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Indie Mom and I have been so busy with concerts that we haven't had an edition of Time Travel Tuesday for several weeks. The cover article of the latest issue of Rolling Stone, 100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time compiled by writers David Fricke, Brian Hiatt, Evan Serpick, and Douglas Wolk, is the inspiration for today's trip.

I am less irate than the people who commented about this article online (Pantera!), but I also have my own beefs about who is not on it. For one, the article does not say it's the 100 greatest electric guitar songs of all time, but if there are any acoustic guitar songs on the list, they are few. Second, the list is heavily weighted on the side of blues, acknowledging rock's great debt to its blues daddies like B. B. King, Albert King, and Muddy Waters but little about rock's debt to country. The writers are also overly-enamored of wah-wah, which I like too, but what about slide? What about pedal steel? I'm left wondering, Where's David Lindley? Bonnie Raitt? Jeff "Skunk" Baxter?

The way the list is put together by song allowed the writers to list the same guitarist several times--no fair! This includes most notoriously, Eric Clapton with a whopping five songs: with Cream, with the Yardbirds, with the Beatles ("While My Guitar Gently Weeps"), with John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers, and with Derek and the Dominoes. OK, "Layla" (#13) had to be on the list, no argument there, and the wah-wah on "White Room" is fantastic, I grant that. Jeff Beck also makes the list four times, while favorites of mine Ry Cooder and Johnny Marr (the Smiths) get only one entry apiece.

The article gives away some of the secrets of the famous sounds, such as the fact that Keith Richards plays "Brown Sugar" without the lowest string on the guitar.

Delightfully, the online article allows you to listen to each song along with its entry on the list (if you have a Rhapsody account, anyway). On the sad side, some of these songs have been played so damn much I never want to hear them ever ever ever again. That goes for Led Zeppelin's "Stairway To Heaven" (#8), Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Free Bird" (#64), and Pink Floyd's "Money" (#69).

Song #1 is "Johnny B. Goode" by Chuck Berry, and if you have never heard that, you aren't reading this blog anyway. Onward.


Jimi Hendrix absolutely has to be on this list, and he hits it three times: #2-"Purple Haze," #12-"Voodoo Child," and #49-"Machine Gun." If you haven't already heard "Purple Haze," you have been living in a cave, so let's go with one of the two lesser-known songs.

Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child (Slight Return)
from Electric Ladyland (1968)



Eric Clapton takes #3-"Crossroads" and #55-"White Room" (both from Cream's 1968 double LP Wheels of Fire, which I played till the grooves wore thin), #7-"While My Guitar Gently Weeps" (with George Harrison), #13-"Layla" (with Duane Allman), and #42-"Hideaway" (with John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers).

Instead of any of these, here's an older Cream song:

Cream: Outside Woman Blues from Disraeli Gears (1967)
It's interesting to hear Clapton sing, long before his affair with Patti Boyd Harrison: "And if you lose your woman, please don't mess with mine"


Stevie Ray Vaughan gets two entries for covers of Jimi Hendrix and bluesman Larry Davis songs: #54-"Little Wing" (a big favorite of mine, although it's difficult to say how Vaughan improves on the original) and #66-"Texas Flood".

Stevie Ray Vaughan: Little Wing
from The Sky Is Crying (1991)




Duane Allman of the Allman Brothers Band at #9 with the Old Blind Willie McTell cover of "Statesboro Blues" serves to further solidify the whole blues-rock connection. I was tempted to post another one of my favorites and an Allman Brothers original, "Whipping Post" from their 1969 self-titled debut, or the Muddy Waters cover "Trouble No More" from Eat a Peach (1972), but this time I'll stick with the article's selection because it's just great. But don't forget Duane's non-blues gems like "Jessica."

The Allman Brothers: Statesboro Blues
from Live at Fillmore East (1971)

If you spend any time with me, you'll probably hear me say more than once that I never thought Clapton was god, but I did think Jimmy Page was. Led Zeppelin makes the list twice: #8-"Stairway To Heaven" and #11-"Whole Lotta Love." It's difficult to argue with the choice of "Whole Lotta Love." Those growly blues riffs and the intense buildup of those zoomy sounds Page makes for once overshadow Robert Plant's screams. I'm going to offer instead the re-mastered version of one of my other faves, "Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You," originally from their 1969 debut LP, still my favorite of theirs, which shows off a range of Page's styles as well as the group's deep blues roots.

Led Zeppelin: Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You (remastered)

Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits gets proper recognition but in my opinion #32-"Sultans of Swing" is not the best example of his skill. And since you can hear that and #94-"Money For Nothing" in any grocery store anytime, let's find something else. Maybe the sultan didn't want to make it cry or sing, but Knopfler makes that guitar weep and moan. What I love especially about Knopfler (and about Ry Cooder too) is that he plays the spaces between the notes. You know that next note is coming, but he makes you wait for it, anticipate it until your skin almost itches, then he gives it to you, and ahhhhhhh!!! Here's a live version in 320 kbps of one the best examples, and I have no idea why it isn't on the list. The gorgeous pedal steel at the end is Paul Franklin.

Dire Straits: Brothers In Arms from On the Night recorded live, 1992
Originally on Brothers In Arms (1985)
"We are fools to make war on our brothers in arms"

This is pretty fun, isn't it? How about more next Tuesday? Let me know.