Hi everybody. This is Darrin Goodman from guitarcontrol.com
bringing you this little video lesson today. Today I want
to show you how to play a cool lick. Its a Steve Vai lick
from the intro of the song Tobacco Road thats on the
first David Lee Roth solo album after he left Van Halen,
Eat Em and Smile. If you have never checked out that
album, you really should. Its got some of Vais best
playing, in my opinion, ever on it; great line-up for a
band. Anyway, be sure to click on the link in the
description for the tabs and lets get started.
This is a really simple lick thats based in the first
pattern of pentatonic minor. Were in A. Hopefully you
already know that scale. If you dont, check through
the other videos. Theres probably numerous videos
that teach you how to play that scale.
Were starting off, were on the 7th fret of the 3rd
string with my 3rd finger and Im going to bend that
note up a whole step. Then Im going to follow that by
barring my 1st finger across the 5th fret of the 1st and
2nd strings. Then, after that, Im going to go back to
the 7th fret on the 3rd string and then from there to the
5th fret on the 3rd string. Then to the 7th fret on the
4th string, then back to the 5th fret on the 3rd string.
Now, the next note is on the 7th fret of the 3rd string
again, and Im going to do an artificial harmonic. Well,
Im going to attempt to do an artificial harmonic.
For those of you that are not aware of how to do these
pinch harmonics, what Im basically doing is Im taking
the pick and the way that Im holding it, Im choked-up
on the pick really far, which you should do anyway. Think
of the guitar pick as like a pencil. When you write you
dont hold the pencil out on the end where the eraser is;
you choke-up on it. When I pick the string Im going to do
it so this fleshy part of my thumb right here makes contact
with the string when the pick does. What that does is it
gives that cool, squeal sound.
Depending upon where you pick on the string is depending
upon like how good of a harmonic you get. Im not sure
if you could see that. So like when Im
See, different
places sound better than others and it depends on what
fret youre on as to where that is. So thats something
that takes a lot of practice to really get that down.
Im going to hit that note as a pinch harmonic and Im
going to bend it and release it a couple of times. So weve
got
Now Im following that back to the 5th fret of the
3rd string and then to the 7th fret of the 4th string.
So after I do the pinch harmonic with the bends, then Im
just going to basically walk down the scale. So I go to the
5th fret of the 3rd string, then to the 7th fret of the 4th
string, to the 5th fret of the 4th string. Now, Im going
to do a repetitive hammer/pull-off kind of a trill thing
between the 5th and 7th frets. So the entire sequence
I hope you enjoyed that. Be sure to click on the link in
the description for the tabs and until next time
