[GCW]

Judas Priest. Painkiller.

Discuss.

[mrjonathanr]

Had a listen. Not sure about that, but it did lead, via the Green Manalishi, to relistening to Peter Green's majestic guitar playing with early Fleetwood Mac. So thanks for that 

[GCW]

Anyone else that mentions Fleetwood Mac or Hotel California gets Puntered

[mrjonathanr]

Ermm okay. How about Angus Young, Whole Lotta Rosie?
https://youtu.be/LJakepFG-Mw?t=3

[Luke Owens]

Megadeth - Tornado of Souls
Testament - Practice what you Preach
Everything by Jeff Waters from Annihilator

And for sheer chaos Slayer - Angel of Death

[lagerstarfish]

Richie Blackmore, Highway Star (or maybe Speed King)

What is this "discuss" you mention?

[lagerstarfish]

Judas Priest. Painkiller.

Reyt solo.

Great prompt for me to vary the metal on my skating playlist, paying more attention to the guitar solos.

[shurt]

Does Zeppelin qualify?

Asking for a friend....

[mark20]

For me the best guitar solos are in slower, softer rock, Gilmour era Pink Floyd.
Guthrie Govan’s solo in Steven Wilson’s track Drive Home is incredible.
Neither are really metal though.

I’ve always really liked the solo in AC/DC You Shook Me All Night Long , nothing too fancy but does what it needs to
Grateful Dead - Hard To Handle (8-6-71) One of their more punchy tracks, this particular version goes to all the right places and builds to a brilliant climax.
Freebird obviously. Such fun.

None of the above are particularly metal. Ritchie Blackmore definitely springs to mind and clearly a huge influence on all that came after
I’ll have a think for metal metal

[cheque]

Can’t claim to be an expert on the genre (my career as air bassist and backing vocalist of -IIRC- The Steel Panthers was over before my 8th birthday) I’ll vote for Van Halen’s Eruption.

[Probes]

Wading in out of the shadows.

+1 for Painkiller

For me, and metal solo, Mark Tremonti has to be up there.. Alterbridge (such a good band) Find the real or more probably has to be Blackbird. Shredding intermixed with some pretty decent chilled work.

[shark]

Does Zeppelin qualify?

Asking for a friend....

Same question re Hendrix

[BrutusTheBear]

+1 Painkiller

Cliff Burton - Anesthesia (Pulling Teeth) immediately came to mind...  I know it's bass but it is incredible.

Will be back with some actual guitar solos though 

[T_B]

Lorna Shore - To the Hellfire

Quite a few guitar solos on their album Pain Remains, which I’ve been enjoying recently.

[User deactivated.]

Does Zeppelin qualify?

Asking for a friend....

Same question re Hendrix

Many of the artists listed so far are just rehashing Hendrix/Page pentatonic licks anyway. Licks that they themselves nicked from the Blues guitarists that came before them 

For a guitar solo to be worthwhile, there has to be some composition in there for my money and the arrangement must be greater than the sum of each part. If the solo is a collection of licks you could play over any backing track then it's just self indulgent noodling that actually detracts from the song, in most cases. Many of the dad-rock greats are guilty of this.

For what it's worth, I rate Hendrix extraordinarily highly. I like the looseness in his playing and the way he blended both his guitar and voice to thread transparently between rhythm, lead and melody. Angus Young noodling pentatonic licks in the 16 bar break between choruses doesn't come close.

Punter me into oblivion 

Anyway, since this is metal solos, I'll submit the whole outro section to this Meshuggah song (timestamped) even though the actual guitar solo comes in a bit later. It's not the 'best' solo ever as there's no such thing, this is art not sport, but I like it:

https://youtu.be/rQS3vP47Xjs?t=185

[SA Chris]

Lone Ranger and Tonto riding through the reservation, listening to the sound of drums being beaten. The drums suddenly stop.

"Heap bad news!" says Tonto

"Why?" asks the Lone Ranger

"Means the guitar solo is about to start!"

Lets not include prog / dad rock here. I recall my stepdad loving the one on Dire Straits' Love Over Gold, that lasts about a week.

[duncan]

Does Zeppelin qualify?

Asking for a friend....

Page and Plant famously vehemently denied they were Metal and only admitted to some of their songs being Hard Rock. Zeppelin's range was quite broad and they didn't want to be categorised, or so they said. Where Metal begins is drawing a line on a spectrum: when does dark Blue(s) become Deep Purple?

Like an operatic aria, a solo is a balance between showing off your virtuosity and fitting the piece. Bleeding chunks are fun in isolation but even better if the music demands further ramping up the intensity rather than 'we're 3/4 of the way through and the guitarist (or soprano) insists on their solo now'. Verdi rather than Donizetti, 70s proto.-metal rather than post-Van Halen shredding. Probably too mainstream for you lot but Metallica's One fits this bill for me.

TL\DR: What Liam said!

[GCW]

Let’s not include prog / dad rock here. I recall my stepdad loving the one on Dire Straits' Love Over Gold, that lasts about a week.

I did have some Dream Theater in mind. Maybe I should punter myself.

Some good solos on Carcass’ Necroticism. Metallica’s Fade to Black?

Non metal honourary mentions welcome (apart from the Eagles).

[User deactivated.]

This isn't metal and earlier I said there's no such thing as 'best' in music, but this is the best guitar solo of all time   

[cheque]

For what it's worth, I rate Hendrix extraordinarily highly.

Not sure that thinking Jimi Hendrix was a great guitarist counts as extraordinary. 

[webbo]

Guitar solos need to be throw in same bin as flared pants.

[36chambers]

We are very fortunate to live in a world where there are two best metal guitar solos ever.

Obviously, Domination by Pantera. One of the best metal songs just so happens to have the best metal solo too, coincidence? Obviously not. It also just so happens to have been written by the coolest metal guitarist ever too. This is the Karma of metal guitar solos, therefore making Dimebag the Fred Nicole of metal. What a legend.


 
The other best metal guitar solo ever is Kissing the Shadows by Children of Bodom. If this was a climb, it would be Livin' Large, making Alexi Laiho the Nalle of metal. Both kinda cool in their own way, but certainly still heroes. And perhaps I'm only mentioning Nalle because they're both Finnish, but there we go.



You could argue that this is 3 solos split by two keyboard solos, but at least no one's using the pentatonic scale around here.

[Johnny Brown]

For what it's worth, Jimi Hendrix rated Billy Gibbons extremely highly.

I do have some favourite guitar solos, but I don't like metal, so I'll leave it at that. Though that doesn't seem to have stopped anyone else.

[teestub]

I’ve been pondering this today and come to the conclusion that solos don’t really stick in my head and it’s all about the riffs for me!

[jwi]

I don't understand the question, but I am sure that the answer is Paco de Lucía