The Evolution of Rock and Roll From the Beatles to Death Angel

One of the things I think is good to analyze is the natural historical progression and evolution of Rock and Roll guitar from the '60s to the recent past. Personally, I sort of lost contact with the music industry in the '90s but I will clue everyone in on earlier developments.

The Beatles invented modern rock guitar to my way of thinking. They took over from the blues masters and they started the trend that led to one guitarist after the other. With songs like Hazy Days of Winter, they managed to spark innovations in the music industry that have been changed over the years.

How we got from the Beatles to Death Angel I don't know but keep reading, as I write this, I will probably stumble on the answer. There is logic to all of this.

Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page and Jimi Hendrix were next. "Clapton is God" was a slogan that was written on the walls in England and Beck also forged a new path.

Clapton cross-fertilized a lot of bands. He was very prolific. A lot of people complain that after his original hard hitting songs, he mellowed out too much and he lost his edge. Song's like the original Layla, Crossroads and Sunshine of Your Love were the ones that cemented EC's legacy.

I had a book on classical guitar that called Clapton "an overrated guitarist," but simply put he just wasn't a classical player. In his own genre, he was very expressive and original.

Hendrix was the pioneer of much of what is done today. He was the innovator who used feedback, Wah, distortion, the Univibe rotary speaker simulator and other guitar effects such that he revolutionized the playing of everyone who came after him. He also introduced destruction as an art form in music. Lighting his guitar on fire during Woodstock gained him considerable press time.

Originally, Hendrix' style was called "Acid Rock." But later on it was rechristened Heavy Metal and the industry tried to divorce Hendrix from the image of his being a user of drugs to "expand his mind." As we all know, he died from an overdose of drugs and chocked on his vomit. His loss was one of the greatest losses of a talented player in the history of rock and roll.

It should also be noted that Hendrix usually is rated the top rock and roll guitarist of all time, despite the fact that quite a few notables like Eddie Van Halen, Randy Rhoads, Yngwie Malmsteen, came later and added to Hendrix' innovations.

Page of Led Zeppelin also was an innovator. He wasn't as flashy as Hendrix but his exotic style and the seminal Led Zeppelin IV recording containing Stairway to Heaven is often voted as #1 guitar recording of all time.

Eddie Van Halen burst on the scene when he was just 17 back in '78 with his seminal Van Halen recording. His Eruption solo set the pace for the new wave of rock and he sent guitarists, who are natural copy cats, back to the drawing board when it came to his two handed tapping technique (aka bidextral technique) his use of harmonics and guitar chimes. He really transformed rock for years until his style fizzled. There are attempts to reenergize his career underway right now.

By the way, the bidextral technique was not invented by EVH. He made it a part of his arsenal in a strong way, but it was an old classical technique and Hendrix did it too. Jeff Watson of Night Ranger enhanced the one finger used by EVH and used all 4 fingers on his right hand to take it to the next level.

Combining two handed tapping with Malmsteen's 3 octave arpeggios was the next logical progression in rock and we will cover Yngwie next.

Next up was Malmsteen. He auditioned for Mike Varney over at Shrapnel Records and Varney said that he was the biggest leap in technique. Nothing like his neo-classical school existed and he replaced Eddie as The Guitar God in the early '80s.

Soon guitarists all over the world mimicked his use of classical scales, his 3-octave arpeggios, tapped arpeggios and his reliance on the Harmonic minor scale in particular. His style too went out of business as the age of the guitar god occurred sometime in the '90s.

Since then, people like Kirk Hammet of Metallica came on the scene and that band had some formidable chops. Also, James Hetfield also had some good guitar work on their recordings.

Paul Gilbert of Mr. Big and Michael Angelo Batio are also monster guitar players and they have videos out on how to play their advanced shred techniques. MAB has a series you can buy on Metal Method's website called Speed Kills. He unleashes his super speed licks. He also teaches jazz. Even Doug Marks, the founder of Metal Method Guitar lessons says that jazz is beyond him.

One of the things that I love about the guitar is that if you want, you can keep everything very simple. If all you want to do is put 3 chords together and make them sound good you can.

But if you want to master the complexity of the instrument, you can spend a lifetime experimenting around. Personally, my style grew progressively. Every time I was ready to go to the next level a new teacher appeared. I have evolved over the years.

Now I focus on spiritual music. Jewish, Hebrew Christian and Contemporary Christian music is my new field and I am launching a study of the best artists in those genres.