Yngwie
Johann Malmsteen (born Lars Johann Yngve Lannerbäck, June 30,
1963) is a Swedish guitarist, composer and bandleader.
Widely
recognised for his guitar skills, Malmsteen achieved widespread acclaim in the
1980s for his technical proficiency and his pioneering of the shred guitar
technique, and neo-classical metal genre.
In late
1982 Malmsteen was brought to the USA by Mike Varney of Shrapnel
Records, who had heard a demo tape of Malmsteen's playing. He had brief
engagements with Steeler, for their self-titled album of 1983, then
Alcatrazz, for their 1983 debut No Parole From Rock N' Roll, and the
1984 live album Live Sentence. Malmsteen released his first solo
album Rising Force in 1984. His album was really meant to be an
instrumental side-project of Alcatrazz, but it contained vocals, and
Malmsteen left Alcatrazz soon after the release of Rising Force. It
was a success; it was the winner of Guitar Player Magazine's Best Rock
Album and was also nominated for a Grammy for 'Best Rock Instrumental',
achieving #60 on the Billboard album chart. This was followed by Marching
Out (1985). Jeff Scott Soto filled vocal duties on these initial albums.
His third
album, Trilogy, featuring the vocals of Mark Boals, was released in
1986. In 1987, yet another singer, former Rainbow vocalist Joe Lynn Turner
joined his band. That year, Malmsteen was in a serious car accident,
smashing his Jaguar XKE into a tree and putting him in a coma for a week.
Nerve damage to his right hand was reported.
Malmsteen's
"Neo-classical" style of metal became moderately popular during
the mid 1980s, with notable contemporaries such as Paul Gilbert, Marty
Friedman, Tony MacAlpine and Vinnie Moore all reaching prominence after
Yngwie. However, only Paul Gilbert claimed Yngwie as an influence, with
MacAlpine coming to the neoclassical/shred field by applying his classical
piano training to his guitar playing and Moore arriving at a similar style
because he shared Yngwie's major influences, Ritchie Blackmore of Deep
Purple and Al Di Meola, American jazz fusion great of Return to Forever
fame.
Aside from technical prowess, distinctions of Malmsteen's guitar style include
a wide, violin-like vibrato inspired by classical violinists, and use of
such minor scales as the Harmonic minor, and minor modes such as Phrygian,
and Aeolian. Malmsteen cites the Fender Stratocaster and the single coil
pickups as being instrumental to his unique tone.