RIP Link Wray

Alot of people credit Link Wray with creating the "power chord", and that may or may not be true. As the story goes, he was looking for a different tone outta his guitar, something different than the usual clean tones of the era (1950's), and proceeded to stab a pencil into the speaker cone of his amplifier, thus creating a fuzzy, distorted tone that kids nowadays spend hundreds of dollars to emulate using fancy guitar FX processors (if not cheapo distortion pedals).

Anyways, my dad loved Link Wray, and subsequently so do I. His biggest hit, the instrumental "Rumble", still sounds menacing to me today, and I can imagine in 1958, alot of people stared at their AM radio and wondered, "What the fuck is this?"

Rest in distorted peace, Mr. Wray


Hotcha!
Hank