[DISCUSSION] Do you think the era of Guitar Heroes will ever return to the mainstream?

When I think of the “Guitar Heroes” of old – Clapton, SRV, Hendrix, etc., all of these guys had a sort of mysticism to them. They appeared to be larger than life and had skill levels that those around them couldn’t comprehend.

Nowadays? You can see tons of extremely technical players of almost age playing anything you could possibly imagine from these legends note for note. Just go on YouTube and look at the 1000+ Cliffs of Dovers covers.

With Extremely technical, great playing becoming something so normalized and easily accessible, what would it take for another guitar hero to pop up?

There’s not a new artist out there who the younger audience sees and says “woah he makes me want to learn guitar” as far as I know. Ask any guitarist today who their inspirations are / who inspired them to pick up the guitar & a ton will name a guitarist from the 60s-80s.

I do know teachers who said that when GVF got popular, they got a ton of new students wanting to learn their songs, so that’s the most recent example I can think of.. maybe Tim Henson? He has a good following regarding the younger demo but his music isn’t as “mainstream” and radio friendly as the guitar heroes of the old days lol. Christone Kingfish Ingram is marketable enough imo too.

I personally think we will see a modern day guitar hero return to the mainstream one day. What do you all think? Anybody out right now that you think could evolve to that point or is the “guitar hero” probably some unknown person nobody knows right now who will just burst onto the scene suddenly?