geez, forget the guitar - check out the bass work on this by Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Npy3DlV98yM

#1 bassist, sounds like a new thread to me.

Mingus is dead, long live Mingus.

Alvin Lee

Jeff Beck

I'll see your Mingus and raise you one Ray Brown;)

Wow, hit the crack pipe much?

I'll re-raise with Paul Chambers

While I love Angus Young for what he is, no one has ever called him a serious shredder or innovative guitar legend. I think Page is light years ahead of Angus in his writing and creativity. I've only seen Angus play live once and he played very well. Though I could play well at that level when I only had three years under my belt. Their music is not in the least bit technically challenging. And I was one of those Van Halen disciples who sat down and learned every song note for note and then thought I had accomplished something. When I go see EVH live nowadays, he still blows me away completely. It's one thing to sit home and play along with the tape and quite another to do it live with a band and make it sound flawless every time. I've seen EVH and Eric Johnson live many times and they often jazz up even their already shredding guitar solos. I've seen them have off nights before, but they are usually at 110%.

You see...First you must understand that Jimi Hendrix took you on a "Trip" and he tried to "Blow Your Mind"...Remember that saying???

Jimi F'd up a lot of people that dropped a little acid or whatever and "dared" to sit down, put the Koss earphones on, turn on the "Blacklight" that hit all the posters in the room and put Jimi Hendrix on the stereo......

Ya kinda had to experience Jimi at that time and space of the 60's and early 70's.

in all seriousity.... Danny Gatton was one of the most amazing guitarists ever.
I was late in getting into him... I had heard of him, but never heard him... the morning after
his suicide in 94, im driving and flipping around and heard some amazing playing on the PBS station... turned out it was a tribute to Danny Gatton... no one played the Tele like him. His death is a tragic loss, not only the loss of his talent...but the way things are today...wide open with the internet both creating and celebrating legends and heros, Gatton would have been larger than life, and probably at the top of his game in popularity. As it is we only have these clips and a few records to listen to and appreciate.

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Jack Bruce

Yes, Danny Gatton did some great stuff...I assume you've heard his stuff with Robert Gordon singing?

Rick, I guess we are at guitar idol odds then. I've never liked those 'guitar magazine' guys. Ever. I'll take 3 chord Johnny Ramone over Steve Vai.

3 of my favorites lately = Billy Zoom, Phil Manzanera, and Vincent McAllister. Oh, and the guy from the Sensational Alex Harvey Band, but I can't remember his name...


and Mick Ronson. I've got a good live 78 bootleg of the Hunter/Ronson band that rocks.

He does it in front of people in bars/clubs with a band, not as much now as 30 years ago, but musicians are flakes.

The reason I mention Angus and Jimmie Page together, is because they both play sloppy as all get out.

When he is just playing, my brother really reminds me of David Gilmour, with respect to style.

Maybe I missed him in the discussion but how about some love for Eric Johnson?

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EJ is truly one of the greats.

I re-re-raise with Tal Wilkenfeld!

posted this in the random videos thread but it belongs here too, very impressive.

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Junior Brown, just a good ole country boy, hank Williams style, but he can play. He used to be a regular at crazy Horse before they tore it down.
Here he is doing a little rock and roll medley. Can you imagine Hank Williams doing Jimmie Hendrix?
His 10 minute surf medley is amazing too.

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yeah in that the early BBC Sessions, he was a lot more focused and playing great. If you check out the unaccompanied live solo "Black Mountain Side", he is very clean and plays technically pretty well....also his solos were tight all around.

My take on Page is that he probably didnt sit around and practice much... unless necessary to pull off a song well in the studio...he used the guitar for its sonic properties and composing was much more interested in what he could get out of it in the studio... that having been said there are some great concert footage later on such as the Knebworth shows where he is absolutely great... and he has been quoted as saying he takes pride in performing live well... the 73 madison sq. shows really hurt his rep cause they were bad and showed up in TSRTS movie.

Sorry, there is just no excuse for sloppy playing when you do it professionally for gazillions of dollars and have a guitar in your hands for several hours every day. Even when I go a few months without playing, I can usually get back up to speed in a few hours. For someone whose job it is to record and perform live, I don't want to hear about experimenting or writing or all that. You should play well, period. Even if you don't sit down and practice all the time, just the fact that you're always recording or performing must have some improvement effect on your playing. I know, when I was playing in college, I rarely had the time to sit down and learn new difficult stuff or push myself to the next level. But between gigs and rehearsals, even playing the same stuff over and over, I got pretty polished at it. We all know Page CAN play well live, which irritates me even more that he doesn't do it consistently.

chill. I wasnt making excuses for him...for the most part I agree with you (especially the part about the more you play live, you shouldnt be sloppy)...but he IS Jimmy Page...and we are not. :p

Can't disagree with you there.

Page IS the riff master.

Funny how the "technicians" always seem to get down on Page. Armchair quarterbacking at its finest. Bottom line is, Page was one of the most entertaining guitarists I have ever seen, and I saw him several times. Yeah, I love watching a technical master strut his stuff and never miss a note; that can be very entertaining as well. Sometimes, however, in a rather antisceptic sort of fashion. Page will never be accused of that...

I think one of the things that people overlook with Page. He is a brilliant composer. Even John Paul Jones who is widely regarded as an arranger and composer would marvel at some of the progressions and changes that Page would come up with. A lot of the stuff theoretically should not work but Page always pulls it off.

Dick Dale

no way is there 1 single best. there can only be favorites. music is subjective. its not like car racing that has an objective standard..you either win the most or you dont etc..

my favs would be:

David Gilmour
Syd Barrett
Grant Green
Kenny Burrell
Jerry Garcia
Tony Iommi
Bob Marley
Muddy Waters
Doc Watson
Bo Diddley
Robby Krieger
John Lee Hooker
Jimi Hendrix
Dick Dale
Eddie Cochran
George Harrison
Mike Campbell
Jimmy Page
Paul Weller
Duane Allman
Mississippi John Hurt

I suppose this list could go on for a long time

Re: Jimmy Page, I love the stuff he did with Zep and listened to it a lot back in the day.

I'm not making excuses nor do I know anything about his personal lifestyle...

However he is a rock star and those types have been known to over indulge if you know what I mean and that may have contributed to some of his sloppy playing.

I think if you look hard enough you can probably find footage of most great musicians playing badly. I love Hendrix too... but I have seen some pretty bad film of him.

Huh? I've seen him play live twice, both times in the early 80's. First time wasn't all that bad, figured we just caught him on a bad night. Second time i wanted my money back.
He played as fast as he could, ignoring the beat from the drummer and bassist, as if he was pretending to be a punk rocker or something.
I could have played as good as he did and I sucked. He can't hold a candle to Nokie Edwards IMHO.

I did get to play one of his guitars once, actually it was a custom left-handed ventures signature guitar made to order for him but he never payed for it or picked it up so the ventures were trying to sell it at NAMM.

I remember when I was in college in the early 90s, my roommate was a lead singer in a hair-metal type band. This was in the era when hair metal was becoming passe...and Grunge had moved in to replace it in the popular music scene...but my roommate was still into that Warrant/White Lion/Winger band thing and his lead guitarist was this Yngwie Malmsteen clone... the kid could play but he was all chops and technique...

Anyway "Heartbreaker" was on the radio in our apt. once, and Chris my roommate goes "man...listen to that crap, that is total shi- who would put such a sloppy solo on a record....the guy plays like he has 2 mittens on"

After we graduated I saw him 4 or 5 years later as I was producing a demo for his band in the studio where I was working. He was now into grunge...and loved Zeppelin and thought that Page was GOD songwriter and played with a ton of soul.

so opinion is a matter of perspective & experience sometime...

Some of my favorites...but I'm no musician, just a listener..

Chuck Berry
Jeff Beck
Duane Eddy
Micheal Bloomfield (paul Butterfield Blues Band)
Eric Clapton
Scotty Moore (Elvis)

I agree. There can be no best. That's relative.

Favs:

Clapton - I've been a fan since Cream esp the blues stuff
Hendrix - ohhhhhhhh, my chem days
John Lee - always
Muddy - always
Knofler

Oh yeah & Mississippi John Hurt WAS good! . . .

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Ian

This was sent to me in an e-mail. We could see a whole new era in guitar solos. Th Moog Guitar..http://blog.wired.com/music/2008/06/moog-unveils-ba.html

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thats cool craigster...i just cant say im a fan of those sounds very much

As a listener, I agree. But then I'm an old goat, prefer the sound of musicians using instruments to make music...computers can keep a very accurate beat...BUT...

only one

Jimi Hendrix....

Plus > he was a paratrooper [101 ABN DIV]

Since I can´t see them mentioned so far:

John Scofield

Cornell Dupree

I have Scofield's Pick Hits with Dennis Chambers and Gary Grainger. Unreal band.

jimi is the man. "Drivin South" - live BBC sessions pretty much says it all

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I really like Nokie Edwards too. I just didn't think anyone else here would know who he was. Of course for drums you simply can't beat the late great Mel Taylor.