(DailyDig.com) – An early rock guitar hero, Duane Eddy, with fans such as Jeff Beck, George Harrison, and John Fogerty, died on April 28 at age 86. He was in his hometown hospital in Franklin, Tennessee, as disclosed by Deed Abbate, his wife.
Eddy, born in New York, where he picked up his first guitar at age five, lived in Arizona during his teenage years. He had a dream that some day he would play for the Grand Ole Opry. In 1958, he signed with the Jamie Records label and worked with Lee Hazelwood, a songwriter and producer. They both collaborated and soon released his first single, “Rebel Rouser.”
The song became a top 10 hit, and Eddy said that it was a different sound for that time, but the title was good, and it had the new popular fad of rock ‘n’ roll intonation. As an instrumental, the song introduced the rock ‘n’ roll crowd to music without vocals.
Eddy’s guitar sound, the echoey twang, sounded refreshing yet easy for kids to pick up, according to Billy Zoom from X, a punk rock band.
After “Rebel Rouser” became a hit, Eddy continued to follow up with more singles that captured his signature twang from his Gretsch guitar. “Twang” was a part of many titles of almost two dozen albums that he released during his career. In fact, his first album release in 1958, “Have Twangy Guitar Will Travel,” was the beginning of his use of “Twang” on his albums.
Eddy’s peak commercial success lasted from 1958 to 1963. When he released “Freight Train” in 1970, he said in an interview in 1993 that he took it as a sign that he should slow down with his own music. He said that nearly six years earlier, he had been at the forefront of the music scene, but “Freight Train” just sounded like easy listening.
In a 1986 interview, Eddy emphasized his instrumental work by stating that he never thought much of his singing. He claimed that it was his best contribution to the music industry.
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