that I enjoyed making, and music that other people seemed to enjoy listening to.
But the thing I credit most in terms of both being a good player and never losing my love of the instrument some 31 years later was learning quickly to command my own ego.
I find ego to be something like a drug: with the correct dosage, it can push you to become the best player you can be, but abused, it will derail progress, alienate you, and take all the joy out of playing in any situation other than by yourself. There are few things that can be as much fun as sharing the stage with other competent guitar players, and enjoying the back and forth as you serve the music and the moment. But when the ego is left unchecked, there is no hope of this joy.
I’ve played in live band situations since college, though not consistently. I’ve had years on end where I took breaks from it, only to find myself drawn back to it again because the shared experience of music is something that I enjoy. In my many years on many stages, I’ve seen the ego ruin the experience for many a guitar player (not to mention the band backing them, and often the audience!) I’ve had so many of them step on the stage with me and proceed to try and make the moment a competition, which for me steals all the potential fun from serving the songs and the moment. I’ve been off the stage and watched guitar players compete with each other from the perspective of the audience member, one cranking their amp louder, only to lead to the other player doing the same, until the entire thing became a spectacle of ego rather than enjoyable back and forth that can come from two competent players who respect one another.
I’ve always tried to keep my ego in check by competing with one person only: myself. I want to be the best player that I can be because I think that serves the music, and because it keeps out the toxic need to ‘show up’ other players. When I want to improve, I listen to my influences, and when I know my ego needs to be checked, I do the same. And these days, if any adult player begins to find their ego taking over, thinking that we are more special than is true, we only need to pull up YouTube. We can then see kids at ridiculously young ages who can already ‘shred our faces.’ We can also watch consummate players like Eric Gales, Andy Timmons, Joel Hoekstra, and a host more, who all respect one another and share a stage with respect, and learn from their example. I find doing this to be a marvelous tool in making certain my ego is being administered at the correct dose.
Of course, there are always those players who derive a sinister joy from wanting to show up other players, and nothing can be done about or for them, as this is just the human condition. But most genuine musicians want to serve the music and not destroy others. Some have this quality early on in their journeys, and some find this as they age, realizing with time and the wisdom of growing older that an unchecked ego is a zero-sum game. Like the habit of abusing a drug, the ruinous monster of an unchecked ego can never be satisfied, only satiated moment to moment in a never ending cycle.
Carey Henderson is the lead guitar player for The Michael James band and one of three guitar players in the band Reagan and The Advisors.
He can be found on Facebook and can be emailed at carey.henderson@gmail.com