So if we had to say what the best album was musically in terms of great playing, great playing, and great producing, though focus here on the playing...Which would it be? Honestly, I'm going to say their newest Let It Rip.
Anyone else?

I will say Metro's Tree People & MetroCafe' cd's! The Rippington's Curve's Ahead is a classic as are several Spyro Gyra cd's.

Whoa. That's a whole new ballpark. I just meant the Rippingtons.

Overall on albums, Miles Davis on Columbia produced several great ones, Bitches Brew comes to mind. I always thought SRV's In Step album had fantastic playing by all. As far as the Ripps go... Live in LA beats em all.

Well, then you should have posted this on the Rippingtons forum.

DW, you're right, but I'll cut bd a little slack, honest oversight, if he came here by way of the ripps website....
as for best playing by the ripps, that's a tough one, but I'll take High Roller and Curves from Live in LA for the "old" band and most all of Let it Ripp for the latest incarnation.
As for others, there are so many, but one that always comes back to me as being truly unique and memorable is Grant Geissman's guitar solo on Chuck Mangione's Feels So Good....once that gets in your head, it's there all day. Another great lick is Larry Carlton on Kid Charlemagne with Steely Dan.

Yes but I wanted the musicians only to comment on this okay?
Boy people are picky about where you post...

No picky'ness intended. You never said "just the Rippingtons". Additionally, this forum was intended for musicians to discuss musician related topics. At least I thought it was........

Oh right perhaps I misunderstood, I just don't see people getting into the nitty gritty musical details of the Ripps on the main part, so though we could discuss it in here. For example why not ever try to do a "live " studio album? In other words, live in the studio with very few overdubs?
That's all I meant...

Well, they did that with their last cd, Let It Ripp. Not sure how many times Russ is going to do that though as he is very meticulous about how he wants a song to sound. I know how that can be as I've presented my songs to band members and it just didn't sound the same so I refused to bring any more of my songs to the table. And I've been on the other end as I've gotten studio calls and had to learn songs on the spot and I've come across many bassline that were either impossible to recreate or just plain wack and I would try very hard to play it my way with my own stamp on it if you will but sometimes it just doesn't work out.