There are many 'guitar heroes" in the annals of rock history. They always seem to be mostly shredders or blues cats.
The B-52's Ricky Wilson doesn't usually get included in those conversations but he was the right kind of guitar hero to me when I was first learning to play. His sound blared, blurted, barked and blanged. It was weird, it was funky. It was like surf music from outer space. He didn't need to peel off a billion notes in a minute to get a point across.
No "serious" guitar player of the time would sling a Mosrite, let alone one missing a string or two. Ricky wasn't trying to sound like anyone else. No else sounded like him.
Ricky died of AIDS in 1985 at the age of 32. He would've turned 65 years old today.
