Guitar God Link Wray Dead at 76

Guitar pioneer and "father of the power chord" Link Wray died at his home in Denmark in November 5th.

His instrumental hit "Rumble" was improvised at a sock hop in Fredericksburg, Va. in 1958. Wray didn't know the song, but when his drummer (and brother) Doug Wray laid down a stroll-like beat, Link filled in with a slowly unfurling, ominous guitar sound so immediately cool the crowd demanded it three more times that very night.

When he tried to recreate the sound in the studio, it finally came to him that it was the distortion that made the song and in order to achieve it, he ended up putting two holes in his amp with a pencil creating the fuzzbox. He later wrote Rawhide, Jack the Ripper, and The Swag.

NME dubbed Wray the father of punk rock, heavy metal, and every other form of sonic nastiness and guitarists from Bob Dylan and Pete Townshend to Bruce Springsteen and Neil Young all named him as an influence. While his populrity waned in the early 60's he continued to play and push his guitar. He played his last show in Washington D.C. in May,