Albert King

Albert King's angular, string-bending style -- played left-handed on an upside-down right-handed Gibson Flying V tuned to open-E minor -- was so distinctive that Stevie Ray Vaughan described him as his single greatest influence. His 1967 album Born Under a Bad Sign, produced by Booker T. Jones at Stax Records, is the blueprint for the electric blues that defined late 1960s rock.