Sometimes you just need more. For this month’s installment of Staff Picks, PG editors and blues slinger Samantha Fish discuss the guitarists we’d like to hear from this year.
Q: Which guitar hero needs to make more music in 2017 and why?
Samantha Fish — Guest Picker
A: Jack White, because he’s always bringing an innovative sound to the table and I’ve been a fan for years. Another would be Tab Benoit, because he’s one of my favorite blues guitarists. Killer tone and a style that’s incredibly unique.
Current obsession: Old soul from the ’50s and ’60s. I just did a record in Detroit with horns and keys, so I am still in that mode.
Andy Ellis — Senior Editor
A: I’m jonesing for a new album from David Lindley, whose lap slide playing is insanely funky and melodic. Check out the clip below and see if you agree. Revealing, multi-camera close-ups of Lindley’s bar work and fingerpicking turn this 2012 TV performance into a lap-slide master class. His soulful solo starts at 2:25.
Current obsession: Exploring Renaissance lute music on electric guitar. In a tumultuous world, I find it reassuring to play music that has survived for 400 years.
Shawn Hammond — Chief Content Officer
A: “Guitar hero” is all relative, right? The nostalgic teenager in my brain wants to scream “EVH,” but these days my heroes meet different criteria (plus, I’m terrified to hear what Roth might do over the top of it). So my real answer would involve players such as Per Stålberg and David Fransson (Division of Laura Lee), Gary “Dr. Know” Miller (shown, of Bad Brains), or Sune Rose Wagner (the Raveonettes).
Current obsession: Obliterating the static that plagues my Jazzmaster when I use the trem.
Tessa Jeffers — Managing Editor
A: The guitar hero I want to hear more from this year is the person I’ve wanted to hear more from for the past two decades, since the moment I discovered Led Zeppelin. I still listen to this band almost daily, it never gets old, but Jimmy Page, it’s time to give the people what they want!
Current obsession: The light-a-fire-under-my-toes tempos of the Gipsy Kings. The guitar runs the gamut from frenetic, spitfire flamenco to pulsating rhythm to percussive with abandon. Listening to this spastic, funky, infectious rumba is a full-body experience: I recommend blasting it when no one’s around and just let it go, because you’ll want to dance. Caliente!
Ted Drozdowski — Senior Editor
A: I can’t get enough of David Gilmour’s beautiful tone, elegant approach, and insane sustain, which seem to get grander as he grows older. Blend in the mature perspective of his recent songs and that mellow-whiskey voice, and I’m just as pleased as I was when I first heard Wish You Were Here as a teenager, buzzed on $20/bag Mexican weed.
Current obsession: My ’58 Les Paul Special. Why was this guitar ever in the closet?
