The Top 100 Rock Guitar Solos of All Time--79-70

79.) Cult of Personality (Living Colour)



I don't know any other Living Colour songs other than this famous one, but where the fuck did this solo come from? Vernon Reid tears the absolute living shit out of his axe on here. Even the noise-chaos of the brief first solo can't prepare you for the total hellstorm of the big break. This seems like a very 1984-inspired song (I'm thinking mostly of the line "one and one makes three" here). There is really no conceivable pattern or meaning to the solo--Reid just lets shit loose, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. Considering this is one of the few solos by a black man on here or on any rock guitar list, it feels especially like its full of anger and the freedom that music grants us above our bigoted society.

78.) "Reelin' in the Years" (Steely Dan)



One of the great intellectual groups in rock history, Steely Dan was one of the few rock acts that was able to match the sophistication of their lyrics perfectly with the musical backdrop they were implanted in. Their music always had a very sexy, jazzy feel. Their guitar-playing, which from my understanding was mostly done through a collection of professional studio musicians, was tight and assured without being indulgent. By using studio musicians, they had solos that perfectly fit the tone of the song without seeming like an ego-boost for the lead guitarist looking to get on the cover of a guitar magazine. This song has such wonderful, exuberant guitar, from start to finish. This whole song seems like it's walking two feet above the ground, so tight is the band performance and so crisp is the songwriting.

77.) "Hot Dog and a Shake" (Dave Lee Roth)



Ah, a classic David Lee Roth song, full of shrieks and absurdly bad lyrics. Bassist Billy Sheehan and Steve Vai were really the only saving features of his solo career. But never failing to do his job to get a few post-show blowjobs, Vai saves the song with his showy, multi-part guitar solo.

76.) "Killing in the Name" (Rage Against the Machine)



This song reminds me of James Jones. We used to listen to Rage so much while driving around at high speeds, going nowhere but deeper into the purple haze of Western Loudoun (how's this for a tie-in to our month?). Guitarist Tom Morello is justifiably acclaimed for his use of effects to make his guitar sound out-of-this-world, at times like a DJ scratching a record, at others like some sort of early, 1970's arcade game. I rank this as his greatest solo because of the way the whammy pedal effectively caps Zack de la Rocha's always-pissed-off vocals. You know what I hate? When this song is played on the radio and they edit every single "Fuck you, I won't do what ya tell me." What the hell is the point of this song without that?

75.) "Cemetery Gates" (Pantera)



Though rightfully best known for his impressive chops and metal attitude, Dimebag Darrell's most notable attribute was bringing a sense of beauty to the heavy metal of Pantera. You can see it in the stately intro to this song, in the ringing riff of 3:40, and in the beautiful, melancholy solo. Dime was one of metal's most lyrical players. That really set him apart from the hordes of shredders that crowd the genre. I think it made him a better guitarist than his peer and friend, Zakk Wylde. Zakk had more technical chops, but Dime could craft a finer solo, and that's ultimately what being a guitarist is about. Oh, and by the way, this song has an ass-kicking riff in it. Both him and Zakk love the shrieking artificial harmonics. Watch a live video of Zakk and he does it about every five seconds, kinda like Yngwie Malmsteen kicking his picks into the audience at a live show.

74.) "Whispering a Prayer" (Steve Vai)



Ah, the first of Steve Vai's "seventh song" ballads on this list. He always put his most spiritual and beautiful ballads as the seventh track on his albums, because of his own obsession with all things New Age and cheesy. This is one song where a studio version does not exist, since it was first composed for and released on his live album Alive in an Ultra World, where he wrote a song for each of the countries he visited based on the musical stylings of that particular country. I think this one was Ireland's? Who knows, but there's some good music on there, and there will be at least one more song later on this list from the album.

This is just an exquisitely pretty song, and though it lacks the intense solos of some of the later seventh songs that show up on here, it has his signature build-up and release with the climaxing solo. This video is a lot of fun watching him play live. He loves putting on a good show. The real star of this song is the great tone he gets through a combination of volume swells and whammy bar dips on all the notes. Look at Billy Sheehan rocking that double bass! The ending is so good.

73.) "Ice Cream Man" (Van Halen)



Still have goosebumps from that last beautiful song? Well here's good ol' Dave Lee Roth to take away any sense of profundity you might have experienced with his tawny locks, jumping kicks, and absurd swagger. God bless him. As usual, Eddie is the real selling point of this song. In an unusually extended solo for him, Eddie delivers a bluesier and more free-form solo than some of his more mechanically proficient and cold ones, creating a classic in the result. 30+ seconds is really a long time for him to solo. Though he sucked all of the blues roots out of rock music, opening the way for the dreaded hair metal of the '80s and the lines of HIV-infected groupies, gay-looking band members who were junkies and fucked surprising amounts of women, and the tons of synthesizers that came along with it, I get the feeling that if he so desired, Eddie could've really spiced up the blues with his unique, freeform technique. Instead, the resurrection of the blues was left to Stevie Ray Vaughan (perhaps an even finer guitarist than Eddie), who will make an appearance much later in the list.

72.) "Ride the Lightning" (Metallica)



Kirk, on the other hand, had no problems soloing for extended amounts of time, and this song is no exception. An exceedingly intricate and yet memorable solo from Hammett, beginning with a frightening-sounding tapping lick and ending with Hammett's signature legato licks, the solo covers a lot in between. Though he sometimes gets flak for riding on Dave Mustaine's coattails, Metallica's original lead guitarist who was kicked out for his alcoholism early on, Hammett I think had a very unique style in terms of metal soloists, and came up with some of the most memorable licks of metal guitar history. He is perhaps the most legendary metal guitar soloist.

71.) "Altitudes" (Jason Becker)



Seventeen years old when he recorded this gorgeous shred song, Jason Becker's tremendous guitar chops were unfortunately lost too early to Lou Gehrig's disease, and even though he apparently can no longer speak, he has continued to compose music through a computer and communicates using eye movements with his family. This is a tremendous multi-part shred song, and gives us a taste of the talent which was taken from us too soon.

70.) "Master of Puppets" (Metallica)



One of Metallica's greatest epics, this song about addiction also arguably contains Metallica's finest single moment in the absolutely stunning breakdown at the halfway point of the song. Though there is a classic Kirk Hammett shred solo later in the song, it is his slow, seemingly double- or triple-tracked solo that earns this a place on the list. Though metal guitarists get a bad rap for their notoriety of shredding as fast as possible in solos, there is actually some of the most melodic guitar in metal music. Look at this or Dimebag Darrell or Randy Rhoads or Judas Priest and Iron Maiden's guitarists. The riffing on this song is absolutely grinding, and Metallica were better able to come up with lyrics to suit their epic songs than most metal bands. The primal caveman riff at 5:10 is one of my favorites by them. God Almighty that is fucking heavy. A metal classic if I've ever seen one. This and "War Pigs" are perhaps the most legendary metal songs of all time.

--Edward