Why is Hendrix so revered amongst guitarists?

Heartfeltdawn

There are a lot of people out there with technique who can play. In many cases it becomes an exhibition of their technique first, music second. Stuff like Guthrie Govan and Bonamassa for instance leaves me utterly cold. Hendrix could play with the best of them, was a fantastic showman, and the dude could write as well as he played. Sure, there are people who could play better out there but it's the whole package with him. 

One Hendrix = a million Klon playing snoozeblues players. 

Heartfeltdawn

Oh, fuck it. With Hendrix, the techniques and ability on display never overpower a song. Melding serious songwriting with serious playing is rare. 

ICBM

koneguitarist said:

Listening to all along the watchtower, I would say that's the definitive version by Hendrix. But his guitar playing is fairly standard stuff even for the time, used the new effects well etc. But it's also still melodic playing.

I actually think it's one of his less radical pieces because he almost uses it as a demo to show a little example of each of the effects he has - that's not to put it down in any way, and it's still one of my favourite Hendrix tracks, but it's quite conventional and safe by his standards - almost too polished. It's the more abstract and extreme sonic soundscapes which really show what he can do, even if at first they can sound a bit like noise.

Megii

DrJazzTap

When I first started playing, I thought "have to check out Hendrix" it seemed that he was constantly in the guitar magazines (well nothing's changed).
I thought he was a good guitarist, better than Cream era Clapton. I liked the songs. The Jimi Blues album is my favourite album of his. The showman ship routine was as we all know was partly stolen from T bone walker. And basically a lot of guys did that sort of thing. Hendrix grew to despise it and just wanted to be taken seriously for his music.
I think he's so revered for a number of reasons. He was one of, if not the first african american rock star. A huge role model in that regard. He had a very unique appearance. His songs displayed numerous influences, and he also had a sensitive side to his songs. Which I imagine the ladies loved.

Ultimately he burned very bright and very quickly. His life ended with lots of unanswered questions and the big "what if?" He also died very young in murky circumstances.
And I'm not comparing the two, but in ten years time we will be going through an Amy Winehouse resurgence. Purely for the short successful career she had..... And the drugs

EricTheWeary

He is an icon. He is the person in history most associated with the electric guitar. He is what the man on the Clapham omnibus thinks about when you say guitar hero. Regardless of what he did anyone who has picked up an electric guitar since the early seventies is linked with him in some way, even if it's just a drunk at a gig shouting Oy Hendrix st you post solo.

If I play x7678x ( God, hope I've got that right!) that's the Hendrix chord. He owns a chord shape FFS!

Sure there were tuneless jams but there were psychedelic experiments, there was poetry, there was achingly good straight blues, there was funk rock, he shagged more women on an average week than most of us will do in a lifetime, he was witty and intelligent, he rose above a difficult background, he inspired others and continues to do so.

I think you could criticize Hendrix for being little more than the sum of his influences. He stole from Little Richard, T Bone Walker, Albert King, Guitar Slim , Wes Montgomery and many, many others. To some extent he was taking Chitlin circuit showmanship and groove and selling it to an audience that was unfamiliar and willing to be dazzled by it. But, those influences were out there waiting to be put together and no one else did, even if the Guys, Claptons and Stills got some of it they weren't the whole package.

And all this in such a few years.

I was a very young child when Hendrix was at his peak and I wouldn't describe myself as a fan. But reverence is about the right word.

Of course the most important electric guitarist ever was T Bone Walker but only me and Duke Robbilard agree on that ...

koneguitarist

Skarloey said:

Influenced other country players. Some influence in other genres.

I know the story of JB using an unwound 3d that influenced British rockers.

But MORE influential than Jimi? All great players undeniably, but he laid down the grammar of modern rock guitar (bar later advances like tapping) and he had a bigger wider cultural influence.

Country music is not everyone's cup of tea, and I am first to admit not the most exciting music to listen to at times either.

Never the less, it's absolutely huge, Merle Travis developed and defined a style of playing, now known solely as "Travis picking", no effects just plain top quality guitar work that even now 60-70 years later is hard to emulate. Songwriting was right up there too, with bigger hits than Hendrix. 

Chet Atkins is one of the most influential guitarists the world has known, add to that his producing and A&R work for RCA including Elvis Presley's first RCA sessions, even playing on Heartbreak hotel and others. Influencing countless guitarists in all fields of music.

But the point is Hendrix, good player of a time, when new FX were being invented and like the Beatles was in right place at right time. After listening to quite a few songs tonight I still think the best stuff he did was the quiet laid back stuff like Little wing, Hey Joe, and the Wind cries Mary.

I think his influence was far less, than suggested but it's popular to say he was the greatest , same as the Beatles as it was a moment in time when everything was still new and being explored.

If you listen to some of the stuff he did with Isley brothers and Little Richard, it's fairly bland and innocuous, not indicative of what was to come, which only happened after he came to UK and seen Clapton, Beck and the like.

 Remember it was Big Jim Sullivan (another UK guitarist)who was one of the first to use FX such  as Wah wah's on record.

koneguitarist

EricTheWeary said:

He is an icon. He is the person in history most associated with the electric guitar. He is what the man on the Clapham omnibus thinks about when you say guitar hero. Regardless of what he did anyone who has picked up an electric guitar since the early seventies is linked with him in some way, even if it's just a drunk at a gig shouting Oy Hendrix st you post solo.

If I play x7678x ( God, hope I've got that right!) that's the Hendrix chord. He owns a chord shape FFS!

Sure there were tuneless jams but there were psychedelic experiments, there was poetry, there was achingly good straight blues, there was funk rock, he shagged more women on an average week than most of us will do in a lifetime, he was witty and intelligent, he rose above a difficult background, he inspired others and continues to do so.

I think you could criticize Hendrix for being little more than the sum of his influences. He stole from Little Richard, T Bone Walker, Albert King, Guitar Slim , Wes Montgomery and many, many others. To some extent he was taking Chitlin circuit showmanship and groove and selling it to an audience that was unfamiliar and willing to be dazzled by it. But, those influences were out there waiting to be put together and no one else did, even if the Guys, Claptons and Stills got some of it they weren't the whole package.

And all this in such a few years.

I was a very young child when Hendrix was at his peak and I wouldn't describe myself as a fan. But reverence is about the right word.

Of course the most important BLUES guitarist ever was T Bone Walker but only me Kone and Duke Robbilard agree on that ...

Fixed

Lew

Have you even heard the guitar in All Along The Watchtower? It's so damn perfect to the song in every way. There's nothing standard about it.Hearing Voodoo Child for the first time was like having a lightning bolt savage my body. Nothing was the same after. Oh c'mon, the best guitarists in country? What nonsense. Most nauseating, perhaps.  You seem to be quite fixated on his effects. Tell me what did he use prominently? Fuzzface, wah, univibe. What else?

ToneControl

He was a gifted musician, and wrote some good music

Personally I can't tolerate any of the recorded performances I have seen, comic circus-showmanship, a frequently out of tune guitar, and sloppy playing a lot of the time

Regardless of all the clichéd statements about his brief career, as if someone cannot be good for long without being doomed in some way, I have no doubt he would have left a long legacy of far more valuable blues/jazz/rock that would match any. I don't think he had even got started

As it is, I can only stand to listen to recently compiled anthologies, because the old LPs are too corny or dated, much more so than Cream's output of the time. Ultimately, like most top notch guitarists from any era, his song writing did not match his virtuosity - why should anyone expect any magnificent player to also be a top-notch writer? Jeff Beck at least has realised that he should mostly do covers. Consider old Jeff Beck stuff from the same era, and what he has done since

There have been many guitarists who are just as influential, but he definitely is an influence, just a shame his videos and records only capture his first steps.

So: judged on videos, records and song writing, yes he is overrated, but you can see from passages in his videos and LPs that there is some very fluid playing there that was beyond blues reworkings, but near in mind Jazz had been going strong for over 50 years at this point, so blues was not the only game in town

p90fool

If you listen to any pop/rock group whose career spanned the mid to late sixties you can pinpoint from their recorded output exactly when they all first heard Jimi Hendrix.

I can't think of another artist like that.

koneguitarist

p90fool said:

If you listen to any pop/rock group whose career spanned the mid to late sixties you can pinpoint from their recorded output exactly when they all first heard Jimi Hendrix.

I can't think of another artist like that.

Beatles ?

koneguitarist

Lew said:

Have you even heard the guitar in All Along The Watchtower? It's so damn perfect to the song in every way. There's nothing standard about it.Hearing Voodoo Child for the first time was like having a lightning bolt savage my body. Nothing was the same after. Oh c'mon, the best guitarists in country? What nonsense. Most nauseating, perhaps.  You seem to be quite fixated on his effects. Tell me what did he use prominently? Fuzzface, wah, univibe. What else?

Duh! Yes. It's fairly standard playing even for the time, as for FX, I stated that I thought he was better without them ? Not that's all he used. But apart from Fuzz,wah and uni vibe, echo, phasing and reverse tape etc and he used them well generally, as who could say differently as no one had really mixed it up like that before.

But I think the Beatles and other Uk artists were as big an influence on him as he was on others. 

not_the_dj

koneguitarist said:

But I think the Beatles and other Uk artists were as big an influence on him as he was on others. 

Certainly true from what I've read, there was a great mutual respect (likewise Dylan and the Beatles). It wasn't music as a competitive sport. 

chrisj1602

This is the third of a similar type of thread...

1. Clapton hero or zero.

Findings: some people like Clapton. Some people don't like Clapton.

2. What is wrong with Jimmy Page's Guitar Tone?

Findings: some people like Jimmy Page. Some people don't like Jimmy Page.

3. This thread.

Findings: some people like Jimi Hendrix. Some people don't like Jimi Hendrix.

viz

Lol exactly!!

viz

Still makes interesting reading though

Fretwired

Lixarto said:

He was nought but a poor man's Stephen Stills.

Serious question - is there anyone you actually like? It all seems a bit negative to me. You like Neil Young but without Hendrix there would be no Neil Young as we know him.

chrisj1602 said:

This is the third of a similar type of thread...

1. Clapton hero or zero.

Findings: some people like Clapton. Some people don't like Clapton.

2. What is wrong with Jimmy Page's Guitar Tone?

Findings: some people like Jimmy Page. Some people don't like Jimmy Page.

3. This thread.

Findings: some people like Jimi Hendrix. Some people don't like Jimi Hendrix.

I think it has more to do with the fact that many guitarists are arseholes - music isn't a competition. It's art. I like Return to Forever and the Stooges ... I can't be arsed worrying about whether guitarist A is technically better than B - it's all about the music. I once had a conversation with a household named US jazz rock guitarist. I made this mistake of asking if he'd ever played with John McLaughlin and was on the receiving end of a diatribe about what a shit player John was .. sad that people are so small minded.

chrisj1602

I just don't get these "I am I weird for not liking guitarist X?" No you are not because it is optional. There are genres. There is a choice. My friend doesn't like chocolate, but we don't need to argue about it, I eat the chocolate, he just has a brew.

Bellycaster

Hendrix recordings still make my hairs stand on end now, even after 10000000's of listens. A lot of Guitarists playing have this effect on me and they all vary in technical ability.

I can't vouch for every Live Hendrix performance and we all know that in the studio, much layering and overdubbing was used on some tracks, but the guy had Mojo by the bucket load.

He made himself stand out from the rest and his playing was unique at the time, his signature licks and style grabbed attention, his phrasing and subtleties were so sublime you could almost taste them. He deserved every bit of fame he got, it's just a shame we never saw what might have been in years to come. No matter how many "falls from graces" he might have had, had he lived on, I'm sure he would have kept on releasing quality material.

It wouldn't be too farfetched to have imagined him hooking up with Prince for a collaboration in the 80's or whatever else.

Oh boy, the things that never got to happen.