It’s true, Eric is great, and he does his thing, and we love him for that. Same thing with players like Eddie Van Halen. As a kid I was firmly in the “Eddie Can Play Anything” camp, but as an adult you realize that you like these guys less because they’re all-poweful, and more because they sound like themselves.
Jazz players like Mike, no contest, in terms of the sheer variety of their vocabulary. That’s just not going to happen without all the work they do that goes into building that. If there’s a takeaway from this interview it’s that, if you want that kind of vocabulary, it’s not just divine inspiration. You need specific techniques for building it, pulling new and sometimes weird ideas out of ordinary stuff, and constantly expanding the boundaries of what you know.
The cool thing is, it’s also clear that you can keep adding those ideas your whole life. When I interviewed Albert Lee, he said he hadn’t “worked on anything in 40 years”. In Mike’s case, there’s probably not a day goes by he doesn’t try something new. Again, we love both players. But there’s something inspiring in knowing that journey doesn’t ever have to end.
