As guitarists worldwide drool over the release of the Gibson Slash Appetite For Destruction Les Paul, the Chapeaued Shredder himself sits down and talks about his new, star-studded solo album and recreating the guitar that welcomed us all to the jungle.

Steve Miller knows everybody. And we mean EVERYBODY. For instance, when we meet Steve at his tour bus outside the Gibson Custom Factory and the breakfast discussion turns to T-Bone Walker, he rather matter-of-factly pulls out a CD, that just happens to be lying around, of T-Bone playing at a house party…in his parents’ living room! Later, he takes a break from our discussion in the showroom to take a phone call from Billy Gibbons to chat about, among other things, the Gibson Pearly Gates reissue that is now a regular part of Steve’s live show. Steve Miller IS rock and roll. He’s more than an observer of the great musical form of the late 20th Century. He’s the very fabric of it.

Among the five artists who will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on Monday (March 15), Jimmy Cliff is probably the least familiar to American audiences. By all rights, the Rock Hall’s honoring of the Jamaican legend should change that.

Steve Miller is the consummate showman, a reputation built on a unique upbringing among giants in the music industry and hewn in thousands of clubs and stadiums across the globe. Even when he’s testing guitars in the Gibson Custom Factory showroom, he can’t help but please the small crowd at hand by rolling off some of the greatest riffs ever written: “Rock ’N Me,” “Take the Money and Run” and the ephemeral “Fly Like an Eagle”— These songs have been the lifeblood of FM radio for nearly four decades.

Discovering unreleased alternate versions of songs that Jimi Hendrix cut during his brief 1967 to 1970 reign as the innovative king of six-string rock is like panning for gold. Every so often nuggets turn up. But to find a complete, undiscovered song is like finding a vein of the precious metal.

Some people call him the Space Cowboy. Some call him the Gangster of Love. But what is universally recognized is that Steve Miller is one of the great blues-rock guitarists and songwriters of the Rock Era. He’s also The Joker, the ultimate hilarious conversationalist, with more tales than the Brothers Grimm. Fortunately for us, he’s also a world-class guitar collector. And so, Gibson.com was able to catch up with Steve as he made a pilgrimage to the Gibson Custom Factory to chat with Gibson’s master luthiers, try out loads of guitars and even consult the experts on a mystery axe from his past (a gorgeous Les Paul Special, given to him in the late ’60s by Leslie West and hand-painted by surfboard artist Bob Cantrell).

The recent rabid response to our feature on great guitar-riff intros got us to thinking: what are the greatest riffs, ever? Our thinking caps duly in place, it soon became clear that the ‘70s wasthe decade for superlative riffage.

In the realm of guitar gods, David Gilmour deserves his own Mount Olympus. Besides smearing his signature six-string savoir faire all over his four solo discs and 15 Pink Floyd albums, where he’s held the guitar seat since replacing Syd Barrett in January 1968, Gilmour has toured, played on albums and even engineered for an A-list of rock luminaries that includes Bryan Ferry, Paul McCartney, Kate Bush, Elton John, Tom Jones, Seal, Jools Holland, Pete Townshend, the Who, Supertramp, Levon Helm, Robbie Robertson and Alan Parsons.

As thousands of bands, artists and industry professionals from around the globe take over Austin, “The Live Music Capital of the World,” for one of the hottest annual events in the music business – South By Southwest 2010 – Gibson Guitar will be at the heart of the festival’s diverse spectacle of excitement. Through showcases, exclusive live streaming, social media programs, innovative promotions, and media events, Gibson Guitar will give artists and consumers an insider’s view of one of the most popular music conferences and festivals in the world.

“The soul of a human being and the hands of a legend” is how producer Jeremy Rubolino describes guitarist Bruce Kulick, with whom he worked on Kulick’s third and most recent solo album, BK3. The disc is receiving outstanding reviews worldwide and entered Billboard’s Heatseekers chart at No. 12.