Tom Morello is The Greatest Guitarist Of My Generation!*

That sooo didn't suit the song. Does that kind of a solo suit any song?

 

I do wonder how many Bruce Springsteen fans listen to alt rock on a regular basis. Using Springsteen performances to make a point against Morello only lets more people know that Springsteen himself liked him enough to play with him.

 

I love Tom Quayle's amazing technique. Too bad it's wasted over elevator-fusion most of the time. Check this insane solo out.

 

I'm starting to think you should have titled the thread Morello-worst guitarist of a generation so we'd get people going against the grain/OP the other way and say why he's great.

People like to go against the grain of the OP or common opinion so they can feel like they're more of an individual so when any of us makes a bold title or bold statement about 'best' or 'greatest', we will always get shot down by those who 1. don't like 'greatest' titles and 2. don't want to feel part of a herd of sheep. Also, people use personal preference to determine ability when it's not all about personal preference. There are things that Morello does that no one else is skilled enough at doing. Doesn't matter if a person doesn't like scratch record guitar or sirens or bomb sounds, he can produce them in ways no one else can. Add in the genre jumps and songwriting and you have someone who helped change rock music through innovation.

 

That's another good point. I'm only claiming he's the best rock guitarist, but if he's against a classical guitarist, jazz guitarist, etc., I just don't have the knowledge to commit to Morello over them so perhaps someone like Tom Quayle is better. That's my fault for not being qualified to judge but at least I admit it.

 

I do like Tom's turntable guitar technique. That's pretty nifty

 

Tom Morello is a total butcher who couldn't play a decent solo if there was a gun pointed to his head.

His guitar solo on that live version of Tom Joad is so bad that it's laughable. Morello is the hackiest of hacks.

 

Fantastic!

Ugly guitar though :}

 

That is nonsense. Morello wrote some great riffs and came up with a couple gimmicks that he beat into the ground by overusing them.

 

I like him but always thought his playing was kind of gimmicky.

 

You make good points about people wanting to be contrarians. I’ve already stated that I think he’s an innovator and I like some of his music. I do think it’s an overstatement to say he’s more ‘skilled’ than other guitarists in that he does what ‘no other players can do’.

I think it’s more than no other guitarists have really tried to do what he does. I think there are many as skilled or more skilled that could if they chose to. I do admire Morello’s ability to replicate, essentially, a DJ when playing. There’s no samples with the stuff he does; he does it himself. A brilliant idea and I’m sure it took years to perfect his technique but to say no one else is skilled enough to do it other than him is just not correct. It’s just no one else has. So we’re talking innovation as opposed to pure, raw ability, but, perhaps, they’re one and the same or, at least, related.

 

i'd say tom Morello is the greatest tom Morello of your generation.

 

I would also add Doug Martsch and J. Mascis to this discussion. And I agree with Kevin Shields mentioned above.

Martsch here--https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cH9EJg4o9-s

 

The real issue is that hyperbolic proclamations like "best" or "greatest" remove nuance from the topic and turn it into a binary. This is an ongoing issue in discussions online because some people have adopted the BuzzFeed approach.

Imagine a "Tom Morello appreciation" thread. We could talk about stuff like how his moody playing on "Shape of Things to Come" is super cool and wonder what the hell he was thinking with that solo. We could discuss how that Renegades album is full of tasteful playing. Instead, it's basically a OMG ToM MoReLl0 iz teh BESSST! tweet.

 

I never liked his playing with Springsteen. Maybe Bruce was trying something different, but it just did not gel. I still don't get why he even needed Tom when Steven took time off. It seems like Nils and Bruce himself could have easily handled the guitar duties. But this was during the time that the E Street Band turned into its own city, with backup singers, horns, three (or four!) guitarists percussionists, string players and whatever else Bruce wanted onstage to make him feel comfortable. I was glad The River tour returned to the classic E Street Band (as much as they could anyway).

I still think Bruce should do a stripped down "guitar band" tour with Max, Gary and Steven. Perhaps Nils could help out on various vocals and instruments. But what do I know? Bruce is making millions on Broadway.

 

I wonder how much of a bias there is against Morello because of his hip hop leanings/influence? I’d bet there’s a lot of prejudice because of the style he played/plays (even though it was/is in the heavy rock genre).

I’ve been listening to a lot of his stuff due to this thread and there’s no question in my mind he’s a good player. However, the notion that he’s the only guitarist good enough to play what he does is bunk. I played in a RATM “tribute” band with a totally spare guitarist who worked at the MHMR center with me and he could do about 95% of what TM did with effects and other techniques. I’d say that dispells the theory that no one else can play like him because, in fact, many can. Exactly? No, but close enough for rock n roll.

 

I like a bit of Snoop/Beasties/Dre so have no problems with his hiphop vibe. I just find his image uncool and his solos abysmal. All that beeping & farting, and if you watch that Springsteen Tom Jhoad performance he muscles in on Bruce before he's finished and apart from playing an outro solo that didn't fit the song at all, a lot of the time it was like he didn't know which key or scale he was playing in! I know that occasionally playing off scale adds a bit of colour but he plain sounded out of tune.

 

Here he is with my favourite artist (Roger Waters):

 

Well count me in
Tom is the reason I decided to play guitar and while there are more technically advanced players I find his approach just right my alley. Never got annoyed by his way of doing solos, and for those who don't know he actually did some shredding at the start.

 

An overrated guitarist IMO. There are many other guitarists with better technique and lot more soul.

 

Fans of Tom Morello should check out Street Sweeper Social Club. Tom Morello and Boots Riley=very cool!

 

Soul Power

 

I'm 39 and completely disagree. There have been some amazing players in our generation and that's not to say that Morello isn't great, but I just can't roll with your thought.

I'll give a short list of guys I find to be more sonically interesting:
1) Warren Haynes
2) Dean DeLeo
3) Mike McCready
4) Derek Trucks
5) Marc Ford

There is an obvious theme here with my selections but I just find these guys to be the guys that spoke to me the loudest. And that remains the biggest problem with these lists: they are all BS and subjective. If Tom is your guy, that's cool. He's not mine, but what does that matter to you? Not a bit.

Now I should go get stoned too...

 

Stephen Malkmus

 

I get that same feeling from Adam Jones of Tool - interesting to note that both men were friends in their young days.

Perhaps a sign (starting in the late 1980's) that the up-and-coming batch of rock guitarists hadn't cut their teeth on jazz or the blues, as the previous generation had.

For all of the great qualities of Tool's music, their lead guitar lines are little more than nails on chalkboard to these ears.