In
Search of the 100 Best
Guitarists
Who is the Greatest Guitar
Player?
Not an easy
task. Narrowing down the list of
folks who've played the guitar to
the 100 best guitarists is, well,
challenging. So many people have
played the axe that it's near
impossible to come up with a list
of the very "best." It is
difficult to come up with a set
of criteria, to boot!
To
Narrow the List
So where do
we start? How about with the dawn
of the instrument's impact on the
American music and cultural
scene. We have to go back all the
way to Robert Johnson, probably
considered the first guitar hero.
Does that earn him a spot on the
list of the 100 best guitarists?
In my mind it does - originality
counts for a lot, and no one was
more original than Robert
Johnson.
He was one
of the original Delta Bluesmen.
The "Delta," of course, is the
Mississippi River Delta, which
empties out into the Gulf of
Mexico after traveling through
New Orleans. You could say the
Big Easy is the spiritual home of
blues and jazz music, and
therefore the spiritual home of
the guitar - at least as it's
known in America.
The list of
Delta Bluesmen that Johnson
influenced could in itself be the
list of the 100 best guitarists.
Muddy Waters. BB King. Howlin'
Wolf. Bo Diddley. And on and on
and on.
What's
great about that is you can see
the influence that Johnson had
still in evidence today. Muddy
Waters was the favorite bluesman
of Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck, both
members of the British Invasion
(through the Yardbirds, the Jeff
Beck group and, of course, Led
Zeppelin) of the 1960s and both
surefire members of the list of
100 best guitarists.
The
Famous Dave Grohl 0n the
100
Moving
further down the road we have
someone like Dave Grohl, an
accomplished singer, songwriter,
drummer and guitarist with
Nirvana and Foo Fighters, who
lists Jimmy Page as his biggest
influence.
Does Grohl
belong on the list of the 100
best guitarists? Probably not,
but it's a matter of personal
taste. What is important, though,
is that you can draw a straight
line from Johnson, to Waters, to
Page, to Grohl - who's still
making chart-topping music
today.
Back
several decades ago, Johnson was
referred to as "the Granddaddy of
Rock and Roll," and it was
fitting since, his heirs, Page,
Beck, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix
et al would be his grandsons.
In the 21st
century he might better be
referred to as "The Great
Granddaddy of Rock and Roll."
Either way, he's your starting
point for figuring the 100 best
guitarists of all time. See if
you can put your favorite guitar
player somewhere on the
list.
Going
Forward in Ranking the 100
Greatest
Guitarists
When naming
the 100 greatest guitarists, most
folks would suggest you start
with Jimi Hendrix and just go
from there. Hendrix was so good,
so distinct, so incendiary that
most people - critics, other
guitarists, etc. etc. - have a
hard time imagining ranking
anyone higher than
Jimi.
About
Guitar Player
Competitions
But Hendrix
wouldn't feel that way, because
he seemed to get it: Music is
not competition. How can you
rank people that aren't competing
with each other? Sure, you may
like Jimmy Page better than Eric
Clapton, but that doesn't make
the Clapton fan incorrect. It's
all just a matter of
opinion.
The
Who?
So then,
the idea of constructing a list
of the 100 greatest guitarists is
kind of a nonstarter. Everyone
has their favorites, everyone has
those guitarists they dislike.
Plus how do you work with someone
like Pete Townsend? Townsend was
without question an absolute
master of the instrument, and an
even better songwriter.
But then
something happened in the '80s.
Maybe he just got too old, maybe
the drugs went to his head a
little bit, maybe it was the
alcohol - "Who Are You" for
example, is a song he wrote about
waking up on a doorstep in the
Bowery after a night of
hedonistic excess.
Well,
Townsend was unquestionably
great. But then, seemingly
overnight, he became a parody of
himself, someone who wouldn't be
in shouting distance of the 100
greatest guitarists ever. Which
Townsend do you rate?
A New
Wave for the Best
Guitarists
Another
problem is rating the "new"
guitarists. Jack White is the
real standout, and his body of
work is reaching sufficient size
to say "yeah, he belongs on the
list." But what of the guitarist
from "Muse", who've released two
amazing albums but might not
produce a third?
Is that
enough work to guarantee him a
spot on the list? Is the list of
the 100 best guitarists supposed
to be based upon talent alone, or
does productivity come into
play?
The 100
Best Guitarists - Who are
They?
This is
absolutely a common and fun
subject for music lovers to
discuss. Everybody gets to have
an opinion on it, and since it's
all subjective, everyone gets to
be correct!
Favorite
Vs. Best Guitar
Player
Personally
my favorite guitarist of all time
is David Gilmour of Pink Floyd.
Others might turn their noses up
a bit at that, but Gilmour's
solos and fills move me in a way
that others haven't.
Notice,
though, I said "my favorite"
instead of "the greatest."
You've gotta realize that
subjectivity is the issue here.
But remember, your list of the
100 greatest guitarists is YOUR
favorite list, not anyone else's.
It's a personal thing. Let's
stop talking and start
playing.
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