Les Paul died yesterday at the age of 94. He was one of the biggest innovators in modern music having invented one of the two great guitar designs in the 1950s that have not been bettered since. So many people still want to play the LP custom that the invention will live on into the future.

Peter Green was the best electric guitar player of all time (that’s my view anyway) and I loved his sound and phrasing. His Gibson Les Paul (1959 model) was accidentally modified (he put the magnets back in upside down) and he discovered in the middle position he got an out-of-phase tone that honked so strongly that the mod remained. Unfortunately he took too much acid and had a disposition to mental illness and spent most of time since the 1970s in various states of ill health occasionally re-appearing to play again. Never regaining the dominance of the 1960s though. But once again he is playing again and this time he is sounding better.

On Monday I saw Jeff Beck at the Palais Theatre in Melbourne.  Here is what I thought. Last night (Saturday, January 31) I saw Leonard Cohen at an open air concert in a Hunter Valley vineyard. It is not often that you get to see two masters in one week. I gave last night’s concert a score of 8.5/10.

On Monday I was doing some work in Melbourne and took advantage of the location to see Jeff Beck at the old Palais Theatre in St Kilda on Monday night. I love the Palais and have seen some great things there. This was the first time I had seen Jeff Beck live and only the second time he has been to Australia. He is a masterful player of the instrument that has defined our generation of music. He played a white (could be cream) stratocaster through what looked liked a 50w single stack Marshall and another Fender blackface twin  amp (I wasn’t close enough to see which type). He use an octave divider and some overdrive (pedals were obscured behind foldback) but not much else.