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When Guitar Player magazine asked on the cover of its September 1997 issue, "Is rock guitar dead or does it just smell funny?" the decades-old art of the wailing electric guitar solo made the musical endangered species list. Its decline began with Kurt Cobain, who in his rebellion against what he saw as heavy metal’s sexist lyrics, tossed the baby out with the bathwater by dispensing with guitar solos in his music. Green Day followed suit, and although highbrow exceptions like Dream Theater can be found, rock lead guitar is still largely AWOL. So, it seems, is the incentive to resurrect it. Why bother learning all that hard technical stuff like movable scale fingerings, how to create a riff that jives with the underlying chord of the moment, or how to gain speed and accuracy with the pick when you can just play Guitar Hero or Rock Band? It’s a lamentable state of affairs for anyone who remembers the towering triumphs of six-string slingers like Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Randy Rhoads, and Eddie Van Halen. —Glenn Weiser
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