Tenology: More Weak Guitar Solos In Rock/Metal

I know it hasn't been long since the last blog post about weak solos but in typical Riffs And Raffs tradition, I recalled about eight songs with weak solos right after finishing the first post. Similar to the last post, these aren't necessarily "bad" guitar solos; they're ones that sound underwhelming or poor in comparison to what the band is capable of. Also similar to the last post, I'll try not to dwell too much on solos I've criticised in previous blog posts but I might slip a couple in just to justify my personal (and this post is largely personal) thoughts on why it's weak.
If you want to listen to each of these songs and their respective solos, scroll to the bottom of the page for an embedded Spotify playlist with each track. I've also included the time the solo starts next to each song title and artist in the list headings in case you just want to listen to the solo whilst reading the post.

1. "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" - Blue Oyster Cult (2:43)

So this is one of the guitar solos I've often criticised on the blog, hence me getting it out of the way first. I love the song and I've talked about how much I love Buck Dharma's guitar playing when it comes to both riffs and solos but I've always thought this song stopped being awesome right after the second chorus. The song's built around an awesome riff and chord progression but once it's time for the solo, the track takes a sharp and awkward turn into a completely different song. It sounds like something they couldn't fit onto another track and chose to tape onto this one...or maybe it was chosen to be a darker twist in the song's melody to signify the song's story about vampires and their victims, although that doesn't excuse it for sounding like dogshit.
Aside from the opening series of notes, there's nothing hugely memorable about the solo and the way it ties into the rest of the track. It doesn't show off technical talent or contain catchy hooks like the song's main riff, it just sounds like Buck's winging it after an imagination drought. It probably could've been improved with more melodic riffs and less dull sustains but it's hard to say, as I feel like I'm conditioned to hate it as soon as the bridge before the solo starts.

2. "Holiday" - Green Day (2:00)

Green Day aren't your typical screeching solo Rock band so I didn't feel like they were an appropriate band for the last blog post. However, since writing the last post, I've realised that Green Day have actually given us a couple of solid solos such as the one from "American Idiot" and "Jesus Of Suburbia". Sure, they're not great in comparison to Zeppelin and Iron Maiden tunes but they work in the songs and showcase some decent guitar playing. "Holiday" has a solo that sounds forced and uninspired, even for Green Day.
It's not quite as bad as simply reciting the vocal melody (we'll get onto that later) but it is far too short and far too simplistic to be considered a good solo, even for the song. It sounds like something that should play under the vocals during the last chorus, not the instrumental break that 90% of Rock songs use to release the energy they've built up throughout the course of the song. But hey, at least the rest of the song's OK, I guess.

3. "Woman From Tokyo" - Deep Purple (4:40)

I was tempted to pick "Smoke On The Water" for this list, as I've always found the solo to be a bit underwhelming in an already dull track. However, upon revisiting it, I realised that it's not actually that "weak" in comparison to the rest of the song. In comparison to other Deep Purple guitar solos, hell yeah it's weak...but then, so's this solo and my God, this solo makes "Smoke On The Water" sound like "Burn". As far as Deep Purple songs go, this one's pretty white bread. Basic riff, bland vocal melody but a good structure. The song plods along until the last minute, where the pianos pick up a bit and a guitar solo's set up...and it sucks.
It's a non-solo, a bit of fluff that sounds like the first part of an actual solo but as it stands, it's just terrible. The obvious improvement to it would be to make it longer but the song's already getting on towards the fifth minute and as I previously said, it's not really anything special. Extending a filler track with no life or character to six minutes is a surefire way to create a forgettable and unnecessary song (just look at some of the band's other tracks for proof). Or just don't include a solo! Not every song needs one and I'd rather it was a tighter package without one than forcing some hollow shit into a passable track.

4. "Californication" - Red Hot Chili Peppers (3:29)

I've said before that Red Hot Chili Peppers are a band that are strongest with softer songs in the Alternative Rock genre rather than heavier Funk based ones. This song is no exception and contains your typical RHCP sound at its finest right up until the solo. It sounds disjointed and out of place, enough to take you right out of the song with its awkward note bends and clashing harmonics. It sounds like a beginner's first attempt at writing a "deep" solo which, for John Frusciante, is the definition of weak.
A solo does work in this song but it needs to have a bit more meat to it than this. It doesn't have to be "Suck My Kiss" but it would benefit from some more melodic work; think the solo from "Cirice" - Ghost, it's competent and feels like the culmination of what the song's been building up to. It doesn't sound like a poor fit or that it's a waste of talent like "Californication" does.

5. "Armageddon It" - Def Leppard (3:12)

One of the lesser known singles off the band's biggest album and with good reason. It's a bog standard tune for Def Leppard from the album that had "Rocket" and "Pour Some Sugar On Me" but it didn't do the band a lot of favours with fans of traditional British Rock as opposed to overproduced American Arena Rock, especially when it came to the guitar solo. The solo itself isn't all that bad; it's a little plain and could easily be longer but musically, it works for the song. The biggest problem with it is the tone.
The solo is played with guitar synthesiser and it sounds fucking naff. This is a good example of when overproducing something can make it worse, as a typical guitar sound instead of synthetic nonsense would've helped steer it away from this blog post. There's also a small guitar solo that fades out with vocals in the outro of this song but again, it's nothing worth getting excited about.

6. "Smells Like Teen Spirit" - Nirvana (2:52)

I've briefly touched upon this solo being pissweak in the past but now I get to retread that ground with the rest of the song to back me up in an embedded Spotify playlist! I get that Nirvana aren't about guitar solos but this song was as commercial as they came and with that means they needed a solo in their song, since they were clearly going for a popular sounding Rock song (presumably one of the subconscious reasons the main riff sounds like a twisted version of the chorus riff from "More Than A Feeling" - Boston). It obviously wasn't going to be a solo full of noise and furious strumming but it does lack any kind of imagination.
I've said it multiple times before and I'll say it again, solos that simply play the vocal melody or chord sequence of the main riff are not good solos. This song literally just plays Cobain's vocals in the verse before giving us another verse! If it was the vocal melody BEFORE a great solo, I would've let it slide for giving us something. Unfortunately, it gets the solo completely wrong but hey, it's one of the most iconic Rock songs in the last half century so I doubt anyone involved in the songwriting process (who's still alive) is crying themselves to sleep over missed opportunities.

7. "All You Need Is Love" - The Beatles (1:18)

This song will always remind me of the final episode of The Prisoner. It had a great use but I never really got into the song due to its overproduction and weak melodies, another fine example of polishing something insubstantial in the hopes it'll become amazing. However, the worst part of the song has to be the pathetic excuse for a guitar solo. If you haven't heard the song in a while and don't recall it sounding offensively bad, I recommend never listening to this song and the solo again as your false memories of a passable solo are better than the original will ever be.
It sounds like a shitty covers band attempting to play the actual solo but messing up all the way through, complete with rough note bends and the guitarist eventually just fucking giving up in the middle of it. These are all signs of a bad solo before you get onto the fact that it's just repeating the opening vocal melody. George Harrison has given us some cracking solos in the past but this takes the absolute piss.

8. "Everybody Wants Some!!" - Van Halen (2:34)

Ah yes, the song that "Panama" made redundant. I think I prefer the guitar riff and chorus for this over "Panama" but God, David Lee Roth didn't make this song pleasantly memorable with his weird sexual improv during the breaks and the delivery of some of his lines in the verses ("I seek a poopoo ladder lookin' for a moopee" is the best I can make out at 1:55). However, if Lee Roth fails, you can always rely on EVH to make a song great, right? Right...just not in this case. Eddie phoned it in when it came to writing a solo and chose to just play a descending note pattern without his trademark tapping or imaginative shredding.
The closest he comes to showcasing some great guitarwork is when he rapidly strums the same notes but even then, it's not much for a man of his talents. I can appreciate that he only has so many guitar solos that are iconic or awesome before the inevitable drought or unintentional recycling of ideas comes in but it's not like this song came out well into the band's career. This song came out before Fair Warning and 1984, albums with fine solos (although "Unchained" is a bit dodgy). Ah well, at least we've always got Lee Roth's one-sided conversation about stockings to enjoy.

9. "Suffocated" - Orianthi (2:23)

I talked about this song in my write-up of the Guitar Hero: Warriors Of Rock soundtrack and whilst my opinion on Orianthi as a musician has changed since I first played that game, my opinion of the song has not. It's generic Pop Rock garbage with utterly soulless shredding crammed in on more than one occasion. In this case, the "solo" is the brief section in between the middle eight and the final chorus where Orianthi showcases her talents as a guitarist but not as a songwriter. I could've picked the "According To You" solo for basically the same reasons except that solo has its place in the song, even though it's the audio equivalent of Orianthi loudly shouting "LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT ME!" (although you could probably say that for most guitar solos in Rock).
No, I went with "Suffocated" because the bland shredding, whining vocals and Pop structure don't blend together at all. If you're one of those teenagers who thinks great guitarists are ones who can fit as many notes into a short space of time as possible without considering the quality of the sound, melody and dynamics, you'll probably think this song's the shit. If you want a solo that tells a story, that feels like it belongs in a piece of music and isn't just taped on for the sake of it, you're better off listening to something else.

10. "Cinnamon Girl" - Neil Young with Crazy Horse (2:06)

I remember seeing this song on a list of amazing guitar solos or something along those lines and to this day, I have no fucking idea why. At least overrated solos like "Comfortably Numb" and "Stairway To Heaven" have some musical creativity and skill behind them. This solo's just the same fucking note over and over again! The rhythm guitar is more active than the lead, for crying out loud. It's lazier than repeating the vocal melody on guitar and it sounds like toss, the only downside to a great Classic Rock track.
I could forgive the terrible solo if the outro went somewhere, as it sounds like the song's going to kick things into the next gear similar to the guitar solo in "Heartbreaker" - Led Zeppelin but nope. That's not the Neil Young way! Instead, it just ends on a strong note shortly after a pissweak one. I don't even need to talk about how the solo could be improved, it just needed more than a couple of notes. Still, the song's still good and the crap solo was enough to inspire a Tenacious D skit on their first album. That's right, this song made them think of "Hard Fucking" because the solo fucks the listener hard in the ears.


I didn't expect that I'd be writing another one of these posts so soon after the first so for all we know, I'll be cracking another one of these out in a week. That or a video game post so you've got that to look forward to.
Until then, here's the Spotify playlist with all the songs listed above.