Friday, December 07, 2007

The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time : Rolling Stone

UPDATE: My Favorite Musicians Who Happen To Play Guitar

What? How did I miss this and why is Clapton #4 and SRV #7? Are Rolling Stones fans high? Wait, don't answer. Of course they are!

But they should be smarter than this list indicates.

1Jimi Hendrix
2 Duane Allman of the Allman Brothers Band
3 B.B. King
4 Eric Clapton
5 Robert Johnson
6 Chuck Berry
7 Stevie Ray Vaughan
8 Ry Cooder
9 Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin
10 Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones
11Kirk Hammett of Metallica
12 Kurt Cobain of Nirvana
13 Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead
14 Jeff Beck
15 Carlos Santana
16 Johnny Ramone of the Ramones
17 Jack White of the White Stripes
18 John Frusciante of the Red Hot Chili Peppers
19 Richard Thompson
20 James Burton
21 George Harrison
22 Mike Bloomfield
23 Warren Haynes
24 The Edge of U2
25 Freddy King
26 Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave
27 Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits
28 Stephen Stills
29 Ron Asheton of the Stooges
30 Buddy Guy

Eddie Van Halen is #70. Shameful.

The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time : Rolling Stone
My Favorite Musicians Who Happen To Play Guitar

22 comments:

Tony H. said...

Ah. I guess they're not grading skill. They should have named it, "Most popular dudes who can play the guitar." Kurt Cobain? Cmon. Where's Joe Satriani?

Most of the *best* guitarists aren't well known outside of the music world, because the bands they are in never found mainstream success.

billspaced said...

EXACTLY!

Alternate title: "Most popular dudes who can hold a guitar."

Anonymous said...

What a piss poor endorsement for subscribing to Rolling Stones magazine that was.



Angus Yound #96? behind Joan Jett?



Randy Rhoads #85, Pink Floyd's David Gilmore #82, Johnny Winter #74 & Eddie Van Halen #70 behind such notables as Frank Zappa, Lou Reed, Jerry Garcia and Johnny Ramone????



Who the hell comprised this list? Some teenage kid with the help of his black great grampa it looks like. I never heard of half of them.



WHERE IN THE HELL IS:



Gary Richrath of REO Speedwagon

Ted Nugent

Joe Walsh

Tom Scholz of Boston (see video below, watch the whole thing, it gets interesting later)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK5QSIRLLNA&feature=related

George Thorogood
Neal Schon of Journey
Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top
Jonny Lang

Peter Frampton

Kenny Wayne Sheppard

Roy Clark of Hee Haw for Christ Sake!!!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

What a piss poor endorsement for subscribing to Rolling Stones magazine that was.

Angus Yound #96? behind Joan Jett?

Randy Rhoads #85, Pink Floyd's David Gilmore #82, Johnny Winter #74 & Eddie Van Halen #70 behind such notables as Frank Zappa, Lou Reed, Jerry Garcia and Johnny Ramone????

Who the hell comprised this list? Some teenage kid with the help of his black great grampa it looks like. I never heard of half of them.

WHERE IN THE HELL IS:

Gary Richrath of REO Speedwagon
Ted Nugent
Joe Walsh
Tom Scholz of Boston
George Thorogood
Neal Schon of Journey
Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top
Jonny Lang
Peter Frampton
Kenny Wayne Sheppard
Roy Clark of Hee Haw for Christ Sake!!!!!!!!

billspaced said...

@anonymous:

EXACTLY!!! Perhaps the shittiest list of all time.

Anonymous said...

jimi hendrix first place???
why???????
angus yong 97????
the most fucked list of all times.

Anonymous said...

wtf is wrong with this list, they got zappa at like 47..... half of the people on this list couldn't play his songs even after months of practice.

Anonymous said...

pkyeah it is pretty fucked up my friend has a magazine where there is another list its alot better cant remember all names of course but i remember eddie is 1#, jimmy is 2# dont know 3# angus is 4# cant remember much more tom marello is the same um the slipknot guitarists are number 98# for james root and mick tompson is 97# like this list alot better damn rolling stones fuck them

Anonymous said...

Who in the hell wrote this. EVH 70? Angus Young 96? how in the hell do you place behind Joan Jett? Randy Rhoads 85? All of them totally rape johnnny ramone and kurt ko fucking bain

billspaced said...

I totally fuc#(*$ agree!

Anonymous said...

Theres no Slash on that list. I would place him up there in the top 100. For his style, his precision and the great riff's and solo's he has done, which just stick in your head. He may not have the speed of other guitarists but he certainly deserves a mention. And i don't care if you hate Sweet Child O' Mine :P

Anonymous said...

where da hell is slash??!! he's gotta be 1 of the top 10

billspaced said...

Slash should be on the list. I'm thinking about putting together my own list of the greatest guitarists of all time, but I'll need help from you, my readers.

So, feel free to send me YOUR list and I'll consider them in conjunction with the list that's currently just in my head.

Here are a few names that may appear on my list, in NO PARTICULAR ORDER:

Stevie Ray Vaughan, Eric Clapton, Eddie Van Halen, Slash, Eric Johnson, Joe Satriani, Chuck Berry (for his influence, mostly), Jimmie Hendrix, some speed metal dudes, Mark Knopfler (spelling?), Chet Atkins (don't laugh), others.

Anonymous said...

I agree with everyone. Other notables that I would like to add are Paul Gilbert - who's speed and precision is just plain amazing, Marty Friedman - lovely mix of genres in his solo stuff...

Anonymous said...

the fact that kurt cobain is 12 and david gilmour is 82 just shows how ridiculously stupid this fucking list is. Also there should not even be a list like this considering every guitar player has a different style and each guitar player can do something that other guitar players can not do. you cant compare most of these guys enough to accurately say who is better than who. Fuck you rolling stone magazine. why dont you put fucking johnny depp or brangelina on your damn cover.

billspaced said...

OMG, that's a great comment!!! Email me billspaced@rantsnreviews.com because I want to channel all that hostility into a recurring Rant!

Anonymous said...

I have to agree that you cant compare most great guitarists with each other and obviously Rolling Stone hasn't considered that. Maybe list them by genre (or however you spell that). Billspaced if you are still making a list, take Jimmy Page and Herman Le (although new) into consideration.

Anonymous said...

HOW THE FUCK IS JACK WHITE 17 rolling stones should commit seppuku

Anonymous said...

Ummm
Paul Gilbert, Joe Satriani, John Petrucci, Vai, Yngwie, Slash all should be up there... that list is pretty wack

Anonymous said...

There list sucks balls, but I would just like to say before what I'm about to say is I love Guns N Roses. But Slash is not one of the Top 10 guitarists. Hes good but not extremely good. Others on this list shouldn't be that low like Johny Ramone, but Jimi Hendrix is very good my friend. Many others should have been on this list such as Joe Walsh and Billy Gibson, and Rory Gallagher. This magazine needs to look past 40 years ago. Oh and 1 more comment, as much as I love Van Halen, Frank Zappa is a hell of a lot better than Eddie Van Halen.

Anonymous said...

Question...where's Yngwie Malmsteen....where's Joe Satch.....where's Eric Johnson......and WHERE THE FUCK IS ULI JON ROTH!!!!???
why the fuck is Jack White and Kurt Co(caine) even on the damned list...they couldn't lick the sheep shit off of Randy Rhoads' boot much less even THINK of touching a single guitar string
FUCK ROLLING STONE Mgz!!

Dughy said...

I'm with ya billspaced and I ain't laughing one fucking bit. Chet Atkins? Joe Satriani? Eric Johnson? Who the fuck dreams this shit up? This "list" is a fucking joke!