I was going to post J’s solo on Dinosaur Jr’s Freak Scene, but having timed it it is longer than I thought - about 30 seconds, and a fair proportion of the entire song. Here it is anyway, solo starts at 1:43:
It repeats and gets expanded a bit later in the song. Exhilarating is the right word for sure.
I agree with this. It’s pretty much the gold standard of short, powerful, perfect-for-the-song solos.
Another in a similar vein is Joe Walsh’s solo on the James Gang’s “Funk #49”. Perfect for the song, brief, powerful, sounds cool.
What really takes that solo to the next level for me is Page’s much noted sloppiness; it somehow makes the solo better. The whole time he’s punching out those call-and-answer riffs, it sounds like he’s barely holding it together and will fuck up any second, and he never does. That creates a delicious tension all the way through that section of the song, and when the band comes back in you almost have to heave a sigh of relief. Its’ hints at imperfection are just so perfect.
Good example. The actual “solo” part lasts all of 7 seconds, completely unaccompanied, then Walsh restates the opening riff and off we go again. Wham, bam.
That’s really well put. Sometimes with Page, particularly in some of their later stuff, I find that sloppiness to be off-putting, but it’s great in that song. Absolutely brilliant. It really does sound like he’s at the very edge of breaking apart.
Another example, from the album that followed, would be his solo in “Midnight Man.”
Wow, I’ve never heard it stated so perfectly. I agree with everything you wrote. The best I could ever say about it was THAT’S FUCKIN’ AWESOME!
The main solo in Orianthi’s According To You is a solid contender at 15 seconds, from 2:12 - 2:27. Before that, though, is the three-second gem at 0:59 - 1:02.
Belew plus Brian Eno, even.
That’s a great entry, brief and way punchy.
I do find that video really confusing – I’m not getting why there’s a disembodied POV guitar neck in the foreground “playing” things that aren’t at all like what I’m hearing. It feels like a track from Guitar Hero or something, a really broken one, and it’s really distracting. Any idea why they did that?
The lead in to Mississippi Queen is an oldie but goodie, grabs you right out of the box.
Todd Rundgren has some really ridiculously nasty solos that aren’t necessarily “featured solos”, but the ones I remember best all clocked in over :30
This is a good thread, really makes you search the memory banks to try to fit the criteria.
The Linda Ronstadt version of You’re No Good has a nice short solo by Andrew Gold, and Elvis Costello’s version of (What’s So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding has a sweet little solo, I presume by the man himself. Both are about 14 seconds long.
Big Brother and the Holding Company added a two-measure intro to the intro (both appear again later in the song) which isn’t in the original Erma Franklin recording of Piece of My Heart. It could very well be considered its own tasty little 7-second guitar solo – played by Sam Andrew or Peter Albin, I’m not sure which.
One more. It’s not ultra short at 16 or 17 seconds, but Peter Buck’s solo on R.E.M.'s Flowers of Guatemala is so simple and perfect in its way that I think we should count it – especially because it’s really just four measures of music (a two-measure phrase repeated three times, followed by a different two-measure phrase,)
It certainly does.
Huh, I’m darned if I can dig up an album version of that song on YouTube; lots of live versions, but I want to hear the “canon” solo. I’m not going to go buy the song to hear 14 seconds of music. Hmph.
I’d forgotten about that intro (probably 'cuz I’m not much for Janice), but that is a great little guitar lead-in. Thanks.
A bit sparse for me, but well done and it does fit the song quite well. And at - I think - 20 seconds it certainly fits the category.
I do love Orianthi, but every time I hear that song I think “Is she covering a song that Taylor Swift wrote for Kelly Clarkson to sing?” 
Nice! Thanks!