PLEASE RECONSIDER TAB!

Long time subscriber here, since 2003! I just wanted to write and hope you reconsider your ‘no transcriptions’ stance. While I understand what you’re saying about tabs being available all over the net, most aren’t of the best quality. It’s really nice having a quality backing track to go with it as well. Maybe you’ll consider three or four tunes a year. Dig back into more jazz, more blues, more classic rock, etc. I saw another letter in Talkback where someone was requesting Long Cool Woman by The Hollies. That would be a great tab. On another note, I do have nearly 400 tunes in my back issues to learn, as well as tons of lessons, so I won’t be totally lost looking for new material, lol. One of my goals is to get through every Creative Rock lesson! Anyway, thanks for listening and keep putting out a great magazine. Rick Campbell With “400 tunes in your back issues” you’ve sort of answered your own question there, Rick. Joking aside, it’s not so much a ‘stance’ as a practicality. The costs of printing copyright tab skyrocketed to the point where it was simply not viable for us. The point about three or four a year is worth pondering, though. Of course then the trouble is, which three or four? Do we revisit the absolute classics – the Stairways, Hotels and Highways – or go more obscure with Shawn Lane, Holdsworth, Bill Frisell, Bebop Deluxe, Ollie Halsall; or perhaps those 60s pop bands like The Hollies (Tony Hicks is a great guitarist), The Easybeats (with Malcolm and Angus’s brother) or The Big Three (best ever Liverpool band as some would say). If I could bring one old GT feature back it would be A-Z Of Riffs – it was a brilliant column (Phil Hilborne’s) but would sadly cripple us financially. I will say that the big technique-theory pieces we’ve been running lately have really been going down well, so there will definitely be more of these.