Best Guitar Intros: A Clash Between Classics and Metalcore

Thunderstruck Isn't the Best Guitar Intro

There's no such thing as the best guitar intro in history. There are factions. The riff from Thunderstruck, the intro to Hangar 18, and the distorted opening Paul Pesco recorded for C+C Music Factory have all been championed as number one and dismissed with disdain in the same breath. The debate recycles every few months and isn't about facts: it's about birth dates.

Some argue that the material from the 70s and 80s remains the holy grail, while others retort that this is nostalgia disguised as criteria. In music, old is the grail, summarizes a veteran, half-jokingly. On the other side, a thirty-something counterattacks that they don't come from disposable urban music, but from metalcore. Between them lies a gap that no one fills: there's no way to objectively measure an intro.

What Makes an Opening Riff the Best in History?

Nothing. There's no metric. Intensity, technique, and impact are feelings, not magnitudes, which is why each side chooses its own battleground. When Duane Allman, who died at 23 in an accident, is mentioned, it's an appeal to truncated talent. When Roy Buchanan or Lonnie Mack are cited, it's a defense of guitarists who never got the fame they deserved. And when someone brings up Thunderstruck, the response is usually a shrug: brutal, yes, but overplayed.

The fight is really about legitimacy. The solos of Stevie Ray Vaughan or the riffs of Rory Gallagher are presented as proof of an era when playing well mattered. The hardest cuts of modern metal, on the other hand, come with vocalists studied for the extremity of their gutturals.

The Generational Divide: Metalcore vs. Classic Metal

The clash isn't musical. It's chronological. A veteran over 50 defends that today's bands make the 80s idols look like boy scouts singing around a campfire. From the other side, a thirty-something responds that classic metal bores them and they prefer more recent bands. Neither has listened to the other's album in full. They both know it.

The irony is that both sides end up citing the same names when they want to boast about their taste: AC/DC, Iron Maiden, early Metallica. The difference lies in what comes after the comma.

What No One Disputes

With this material, any prediction is bold. It's likely the fight will never end because it's sustained by something that admits no verdict: taste. The most brutal intro will always be the one that played at the exact moment someone decided to pick up a guitar. That, not the riff, is the only thing that isn't disputed.