The best guitarist I ever saw

I've had the extreme good fortune of seeing a handful of the world's best guitarists do their thing in the flesh. I've watched Neil Young shred it up with his Crazy Hose buds, and I've seen Jack White play to his audience of one.

There are many, many of the world's greatest guitarists who I have not seen, and never will. I'll never see Hendrix in the flesh, or any of those 60s greats that have, at the very least, retired from constant performing.

Then there are the great bluesmen of the old days, whose work survives in scratched permanence, and they were doing great work a century ago. And there are the people I've seen in pub bands who never broke big, but could do remarkable things with their guitar. And even some mates - my friend Louis has some of the best slowhand technique I've ever seen, but is content letting it rip at jam nights at the local pub.

But when it comes to the big shows and the big stars, there is one guitarist who genuinely impressed me more than anybody, and that was Tom Morello.

I didn't even know Prophets of Rage was a thing - a supergroup of members from Public Enemy, Audioslave, Cypress Hill and Rage Against the Machine - until my mate Brian convinced me to go to their show, and I was fucking glad I did because it was one hell of a gig, with that kind of back catalogue to dive into.

It was also a great fucking show because I spent almost the whole time staring with absolute adoration at Morello's guitar playing. I'd seen the big man perform a thousand times in music videos and concert films, but seeing him show off all his tricks in front of a huge audience was a total trip.

He shredded the big riffs, of course, but his playing was also so light and playful. He actually made feedback work as a separate instrument, and filled in the songs with all kinds of crazy noodling about. He had been doing this for several decades now, and obviously knew how to impress a crowd, but made it look like he was coming up with new ideas on the fly, as if this was the first time he'd ever thought of playing his guitar upside down.

And he made it look so easy, as if the six-strings were another part of his body, and playing unearthly sounds on it was just as natural as walking.

I've seen a lot of the huge bands I grew up loving, and look forward to seeing more - I finally got to see Pulp this year, so anything is possible! But it would take something to beat what I saw Tom Morello do on stage that one time.