10 Best Hard Rock Guitar Riffs From The 2000s

10. Last Resort - Papa Roach (2000)

The power of this riff was only matched by the intensity of Jacoby Shaddix lyrics. It says a lot about a generation that one of their most defining songs was a track about suicide. The lyrics were inspired by a friend of the band who had found himself in such a low place that he contemplated the saddest of solutions.

The lyrics aside, it was the frantic and alluring melody of the guitar part that helped force this song into the musical zeitgeist. It could have had a different sound entirely, however.

Bass player Tobin Esperance wrote the original melody as a slow melancholic piano number, but when the rest of the band heard it they felt it deserved the distorted guitar treatment. And thus, the track was born.

This was nu metal at its best. It was near impossible not to get swept up in the aggressive energy this riff had and paired with with gravitas of the songs subject matter it led to one of the most memorable songs of the decade.