I voted Randy.
It is very hard for me to decide whether I like RR or ZW more.
Zakk Wylde made me pickup a guitar in the first place. The first pictures I saw of him with long (not permed) hair, bullseye
Les Paul, barefoot and wearing flares on stage was such a change from the more image orientated guys of the '80s, and it said to me that the playing was good enough not to need any other imbellishments. I am not a religious man, but if God played guitar, he would sound like Zakk; omniscient artificial harmonics.
Randy Rhodes makes me want to be a better guitar player. He had the most amazing musical brain. His compositions were out of this world, I still marvel at some of them. The guitar solo in Goodbye to Romance is one of the best pieces of
guitar playing ever IMO. I know that Malmsteem et al. were credited with inventing neoclassical rock, but Randy bought that classical guitar theory, composition and feel and put it in front of a main stream audience. I am sure we all have a great affection fo Yngwie, but Blizzard of Oz was one of the biggest/most influencial rock albums of the '80s, because of Randy.
We had a deal that our first born would be named after one of Ozzy's great players. If we had a girl we were going to name her Miranda so that I could shorten that to Randy. My wife refused to name any child of ours Randy (I am not sure of the name carries the same connotation in the State/worldwide, but anyone that has seen Austin Powers knows what it means in the UK).
I named my son after Zakk Wylde (Zach), so I guess that it is only fair the Randy gets my vote.
