5 Essential Guitar Albums You Should Know

Must-Haves In Your Record Collection
What constitutes a great guitar album? Is it the blistering, face-melting performance? Or the insane, mind-blowing solos? There are so many good stuffs out there and for the most part, it’s subjective and all about personal taste. So for this list, we won’t just pick what we like (and we can’t tell you enough just how tempting that is). Instead, we’ll go for those which every single guitar-loving person needs to listen to at least once in their lives.
Are you ready? We suggest putting down your axe because this is one wild, musical trip.
5. Pink Floyd – “Dark Side of the Moon”
You would have to be deaf to not appreciate David Gilmourโs stunning and hypnotic guitar work in Pink Floydโs eighth studio album โDark Side of the Moon.โ It had dark, ominous and haunting themes and while weโre hesitant to call it their finest work, it was the definition of what rock music was in that era.
In fact, weโre at a loss for words as to the most accurate way of describing it. To say itโs โgreatโ is an understatement โ Gilmourโs playing alone deserves all the praises it can get. Every member of the band was at their peak.
โI try to approach things, given my limitations and strengths, from a more melodic standpoint and just work on it until it sounds … nice.โ โ David Gilmour
Gilmour doesnโt subscribe to โrules and regulations.โ And perhaps thatโs one of the things that made his guitar playing difficult to duplicate. Thereโs a certain magic about it that no one can recreate. Still, this album is proof that he was not your average axeslinger.
4. The Who – “Who’s Next”
Ever unafraid of starting and popularizing trends, The Whoโs fifth studio album โWhoโs Next?โ had everyone, including critics, singing their praises. When the โLifehouseโ project was aborted and scrapped, Pete Townshend was deeply upset. But on the brighter side, he was left with a cache of epic masterpieces which became instant classics.
With Townshend and his obsession with synthesizers, the songs packed a lot of punch. And more than his guitar-smashing antics, Townshendโs axeslinging skills were put on full display.
โYour hand and the pick have to connect with the [expletive] strings. You don’t open your fingers up and just sort of slap. And you have to be able to do it in a downward direction as well as an upward direction.โ โ Pete Townshend
He may not do a lot of guitar solos but he clearly knows how to put everyone in a trance. If you still havenโt realized just how good he is at what he does, plug in this album. Youโll thank us later.
3. The Jimi Hendrix Experience – “Electric Ladyland”
https://youtu.be/gLEQGEuFswc
A classic rock masterpiece, this album has it all. To be fair, you can just pick any record from Jimi Hendrix. After all, heโs a guitar god and if weโre honest, the man has no peers. From delicate to blistering jams, itโs almost hard to keep up.
Itโs like an inside look into Hendrixโs head and well, who doesnโt want to see whatโs going on in his brilliant, perfectionist mind?
โAs an album this influential (and as far as influencing a generation of players and beyond, this was his ultimate statement for many), the highlights speak for themselves: “Crosstown Traffic,” his reinterpretation of Bob Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower,” “Burning of the Midnight Lamp,” the spacy “1983…(A Merman I Should Turn to Be),” and “Voodoo Chile (Slight Return),” a landmark in Hendrix’s playing.โ โ AllMusicโs Cub Koda
It was the pinnacle of psychedelic rock. And whether youโre a newbie or a pro at guitar playing, this album never fails to elicit one common reaction: awe. Thatโs Jimi Hendrix for you, ladies and gentlemen. He knew how to blow everyone away and it’s not surprising if anyone just finds their jaw on the floor after listening.
2. Led Zeppelin – “Led Zeppelin IV”
https://youtu.be/jugd9S4oBvQ
This needs no introduction. But if you still need some valid reasons why the record made it to this list, we have two โ Jimmy Page and โStairway to Heaven.โ Also, this is perhaps the best way to handle critics โ throw them a masterpiece to make them shut up.
Itโs Led Zeppelinโs tour de force and while there are several underrated tracks which deserve more recognition, nothing beats โStairway to Heavenโ and how it basically defined the entire album.
โAfter all we had accomplished, the press was still calling us a hype. So that is why the fourth album was untitled.โ โ Jimmy Page
Everyone knows Jimmy Page is a legend even among guitar gods. Somehow, he makes playing look so easyโฆ that is, until you try it yourself. Thereโs really nothing else to say about this record because you just have to listen to it to understand why itโs widely considered as one of their best works.
RUNNER-UP: Stevie Ray Vaughan “Live At The El Mocambo” (1991)
We know this isnโt exactly an album like the other ones but thereโs absolutely no way we can leave out Stevie Ray Vaughan and his stellar live performance. Itโs times like this when weโre not sure if he was even human because that power he displayed is almost otherworldly.
SRV earned the respect and influence the music of countless musicians, some of whom are legends in their own right โ Jeff Beck, Keith Richards, Eric Clapton and Kirk Hammett.
โItโs difficult to emulate SRVโs tone because his hands and soul had so much to do with it.โ โ Kirk Hammett
He was just on another level and at his prime, he basically left everyone in the dust. You donโt need more evidence than this live video of him with his band Double Trouble. It was recorded on July 11, 1983 at the El Mocambo club in Toronto, Ontario during their Texas Flood tour.
1. The Beatles – “Revolver”
https://youtu.be/SikEwOtSW2s
We can never ignore The Beatlesโ influence when we talk about classic rock guitar. Not everyoneโs a fan of The Fab Four but it doesnโt take much to appreciate their greatness.
The Rolling Stone magazine referred to โRevolverโ as โthe bandโs biggest musical watershed.โ They took their music to another level โ the album was diverse, well-written and in many ways, it was the culmination of their creativity.
โThere are sounds [on Revolver] that nobody else has done yet โ I mean nobody … ever.โ โ Paul McCartney
The Beatles took a giant leap into the unknown but if thereโs anything we know about them, itโs that they were always more than willing to take huge risks where music was concerned. And one of the key features of the album was the use of โartificial double tracking.โ
Another thing is, George Harrison wasnโt the only one who showed off his guitar skills because Paul McCartneyโs solo in โTaxmanโ went down in history as one of the greatest solos ever recorded.