Randy Rhoads 12/06/1956 - 03/19/1982

[Floyd Eye]

Find one single person anywhere in any interview who claimed Randy lied or was petty, jealous or a narcissist. Or anything other than a down to earth nice guy. Truckloads of evidence exists proving all that shit was part of who Eddie was.

 

[paulyc]

Find one single person anywhere in any interview who claimed Randy lied or was petty, jealous or a narcissist. Or anything other than a down to earth nice guy. Truckloads of evidence exists proving all that shit was part of who Eddie was.

I don't dispute those things about EVH AT ALL LOL

As for RR... who knows. And again, the guy burned to death in a plane crash, who was going to come out after that and say anything negative ? I'm NOT saying he was an asshole either, but I did read somewhere that he felt EVH was more flash than substance and IDK how wonderful a human being you'd have to be to not feel like he was huge and you weren't (yet), especially given RR's level of music education and dedication to the craft etc.

 

[Strandberg Junkie]

So, people don't lie?

you make all the assumptions you want.

I read tons about RR being the nicest guy in the world.
I read a lot of things about EVH that say the opposite.

So what?

 

[paulyc]

you make all the assumptions you want.

I read tons about RR being the nicest guy in the world.
I read a lot of things about EVH that say the opposite.

So what?

You're assuming everything you read is true. If that's the case, get back to OT and keep reading all the right wing BS in there and you'll be converted in no time. LOL

 

[Floyd Eye]

I don't dispute those things about EVH AT ALL LOL

As for RR... who knows. And again, the guy burned to death in a plane crash, who was going to come out after that and say anything negative ? I'm NOT saying he was an asshole either, but I did read somewhere that he felt EVH was more flash than substance and IDK how wonderful a human being you'd have to be to not feel like he was huge and you weren't (yet), especially given RR's level of music education and dedication to the craft etc.

It’s pretty widely accepted that RR wasn’t that interested in being huge or famous. He just wanted to be the best guitarist he could be. And he was more interested in classical than rock and roll so it’s not a stretch to assume he might have thought EVH was more flash than substance since to Randy substance probably meant music theory, etc. Lots of people were upset that QR was the number one or two draw on the strip for years yet had no record deal, but no evidence exists to suggest RR was angry about it. He planned to quit ozzy. Hell, he intended to quit when Ozzy fucked over Bob Daisley and was talked out of it by Bob and Lee Kerslake.

 

[Floyd Eye]

You're assuming everything you read is true. If that's the case, get back to OT and keep reading all the right wing BS in there and you'll be converted in no time. LOL

That was kind of uncalled for brother. So far we haven’t had to deal with political bullshit in this thread. Might be nice to keep it that way right ?

 

[paulyc]

It’s pretty widely accepted that RR wasn’t that interested in being huge or famous. He just wanted to be the best guitarist he could be. And he was more interested in classical than rock and roll so it’s not a stretch to assume he might have thought EVH was more flash than substance since to Randy substance probably meant music theory, etc. Lots of people were upset that QR was the number one or two draw on the strip for years yet had no record deal, but no evidence exists to suggest RR was angry about it. He planned to quit ozzy. Hell, he intended to quit when Ozzy fucked over Bob Daisley and was talked out of it by Bob and Lee Kerslake.

I think it's pretty crazy to think he wouldn't want to be successful as far as money goes, even EVH didn't like the fame angle (does anyone ?) He could take care of his mom, own a home, have a family, etc... who wouldn't want that ? Why get into rock and roll in the first place ?

EDIT: Don't forget EVH had music theory too, on piano, up to community college level. I don't believe for a second that he didn't apply it to songwriting and guitar playing in general, as he's been known to dumb down himself in interviews about theory.

 

[jabps]

Maybe I should have said he was the first guy to do it very successfully. I'm sure some people knew who Yngwie was in 1981, but EVERYONE knew who Randy was.

I would also argue that Randy did it better than Yngwie and certainly Schenker. Just my opinion I suppose. Don't get me wrong, I am an Yngwie fan, but all his stuff sounds very classical and robotic and Randy's had feel, fit the music and was more melodic.

Agreed, Uli, Schenker they didn't have the impact Randy did. Ying Yang wouldn't "really" hit for a few years later. Randy brought this out to the forefront, to the masses. Does that mean he was the best? No, it just mean he got it out first. In my lifetime I've only seen one other guitarist have the impact Randy had on popular music and that was EVH. And of course Ed's impact was universal across all music genre's, a whole massive other scale in terms influence etc...

That time frame was incredible for furthering rock guitar, was truly an amazing thing to have grown up in that era where everything was fresh. Watching G Moore finally break, Sykes, Campbell, Vandenberg, Gilbert, Vai, Vito - every week a new album with a hot new player. If you didn't live it, I'm sorry because it was amazingly fun. And even when the music started to push the cheese factor you'd have a great player like Kee Marcelo or guys in other genre's breaking like Eric Johnson. What a time to be guitarist and having all these guys at your fingertips pushing you along.

Another thing as well - as far as the competition between Randy and Ed, his brother and sister pretty much said that didn't exist. Randy was interested in what EVH was doing just like all those guys on the LA scene who came up together were interested in what each were doing. And I have no doubt Ed was interested in what they were doing as well but he sure wasn't going to say that in print. Sorry but all this crap like Yngwie spills about not listening to other guys, please. They're all human and it's human nature not at least be interested in what's happening in your field. You don't just wake up with it. Frankly Ed could be petty back then because the guy was an alcoholic. Ego and alcohol aren't a good combo for some people. There are tons of interviews with Ed that it's always somebody else's fault or somebody did this yada yada. I love Ed but he wasn't a perfect person, especially when the alcohol came into play which was pretty much all his life until he got sober.

Back to Randy, I miss him. Music misses him and IMO had he lived I think they guy would have gone to UCLA, gotten his degree and gone into that field. I think he'd probably be a master now and teaching.

 

[paulyc]

That was kind of uncalled for brother. So far we haven’t had to deal with political bullshit in this thread. Might be nice to keep it that way right ?

I'm just pointing out that just because you read something doesn't make it true... believe me, lets keep politics out of it.

 

[Floyd Eye]

I think it's pretty crazy to think he wouldn't want to be successful as far as money goes, even EVH didn't like the fame angle (does anyone ?) He could take care of his mom, own a home, have a family, etc... who wouldn't want that ? Why get into rock and roll in the first place ?

I’m sure he wanted to make a good living at it but improving his skill was the most important thing in the world to him dude. He was taking classical lessons, probably from people with less skill than him, in towns all across the world while he was on tour with Ozzy. The fact that he was willing to throw his big break away to stand on principle over the Daisley firing is proof of that, no ?

 

[Floyd Eye]

I'm just pointing out that just because you read something doesn't make it true... believe me, lets keep politics out of it.

I agree with that brother but man, there are shit tons of people all saying the same things about Randy. I mean it’s universal. Absolutely no one has ever said otherwise. Really not even Eddie. Other than the claim he made that Randy admitted learning everything he knew from Eddie ( preposterous) Eddie never had anything bad to say about the guy right ?

 

[paulyc]

I’m sure he wanted to make a good living at it but improving his skill was the most important thing in the world to him dude. He was taking classical lessons, probably from people with less skill than him, in towns all across the world while he was on tour with Ozzy. The fact that he was willing to throw his big break away to stand on principle over the Daisley firing is proof of that, no ?

I've never heard he wanted to quit Ozzy over Lee & Bob, just that he wanted to do UCLA classical guitar. Not saying it's not true, I've just never heard it. If you believe Ozzy and Sharon (laughable I know), RR didn't want to play with Bob & Lee in the first place, Ozzy said he called them "geeks, how are we going to conquer the world with those two", and then they brought Rudy in, and Tommy.

 

[Strandberg Junkie]

You're assuming everything you read is true. If that's the case, get back to OT and keep reading all the right wing BS in there and you'll be converted in no time. LOL

Why you gotta be an asshole about it?

 

[paulyc]

Why you gotta be an asshole about it?

Didn't think I was...

 

[Strandberg Junkie]

Ego and alcohol aren't a good combo.

I have this tattooed on my chest.

 

[Strandberg Junkie]

Didn't think I was...

My apologies then.

I'm not going to make assumptions about what was in the guys' head.
Unlike today, back in the 80s we had Guitar Player, Guitar World, and Guitar for the Practicing Musician.
I read every single one of them front to back every month. As you can imagine those two guys were
featured all the time.

I can't make assumptions about who did or didn't lie about anything. I'm just relaying what I read.

P.S. Wanna hear about the time I spent a few hours with EVH discussing a potential new speaker product
for his EVH brand? Him, his brother and his lead tech drove down from LA and spent most of the day at our
offices. This would have been around 2010 maybe???

 

[legend71]

It is interesting whenever RR is talked about the comparisons between him and EVH always comes up on here. The RR fans seem to always want to make that comparison. I think they were two wildly different guys with wildly different takes on hard rock guitar. RR was great in his way but far more conventional in his approach (to me). He did some very interesting things within the framework and context of being the guitar player in Ozzie's band. EVH was not constrained by VH as much and basically wrote all of their material musically himself. I recall some interviews where RR sounded like maybe he was getting tired of what he was doing in Ozzy and was going to do something else in the future. Who knows? I think ultimately he would have quit a la Jake E Lee as he was probably being ripped off my management like all the guitar players in his bands have been.

 

[paulyc]

My apologies then.

I'm not going to make assumptions about what was in the guys' head.
Unlike today, back in the 80s we had Guitar Player, Guitar World, and Guitar for the Practicing Musician.
I read every single one of them front to back every month. As you can imagine those two guys were
featured all the time.

I can't make assumptions about who did or didn't lie about anything. I'm just relaying what I read.

P.S. Wanna hear about the time I spent a few hours with EVH discussing a potential new speaker product
for his EVH brand? Him, his brother and his lead tech drove down from LA and spent most of the day at our
offices. This would have been around 2010 maybe???

Fuck ya I'd LOVE to hear about it !

I read all those mags too.

My whole issue with RR is that I just don't believe he was the angelic little guy that everyone makes him out to be. Maybe he was, just hard to believe in cut throat LA in the late 70s early 80s that anyone could be that egoless and nice etc. Maybe he was, I just don't think human nature really works like that.

 

[Mr. Willy]

I think a lot of players like Yngwie & Shawn Lane were great players with chops, feel, vibrato and tone (for Yngwie) all going for them, but they just weren’t gifted like Randy or Marty was at actually composing the musical ideas. They shoulda let someone else who was do that part for them and we could’ve had something truly spectacular with quality playing & quality musical content. One can dream…

I agree with what I think you’re saying here. As gifted and talented as Randy was, the two albums with Ozzy were a total band effort. The contributions of Kerslake, Daisley (the MOST detrimental to this group other than Randy), and even Ozzy (contributed more to the crafting of the vocal Melodies than he’s given credit for) cannot be overlooked in the overall composition of the material that was produced. I love Randy’s playing as much as anyone, but the music he created on those two Ozzy albums would not have been possible without those four guys together in that time. For example, go listen to the QR stuff with Randy. There’s some cool stuff, tunewise, here and there, and the playing is magnificent as expected, but most of those tunes fall very, very flat. Had it not been for Daisley helping Randy to write and arrange his material, it would have been immensely harder for Randy’s material to have the lasting legacy that it does.

 

[Kapo_Polenton]

EVH goes WAY beyond tapping or speed licks (Randy does too of course), and I'd say Randy. Uli, Blackmore, DiMeola, and Schenker probably had as much influence on "shred" guitar as EVH did (maybe more), but as I said before, EVH really transcended just the guitar universe and impacted pop culture, VH was HUGE. Not to mention the WHOLE LA metal genre, EVERYONE ripped EVH off. Humbucker in a strat ? Rip off. Graphic on a guitar ? Rip off. Tapping licks ? Rip off. Modded Marshalls ? Rip off. If you don't agree these things are direct rip offs, at least admit they didn't really exist before EVH made it popular.

Also, if anything, I'd say Randy was more peeved that EVH was more well known/popular than he was than EVH gave a shit about some kid that was in his shadow. Well known QR was very bitter about their lack of an American record deal for their first two releases, and that Randy wanted out of Ozzy despite Ozzy really breaking him nationally.

Man, QR sucked balls.. I love Randy but the other guys gave his riffs some direction rather than supporting Dubrow's grating vocals. He's human not a god, he had the talent but he needed other people to bring it out and collaborate with him. Once he hit on Ozzy and his band, those guys brought out the beast. I guess you could say EVH also needed DLR's sleazy lyric style to bring out his chops. Nuno needed Cerrone... lol wait, scratch that last one . Nuno was a complete package on his own.

Also, this thought that guitar innovation ended with EVH and Randy, I don't want to bring that back up again but listening to this iso track of Lynch on the Hunter, what attack he had in the way he also approached the notes on his guitar. He's a contemporary of both EVH and Randy. There were studs all over the place before, during, and after all these guys. It's music, don't label everyone, just enjoy their unique talents and voices on the guitar. Would have been awesome to hear Lynch on tour with Ozzy instead of wank my bar Gillis.