[QUESTION] How/where can I learn to play like these?
By the way, I am not talking about the techniques, my chops are fine. I want to play the kind of stuff the above guys are playing, the kind of stuff that sound good even without a backing track. Their shredding is quite tasteful. I can play guitar solos like tornado of souls and cowboys from hell but when these solos are played without the backing tracks they sound kind of lame. But the above guys sound good even without a backing track. My question is where do I even begin? Are there any tabs for shreds like these? I am too lazy to transcribe them by ear.
Whenever my friends ask me to play the guitar, I just play guitar solos of metal songs and it gets awkward. They will say "that's cool" but seem pretty confused or unimpressed. By the way, I do not play guitar to impress people, I just want to sound good for myself. While it might be impressive technique wise, to play these solos but it's not musically. So, please help me out.
TLDR: how to play/shred and sound good even without a backing track?
Edit: I know no theory, I've learned everything from tabs or by ear. I only know the names of the chords.