alt Hacker NewsI am saying on surface it might seem they should be the staunchest opponents and as I said the culture is "only cassette tape is real otherwise fuck off and die" but simultaneously its also one of the least image/player focused genres in some ways, what is being played is of much higher priority than who in specific is playing it.
Hmm I can think of various examples where the guitarist was changed and people dismiss the new guitarist. Take a look at Megadeth for example - every new solo guitarist gets compared to Marty Friedman even though he hasn't been in the band for 26 years. So a lot of it is player focused.
But your point also stands here, every new guitarist must play the solos as close to the original ones as possible, otherwise it's not the same experience. So on the music level "what" is of much higher priority still. But I wouldn't say it is as black and white as you make it out to be.