Beck said simply, “I think Stevie Ray was the closest thing to Hendrix when it came to playing the blues.“
"There's clearly a touch of Jimi Hendrix in Vaughan's outburst in particular – not just the obvious technical skill and similar blues influences, but in the solo's sense of adventure, and devil-may-care fearlessness." (Guitarworld)
"When I saw Jimi we knew he was going to be trouble. And by ‘we’ I mean me and Eric [Clapton], because Jimmy [Page] wasn’t in the frame at that point. I saw him at one of his earliest performances in Britain, and it was quite devastating. He did all the dirty tricks – setting fire to his guitar, doing swoops up and down his neck, all the great showmanship to put the final nail in our coffin. I had the same temperament as Hendrix in terms of ‘I’ll kill you’, but he did in such a good package with beautiful songs."
I don’t want to say that I knew him well, I don’t think anybody did, but there was a period in London when I went to visit him quite few times. He invited me down to Olympic studios and I gave him a bottleneck. That’s what he plays on Axis: Bold As Love. We hooked up in New York and played at Steve Paul’s club The Scene. (Loudersound)
Jeff Beck: looking back at his childhood in newly unearthed audio of an interview with Rolling Stone’s Kory Grow. “They were one step away from jail, most of them. The guitar saved me from that.
Jeff Beck, the ‘guitarist’s guitarist’ who forever altered the course of rock’n’roll.
“Jeff could channel music from the ethereal… his technique unique, his imaginations apparently limitless,” said Jimmy Page of this “six-string warrior” and “the spell he could weave around our mortal emotions”. Jeff Beck “was punk rock before punk existed,” declared The Edge. “The Salvador Dali of the guitar,” said Aerosmith’s Joe Perry; “an infinite source of joy,” claimed Stevie Van Zandt; an innovator, pioneer and profound influence, stated Dave Gilmour, Steve Hackett, Johnny Marr and Joe Satriani. The phrase “guitarist’s guitarist”, which could have been coined for Beck, had never felt more apposite.
Beck – who died this week at the age 78 – looks back at his entire career, from the Yardbirds to the Jeff Beck Group to his fusion era and beyond in the interview, which can be heard in its entirety in the new episode of our Rolling Stone Music Now podcast. “I’ve never made the big time,” Beck said, “and mercifully, probably. When you look around and see who has made it huge, it’s a really rotten place to be when you think about it. Maybe I’m blessed with not having had that.” (Source Rolling Stone)
The nearly two-hour-long tribute episode also features new interviews with three guitar legends: Mike Campbell of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Vernon Reid of Living Colour, and Joe Satriani. Elsewhere in the episode, Andy Greene joins host Brian Hiatt to discuss Beck’s entire career.
“Jeff Beck probably stood out the most in terms of spontaneous, quirky, but melodic stuff,” says Campbell. “It was always surprising, like, ‘How’d he come up with that?’ Plus, he looked great!” Campbell also reveals one thing he had in common with Beck: Both of them kept guitars in their bathrooms, just in case.
