1- Anytime Tom Verlaine was touching the guitar on Marquee Moon.
2- "Church on White", by Stephen Malkmus
3- "Blackberry Blossom", by Tony Rice
4- Everything else by Tony Rice
5- "Paranoid Andriod", by Radiohead

- The Cars' "Tonight She Comes", solo by Elliot Easton. 80's-approved tremolo bar abuse and song-fitting, melodic, flash.
- Ozzy Osbourne's live "Suicide Solution". Randy Rhoads' tone is truly wild, on the verge of going out of control - and it does, every time he takes his hand off the strings.
- Van Halen's solo on "Mean Streets". Melodic and bluesy, in that jarring Van Halen way. Sounds very off-the-cuff and probably was.
- Andy Taylor's solo in Robert Palmer's "Addicted to Love". Perfectly fits the hot summer night-vibe of the song and surprised a lot of people when they found out who it was.
- Jeff Beck's soloing on "People Get Ready". Beautiful, hummable, and unforgetable.
- Jimi Hendrix' playing on "Voodoo Child". Grabs your ear from the first wah-inflected note and slaps you on the cheek, hard, once in a while, just to make sure you are paying attention.
- I thank you.

1. Boston, "More Than A Feeling."

2. Allman Brothers, "Blue Sky," a beautiful major-key solo that takes up most of the track.

3. Allman Brothers, "Whipping Post". This is the antithesis of the solo on "Blue Sky", full of fury and frustration, a perfect addition for one of their best songs ever.

Yep...Allman Brothers...thanks, Captain Ed.

Guns N Roses - Sweet Child O Mine - Slash at his best. Great motif...the way he swings the bridge melody into a minor key and builds up.

David Gilmour, "Time" - Mitch, you say you don't like Pink Floyd, but this is by far Gilmour's best work on Pink Floyd's best album.

ABS.

"1- Anytime Tom Verlaine was touching the guitar on Marquee Moon."

Sponge, as much as I disagree with you on everything else, this is a good call.

"5- "Paranoid Andriod", by Radiohead"

Hm. Not so familiar. I'm a major un-fan of Radiohead, but I'll check it out.

"- The Cars' "Tonight She Comes", solo by Elliot Easton. 80's-approved tremolo bar abuse and song-fitting, melodic, flash."

Yeah, I love Easton on principle, and TSC is a good example. Actually, the more I think about, the more I think "It's All I Can Do" is the best thing he's done...

"- Ozzy Osbourne's live "Suicide Solution". Randy Rhoads' tone is truly wild, on the verge of going out of control - and it does, every time he takes his hand off the strings."

Good catch.

"- Van Halen's solo on "Mean Streets". Melodic and bluesy, in that jarring Van Halen way. Sounds very off-the-cuff and probably was."

Ditto.

"- Andy Taylor's solo in Robert Palmer's "Addicted to Love". Perfectly fits the hot summer night-vibe of the song and surprised a lot of people when they found out who it was."

It's a great solo, and yeah, it surprised me that it was Andy Taylor the first time I heard. But it's more of a riff solo than most of the ones I'm thinking of - not that that's a bad thing (!!!).

"- Jeff Beck's soloing on "People Get Ready". Beautiful, hummable, and unforgetable."

Yep.

"- Jimi Hendrix' playing on "Voodoo Child". Grabs your ear from the first wah-inflected note and slaps you on the cheek, hard, once in a while, just to make sure you are paying attention."

Yep. Very true. I didn't put Hendrix largely because, well, saying Hendrix had some great guitar is like saying the sea owes a lot to salt.

"1. Boston, "More Than A Feeling."

Great call - and a nostalgic fave, the first guitar solo I ever personally learned - but the second (Barry Goudreau) solo in "Long Time" gets my nod for greatness. It's also been my Moby Dick among guitar solos for the past 25 years; I've never figured it out.

"2. Allman Brothers, "Blue Sky,"..."Whipping Post".

Well played.

"Guns N Roses - Sweet Child O Mine - Slash at his best. Great motif...the way he swings the bridge melody into a minor key and builds up."

Good catch.

"David Gilmour, "Time" - Mitch, you say you don't like Pink Floyd, but this is by far Gilmour's best work on Pink Floyd's best album."

I knew someone would bring that up. Duly noted - but my vote still goes to "Mother". Chalk 'er up to personal preference.

Peter Frampton, Frampton Comes Alive "Do You Feel Like We Do"

I don't know diddly about riffs, bridges, or other stuff like that, but the song grabs me everytime.

And I would go with the Hendrix Star Spangled Banner at Woodstock too.

Mr. Berg:

I'm not too into Radiohead myself, but OK Computer is pretty hard to argue with. If you have access to iTunes (and if Radiohead is on iTunes), I suggest picking up the 1st 3 songs on OK Computer plus "Karma Police". Also, "Fake Plastic Trees" off of The Bends.

Mr. Malkmus' "Church on White" is available on iTunes and it is well worth the 0.99 cents (along with "Jenny and the Ess Dogg."

This was a nice topic, by the way. As much as I love politics and love to mix it up...it can get old.

Do you play guitar?

I own far too many guitars for my own good and I would hate to find out that you are a guitar player because then I couldn't be as snarky as I was before. ;)

Sponge -- oh yes, he has guitars.

Mitch, I'm the owner of ALL things Radiohead. I completely agree with Sponge on OK Computer.

And the one solo I've wanted to do -- sort of the guitar answer to learning "Flight of the Bumblebee" on violin -- is Zappa's solo on "Muffin Man". If I produced NARN alone, that would be the exit of hour 3. Either that one or the one on (Not Necessarily the) St. John's Infirmary should be on this list.

I've been playing for about 28 years. I have a 1960 Fender Jazzmaster that's been hotrodded something fierce, a 1976 Ibanez knockoff of an SG that plays nicer than any SG I've ever tried, and a couple of woods.

Plus a set of bagpipes, a curan, a bunch of harmonicas, an old Crumar organ that, when properly amped and miked, does a decent B3 impression, a curan (think Turkish mandolin).

I need a bass!

Doh. Mentioned "curan" twice, forgot the cello.

Mitch, why can't we nominate Sultans? I'm not a guitarist, but how (and I'm asking this seriously) does the last 30 seconds of that song not qualify as a solo? It's one of my favorite parts of any song ever, and I "grew up" on crap like death metal and metallica (not sure what that has to do with anything, other than to show what a LACK of taste I used to have).

Seriously though, the two times in Sultans of Swing where Knopfler goes off on those wonderful, twangy, high pitched tangents are the catchiest, hardest-to-get-out-of-your-head notes I can currently think of. Is there something about them that TECHNICALLY disqualifies them from being solos?

Fun thread though, gives me some ideas for a new mp3 ringtone to replace my current, you guessed it, Sultans one...

Oops, I didn't mean to come off as calling Metallica crap. I still love most of their work up through And Justice For All, and some off Black, but after that I feel they totally wimped out and can't see what anybody sees in the new stuff...

That's just me though...

Very nice. I have played since I was 12. I'm the proud owner of a 1973 Fender Tele Thinline, Collings OM-1a and a Santa Cruz Tony Rice pre-war dreadnaught. However, outside of the Collings (she's my baby), the other guitars tend to get traded for something else every now and then.

I used to play in punk bands but I have gone almost exclusively to bluegrass/flatpickin'.

Beyond the guitars I have a Fender bass, several keyboards, a fiddle and a mandolin.

I need a banjo and a washboard.

A while back I remember you had a post about the Twin Cities area and what was good and bad about it.

I'm a Texan and it pains me to say this (as Austin has tons of good shops):

Mpls has the best guitar shops in the country.

You will not find 2 better shops than the Podium and Willie's. Plus the Homestead Pickin' Parlor is the only place to be for bluegrass jams.

Didn't say not to nominate Sultans. I wasn't especially clear, I guess - since both the middle solo and the outro are wonderful.

Let's just say I misspoke.

Feel free!

Ok you may laugh at this one, but Chicago's 25 or 6 to 4 has a great solo, one of the most melodic, yet cruising fast.

oh and anything by Ted Nugent

Mr. Bob - 25/6/4 is, along with Long Time, my great white whale; I've been trying to get it down since I started playing. No joy. I mean, I've gotten "Sultans of Swing" and "Shoot Out the Lights" down, for crying out loud. And yet Terry Kath's classic remains inscrutable.

Nugent? Never been a fan. I know he's got hella chops, but he's never grabbed me.

another nominee;
I Know a Little, by Lynyrd Skynyrd

"You will not find 2 better shops than the Podium and Willie's. Plus the Homestead Pickin' Parlor is the only place to be for bluegrass jams. "

I agree, but only because Dominic's closed so long ago; they were my big three.

And Pete's, of course - but then, you needed to be George Harrison or Bob Dylan to get an appointment there.

Speaking of great guitar shops:

When I was a kid - like, age four through probably twelve - one my my friends was this girl named Linda Mowry. Just a pal in the neighborhood. Her mother ran a little guitar shop on Main Street in Jamestown; it also sold a zillion other things (I remember her mom giving me a "Man from UNCLE" Corgi car when I was probably six) because - well, it was a music shop in Jamestown, ND. When I was in probably fourth grade, she moved to a bigger location (there are walk-in closets in Lakeville bigger than the original shop), and opened a store in Moorhead, MN (across the river from Fargo). Along about eighth grade, she closed the Jamestown store, and her and Linda moved to Moorhead.

Naturally, Linda's mom was the legendary Marguerite Mowry, owner of Marguerite's Music, the best guitar/music store between the Twin Cities and the West Coast, and until Guitar Center, the biggest between Chicago and California.

Opportunities missed...

Plus, we have the world's greatest guitar luthier living up in Circle Pines:

Jim Olson.

"Calling Card" by Rory Gallagher on the "BBC Sessions" album or just about any guitar solo by Rory. Dave Davies solo on "Celluloid Heroes" by the Kinks on the "One for the Road" album. Solo by Mark Englert on "Ain't it the Truth" on the Dramaram album "Vinyl". "I got a Line on You" Solo by Randy California on the "Spirit" album "The Family that Plays Together".

My additions:

Forget "Time" or "Mother"...David Gilmour at his best is the ending solo on "Comfortably Numb." Go back and listen...it may be the most underrated rock solo ever.

"Eruption" - Van Halen. Still a classic.

Steve Lukather's solo at the end of Toto's "99," which most people haven't heard because Top 40 radio edited it. Don't agree? You try playing it, especially with Lukather's subtleties.

"Sharp Dressed Man" - ZZ Top. Billy Gibbons solo is like all great blues solos--gritty and delivered with attitude. Extra bonus is Dusty Hill's distortion-coated bassline, which makes the track's groove sound like an idling hot rod under the solo, matching the vibe provided by the 1934 Ford on the album cover.

"Change It" - Stevie Ray Vaughn. Vaughn recorded a ton of great solos, but here he displayed possibly the entirety of his huge bag of tricks in the span of one minute.

"Since I've Been Lovin' You" - Led Zeppelin. A hidden gem from the third album.

"Love or Confusion" - Jimi Hendrix. This is the track that proved Hendrix's ability to play his Strat like a studio. Keep this in mind when you listen to the track: Take away the bass, drums and voice, and everything left is Hendrix playing live in the studio with no overdubs--feedback and all--he only had a four-track system to work with. It still blows my mind.

"All Along the Watchtower" - Jimi Hendrix. Forced Bob Dylan to play this song with an electric guitar ever since.

"The Thrill is Gone" - B.B. King. The lonely, wailing solo in the middle is why it's his signature track.

"25 or 6 to 4" - Chicago. An almost forgotten solo today. One of Terry Kath's biggest fans was Jimi Hendrix.

"Black Magic Woman" - Santana. No comment necessary.

"No One Like You" - Scorpions. Everything a solo should be: technically proficient, plenty of melodic hooks, and instantly recognizable.

"Let It Slide" - Angelo Jannotti. A great solo showing that you don't have to be fast to be good.

That's the ones off the top of my head. The problem that there are so many good ones to pick from.

I see Mr. Bob and Mitch beat me to the punch on 25 or 6 to 4 while I was compiling my list!

I'm probably going to get banned for bringing down the level of musicianship under discussion, but one that comes to mind is Zakk Wylde's solo on Ozzy's "No More Tears." Probably derivative and easy to digest, but I can't get tired of it.

Other good ones along the same lines are Kirk Hammett's various solos in "One," just about every solo Jim Martin ever played with Faith No More (simple but good), and the almost-noise solo on Alice in Chain's "Man in the Box."

I could probably think of more, but what little reputation I have would only suffer more...

Mitch - as a Minnesota resident, I can not believe that you didn't have Prince on your list! If I had to limit myself to one it would have to be the guitar solo on "Purple Rain". Oh and if you're gonna talk about Mark Knoppfler - the solo on "Brothers in Arms" will bring ya to tears!

One more comment: Elliott Easton should get the all-time stealth award for sneaking country twang solo lines into The Cars' "My Best Freind's Girl."

For me, solos are all about the tone. Well, most of the time, anyway. By that standard, the two whompin'-est guitar solos of all time are:

1. The Cure - "Three Imaginary Boys" from the album of the same name, their first. Also available on the _Boys Don't Cry_ album. Simple, gloomy, melodic.
2. Queen - "We Will Rock You" - The song itself is lame, but Brian May comes in at the end and just kills with that overdriven Vox amp. Brian May is the master of tone.

RobbL,

Yep. May's tone is something I've always wanted to lift. WWRY and the final multitracked solo in "Bohemian Rhapsody", along with Gilmour no "Mother and Comfortably Numb" are the coolest tones for soloing that I've ever heard.

I want a stomp box with six detents: Brian May, David Gilmour, Mark Knopfler, Malcolm Young (for rhythm), Nils Lofgren and Supro Combo.

Jeff Beck, "'Cause We've Ended as Lovers,"
[Blow By Blow]

Carlos Santana, "Song of the Wind,"
[Caravanserai]

Robin Trower, "Bridge of Sighs,"
[Bridge of Sighs]

Danny Gatton, "Funhouse,"
[Cruisin' Deuces]

Eric Johnson, "Cliffs of Dover,"
[Ah Via Musicom]

Jimi Hendrix, "Machine Gun"
[Band of Gypsys]

Stevie Ray Vaughn, "Riviera Paradise,"
[In Step]

Just about anything from Jimmy Page, but Clapton's overrated --great guitarist, songwriter --but overrated. You also can't leave out Albert King or Albert Collins. John McLaughlin doing anything with Miles Davis ("Bitches Brew) is amazing stuff too.

I've been playing 35 years but all it's taught me is I can't play.

You should really check out the Pod XT Live from Line6. I've got one, along with a Variax 500, and can emulate just about any guitar/amp/effects combination out there. Will a purist pooh-pooh it and claim the real thing sounds better? Of course. But when you're actually playing with a band, it sounds as good in the mix as the real thing, and TONS cheaper. Hint: Play through a solid-state amplifier, or straight into the mix. It's already emulating the vacuum tubes (assuming you picked a tube amp), and running it through a second set makes things sound muddy.

You can tweak everything on your PC or Mac, via a USB cable and their free editing software. And I mean EVERYTHING - you choose an amp head, cabinet, effects (including order), microphone, distance of the mic to the amp, on-axis or off-axis micing, etc. With my Variax plugged into the Pod, I can be playing a Martin 12-Sting acoustic, and by pressing a single pedal, switch to a Gibson Les Paul playing through an overdriven Marshall stack. Then to a Rickenbacker (6 or 12 string) through a Vox AC-30. It's amazing.

Finally, they've got an on-line sound-sharing library that allows users to share patches that they've created, so when someone else finds that perfect Mark Knopfler "Brothers in Arms" sound (there are several examples), you can download it and tweak what they've already started.

Here's the URL for the Pod XT Live:

http://line6.com/podxtlive/

Classical Gas. Call it Baroque Rock.

The opening sequence from Blue Oyster Cult's "Godzilla" (random diacritical marks omitted) - simple, compelling, memorable

The guitar waterfall in the Surfaris' "Wipe Out"

And I'm a little surprised that no one has mentioned Dick Dale, though I'm not sure which bit I'd pick.

I hate these things. Everybody is always SO wrong and I am SO right ;-)

Seriously, matters of taste are impossibly subjective but I'll toss out a few less obvious suggestions:

16-year-old Dave Davies on "You Really Got Me". Short, sweet, uninhibited and groundbreaking.

Ronson on the live version of Bowie's "Width of a Circle." Only on video with shitty sound, but incredible.

Mick Ralphs on "Ready for Love" -- the Mott the Hoople original, not that piece of shit he did with Bad Company.

Prince - shoot a fish in a barrel but "Purple Rain" rates up there.

Chuck Berry - dittos but "Oh Carol" is a good example.

Hendricks, double dittos. Shoot your own fish.

Enough of a surface scratch for me.

I will refrain from criticizing some of the aggregious picks of others, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder, innit?

Cheers!

My votes that haven't been mentioned before:

"Telegraph Road" - Dire Straits.

"Shine On You Crazy Diamond" - Pink Floyd. "Time" is great, but I prefer the more mellow solo.

And nobody mentioned Zep's Stairway? How can you have a classic R&R discussion and not mention that tune?

>> Dave Davies solo on "Celluloid Heroes" by the Kinks on the "One for the Road" album. <<

>> 16-year-old Dave Davies on "You Really Got Me". Short, sweet, uninhibited and groundbreaking. <<

Glad to see a couple of people give Dave Davies his due. Terribly underrated, IMHO. But then, I'm an old fart who's been a huge Kinks fan since '64. How about "All Day and All of the Night," or "Living on a Thin Line," or "Destroyer"... OK, I'll stop.

Here's an obscure oldie: Leslie West (Mountain) in "Nantucket Sleighride" or "Theme for an Imaginary Western."

Rumour has it that DG's "Time" solo was a
one-take effort with no edits. It's my favorite.

I thought about this all day, and the two solos that i can't shake are:

--"Let It Be," the Beatles (George Harrison): try as i might, with thirty-five years of weird improvisational exposure, i can't think of a note i'd play differently.

--"Late for the Sky," Jackson Browne (David Lindley): so stunningly effective in its evocation of desperation that Scorcese used it for the scene in "Taxi Driver" where Travis Bickle finally cracks while watching "Amercian Bandstand" on TV.

i can think of a lot of other playing that i absolutely love--Hendrix, Garcia, and Neil Young being only the foremost--but those two solos are absolutely perfect.

for a favorite, i'd probably have to go with the cadenza at the beginning of the studio version of "Calvary Cross" by Richard Thompson, where RT works a two-chord pump-organ drone pattern into a frenzy of Middle Eastern-inspired hammer-ons and pull=offs. i actually sat down and wrote that one out note-for-note so i could figure out what he was doing.

25 or 6 to 4 - "Terry Kath's classic remains inscrutable."

Ain't that the truth. And all with those fat little fingers too. Inscrutable indeed. I betcha he can't even lay it down like that again.

Wes Montgomery deserves mention. The old man played everything with his thumb. Not exactly rock solos, but in a class by himself as a guitarist.

I sat down and worked out the Calvary Cross cadenza myself. Amazingly fun and tauntingly difficult.

Here are a few that I love. Surprisingly, they are all from the "classic rock" KQRS playlist:

Keith Richards - Sypmathy for the Devil

George Harrison - Let it Be

TonY Iommi - Paranoid

Martin Baare - Aqualung

Santana, on Carvanserai.

"Master of Puppets" by Metallica. I know it'll probably get downchecked because of Mitch's aversion to speed metal, but there's some great guitar thrashing on there.
At the other end of the spectrum, "Too Long In The Wasteland" and "Outskirts" by James McMurtry. Boy can flat-out play.

Hey all,
I know this is more Blues than Rock, but I have been a huge fan of Robert Cray ever since "Smoking Gun," and some of his earlier work is better still, but the solos in that do me in every time and out comes the "air guitar."

And lest we forget, Mike Bloomfield and Elvin Bishop on The Paul Butterfield Blues band's "Work Song". They both get a long workout. And the MOST UNDERRATED solo, Roger McGuinn's work on 8 Miles High. Nothing like it before and maybe since.

No aversion to speed metal - just not among the 20 CDs I'd take to a desert island.

Lest we all burn in Hell, we reference here Jerry Garcia and Paul Weir in any live Grateful Dead performance. I saw it, I heard it, but I still don't believe it.

Elliot Randal / Reeling in the Years / Can't Buy a Thrill / Steely Dan.

Can't listen to rock and roll anymore.

Santana on "Zebop" album. Lifeson of Rush "La
Villa Strangiato" from Hemispheres. Zappa
"Black Napkins" from Zoot Allures. Jimmy Page
"No Quarter" live on Song Remains the Same.

Bruce Cockburn's very short solo following the bridge on "Scanning These Crowds".

Badfinger's Baby Blue composer was "Pete Ham" not Dave. On this song, it is actually their other guitarist doing the solo, a fellow named Joey Molland. Just FYI. :-)

Barrymores interprocess deemphasizing grabber Harrison beach?absenting dowel.bumbling