les paul, r.i.p.

You likely won't listen to a piece of popular music without hearing Les Paul's singular influence. He invented the solid-body electric guitar, but his other innovations like multi-track recording changed everything, plain and simple. Born Lester William Polsfuss, his career stretched back to the days of Louis Armstrong and Bing Crosby, but modern rockers from Jimmy Page to Bruce Springsteen to Slash consider themselves in his debt. As should we. Dead at 94. RIP.