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Heavy Metal Thunder Neoclassical Shred

Genres Heavy Metal Power Metal Neoclassical Shred

Neoclassical Shred

Bach and Paganini rewritten for electric guitar at impossible speed, and often with no singer at all.

Active years
1984 – present
Origin
Sweden / USA
Family
Power Metal
Bands here
13

Start here

Four records in order of how easy they are to get into — which is not the same as best first.

  1. Rising Force Yngwie Malmsteen, 1984 The landmark

    Year zero for the whole idea. Malmsteen was twenty-one, had listened to more Paganini than Chuck Berry, and played faster than anyone thought a guitar allowed. Mostly instrumental, which is the point.

    Listen to Rising Force

  2. Edge of Insanity Tony MacAlpine, 1986

    The most composed of the shred records — MacAlpine is a trained pianist and it shows in how the pieces are built rather than just played. Billy Sheehan and Steve Smith are the rhythm section.

    Listen to Edge of Insanity

  3. Speed Metal Symphony Cacophony, 1987

    Marty Friedman and Jason Becker in the same band, aged twenty-four and eighteen, harmonising lead lines that nobody else could play. Absurd and delightful.

    Listen to Speed Metal Symphony

  4. Perpetual Burn Jason Becker, 1988

    Recorded when he was eighteen, three years before the ALS diagnosis. Technically the deep end and emotionally the opposite — there is a lot of joy in it.

    Listen to Perpetual Burn

What it sounds like

Baroque scales played impossibly fast, usually with nobody singing. The harmonic minor is the whole vocabulary: arpeggio sweeps, diminished runs and phrasing lifted straight from Paganini and Bach, executed at a speed intended to be remarkable. Most of it is instrumental, and where a vocal exists it is there to fill space between solos. The rhythm section keeps out of the way. It is virtuoso music in the literal sense and makes no apology, which is why it either delights or exhausts a listener within about ninety seconds. Every shred guitarist since owes it something. Compared with the power metal it fed into there is almost no songwriting here at all — the composition IS the solo, and the band exists to accompany it.

  • Heaviness 3 out of 5
  • Speed 5 out of 5
  • Aggression 2 out of 5
  • Technicality 5 out of 5
  • Darkness 2 out of 5
  • Melody 5 out of 5

Where the name came from

'Neoclassical' is lifted from music history, where it means a modern revival of classical form. Yngwie Malmsteen's Rising Force (1984) defined the style so completely that four decades later everything in it is still measured against him.

The bands

Hear these first

  • Yngwie Malmsteen Sweden
  • Tony MacAlpine USA
  • Cacophony USA
  • Jason Becker USA
  • Racer X USA

And 8 more

  • Impellitteri USA
  • Vinnie Moore USA
  • Marty Friedman USA
  • Paul Gilbert USA
  • Greg Howe USA
  • Michael Angelo Batio USA
  • Uli Jon Roth Germany
  • Joey Tafolla USA

What it led to

If you liked this

Closest in sound outside this family, leaning towards the similar or the gentler rather than straight into the deep end.