10 Rock Guitarists That Are Impossible To Imitate
8. Neil Young
When talking about the usual trappings of '70s guitar, Neil Young doesn't feel like he belongs in any one category. He was never all that flashy in his solos like Jimmy Page, and yet his acoustic guitar playing wasn't exactly the more eclectic mix you would find in someone like Joni Mitchell or James Taylor either. So....who the hell is Neil Young? The answer: he's NEIL YOUNG.
When looked at against his contemporaries, Young has always been able to adapt himself to the music world that he's lived in across each generation, showing an open hearted earnestness to his more subdued period on songs like Heart of Gold and After the Gold Rush. If you just know him as the folk balladeer though, you're leaving a lot of the most caustic hard rock on the table, from the pure allure of Hey Hey My My to the pure emotion he squeezes out of every note of the solo of Rockin in the Free World.
The solo to Cinnamon Girl really shows you all you need to know, as Young squeezes the lifesblood out of one note for all its worth, saying with one pitch what Yngwie Malmsteen never could. With collaborations ranging from Crosby Stills and Nash to Emmylou Harris to Pearl Jam, Young's versatility behind his guitar has made him the true musician's musician.