Best shredder.

Yngwie Malmsteen

Oh, am I the only Eric Johnson voter here?  Oh well.  He is the best that I've heard so far, although I do bow before the wizardry of both Mattais Eklundh and Herman Li!  And, naturally, Alex Lifeson!

MY favorite shredder is JP, but I like Surfing With the Alien solo better

The godfather of shred Nicolo Paganini, ask Yngwie.

I don't see Al Dimeola, Allan Holdsworth, Greg Howe, Uli Jon Roth, Scott Henderson & Andy Timmons on the list, so my vote goes to Jason Becker.

Forgotten Son wrote: I prefer the term Instrumental Guitar Virtuoso to "shredders". Only about half of the guitarists on the list actually "shred" and most of those only ocassionally. Satriani and Vai have displayed some excellent melodic guitar playing (Satch: Cryin', Starry Night, Until We Say Goodbye. Vai: For the Love of God, TEnder Surrender, Windows to the Soul) as has Buckethead on his albums Colma, Electric Tears and Population Override. Using the term "shredding" with regards to these players really does them no favours, as it immediately causes people unfamiliar with their work to think of tasteless guitar w**kers like Michael Angelo Batio. As a result right them off, when in fact they have much more to offer than fast licks (I myself can play Joe Satriani's Cryin', which goes to show that some of their material is actually not very technical ) BTW, Blackmore did do some shredding and was infact a pioneer of Neo-Classical electric guitar. Listen to tracks like Catch the Rainbow from the album Rainbow: Live in Germany and you'll hear some great examples of Blackmore more technical side.

No doubt that Blackmore did set some standards ... but I guess it's a percentage thing (gasp, not another genre debate) ... I know Blackmore did do a bit of high-speed arpeggios,scales, etc, but I feel it was only a small percentage of his totally output ...

I can't say the same for Malmsteen and Petrucci though ...

Definition of shredding: extremely fast guitarring characterised by sweep picking and arpeggios.

Joe Satriani barely ever shreds, so even though I love him, I wouldn't vote for him here. In fact, I think it would be an insult to his guitarring to call him a shredder.

Steve Vai is more of a shredder than Satch, but still too diverse to be called a shredder. An unbelievable virtuoso, but not a shredder.

Michael Romeo is a poor man's Malmsteen.

John Petrucci certainly has shredding in him, it may even be his main attribute, but I'm not blown away by his speed like I am with Malmsteen.

btw, I don't even like Malmsteen as a guitarist, I find him boring and a show off. But, I haven't heard anyone who matches him in terms of shredding alone.

Download a video? Not on dial-up!

Vai is not a shredder!

I voted for Michael Romeo. I consider Vai to be the best on that list, but i don't really consider him a shredder. He shreds, yes, but as somebody else pointed out, he's much more than that.

Romeo is like an entertaining Malmsteen.

Ian Chricton of Saga.