I’ll add to the debate. Full Disclosure, I discovered Yngwie during his Alcatrazz stint and then ordered Steeler on Vinyl before the original Rising Force album came out in ‘84. I lived and breathed Yngwie through the late 80s. And have cringed along with the other devoted disciples at his less impressive efforts of late. So I am biased. In ‘78 Ed literally changed the guitar landscape. That does not minimize or trivialize the blistering works of Frank Marino or Pat Travers or Gary Richrath etc. But Ed changed the game. Everything that came out between ‘78 and ‘84 was someone attempting to move (some successfully) the boundary that EVH established on the first VH album. The guitar landscaped changed again after the ’84 Rising Force album in the same way that the landscape changed after the first VH album in ‘78. Vinnie Moore, Tony Macalpine, Paul Gilbert, Marty Friedman, Jason Becker, Steve Vai, etc. In no way am I suggesting that these guys would not have been monster players had Yngwie never come along - but Yngwie’s whole ‘thing’ provided both artistic inspiration and a commercial ‘lane’ for what these guys did. Hendrix - Edward - Yngwie. These guys mark substantively different ‘eras’ of the then existing state of the art of electric guitar. That doesn’t minimize any other players’ contributions. But I think those 3 are fur sure Mt. Rushmore players.
Not everyone on this forum was into the scene back in ‘84, but watch this 5 minute clip - remember he was 19 or 20 when he played this - and ask yourself, was this more of the same of what was going on in 84, or was this just qualitatively different than anything and everything all those tapping in Ed’s wake were doing at the time:
