The greatest guitar songs of the 21st century – 2008
Rock N Roll Train – AC/DC
From the band’s last album with rhythm guitarist Malcolm Young, a song great enough to have been on Back In Black.
Nothing Ever Happened – Deerhunter
Bradford Cox and co established a spindly indie-psych sound that would inspire the next decade of guitar bands.
There Was A Time – Guns N' Roses
On the finest track on GN'R's long-awaited Chinese Democracy, beautiful solos from both Robin Finck and Buckethead culminated in an utterly epic outro.
Bleed – Meshuggah
If you think rhythm guitar is easy, try keeping up with this right-hand workout from the digit-crunching Swedish math-metallers. Ouch.
Salute Your Solution – The Raconteurs
Jack White howls like Robert Plant over offbeat powerchords that sound like a fuzzed-out AC/DC.
Ain't No Rest For The Wicked – Cage The Elephant
Memorable slide guitar riffs in indie are rare, but Nick Bockrath proves we need more of them.
Psychosocial – Slipknot
Returning four years after the varied Vol.3: (The Subliminal Verses) with a major return to form, Slipknot had ditched most of their nu-metal influence by album four – and Psychosocial was a brutal, be-masked highlight. You better psych yourself up to attack this disasterpiece, because #4 and #7’s riffing is as tight as ever.
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And, though the riff is strong, the solo is where you’ll really need to put in the practice. The toughest part is Mick Thomson’s opening salvo of alternate-picked scale runs.
Technically, he switches between picking and legato, but it’s worth trying strict alternate picking, then combining the technique with hammer-ons and pull-off s. Jim Root takes the second half of the solo, which is equally as challenging. The old adage of ‘start slow and build up speed’ definitely applies here.