Tournament of Maiden Solos: the Top 10 video!

Which guitar solo is your favourite?

  • Total voters
    32
  • Poll closed .
Isle of Avalon and The Duellists.

All four are very good. The two I vote for, get it because they feel more different. Maybe that's because the rhythm part is less standard as well - and despite rhythm parts are not the subject of this poll, I guess soloing over a different rhythm part challenges the lead guitarist to use his imagination more - less auto-pilot, so to speak.
 
Dr. Eddies Wingman said:
All four are very good. The two I vote for, get it because they feel more different. Maybe that's because the rhythm part is less standard as well - and despite rhythm parts are not the subject of this poll, I guess soloing over a different rhythm part challenges the lead guitarist to use his imagination more - less auto-pilot, so to speak.
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Underlying rhythm parts are not only as important as the notes in the solos themselves, but more important. With a typical Maiden-chorus progression (i-VI-III-VII) you can play whatever notes in the pentatonic - there's just little to no dissonance to take into consideration. Solos could be recorded over one section and then pasted over another to give them a fresher feel. Definitely not a bad studio trick if your guitarplayer gets stuck in a rut and repeats himself, but in Maiden's case it gets trickier since they don't record to a click track. (I think it could be done though.)

The lead player is a slave under the the rest of the band during the solo. The more 'different' the rhythm part, which I take to mean the less strong it is harmonically, the more inherent dissonance there is etc. the more locked in the lead player is. And of course, if the underlying chord progression/riff is jarring with no complete resolution, the lead player can do nothing about it. Some progressions can make you sound like a hell of player, and others are rather thankless assignments... or a fun challenge, if you happen to be in that sort of mood.

To summarize, melodies in themselves mean very little without the harmonic context they relate to. And I think you'd all agree that a chorus is generally more recognizeable/stronger than a verse. So in the end, it makes little sense to sit and compare solos like we do here... without taking their function in the respective songs into consideration. Some of them are played over chorus-progressions, others over verse-progressions, and others still over riffs that offer very little resolution in themselves. It all impacts how well they stand on their own.
 
Wow it's a tough group, each solo very different but all a similar high quality to my ears. The Duellists wins because I love it when Davey holds back on speed and plays a melodic solo at the tempo of the rhythm...if that makes sense. Like his solos in TROBB, Death or Glory and Tears of a Clown.
 
Maturin said:
Underlying rhythm parts are not only as important as the notes in the solos themselves, but more important. With a typical Maiden-chorus progression (i-VI-III-VII) you can play whatever notes in the pentatonic - there's just little to no dissonance to take into consideration. Solos could be recorded over one section and then pasted over another to give them a fresher feel. Definitely not a bad studio trick if your guitarplayer gets stuck in a rut and repeats himself, but in Maiden's case it gets trickier since they don't record to a click track. (I think it could be done though.)

The lead player is a slave under the the rest of the band during the solo. The more 'different' the rhythm part, which I take to mean the less strong it is harmonically, the more inherent dissonance there is etc. the more locked in the lead player is. And of course, if the underlying chord progression/riff is jarring with no complete resolution, the lead player can do nothing about it. Some progressions can make you sound like a hell of player, and others are rather thankless assignments... or a fun challenge, if you happen to be in that sort of mood.

To summarize, melodies in themselves mean very little without the harmonic context they relate to. And I think you'd all agree that a chorus is generally more recognizeable/stronger than a verse. So in the end, it makes little sense to sit and compare solos like we do here... without taking their function in the respective songs into consideration. Some of them are played over chorus-progressions, others over verse-progressions, and others still over riffs that offer very little resolution in themselves. It all impacts how well they stand on their own.
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Well, this is basically my point. The Trooper uses a rather generic chord progression, making it easy to solo over it (the solo is still cool). Avalon is a lot more challenging for the lead guitarist, and a solo which sounds good over a more unusual chord progression/rhythm part deserves some credit for just that.

The Duellists has another element that maybe would throw some lead guitarists off; the bass guitar and the rhythm guitar depart from each other in the 2nd bar of the solo (the rhyhtm guitar goes a whole note down, the bass guitar goes up and plays the third note in the major chord instead of the base note, thus creating some harmonic tension - albeit not a dissonance).
 
Dr. Eddies Wingman said:
Well, this is basically my point. The Trooper uses a rather generic chord progression, making it easy to solo over it (the solo is still cool). Avalon is a lot more challenging for the lead guitarist, and a solo which sounds good over a more unusual chord progression/rhythm part deserves some credit for just that.
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Very generic, surely (and with little dissonance) - but it's not a strong progression. I think both solos in The Trooper are super dull, but that's more due to the rather static backing than the playing itself. It's not an easy progression to solo over and sound amazing - just an easy progression to not sound bad over, because there's so little happening.

Avalon is even more dull. It's just E-D-C and a sort of short riff repeating. I don't get where the "unusual" is.
 
Caught Somewhere in Time. Simply one of the most memorable solos ever and one of the very best on SiT (which alone says much). I also like FHTE (didn't even remember that there is such solo in that song :P) but the gap between this and CSIT is too big, so no second vote this time.
 
Srogyy said:
Caught Somewhere in Time. Simply one of the most memorable solos ever and one of the very best on SiT (which alone says much). I also like FHTE (didn't even remember that there is such solo in that song :p) but the gap between this and CSIT is too big, so no second vote this time.
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The same
 
From Here to Eternity only, because it needs the help. Unique, memorable and pure fun.
But every solo here is excellent, better than many that have gone through.
 
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