Kirk Hammett Guitar Quotations

My guitars are my umbilical cord. They're directly wired into my head.

I feel really fortunate that, in playing guitar and surfing, I've found two things that mean so much to me, and which really complement each other. There's definitely a spiritual thing to both of them; they totally connect you to a higher realm.

Guitar players in the nineties seem to be reacting against the technique oriented eighties.

If a guitar is too easy for me to play, it makes me too laid back. I like to battle with my guitar.

Guitar playing is both extremely easy for me and extremely difficult for me at the same time.

I would have to say I'm bored with the standard rock, guitar solos, but I've done it for five albums now, and this time I wanted to go in a completely different direction. I wasn't interested in showing off any more.

It really shocked me just to hear of the fans' response to 'St. Anger' not having guitar solos.

Jeff Beck is one of my heroes and has been since I first picked up a guitar.

I didn't want to fall into the trap of competing with all these other great guitar players. I just want to sidestep the whole thing and get out of the race.

Ampeg made incredible guitar heads in the early Nineties and then stopped. And I don't know why. The one we used had a nice clean, warm sound, and it blended well with the other amps that were in the studio.

I'm very fortunate to be doing the thing I do best, which is play guitar. There aren't many other things I could do.