NON FAMOUS/LESSER KNOWN GUITAR INFLUENCES.

[Kandinskyesque]

I thought of this point this morning off the back of a phone call with a relatively unknown musician that I would consider at the top of the large hill of guitarists where I've drawn my influences.

If I were to list the top three most influential guitarist that have affected most the way I play, then very few people, other than locally, will have heard of them.

Two electric players and one acoustic player that I watched a lot/roadied for when growing up. I even had the eventual privilege of spending time playing with all three of them either in the studio or in the case of the acoustic player in a live band for a few years.

The electric players worked with some fairly successful Scottish bands but remain fairly obscure to all but a few people with a specific interest in these bands.
The acoustic player remains more or less unknown outside of the bar scene and a few small folk festivals.

However, I can't deny that they have more to do with my guitar style than all or any of the household names.

Is anyone else in a similar position?

 

[Weazel]

I am probably influenced by far more guitarists than I am aware of, but one of them is the late Adrian Borland of The Sound. Nothing flashy, just doing the right part for the song and knowing when not to play.

Edit: Fantastic song which proves what i mean. And I REALLY like his singing as well.

 

[dented]

Larry "6 Fingers" Green was a SoCal guitarist playing in bar bands that should have hit the big time. He was also a good husband and Dad and he passed away in his 50s. Man the guy could do it all. Had the early 60s scarred, weathered, sunburst Strat and just could float through songs so easy. Don't know why he never went big. Maybe he didn't want to but he was one of the best I ever saw and I watched him close to copy his style.

 

[brookdalebill]

There’s a local blues guitarist named Alan Haynes who has always been very good.
He’s been around Austin a long time.
I’d go see him play at Antone’s on Guadalupe St. after my gigs in the 80’s.
I recently opened for him, and recommended a drummer friend of mine to sub for him.
It was a good fit!
He plays/owns SRV’s red Strat.
I actually saw SRV play that guitar at the Rome Inn in 78.
Alan, though a contemporary/colleague/friend of SRV, perhaps might be compared to him, he considers himself more of an acolyte of Johnny Winter.
Great, relentless singer and player.

This guy.
P.S.
He’s originally from Houston.
He plugs straight into his amp, sans pedals.
Gotta get out and hear him soon!

 

[Festofish]

Daniel Ash from Love and Rockets
Dimitri Coats from Burning Brides
Glen Buxton, Michael Bruce and Dennis Dunaway from Alice Cooper when it was a band. I still listen to the early stuff regularly. The guitarists rock! Schools out? I’m 18? I played bass for 13 years at Church before I knew better. My main Influence was Dennis Dunaway. Great musicians all. They’re in the Rock and Roll hall of fame yet most people have no idea. Having said that…my fave Alice album doesn’t include them. Welcome to my nightmare is awesome!

 

[bottlenecker]

I thought of this point this morning off the back of a phone call with a relatively unknown musician that I would consider at the top of the large hill of guitarists where I've drawn my influences.

If I were to list the top three most influential guitarist that have affected most the way I play, then very few people, other than locally, will have heard of them.

Two electric players and one acoustic player that I watched a lot/roadied for when growing up. I even had the eventual privilege of spending time playing with all three of them either in the studio or in the case of the acoustic player in a live band for a few years.

The electric players worked with some fairly successful Scottish bands but remain fairly obscure to all but a few people with a specific interest in these bands.
The acoustic player remains more or less unknown outside of the bar scene and a few small folk festivals.

However, I can't deny that they have more to do with my guitar style than all or any of the household names.

Is anyone else in a similar position?

I think learning from people directly, face to face, has a value you can't get from learning off records. My uncle was a huge influence on me. He talks about recording but he's a hermit. Likely no one will ever hear him.

 

[ChicknPickn]

Mick Jones, Foreigner. Unapologetic pop rock, “singable” songs, smoothly crafted lead work. Clean.

 

[tery]

Massachusetts blues guitarist Mark Gordon has been a big influence for me.

 

[Killing Floor]

Randy Bewley from Pylon. He is more responsible for that southeast/Athens jangle that shaped the 80s than probably any other guitarist.

Dennes Boon. He also has influenced thousands of players. He was a wonderful person.

And so it’s not all dead guys on my post,
Mark Speer. 10 years from now every town is going to have a band that sounds like him. It’s already happening. He’s pretty down to earth but he is rapidly changing how kids are using the guitar. He’s a legitimate influence on the future of American pop even though that’s not his intention.

 

[Tricone]

My grandma. Taught me how to tune by ear, my first chords, and how to put them together. Most importantly, she encouraged me to keep playing from the beginning. She helped open up the world of music for me.

 

[brookdalebill]

I’ll try to be succinct.
The late Pat Hornsby.
Pat was a week older than me.
Brain cancer from chronic smoking took him 15 years ago.
He moved to town from Natchez, Mississippi circa 1974.
Slight, blonde, wiry, and precociously talented.
Great singer and guitar player, at 16.
He had facets of Steve Marriott and Rick Derringer rolled into one guy.
Wicked vibrato, fast, accurate, soulful, and could really sing.
At 16!
He played in bars around here for decades.
Always power trios.
Always powerful.
I sold him my first car, and a couple of guitars.
Pat played a white 62 SG Special, straight into a cranked 100W Plexi half stack (top cab).
He (graciously) put me in my place when we were high school students.
Pat got kicked out of high school for weed.
He was that guy.
Sheesh.
He shoulda been a big star.
RIP, brother.

 

[Dan German]

Al Racketti. When I was a teen (mid ’70s), he was part of my friend’s older brothers’ Cool Hippie circle. He gave lessons, so I signed up. He played a lot of stuff, but his focus was pre-war blues/jazz. His working repertoire was astonishing, and he played with more feeling than anyone I know. He was rarely recorded, and he is long gone, but my friend and I still play things he taught us. (There are even a couple of tunes he taught us differently but complementary, so that when we play them together, we sound like we know what we’re doing.)

 

[Charlie Bernstein]

First are all my big sister's folksinging crowd and all my own guitar-playing friends who have showed me stuff. Of established pros, the first and foremost is Josh White Jr.

My sister took me to hear him at her high school when I was about ten. I didn't know it was blues, I just knew I loved it. Sixty years later, I can still hear "In the Pines," "John Henry," and "Free and Equal Blues," the song that kicks off this video:

 

[Stringbanger]

My buddy Al was my biggest influence. He was 6 years younger than me. We worked together in the late 70s, early 80s. He was mainly an acoustic guy.

For a couple years we were almost inseparable. He would come over to my apartment that I shared with my first wife, and we would have jam sessions in the kitchen. Sometimes we would go jam at this old barn that my Dad owned.

Al showed me new chords and better ways to play chords I all ready knew. He also taught me how to flatpick and other techniques like hammer-ons, pull offs, bends, and barre chords.

Al and I kind of lost touch after he moved out of state. I know he earned a doctorate degree, and I think it was in biology, but I’m not certain. He comes back in the area to visit his brother, but he never looks me up. I’ve expressed to his brother that I would love to see Al. Rumor on the street has it that Al is ticked at me because I dated one of his former girlfriends. Oh well!

Thanks anyway Al for all that you’ve taught me.

 

[Charlie Bernstein]

I am probably influenced by far more guitarists than I am aware of, but one of them is the late Adrian Borland of The Sound. Nothing flashy, just doing the right part for the song and knowing when not to play.

Edit: Fantastic song which proves what i mean. And I REALLY like his singing as well.

Then you might like another of my lesser known influences, Diblo Dibala. Soukous is a totally different genre and attitude, but Dibala's style is kind of a hopped-up version of the bit of Borland's you just showed us:

 

[Harry Styron]

My teacher for the past six or seven years ago has been Randy Buckner. He is probably better at replicating the style of Merle Travis than anyone, at least that’s what Merle’s son Tom Bresh told him. He can also play like Chet, Jerry Reed, Junior Barnard, Wes, George Barnes, Johnny Smith, etc.

Most all that I can do on the guitar I owe to him, but I don’t have but a tiny fraction of his skills.

 

[tomasz]

Mark Speer. 10 years from now every town is going to have a band that sounds like him. It’s already happening. He’s pretty down to earth but he is rapidly changing how kids are using the guitar. He’s a legitimate influence on the future of American pop even though that’s not his intention.
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Oh, very cool, he's got so much African influences, you can easily hear Kongo, Mali or Ethiopia in his playing. Very interesting!

 

[Cali Dude]

Charlie Baty of "Little Charlie and the night cats" was definitely a lesser known player who influenced my playing. I was fortunate to have seen him/them live several times. He had serious chops. Sadly he passed not long ago.

 

[Double Stop]

If push came to shove, Jeff Beck is my all-time fave. Of course, we all know him but I'm also influenced by these "lesser known" players:

Roland S. Howard (especially his Birthday Party stuff)
John McGeoch
Duane Denison

 

[gitold]

My 3 biggest influences though known are weird. Johnny Winter, Jeff Baxter, and Larry Coryell.