Latest articles by Amit Sharma
Michael Amott: “I actually play quite soft – I’m not as aggressive as people might think. I prefer to explore the dynamic range”
Arch Enemy’s riffer-in-chief discusses the dark art of metal riffing and explains how Megadeth and Metallica led the way, and Carcass’s Bill Steer helped hone his brutal chug
Robert DeLeo on how his vintage guitar collection inspired his first-ever solo album and the songwriting secrets behind Stone Temple Pilots' Core
The principal songwriter behind some of STP's biggest hits details the magic of old gear and why he never changes his acoustic guitar strings
Best rock guitars: 8 of the finest rock-ready axes from Gibson, Fender, Ibanez and others
Searching for the right guitar to rock people like a hurricane? Well, this list is sure to strike a chord
Gavin Rossdale: “Modern tones are where it's at – and if you're not where it's at, where are you?”
The Bush frontman on how he engineered the band's heaviest album yet using Neural DSP amp sims, his surprising history with Joe Walsh’s ‘Hotel California’ Jazzmaster and the tone tips he received from Carlos Santana
Matt Bellamy’s 10 greatest Muse guitar moments
Total Guitar readers voted in their thousands, and the results are in. By popular vote, these are your favorite Muse tracks
Gavin Rossdale reveals how he came to own Joe Walsh's 'Hotel California' Fender Jazzmaster – and why he wasn’t too pleased when the Eagles legend signed it
The Bush frontman copped a bit of music history when he picked up the purple offset, though, in his own words, its background “didn’t really mean much” to him
The inside story of Matt Bellamy’s vision for Manson Guitar Works
Co-owner Adrian Ashton takes us inside one of the most thrilling gear collaborations between artist and luthier, and explains how the Muse frontman drives innovation at the company he co-owns
Guthrie Govan: “You need to learn to enjoy the sound of a scale before you have any hope of using it effectively, in the same way you have to learn to like whiskey”
With his instrumental power trio The Aristocrats sounding more 3D than ever on new release with the Primuz Chamber Orchestra, Govan checks in to reflect on his career so far
Derek Trucks: “Slide playing is all about intonation – how you attack a note affects whether it sings or not”
The guitar maestro unpacks the story and influences behind Tedeschi Trucks Band’s epic quadruple-album I Am the Moon, and explains why slide guitar is a process of self-discovery
Marcus King on raiding Dan Auerbach’s fuzz museum, soul singer solos, and chicken pickin’ hoedowns with Brent Hinds and Matt Pike
The South Carolinian phenom's new album Young Blood is a tour-de-force of blues-rock and soul, and vintage gear to make it all “sound like a tattoo gun”
Matt Bellamy on Yngwie Malmsteen-inspired solos, recording with Jeff Buckley's Telecaster and his secret to beaming blues riffs into Muse’s space-age guitar sound
The Muse frontman takes us behind the most explosive guitar album of 2022, made with a mountain of gear and taking inspiration from Iron Maiden and Slipknot
The greatest guitar albums of the 2000s
Blues had a new star, fingerstyle was taken to a new level and heavy guitar was everywhere…
Tyler Bates talks recording and touring with Jerry Cantrell, and how the GuitarViol became a "primary color instrument" for his movie work
The prolific composer and guitarist on scoring 300, working with Rob Zombie, and tipping the hat to David Gilmour on Cantrell's latest solo album, Brighten
Nita Strauss on lighting Demi Lovato’s guitar fire and how fresh tones – and the 2nd position – are helping her introduce shredding solos to new audiences
The Hurricane talks tutoring the pop superstar and recruiting her to the ranks of Ibanez, and why her new solo single Summer Storm embodies everything she is about as a player
Gibson Gene Simmons G2 Thunderbird review
Shout it out loud! The God of Thunder's Gibson collaboration is here, and it's pretty darn awesome
Def Leppard’s Rick Savage: “The bass player is the bridge between the rhythm and the melody... without you the whole thing will fall apart”
Masters of the stadium-conquering anthem, Def Leppard return with Diamond Star Halos, and bassist Rick Savage stops by to talk Sting, technique, and making their finest record since Hysteria
Steven Wilson on Porcupine Tree's triumphant return and his love of “guitar players that can play one note and break your heart”
Porcupine Tree’s comeback album, Closure/Continuation, is a prog masterclass, but Wilson insists he is no virtuoso. He does, however, know how to to take happy chords over to the dark side...
Derek Trucks on the magic of Pink Floyd: “David Gilmour created his own universe on guitar through his tone and approach”
The Tedeschi Trucks Band’s resident slide master on how David Gilmour stamped his musical identity all over Pink Floyd’s earliest recordings, and why no one can replicate it
Epiphone Jerry Cantrell ‘Wino’ Les Paul Custom and Les Paul Custom Prophecy review
Jerry Cantrell’s collaboration with Epiphone presents two very different but similarly thrilling takes on the classic single-cut. The question is: which one do you want more?
Meshuggah’s Mårten Hagström and Animals As Leaders’ Tosin Abasi on the expansive possibilities of the 8-string
Few have done more to expand the popularity of the extended-range electric guitar. Here, Hagström and Abasi talk techniques, tones, and epiphanies, and have some advice for guitarists looking to expand their repertoire beyond six strings
Muse’s Matt Bellamy on the genius of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon – “You get this feeling of floating around indefinitely when you’re listening to David Gilmour play”
The latter-day prog rock superstar tells us how he first came to hear the 1973 Pink Floyd classic, and what makes David Gilmour a player beyond compare
Matt Heafy: “I knew me and Gerard Way doing a track together would break the elitist mindset of what black metal can be”
The Trivium frontman discusses his new signature Epiphone Les Paul Custom Origins series, explains how Ihsahn empowered him to subvert black metal, and teases more signature gear...
Bleed From Within’s Craig ‘Goonzi’ Gowans and Steven Jones talk sick riffs, fierce grooves, and how Neural DSP revolutionized their sound
The Scottish bruisers' new album, Shrine, is a vulgar display of pyrotechnic metal guitar, all recorded with plugins. Here the twin-guitar tag team pick us off the canvas and explain why
