(Guitar World Presents). This exciting book from the editors of Guitar World is a treasure trove for any guitarist. Featuring electrifying profiles of everyone from hard rock gods (Wes Borland, Dimebag Darrell, Tony Iommi) to British giants (Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, even Nigel Tufnel) to trailblazing bluesmen (John Lee Hooker, Reverend Gary Davis) to country gents (Clarence White, Albert Lee) to the founding fathers (Chuck Berry, Dick Dale) as well as jazzmen, progressive rockers, punks and rockabilly superstars, Guitar World's 100 Greatest Guitarists puts all these inspiring masters at your fingertips. But the fun doesn't stop there. Guitar World has also assembled the riveting stories behind the 100 greatest guitar solos. You know them note-for-note, from David Gilmour's transcendent phrasing in "Comfortably Numb" to Jimi Hendrix's rich notes in "Little Wing" to Kurt Cobain's unforgettable melodic turns in "Smells Like Teen Spirit," and now you can get the inside stories of how these magic moments were captured for all time. Rounding off the collection is bonus material such as a lesson with Metallica's Kirk Hammet, a guide to the 12 greatest guitar tones, and 25 guitar masters weighing in on their favorite solos.

For nearly a decade, “Dear Guitar Hero” – where everyday fans get a chance to ask their hero a question – has remained one of Guitar World magazine's most popular departments. Now the best of these interviews with rock's most inspiring six-string icons are presented here in one volume. Dear Guitar Hero features interviews with a broad range of celebrity guitarists, from such rock legends as Jimmy Page, Eddie Van Halen, Ace Frehley, and Billy Gibbons to such superstar shredders as Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, and Paul Gilbert to such heroes of the modern rock world as Dave Grohl, Jerry Cantrell, and Warren Haynes. Through the years, Guitar World readers have proven themselves to be fearless when asking questions of their guitar idols, often touching on subjects others would be reluctant to broach. Whether it's the truth behind the Allman Brothers' legendary At Fillmore East album cover photo and the illegal substance in Duane Allman's hand, what Ritchie Blackmore meant when he referred to Eric Clapton as “not a very good guitar player ” or Dave Mustaine's true feelings about Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich, Dear Guitar Hero features revealing conversations with many of the most legendary figures in rock guitar history.

A vivid and energetic history of Van Halen's legendary early years After years of playing gigs everywhere from suburban backyards to dive bars, Van Halen — led by frontman extraordinaire David Lee Roth and guitar virtuoso Edward Van Halen — had the songs, the swagger, and the talent to turn the rock world on its ear. The quartet's classic 1978 debut, Van Halen, sold more than a million copies within months of release and rocketed the band to the stratosphere of rock success. On tour, Van Halen's high-energy show wowed audiences and prompted headlining acts like Black Sabbath to concede that they'd been blown off the stage. By the year's end, Van Halen had established themselves as superstars and reinvigorated heavy metal in the process. Based on more than 230 original interviews — including with former Van Halen bassist Michael Anthony and power players like Pete Angelus, Marshall Berle, Donn Landee, Ted Templeman, and Neil Zlozower — Van Halen Rising reveals the untold story of how these rock legends made the unlikely journey from Pasadena, California, to the worldwide stage.

The Routledge Handbook of Pink Floyd is intended for scholars and researchers of popular music, as well as music industry professionals and fans of the band. It brings together international researchers to assess, evaluate and reformulate approaches to the critical study and interpretation of one of the world’s most important and successful bands. For the first time, this Handbook will ‘tear down the wall,’ examining the band’s collective artistic creations and the influence of social, technological, commercial and political environments over several decades on their work. Divided into five parts, the book provides a thoroughly contextualised overview of the musical works of Pink Floyd, including coverage of performance and sound; media, reception and fandom; genre; periods of Pink Floyd’s work; and aesthetics and subjectivity. Drawing on art, design, performance, culture and counterculture, emergent theoretical resources and analytical frames are evaluated and discussed from across the social sciences, humanities and creative arts. The Handbook is intended for scholars and researchers of popular music, as well as music industry professionals. It will appeal across a range of related subjects from music production to cultural studies and media/communication studies.

This book defines the key ideas, scholarly debates, and research activities that have contributed to the formation of the international and interdisciplinary field of Metal Studies. Drawing on insights from a wide range of disciplines including popular music, cultural studies, sociology, anthropology, philosophy, and ethics, this volume offers new and innovative research on metal musicology, global/local scenes studies, fandom, gender and metal identity, metal media, and commerce. Offering a wide-ranging focus on bands, scenes, periods, and sounds, contributors explore topics such as the riff-based song writing of classic heavy metal bands and their modern equivalents, and the musical-aesthetics of Grindcore, Doom metal, Death metal, and Progressive metal. They interrogate production technologies, sound engineering, album artwork and band promotion, logos and merchandising, t-shirt and jewellery design, and fan communities that define the global metal music economy and subcultural scene. The volume explores how the new academic discipline of metal studies was formed, also looking forward to the future of metal music and its relationship to metal scholarship and fandom. With an international range of contributors, this volume will appeal to scholars of popular music, cultural studies, and sociology, as well as those interested in metal communities around the world.