Can you remember the moment of guitar playing that made you want to play

CHRISB50

proggy said:

When I was a little kid I heard Fleetwood Mac's Albatross on the radio and I thought "wow, I want to play the guitar".

But I ended up a bass player instead, but I've since switched to the guitar (a long time ago).

Same as Peter Green himself. He was a bassist before taking up lead. 

Garthy

Brian May at Live Aid.

cruxiform

1981. Hearing Anarchy In The UK for the first time.

NotNowJohn

When I saw the video for Prince's When Doves Cry on Top of the Pops. Queen at Live Aid cemented the obsession but for some years I actually wanted to be Prince - my first good guitar was purple.

proggy

CHRISB50 said:

proggy said:

When I was a little kid I heard Fleetwood Mac's Albatross on the radio and I thought "wow, I want to play the guitar".

But I ended up a bass player instead, but I've since switched to the guitar (a long time ago).

Same as Peter Green himself. He was a bassist before taking up lead. 

Really,I didn't know that. That could be an omen.

cbilly22

BloodEagle said:

This was part of a BBC2 Arena Special about 'Heavy Metal' in about 1989 - blew my 14 year old mind and made my want an electric guitar more than anything I'd ever wanted before

This wasn't the reason I started playing but I remember that so well. Played the Slayer bits to death.

timmysoft

For me it was listening to the mark Radcliffe show on radio 1, 10-12 every night, bands like Ash, Manics, 60ft Dolls. 

Pete24v

For me it was the Gary Moore & Albert King 'Oh pretty woman' video that was being played on MTV around 1990. 

I was only 15 and had never heard guitar playing like it before. I remember thinking it would be great to have a go at that, then SGTB came out.. I needed a guitar. 

tone1

Got any Quo?

http://i1373.photobucket.com/albums/ag391/tonysmyth1/Mobile Uploads/436E11B8-5F2A-4232-A212-B777F8D6F467_zpsp1ehqzyg.png


It was probably this Album cover or AC/DC Live 'If you want blood 

steer

I've always like guitar led music, but the moment I wanted to play was when I saw a black strat in the window of a music shop for the first time. If that moment was in a film, the world would pause, a spotlight from heaven would light up the guitar, and some kind of angelic song would burst thenceforth.

Cookiemonster

80s hair metal. Then 90s indie rock

Grunfeld

I didn't want no stupid guitar -- plank of wood with six strings nailed to it.
I wanted to pilot a fucking spaceship! 
I wanted to be controlling giant synthesisers with tons of flashing lights and loads of leads. 
Really.


Getting a guitar was my mate JB's idea.  Punk had just arrived. 
And JB swore that playing guitar would get me into Sally B's affections.
Bastard lied. 
Never did get off with Sally B.... but I scored with her friend!
Woohoo!  A Columbus SG and two chords of lust.
It kind of went downhill after that but it was a wonderful start.

barry2tone

About '62 my Dad went up that big Lunnun Town.
Came home with a blue and cream Dansette record player plus ~10 LPs. 
It was the Decca recording of Segovia playing transcribed Bach pieces that lit up my eight-year-old ears.
 [Bartok and Tom Lehrer were the other newly-found faves.]
Heard directly how emotion can be expressed, even within formal architecture.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBQfHJA2Lng

Nowadays  I might find the interpretation a tad Spanish.   
But no other player imagined the instrument this way previously.
 Many thanks (and curses), Andrés.

DaiCapp

Listening to Release by Aztec Camera when I was 13... I'd been messing around with guitar a couple of years and learnt my basic first position chords but never bothered much more (I was already a big Tom Waits fan so preferred piano) until Mr Frame showed up...

Nitefly

olafgarten said:

For me it was Helplessly Hoping, CSNY. Still can't play it though. 

Wow, @olafgarten - that's a great call, good song!

For me it was The Shadows, "Apache", "FBI" - what a sound that was!  

And yet, I've only ever had one Strat, and I didn't keep that one very long...

dogload

Probably after getting this album for Xmas 1978


Like @Grunfeld I wanted a synthesizer but they were stupid-expensive. Anyway I got into this album big-time and then discovered Hawkwind and I had to play guitar. Not a very cool band to be into, The Moody Blues, but thar ya go! I think it was down to the songs 'The Actor' and 'Tuesday Afternoon' that I wanted to learn guitar.
Anyway, four years later (I eventually got a guitar and started learning how to play in 1981) I could play all the songs on the album - more or less! I never quite managed to get 'Question' right,

TheOtherDennis

I don't remember one particular moment, but probably seeing John Lennon and George Harrison in A Hard Day's Night on the telly when I was about 6. It wasn't so much the guitar as being part of a bunch of mates having a blast that appealed to me.

I've since wanted to do what @Grunfeld originally wanted to do, be a drummer like Cozy Powell or the guy who drummed for Peter Gabriel on his first solo tour, and then went back to wanting to play guitar when I heard Mott the Hoople, James Taylor, John Cale, Joni Mitchell, Dr Feelgood, the Sex Pistols, Carlos Santana playing Samba Pa Ti, Peter Green's Man of the World, all sorts of stuff. I did nothing about it for over 30 years, and probably still don't, really.

Loobs

When I saw @Gassage ;pedalboard for the first time. 

Rigid_Digits

Just hearing and seeing The Beatles as a very young boy. I wanted to do that and be one of them.

Gassage

Loobs said:

When I saw @Gassage ;pedalboard for the first time. 

Only human; cut you and you bleed.