One of the most important aspects of becoming a good metal guitarist is developing the ability to play long single-note lines with absolute precision, in regard to both picking articulation and...
One of the most important aspects of becoming a good metal guitarist is developing the ability to play long single-note lines with absolute precision, in regard to both picking articulation and locking into the beat.
Every great metal guitarist I know of—including James Hetfield, Kirk Hammett, Dave Mustaine and Dimebag Darrell—have always displayed the power and precision essential to great metal guitar playing.
For this month’s column, I’ve composed a fairly long, rhythmically and harmonically challenging metal-style riff that is intended to help you to sharpen your single-note chops.
FIGURE 1 is an original 17-bar riff that is based primarily in the key of E minor but is harmonically ambiguous here and there as well as rhythmically deceptive. For me, some of the best metal songs, like many of the classic tracks on Metallica’s Master of Puppets or Megadeth’s Rust in Peace, have these qualities.
The majority of the riff is played in even eighth notes, and I stick with alternate (down-up) picking throughout. In many of the bars, I shift back and forth between a picked note and a pair of notes sounded on the next higher string with a single pick stroke followed by a descending or ascending legato finger slide. In these instances, I still stick with the alternate-picking approach in order to maintain consistency in my attack with the pick hand. Bars 1–9 feature notes played on the bottom two strings only, with palm muting (P.M.) used on the sixth string throughout.
Palm muting involves laying the edge of your pick hand across the strings by the bridge saddles. It produces a darker, more percussive and heavier sound. In bars 1–3, all of the notes are derived from the E Aeolian mode (E F# G A