When people talk about guitar heroes, they usually invoke names like Jimi Hendrix or Eddie Van Halen. While these were trailblazing musicians whose pyrotechnics inspired millions of teenage kids to pick up an instrument, they’re only part of the story.
Much of the groundwork for the guitar heroes of the 1960s and beyond was laid by musicians in the 1950s, some of whom came from jazz, blues, and country music backgrounds and were at the forefront of what would become rock guitar. They may not get the credit they deserve 70 years after the fact, but our favorite guitar heroes would be working at Waffle House today without them. Here are 12 that made it all happen.
Image Credit: Wikipedia.
1. Chuck Berry
It’s hard to imagine rock and roll guitar existing without Chuck Berry. Songs like ‘Maybellene,’ ‘Rock and Roll Music,’ and ‘Johnny B. Goode’ created the blueprint for it, and the artists he inspired included the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. Simply put, no Chuck Berry would mean no rock and roll.
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2. Bo Diddley
Musicians rarely get a specific beat named after them, but Bo Diddley was one of that select few. Primarily identified by his rectangular guitars, he influenced everyone, from British Invasion artists like the Animals to punk rock bands like the Clash. Even Buddy Holly, a pioneering 1950s guitar player in his own right, owes Bo Diddley a colossal debt.
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3. Peggy Jones
Bo Diddley may be more famous, but Peggy Jones was a trailblazer too. She played rhythm guitar in Bo Diddley’s band, leading her to be nicknamed “Lady Bo,” and she was also dubbed “Queen Mother of Guitar,” a distinction they’re not handing out to just anyone. She played on two of his best-known singles, “Hey! Bo Diddley” and “Road Runner.”
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4. Scotty Moore
Scotty Moore played alongside Elvis Presley, most famously turning out the guitar solo in ‘Jailhouse Rock.’ However, Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards told BBC News in 2016 that ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ did it for him, saying, “Everyone else wanted to be Elvis, I wanted to be Scotty.”
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5. Muddy Waters
Chicago bluesman Muddy Waters is regularly cited as the man who took the rural musical form and electrified it, and the music that he made with Chess Records in the 1950s more than holds up today. As far as his influence on rock and roll, the Rolling Stones named themselves after his song ‘Rollin’ Stone,’ and 1960s guitar heroes like Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton regularly cited him as a significant influence. If you listen to his music for even five seconds, it’s easy to see why.
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6. Sister Rosetta Tharpe
Although she got her start playing gospel music in the 1930s, Sister Rosetta Tharpe was so influential to such 1950s rock and rollers as Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis that she deserves to be on this list. Furthermore, she played a Gibson SG, the guitar of choice for Black Sabbath’s Tony Iommi and AC/DC’s Angus Young, so her influence through the decades is impossible to deny.
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7. Chet Atkins
Guitarist Chet Atkins was known as “The Country Gentleman,” and he mostly made a name for himself as a performer and producer of country music. However, that doesn’t mean that rock guitar players weren’t listening, and he was hugely influential on any rock guitarist with a little twang in their playing, whether it’s Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits, Steve Howe of Yes, or George Harrison of the Beatles.
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8. Les Paul
Les Paul spent much of the 1950s making music with his wife, Mary Ford, and if that were all he had done, he would still be worth a mention. However, aside from his stellar guitar playing, he also created the guitar that bears his name, and that’s the go-to instrument of almost any rock guitar icon you’d care to name, such as Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page, KISS’ Ace Frehley, and Guns N’ Roses’ Slash, to name just a few.
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9. Link Wray
Link Wray may not be a household name like some of his 1950s peers, but his effect on rock guitar puts him firmly on the list of people who made it what it is today. In 1958, he recorded an instrumental song called ‘Rumble,’ which was among the first to feature guitar distortion. Without that, bands like Metallica and pretty much any other that relies on distortion to provide their trademark grit would be seriously out of luck.
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10. Carl Perkins
Best known for the song ‘Blue Suede Shoes,’ Carl Perkins was a rockabilly and rock and roll pioneer whose influence is hard to overstate. So we’ll let Paul McCartney of the Beatles do it instead, since in 2007 he said quite bluntly, “If there were no Carl Perkins, there would be no Beatles.” A cursory glance at their set lists from their early days shows that they covered his songs more than those of almost any other artist.
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11. Eddie Cochran
Eddie Cochran only lived to be 21 years old, but like Buddy Holly, he accomplished a lot for rock and roll in a very short number of years. In addition to co-writing rock and roll staples like ‘Summertime Blues,’ ‘C’mon Everybody,’ and ‘Somethin’ Else,’ he was a multi-instrumentalist who also experimented with such new recording studio technology as overdubbing and multi-tracking. If that’s not enough, the Beatles’ Paul McCartney auditioned for John Lennon’s skiffle group, the Quarrymen, by playing Cochran’s “Twenty Flight Rock.” He got the gig.
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12. Duane Eddy
Duane Eddy pioneered twangy guitars, but not the kind of twang associated with country music. Instead, it was a hard rockabilly twang best personified by ‘Peter Gunn,’ from the soundtrack to the television show of the same name. His playing influenced everyone from surf rockers like the Ventures to more progressive players from the 1970s and 1980s, such as King Crimson’s Adrian Belew and Bill Nelson of Be-Bop Deluxe.
This article was produced and syndicated by MediaFeed.
Image Credit: Wikipedia.
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