But they rock even harder nowadays, and the 2020 album Sun Racket is a regular barrage of killer riffs, including the vibrato frenzy on “Dark Blue.” Earlier solo tracks, like the Michael Stipe duet “Your Ghost,” show her elegance on acoustic lead.Ĭheck out: “Dark Blue” 69: Joe Walsh (The Eagles, The James Gang) On the band’s early albums she devised angular and logic-defying lead parts. Even after Joe Walsh’s arrival, it was still Felder who provided landmark moments like the long intro to “Hotel California.” The stinging solo on “One of These Nights” may well have been his peak.Ĭheck out: “One of These Nights” 70: Kristin Hersh (Throwing Muses)Īs the leader of the perpetually underrated Throwing Muses, Kristin Hersh is also one of the indie rock movement’s most inventive lead players. When he joined for the third album On the Border, they suddenly transformed from tasteful country-rockers to a guitar army. Though he ultimately fell out with the band, Don Felder’s importance to the Eagles can’t be overlooked. He initially held the coveted “stunt guitar” slot in Frank Zappa’s band, where his offstage exploits earned him the track “Stevie’s Spanking.” During a brief stay with Whitesnake and a longer one with David Lee Roth, he played shredding solos with the best – but check the solo track “Weeping China Doll” to hear him in a more artful context.Ĭheck out: “Weeping China Doll” 71: Don Felder (The Eagles) One of his most classic solos occurs in his ode to another guitarist: Check any of the many recorded versions of “Keith Don’t Go.”Ĭheck out: “Keith Don’t Go” 72: Steve VaiĪ great guitarist of amazing technical ability, Steve Vai has kept one foot in hard rock, and the other in serious composition. But Nils Lofgren’s no slouch of a songwriter himself, and his solo projects give him more room to stretch out than Bruce Springsteen and Neil Young do. When you’re a current, full-time member of both Crazy Horse and the E Street Band, your status as a great songwriter’s guitarist is unshakeable. Satriani would turn down numerous lucrative band offers to pursue his solo mix of fusion, metal, and prog.Ĭheck out: “Surfing with the Alien” 73: Nils Lofgren (Crazy Horse, E Street Band) “Surfing With the Alien,” the title track of his hit ‘87 album, was four solid minutes of impossible licks, but the track still had the gonzoid appeal of a vintage surf instrumental. Flashy guitar solos by anybody but Eddie Van Halen were falling out of fashion in the late 80s until Joe Satriani made them fun again.

Wake Me Up by Ronnie Matthews