You use a lot of volume and mute the chord with the palm of your picking hand. Some Great reggae guitarists can play that sort of rhythm without muting, though. At that time I was playing everything I knew when I took a lead. He taught me that it was much harder to be simple that to be complicated during solos. IF you blow your cookies in the first bar, you have nowhere to go.
Blues is really good that way.
It teaches you to develop coherent solos, because the form you're playing over is so basic. You have to develop leads that go someplace. The neatest compliment I ever got was when I was playing with Albert King at an indoor concert in Boulder, Colorado. He used to let me take solos, and I was very into playing that day. I really respect him.