Skip to main content
MusicRadar MusicRadar The No.1 website for musicians
Sign in
  • View Profile
  • Sign out
  • Artist news
  • Guitars
  • Guitar Pedals
  • Synths
  • Keyboards & Pianos
  • Controllers
  • Guitar Amps
  • Drums
  • Software & Apps
  • More
    • Recording
    • DJ Gear
    • Acoustic Guitars
    • Bass Guitars
    • Tech
    • Tutorials
    • Reviews
    • Buying Guides
    • About Us
More
  • Radiohead theory
  • Steely Dan's drum machine
  • Deep Purple in the dungeon
  • Prince's drummers
  • 95k+ free music samples
Don't miss these
John McLaughlin
Artists “I don’t have many guitar players’ albums on my iPhone, but Jeff is there”: John McLaughlin on the magic of Jeff Beck
Otoha holds a blue Fender Strat in a staged setting with neon pink and blue lights overhead.
Artists IDLES, Wet Leg and Sam Fender all graduated from the Fender Next programme – meet its Class of 2025
Brent Hinds plays a bespoke ESP offset live in Mexico as he performs with Mastodon in 2022.
Artists “My mind’s the most cosmic place I could ever visit. All I have to do is zone out and play the guitar, and before you know it, I’ve visited places unheard of”: Remembering Brent Hinds, the maverick who trampled metal guitar underfoot with Mastodon
Danny Carey
Drummers 6 of the most inspirational drummers of all time
Dickey Betts [left] and Warren Haynes trade licks onstage with the Allman Brothers Band at the 1993 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Haynes's Strat would soon be stolen in New York.
Artists How Warren Haynes turned to Les Pauls after his favourite Strat was stolen
A composite image of Steve Vai [left] playing his green PIA Ibanez signature guitar onstage with the Satch/Vai band, and right, the late, great Allan Holdsworth playing an S-style with a cigarette smoking wedged on the strings.
Artists Steve Vai on why Allan Holdsworth – the fusion virtuoso who wrote his own rules – was the GOAT
A Fender Player II Stratocaster and Telecaster on a white piece of wood with lots of holes in it
Electric Guitars Best electric guitars under $1,000/£1,000 in 2025: My top picks for players of all styles
10 people drummers will encounter at gigs
Drummers The 10 people drummers will inevitably encounter when playing a gig
Drummers When British rock drumming ruled the world
Mick Ralphs in 1971
Artists “Bowie gave them the song but Mick wrote the intro — the lick of all licks”: Joe Elliott's tribute to Mick Ralphs
Close up of Gibson and PRS left-handed guitars on a green background
Electric Guitars Left-handed guitarists have been overlooked for too long, but Thomann’s up to 20% off Lefty Deals sale changes that
Orbit Culture's guitarists
Electric Guitars Orbit Culture show us their ESP guitars – and tell us why the EverTune bridge is a game-changer
Drummers Listen to 11 isolated drum tracks from rock's drumming legends
Carlos Santana and Jeff Beck
Artists Carlos Santana on what made Jeff Beck a guitar great, and getting into character to cover Michael Jackson
Mark Knopfler
Artists "I did everything wrong, but I think they’re perfect notes”: Mark Knopfler's favourite guitar solo
  1. Artists
  2. Guitarists

8 underrated guitarists

News
By Total Guitar ( Total Guitar ) published 5 June 2013

We salute the great unsung heroes

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.

Prince

Prince

“Prince is a better guitar player than Slash,” Graham Coxon once claimed, and while we wouldn’t go that far, the purple one is a truly incredible player: fusing rhythm, lead, feel and technique into a style that’s almost Hendrix-worthy. Find his performance of While My Guitar Gently Weeps on YouTube and revise your Top 5 guitarists list accordingly.

Page 1 of 8
Page 1 of 8
Izzy Stradlin

Izzy Stradlin

He held down impeccable rhythm, co-wrote half the Guns N’ Roses catalogue from Don’t Cry to You Could Be Mine, and his exit from the line-up in 1991 effectively killed the band. Given all
of that perhaps it’s a little bit unfair that Mr Stradlin will forever be known as “y’know, that bloke in the chimney sweep cap who used to stand next to Slash on stage...”

Page 2 of 8
Page 2 of 8
Alex Lifeson

Alex Lifeson

Despite monster prog chops and a Les Paul tone to die for, the Rush man rarely gets a mention in pub discussions, presumably because he’s never achieved notoriety by falling out of Stringfellows with a stripper’s garter belt over his head.

Page 3 of 8
Page 3 of 8
Malcolm Young

Malcolm Young

Despite owning arguably the best picking hand in rock, Young Snr has spent four decades skulking unloved at the back while the crowd chants: “An-gus! An-gus!” In fairness, that’s what happens when you dress your little brother as a novelty schoolboy and give him all the solos.

Page 4 of 8
Page 4 of 8
Huey Morgan

Huey Morgan

The headlines focus on the faux-mobster shtick, the Radio 6 Music show and the reality TV dog- training, but beyond the play-in-a-day riff of Fun Lovin’ Criminals’ signature tune Scooby Snacks, Huey is also a seriously accomplished blues soloist. And don’t you punks forget it.

Page 5 of 8
Page 5 of 8
Mick Ronson

Mick Ronson

Armed with his stripped Les Paul, the late sideman swung from spaced-out lead gorgeousness on Bowie’s Life On Mars? to visceral freak-outs such as Vicious from Lou Reed’s Transformer. But that’s the trouble with hanging out with era-defining rock icons: nobody even notices you’re there.

Page 6 of 8
Page 6 of 8
John Lennon

John Lennon

Frontman. Songwriter. Icon. Tragic hero. But does anyone remember Lennon as a guitarist? Well, they should: his blazing Rickenbacker 325 rhythms on the early Beatles material are peerless, while I Want You (She’s So Heavy) and Yer Blues find him handling his guitar like a weapon.

Page 7 of 8
Page 7 of 8
Mick Taylor

Mick Taylor

Respect to Brian and Ronnie, but Stones fans know that in the early 70s, this gangly introvert was Keef’s greatest wingman, applying bottleneck brilliance to the likes of Sway, before jumping ship in 1974 to do... not a lot. “Mick is a great guitar player,” said Richards. “But he found out the hard way that’s all he is.”

Page 8 of 8
Page 8 of 8
Categories
Guitars
Total Guitar
Total Guitar
Social Links Navigation

Total Guitar is Europe's best-selling guitar magazine.

Every month we feature interviews with the biggest names and hottest new acts in guitar land, plus Guest Lessons from the stars.

Finally, our Rocked & Rated section is the place to go for reviews, round-ups and help setting up your guitars and gear.

Subscribe: http://bit.ly/totalguitar

Stay up to date with the latest gear and tuition. image
Stay up to date with the latest gear and tuition.
Subscribe and save today!
More Info
Read more
John McLaughlin
“I don’t have many guitar players’ albums on my iPhone, but Jeff is there”: John McLaughlin on the magic of Jeff Beck
 
 
Otoha holds a blue Fender Strat in a staged setting with neon pink and blue lights overhead.
IDLES, Wet Leg and Sam Fender all graduated from the Fender Next programme – meet its Class of 2025
 
 
Brent Hinds plays a bespoke ESP offset live in Mexico as he performs with Mastodon in 2022.
“My mind’s the most cosmic place I could ever visit. All I have to do is zone out and play the guitar, and before you know it, I’ve visited places unheard of”: Remembering Brent Hinds, the maverick who trampled metal guitar underfoot with Mastodon
 
 
Danny Carey
6 of the most inspirational drummers of all time
 
 
Dickey Betts [left] and Warren Haynes trade licks onstage with the Allman Brothers Band at the 1993 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Haynes's Strat would soon be stolen in New York.
How Warren Haynes turned to Les Pauls after his favourite Strat was stolen
 
 
A composite image of Steve Vai [left] playing his green PIA Ibanez signature guitar onstage with the Satch/Vai band, and right, the late, great Allan Holdsworth playing an S-style with a cigarette smoking wedged on the strings.
Steve Vai on why Allan Holdsworth – the fusion virtuoso who wrote his own rules – was the GOAT
 
 
Latest in Guitarists
Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi perform live in 2023, with Trucks playing his Dickey Betts Artist Series SG, Tedeschi playing her Les Paul Standard.
Derek Trucks says Tedeschi Trucks Band have completed new album and have been sneaking in some of the tracks live
 
 
Spinal Tap's Nigel Tufnel plays a custom Marshall stack Jackson guitar while David St Hubbins sticks to the classic Les Paul in this live pic from 1992.
Seymour Duncan celebrates Spinal Tap sequel with custom pickup that has an “eye-watering” 111K DCR
 
 
Andy Summers of The Police performs at Oakland Coliseum on June 13, 2007 in Oakland, California
“Every culture has accessed it and made something of their own of it”: Andy Summers to front new docu-series about the guitar
 
 
Biran May and friends
"It's a classic... one of the best rock songs ever”: Which 2013 track could Brian May be talking about?
 
 
Jackson Pro Series Limited Edition Phil Demmel KV King V: the V-style electric is finished in black-and-white polka dots, and looks good in all settings, against a white background or barroom scene alike.
Jackson and Phil Demmel salute Randy Rhoads with limited run Pro Series King V in polka dot finish
 
 
John McLaughlin plays his PRS live onstage. He wears a black tennis wristband; the guitar has a highly figured flame maple top and he wears a blue shirt. On the right, Jimi Hendrix plays his Gibson Flying V with the psychedelic paint job.
John McLaughlin on how his first encounter with Jimi Hendrix ended in “disaster”
 
 
Latest in News
Jackson Pro Origins 1985 San Dimas: these retro S-styles take the high-performance electric guitar brand back to the '80s, offering single and dual-humbucker platforms for shred with the choice of rosewood or maple fingerboards – and what about that "Two-Face" black-and-white finish?
“These guitars empower metal artists with the authentic, crushing tone that built Jackson’s legendary reputation”: Jackson takes us back to the heyday of shred with the Pro Origins 1985 San Dimas series – and what about that Two Face finish?
 
 
Mark Ronson and Michael Jackson
How a teenage Mark Ronson convinced Michael Jackson to write him a bassline so he could make a hit song out of it
 
 
English singer-songwriter FKA twigs attends the MTV Video Music Awards at UBS Arena in Elmont, New York, on September 7, 2025
"It shows the breadth of talent from across all of our nations”: The Mercury nominations are out and diverse as ever
 
 
The new Gibson Murphy Lab Light Aged Acoustics released on 9 September 2025, all lined up in a wood-panneled show room with round windows and a rural landscape outside.
Gibson expands acoustic Murphy Lab collection with five Light Aged classics – including a Nick Lucas 1929 reissue
 
 
A mac book being closed
Transform your MacBook into a theremin! Or a creaking door!
 
 
TORONTO, ON - AUGUST 04: (EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NO STANDALONE PUBLICATION USE (NO SPECIAL INTEREST OR SINGLE ARTIST PUBLICATION USE; NO BOOK USE)) Taylor Swift, Swift and Bryan Adams rehearse onstage during the Taylor Swift reputation Stadium Tour at Rogers Centre on August 4, 2018 in Toronto, Canada. (Photo by Jason Kempin/TAS18/Getty Images for TAS)
Bryan Adams explains why the only person to do justice to Summer of '69 was Taylor Swift
 
 

MusicRadar is part of Future plc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site.

  • About Us
  • Contact Future's experts
  • Terms and conditions
  • Privacy policy
  • Cookies policy
  • Advertise with us
  • Accessibility Statement
  • Careers

© Future Publishing Limited Quay House, The Ambury, Bath BA1 1UA. All rights reserved. England and Wales company registration number 2008885.

Please login or signup to comment

Please wait...