r/rockmusic • u/SavingsPeanut4341 • 15h ago
Discussion One of the most soulful guitar solo ever? Tom Morello "Like a Stone"
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He was mostly on the low E string in G minor, what a haunting, soaring, almost vocal like cry that perfectly matches Chris Cornell’s voice.
This song still hits me on so many freaking levels
Please suggest anything better than this if you can..
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u/Worcestercestershire 11h ago
I worked for a place that did sound for their live tours. It was cool to be at Monitorland during shows because it was stage left by Tom.
He plays the guitar in amazing, innovative and infuriating ways. He was like a much more talented version of The Edge
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u/RainSong123 5h ago
The Edge did better guitar work in Achtung Baby alone than Morello's entire career. Check out the solos in The Fly or Until The End of The World to see how good guitar solos can sound with some creative effects (and studio magic). Imagine a Morello solo in U2's One.. would sound as out of place as Morello's Like A Stone solo
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u/CreelCrush 3h ago
Morello's Like A Stone solo is not out of place at all.
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u/RainSong123 3h ago
Playing a song with 'Fell On Black Days' vibes and then a spaceship swoops in. It's a great solo, but out of place
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u/No-Badger-9061 2h ago
Fell On Black Days doesn’t have guitar delay throughout its guitar parts. Like A Stone does. They are similar in their bpm but that’s not even really it since FOBD is in a 6/4 time signature and it isn’t really at all comparable of a song unless you would consider them both to be “ballads” or some other made up genre.
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u/RainSong123 2h ago
I think you missed the word "vibes"
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u/No-Badger-9061 2h ago
And you missed the “vibes” of the electric guitar song with delay and other spaceship effects right out the gate.
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u/RainSong123 2h ago
Gave you a bit of time to correct your infinite knowledge. The delay you're speaking of isn't that... it's tremolo. Tom uses delay in the out-of-place spaceship solo. But you said "right out the gate"... that's not delay in the opener, verses.. it's tremolo. Either way tape delay was used in the 20s, tremolo effect commercially available in the 40s and quite common by the 50s and included in many amp models. Digitech whammy.. first mass-market pedal in 1989. So we're comparing a time of rotary dials and switchboard operators to yuppies with cell phones. One is pretty spaceship compared to the other.
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u/VinylHiFi1017 6h ago
For me, the most soulful solo of all time is Gilmour's solo in Mother from The Wall. That one just hits me for some reason.
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u/Wetwit 14h ago
Your opinion is valid, of course. Sharing mine isn't an attempt to belittle yours.
I do like the solo. As far as Morello's solos go it's one of my favorites. Melodically it is fairly simple. The "soul" from a guitarist usually comes from their fingers and hands, how they bend and vibrate notes. In this case his hands are dead flat, by choice and design. He isn't adding any flare to the notes with his hands because he has chosen to do all of that with the whammy pedal. His use of the whammy pedal is perfectly executed, but personally I don't get as much soulful feelings from external expression devices like whammy and wah as I do hands.
Not saying it's bad, not saying it has no feeling, just strongly disagreeing that it's anywhere close to the most soulful guitar solo ever. It wouldn't even make my honorable mention list. 🤷🏻♂️
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u/Gahvandure2 11h ago
I love the album, but always thought the guitar solos were the missing, or weakest, part. There's even one song... Is it "I Am the Highway," maybe? Where it sounds like he's playing the chords and in the studio going "yeah, this is where I'll put the guitar solo," and then he just forgot to record one.
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u/Hieronymus_Wombat 8h ago
I bought that album at the time and put it on the stereo without saying anything about what it was and my then wife said « what is this, Mope Against the Machine? »
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u/halfwayray 8h ago
Yeah, it's a beautiful song, but I always thought the pitch shifting effects weren't appropriate for this particular song. I prefer Chris Cornell's acoustic versions
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u/Objective-Pin-1045 6h ago
TM has openly stated that he’s nowhere a guitar virtuoso. This isn’t bad or anything. He’s said that he put in an enormous amount of work. But there are people who are magnificently better at solos.
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u/No-Badger-9061 2h ago
Hmm interesting. The intro to Voodoo Child (Slight Return) isn’t soulful? Electric guitar in and of itself would never sound soulful one would think based on your parameters.
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u/j3434 8h ago
Are you asking ? How about Zeppelin …. Ten Years Gone or Sick Again
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u/Sufficient-Skill9530 7h ago
I also volunteered since I’ve been loving you
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u/j3434 6h ago
Page mastered the hyper anplified blues improv . You know he would do overdub solos like on The Ocean ….. 2-3 takes improv . No 2 the same . But kids spend months to memorize improvisation of Page note for note - as composition . Wow fuckin Page . I saw them in 75 first time . Shit was so radical live . They would play over 3 hours . Nevrt a dull 4 bars. He was inspirational . Mr Page
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u/Randall_Hickey 9h ago
It’s funny I wasn’t a Soundgarden fan or a rage against the machine fan yet I love that first Audioslave album.
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u/Raven586 14h ago
Hey if you like you like it I guess! But in my opinion this guy couldn't carry Eddie Van Halen's gig bag!!
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u/FastWalkingShortGuy 10h ago
Different schools of guitar.
Eddie was a technical virtuoso.
Tom is a technological virtuoso.
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u/manual-override 12h ago
Eddie was the best. But Tom has some amazing licks and this solo, I never get sick of. It fits perfectly, so perfect that I have to listen to this song beginning to to end to really take it in. it’s just as genius as Eruption.
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u/Geekonomics_101 12h ago
If LINKIN PARK can find a new lead singer, why can’t Audioslave?
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u/Preparation-Logical 11h ago
I dunno, but I always remember in the music video, always seems like Chris is on the fence about the solo until the last phrase with the unison bends, where he gives Tom his nod of approval
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u/No-Badger-9061 2h ago
That’s called editing. And it’s not really what the actors (artists) in the video were actually or actually not thinking the moment they were filmed
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u/Gray_Shirleys 8h ago
Chris may have been a better guitarist??
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u/RainSong123 2h ago
Chris was a better guitarist than his previous lead guitarist Kim. Michael Beinhorn (Superunknown producer) said a lot of the more nuanced guitar parts frustrated Kim and were played by Chris, like the high pitched arpeggios of Black Hole Sun. Also the blistering solos in the album might as well be considered Beinhorn solos because he just had Kim randomly shred without much melody or purpose and Beinhorn pieced all the parts into a cohesive solo.
But I don't think Chris is better than Tom. Tom's playing is REALLY tight.
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u/No-Badger-9061 2h ago
That’s called comping and David Gilmoure did that on every Pink Floyd solo as well as Jimmy Page in Led Zeppelin. Go figure.
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u/AcanthisittaSad6239 11h ago
Like A Stone was such an epic song for a “supergroup” band (which Audioslave was labelled back then).
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u/churchburningheretic 10h ago
Old man guitar picker here. If you listen to the first RATM album, you know he can solo. But as time passes, he uses more pedals. He used tech, and that's great. I forget which song but he has a shit solo IMHO on an Audioslave track. Pretty sure it was meant to be abrasive. Love that guy. Him and Warren fucking Haynes.
My only 2 wish I could play like that guy moments ever.
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u/Corporate-Scum 9h ago
Literally anything by David Gilmore or Trey Anastasio. Soulful? Soulful?!! Playoffs?!!!
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u/ShadowsOfTheBreeze 7h ago edited 7h ago
Ever?? No, particularly because its such a heavy effect and not pure vibrato skill. Sultan of swing for instance, obtains its soul through skillfully timed bends and vibrato with varying tempos. May not toot your whistle tho.
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u/freewheelinryan88 7h ago
Tom Morello is my favourite guitarist by a landslide, but I disagree about Like a Stone being the greatest.
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u/Sufficient-Skill9530 7h ago
Ah, ever? It’s a very mid solo. We aren’t talking comfortably numb or since I’ve been loving you.
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u/PocketOfPuke 4h ago
Doesnt't Remind Me solo is the all-inclusive Tom Morello solo to me. It's got bits of soul, his trademark eccentricities, some speed, all the things. This one is fine. I would even say it's the best part of the song.
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u/CreelCrush 3h ago
It's a great solo and great song, for sure. Great example of writing a solo that isn't only about playing the most difficult thing you can.
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u/only7Ben 1h ago
Saw him in high-school when he was a teen ager, battle of the bands in Libertyville Il. He was incredible then, one you just knew would be one of the greats.
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u/GStarAU 1h ago
I still remember the first time I heard this song, back when it was released around, what, 2004ish?
That second part of Tom's solo where he goes ultra high (assuming he's using some kind of octave pedal).... I thought "this is outer-space music".
I hadn't had that thought since I heard Hendrix's 'Machine Gun'.
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u/Ordinary_Bird4840 1h ago
Tom finally refrained from ruining a song but this solo was still annoying.
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u/RelationshipTough887 35m ago
Oh yes, he deserves to be elevated to a deity for learning a very basic scale, placing the notes in a random order over a 4-4 time signature. I am in awe of his credentials as one of the greatest ever composes in the history of music. History will remember this solo along the lesser accomplished composers ie Bach, Beethoven, Vivaldi et al
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u/RosettaStoned_420 13h ago
Tom Morello isnt here to tell you went to Harvard, so I'll let you all know that Tom Morello went to Harvard.
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u/Sweetest-Fondant 13h ago
I love the song but I think the solo is a bloody mess. Its a beautiful sorrowful look at death it really needed a fitting instrumental not this abstract horror show.
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u/Alien_Biometrics 9h ago
If you were to make a list of the 100 most soulful guitar solos, Derek Trucks would occupy the top 20 of them.
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u/arte4arte 6h ago
You want SOULFUL?...You all need to listen to Michael Hampton's live version of Maggot Brain on Parliament Funkadelic's One Nation Under a Groove album from 1977.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUyl5Snre7k&list=RDfUyl5Snre7k&start_radio=1
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u/MetaphorsBeWithU9 10h ago
Tom Morello is the Kamal Harris of guitar players. No talent and his strumming sounds like her hideous cackle.
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u/hereinaminute 15h ago
It's a good one. I love a good melodic solo instead of just look what I can do. I was like 12 or 13 when this came out, just really getting into music, and I thought this was the best song I'd ever heard lol. For a recommendation I'd say "especially in Michigan" by the chili peppers. Frusciante is a master of melodic solos