A Quote by Allan Holdsworth

The electric guitar's a pretty cheesy thing when you think about it, still working on those bits of wire and magnets for its sound. It's all of the things that are wrong with it that have made it the unique instrument it is.

Allan Holdsworth

Quote Topics

About Bits Cheesy Electric Electric Guitar Guitar Instrument Made Made It Pretty Sound Still Thing Things Think Those Unique Wire Working Wrong

Quote Author

Allan Holdsworth
British - Musician
August 6, 1946 - April 15, 2017

The Marshall guitar amplifier doesn't just get louder when you turn it up. It distorts the sound to produce a whole range of new harmonics, effectively turning a plucked string instrument into a bowed one. A responsible designer might try to overcome this limitation - probably the engineers at Marshall tried, too. But that sound became the sound of, among others, Jimi Hendrix. That sound is called electric guitar.

Brian Eno

When do you suppose the electric guitar was invented? If you thought the 1950s, you'd be wrong. If you can muster a recollection of hearing electric guitar in Lionel Hampton's big band in the 1940s and date it to that decade, you'd still be off - by more than 30 years.

Daniel Levitin

Led Zeppelin is what made me buy my first electric guitar: the Jimmy Page guitar sound.

King Diamond

Jimi Hendrix is the greatest guitar player in the world... a guy who mastered that instrument. It was talking when he played. And when he did a solo, he made the guitar cry - or made it sound like it was coming from the devil's amplifier.

Bruno Mars

The thing I find frustrating about rock music is, how different can you make an acoustic drum kit sound, an electric guitar and vocals?

Flume

Basically, I try to treat the electric guitar like an acoustic guitar. What you have to do is attack the instrument and know that your feelings aren't controlled by the controls of your guitar.

Rory Gallagher

I've always liked the electric guitar better. Even though the acoustic can be a very sexy and mysterious instrument, I can go to way more places with an electric.

Jeff Buckley

With Whitney she has such a unique sound and powerful instrument that she made those songs her own. She might as well have written them because she brought such a power and passion to them that were very unique. She has a great gift.

Justin Guarini

The use of electronics is a natural extension of the instrument - it is an electric guitar. So we guitarists have been plugging into something since 1931, and we are not about to stop now. Current advances in technology means we can have a huge array of sounds at our fingertips, and this offers amazing possibilities to the contemporary composer. It is always a guitar (I don't play synthesizer) but it becomes something else all together - more like sculpting sound in real time using metal wires, 5 fingers and a pick.

Tim Brady

Using modern guitar techniques and modern methods on an early instrument is not a very clever thing to do, because it is the authentic spirit of the instrument that should dictate the quality and characteristic of the sound.

Julian Bream

The classical guitar has a dynamic to it unlike a regular acoustic guitar or an electric guitar. You know, there's times when you should play and there's times when you gotta hold back. It's an extremely dynamic instrument.

Steve Vai

I was interested in the electric guitar even before I knew the difference between electric and acoustic. The electric guitar seemed to be a totally fascinating plank of wood with knobs and switches on it. I just had to have one.

Jeff Beck

I made an instrument which I'm really happy about, because I always wanted to have a machine that did this so once I established it as my unique tool, it was like, now I'm going to master it like a guitar.

Jamie Lidell

I always liked the steel guitar. I also love the guys that play the bottleneck. But I could never do it; I never made it do what I want. So every time I would pick up the guitar, I'd shake my hand and trill it a bit. For some strange reason my ears would say to me that sounds similar to what those guys were doing. I can't pick up the guitar now without doing it. So that's how I got into making my sound. It was nothing pretty. Just trying to please myself. I heard that sound.

B. B. King

If you have a great-sounding guitar that's a quality instrument and a good amp, and you know how to make the guitar talk, that's the key. It starts with the guitar and knowing what it should sound and feel like.