Your 5 Most Influential Recordings?

[PeeWee]

Since we've such a broad range of players here at the Hub, I thought that it'd be interesting to hear what shaped us individually and inspired us to play in the first place. What were the five most influential recordings in your life that really affected you? They don't have to be in order of importance, so don't make your brain bleed -

I'll get things rolling :

Albert King - Live Wire/Blues Power; a powerful example of one of the most original Blues guitarist of all time. There are other records that are a bit more polished, but this is Albert "warts & all".

Jimmy Smith - Jimmy Smith's Christmas Album; my very first taste of Jazz organ. From that moment onward, I was hooked on the B-3 and through Jimmy discovered guys like Kenny Burrell, Wes Montgomery and Grant Green as well as other organ monsters like Richard "Groove" Holmes, Brother Jack McDuff, Jimmy McGriff, "Baby Face" Willett, Charles "The Mighty Burner" Earland & Shirley Scott.

The Beatles - I Feel Fine; we had this single around the house when I was coming up. I used to play that feedback intro over and over until my folks would snatch it off the turntable - still one of the greatest Pop riffs ever, IMO.

Deep Purple - Smoke On The Water; the very first thing I ever learned to play on a stringed instrument.

Cream - Sunshine Of Your Love; this song still resonates with me to this day. Ginger Baker laying down that dark, thudding rhythm on 1 & 3 and Clapton's woman-tone solo with the paraphrasing of "Blue Moon" at the intro did it for me. This was the very first guitar solo I ever learned note for note and I still love playing it nearly 30 years later!

[gururyan]

Cream - Strange Brew: This song is why I ever picked up the guitar to begin with. It was the summer of '85, I was on the floor with my dad's speakers pointed at my head like giant headphones. I had Disraeli Gears spinning on the Dual, the record player I was not supposed to touch (which I own now and use often). I had never heard guitar until that moment. I have never been the same since.

Beatles - Tomorrow Never Knows: At the time I heard this, I hadn't heard anything like it before. It opened my eyes and my ears to a whole new approach to music. The lyrics, the backwards solo, the drumbeat...everything about this song floored me, still does.

Beatles - Twist and Shout: John's vocals on this are absolutely amazing, my hair still stands up when I listen to it. The music could never equal his vocals on this one. I still can't sing along to this one with out getting into it and straining my voice.

Led Zeppelin - In My Time of Dying: This was the first song I learned (well, most of it) on slide. That's a feeling that just doesn't ever go away. The amazement that you are making a sound that is just like on the record of THE rock band. Jimmy's slide and John's thunderous pounding is such an integral part of this masterpiece. Rock 'n' Roll.

Ween - Roses Are Free: Yeah, not a group one would expect to see as an influence on my guitar playing roots. Well, I started on bass guitar and when I ran my Fender 5 String into a Peavy Distortion, I could nail the solo on this song. I am a huge Ween fan and they are a major influence on my music. This song could be heard coming out of my bass amp the entire summer of '94.

[PeeWee]

Funny that you should mention Tomorrow Never Knows. I had a similar experience when I was about 11 or so. I would crank the B-side of Lady Madonna on Apple which was George Harrison's The Inner Light. All the Indian percussion and George's sitar playing drove me NUTS!! Having grown up in "white bread suburbia" just outside of Alexandria, VA, I'm sure that all the neighbors thought I was insane....or maybe just a little weird. :D

[sliding-tom]

Hi PeeWee! Nice to meet you. Now that's a tough one, partly because it's been a long time since I encountered my most important influences and second because you limit it to two. BTW: I'd never guessed that "Smoke On The Water" was an influence on you!!:D

"Live Wire-Blues Power" - absolutely!! Everything you said: Warts and all - the two more albums from those shows that came out much later don't measure up.

"Rubber Soul" - maybe still my favourite Beatles album. It was released when I started out on guitar. Now 40 years later I'm here playing "Drive My Car" with "The Roosters" - what a thrill!

Robert Johnson - King of the Delta Blues Singers Vol. 1 ( and Vol.2, of course)

between that and:

B.B.King - Blues is King (not my first B.B. record but I like it better than "Regal" because it's rawer and rougher)
I just had to fill in the missing links to get educated about blues playing.

That leaves just one and that would be "Allman Brothers at The Fillmore East" - I still remember the thrill I got coming home from school one day, turning on the radio, tuning into my favourite station and then hhearing "Statesboro Blues" - slide wasn't new to me but that tone!!
Cheers
Tom

[BJF]

Hi,

Inspiring?
The Beatles:
Nowhereman: The melody
Ticket to Ride: The movement
It Won't Be Long: The riff
Daytripper: The RIFF
and yes
While My Guitar Gently Weeps.........

*** Pistols
Pretty Vacant: The sound, the works, a wake up call- God Saves I know but this was the intro

Led Zeppelin
Rock 'n' Roll: The Drums, the vocals and how to back that up on guitar

The Who
Pinball Wizard: The commanding rythm- rythmguitar and solobass

The Ramones
Sheena is a Punkrocker: The bouncing rythm- also totally solid album any song really

BB King
The Thrill Is Gone: Just one note ..........value

The Shadows
Apache: The echo

Jimi Hendrix
Any song from Smash Hits ( only studio recordings): Caos,order and excellence

Sham 69
Ulster Boy: Things can be simple

Stiff Little Fingers
Alternative Ulster: just that

Larry Wallace
I'm a Policecar: Haunting 'hungry black and white' Interaction of guitar and bass

David Bowie
Ziggy Plays Guitar: Yea he does, and I knew the meaning of Guitarhero- they say he did it backwards but I think he just didn't conform

Dead Kennedys
Let's Lynch The Landlord: How to balance rythm and leads- great guitar, like 'It's finished'; also message

Chris Isaac
Blue Hotel: My wife, and yes I know this guitar sound from deep within and it still moves me like a distant echo

The Sparks
Talent Is an Asset: This spoke to me before punk, mostly because it had distorted rythm guitar, no 5 minute solos, which is exactly why I enjoyed the Ramones, and I was just learning from my elder brother that a guitar has six strings and a bass four

Hm, I think I stop listening sometime around 1980.
I remember jumping in the bed listening to the Beatles, sitting on the floor suddenly wakening up to Pretty Vacant.........., not understanding Hendrix until discovering the rythm of doing the dishes, always listening for that mean distorted guitar, the melodies, things connected to music, maybe Lady Melody- yea that's Audio Karate.........still 5, would be difficult, even though I didn't think I paid much attention, but some things just crawl or creep into the mind and sits there, making imprints, little bits that build the library of sounds and you can tell those men with horses for eyes that I enjoy the Church, but it is the way and the sound of strings, distorted slightly or severe and the movement and the value of notes, and just that melody that lingers, and the band shake their heads as the drummer plays the melody, and it's secure not to have a point of view sitting in the Nowhereland..........it sets the train of thoughts and the Last Train To Clarksville just left, so I'll book a room at the Blue Hotel, double bed please.

999
New Rose

There's an African drum that makes the most annoying sound like a new chalk on a blackboard and it is the sound of a dangerous spider polishing its backlegs- still in the middle ages there was the Krumhorn that sounds sort of similar to a distorted rythm guitar, that in turn was inspired by the saxophone, that before guitar was the key melody instrument as the Krumhorn before that...........and both are distorted flutes, like the spinette is a lightly distorted piano and the sound of roaring hammonds made the wall of sound and guitar only needed to be thin......yet Blackmore, I thought he was a hippie, but a damned good guitarist graciously so, but you know who's the Lord........and this sound is also why I enjoy JS Bach, preludium.
If you take the transient attack outof a guitar and distort it to sustain what does it sound like?

You take a flute and it's triangular wave, very pure, while the Clarinett has the distortion hehehe.

I had a master of flutes show me her flutes from the smallest piccolo to one that could only be played sitting and she was right in that flute is an underestimated instrument, but still can we have more distortion please?
Yes she was beautiful and a master, but just give me an old guitar

Thanks for the memoryjog- the more I think about it's sounds and parts of songs, more than whole songs. Yes I know it's a mess, but all of it had the secret message: "PLAY GUITAR"

but above all it's fun
BJ

[cvansickle]

Impossible to narrow it down to five hundred, let a alone five! Everything I hear is an influence one way or the other.

[PeeWee]

Bjorn - my man!

Wow....Sham 69. I have the LP Tell Us The Truth from back in the day. I used to play it often.

Can't agree more about Pretty Vacant. I owned 3 copies of Never Mind The Bollocks and worm them all out! I haven't heard the record in probably 25 years and what starts playing in my head a few days ago? - Liar. I first saw them on a TV special in 1976 and was transfixed to the screen. They were so unlike anything that was happening in the US at that time plus, they were raw and exciting.

Having grown up in DC, I went to more than a few Punk shows during the late '70s and early '80s; when it was still cutting edge and not this watered down bullshit they pass off as Punk or Punk-Pop today. Saw bands like Marginal Man, Henry Rollins & Iron Cross, The Cro-Mags, Bad Brains, Black Market Baby, Minor Threat and many others.

I like much of what you've listed!

[K-man]

The most influental albums to me:

1. AC/DC - Back in Black

I got my first guitar for Christmas after hearing that album.

2. Allman Brothers - Brothers and Sisters

This is the album that got me away from the metal I listened to as a teenager and into classic rock. Jessica blew me away.

3. Stevie Ray Vaughan - Texas Flood

This album got me into 'da blues.

4. T-Bone Walker - T-Bone Blues

Father of the electric blues and the main influence of every blues player (whether they realize it or not). 'Nuff said.

5. Wes Montgomery - The Incredible Jazz Guitar of Wes Montgomery

I bought this album after reading a poll in a guitar mag about the greatest guitarists of all time. He's definately in the top 5 IMO and this album got me into jazz.

[PeeWee]

T-Bone Walker - T-Bone Blues

Father of the electric blues and the main influence of every blues player (whether they realize it or not). 'Nuff said.

Amen, brother! This is the recording that I always recommend to folks who ask about 'Bone. The playing is killer ( especially stuff like Two Bones & A Pick w/ Barney Kessell ), the audio quality is better than most of the Imperial stuff and the track selection is great. Without T-Bone and Charlie Christian, there would be no electric Blues guitar - period.

[BJF]

Hi

Yea, I was flabbergasted by pretty vacant! Yea yea 'Tell Us The Truth' I guess the Truth was told
PeeWee, did you ever listen to 999?
One of the most influental bands to me was Ebba Grön and they had the anger on guitar, basslines and a jazz drummer.

As a young boy I was a guitar technician and worked mainly with classical guitarists and jazz legends, many of which were fine gent's and they were the punkrockers of the past
I'd always love to tell them they needed more distortion, while jazzguitarist Anders Fardahl would play the melodies and I would understand where he'd come from, while Django would be the tune of the day it's just the melodies except for the rythm guitarist of all times Malcom Young of AC DC
but AC DC was the other guy's band..........strange like with the Rolling Stones......................

I never had a record collection, but my brother and friends did and they'd play every recording ever made by Hendrix, Beatles, Rolling Stones, Bowie,Status Que but also 'Tell Us The Truth'

It wasn't until later I'd say *can't you put on Django or Hubert Sumlin"

I saw BB King play and he preached, like a father would tell children what to do- still Hubert would be just the wayward soul of a classically trained guitarist viewing roots from a different angle- never conforming, just following the sound and what it would suggest........... while John Lee Hooker would pound the rythm with a big 45

They talk about soul and I think soul can be viewed form many angles and it would weigh about 7 grams and be just what puts humans apart while it could unite like a Brittish football choir: " The Kids Are United"

Yes, I know I am an old man now, with kids to raise and one day I will cut the roses, make pancakes, tell stories, give away a toybus and play guitar like was it a gospel from the past just to pass on something important.

A friend gave me Stevie Ray Vaughn, to listen to and you know he could play guitar, I also heard Eddie van Halen and he certainly played guitar..............as could so many

Still at the back of my mind Ziggy plays guitar - I know he's an imaginary guitar hero but also one that tells or speaks from a magic cloud and certainly so and this I grasped from listening to the intro of Pretty Vacant.....

There was this professor at the Royal Academy of Music that many years ago asked what direction I'd like and I asked what they were and he answered ' Classical or Jazz'

That's just fine but not my core and so I learnt nothing

but at the end of the day my guitargods play for me in my head and I realize why I love the electric guitar

Thoughts
BJ

I believe we are Brothers in arms and that's Dire Straits and we can be the sultans of swing