Search - Joe Walsh - Instructional DVD for Guitar on DVD

Extremely Basic, but Entertaining

J. A. Crabb | Nashville, TN USA | 02/22/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This instructional video was originally released in 1992, two years before Joe Walsh went sober. It is painfully obvious in this video that he is slightly inebriated, which makes for an entertaining 47 minutes. My only complaint is the video consists of very very basic guitar instruction, spending far too much time on guitar setup and intonation. The only real insight one can digest is Joe's suggestions for different guitar tunings for slide guitar play. In between the setup and lesson segments we are treated to Joe Walsh playing snippets of his hits live with his band. A little talkbox performance but no lessons on this I am afraid. It would have been nice if an advanced video had been released in the series, but this is all we have for now. Joe keeps you entertained through this with all his antics, it is worth one or two viewings. Buy it used if you can."

Nice enough, but not terrific.

Mark Hiatt | Lincoln, NE USA, where Lindbergh learned to fly. | 04/03/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I thought this was very interesting, watching Joe Smoker-Player Walsh stringing a guitar, and discussing how he winds the strings so they stay in tune. It's widely known that Walsh spent much of the 1970s and 1980s as an amateur pharmacist, so maybe we shouldn't put much stock in what he says about truss rods, and setting things up, but I sure learned a lot. Cleaning pots? Monkeying with pickups? This was all a bonus that I wasn't expecting. I figured the whole DVD would be alternate tunings, bottleneck slide techniques, counting and such. But there is a whole lot more than that.

I agree with the other reviewers who say much of the material is pretty basic. Playing close to the bridge or close to the neck? Sure, that's stuff you (should) learn wearing out your first set of strings. But, if you do not know it, it's all worthwhile.

Maybe one of the best lessons, though, especially for beginning guitarists, is watching the pre-sober Walsh negotiate such difficult tasks as sitting on a guitar stool. It makes you wonder what we all may have missed out on, "we" including even Joe himself.

I enjoyed this. But I come at it from the perspective of someone fifty years old, who was pretty good back in high school and admittedly, Joe Walsh was one of my heroes. I'm coming back to guitar now from an absence of almost thirty years. I knew I would never again be good enough for Gibsons, so I bought an Epiphone Les Paul Custom and an Epiphone Dot. I long-ago put away any dreams of going on the road. So for $10 out of the bargain bin I learned quite a few things and came away happy. I wish there had been more about soloing, more "how I wrote" my favorites and maybe some backing tracks we could play along to. But seriously, for what it is, this was very worthwhile for me and I hope you'll like it as much as I did."

Well, it has it's good points

M. Hyght | San Antonio, TX | 11/27/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I love Joe Walsh, but good Lord the guy seems to be "out there." He may be fooling us all though.
I bought this video for the truss rod/intonation info, and though that's not as detailed as I'd hoped, it's the best I've seen so far on these types of DVD's. What's frustrating is Joe demonstrates how he does it (in his own semi-understandable manner of communicating) while his clearly speaking guitar tech stands back and watches. Let the tech speak! :-)
Oh well, there were some good performance cues about alternate tuning.
I agree with the first post, a bit about the talk box would have been a HUGE bonus for this DVD. But, it's still ok.
Just don't pay more than 15 bucks for it."