The Players
News and happenings from the world of your favourite guitarists
Guitarist was saddened to hear of the passing of Johnny Cash guitarist Robert ‘Bob’ Wootton on 9 April, aged 75. He played with Cash’s backing band, The Tennessee Three, for 30 years until the country legend first retired from touring in 1997. In addition to many Cash studio albums, he featured with The Man In Black on 1969’s At San Quentin and Girl From The North Country from Bob Dylan’s Nashville Skyline.
J Geils of The J Geils Band passed away from natural causes on 11 April, aged 71. His band released 11 albums between 1970 and 1985, enjoying their biggest hit with the song Centrefold from 1981’s Freeze Frame.
The guitar world also lost Col Bruce Hampton, who passed away on 1 May. The US ‘godfather of the jam-band scene’ collapsed on stage during a concert celebrating his 70th birthday at Atlanta’s Fox Theatre. Hampton’s career as a musician began in the 60s as the leader of the Hampton Grease Band who, despite a shaky commercial start with Columbia Records, went on to gain a live reputation opening for the likes of Grateful Dead and The Allman Brothers Band. Hampton later collaborated with a number of jam bands and would become a mentor to a young Derek Trucks, who described Hampton’s important influence to him and others as that of “a minor league baseball coach for musicians”.
John Mayer has been using an as-yet-unnamed new PRS model on his world tour with a body shape reminiscent of a Fender Strat. Although Mayer became synonymous with the Stratocaster and had signature models released in the past, he cut endorsement ties with Fender in 2014, the same year he began working with PRS. Expect to hear much more about it this autumn.
The unlikely duo of The Who and Guns N’ Roses have teamed up for South American dates in September. GN’R have been playing The Who song The Seeker at gigs since they reunited with Slash and Duff McKagan.
Although last year’s three gigs were touted as one-time only events, it seems that Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow aren’t done yet, with live shows and now the news they have recorded new material… but just don’t expect an album. “I wrote one new song, and also recorded one of the old ones,” he told Japan’s Bur magazine. “Rather than make an album, we may release as singles.”
Although the sight and sound of 6,299 guitarists playing Hendrix’s Hey Joe together would be reason enough for celebration for us, unfortunately, the world record attempt for ensemble guitar playing on 2 May in the Polish city of Wrocław failed to smash the previous number. The gathering took place as part of the city’s annual Thanks Jimi Festival, a tribute to the legendary guitarist, and although the event had grown each year since 2003, it fell short of the 7,356 record set in 2016. Thankfully, that was set by Thanks Jimi, so they’re still number one.