That time Ronnie Montrose told me that the Montrose LP marked his “kindergarten days” as a guitarist

By Steve Newton

Very few albums that I bought as a teen in the seventies had as huge an effect on me as Montrose.

I mean, from the very first riff of the very first track of the very first Montrose album, I was like “Holy shit!”

It was 1973, I was 17 years old, and I wouldn’t get as seriously blown away by the sound of a cranked guitar until five years later when Eddie did his thing on Van Halen.

I only got the chance to interview Ronnie Montrose once, back on September 9, 1994, when he was heading to Vancouver for a double-bill with the Dixie Dregs, whose guitarist, Steve Morse, I’d chatted with two days earlier.

During the course of our conversation I couldn’t help but bring up that mindblowing Montrose LP, only to hear that Ronnie thought those were “kindergarten days” for him as a guitarist.

Have a listen:

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