Unplugged
Legends
Joe Bonamassa
"OK, I'll just do everything, then" With his childish face and fiendish grin, it's easy to imagine Joe Bonamassa (New Hartford, New York, 8th May 1977) answering in this way to the poor soul that had just given him some typical all-American advice: "Keep to what you know and just do your best". Clearly, he had no fear of becoming...
Tony Iommi
Our heavy legends series kicks off with rock's man in black, a man whose singular sound can be traced back to an unlucky accident he had as a teenager when, quite literally, he was working with heavy metal. With the tips of two of the fingers to his right hand amputated, Tony Iommi tuned down his guitar strings to relieve the pain and by doing...
Gary Moore
A calling card lasting over nine minutes long. Grinding Stone is the name of the first song that Gary Moore performed at the start of his recording career. We're back in 1973 and that is also the title track of his debut album under his own name with his own band. He was 21 years old and another guitar legend began to take shape in the damp...
David Gilmour
Back 50 years ago, the future Commander of the Order of the British Empire was dragging along half dead from hunger in search of non-existent adventures in France and Spain. He had barely turned 20 years old as the '60s started drawing to a close. His dream ended when he returned home, but only so a new one could begin. Pink Floyd was...
Billy Gibbons
On the outskirts of town, between the traffic lights and road signs, the neon lights shine. Not everyone hears their call. And not everyone who hears the call knows the secret. The road to paradise goes by way of winding roads, and you have to know how to take your chances, understand the signs, get in the car, slam it in gear and put the...
Ritchie Blackmore
You don't have to be sporting a mane of hair (or what’s left of it) or wear a studded wristband to include Smoke on the Water in your life’s soundtrack, as many human beings would concur. Just as you’ll find this song on the playlist at most New Year's Eve parties, its melody marks the "heavy" side that we all secretly carry inside us...
Slash
It's 1985 and Guns'n'Roses begin to bring in the hoards gig after gig. In mid-ruckus, a moment of dawning: Slash comes to the conclusion that on a stage like this, they won't be able to get a decent manager worth his salt. With these five beasts making the noise, that part of the bargain is taken care of. What we rock thoroughbreds need is a...
Mark Knopfler
Act 1 Our scene: in inspiring London. A tennis player's sweat band around his head, sleeveless t-shirt and wrist band resting on the top of his Strat. Cotton trousers rolled up to the ankle; it's the '80s. On this stage in the background we can of course see Mark Knopfler barking out "Walk of Life" in front of a sea of tens of...
Albert King
20 miles along Highway 82 in the heart of Mississippi separate the cradles of the two kings of cotton, free slaves from blues, black men in whose bums an electric guitar always seemed a mere toy. And this mere toy, they both spun all the strings the six strings they had stored, converting them into something true and raising their fans beyond...
Duane Allman
Music is pain, a lament for failing to unite the broken pieces. Music is born from a broken heart and from absences. It is expressed through the personality of suffering, be it as a solo artist or in a band...there is always a moment of solitude, silent dialogue with the notes that brings tears to the eyes and causes blisters on the fingers....
George Harrison
George Harrison, undoubtedly, belongs to the immaterial world of the soul. It is impossible that during his presence of 58 years as a mortal being—the way “we” mere mortals knew him—was his purest state of being. At the very least, it could not have been for him because he never reached the level of perfection he constantly sought. Or...
Eddie Van Halen
Just as with the impressionists, later arrived the “heavy-metals”. Taking the accessory by the base and inventing a new language. They knew they were venturing into uncharted territory. Heavy-metals and impressionists alike knew. And that they would be branded as weird, turned inside out, loud and noisy. The stain as the beginning of all,...
Stevie Ray Vaughan
I’ve got the blues. And I’ve got no hurry in fixing them, nor even showing them. I find them, amongst a cloud of smoke, as I search for every pitch-perfect note. From the pain in my soul, oh I’ve got the blues. I’ve got soul and rock, and even country; I’ve got a Strat and together we travelled the World over. I’ve got some songs...
Chuck Berry
What is it if it's not classical music? Whatever it is, let's pigeon-hole it as popular music, broadening what the concept of rock 'n' roll is; whatever name we care to give it, let's say that in the beginning there was an Adam. And if we were to choose, subjectively, of course - unless divine intervention was behind these writings (which at...
Keith Richards
Those who haven't heard of him wouldn't be wanting to cross his path on the corner of Edith Grove. On a wet and lonely night, the only signs of his presence are his footsteps, up until the moment when his imminent arrival is presaged by a hormonal discharge that impregnates the air, a rancid smell that only bodies that have been soaked in...
Pete Townshend
What is music, rock music for example? And who makes it? Those that write it or those that perform it? What type of art is it? Lyrical or transgressive? Is it forced or does it flow out, born of inspiration? Is it improvised or does it already exist even before it is written, even when it is never actually written, even before it...
Jeff Beck
They say that the army is like a society within a society, a state within a state. And you could say that the guitarist community is much the same. It's a tiny world in which everyone knows one another. Be it in the bar, in the market or up on the stage - sooner or later, our paths cross. Jeff Beck forms a part of this world's social elite, of...
Eric Clapton
Back then, Clapton was already a god. But only for a select group of weirdoes and the odd groupie. His mission down here on Earth, at least the parts of it in which His Majesty moved, was to spread the word of the purest of blues. And this had instilled in him the most incredible vanity, to the need to go bouncing around from venue to venue,...
Jimi Hendrix
In the beginning there was man, half Indian, half black. And the man played riffs for five dollars, which is how much his first guitar cost. He bought it from one of his father's drunk friends. And with it, for the first time ever, he understood himself. There is a parable told about Jimi that describes how one day after having...