Worst Guitarists of All Time
Dwayne Michael Carter, Jr. is an American rapper from New Orleans, Louisiana. He was discovered by Brian "Baby" "Birdman" Williams at a very young age, and was signed to Cash Money Records, where he would be one quarter of the rap group Hot Boys. In the years to follow, he would go on to find his own... read more Not much to be said here that hasn't already been said. He clearly can't play the instrument and doesn't try to learn. This is evident in his infamous guitar solo on YouTube.
He's the worst and fake. I mean, I saw his guitar solos. Are those even real? They are lame jokes. I mean, he taps on the guitar and the sound is something else. If you show me someone picking a note with one finger and calling it economy picking, would you believe it? I wouldn't call him the worst guitarist, even if he can't play guitar. But why pretend to be something you can't do? He tries to become Eddie Van Halen!
At least Kurt Cobain plays guitar, and those were real. It doesn't matter how good, bad, or overrated he is.
Nicholas Jerry "Nick" Jonas is an American singer, songwriter and actor, best known as one of the Jonas Brothers, a pop rock band he formed with his brothers Kevin and Joe. Guys, he is technically by far the worst on this list. He is absolutely talentless and has no purpose in anything whatsoever. Worse than Lil Wayne and Fred Durst. Also, what the heck is Kirk Hammett doing on this list?!?!?!?!?!? The guy who made this must have been drunk.
If he's trying to be a bad guitarist, then he's doing good.
His song and his guitar playing are just no...
William Frederick "Fred" Durst, born as Frederick Allen Mayne III, was born on August 20, 1970. He is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, and film director... read more He is a good rapper, but Wes Borland is the rightful guitarist.
He's not a guitarist, but he tried playing guitar once and he sucked at it.
Taylor Alison Swift is an American singer-songwriter. She was born on December 13, 1989, in Reading, Pennsylvania. Swift is best known for writing personal songs and has won 13 Grammy Awards... read more I don't understand why a bunch of girls pick up a guitar because of Taylor Swift's "music". All she does (or at least did when she was a country singer) is play four chords over and over and sing about every guy she's gone out with and broken up with. She's not that talented and doesn't even play guitar anymore.
Taylor Swift is beyond talentless. I have never seen a more deplorable vocalist in my life.
New Eddie Van Halen my ass. She sucks.
Justin Drew Bieber (born March 1, 1994) is a Canadian singer, songwriter, and record producer. He currently resides in Ontario, Canada and is Christian. He is the son of author Pattie Mallette... read more Baby: One chord at the intro, nothing else. This guy is a poser guitarist.
Does he know what a guitar even is?
Kurt Cobain was born February 20, 1967, in Aberdeen, Washington. In 1987, he started the grunge band Nirvana, which became one of the most successful bands ever. He was a talented yet troubled grunge performer. Kurt Cobain became a rock legend in the 1990s with his band. He committed suicide at his... read more Kurt wasn't technically a good guitar player. He never did many impressive solos or musically diverse riffs, but his guitar playing perfectly matched the feeling the band was going for. His sloppy, distorted guitar screeches matched Nirvana's style and actually made their music sound more interesting and better. If they had a more technically skilled guitarist like Slash, for example, the band's music wouldn't have been as good or made as much of an impact.
The thing about Kurt was that yeah, you could sit down with your guitar and play his songs without too much trouble, but it makes you go "why didn't I think of that?" He had an amazing feel for writing compelling guitar lines, technicality aside. There are plenty of bands that like to show off their music theory knowledge, but something just gets lost along the way sometimes.
Shawn Peter Raul Mendes is a Canadian singer-songwriter and model. He attracted a following in 2013, when he began posting song covers on the popular video sharing application Vine. This guy stinks. He sucks. He only plays acoustic. Have you even seen him on electric guitars before? Hell, I think he writes all those songs just to get chicks.
Any one of his songs can be learned in under 60 seconds.
I think I can play even better than him.
Joseph Adam "Joe" Jonas (born August 15, 1989) is an American singer and actor. Jonas first rose to fame as a member of the pop-rock band Jonas Brothers, along with his brothers Kevin and Nick... read more
Edward Christopher "Ed" Sheeran is an English singer-songwriter and musician. He sang songs such as The A team and Shape of You. He was born in Hebden Bridge in Yorkshire and raised in Framlingham, Suffolk. Can't play. Can't even make a single good song.
All he does is play three chords over and over while singing boring and generic love songs.
James Patrick Page is an English musician, songwriter, and record producer who achieved international success as the guitarist and founder of the rock band Led Zeppelin.
Brian Hugh Warner, better known by his stage name Marilyn Manson, is an American musician, songwriter, actor, painter, multimedia artist, author, and former music journalist.
Billie Joe Armstrong (born February 17, 1972) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and actor best known as the lead vocalist, primary songwriter, and guitarist of the punk rock band Green Day, which he co-founded with Mike Dirnt... read more Maybe if he'd shorten his strap, his pick would actually catch all the intended strings. Quality is sacrificed for image, and his ego kills his talent even more.
Sure, his solos are easy because as a child he didn't focus on being the best guitarist ever. He focused on being the best songwriter ever.
I can't believe his solos are super easy. I played the solo in "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" in maybe under 1 minute!
Adam Noah Levine is an American singer and songwriter. He is the lead vocalist for the Los Angeles pop rock band Maroon 5.Levine began his musical career in 1994, when he co-founded the band Kara's Flowers, of which he was the lead vocalist and guitarist. The band split up after their only album,... read more
Noel Thomas David Gallagher is an English musician, singer, songwriter and guitarist. He served as the lead guitarist, co-lead vocalist and principal songwriter of the rock band Oasis. Since 30 years ago, he sounds like he has only a few days of practice and never improved a little bit. The worst guitarist ever, worst solos ever, boring, simple in the worst sense of the word... very low-quality music made for the masses... Oasis is the McDonald's of music...
Graham Coxon, Jonny Greenwood, Keith Richards, and Pete Townshend are way better guitarists than Noel Gallagher. Also, he is an absolute idiot and treats everyone like garbage. Why anyone would like or support this person is beyond me.
David Jesus Torres (born September 5, 1984), better known by his stage name Dahvie Vanity, is an American singer-songwriter and rapper. He is best known as one half of the crunkcore duo Blood on the Dance Floor and as the face and creative mind behind the industrial project Sinners are Winners. He is... read more
John Christopher "Johnny" Depp II (born June 9, 1963) is an American actor, producer, and musician. He has won the Golden Globe Award and Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Actor... read more
Øystein Aarseth (1968-1993), who went by the pseudonym Euronymous, was a Norwegian guitarist and co-founder of the Norwegian black metal band Mayhem. Euronymous was stabbed to death by band member Varg Vikernes in August 1993... read more Overrated: remembered more for his murder than his skills. Even worse, his murderer is remembered more than he is. Varg left a bigger impression on people than Euronymous ever did.
Kirk Lee Hammett is the lead guitarist and songwriter for the heavy metal band Metallica and has been a member of the band since 1983. Before joining Metallica he formed and named the band Exodus. Whammett demonstrates what happens when you're taught by one of the best and don't practice your material. Kids, please learn from this!
Seriously? This guy's solos are awesome!
Chad Robert Kroeger is a Canadian musician and producer, best known as the lead vocalist and guitarist for the Canadian rock band, Nickelback. All he does is play basic chords that you would learn in the first month of guitar lessons (Photograph is a perfect example). He doesn't even have good note selection either: Burn It to the Ground would have sounded better if he hadn't gone from plucking the open E straight to plucking that string on the 15th fret.
Why is Kurt Cobain above him? I'm not even a Nirvana fan, but it's not hard for me to realize they're nowhere near the worst! But Chad Kroeger sucks!
Take a look at this trash guitar.
Every time I play it I become a star.
Oh wait, that was stolen!
John Clayton Mayer is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Mayer attended Berklee College of Music in Boston, but disenrolled and moved to Atlanta in 1997 with Clay Cook. Together, they formed a short-lived two-man band called Lo-Fi Masters. Terrible guitarist. Even Lil Wayne plays much better.
John Beverly, born John Simon Ritchie, later named Sid Vicious, was an English musician, most famous as the bass guitarist of the influential punk rock band the Sex Pistols, and notorious for his arrest for the alleged murder of his girlfriend, Nancy Spungen. Why is this junkie even on the list? He deserves to be forgotten. Lemmy even tried to give him basic lessons, but he was too incompetent to understand them. Do the world a favor and retire every memory of this murderer. Freddie Mercury was right to look down on him.
While I know he was a bassist (and let's be fair, a bass is essentially a different type of guitar), most would agree that his playing was incredibly subpar.
Bruh, this dude was a bass player, and he wasn't even a real musician, honestly.
Yngwie Johan Malmsteen is a Swedish guitarist, songwriter and bandleader who was born on June 30th, 1963, in Stockholm, Sweden. He was known for his neoclassical metal playing style back in the 1980s. Doesn't play with enough feel, but he does do some impressive feats.
He used to be good. Now, he seems to have lost all knowledge of music theory. As a guitarist, Richard Benson's guitar playing sounds like he's just slamming a bunch of random notes from different arpeggios, scales, and keys together, and playing them at lightning speed with no regard for musicality.
A bad guitarist with no skills. All he knows is how to tap and make a guitar suffer. He sucks!