MusicRadar

"It's quite an experience to be in a room packed with almost every one of your heroes" said Joe Bonamassa in accepting the Breakthrough gong at last night's Classic Rock Awards. It's a sentiment we have to admit to sharing.

On arrival at last night's awards – hosted at London's regal Park Lane Hotel – MusicRadar was greeted with an awesome barrage of celebrity the likes of which we'd never seen.

Look, there's Slash! There's Ronnie Wood! Pete Townshend! Brian May, Jeff Beck, Billy Gibbons, Tony Iommi, Jimmy Page, Ginger Baker! These were people whose music we'd grown up listening to – bona-fide rock legends we'd idolised as kids, now all together under one roof.

The atmosphere was genuinely electric. An hour in and all the star guests had arrived - the party was now in full swing. Drinks were being quaffed, old bandmates reunited and glamorous young women apparently hired to look glamorous, young and, well, like women were being, erm... politely accosted by a '60s rock 'n' roller we shan't name. (His girlfriend kept an eye on him though – we guess you can't always get what you want.)

Ronnie Wood wearing a shirt he painted himself.

We used the reception drinks time to corner a few celebs with a Dictaphone, quizzing rockers on their favourite riffs of all time (the fruits of which will feature in MusicRadar's upcoming Riff Week). Far from the brusque or even plain rude rockstar stereotype, we found Billy Gibbons, Tony Iommi, Jeff Beck and the others we interviewed to be genial and charming. Brian May in particular was a gent, musing carefully on our riff-based enquiries with all the intellect and eloquence we'd expect from the learned rock legend.