when satriani and steve vai were younger they were listening to led zeppelin - jimmy page
when malmsteen was a teenager he was deep purple's big fan
john petruci is doing deep purple covers as well.
get the point?
music dont have to be complicated to be good, besides there are things which you can play if you practice shredding certain amount of time, but there are things that all those shred guys wont be able to play no matter how hard they will try. they dont have anything to say in their music (well maybe satch does have few things and so steve vai) so they just play fast. i bet you no one of them can write a solo like brian may wrote, but he didnt have to play fast to make his solos perfect
ever heard about SRV? i bet you cant play even half of his solos on the speed he played, with .11 or .12 strings and not .9 like all the speedo guys are playing
you think im jealous? why should i be??

besides if you like shredding - go ahead shredd till your fingers will bleed, dont yell at people here because we dont like your kind of music