Who’s the Best? Pete Townshend Names His Top 3 Guitar Legends

Pete Townshend has always been known for the way he attacks a guitar—windmills, crashes, the sharpness of his chord work—yet his technique came from more than theatrics. Long before he became the driving creative force of The Who, he was listening closely to players who pushed the instrument into new territory. Their ideas shaped the foundation he later built on, even as he carved out a style that no one else could quite imitate.

What’s interesting about Townshend is that he has never claimed to be the fastest or flashiest guitarist. Instead, he has always talked about the guitar as a storytelling tool, something that could launch an anthem or tear open a moment of raw emotion. That way of thinking didn’t appear out of nowhere. It came from studying musicians who approached the guitar with invention, soul, and a sense of danger—qualities he carried into every stage he stepped onto.

So when Townshend names the players he considers the greatest, he isn’t just ranking heroes. He’s pointing to the architects who shaped rock’s vocabulary. His top choices reveal the musicians who left an imprint on his ears and on the genre itself, the ones whose influence still ripples through generations of players who grew up chasing the kind of electricity Townshend once felt as a young guitarist.

Jimi Hendrix

Townshend has spoken about many musicians over the years, but the way he talks about Jimi Hendrix carries a different kind of weight. Hendrix wasn’t just another standout player to him—he was a moment, an impact, something that shifted the way a guitarist understood the instrument. When Townshend recalls seeing Hendrix for the first time in London, the memory still carries the shock of someone witnessing a new language being invented on the spot.

That encounter didn’t simply impress him; it rearranged what he thought was possible. Hendrix had a way of bending sound into shapes that didn’t exist before, pairing precision with a kind of chaos that felt deliberate and alive. Even Townshend, who built his entire reputation on explosive stage presence and sharp rhythmic power, found himself stunned by the level of invention Hendrix displayed from the very first notes.

For Townshend, Hendrix wasn’t a figure you celebrated because everyone else did. He was someone you had to experience in person to understand the force behind the myth. The admiration he expresses comes from standing in a small club, watching a player who seemed to channel something cosmic through his fingertips—someone who didn’t just play brilliantly but redefined what brilliance could sound like.

Howlin’ Wolf

Long before The Who were blasting through amplifiers with a force that reshaped rock’s identity, Townshend was listening to American blues. Among the voices that hit him hardest was Howlin’ Wolf, whose raw power and heavy presence seemed to cut through the polished pop of the time. Wolf didn’t need flash or ornament; his delivery alone carried an honesty that young British musicians weren’t hearing anywhere else.

Townshend has credited Howlin’ Wolf with opening a door that many English rock bands would soon walk through. Wolf’s music didn’t offer escape so much as confrontation—a way of channeling emotion that felt rough, unfiltered, and grounded in real struggle. That approach seeped into the DNA of early British rock, shaping the sound of bands who wanted their music to feel urgent and uncompromising.

What stood out to Townshend wasn’t just Wolf’s voice or phrasing, but the attitude behind the sound. There was a toughness to it, a sense of permission to be fierce and unapologetic. In an era filled with clean radio hits, Howlin’ Wolf showed players like Townshend that intensity could be its own form of beauty, and that the blues could be a guide for anyone trying to express something deeper than what the charts were offering.

Link Wray

If Hendrix expanded Townshend’s vision and Howlin’ Wolf shaped his emotional compass, Link Wray was the spark that lit everything in the first place. Townshend has said many times that Wray’s early records didn’t just influence him—they pushed him toward the guitar with a sense of urgency. When he heard those thick, punchy chords on “Rumble,” the instrument suddenly felt like a doorway into a life that had color, movement, and meaning.

Wray’s appeal wasn’t about technical excess. His style had grit, simplicity, and menace, built around tones that felt rebellious before the word became a rock cliché. That kind of sound resonated deeply with a young Townshend, who was searching for something that didn’t feel sanitized or polite. Wray proved that the guitar could speak loudly without needing complexity, and that raw energy could be more thrilling than precise execution.

Townshend often describes his early years as a time when the world around him felt muted, while music carried the brightness he was craving. Link Wray became part of that shift—an artist who showed him that sound could carve a path out of the grey. Without Wray’s influence, the story of Townshend’s own guitar journey might have taken a very different turn, and the landscape of rock would be missing one of its most distinctive voices.