trebledamage: my first "real" song was highway star, from the machine head album, which you probably know if you know smoke on the water...
so why people cant start with things like highway star or smoke on the water?! you can realy learn things from highway star, but what can you learn from linking park?
besides in my opinion the problem is that in the 70's many things were invented, many different styles and great guitarists arived from no where, and everyone of them was a genious. in the 80's the people were inspired by the 70's so there were few people who took the playing to a new level, like malmsteen and others.
in the 90's we had the nirvana syndrome, and now you have 100000s of bands like linkin park who think that punk is the best style ever, most of them probably havent even heard a decent solo in their life, because there are no good solos in punk, if any at all, and the guitar playing is dying slowly, day after day.
if this thing wont stop as soon as posible, in another 4-5 years a "rock" band will be a drummer a bass player, singer and a d.j.