Guitarists Everyone Can Agree On

Frank Zappa used a solo to construct a song he named "The Secret Carlos Santana Chord Progression"... because Carlos always uses the same progression.

He's great but so limited. He fell in love with one thing and made a career out of it.

I agree he is great and all, but if you want to hear just how limited Santana is, just listen to his album with John McLaughlin. McLaughlin is on a different level entirely.
 
Thats true of more "great" musicians than you'd believe.

When I was a kid, I used to hang out at a record store and the owner used to sell me bootlegs of old concerts.

Jimi Hendrix was brutal live. Just awful.
The Doors sounds like every single weekend blues bands I've ever seen. Sloppy, messy.
Led Zeppelin, same thing. Awful.
One band who really impressed me from the tapes I heard was Black Sabbath. They were always tight and accurate with their tunes.

With Sabbath, the weak link was always Ozzy.

I think a lot of Jimi's problems came from the constant need to retune.
 
I agree he is great and all, but if you want to hear just how limited Santana is, just listen to his album with John McLaughlin. McLaughlin is on a different level entirely.

LOL. Isn't that pretty much true any time another guitarist plays w/ JM?
 


I know a lot of guitarists have huge respect for Shawn Lane. He's just a little too fast for me LOL. When I first heard this I thought it was fake then I found more videos of him and realized he was real.

Quite a loss.. RIP


Shawn Lane was obsessed with speed and nearly every single piece of music he ever made suffered because if it. He preferred to play really fast notes that sounded like shit, all for the sake of being "fast".
 
Pretty sure some of these guys wouldn't make the cut but these are a few i really enjoy listening to.

Ernest ranglin
joe pass
rory Gallagher
syn gates and Zack vengeance
Wes Montgomery
jason becker
Hendrix
knopfler
Ritchie valens
 
LOL. Isn't that pretty much true any time another guitarist plays w/ JM?

Though I love him, McLaughlin was absolutely outclassed by Paco and Al di Meola on their guitar trio albums.
He was third place by a long shot.
But against those two anyone would be outclassed.
 
Though I love him, McLaughlin was absolutely outclassed by Paco and Al di Meola on their guitar trio albums.
He was third place by a long shot.
But against those two anyone would be outclassed.


No way. Dimeola was an impostor and had no biz on that stage. And, JM, playing flamenco with a pick, ate Delucia alive.
 
Last edited:
No way. Dimeola was an impostor and had no biz on that stage. And, JM, playing flamenco with a pick, ate Delucia alive.

You are wrongly wrongful, sir.
That was back when though and I am happy to say John's fretting hand has caught up to his picking speed. Back then, you could hear him get short of ideas at the end of a run.
Agree to disagree with the stipulation that John belongs on the list?
I'll add that John's electric playing outclasses di Meola's.
 
Paco De Lucia and Andres Segovia.
 
Paco De Lucia and Andres Segovia.

Both have to be on the list.
No order:

-Paco de Lucia has been called the greatest guitarist in any idiom.
-Andres Segovia was a master of classical.
-John McLaughlin
-Django
-Frank Zappa
-Robert Fripp
-Jimi
 
You are wrongly wrongful, sir.
That was back when though and I am happy to say John's fretting hand has caught up to his picking speed. Back then, you could hear him get short of ideas at the end of a run.
Agree to disagree with the stipulation that John belongs on the list?
I'll add that John's electric playing outclasses di Meola's.


I didn't nominate John for the list. He doesn't belong on the list. He is esoteric and experimental.

BTW, I saw that act when they toured together. Dimeola got exposed. And, every guitarist and fan I have ever spoken to (dozens) about it said so. They also said JM blew Al and Paco away.

Listen to that live album with the 3 of them. Dimeola is an unflushed turd. He goes way out of key for an extended period of time and can't even find his way back. The fact that such horrendous playing by him made it onto that album is probably a hint as to how many of his clams were on the cutting room floor.
 
Why should you care? Only about 20 percent of the people posting in this thread understood what TS was posting about. The urge to throw out your own favorite guitarists is just overwhelming.

In retrospect the direction this thread took should have been highly predictable.

Also, LOLOLOLOLOL at Buckethead having mainstream appeal. The dude plays instrumental shred guitar while wearing a mask and a KFC bucket. He's the epitome of a musical curiosity lauded by guitar hipsters but unknown by anyone who doesn't play electric guitar.
 
Old bootlegs are brutal. And unfair to the artist who would never release a bootleg quality album.

Sound quality was good on most of the ones I had. Hendrix for example didn't bother to tune between songs, he'd be way out of tune with the bass.I had tapes of him forgetting words of songs and he'd just go "uhhh......... ha ha"

If people are paying to see you play, I think you have a responsibility to sound good, not just when some is videotaping for TV.
 
If people are paying to see you play, I think you have a responsibility to sound good, not just when some is videotaping for TV.
I agree completely, I've seen Metallica four times and every single time the band was amazing, James always knows how to get the crowd into it. Also saw Nine Inch Nails twice and soon will be seeing them a third time with Soundgarden and Trent Reznor and company put on one hell of a show.

I've seen a few bands live that were horrible and probably the worst was Deftones when they opened for Metallica during their Summer Sanitarium tour in 03. Chino Moreno rolled around on the stage the whole time and was mumbling through almost every song. Looked as if he was drunk or high during the gig, plus the rest of the band sounded like shit
 
Back
Top