Who's your guitar daddy now?

Top flight musicians are like professional athletes in that on any given night they'll be good, real good. But on some special nights they'll be utterly fantastic. Tiger Woods doesn't win ever round of golf, Kobe doesn't score 81 every night and Clapton isn't God-like at every show. It's just the way it is.

Onhwy61,

You are right, BUT, Kobe has to face other people trying to stop him who are also good every game.

Musicians do not have others being paid also to impede what they do. Its mostly up to them.

The golf analogy might be a little better one. But even there, if Tiger doesn't have a good day, someone else does. Those who pay to watch still get their money's worth. If I drop a couple hundred to see Clapton or any other musician for that matter perform, I expect them to deliver. Otherwise, lower the price.

When I saw Clapton seemingly on auto pilot, it was at Staples Center in Los Angeles. I would think he'd have been on his "A" game for this show (and perhaps he was). The performance was extremely professional. I just thought it lacked spontaneity and soul.

My best guitar daddy experience live recently was seeing Dick Dale live in a very intimate venue and being right up front.

Despite his age qualifying as a guitar great grandaddy even, he was energized, spontaneous and seemed geneuinely happy to be there, even staying to chat with fans afterwards while sitting on stage. Needless to say , he smoked throughout the night on guitar, even breaking out into other genres besides his trademark "surf guitar" style. The best guitar concert ever for me. Worth 10X the $18 cost of admission.

Tvad, Clapton's commercial success is a two edged sword. The positives are obvious, but the downside has him trapped as a mid-60 year old man having to play what he played when he was in his 20s. Forty years of playing "Crossroads" and "Badge" has got to take it's toll. And if he tries something different, then his fans will probably abandon him. Think Miles Davis. Some purist never forgave him from going beyond the Shorter/Hancock quintet. He said he just couldn't play "My Funny Valentine" anymore. It was too emotional for him. You grow old and you evolve, but your fans always want something from and idealized past.

Eddie Van Halen once confessed that he couldn't currently play many of the guitar parts from the first few Van Halen albums. At the time he had a family and other interests and just wasn't playing guitar 10 to 12 hours everyday. It doesn't matter who you are, but nobody stays at their peak.