Rolling Stone’s “Greatest Guitar Solos” List Is Here, So Naturally Everyone Is Normal About It

Rolling Stone dropped a fresh list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Solos of All Time, and because guitar players are famously calm, emotionally stable people, the internet responded with measured reflection and zero yelling.

Just kidding. Everyone immediately started sharpening their picks.

The list puts Prince’s “Purple Rain” solo at number one, followed by a parade of obvious legends: Hendrix, Eddie Van Halen, David Gilmour, Funkadelic, Led Zeppelin, the Eagles, and the usual Mount Rushmore of classic guitar heroism. Rolling Stone says the criteria centered around solos that “make the song,” can be hummed or sung, and don’t merely repeat the main melody. Which is honestly a pretty solid framework.

But of course, this is Rolling Stone, so the real fun is not in the picks that make sense.

It’s in the choices that make guitar players stare into the middle distance like they just heard a Guitar Center employee play “Sweet Child O’ Mine” through a Line 6 Spider.

The Problem With “Greatest Guitar Solos” Lists

Here’s the thing: any list like this is designed to make people mad.

That’s not a flaw. That’s the business model.

A perfectly reasonable ranking would be boring. Nobody shares an article because they agree with 87% of it. They share it because some editor put a beloved solo at number 76, left out an obvious metal player, included a deep-cut indie pick, and then described something as “angular” like they’re trying to summon Brian Eno from a haunted typewriter.

And honestly? Respect.

But there’s always a weird tension in these lists. Are we ranking technical difficulty? Cultural importance? Emotional impact? Influence? Guitar tone? How many divorced dads have attempted it at Sweetwater while pretending they’re “just browsing”?

Because those are very different lists.

“Eruption” matters because it detonated the guitar world. Eddie Van Halen did not just play a solo; he made every guitarist on Earth look at their instrument and go, “Well, apparently I’ve been using this wrong.” “Purple Rain,” on the other hand, is not about technical gymnastics. It is drama. It is release. It is a closing argument delivered through a guitar amp.

Both deserve reverence. But ranking them against each other is like asking whether a chainsaw or a cathedral is “better architecture.”

Prince at Number One Actually Makes Sense

I know some people are going to scream about Prince taking the top spot, but I’m not one of them.

“Purple Rain” is one of the rare guitar solos that non-guitar players actually know emotionally. They may not know the notes. They may not know the gear. They may not know whether Prince was playing in a minor pentatonic box or channeling lightning through a lace glove.

But they know the moment.

That matters.

A truly great guitar solo does not just impress musicians. It changes the temperature of the song. It turns a performance into an event. And “Purple Rain” absolutely does that.

So yes, putting Prince at number one is defensible. It is maybe even correct.

The rest of the list? That’s where things get spicy.

The Usual Classic Rock Gravity Problem

One thing that jumps out immediately is how much these lists still orbit the classic rock canon. Guitar World noted that the top 30 entries are all pre-1990 compositions, which tells you a lot about how these rankings are usually framed.

Now, is that because the greatest guitar solos really did mostly happen between the late ’60s and late ’80s?

Maybe.

Or is it because the people making and validating these lists still treat that era as the official holy scripture of electric guitar?

Also maybe.

There’s no denying the classics. Hendrix, Gilmour, Page, Van Halen, Don Felder, Joe Walsh, Eddie Hazel — these players shaped the vocabulary. They are the reason half of us started annoying our families in the first place.

But if your greatest guitar solos list feels like it was assembled in a wood-paneled basement with a lava lamp and a subscription to Mojo, it might be worth asking whether “greatest” has quietly become shorthand for “most canonized by boomer rock culture.”

The Weird Picks Are the Point

Every one of these lists has a few selections that feel like someone in the editorial meeting said, “We need one pick that makes people Google a name.”

That is not necessarily bad. A list like this should introduce people to something unfamiliar. It should not just be the same 25 solos shuffled like classic rock Uno cards.

But there’s a difference between “this is a bold, interesting inclusion” and “this feels like a hostage note from the credibility department.”

You can almost hear the internal logic:

“We have too much dad rock.”

“Add something indie.”

“We need jazz credibility.”

“Find a woman guitarist before the comments murder us.”

“What about metal?”

“No, no. Not like that.”

And suddenly you get a list that is part historical document, part taste-making exercise, and part museum placard written by someone who really wants you to know they went to college.

The Metal Problem

The most predictable complaint is also one of the most valid: where is the metal?

Not just token metal. Not just one Megadeth pick so everyone can go home. Actual acknowledgment that entire generations of guitarists learned precision, speed, harmony, phrasing, and right-hand discipline from metal players.

You do not have to turn the list into a sweep-picking Olympics. Nobody needs a 14-minute ranking detour where every solo sounds like a caffeinated spider sprinting across a fretboard.

But acting like guitar culture after 1990 did not produce world-class soloists is absurd.

Modern metal, prog, fusion, and instrumental guitar scenes have players operating at a level that would have gotten them burned as witches in 1974. And yes, not every technically brilliant solo is emotionally meaningful. But plenty of them are.

Leaving that world underrepresented makes the list feel less like “greatest guitar solos of all time” and more like “greatest guitar solos your cool uncle still has opinions about.”

Ranking Guitar Solos Is Fundamentally Ridiculous — Which Is Why It Works

The beautiful and stupid thing about guitar solos is that they are deeply personal.

One person hears “Comfortably Numb” and has a religious experience.

Another person hears “Hotel California” and immediately smells a Guitar Center on a Saturday.

Somebody hears “Maggot Brain” and feels their soul leave their body.

Somebody else just wants Nuno Bettencourt to be treated like the monster player he is.

That’s why these lists work. They are not really about determining the final truth. They are argument machines. They give musicians a reason to yell, revisit old records, discover new players, and make content complaining about magazine editors who may or may not be trolling us professionally.

And in that sense, Rolling Stone did its job.

Because here we are, talking about guitar solos again.

Final Thought

The best guitar solo is not always the hardest one. It is not always the fastest one. It is not even always the most innovative one.

The best guitar solos are the ones that become part of the song’s identity. The ones you wait for. The ones you air-guitar in the car even though you are a grown adult with responsibilities and lower back pain.

So is Rolling Stone’s list perfect?

Absolutely not.

Is it occasionally baffling?

Of course. It’s Rolling Stone. Baffling is part of the brand.

But if it gets people arguing about Prince, Hendrix, Eddie Van Halen, David Gilmour, Funkadelic, Steely Dan, metal snubs, indie curveballs, and why every guitar list somehow feels legally required to mention the ghosts of the Delta, then honestly?

Mission accomplished.

Now go watch the video, yell at me in the comments, and tell me which solo got robbed the hardest.