r/guitarlessons • u/broadwaybass • 13h ago
Question Solos every player should learn
So I'm a professional bass player and fairly competent at rhythm guitar, but I really want to get better at guitar solos, especially in a pop/rock context. I'd love to learn some iconic solos to expand my vocabulary. So what would you guys say, what are your essential solos that can really help getting gud at soloing?
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u/newaccount Must be Drunk 12h ago
Wish you were here - Floyd.
Learn every part of the song, it’s a master class of how to hair the major scale
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u/us_me_erna 13h ago
Hotel California. I hate that song, but the solo has everything
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u/Ok_Attempt_1290 12h ago
Seconded. The solo is really good at teaching you phrasing and bends. I'm getting so sick of practicing it though lol. It's deceptively difficult. But I also suck at solos lol.
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u/royce32 11h ago
It just keeps on going.
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u/Ok_Attempt_1290 11h ago edited 11h ago
The last section just repeats over and over. The actual solo ends around the 1 minute 30-ish second mark.
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u/philbymouth 11h ago
Yep, came here to say this - first thing which came to mind.
It changes position and follows the chord changes whilst focusing on melody.
Sultans - Dire Straits would be another good shout as would Stairway To Heaven
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u/egirlames 7h ago
what a solo, insane. I learnt it on the piano but I’m new to the guitar and my fingers are bleeding from playing just chords 😭
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u/Wooden_Permit3234 6h ago
lol I also don’t care for the song but it’s the only solo of any length I know.
I’m maybe an “advanced beginner” at best and it’s taught me so much learning it. It’s forced me to get better at so many little skills, and the end part has fucking finally got my hands to stretch.
After several months focusing on it I can actually play it pretty well, even if there’s still plenty of room for improvement (which is good and means I have something pretty mindless I can continue to grind and use to improve, and while I don’t like the song much it’s fun to play.)
It’s really not even that hard, barely any of it is fast, no complicated fingering, the ending will come if you just make yourself stretch out and do it slowly for enough days. And if you can’t do that, no better time to get able to do it.
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u/Ragnarok314159 6h ago
I tried, but I hate the eagles so much don’t even want their shit in front of me.
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u/Striking-Base-7098 2h ago
What about CCR ?
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u/Ragnarok314159 2h ago
They are ok.
It’s all preference anyways. The Eagles just seem like asshole people and I can’t get over it.
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u/DanteAlligheriZ 10h ago
Metallica - Nothing else matters, it taught me a lot when i started out, it was one of the first songs i fully learned.
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u/aeropagitica Teacher 12h ago
AC/DC :
You Shook Me All Night Long
Touch Too Much
Back In Black
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u/Formula_420_ 12h ago
Highway to Hell solo has sorta weird phrasing(at least as a first solo for my beginner self) and taught me how to bend double stops
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u/AudieCowboy 12h ago
Also thunderstruck
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u/McTacobum 9h ago
The intro is great if you alternate between 1&3 and 2&4 fingers - great little exercise
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u/AudieCowboy 9h ago
The cool thing is listening to it, it doesn't end for the full 4½ minutes, I'm gonna add it to my practice routine soon
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u/svinyard 18m ago
This. Angus loves Chuck Berry and you get some of that swing vibe out of the more musical solos like Shook Me and Back in Black. Plus a LOT of dynamics, Angus hits some of those hard to get those big notes
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u/Strict_Light2677 8h ago
Stairway to heaven solo. Not very difficult to learn. Its phrasing, placement in the song and how it drives the song forward make it (IMO) the best guitar solo of all time
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u/Ragnarok314159 6h ago
Which version? The cocaine, marijuana, acid, or the various combinations?
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u/Strict_Light2677 1h ago
I meant the studio version. Although the madison square (heroin) version is also good
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u/timebomb011 10h ago
Maybe an unpopular opinion, but learning solos doesn’t help you learn as much as practicing freestyle soloing. Jam with people or loop a section and just practice. Get your BB king on and don’t play many notes when few notes will do. Make the guitar talk.
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u/GarantKh27 8h ago
A good thing to do, but learning solos enhances your repertoire, which in turn helps you jam and improvise better. I think it's best to combine both
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u/Terminus_Rex 7h ago
I agree. Having a vocabulary of licks you can play in any key is a solid foundation for soloing.
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u/Wooden_Permit3234 6h ago
I’ll express my skepticism of your take, at least below some level of skill.
Solos can force you to learn new skills and grow. Freestyle can do that, but I’d hazard a guess it’s a lot less likely to challenge oneself sufficiently while doing it and instead lean more on what you’re already very capable of.
Above some threshold of skill and understanding, one is probably a lot more likely to improve freestyle though and good enough to not get a whole lot out of learning many solos.
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u/timebomb011 5h ago edited 3h ago
You're right, it depends what you wanna learn. Do you want to mimic or express yourself originally? learning other people's solos won't help you find that self-expression faster, gotta explore and find it on your own. so may as well jam and have fun while learning!
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5h ago
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u/timebomb011 5h ago
everyone is using the same 12 word vocabulary. it's a matter of how you express yourself with the limited pallette. i don't think solo is so much about skill as it is expression, but as i started, maybe an unpopular opinion.
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5h ago
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u/timebomb011 5h ago
sure! just started recording and have been investing in some gear and learning. here's a song i've been working on and would love you to hear. thank you for wanting to listen, that's very nice! solo is just after 1 minute.
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5h ago
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u/timebomb011 5h ago
nice! i really appreciate you listening. it's just over Gm - C. you should record an exact version of it now! would you like me to make a tab of the solo for you so you can do it exactly? since the whole discussion is about learning someone else's that would be the best way to bring this full circle!
edit: i can make a loop of the section for you as well to do it over to make it easer.
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u/timebomb011 4h ago
reddit's being weird, i was responding to the video comment and it disappeared
perfect! this is so fun! i think the technical playing is great, but it just seems so empty, and doesn't have any expression behind it. this is exactly the kind of soloing that i think comes from mimicry, instead of learning to play originally. it may come down to taste really and what a person want to achieve when playing at the end of the day. but it's so cool you want to collaborate and want to record my solo.
here's the solo for you to learn and record over the loop below
here's the loop
lemme know if you want the tab!
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u/Wooden_Permit3234 5h ago
Doesn’t strike me as much of an either or.
But I do think learning solos is a great way to build a lot of different useful guitar skills which can then let you express yourself more broadly and originally, even if you probably would want to actually experiment and freestyle to come up with original music and style.
It’s not like learning solos is merely memorizing them; unless you’re already good enough to play it perfectly it tends to result in new skills as you practice, I’d think.
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u/did_i_or_didnt_i 12h ago
Killer Queen
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u/GarantKh27 8h ago
Isn't it two tracks superimposed over each other? I'm not sure you can play this solo like on the original record with just a single guitar
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u/ObviousDepartment744 8h ago
Larry Carlton’s solo in “Kid Charlemagne”
Any Elliot Easton solo with the Cars
Any solo by Prince
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u/GarantKh27 8h ago
Metallica - Master of puppets. The first solo is calm and quite easy, but teaches steady rhythm and good phrasing. The second solo is metal fast and technically difficult, and there's that uneven beat, not 4/4, but something very special, that teaches you to keep up with it. I would recommend giving it a try.
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u/KeepItPositiveBrah 6h ago
Sultans of Swing, Little Wing, Any variation of Brown Eyed Women, Both comfortably numb solos
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u/TheAnalogKid121 6h ago
My first solos were:
Metallica - Nothing Else Matters
Pink Floyd - Another Brick in the Wall
Metallica - One
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u/Raaazzle 2h ago
The beginning of Metallica's Fade to Black. Not solos, but the parts in Am I Evil and Thunderstruck are similar, fun to play, and impress non-guitarists
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u/Educational_Cow8956 13h ago
The solo in Jimi’s version of Hey Joe. It more or less taught me pentatonic on the 12th fret and how to play the same notes without moving your hand from seventh fret to fifteenth fret. I think it’s definitely a teachable solo.