HEVYDEVY FORUMS

Recently for a change I have been listening to Joe Satriani who is connected with

Steve Vai who is connected with

Devin Townsend


and I have come to conclusion that both of them are not even close to Dev's genius lol
Maybe it is the type of music but honestly Devin got something that makes him enormously better musician than Steve and Joe.

Oh wait maybe it is his awesome vocal? but again only his guitar style is so... so lovely, "simple" and yet so magnificent.


Does anyone else getting similar feeling?

You don't seem to understand the > symbol. It's like an alligator, and it's mouth always faces the greater of two compared objects.

Case in point: the alligator would rather have 4 apples than 2, so 4>2. Therefore, it should be Devin Townsend>Steve Vai>Joe Satriani.

Not that I agree. I'm not a big fan of quantifying artists like that.

djskrimp wrote:You don't seem to understand the > symbol. It's like an alligator, and it's mouth always faces the greater of two compared objects.

Case in point: the alligator would rather have 4 apples than 2, so 4>2. Therefore, it should be Devin Townsend>Steve Vai>Joe Satriani.

Not that I agree. I'm not a big fan of quantifying artists like that.

I concur with this post wholeheartedly - I was all set to argue with you until I realised you got your hungry signs back to front.

lol sorry for mistake I never knew about this >:D

Anyways, I know it is really hard to compare these artists but I just wonder if anyone else have same weird feeling that the Devin is far beyond them?


Maybe I get too much into his music and now I am not able to accept anything else lol...

I am also damn afraid that I will get bored if I will listen DT so much. I know it sound stupid but it already happened with Fear Factory, Opeth, Front Line Assembly and few more.

Thanks god DT is damn creative guy and he release quite many albums

tgchan wrote:Anyone else have same weird feeling that the Devin is far beyond them?


Maybe I get too much into his music and now I am not able to accept anything else lol...

That's why we're here, right

Simply put, Satriani is light years beyond Dev and Vai that much beyond Satch in terms of sheer skill on the instrument. These are objective things that can be measured. They can both play much more technically in pretty much all aspects than Dev can. Their respective ability to write music is completely unrelated and impossible to truly quantify as it's a subjective thing.

Fretburn wrote:Simply put, Satriani is light years beyond Dev and Vai that much beyond Satch in terms of sheer skill on the instrument. These are objective things that can be measured. They can both play much more technically in pretty much all aspects than Dev can. Their respective ability to write music is completely unrelated and impossible to truly quantify as it's a subjective thing.

So's your face.

Yeah, Dev's barely a guitar hero - plenty of stuff in the same key/scale/whatever (most of "alternate tunings" is just lowered Open C or something), same sweeps, lotsa powerchords and stuff. Nothing shocking about that, Dev's admitting it himself in one of these D'addario clips - something about doing the same stuff on the last few records and getting away with it.

I don't think about him as a top instrumentalist, more of a great frontman, vocalist, songwriter and generally guy able to put the shit together in excellent manner. Aside of that, he's a nerd instead of a cocky rockstar which is doubleplus awesome :>

I prefer spirituality and psychology on my records. My opinion on this matter should be obvious.

Naz wrote:I prefer spirituality and psychology on my records. My opinion on this matter should be obvious.

Based on that statement alone I would probably say Steve Vai, but I assume it's Devin since this is the hevydevy forum.

BrunoN wrote:Yeah, Dev's barely a guitar hero - plenty of stuff in the same key/scale/whatever (most of "alternate tunings" is just lowered Open C or something), same sweeps, lotsa powerchords and stuff. Nothing shocking about that, Dev's admitting it himself in one of these D'addario clips - something about doing the same stuff on the last few records and getting away with it.

I don't think about him as a top instrumentalist, more of a great frontman, vocalist, songwriter and generally guy able to put the shit together in excellent manner. Aside of that, he's a nerd instead of a cocky rockstar which is doubleplus awesome :>

Yes, but Dev's ZIltoid. And ZIltoid is the ultimate guitar hero.

existentialist wrote:

Naz wrote:I prefer spirituality and psychology on my records. My opinion on this matter should be obvious.

Based on that statement alone I would probably say Steve Vai, but I assume it's Devin since this is the hevydevy forum.

So many "who gives a shit?" ideas.

Between the three, you can't really compare styles unless you're 13 years old with a Strat-pack, or whatever you can buy for $150 at the shop, with older brothers that have tuned you into anything of the caliber. Vai has his moments, but he wouldn't be the first thing I'd tune into. Satch is a little closer. And to be honest, I probably owe both of those guys another run-through of my discographies. With Townsend, there's always been some sort of "connection" with the music that came easier, but I don't think I''d call it genius. I write a lot of shit that reminds me of Townsend, even before I caught on to it, and there's no fucking way either of it is "genius". I think it's simply a matter of "quit fucking thinking and just listen.". Townsend just makes sense. There's no thinking. There's just "doing".

Jeff Beck

game over.

Well let's be honest here. Satriani and Vai are legends to nearly every rock fan. How many standard rock fans are even aware of Devin Townsend? Shockingly few. That alone will tell you who is technically more "skilled".

But. I have never heard anyone play the instrument with as much passion as Dev. He puts himself into every. single. song. Truthfully if we are judging on skill then a computer wins, because no human can outplay a machine. It's sort of like playing kasparaov against Deep Blue. Kasparov was beaten soundly. But does that really matter?

If I can play guitar better than anyone else but can't write a single note then I'm just a copy. If i can't put passion into my music I'm just a robot. If I can play with skill (and yes Devin IS skilled) and put as much passion as Dev can into a single song, then I would take THAT over playing like Satriani or Eddie Van Halen ANY day.

Not to mention, very lead singers are also the lead guitarists as well. Just an aside if he focused soley on his guitar he'd be far better.

Can I toss Max Cavalera into the mix?