Originally Posted by: garthioThen theirs the St.Anger album which i loved dispite their style change. Kirk didnt play any solos in the album but..........he is still coming up with some awsome soos that he playes at live gigs. so he didnt put solos in st.anger who cares!!!! he is still and awsome player who writes awsome solos he playes at live gigs!!
Kirk Hammet Forever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't know about all that. St. Anger was pretty uninventive, unimaginitive, and unadventurous. Metallica's "style change" (which really began with the Black Album and became fully realized with Load if you actually give it a decent listen) seems, to me, nothing more than a cowardly retreat into a more mass-marketed type of rock: the abandonment of values. I'm glad Hammet didn't put solos on St. Anger. He's been completely out of new licks since 1991. However, I don't really look down on him for that. He'd been successfully writing music with Metallica for 11 years, so it's acceptable that he would eventually run out of juice. Still, stylistically, Hammet really isn't very creative. Look at his main collection of licks. He reuses MANY of them in a lot of his solos ad nauseum. A bit of recycling is perfectly acceptable (and normal) but Kirk only has about five or six licks.

Another question I have is this: is writing solos that you play at gigs all that is required to be a great guitarist?