The #56 Guitarist of the Rock Era: Richie Kotzen

Up next in The Top 100 Guitarists*, another guy who learned at an early age and has perfected his style and technique over the years:

#56:  Richie Kotzen, solo, Poison, Mr. Big

25 years as an active guitarist

Richie Kotzen was born February 3, 1970 in Reading, Pennsylvania.  He has been with the groups Poison and Mr. Big but most of his career has featured solo projects.  He has a fast style and is one of the better sweeping guitar players of the Rock Era.

Kotzen began playing piano at the age of five.  At age seven, he was inspired by listening to Kiss to learn to play guitar and he practiced it relentlessly.  Kotzen's first band was called Arthurs Museum.  Eventually, Richie was discovered by Mike Varney of Shrapnel Records and Kotzen recorded his first solo album at age 19.  That same year, he created the instructional video Rock Chops, which highlighted his fluid sweeping and technique for using wide intervals.

In 1991, Kotzen joined Poison, co-writing and playing on the album Native Tongue.  Two years later, however, Richie was forced out of the group for having a relationship with the ex-fiancee of drummer Rikki Rockett.  In 1999, Kotzen replaced Paul Gilbert in the group Mr. Big, performing on the album Get Over It, which went platinum, as well as the album Actual Size.  In 2006, Kotzen opened for the Rolling Stones on their tour of Japan. 

After Mr. Big split up, Kotzen released another solo album, Change, in 2003.  He also bought a building in Los Angeles and established a recording studio.  Since then, he has produced several solo albums and collaborated with Gene Simmons of Kiss and jazz legend Stanley Clarke, among others.

Kotzen's style features elements of rock, jazz, fusion, blues and soul.  He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Eddie Van Halen, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Allan Holdsworth and Jason Becker.

Richie prefers Fender guitars; he has Signature Model Telecasters and Stratocasters.  Both models feature ash bodies with laminated flame maple caps, maple necks and one-piece maple fretboards and 22 super jump frets.  The Telecaster has a DiMarzio Choppter T pickup in the bridge position and a DiMarzio Twang King in the neck.  The Stratocaster has three custom-made DiMarzio single coil pickups.

 Early in his career, Kotzen used Ibanez and Laney amplifiers before switching to Fender guitars and Marshall amps in the early 1990's.  He used Marshall Super Lead, JCM800 and JCM900's as well as Yamaha DG Seriers amps in the late 90's.  In 2005, Cornford Amplification issued a Richie Kotzen signature model--the RK100 to best present his expansive playing style.  The amplification system also has a matching signature model speaker cabinet with four Celestion Vintage 30 12" speakers. 

Kotzen does not play many effects live, though he does use the Sobbat Drivebraker and Glowvibe pedals and reverb and delay effects of his signature series Zoom G2R effects processor.

Safe to say that if this guy keeps it up, he'll keep climbing the ranking.  For now, Kotzen ranks #56 for the Rock Era*.