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UNBELIEVABLE: Guitar world | History Defined

“Frank took an extended 10-minute solo. I walked off stage. David Bowie and Iggy Pop were standing there”: Adrian Belew on how he went from playing with Frank Zappa to joining David Bowie’s band

Belew would serve as Bowie’s lead guitarist between 1978 and 1979, before returning as his musical director in 1990

Guitar World

The pedal that changed me – I asked the Guitar World staff to name the stompboxes that actually made a difference to their playing

Whether it was fun, frustrating, or forced us to think differently, these are the 12 pedals that GW staffers say have actually changed the way they play

Guitar World

“I did get some bad reviews. Some people called me ‘the guy who ruined the Pretenders’”: Robbie McIntosh on his trial by fire when he replaced the late James Honeyman-Scott

The guitarist had huge shoes to fill, and the press weren’t exactly on his side

Guitar World

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Yamaha confirmed to be among Fender’s cease-and-desist targets

The largest musical instrument maker in the world has been drawn into the ongoing legal dispute over the Stratocaster

Guitar World

“I FaceTimed with her parents and said, ‘I like your daughter’s playing. She’s a natural. She plays like Gary Moore’”: How 22-year-old Anna Cara landed the gig of a lifetime with Alice Cooper

At just 19, Cara was scouted by Cooper's longtime guitarist, Tommy Henriksen, on social media, and immediately flown out to Los Angeles

Guitar World

“What I do can't be put into any corner. I want to do it all”: Lowell George called beer bottle slide master Danny Gatton “the best player in any style that I've ever heard.” In a rare interview, “The Humbler” reflects on his trailblazing career

Now regarded as one of the greatest to ever play the Telecaster, the late Gatton was just starting to break through when Guitar World caught up with him for a chat about influences, and his time playing with “Elvis Jr.”

Guitar World

“Everyone was telling us we sucked. We were the outcast band, and every other high school band at that time talked smack about us”: How Death overcame the odds to bring death metal to the world

In April 1995, Chuck Schuldiner looked back on how his ambitious style helped galvanize a movement that still resonates to this day

Guitar World

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“You couldn’t tell the difference between the Squier and the Fender. I played them live, and I couldn’t tell”: John 5 on the Squier Telecaster that competes with Fender

The Tele obsessive has a high bar, but this budget build blew his mind

Guitar World

“My favorite Ibanez was always the 550. That’s not to say I felt I needed to improve on it, but I wanted to make one RG that had all my favorite variables”: Nili Brosh on Danny Elfman, shredding with intent and augmenting Ibanez's most popular guitar

Wielding her signature custom Ibanez RG, and with a new solo album on the launchpad, Dethklok and Danny Elfman guitarist Nili Brosh is set to go interstellar

Guitar World

“I got a call from my brother. He said, ‘Ozzy wants to talk to you.’ Ozzy tells me that Randy died, and asks if I’m available’”: The guitarist who was hired to fill in for Randy Rhoads – only to be fired immediately afterward

Robert Sarzo – Rudy Sarzo's brother – found himself in the unenviable position of lending his guitar chops to Ozzy Osbourne right after Rhoads' tragic death

Guitar World

“I think people got scared to play it”: Guitar Center CEO on why Stairway to Heaven was banned in guitar stores

All roads – or stairways – lead to a scene from a certain 1990s comedy classic

Guitar World

“I played that lick and went home. An hour later, the phone rang. Tom said, ‘You’ve got to come back. We want to put that lick you played at the front of the song’”: How Mike Campbell's throwaway lick shaped a Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers classic

Campbell's guitar noodling and Petty's ear for a good hook resulted in their first Top 40 hit

Guitar World

“This makes it feel exciting all over again”: Jim Root’s signature Fender reinvented the Telecaster and was praised by John Mayer – now it’s back with a key twist

The Slipknot guitarist's go-to Telecaster returns with a fresh look

Guitar World

“I walked into Guitar Center, saw this Tele and thought, ‘This is incredible.’ It’s the guitar that got me endorsed with Fender”: The guitar that changed John 5’s life

The Mötley Crüe shredder owns over 100 Teles, but this one is the cream of the crop

Guitar World

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Guitar World

“It could give my Quad Cortex mini a run for its money”: My pick of the best new guitar gear launched this week – and the new drops you might have missed

Vote for your favorite new release in Guitar World's weekly guitar gear poll

Guitar World

“I miss my brother… But I’d always had it in the back of my mind that if the Heartbreakers ever retired, I would make this my purpose”: Mike Campbell on finding a new life in The Dirty Knobs, and why we should listen to what our guitars are telling us

With a title track inspired by Brian Wilson, Mission of Mercy is the sound of Campbell piecing his heart – and ours – back together again

Guitar World

“Alex said, ‘I don’t want to play my double-neck – it’s too heavy.’ I said, ‘I’ll do it!’ He lent me his white Gibson EDS-1275 for Stairway”: How Crown Lands went from Rush’s spiritual successors to playing Led Zeppelin with their heroes

Are Crown Lands heirs to the Rush crown as Canada’s foremost prog act? Kevin Comeau is just happy to be living the prog dream, falling down the rabbit-hole of double-necks and 19-minute tracks

Guitar World

“My manager told Eric, ‘You should meet this young artist I'm working with. He's a funny guy – I think you’d like him’”: How a ’70s soft rock icon ended up recruiting Eric Clapton on his debut album

After a friend gave his demo tapes to Art Garfunkel, singer-songwriter Stephen Bishop somehow ended up in the same room as his guitar hero from Cream

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Guitar World

“I have to play through the pain”: Mahogany Rush legend Frank Marino announces return to the stage despite debilitating hand injury and retirement

The Canadian guitar icon had previously announced his retirement from touring in 2021 before sustaining a hand injury while building pedals in 2024

Guitar World

“The label says, ‘We need five more Wait and Bleeds.’ I was like, ‘We're really not that band. You sell our records and we'll make them, okay?’”: Mick Thomson reflects on Slipknot's Wait and Bleed, label pressures – and sticking to their own guns

In a 2014 GW interview, Thomson revealed his disdain for melodic choruses, and how he fought hard for the band to maintain their artistic integrity post-Wait and Bleed

Guitar World

“He would show up in a station wagon full of Les Pauls, Teles and Strats. I bought probably 20 pieces from him over the years”: The classic (and unlikely) gear behind the Eagles’ Hotel California

What Joe Walsh and Don Felder needed was Les Pauls and Teles, and lots of them – and Felder in particular made use of a Texan horse trader who also stocked some thoroughbred guitars

Guitar World

My pick of the best new guitar gear launched this week – and the new drops you might have missed

My personal highlights from a week that brought us a single-pickup PRS for Jon Jourdan, Eventide's next-gen H9, and more. Have a highlight of your own? Let us know in the comments

Guitar World

“I was driving home, and I thought of this chord sequence. I was about 20 minutes away from the studio. I turned around and went back”: Robert Smith on the flash of inspiration that shaped the Cure's biggest hit

Proving beyond doubt that the band's range extended far beyond dense, brooding epics, it remains the Cure song to reference for those who know only of the band's name and maybe their frontman's inimitable hairdo

Guitar World

Bob Dylan has just recruited one of the world's greatest jazz guitarists – and no one quite knows what's going on

Virtuoso Julian Lage – who's very likely your favorite guitarist's favorite guitarist – has been welcomed into Dylan’s band without prior announcement or fanfare

Guitar World

“I’ve never been very confident as a player. I’ve always felt like I had to work hard, and maybe I didn’t appreciate that I have a natural talent for playing guitar”: Alex Lifeson’s 20 greatest guitar moments in Rush

From fever-dream epics to blistering solos, weird harmonizer effects and 12-string chime, here are Lerxst’s finest hours with the iconic Canadian prog trio

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