Rolling Stone's "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" - 1. Jimi Hendrix

Rolling Stone's "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time"

1. Jimi Hendrix

제임스 마셜 지미 헨드릭스는 미국의 기타리스트이자 싱어 송라이터이다. 록을 기타를 아는 사람이라면 누구나 지미 헨드릭스를 록 역사상 가장 위대한 기타리스트로 손꼽힌다. 그는 영국에서 첫 번째 성공을 거둔 후, 1967년 미국의 몬터레이 팝 페스티벌에서 국제적인 명성을 얻었으며 1969년 우드스탁 페스티벌 1970년 Isle of Wight Festival에서 록의 상징, 살아있는 전설로 불리웠다.

출생 : 1942년 11월 27일, 미국 워싱턴 주 시애틀

사망 : 1970년 9월 18일, 영국 노팅힐

영화 : 우드스톡, 몬터레이 팝

자녀 : 제임스 다니엘 선드퀴스트

부모 : 제임스 알렌 헨드릭스, 루실 제터

형제자매: 레온 헨드릭스, 파멜라 헨드릭스, 캐시 헨드릭스, 조셉 헨드릭스

Jimi Hendrix exploded our idea of what rock music could be: He manipulated the guitar, the whammy bar, the studio and the stage. On songs like "Machine Gun" or "Voodoo Chile," his instrument is like a divining rod of the turbulent Sixties – you can hear the riots in the streets and napalm bombs dropping in his "Star-Spangled Banner."

His playing was effortless. There's not one minute of his recorded career that feels like he's working hard at it – it feels like it's all flowing through him. The most beautiful song of the Jimi Hendrix canon is "Little Wing." It's just this gorgeous song that, as a guitar player, you can study your whole life and not get down, never get inside it the way that he does. He seamlessly weaves chords and single-note runs together and uses chord voicings that don't appear in any music book. His riffs were a pre-metal funk bulldozer, and his lead lines were an electric LSD trip down to the crossroads, where he pimp-slapped the devil.

There are arguments about who was the first guitar player to use feedback. It doesn't really matter, because Hendrix used it better than anyone; he took what was to become Seventies funk and put it through a Marshall stack, in a way that nobody's done since.

It's impossible to think of what Jimi would be doing now; he seemed like a pretty mercurial character. Would he be an elder statesman of rock? Would he be Sir Jimi Hendrix? Or would he be doing some residency off the Vegas Strip? The good news is his legacy is assured as the greatest guitar player of all time.

Tom Morello