METALPRIEST
Senior Member
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Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi is arguably the most important player in the history of heavy metal. His awesomely heavy riffs served as the basic blueprint for subsequent bands, and of course, Sabbath’s dark imagery and presentation presaged basically every other metal act.
Iommi’s importance as a riff-maker often overshadows his impact as a lead guitarist. The musician lost the tips of the middle and ring fingers of his right hand — his fretting hand — in an accident at a sheet metal factory when he was just 17 and had to learn to compensate by extending those fingers with thimbles that he developed himself. His playing is based in the blues, and much of what makes Iommi’s playing so special is how he integrated his love of basic blues forms with an inimitable sense of tone and phrasing — as you’ll see in our list of the Top 10 Tony Iommi Guitar Solos.