well i must say my top three fave guitarists of all time are steve vai, john frusciante and kirk hammet. sure steve vai is technically perfect and hammet just seems to play the right notes but john frusciante isnt about that. john admits hes no steve vai and he said at one point when i was younger i listened to captain beefheart and other standard punk guitarists because to him it made more sense to idolise these people because he had a betetr chance to be like them than the virtuosos. john doesnt aim to be the best guitarist ever, he just wants to make music that means something to him, songs that express what hes feeling and in my opinion he is the master with a clean guitar using minimal effects and basic composition techniques. he has brought a lot of inspiration to young guitarists. he also writes music that is acheviable to re-create and lets face it how many people wish they could play like steve vai the first time they pick up a guitar without practicing, but in order to get as good as vai, youve got to be able to learn from players like frusciante and maybe before that kurt kobain who maybe cant play the cr@p out of the piece of wood they have in their hands but they can teach us alot about music.
im guesing youre teacher is biased on blues players and totally against shred or whatever, but do you see him selling out arenas around the world? i think its a shame that he has undervalued everything that Frusciante has brought to the guitaring world and mayb he should let go of this bias he has developed. my teacher too was exactly the same and even tried to convince me to let go of these roots.
but even shorter and sweeter he was voted 18th in rolling stone magizine for best guitarists of all time, so really that does count for alot.
to sum up my opinion, Frusciante rocks!!