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This week marked the 55th anniversary of the death of a man whose name often comes up when the greatest guitarists of all time are discussed: Jimi Hendrix.
Just as that initial burst of British brilliance threatened to turn the original rock scene into a club exclusive to the South-East of England (Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton, David Gilmour, Peter Green, Peter Frampton, Pete Townshend, Keith Richards, Robin Trower, Ritchie Blackmore, Richard Thompson and Danny Kirwan are all from London or the Home Counties), along came Hendrix, setting fire to everything – both literally and metaphorically – and terrifying Clapton.
But is Hendrix the greatest ever? A couple of years ago, our colleagues at Guitar World gave their readers a shortlist of 250 guitarists and assembled a final list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time from the votes that followed. The winner? Another South-East Englander, Queen‘s Brian May.
Is May the greatest ever? He would tell you it’s not a competition, that everyone’s playing is different, that you can’t rank people. And he’s right, of course, but that’s not much fun.
Hendrix wasn’t the only game-changer. Tony Iommi somehow invented an entire genre and several subsequent sub-genres. Eddie Van Halen lit another fuse, ushering in the era of shred: the speed merchants, the finger tappers and the whammy warriors. Even today, there are YouTubers doing things with six strings that no one else has done before.
The choices appear to be almost infinite. Steve Vai. Steve Howe. Steve Hackett. Steve Lukather. Steve Morse. Steve Stevens. Steve Jones. Steve Clark. Steve Miller. Steve Rothery. Steven Wilson. And that’s just some of the available Steves.
Terry Kath. Angus Young. Kurt Cobain. Derek Trucks. Nancy Wilson. Orianthi. James Hetfield. Michael Schenker. Rudolf Schenker. Alex Lifeson. Frank Marino. Gary Moore. Bonnie Raitt. Robert Fripp. There are too many names to list, so we’ll stop.
Who’s your pick? Let us know in the comments below.
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