Fraid I'm gonna have to disagree with you there. I've been listening to Yngwie and Satriani for roughly the same amount of time. Though Yngwie clearly knows his classical and his theory, this music is repetative and sometimes boring. Satriani's stuff is very original, and you can't argue with the guy who taught guitarists like Kirk Hammett AND Steve Vai (though granted, a lot of that goes to Frank Zappa).

Added to this, I counted up how many scales I know. Since I'm self-taught I only really know a few (though recently I have been trying to fix it) and even with this limited knowledge I can still impress women :D