This is coming from someone who listened to dadrock non-stop in high school and was the kid with long hair and chops...

This is coming from someone who listened to dadrock non-stop in high school and was the kid with long hair and chops wearing dadrock band tees surrounded by scene kids.

But why is Hendrix considered le best guitarist ever? I loved him in high school, but now that I'm re-listening to him he sounds sloppy as fuck. I know technical skill does not equal the best or most interesting, but during some of his live performances it sounds like he can't even play.

People glorify him for using a wah, but it wasn't like he was the first to use it. In fact, look into who gave him his first wah pedal. That person is a very underrated musician and guitarist in Americana rock lore.

Would Jimi still be considered le greatest if he was white?

yes, but i mean he blended so many styles with psychedelic rock like funk and jazz. Those genres are rooted in black culture, so his delivery on them seems more genuine one would guess.

but i mean, i hate dadrock for the most part until it comes to hendrix. he's great. His tone was good in my opinion, but he could play some fucking catchy blues licks that are a cross between rhythm and lead.

>In fact, look into who gave him his first wah pedal. That person is a very underrated musician and guitarist in Americana rock lore.
Zappa is underrated?

> in Americana rock lore

Most top guitarists list put him in the 20's, while your typical Hendrix, Clapton, etc. are in the top.

While jimi was "sloppy" during alot of his live performances, i feel like thats what makes them so great. Its a very raw sound.

But he was just a great innovator for his time, he worked with a fuck ton of famous musicians as well. Self taught, played entirely by ear, fuckin pimpin

he changed everything about how people approach rock guitar. and as mentioned he revolutionized rhythm guitar playing and held it up as a high art rather than just a formality in bands

Sorry man but do you play guitar?

To understand Hendrix and why he is considered the greatest takes an understanding of where he came from in rock history. The music he wrote was an almost effortless fusion of blues, funk, and jazz. Not only that, but despite being highly technical, it was ferociously aggressive AND catchy, all simultaneously. His songs jump across the fretboard effortlessly. They can alternatively chug or glide. He basically single handedly created psychedelia with literally one instrument, no real fancy studio tricks or anything. He has some really really incredible live performances too, of course it's been watched to death by this point but his woodstock playing of the naitonal anthem is something else, as well as a really important cultural touchstone for the hippie movement in relation to the america of that time. It's a meme for a reason; he really was the GOAT. are there players that are technically more skilled than him? Definitely. But are there any as innovative or influential as him? definitely not.

he changed the game, the many players today who shit on him technically are standing on his shoulders

>People glorify him for using a wah, but it wasn't like he was the first to use it
He popularized it and made better use of it than any other musician at his time


Also, he is creative as hell, his music is revolutionary.

> he WAS creative as hell, his music WAS revolutionary.
Fix

Yeah great, but would this opinion still be held if he was white?

Youth is thinking Hendrix is GOAT.

Adolescence is realizing Zappa was better.

True maturity is realizing rock is dead and listening to Lil' Pump unironically.

Probably yes.
He would be like a better Clapton

first of all how dare you. second, no he would probably just be remembered as a drug addict and woman beater

Fuck off
You don't even know the difference between Youth and Adolescence

Jimi Hendrix was one of the greatest icons of the 1960s. His death in 1970 still stands as one of the crucial events in the history of rock music. His work may be less important, as too many of his albums were below average. Hendrix was, after all, one of the most exploited artists of all times (many more albums were released after his death than during his lifetime). Hendrix made only two amazing albums: the first and the third, Are You Experienced (1967) and Electric Ladyland (1968). His greatest achievement was to coin a new guitar style, a style that amounted to a declaration of war against western harmony. Born at the crossroad between Chicago's blues, Memphis soul and Charlie Christian's jazz improvisation, Hendrix's style was an excruciating torture of tonal music. A black man, Hendrix always used the blues as the basis for his improvisation, but then used the whole human body to play and distort the sound of the guitar. The guitar became a sacrificial total for an entire generation. A cosmic hymn such as Third Stone From The Sun was fueled towards higher dimensions by the heroic guitar workout. The blues agony of jams such as Voodoo Chile was pushed to new psychological levels by the endless guitar pyrotechnics. Tracks such as 1983 borrowed from free-jazz and avantgarde music to achieve a form of "sound painting". On the album Band Of Gypsys (1970) Hendrix was indulging in endless acrobatics. Hendrix's guitar opened new doors to experimental music. His lesson would be applied not only to guitar but also to keyboards and to whatever instrument would lead a rock song.
Hendrix's case as a guitarist is unique in the history of modern music: Hendrix leads the "polls" of critics worldwide, even among jazz critics. Such a unanimity does not exist for singers or drummers or keyboardists.
His legacy as a guitarist is comparable to Beethoven's legacy as a symphonist.

If Hendrix only had appeared now instead of the 60's he would still look and play cool.

"White-collared conservatives flashing down the street
Pointing their plastic finger at me
They're hoping soon, my kind will drop and die
But I'm going to wave my freak flag high
Wave on, wave on."

Kind of like MLK?
Oh wait... xD

It's so apparent in today's world how much of a spook psy-op the psychedelic movement was in the 60's.

Hendrix being considered the best guitarist is just part of the same agenda pushing trap and hip-hop. More anti-white bullshit.

He's not the best guitarist, Julian Bream is the best guitarist imo.
But Hendrix was raw.

As for the conspiracy stuff I don't know enough to comment.

It's because he's a revolutionary. He's not the best technically or musically when it comes to playing the guitar.

Any time someone is called the "best ever" at something completely subjective, like any form or art, the title doesn't really mean squat. There's no universal way to measure what would make the "best" guitarist.

It's going to be a mixture of technical skill, influence, originality, popularity, and probably a lot of other things as well. It's gotta be a healthy mixture of all those things though, not any one specifically. There are thousand of unknown professional studio guitarists who have 100x the technical skill Hendrix had, but those guys are unknown because they don't bring much else to the table. And who knows how many incredibly original guitarists there are out there that we'll never have heard of because, even though they're got unique ideas, they're absolutely shit at executing those ideas.

Hendrix had a bit of everything. There are definitely other guitarists who have more skill or influence or whatever, and you could make cases for them as well. Point being that "best ever" doesn't really mean anything, but if you're throwing that title around, it's not unreasonable to throw it at Hendrix.


>People glorify him for using a wah

Who the fuck glorifies him for using a wah? It's just a pedal that makes a guitar sound cool. There's no "glory" in a musician making their instrument sound cool. He didn't have to fight for his right to use a wah pedal or something. It's just one of the tools he used.


>Would Jimi still be considered le greatest if he was white?

Of course he would be given the same respect if he were white. There are plenty of white guitarists who aren't as noteworthy as Hendrix who are treated as "the best" by people.