Arguably the Finest...

This morning I was testing out my tactical nuclear stereo, hooking it up to my cable radio connection. The maiden song to blare from it was Donna Summer's Hot Stuff. The long version.

This takes me back. The first time I heard the long version was walking through Little Havana in Miami (from the airport to the bus terminal) in 1980. And it stopped me because there was something I'd never heard in the song before - a guitar solo. And not just any guitar solo, a very good rock guitar solo. And every once in a while I hear the long version of the song and I wonder what anonymous studio musician performed it.

This morning I decided to find out.

The perpetrator, it turns out, was Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, a name that means much to Doobie Brothers fans, apparently, and which I recall from old Steely Dan liner notes. He has never done a solo album, but he has been a studio mainstay forever. He played much of the lead guitar on Can't Buy a Thrill, and apparently played a great solo on "Taking it to the Streets" when the Doobie Brothers performed on Saturday Night Live.

So what is this accomplished musician up to now? Oh, the usual, consulting with congress on missile defense, that sort of thing. Apparently there is a Republican rock band called Coalition of the Willing, which features him and also the Hungarian ambassador to the U.S. He has a few choice words for us on the relationship between rock and freedom.

I would have to guess that Baxter is the finest rock and roll guitarist to play a significant advisory roll for the U.S. government, and I'm therefore sorry he works for the other side.