it's not disappeared, you must just be listening to music without it.

btw, radio often get a number of promo only mixes with "w/o guitar" or "w/o rap" edits removing the solos and raps to shorten a track for a more concise short version to fit 3 minute spots to avoid the dj cutting the track short or talking over the solo. so if most of your music listening is via standard commercial radio stations or mtv etc you aren't going to hear a lot of solos

I do agree with a post from earlier on about pop stars using guitarists to embelish their songs on stage. Rihanna is probably the biggest example,by having Nuno Bettencourt,the guitarist from Extreme,as her musical director on tour...And I'm sure his playing is one of the more popular things about her gigs.The man is phenomonal... So yeah,there's space for guitar solos in popular music today.

Going back a few years nu metal had a tendency to not bother with guitar solos, so they even became scarce in the rock/metal genres, unless you took the time to look a bit further afield.

Here's a cracking solo from this year. The track is electronic/post rock/prog rock/kitchen sink, and quite a huge track, sounding like it could soundtrack one of the Mass Effect games. The solo is at about 4 minutes in.

Teeth of the Sea - Reaper

Shiver up the back time....


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyV8gV7HYp4

Still going strong in most classic rock and metal genres - thankfully - a well played solo can lift a song to another dimension.

I find it odd to hear that pop artists bring out a guitarist for a solo spot as their music is all about the quick fix of a 'hit' song.

Most guitar solos are exactly the same. Few stand out from the crowd. It takes a particularly good guitarist to do that.

Phil Collins was totally unknown and not even in the music business yet when Layla was recorded. It was Jim Gordon on drums.

I find While My Guitar... is an overrated George Harrison song. His finest song ever would be, Something. That stands head and shoulders above everything else he wrote, and the best song on Abbey Road. Also contains his best ever guitar solo. Sadly the original no longer on Youtube.

He means Collins is on the live version he posted from 1986.

Layla was recorded in 1970 wasn't it? Collins was already a professional drummer then, it was the year he joined Genesis.


My brother prefers the version of While My Guitar Gently Weeps by Jeff Healey.

As suggested above you clearly didn't bother to check the link!


I'm not concerned about what you think is better, it was just to illustrate the good use of a guitar solo by The Beatles, nothing more.

Nor would I. It's one of the more monotonous riffs/tunes Clapton was ever associated with. Something to be avoided if possible.

Don't tune into the news when Clapton dies then. It's guaranteed to be played first!

Yes, that, with Sunshine Of Your Love and Wonderful Tonight. :yawn: I actually quite like some of the stuff Clapton did years ago but never gets airplay. A gorgeous little tune he wrote and played on here which beats Layla into a cocked hat. Particularly like the lilting acoustic solo he does towards the end.

Def Leppard's Steve Clark R.I.P. Brilliant!

From 1:59 to 2:44

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7ISmZ0V77k

But then the term "heavy metal" is so generic it has become meaningless.

There are plenty of great guitarists out there, but you'll rarely hear them on the radio or TV.

However I like music with complex rhythms and time changes, for example Tool's Schism, which has @ 47 time signature changes in just under 7 minutes....

Or perhaps because they basically just can't play?

Not just in "Hard Rock", there are plenty of Progressive bands, like Big Big Train, Magenta, Russian circles, etc, who use guitar solos.

The best guitar solo ever is Brian Tatler's solo in "Am I Evil".
It's got soul, it's got widdly bits, it's got tapping. It's excellent.

It's even better than Eddie Van Halens' "Eruption" which must've scared everyone in 1978.

A lot of them probably can't play, but most indie guitarists desperately want to be either Johnny Marr or John Squire don't they? Same as most metal guitarists want to be Jimmy Page or Eddie Van Halen. There's precious little originality, that's the problem.

Haha yeah well I thought I would be nice and er not mention that bluntly most punk & indie guitarists simply don't have the technical skills to do those big winding fret melting solo's.

However if we are following the stereotype through most guitarists that know how to "shred" are usually utterly terrible songwriters. Its like the "simple" act of just putting 3 or 4 chords together to make a catchy song becomes beneath them and they just treat writing a tune as a technical exercise so they can gear it up for...another massive solo!

Plus being a great song writing Johnny Marr type chordal player is a technical skill too, and often overlooked by those that teach guitar in favour of being Mr Guitar Solo.

Its also true that with guitarists there is often a culture of wanting to clone a hero and be exactly like them and that has perhaps been damaging to guitar music in terms of originality. Guitarists tend to be very tribal and never want to step outside of whatever their tribe represents.