Learn to play these 3 killer riffs that groove with Guitar Control instructor Darrin Goodman. Be sure to get the free tabs for these riffs so you can easily follow along and get your groove on tonight!
Introduction
Hey everybody how’s it going? This is Darrin with GuitarControl.com bringing you this video lesson. Today I wanted to show you three riffs that really have a cool groove to them and these are three of my favorite riffs and ones I really like to play. For the most part they’re pretty simple, but they just really have that groove, you know, everything right in the pocket; I just love the way they sound. Be sure to click on that link down in the description so you can get the free chord chart that you can download from GuitarControl.com. It’s in PDF format and you can print it out. It’s really useful and has all of the chords that you could ever need for whatever you’re playing or trying to learn at a glance. So be sure to click on the link in the description for the tabs and let’s get close up and take a look at these.
Groove Riff-1 – Thunder Kiss 65 – White Zombie
All right so the very first one we’re going to look at is Thunder Kiss 65 from White Zombie. So this riff is extremely simple, but it’s just got such a cool groove to it and I just think it’s really awesome. It’s one of those riffs that I’ve heard and I was like man you know I wish I could say that I wrote that. So it’s pretty simple for the majority of it we’re just playing the open low E string… So we’re playing two eighth notes and then a sixteenth note another eighth note and a sixteenth note and that’s like the riff. So it’s like and then it just repeats… So I’m doing that is down up down up down up down and it does that two times as a measure, so that’s one measure and repeats that three times… Then on the second measure it does it one time and then we’ve got this second fret of the A string… to the third fret of the low E and then just move that down a half step so now first fret and then to the second fret and that’s three and four and… and then it just repeats…
Groove Riff-2 – Superstition – Stevie Wonder
All right so the next we’re going to look at here is a riff from Superstition by Stevie Wonder. So I think this is just like a really, really cool riff, I really like this one. So we’re gonna start off with these pickup notes that lead into it, we rest on the first two beats and then the first sixteenth note of beat number two is a rest and then we play two sixteenth notes. We start here on the fifth fret of the low E string for the first finger and we’re gonna pick that and do a hammer-on to the seventh fret and then we rest on the last sixteenth note of beat three. Then we move up to the A string fifth and seventh fret and those are eighth notes; so it’s like… and then that leads us into this riff. So for this riff we start with the low E string to the seventh fret of the A string to the fifth fret of the A string and back to the seventh fret like that… Now open seven five seven to the fifth fret of the D string and then the low E string is a percussive note; so I’m just like heavily muting it and picking it just to kind of get that percussive note in there for the timing and then we go to the fifth fret of the A string and then we have a rest a mute strum again and then the seventh fret of the A string… Then the last measure go back to the fifth fret of the low E string, five, seven, five and seven on the A string to the fifth fret of the D string and then the mute to the fifth fret of the A string, mute and then an E5; so seventh fret of the A string with my first finger and then the ninth fret of the D and G string with my third finger…
Groove Riff-3 – Killing In The Name Of – Rage Against The Machine
All right and then the last one we’re going to look at is a riff from Killing In The Name Of by Rage Against The Machine, another one that I think is just a really cool groovy riff. So this one is actually in drop D, so you have to tune your low E string down to a D. So we start this one off we have to open low E string and this is a quarter note, so this is on the downbeat of one and then we’re going to go to the third fret of the A string and we’re going to pick that on the downbeat of two and then hammer-on to the fifth fret for the and of two; so it’s like one two and. Then we’re going to play the open low E string palm muted twice three and and then go to the third fret of the D string and we’re going to pick that on the downbeat of four and hammer to the fourth fret for the and of four and that’s the first measure… Then on the downbeat of the second measure we have the fifth fret of the A string which is a quarter note and then the open low E string for the second beat which also quarter note… And then we’re going to come to the second fret and we’re going to barre the second fret of the low E string and the A string and we’re going to play that and then move it to the third fret; so this is three and, and then back to the second fret for a quarter note for beat four… So that’s basically the riff and then it just repeats…
Conclusion
All right so there you have it; three riffs that are pretty easy ones, all single note riffs, but I just think they’ve just got such a cool groove. I really dig these riffs and I think they’re a lot of fun to play and they just sound really good. So if you like this 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 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 and have a great day.
