And we have Ritchie saying that’s not so. Of course there’s degrees of doing something. There’s doing something once in a while pretty well, and there’s something regularly and very well. Adrian Belew related a story yesterday. While he was touring with Zappa he’d started experimenting with tapping (which didn’t really have a name yet), walking around LA with a friend of his who was also playing with the technique they wandered into the Whiskey. Turns out Van Halen was there, and they’re watching Eddie tapping, and Adrian turns to his friend and says “hey he’s doing our thing” “yup” “and he’s better than us” “I noticed”.
He was an innovator and he pushed the technique of rock and roll guitar playing in new directions of speed, technique and technical manipulation. Most of the great guitar players out there have been talking about that the last 2 days. Heck they’ve been talking about it the last 2 decades. They liked him as a professional and person. They learned from him. Those are the facts. That is reality.
And yet, wasn’t the guy in Autograph generally considered to be the “father” of “tapping?” That’s what wiki said at one time.
All music rests on someone else’s shoulders. Black musicians claim all the stuff in the 60s-—they had been doing it all for years in the clubs. Who knows?
I like EVH. I wouldn’t put him in my top five guitarists, which would be Beck, Hendrix, Blackmore, Clapton, and Page, all for different reasons.