[Excerpt from passage that mentions Lindsey at FM concert. Also click to see nice picture of Lindsey at the Today show, I think]
The New York Daily News, May 5, 2013
The great guitar solo has been making a comeback lately, heard at Eric Clapton's 'Crossroads Festival' and Fleetwood Mac's Garden concert
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http://www.nydailynews.com/entertain...xzz2SRaMichael Schwartz
Photo caption:
Lindsey Buckingham gave a master class in the guitar solo during Fleetwood Mac's April concert at Madison Square Garden.
Starting in 1975, guitar solos became synonymous with all things indulgent, corny and tired. In the decades since, solos have certainly thrived at the margins — at jam-band festivals, in prog-a-thons, amid smaller jazz clubs or at metalheaded shredder meets. But much of what you’ll hear there only reinforces the punks’ original whine. Many of the solos sound just as self-involved, and noodley, as the haters’ claim.
At the same time, events like “Crossroads,” or Fleetwood Mac’s concert at the Garden one week later, prove that, when done right, solos can be every bit as meaningful and memorable as songs.
At the Mac show, Lindsey Buckingham gave a virtual master class in how to structure a long solo in the song “I’m So Afraid.” He escalated the drama in precise measure for more than five minutes until the sense of need and desire built to a virtual happy-ending resolve.
Tellingly, Buckingham first created that solo right before such things became verboten: 1975. While solos still thrive in bands as big as Phish or Government Mule, without a mass culture to support them, they’ve lost their focus and full musicality.
There’s no better example of this than the career of Derek Trucks. He’s unquestionably the greatest six-string player of his generation. But while his current, live work with the Allman Brothers approaches the genius of the band’s first flush, his own albums — products of contemporary culture — lack the fine connections between solo and song that perfect both. At their best, solos have a melodic assurance and emotional depth as finely For those who’ve forgotten how powerful that alchemy can be, here’s a look at 15 of the Greatest Guitar Solos of all time. And, before you write your, “Hey, moron, how could you forget ...” notes, I can already think of 100 genius-level solos I’ve left out.
Top 15 Guitar solos:
1. Eric Clapton and Duane Allman on Derek and the Dominos’ “Why Does Love Got to Be So Sad?” (1970): The way the guitars pull out of the first chorus has to be the single most compelling start in solo history. From there, the tension just keeps building.
2. Johnny Winter and Rick Derringer on “Good Morning Little School Girl” (1971): There’s no better two-guitar handoff than Winter’s first loop-de-loop challenge to Derringer’s wily, coiled answer.
3. Duane Allman and Dickey Betts on the Allman Brothers’ “Blue Sky” (1972): No guitarists have ever extended a melody longer in a solo setting.
4. Duane Allman and Dickey Betts on the Allmans’ “Whipping Post” live (1971): The guitar break as a three-act, epic drama.
5. Mick Taylor on the Rolling Stones’ “Sympathy for the Devil” live (1969): While Keith Richards mainly holds the rhythm, Taylor’s extensions bore straight through the heart of the riff.
6. Jimmy Page on Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven” (1971): The ultimate solo-as-bridge — between the acoustic part of the song and the three-chord crescendo.
7. Jimi Hendrix “All Along the Watchtower” (1968): Hard to choose a Jimi fave, but this one epitomizes his depth and fire.
8. Jimmy Page on Led Zeppelin’s “Since I’ve Been Loving You” (1970): Page’s bluesiest burn.
9. Jimmy Page on Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love” (1969): The break that comes out of Robert Plant’s vocal freak-out has to be the crunchiest playing in history.
10. Eric Clapton on Cream’s “White Room” (1968): The wah-wah at its wildest.
11. Neil Young on “Down by the River” (1969): Grunge, 20 years earlier, and 20 times grungier.
12. Robert Fripp on King Crimson’s “21st Century Schizoid Man” (1969): Fripp’s spidery solo created math-rock, four decades early, and made the guitar sound like a tool of Satan.
13. Richard Thompson on Fairport Convention’s “Sloth” (1970): Tying the solo to 500 years of Celtic music, Thompson turned that history psychedelic.
14. Carlos Santana on Santana’s “Soul Sacrifice” live (1969): No one has a more voluptuous tone than Carlos, graced by a Latin lilt as well as fingerings as fiery as a solar flair.
15. Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd on Television’s “Marquee Moon” (1977): Twin solos alive with lunar mystery.
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http://www.nydailynews.com/entertain...#ixzz2SRb4goYq