Help Me W/ Solos!!!!!!!!!

I am the Lead Guitarist/Songwriter in my band "The Vestance". Our band is kind of a mix of Trust Company and Slipknot. I've come up with tons of cool progressions, riffs, appregios, and what not, but i cannot make a good guitar solo. I need advice on what makes a good guitar solo and what is required to make it tweak out and sound good. Please help me.

teleman925

Originally Posted by: teleman925I am the Lead Guitarist/Songwriter in my band "The Vestance". Our band is kind of a mix of Trust Company and Slipknot. I've come up with tons of cool progressions, riffs, appregios, and what not, but i cannot make a good guitar solo. I need advice on what makes a good guitar solo and what is required to make it tweak out and sound good. Please help me.

teleman925

Disregarding the mechanics of a solo. The best way that seems to work for me is to take the song I'm trying to make a solo for and listen to it over and over.

Grab the CD player and walk around doing your normal activites with the song playing, then start humming what you think would be a nice solo over the top of the song. Grab your guitar and try to mimic what you were humming. That works for me, but may not for you.

Try to rise above thinking solely about the mechanics of what you're doing (ie, scales, arpeggios, modes) and think in terms of melody and how to convey emotion in what you're playing.
I get so many students stuck in this rut of knowing all the scales inside out, and then when they go to play a solo, all they can do is edit a bunch of scales together.
The 'theory' stuff is great for learning guitar, practicing and keeping your fingers nimble.
But when you play music, you have to use the knowledge you've learned without sounding like you're doing things 'step by step.

Just Jam with some people or with song you like. No one can teach you how to "solo." That's something you need to discover for yourself. You can play scales and it'll sound like crap. Composing a good solo is something you have to find. Like I said it's not like someone can give you a lesson and "suddenly" you can solo well ( although it was enlightening for me when my teacher taught me that scales could be used for that). You have to find that out for yourself. Listen to cd's get ideas from other people's solo's try to copy them, make up your own style.

i agree with listening to your song over and over and humming along to work out some ideas or a pattern for a solo.
another idea i like to use is getting pissed and then jamming over the song, just randomly try out fast passages, melodic ideas, odd phrasing, etc... you may find you come up with some cool ideas, especially regarding phrasing..... its remembering them the next day thats the real trick!

its remembering them the next day thats the real trick![/QUOTE]
Yes! I have a digital recorder and even still, sometimes when I listen to what
I recorded last night I just go "Now how the hell did I play that?" Usually after messing around a while you can play it again.

Any way, not an expert here but I have tried each of the formentioned ideas, including the "get pissed" one and they all work. My vote goes for the "hum a solo over the rhythum and try to play it" Seems to work the best for me. Good luck and uhhhh, Wait and bleed :cool:

I used the humming method to start with, then one day something happened and solos just come to me........, the humming a solo method is a good one to start with

What I do in this situation is throw down a riff and slam something over it. You don't have to play any certain mode or scale, but just use feel. Start off with some bends and slides. Then once you get your solo warmed up keep it rolling by throwing in some palm muted scales and go down all six strings from 6 to 1. Just rip it up and at the end just throw in some diminished 7ths. Get it going get and fast and then top it out with being technical. Alot of people can play fast , but it is harder to be technical & fast & fersatile. Play with feeling & Heart.


Creeper_Eeyes

Hey bud I dunno if this helps but try listening to some bands like maybe Children of Bodom or Shadowsfall, they're good for those crazy riffs and sick ass solos.

What I do when I compose (that is if I'm not composing out of my head) is I jam over the track... for a few hours.... and even then I only come up with certain spots here and there that I want to keep. It's a trial and error thing. I take solos as the music's lyrics. It's the chance for the music to really say something and if you rush it then the song's voice isn't heard over all that frantic stuff. When jamming I just keep playing and when I hear something click like a certain bend timed right with a crash or a slight tap on the whammy bar then I think "hey that worked, now to branch outward from that and make the rest mesh" it's a very stable structure and should be handled with care. Too many good solos are lost because the composer settled. John Petrucci put it best. "the song comes first".

use pentatonic scales :D

A hammer on, pull off, slide and bend. A hammer on bend and vibrato. A prebend, pull off, hammer on. These tools and tricks are what makes your music yours. Play in scales and vary your attack. Try a call and answer thing played over the chords. Just like the lottery there are millions of options. Lose your pick for a while and you'll find another bag of tools in your picking fingers. More options!!! Work with your tools till you become a craftsman. Make it yours!