Keith Richards has looked back on the heyday of 1980s shred guitar in a new interview with Guitar World, admitting that he wasn’t especially fond of the music that was coming out at the time.
As Don Was recently attested, Richards is one of greatest rhythm guitarists to ever have played the instrument. As such, it makes sense that his favorite players from across the years are the ones that sat firmly in the pocket, those that favored groove and feel over fretboard acrobatics.
Early era swing music, Bill Haley, Little Richard, Chuck Berry and the blues – the diet that Richards was reared on – all helped cement his standing as a rhythm great, with the Rolling Stone showing little interest in becoming a lead player.
Unsurprisingly, that meant when the musical tides turned in the 1980s and Eddie Van Halen left a new wave of shredders emerging in his wake, Richards wasn’t all that impressed with what he saw.
“I laughed my fuckin’ head off!” he says in the new issue of Guitar World when asked about the Sunset Strip shredders of the era. “Like, ‘Oh my God, what have we spawned?’”
It won’t come as a shock to learn that the breakneck speeds pushed by the Shrapnel stars and shred innovators such as Yngwie Malmsteen and Marty Friedman weren’t quite Richards’ thing. That said, he appreciates the skill for what it is.
“They were good pickers, and they had a hit record here and there, but that’s pop music,” he adds. “Look, as long as you’ve got something to solo over, then go. But that never appealed to me. What appeals to me is what’s going on underneath.
What I really do love is two or three guitars playing together, because that’s what fascinates me. Just one guy soloing means nothing much to me. Right?”
It goes back to why Richards himself never cared much for lead playing, and why he instead dedicated himself to the craft of rhythm guitar so enthusiastically.
“I have never really wanted to go down that path,” Richards replies when asked if he ever wanted to be a soloist. “I mean, with solos, I admire the virtuoso and the technique and the nimbleness, but at the end of the day, what are you soloing over? You’re the icing on the cake. And I’m the cake!”
Guitar World’s new interview with Keith Richards is available in the magazine’s latest issue. You can subscribe to Guitar World over at Magazines Direct.
