Dave Wirth
When it comes to soloing on a guitar, an instrument which doesn't require the player to breathe to make sound, it should come as no suprise that guitar solos tend to have very little space for rest. No need to breathe, no need to stop, right? Many guitar solos from the 80's hair-metal bands made their sound as big, fast, mean, and unrelenting as possible. No fault there perhaps, but it can be equivalent to a sentence with no space in between the words:
kindoflikethismassofwordsthatsomehowseemstoneglectyourreadershipbutblahblah.
The guitar solo's place in songwriting is often to bring the energy of the song to a fever pitch. Sometimes if the guitarist tries too hard it could end up like that jumbled sentence above. Again, if that's a stylistic choice, no faults. The beauty of not neccesarily knowing how to play solos is pausing becomes more natural. In this way, a guitarist can play without distortion, speed, volume, or perfect technical ability. Sometimes, it can be so lovely and striking! The solo might be spare due to neccesity, but what it lacks in technicality it can make up for in breath, space, and timing.
