Hello everyone I am new to the board. I wanted to say hello and start a most underrated players thread. here is my list

Andy Taylor-Duran Duran and Power Station

Mark Kendall-Great White

Criss Oliva- Savatage

G E Smith-Hall and Oates, Saturday Night Live Band 1980s

John Sykes-Whitesnake, Blue Murder, Thin Lizzy

I'll agree that many of those guys don't get the respect they deserve.

Warren Cuccurullo- Mothers of Invention, Missing Persons, Duran Duran- also flies under many people's radar.

Grant Geissman- Chuck Mangione, solo work- is another.

Richard Thompson

Nils Lofgrin

Welcome welcome APH.

Johnny A

If this can include some who are noted for something other than their guitar abilities, but do a splendid job on the instrument, you can include:

Bob Dylan
Joni Mitchell
Kenny Loggins
Eric Von Schmidt
Tim Buckley

Another that never fully gets his due is
Mick Taylor


Whitefang

+ 2

Richard Lloyd (Television, Matthew Sweet, Rocket From The Tombs)

I talk to younger people who don't realize that Andy Summers remade pop and rock guitar in his wake in The Police, with his sound and approach turning up everywhere from Rush and Def Leppard to every mainstream pop or R&B hit for the next decade+. I went through that for some bandmates by playing all of that stuff and demonstrating how his playing and sound on certain songs directly influenced tracks that followed. They'd never thought about it and assumed he was following the trends at the time, not setting them.

Welcome aboard aph! I would throw in James Taylor, Roy Clark, Jerry Reed, +1 on Bob Dylan, Jim Croce, Paul Simon and George Harrison.

mick taylor-mayall.stones
brad whitford-aerosmith
bill nelson-be bop deluxe
alex lifeson-rush
brian robertson-thin lizzy
scott gorham-thin lizzy
tommy bolin-b.cobham,purple,
hughie thomasson-outlaws
billy jones-outlaws
james honeyman scott-pretenders
rory gallagher-taste,solo
martin barre-jethro tull
frank zappa
toy caldwell-marshall tucker
robin trower
frank marino-mahoghany rush

I second the Alex Lifeson and Toy Caldwell.

I'd throw Junior Brown and his GuitSteel in the mix. Outside of alt country circles, he's largely ignored

A-frikkin-men on Junior!! Amazing musician and great sense of humor to boot.

+1 on Joni Mitchell - she's a fine rhythm guitarist and her use of tunings is brilliant.
Most of my heroes are very highly rated, at least in the small circle of friends that appreciates guitar excellence. One example: Amos Garrett, who was never a household name but highly regarded in the fraternity.
Maybe Buzz Feiten for rhythm playing, such as on "Jungle Walk" from the Rascal's "Island of Real".
I agree that Paul Simon is underrated as a guitarist.

I'M underrated by certain people, LOL..... but they know nothing about music, so I don't strictly speaking, CARE too much.....

Me.

And Hundreds of other local players all over the world that would rather have day jobs, or must play pop crap to compete with "Super Bass" or land the wedding gig...

Who knows .... but most of the guys listed in this thread seem to be pretty well recognized to me.

There are some guys who are not underated by people who know who they are but not alot of people know who they are. Guys that are not household names but respected in guitar circles would be people like Louie Shelton, Tommy Tedesco (RIP), Scotty Anderson, David Lindley ....

Some guys who are well known but not thought of as great guitarist could include Christopher Cross, Steve Miller ...etc ( Steve Miller in the day could do some stuff that is hard to duplicate )

Whoah! Franny Beecher is still around at age 91!




George Costanza

Eddie Hazel
Johnny Marr-lots of raves from guitar mags but no public.
Tony Rice
Joao Gilberto (and many other fine samba players).
Ricky Skaggs

Bugs Henderson
Steve Wariner
Toney Springer
David Gogo
Paul Des Lauriers
Jeff Healey
Jack Grassl
Robben Ford
Jack De Keyzer
Mel Brown

All monster players!

yep

Xris X is coming home to Austin this week. EJ played on some of his tracks. He's an awesome musician and Austinite IMO.

Scratch that - He was here on the 9th...

There is a group of canadian acoustic players that are amazing and can only be found of candyrat.

Probably the best of the bunch is Erick Turnbull he does things I watch on youtube and still can't figure out how he does it.

I've noticed the names of players who were largely unheard of by the larger public, but not underrated by those that have heard of them, like Healy.

The OP might have been intending those that just about anyone has heard of, but doesn't consider their skills, like Summers. Their recordings might not showcase the typical "incidiary solo" that's considered the "hallmark" of a guitar "hero", but closer listening reveals abilities that simply astound the average guitar "hack". Or at least a better ability than previously believed. Which is why I put BOB DYLAN on the list.

Bob will NEVER give those like Steve Vai or Jon Bonamassa any worries of a "run for their money". But a closer listen to some of what he's done on his debut, self titled album BOB DYLAN(1962) shows he had better skills than a simple folk music singer/songwriter. He even does some crude but passable slide work(referred to as "fretting" in the liner notes).

DAVE MATTHEWS is another whose guitar work gets ovrlooked.

Last of all, ELVIS PRESLEY, on his 1968 "Singer" TV special, has a small part on there that showed he knew his way around a fretboard.

Whitefang

There's a great acoustic 12-string player out there named James Blackshaw. I have his "The Cloud of Unknowing" album; he's got a unique approach, no Leo Kottke clone he!
Worth checking out on You Tube.

Bruce Cockburn
T-Bone Burnette

Paul Moak, who's a session player & producer in the Nashville area, is never mentioned. Aside from his playing ability & note choice, he has a real ear for sonic texturing, and somehow gets away with putting some really fuzzed out guitar tones on otherwise sparkly-pop songs.

Andrew Osenga (solo, sessions, the Normals, Caedmon's Call) may not be a Vai-type firebreather, but knows his way around a Memory Man. Not to mention acoustic fingerpicking and a heartfelt lead or three.

Wayne Johnson IS a firebreather. I sometimes miss playing with him. Definitely check out the new album North of Nowhere(even though I'm not on it): https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/north-of-nowhere/id568028786

And I always have to throw a plug for Steve Rothery of Marillion. While his most challenging leads may be on older albums, and I think some of the last couple had some throw away/phoned in simple leads, when he rips a good one, he rips a good one with all the heart, feel & vibrato of David Gilmour and then some. It's also easy to overlook a lot of his textural work with delays, tremelos and various other effects that you might not think it's the guitar playing it. (Plus I'll be going to Montreal next month to see them for a weekend)

John Wesley is getting some more notice as a live sideman for Porcupine tree, but is an established solo artist on his own, as well.

Steve Hackett gets my vote. Even among guitarists, he never achieved the sort of Guitar Hero status that Steve Howe got. A true master of the instrument, and a major innovator, Hackett is credited with having invented tapping, on the Genesis track Return of the Giant Hogweed. (EVH fans can argue if they like, but try to play that opening riff.) I saw him at a small D.C. club in 1980 or so, with one of the first Roland synth guitar rigs, the one that looked like an LP. Great night.

Got to throw in Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash and all those guit pick'en singer song writers out there...it's not always about leads, I just find it cool how they string chords together while coming up with new melody lines...and if they can play a few lead licks, that's cool too.

Check out Steve Hackett`s segment in this concert, it`s the full show:



An awesome early record store appearance from Rage Against the Machine and Tom Morello is playing-gasp-solos!
http://www.1065.com/cc-common/news/sections/newsarticle.html?feed=464524&article=10837346

Frank Gambale

Okay hang on-this came up before with the `underrated players` topic.
There`s underrated, and there`s unrated. For anyone who follows guitar Frank Gambale is in a class by himself. For the general listening public he is unrated, they have no clue. There are more besides him, Tommy Emmanuel comes to mind. I guess the upshot is, underrated by whom? In fact, I don`t know that a rating system even applies to the general audience-like they give a crap. So among those who listen to music and really listen, many of those listed so far are anything but underrated.