agree with pool hall. plus, while yes there are many great guitarists, some who arguably might be better than jimi with respect to technique, a lot more than technique goes into a serious consideration of who might be called greatest of all time. even things like sound tone play in. others might be able to do what jimi did with respect to technique alone, but i have yet to hear one such person do it with that incredible organic tone and that inner reaching timbre.
i once worked for a quite masculine, thoroughly heterosexual man in the late 1970's in NYC. he was quite the tough guy, genuinely. he saw jimi play. he told me that he had never felt even the slightest sexual arousal over any man in his life, except for one, which puzzled him. it was jimi while jimi played. my friend said that jimi was completely guitar, soul, sound, presence, and that jimi naturally had THAT kind of free flowing energy and power----beyond words, beyond comprehension---one of a kind, not repeatable.
additionally, i once experienced a night, again in NYC, when i was at an extremely desolate low point. i was stuck out in the freezing rain, with no money at all, and with no place to go. completely alone too, and with no feeling of hope, and with no perceptible means. i wanted to remember that moment as being the epitome of desperation, despair and low sinking in my life. so i found a wet paper bag and a stone, and i engraved into the bag a poem right then and there, about how this moment felt. i called it No Shelter From Fear. it stands as the darkest moment of my life. yet i arguably have had darker moments since then. still, to me that poem was written during my darkest moment, and describes all such moments. my point is that while i might have had darker moments, that one that i decided to immortalize in words is the one that sets the standard for me so to speak. i will always claim it as the darkest. i literally carved that moment into paper. all such moments to follow, regardless of their severity, are metaphorically just footnotes to the original.
what does that have to do with jimi? while jimi's technique might be superceded by someone now and then, he still epitomizes what we call the greatest. he set the standard. metaphorically it is carved in stone. the rest to follow are just footnotes.
spiritually speaking, you asked? what isn't spiritual about such a thing? that level of impact, that level of purity, that level of absoluteness in the relative world, it reaches to the depths and touches every layer along the way. that is part of the greatness. in my humble opinion, david gilmour of pink floyd is next in line under jimi, with some distance between the two.
want that poem i wrote that set the standard of despair for me? recall that in my opinion it always epitomizes despair for me, in the same manner that jimi epitomizes greatness as a guitarist, regardless of the possibility of more intense likenesses to follow.
no shelter from fear
the soul that chilled with winter's ices
felt no disgust at its lust for splintered vices.
hard despair dealt terrible unnamed toll--
toll held more precious than love in the soul.
yet times old and gone, forgotten, ago,
hold memories colored loudly when times were bold.
never now will they thaw for they have died.
in a season without life they are just lies.
so, wasted and meaningless--the claws of december--
is the future with no past to remember.
the Eraser erases, as the drop of a tear
rolls silent on the floor toward the promise of fear.
like i said, i might have had worse moments since that night. but still i call that night my worst. in the same manner, no matter who follows jimi, he is always the greatest.
note: copyright of the poem is registered under my name with others in a book i sent to the US library of congress for proof of copyright in 1988. not for reprint, distribution or copy in any manner in any country or via internet. except by me. i shared it with you to help make my point about jimi.