29 Guitar Quotes

I come fresh from the street, fast on my feet, kind a lean and lazy; not much meat on my bones, and a whole lot alone, and more than a little bit crazy. The old six string was all I had to keep my belly still, and for each full hour lesson I gave I got a crisp ten dollar bill.

The very day I purchased it, I christened my guitar as my monophonic symphony, six string orchestra.

I can embarrass myself very easily on guitar. It's funny because people say to me I can play anything; I'm God on the guitar. But I could make a big list of everything I can't play... I'm grateful that people don't notice that.

When you think about where guitar playing is going today...: it's going everywhere at the same time.

Basic anatomy. That has got to be the ongoing frustration: Why can't my fingers do what I want them to do? Not being able to play what I hear in my head - that is the ultimate source of frustration.

Guitars are fun. There are plenty of different kinds to play. They look cool. They sound cool. Don't *you* want to play guitar?

'I wouldn't say that I'm the greatest guitarist ever. I'd say probably that I'm the greatest guitarist sitting in this chair.'

I assume most guitar players are like me. They're playing, having fun; then they get a magazine in the mail that says 'Shred Is Dead' and they say, 'What the Hell?' They throw it away and keep on playing.

When these guitar mags bring up that stuff up and say such and such came up with this and that which is pushing the boundaries, I just say, 'let's step back for a minute and admit something: nothing has happened for the last 100 years.' And it's okay. It's not a bad thing ... We're all working with 'tools' that have been in existence for the last 100 years and there hadn't been a new 'tool' for a long long time.

'About ten years ago, I knew three chords on the guitar. Now, in 1982, I know three chords on the guitar.' - Queen on Fire: Live At The Bowl, Milton Keynes 1982 (intro to 'Crazy Little Thing Called Love')

'God created whammy bars for people who don't know how to solo.' -Interview with 'Masters of Metal and Hard Rock' magazine

' That night at the 'Eagle's Nest', I remember, he was playing a D-18 Martin acoustic guitar and he was dressed in the latest teen fashion, but the thing I really noticed though, was his guitar playing. Elvis was a fabulous rhythm player. He'd start into 'That's All Right' , with his own guitar, alone, and you didn't want to hear anything else'

'Elvis Presley's incendiary vocal performance of 'Baby, let's play house' (1955), hails from rockabilly's formative era, when the rules hadn't yet been cast in stone, and Elvis was still experimenting in overdrive, searching for the compelling sound that would catapult him to icon status in little over a year. Presley's slapback, echo laden hiccuping - briefly rendered 'a cappella' before the snarling low end guitar of Scotty Moore enters -, segues into an irresistibly lascivious declaration of lust, and a not-so-subtle hint of violence. Both of Scotty Moore's immaculately conceived, and executed solos were monstrously influential to the rockabilly idiom, copied by countless Southern axe-wielding teens. And Bill Black slaps his thundering upright bass so percussively, that no drummer was necessary'

'But the last side, recorded during rehearsals for his 1968 television special, is another treat, as fine and tough and overflowing with heart and soul as any of his 50's recordings. Playing an electric guitar, rather than his customary acoustic model, he traded fluid rhythm and lead parts with Scotty Moore, their interplay almost telepathic. And with his original drummer, D. J. Fontana, stoking the fires, this music moved, from the ferocious version of Rufus Thomas's Sun Records label blues 'Tiger Man' to Jimmy Reed blues shuffles, to smoldering New Orleans triplet-style blues-ballads like 'Lawdy Miss Clawdy' and 'One Night'. This is rock and roll as good as it gets.'

'This shitty guitar never plays the chords I want it to play. It only knows three chords, but let's see what happens. This is for all you lovely, crazy people out there.' - Queen: Live At Wembley Stadium 1986 (intro to 'Crazy Little Thing Called Love')

'Chrome Grover's are bitchin', I have them on a couple guitars. Almost as good as blue fuzzy Grover's.'

'I can see the problem right away, DON'T SUCK. Cease the sucking immediately. If you decide not to suck, you'll be totally shredding all these major solos and all the chicks will be checking you out and all the guys will be hella jealous of your whammy bar.'

On New Years resolutions: 'I need to get like 34% more hyphy this year, shred 17.4% more often, use 2,000 more notes in each solo, my guitar needs to shoot flames that are at least 10 feet longer than they used to be, aaaand probably 1 more pound of lasers.'

'For me,' he explains his mammoth project, 'it is an obligation to know and learn to understand the various styles living within the guitar, to work with them and pursue them up to a certain point and, when I feel I have learned enough about them, to let them go again. These CDs are a form of pool, a rucksack with everything I have at the moment and what I have focused on.' (Suddeutsche Zeitung, August 1997, Ralf Dombrowski)

My driving philosophy about making music is that you can reduce it all down to one note if that note is played with the right kind of sincerity.

To have ownership of something that powerful is something I'll never be able to get used to. It still knocks me out when I play it.

I think Clapton is brilliant. He's the only one who moved me. The only one who made me want to play the guitar.

was 12 when my mom bought me a $25 electric guitar. I had an uncle who was a preacher, and his family had a gospel singing group. He played guitar in church, and I used to watch him. I became obsessed with the guitar. I locked myself in my bedroom for the better part of a year and taught myself chords. I'd try to learn things off records. (2004)

s a guitarist, I would always look for whatever felt right, something tasteful - and I guess I still do. [I'm] more interested in finding what fits the piece musically as opposed to how many notes I can play quickly. I was never one of those 'look at me' players. (2004)

Had he lived, I truly believe he'd have been one of the greatest guitar players that ever walked the earth. He was when he was here.