The Return of the Hellecasters by the Hellecasters
88 Elmira Street by Danny Gatton
Yep, I like “Discipline” and you are prompting me to dust off “3 of a Perfect Pair” now, but I don’t have “Beat”… or do I? Maybe its in there somewhere.
Concur re Fripp’s last 20 years, sadly.
I doubt instrumentals will be as popular again as they were in the mid-late nineties anytime soon. Two principal factors in the resurgence were the punk explosion of 1993 and the inclusion of some surf tracks on the soundtrack to Pulp Fiction. While there are otherwise a decent number surf revival bands, the major label punk revival helped fuel huge explosion of a lot of sub-genres, such as ska, surf and drag, and even batchelor pad music. While there is a lot of tremendously good stuff from that era (many good bands mentioned already), there is also some serious crap.
I’d suggest an Emusic subscription for your son. For the cost of one CD your son can get 65 tracks of legal MP3s. Since they don’t offer major label doo-doo, the prices are kept somewhat low. You even get 50 free downloads to try it out. Here’s just a sample of what Junior could get in his first month:
The Looney Tunes Cool Surfin, The Euro Boys Jet Age, A Los Straightjackets record (they have 5 to choose from, including the Xmas record), The Phantom Surfers The Exiting Sounds of Model Car Racing.
That Looney Tunes record gets my vote for best surf album of that era, proving yet again that the best American Rock 'n Roll is made in Scandinavia!
Yes! I have those. Probably heard about them here, but it must have been a few years back.
Heck, I’ll get one for me. Thanks. 
Check out Guitar 9. Many of the acts mentioned above can be found there. And with audio clips.
Of the Allman’s instrumentals, I prefer Jessica.
**Kansas[b/] used to do some pretty good instrumental songs
YYZ by Rush is one of my favorite rock instrumentals.
Rush has a number of fine instrumentals:
Leave that thing alone
Where’s my thing?
La Villa Strangiato
YYZ
There’s a whole instrumental genre/movement in modern music that’s usually called post rock that’s been around for a little over a decade now. The actual bands that get lumped in with the movement vary in style - from the jazz/experimental electronic angles of Tortoise and Fridgeto the epic sludge rock of Mogwai and Explosions in the Sky to the droning orchestral pretensions of Godspeed! You Black Emperor and Rachel’s.
Steve Morse is the greatest guitar player on the planet. I will not listen to any arguments. Now he is paying the mortgage by playing with Deep Purple but he used to put out tons of instrumental music. I recommend anything by The Dixie Dregs or *The Dregs * as they were later called. I guess officially it would be called fusion because it is a cross between rock, jazz and country. I like his solo stuff even better. He had a tight trio called the Steve Morse Band which was still instrumental fusion but with more emphasis on rock. My favorite is the first record The Introduction. I’m not sure if he has any recent instrumental recordings.
For a more complete look at Steve Morse’s career and recordings here is his website.
Yet another rare but welcome thing we agree upon, Sam Stone!
The finest driving song ever.
There’s a MIDI of ‘Jessica’ floating around on the internet that’s the best damned MIDI file I’ve ever heard. Sometimes I prefer listening to it over the original, heretically enough.
Search for “Jessica MIDI” and you’ll probably find it.
Jeff Beck’s Jeff Beck’s Guitar Shop is nearly all instrumental, and it kicks ass.
Aaaand, since it’s December, have you heard A Merry Axemas? About a dozen guitars sorcerers, doing wacked out Christmas music.
As Loach said, Steve Morse is the greatest guitar player on the planet(#1). Not only that, he is a really nice guy.(#2)
He has a bunch of CD’s out with The Dregs and the Steve Morse Band(SMB). His latest SMB CD is Major Impacts 2. Major Impacts 1 & 2 is Steve writing in the style of musicians that influenced him. He writes pieces inspired by Zepplin, Genisis, and others. Not a bad CD. My favorite SM disc is ‘High Tension Wires’.
Another great player is Vinnie Moore. He has a new disc out. It’s pretty good. His early stuff had a heavy classical influence. His latest is a little more diverse. Good CD.
Liquid Tension Experiment is pretty damned good. Some really talented guys recorded the CD in a very short amount of time(like a week IIRC). Great CD.
Slee
#1. Steve Morse won the Guitar Player magazine “Best Guitarist of the Year” award. The award is decided by readers. He won it year in and year out. In fact at one point Steve retired from recording/touring and became an airline pilot. He STILL won the award. The magazine finally retired Steve from being eligable for the award because he won it so many times.
#2. I’ve met him a couple of times. He is just a nice, sweet guy who goes out of his way to talk to fans and give advice.
Let’s not diss his work with Deep Purple. Steve has cut three albums with those guys (2 studio, 1 live) and they are all really good. In fact, Purpendicular might be Deep Purple’s best.
To be honest I have been going through a point in my life where I did not listen to music much. Since I have been working out like a demon lately I have been listening to music again including a lot of Steve Morse. I have not heard much of the new Deep Purple. I will give it a try. I didn’t know about the live album, sounds interesting. I was able to see the Steve Morse Band at the Stone Pony years ago. I was about 5 feet away from Steve Morse. He is unbelievable live.
Two of my favorite Zappa albums are almost exclusively instrumental: Hot Rats and Burnt Weeny Sandwich. Sleep Dirt is another good instrumental album. Of course, there are great insturmental pieces on every Zappa album.
Along this line, check out Eric Johnson’s Ah Via Musicom (not all instrumental, but many tracks are) and G3: Live in Concert (Satriani, Johnson, and Steve Vai).
Steve w/ Deep Purple
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000001Y9I/qid=1102213517/sr=1-25/ref=sr_1_25/102-0666271-1791332?v=glance&s=music
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000007N8O/ref=pd_bxgy_text_1/102-0666271-1791332?v=glance&s=music&st=*
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00005GD5C/qid=1102213817/sr=1-147/ref=sr_1_147/102-0666271-1791332?v=glance&s=music