Learn how to play the Iconic tune Hunger Strike by Temple Of The Dog with Guitar Control instructor Darrin Goodman, aka Uncle D. Be sure to get the free tabs to go along with the step by step video instruction and you will be rockin’ this classic tonight!
Introduction
How’s it going everybody? This is Darrin with GuitarControl.com bringing this video lesson and today I want to teach you how to play a somewhat simplified, well really simply more of a kind of a condensed version of Hunger Strike by Temple Of The Dog.
Right now GuitarControl.com is giving away this really cool free chord chart and there’s a link down their description where you can download it. It’s every chord you could ever need all neatly compiled into one sheet and it’s in PDF format so you can download it, you print it off, you can put it where you practice, put it a copy in your gig bag; so in any given situation you can have any chord you might need at a glance and it’s a free download.
So be sure to click on the link in the description for the tab so let’s get close up and take a look at this.
Hunger Strike – Temple Of The Dog
All right so the very first thing we need to do the song is in just standard tuning, but it’s in drop D. So basically what that all that means is that I’m going to tune my low E string down to a D, so the same pitch as the fourth string. Okay, so the song is made up of a verse and a chorus and a bridge and an intro, but most of it is just the same thing over and over and over again with just some subtle differences.
All right so this first part we’re going to look at here is just like the kind of the main riff that is used for the intro of the song as well as the verses. First thing we’re going to want to do is that the notes that we’re going to be fretting we’re going to be fretting the third fret on the B string, you’ll be using your third finger for that, and then you’re also going to be fretting the second fret of the D string and you’ll be using your first finger for that. So we’re going to be alternating between having to lift these fingers up and set them down. So we start off we’re just playing open strings, but you want to just get your hands so it’s in this position so that way you can raise and lower your first and third finger. So we start off we’re going to play the D string to the G string to the G string open… and then back to the G string so and these are counted as 16th notes; so this is like one e and, then on the downbeat of two we’re going to take our third finger and we’re going to place it here on the third fret of the B string and now we’re going to pick starting there, B string to the G string to the D string back to the B string. So, so far we’ve got… All right so that’s half of the first measure and then starting on beat three we’re going to take our first finger and place it down on the second fret of the D string and we’re going to do the same timing, well the same count, but also the same picking pattern that we just did. So we’re going to start with the D string; D string, G string, B string, G string, so three e, and then put your third finger down back down onto the third fret of the B string and then we’re gonna go B string, G string, D string… So that’s our first measure… All right then on the second measure it’s gonna be similar to the first measure, the first beat is the same so all open strings and again that’s on the downbeat of two we’re going to put our third finger down just like we did on the first measure; so we’re going to go B string, G string, D string, E string and then on beat three we have the open D string, B string, G string, B string, back to the G string, so this is like beat number one. Then for on four we’re going to put our third finger down onto the third fret of the B string and now we’re going to go… So that is like pretty much the main riff of the song, it’s just two measures, but it’s just repeated you know a gajillion times in the song. So that second measure… the entire riff… like I said that that just keeps repeating. So it’s played like that with a little bit more of a cleaner tone a little less gain on it for the intro and the first verse and then it’s like on the first verse that’s the or Eddie Veder singing and then on the second verse, excuse me in the first verse is where Chris Cornell is singing, on the second verse where Eddie Veder starts singing, it’s still the same thing, but they turn up the gain a little bit and then there’s the second guitar part in there; so I’m gonna show you how to play the second guitar part and then how you can kind of combine the two together if you’re playing this by yourself. So the second verse the guitar is just doing the same thing that the first verse did… Now the second guitar is playing the same things, the first measure is the same… now on the second measure, well the beat number one is the same so one… we start on the B string to G string to the D string and then normally we just go back to here and keep playing the rest of the thing, but what we’re going to do for the second measure all the strings open, G string and put your third finger down onto the third fret of the B string two B and now we’re going to go back to here to the B string, so it’s the two e and then for beat three we’re going to slide to the fifth fret on the B string with our third finger so then back to the third fret and then the open string and then back to the third fret; so it’s like… Now since there’s two guitars while this the other thing is still ringing out behind it, so when you’re playing it by yourself and you just do that slightly you kind of lose the contents of the song; so just a way that you can do it or like how I kind of do it is just… I just to get it in there so I slide up come back down with my third finger open back to here but still continuing the other part of the riff… So by doing that it just kind of holds it together and it also kind of changes it up a little bit so it’s not just the same thing over and over and over and over again. All right so then the last part we’re going to look at is the bridge and then this is where why we needed to be a drop D tuning. So we’re just going to be doing these drop D style power chords. So we’re going to play the low E string the A string and the D string all open and then we’re going to take our first finger and we’re just going to barre the second fret of the low E string and the A string; so we open two open two, now this one is a sixteenth note and then this one is an eighth note and then a 16th note, so that gives it that… Now there’s on this part there’s actually two guitar parts as well so one guitar does the… and that just rings out while the other guitar does the little bend thing, but again we’re going to is if you’re playing it by yourself this is a way that you can kind of put it together. So if you just go and then stop that and then you come to the fourth fret of the D string, I use my third finger so that way I can put my second and first fingers behind it for a little leverage and we’re going to bend this up a half step… and then back down with some vibrato… So what I like to do is I like to hold this with my finger like that and then while this is still ringing I can do that bend and it makes it sound a little bit more like what’s happening with the two different guitars being played together… And then on the last two sixteenth notes of beat four we just do a quick mute strum. So what I do is I just let my leave my fingers in this same area, I’m just touching the strings, not pressing down and then just two just down up and then it just repeats the second verse is the same as the first one of this…
Conclusion
All right so there you have it a Hunger Strike by Temple Of The Dog. So if you like this Hunger Strike lesson be sure to give me a thumbs up and leave a comment down below if you have any questions about this or other guitar related topics. If you’ve not already done so please subscribe to the channel and hit that notification bell so you don’t miss any of the content that we upload throughout the week. Well that is all I have for you today. Thanks for watching how to play Hunger Strike and have a great day.
