Here’s a video lesson I just recorded for you.
It’s a nice long video with lots of explanations so
I wont give a lot of words here…Just watch the
video and follow along with the tabs.
Hey, how are you? It’s Claude Johnson here
and I’d like to give you a guitar lesson today.
I’m going to show you this cool lick. It’s kind of
inspired by Slash. It kind of goes like this. Let
me give you a close-up on that.
All right, so let’s break it down for you.
First of all, the notes that I’m using are basically
in the A pentatonic scale. And if you’re not familiar
with basic pentatonic scales, I definitely suggest
that you check out my beginner course for lead guitar,
which is called “Killer Lead Guitar Made Simple”.
Okay. So we’ve got our basic A pentatonic position.
We’re going to add two other notes that we’re going
to be using in this lick. The first is the blue note,
which is the flatted 5th, which is E-flat in the key
of A, which you can find on the 8th fret of the G string.
I go over the blue note a lot in my other course for
lead guitar called “Killer Guitar Control Secrets”.
So we talk about the blue note.
We’re also going to be adding the 6th degree, which is
the F-sharp, which I like to think of as coming from
the Dorian mode. But anyway, it’s just an F-sharp and
it’s on the 7th fret of the B string. So you can always
try adding that into your licks.
Okay. Now, the lick starts out, it’s got this really
cool rhythmic kind of feel to it which kind of sets
up the whole feel for the rest of the fast run.
Basically what the rhythm is, is it’s going to be
triples, like slower quarter note, slow triplets,
followed by two 8th notes and then goes into 16th notes.
That sounds a little complicated. So let me first play
it how it would sound if I was not using the triples,
just using quarter notes, and then we’ll change-up
the feel and you’ll see how the triplets come in.
So imagine that I’m just going to play one, two, three,
four-and. And then do the fast notes one, two, three,
four-and; one-e-and-a. Now, let’s change that. Did you
feel that? So instead of one, two, three, four-and,
we have… And that’s what gives it that accelerating
kind of feel, because the triplets are still slower than
those 8th notes, but it’s got a really blues-y kind of
acceleration to it. If that is like too much theory for
you, just try to feel it out.
Okay. So now that I’ve explained the basic rhythm, let’s
go into the rest of the actual notes that we’re going to
be playing in this lick. The first part of the lick goes
like this. So you’ve got your B string, 5th fret, up to
the 7th, up to the 8th and then back down to the 7th and
the 8th. So the first five notes.
And then, you do this. That’s the fast part, 7-8-7-5 and
then 8 on the G string.
So after you have this, then you’re going to go back up
to your 5th fret on the B string, hammer to the 7th fret
back down. So it’s like a hammer-on pull-off and then back
down to your G string, 8th fret. So the whole thing so far
is like this. Once again. Real slow.
From there we’re goign to go up to the B string one more
time, just hitting one note, 5th fret, before we go back
down. Okay? So the whole thing so far.
Now, as far as the picking goes, you can start off with
alternate picking. Down, up, down; down, up, down; up, down.
And then when you do this fast part, you’re only picking the
first note. When you go back up to the B string, again, you’re
using just a down stroke and a hammer-on, pull-off. And then,
here’s the tricky part. When you go from the G string to the
B, back to the G. Basically it’s going to be down, up, down,
but you’re skipping strings. It’s a little harder.
Finally, the last part of the lick we’re just going to
hammer-on and pull-off. We’re already on the G string, just
down from the 8th, 7th to the 5th, back up and back down.
And the whole thing we hit G string, 7th fret and then the
last two notes, 7th and 5th back on the G string. Again,
when you get down on the G string you’re going to be using
hammer-ons and pull-offs.
So let’s practice the first part again. And the second part.
Let’s put the whole thing together.
Make sure you have enough distortion, also, when you’re
playing this so that you get that nice — the right tone
and the right kind of attitude to it. Also, when I’m picking
this I’m also using a little bit of right hand palm muting.
I’ve just got my right hand palm here on the strings and it’s
just making it sound a little bit tighter, a little less
noise going on. Okay?
I hope you had fun with that lick and we’ll see you next time.
