Easier Guitarists that Sound Great

[Hiwatts-n-Gibsons]

Great list, though I would argue that a lot of Dave's shit is pretty fucking complicated. Ocean Size solo, most of the shit on Trust No One.

100%

 

[ChurchHill]

For me, it was (in no particular order)

• Rick Nielsen
• Randy Rhoads
• Tony Iommi
• Angus Young
• Ritchie Blackmore
• David Gilmour
• many more (EVH, BB King, Buddy Guy, Robert Johnson, etc.)

I may be the odd one out, but I never wanted to sound like anyone else. Maybe it was because I started playing violin when I was seven and cut my teeth in that disciplined world and switched to guitar when I was 14 because I wanted to express myself, not someone else's ideas of what music should sound like. So, instead of learning how other players did what they did, I tried to learn why. I knew enough about theory to understand that angle, then went back and listened to the players they listened to. For example, Angus Young led me to BB King, which led me to Robert Johnson. Just learning who the players I admired listened to and learned from opened up worlds of great music. I've tried to learn something from all of them, if not a specific technique, then a sound, a style, a feeling. Then, I'd take that and work it into my own experiences. I have no idea if anyone would consider me a good guitar player anymore, but I still manage to make myself happy with my playing and that's all that has ever really mattered to me.

 

[S̷͖͑m̵͎͂á̵̺s̸͚̈́h̴̬̑]

I think when you are learning metal, finding an easier guitarist to emulate is great.

Lamb of god has a ton of easy songs that sound mean as hell

 

[dstroud]

Schenker for me. I do work on my own style a lot, but his phrasing and vibrato are I think always in the back of my mind. For what I want to do, I really don’t need any more technique than Schenker. From there it’s just style. Every now and then I do like to get something in the technique range of yngwie but not very often

 

[geetarmikey]

It is, but it just rubs me the wrong way that everyone is so obsessed with copying other players instead of creating art

Yeah, I was obsessed with Yngwie and Dave Mustaine solos and learning their techniques when I was a teenager, I'm sure everyone has formative influences right?

It just seems like no one gives a shit about learning to make their own music anymore, which is the "final boss" of being a guitar player. Standing on your own two feet as an individual with your own voice.

All anyone wants to buy guitars and learn guitar for is to copy some other guitarist and it while it's totally normal, at a certain point it makes my eye twitch

There are literally thousands, if not millions, of guitarists, musicians and bands that still create and release their own original music. I can't open YouTube or Spotify without seeing a new release by a "heritage" band or something completely new.

 

[DanTravis62]

There are literally thousands, if not millions, of guitarists, musicians and bands that still create and release their own original music. I can't open YouTube or Spotify without seeing a new release by a "heritage" band or something completely new.

im not talking about about youtube or spotify

i'm talking about guitar players like on this guitar forum

everyone is completely obsessed with copying other guitar players instead of developing themselves into a guitar player

 

[CoreyW]

im not talking about about youtube or spotify

i'm talking about guitar players like on this guitar forum

everyone is completely obsessed with copying other guitar players instead of developing themselves into a guitar player

I feel attacked!

 

[DanTravis62]

I feel attacked!

It's not really an attack, because everyone is influenced by their heros

That part is normal

It's just I don't understand what the "goal" of guitar playing is if it's just to play the same EVH or Metallica riffs or solos or whatever - no pianist buys a steinway for "fun" to cover "imagine" over and over

It's just like, spend SOME of that time developing your OWN style, developing your OWN thing

 

[rsm]

it's like an eagle and a fox. sorta

 

[CoreyW]

It's not really an attack, because everyone is influenced by their heros

That part is normal

It's just I don't understand what the "goal" of guitar playing is if it's just to play the same EVH or Metallica riffs or solos or whatever - no pianist buys a steinway for "fun" to cover "imagine" over and over

It's just like, spend SOME of that time developing your OWN style, developing your OWN thing

I get what you're saying, its just so easy to have a playlist of songs I know and hit shuffle and just get lost for hours just playing along, and loose sight on what I actually want to achieve, which is my own stuff..

 

[DanTravis62]

I get what you're saying, its just so easy to have a playlist of songs I know and hit shuffle and just get lost for hours just playing along, and loose sight on what I actually want to achieve, which is my own stuff..

That's the trap

The better you get at writing your own music and developing your own style as a guitar player, the more you want to spend time on it because the creative process is enjoyable. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy or a feedback loop.

The less time you spend developing your own writing, style, and playing, the worse it is, and the less time you want to spend listening to your own bullshit

That is the mental "Trick" to developing like that

Yeah of course it's easy to get lost in a playlist. Now try picking an amazing song or section of a song, dissecting what makes it work, and then writing your own music using the same thought process with different notes and see if you can invoke the same emotions or vibe.

 

[rsm]

These days I spend most of my guitar time learning and exploring my Helix Stadium XL, and VP4.

When I had my original Helix, HX-Effects, (and FM9) I created a few patches early on, and a few more along the way, but never got deep into everything it can do / how it worked...which I plan to change this time around.

 

[geetarmikey]

im not talking about about youtube or spotify

i'm talking about guitar players like on this guitar forum

everyone is completely obsessed with copying other guitar players instead of developing themselves into a guitar player.

So where would you put yourself on the scale of influences vs originality in your own playing out of interest?

 

[CoreyW]

These days I spend most of my guitar time learning and exploring my Helix Stadium XL, and VP4.

When I had my original Helix, HX-Effects, (and FM9) I created a few patches early on, and a few more along the way, but never got deep into everything it can do / how it worked...which I plan to change this time around.

Whats weird for me.. I have been on the Fractal stuff for over a year now, and prior to that I had the dual amps, massive pedal board, the TGP wet dream rig, minus the Dumble of course.. and the only thing I ever did was just chase tones and never got anything done.. somehow with the Axe, I have found a couple of good patches and occasionally I will do a little tweaking to them, but I go months without opening Axe Edit, I am usually a couple of firmware updates behind, I just plug in and play.

 

[rsm]

Whats weird for me.. I have been on the Fractal stuff for over a year now, and prior to that I had the dual amps, massive pedal board, the TGP wet dream rig, minus the Dumble of course.. and the only thing I ever did was just chase tones and never got anything done.. somehow with the Axe, I have found a couple of good patches and occasionally I will do a little tweaking to them, but I go months without opening Axe Edit, I am usually a couple of firmware updates behind, I just plug in and play.

I made a few simple clean, rhythm and lead patches for 60s, 70s hard rock, thrash/hair and prog and just played them with minor tweaks. over the years Nothing fancy or complex...basically what I'd do if I had the amp and pedals.

I plan to use snapshots more effectively, and turning different things on/off automatically, blending two amps, etc. I know I never got the most out of my modeling gear in the past, now I plan to learn how it works and what it can do, and how I can use more advanced features. When I get tired of that I just plug into one of my tube amps.


Thunderstorms rolling through so I had to unplug my gear and wait for it to pass. We've had houses hit by lightning nearby; one caught on fire, another had all everything that was plugged in fried, had to get all new appliances, computers and more.

 

[DanTravis62]

So where would you put yourself on the scale of influences vs originality in your own playing out of interest?

I've done both on a relatively high level I've played in cover and tribute bands, and played in gigging/touring original bands since I was a teenager (still do!)

My original music is certainly heavily influenced by my own heroes, but I spend a whole lot more time doing it (recording it, playing it, gigging it) than I do noodling around on other people's music. I probably spend an equal amount of time woodshedding (as in, metronome practice, scales, theory, and technique stuff) but I'm almost never learning other people's solos or anything like that. Once in a while I will pick a favorite guitar players solo, riff, or a piece of a solo to work on a very specific technique thing. For example, i'm not the best at sweeping and arpeggios (especially the 5 and 6 string type) so I worked on the arpeggio in the pre-chorus to "the kiss of judas" by stratovarius the last month or so.

Not to say that it's completely pointless to noodle around, but just to warn people that that direction is an eventual dead end of boredom, and making your own original stuff and working on it is infinitely rewarding

 

[geetarmikey]

I've done both on a relatively high level I've played in cover and tribute bands, and played in gigging/touring original bands since I was a teenager (still do!)

My original music is certainly heavily influenced by my own heroes, but I spend a whole lot more time doing it (recording it, playing it, gigging it) than I do noodling around on other people's music. I probably spend an equal amount of time woodshedding (as in, metronome practice, scales, theory, and technique stuff) but I'm almost never learning other people's solos or anything like that. Once in a while I will pick a favorite guitar players solo, riff, or a piece of a solo to work on a very specific technique thing. For example, i'm not the best at sweeping and arpeggios (especially the 5 and 6 string type) so I worked on the arpeggio in the pre-chorus to "the kiss of judas" by stratovarius the last month or so.

Not to say that it's completely pointless to noodle around, but just to warn people that that direction is an eventual dead end of boredom, and making your own original stuff and working on it is infinitely rewarding

Great stuff then, can I listen to any of your playing anywhere?

 

[DanTravis62]

Great stuff then, can I listen to any of your playing anywhere?

Yeah man, I just posted a demo track (just home recordings for fun) in the clips section of the forum

Post in thread 'Original track; Happy Birthday Murica'

Jul 5, 2026

I had my brother in law set up a ton of presets on reaper for me that automatically kept me from clipping and all kinds of other voodoo. I accidentally fucked it all up.

So now i have some decent presets i made myself that get the job done, but that transition from losing the presets to having to set up something workable was a pain in the ass. And it isn't even as complicated as probably what you had. I get it

Yeah there's a whole range of presets and templates that I need to use in a DAW to organize how i'm doing everything

There's the "keep you from clipping" stuff, the noise...

• DanTravis62

• 

But I've posted videos from multiple bands in that subforum as well as posting my bands music and live vids

 

[Uzi Nein Millimetah]

I would suggest work more on writing your own music and developing your own style.

ESPECIALLY writing your own solos.

You can start out with improvising to come up with ideas, but i mean actually writing guitar solos

This is a huge problem with guitar players in general nowadays, everyone is so obsessed with other musicians that they never spend any time turning themselves into the type of musician someone would want to emulate

I can figure out almost any rock/metal/shred solo by ear, and have been able to do so for many years. It developed from years of jamming and studying entire albums and some tab, although today, kids get unlimited free pro level guitar lessons and learn famous solos step by step long before they have any idea what a fucking SONG is or how to even get into the mindset of thinking about writing a song or having their own style.

There are WAY more newbs/preteens/teens/squids today who can copy someone else's riffs or solos perfectly today in mommy's basement than ever because of youtube. And they don't even know how to create a signal chain, they just buy modeling crap and zoom the menus for an EXACT COPY of the other guitarist's tone!

But so what?

Mindless parrots.

And as soon as anyone on this site has mastered all of the '80s guitarists in the OP, which means nailing the FEEL and authority of those guitarists, and writing great songs with some of that style, let's hear it. They are more impressive musicians to me than most any current YT wonders....

 

[S̷͖͑m̵͎͂á̵̺s̸͚̈́h̴̬̑]

Not to say that it's completely pointless to noodle around, but just to warn people that that direction is an eventual dead end of bedroom

You get me