Marty Friedman sang massive praises of classic KISS guitarist Ace Frehley, saying on the Meltdown Podcast (transcribed by UG):
“He was the first guy who I copied note-for-note when I was a kid.
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“The great thing about his stuff in KISS is that he was playing the same pedestrian licks that everybody else was playing, but they had a direction.
“They told a little story, and you could tell the difference between one song and the other because of the solo.
“Most of the guys, especially back then and even now too, when they play with such a limited vocabulary, all of their solos are interchangeable. If you just listen to the solo, there’s no way you could tell what’s the song they’re playing.
“Ace Frehley, if you just needle dropped any of his solos, you could tell what song he’s playing.
“His vocabulary is very limited, but what he does with that is just so much more meaningful then what most guys do with a bigger vocabulary. He’s the only guy I copied perfectly. [Laughs] Everybody else I didn’t care about.
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“Therefore, when they got all the replacements, I was the guy who was like, ‘The guy is not playing Ace’s licks right! The guy is cheating on Ace’s licks, changing stuff around, it sucks!’
“It’s only because I was an uber-fan when I was a kid. It’s hard to be a replacement. I gotta tell you that Tommy Thayer does a fantastic job of doing that. And I know it’s not an easy gig because you’re damned if you do, you’re damned if you don’t.
“But as a 14 year old fan of Kiss I wanted the original stuff to be exactly what it was. [Whatever memories from young age that I had], I don’t want some dude to play some random blues stuff over it.
“I want it to be what it was originally. And I think Tommy Thayer just does an A-list job of that.”
Reaching the Jimmy Page comparison, Marty noted:
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“I don’t know what it was that Ace had, but he really had something special.
“I remember as a kid, people used to say, ‘All the stuff that Ace is doing Jimmy Page did before.’
“And I said, ‘No! Jimmy Page has some fantastic things, but often times when you needle drop you can’t say what solo he’s playing, because it’s just kind of random!’
“Ace’s stuff seemed planned out, and it seemed well constructed for such a basic stuff. I was playing that stuff after playing guitar for about a year. And that’s the ultimate.
“If you can make a style of guitar music that kids can play and wanna play, and get so much satisfaction in such an early period, that’s the ultimate guitar god.
“When you got guys like Van Halen, and guys like myself, that do this difficult stuff, there’s no way that guys are gonna get any satisfaction when they’re playing that stuff in a year.
“So that’s kinda negative as far as I’m concerned, at least in my case.
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“But I look at Ace Frehley, and I go, ‘This is the ultimate.’ I got so much enjoyment out of playing like Ace when I was a teenager, it was a really big deal for me.
“So, I can’t say enough good things about the guy.”
You can check out Marty’s thoughts on two more guitar legends below.
On Alex Lifeson:
“He was one of the first guitar players I heard as a kid. I was big KISS fan, a Black Sabbath fan, my close friend who was also a fan of those bands was a big Rush fan so he turned me on to Rush.
“Immediately I wasn’t as much of a Rush fan as KISS or Black Sabbath, but I liked Alex Lifeson. I think Rush was a little bit too ‘Star Trek’ for me.
“That doesn’t mean it’s not fantastic, I have ultimate respect for Alex and his band. He’s a pioneering guitarist. I’ve never met him but I think he’s great.
“I just never was a huge fan of the band myself, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t the best band of all time.”
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On JOURNEY’s Neal Schon:
“Oh God. Neal Schon is a God amongst men! I’ve met him several times. When I was a kid he was one of my gateway guy as far as learning how to play nicely in a song.
“Talk about playing what’s right for the song, and also having extremely tasty things to say. And the spirit just burns out of his guitar playing.
“Actually I have never heard any of his solo stuff, I’m just talaking about Journey.
“I was not the biggest Journey fan, but I know a great song when I hear it, and I definitely know a great guitar solo when I hear it, and that guy is full of them.
“Just a class-A player, that’s all I can say about that guy.”