If you're going to only have one guitar, I personally wouldn't recommend going from chords to solo to chords, because the solo will likely sound pretty weak compared to the parts with chords. I would start bas(s)ing songs on basslines. You'd still have the root note, so it wouldn't be too much different from basing songs on chords. But then you could just figure out guitar parts that were sorta picky, and you wouldn't have this massive volume drop when you go into the solo.

I mean, it wouldn't hurt to figure out the chords anyway, but I would try and steer clear of playing them live.