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Dimebag Riff Crawl Into

Here is a great Dimebag riff that will help you with your up and down picking as well as slides and some vibrato bends without using the whammy bar. I will have the tab as well as myself playing the riff in a short video below. This song is in Drop-D Tuning. Here is the tab for you.

Click to enlarge


Here is a video of myself playing for you to watch. It will help you see where the bends and slides are.



I will create more videos in the future. As for now practice this intro and remember to use up and down picking. Don't cheat.

Creating Scales

While you are learning different riffs and practice pieces it is always important to bring it all together. Keep everything you learn or have done on your mind and make it your own. Change the things you have learned and create new riffs or practices for yourself. If you are practicing a scale, for example, make sure to always make it challenging for yourself. A great way to change a scale is to add chords into it or mirror the scale and play it higher and lower.

One of the best ways to get creative with scales is to first play a chord. It can be any chord type. After you play the chord try and find some notes that make sense and fit with the chord you played. If you have a recording device then you could play the chord and then try and lay down a scale to it.

There are no rules that have to be followed when it comes to playing music so allow yourself to be free and make things happen the way they sound good to you. If you are designing a scale for a chord and a note doesn't sound right to you then just find a better one. After you do this with more and more chords you will start to realize that you are able to lay down a solo to any number of different riffs.

Learning to scale in this way will keep you YOU. It is great practice to learn scales but it is even better practice to learn how to create your own scales. It will have more of your playing essence than going through a predetermined scale sequence.

In my next post I will get into some solo tabs from Randy Rhoads and Dimebag so get your fingers ready.

Where to begin

I mentioned in an earlier post that Crazy Train is a great place for a guitarist to start so here is the guitar tab.

Click on images to enlarge

This is the introduction from the CD version of the song. I think that learning this song will help you greatly with using your ring and pinky fingers. Use your pointing finger on the beginning notes and then use your ring and pinky on the following notes. Do not cheat. The point is to strengthen your fingers to the point that they become stronger and in time it feels more natural. Transitioning to the chords at the end is a great way to practice as well.

If you are a person who is new to guitar tab the idea is simple. The top is actual music notes but the bottom is the tab. There is a line for every string on the guitar. The lowest line is the lowest sounding string. The highest line naturally is the highest sounding string. The numbers on the string indicate what fret number to place your fingers. Simple right? I hope so. To make it even simpler, and this is not always the case, the number 2's are your pointing finger. The number 4's are your ring finger, and the number 5's are your pinky finger except for the cording in the final bar.

That is, like I said, the intro to the CD version of Crazy Train by one of the greatest guitarists I have ever had the privilege to listen to and learn. To hell with "Smoke on the Water". This is a better place to start.

When you play this you need to take it slow and in parts. Don't try and master all of it if you are struggling. The main thing is to get stronger and practice. Speed will come quicker than you think unless you try and rush it. It might sound silly but going slow is actually a quicker way to gain speed.

This next part is the main riff of the song. The key to playing this correctly is to try and hit the chords with your fingers at the same time as opposed to slapping them on one by one. Here is the songs main riff.


A lot of people find this part of the song hard but again if you take it slow and in parts you will do fine. Also do not forget to practice with your mouth. I can't stress that point enough. At the end of this section there are nice little pull offs before Ozzy Starts singing. When I say pull off I mean your finger is on the string and you pull it off causing the note to sound without having to pick it. In this song diagram S means slid and P means pull off.

This main riffs follows through to the solo that I will now add.


For this part of the solo T means Tap on and in this instance you should Tap on with your right hand finger. It doesn't matter what finger you use with your right hand. Use whatever is comfortable so you can still be able to hold the pick and get back to it after the right hand taps are done. The last thing you want to do is drop your pick. The little forward slashes in pairs means to repeat.

Continue


The three notes in (parenthesis) are played but only with slight pressure on the strings so they make a quick sweeping sound but cut off right away. Don't push the strings down to the fret but just press them slightly and keep them suspended above the fret. B means bend and in this instance a whammy bar bend up and down over and over to give it some flare.

Continue


This part contains hammer on and pull off. H mean hammer on. It means to slap your finger hard on the string with out picking in order to make the note sound. This part of the solo is great strength practice for anyone who wants to build strength in this area. You also slide your hand up the neck to get to the following parts. The more this is done the more it will become smooth and more fluid.

Continue


This is the last part of the solo and the most difficult. Don't rush it and don't get discouraged either. What seems hard at first will, over time, become not so difficult. Make sure to take the last part in small chunks that make sense together. There is a really nice scale at the end that will make you feel really great if you can accomplish and learn it properly.

I hope you enjoyed this post. I will include more and more as time goes on. I wanted to start with Crazy Train because it is where I started. If you are a beginner then have lots of patients with the solo. You might want to not even attempt the solo yet until your finger get a little stronger. That is up to you. This guitar tab is very accurate so don't be fooled into thinking someone else has better tab. This tab comes directly from the Original Randy Rhoads guitar book by Wolf Marshall. I have not seen any other that are as accurate.

Next time I think I will have to post some good old Dimebag.

The emotion of guitar

There is one thing that is very important while playing an instrument.

Emotion

Are you thinking happy thoughts, sad, angry, or scared? These are important questions that need to be in your subconscious at all times while playing guitar. It is the essence of your music.

I always see my music as a movie in my head. Maybe I am feeling a car chase or funeral setting. It doesn't really matter what it is. It just matters that it is something. Otherwise you are going to come out monotone or not have any feel to the notes you are striking.

The most beautiful pieces of music in the world are the ones that give off there emotion to the listener. Pink Floyd comes to mind as one of the most memorable emotional rides that I have ever listened to. These emotions most definitely can be heard and felt by people who are listening to the music. It is as important live as it is in a studio. It is another piece of the puzzle that helps set you above or below the rest.

Changing emotion can be a very useful tool within a song or throughout an album as well. Making the person feel like they are on a journey through your music can greatly give the listener a wonderful and memorable experience.

The next time you are playing try and think about what you are feeling or what the notes are making you feel.

Bring out your soul and leave the radio OFF

I know that it can be fun to learn songs that you really like. It is a great way to learn. You pop a CD into the CD player and get your guitar tuned just right and practice with your favorite music. Most the time during my early guitar playing years I started to realize that while playing with a CD there were many little things that I previously over looked. The length to hold a note. The distance of a bend. The tone of a scream. These are the little things that separate you from the rest. It does not take too much for someone to learn how to play a song but it shows that you stand out above the norm when you can focus on and understand how to play with feel.

Playing with a metronome can greatly help a person with timing and train up there speed. It is a good way to help clean your playing up. Playing with an extra edge and getting the right feel to the music can not be achieved while using a metronome. At least not when you are learning. It is okay to shut the thing off and free yourself from any outside influence. It causes a person to focus on mostly timing. It takes away from being able to let loose and add some feel to what you are playing. I know that it not always true but when you are learning I think it is important to have only yourself to rely on and see what happens. When your jamming with a CD you can learn a lot more about the feel of the song you are playing but even still you are not going to get enough of yourself into the music.

I know that some people think playing the song exactly is what should be done and I agree most of the time but I also think that any guitarist should have his own stamp on everything he plays. Including some other persons music. People have to remember that they are not a robot. They are human. We all have individual minds and souls. If you ask me I will tell you that those two things are the most important part of any musician. If one can learn to tap into that then one can easily stand out and become a distinct individual while playing there guitar or whatever instrument. It does not matter which.

You see. The whole reason why I am even writing these posts is because all I hear all the time is a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy etc... I will not listen to the radio ever. The radio is poison to a true musician. I don't care what anybody says. Go ahead and turn on the radio and listen to the latest rock or metal music. You tell yourself if you hear much of a difference. There is too much music out in the world to chain yourself to the radio. Especially with the internet which of course you have because you are reading this right now. If you are a radio listener then I challenge you to not do so for an entire year. I guarantee your musical taste will become more unique and you will have a far greater understanding of what you really like and how you really would like to sound. If all you get is the same crap everyone else gets then your just a drone and will not have any real feel to your playing beyond the next guy. One of my favorite bands is Prong. If you listen to Prong then you already understand what I am getting at. If you do not listen to Prong then I am first mad at you and second urging you to do so.



Prong is a band that sets the standard. They are the band that other bands follow. They are one of the most unique and amazing bands that is still making music today. Look how many bar bands murder the song "Snap your fingers Snap your neck". This is a good example of how not to be a musician. I have never seen a single bar band that plays this song correctly. Ever. The very reason they are playing that song and not any other prong song is because they listen to the radio. If they had a shred of common sense they would understand that Prong has far greater songs that could be played instead of playing the same songs and set list that every other bar band plays. If you go to bars with bands like this then please stop going. At least start griping about how typical it is.

Sorry about that. I hate bar bands with no real talent. There are too many of them. In the small town where I live it is all I have ever seen. I have to go to Minneapolis if I want to at least hear some unique bands and different music. Where I live it is either radio music or the blues. I HATE THE BLUES. I know most of the music I play myself is of course influenced by the blues but NOT DIRECTLY. If you like the blues then fine whatever. I don't.

There is another very major part of bringing out your own feel and sound and that is your equipment itself. Not just what kind of gear but how you set it up. Music gear is expensive and there is a lot to consider when designing your sound. To this day I do not have everything that I would like to have. I will list what I have so you know where I am coming from.

I play mostly one guitar but I have four guitars. They are:

Westone Spectrum LX
Dean Dime From Hell
Washburn Black Jack
Kramer ZX20

My amplifier

Marshall Valvestate VS100

My effects

Digitech GNX 3

My Digitech is a floor processor which I plug directly into the input of my Marshall head. My Digitech has every effect you could think of and I use a mixture of mostly

Delay
Chorus
Sustain
Compression
Distortion

I mix the effects of my GNX 3 with the settings on my Marshall. My Marshall is set like this

Gain 10
Contour 5
Base 5
Middle 5
Treble 8 or 9

My Marshall also has a mix of Reverb, FX Mix, and Overdrive.

Using all my gear along with my guitar itself gives me a wide range of sound. I have been tweaking my sound my entire guitar life and still do so to this day. You should always be experimenting with your own sound and adding that very thought to your journey of becoming the type of guitarist that you want to become.

Playing accuretly

The most important thing there is for a guitarist is to play clean and accurate. Most of the time when I hear someone play guitar they are very messy and careless. It is important to keep your cool so to speak and hit the notes correctly and not act like some knob who does nothing with his guitar but try and act cool. An example of a poser guitarist would be the guy from NIN. The guy is useless.

Anyway, take things slow and start off by being able to play first with your voice. I don't care if you hum or jent jent ja jent like I do but it is important that you first know what you are playing. If you can hum it then you can play it. That might sound a little dumb but it most certainly is not. It does not matter where I am or what I am doing. I am usually softly practicing my guitar as I walk around, watch TV, or go to the bathroom. My point is to keep what you want to learn on your mind because when it comes time to sit down and play you will be more prepared.

Most people start with the same crappy song they learn at some crappy music center that is over charging for guitar lessons. "Smoke on the water". LAME

I have to say that I think that sets beginning standards to low. All that song has is a bunch of power cords and not much else. If you like that kind of garbage then fine but if you don't then start with at least something cooler like Iron Man. The first song that I learned how to play was Crazy Train. This is a great song to get a person started. It makes use of all your fingers and is a great exercise. I am not talking about the entire song for beginners. I am talking about the part that goes Da Da Nay Da Nay Da Nay Nah Nay Nay Nay Nah Nay Nay Nay Nah.
That probably made no sense at all. Whatever. If you were practicing with your mouth it would so BLAH.

My point is to get away from what everyone else is doing. I have had this situation happen to me so many times. It goes like this.

Your sitting around with a bunch of people and one of your friends goes. "Hey Kent. You should play your guitar. So and so has never heard you play before." So I pick up my guitar and play something really kick ass like "Revolution is my name" by Pantera and after playing this incredibly intricate song this schmuck has the bone head question of, "Can you play smoke on the water?" I mean really. Give me a break. I just shredded a Pantera song and your wondering if I can play smoke on the water. That is just stupid. I usually proceed to tell the individual that of course I could but will not do so because it is against my proper guitar upbringing.

I kid you not. This type of scenario happens all the time. My point is that every wannabe guitarist who has no clue only knows the stupid smoke on the water nonsense because that is the norm. If you want to be typical than that is fine by me but have some common sense and be a musician with something more unique than the next guy okay. PLEASE. There are too many copies of really crappy musicians out there and we don't need any more of them so do us all a favor.

Back to my original point. Play clean and accurate and if your starting out pick a song that is not to hard or to typical. There are plenty of songs to choose from that don't require an expert to show you how to play. Use your ears as well as your hands. Listen to the notes that you are producing. If you find yourself really flubbing things up then slow down. Speed will come later and much faster if you understand that you need to move slow in the beginning. There is no rush.

A great rhythm to get your up and down picking going is the song "A New Level" by Pantera off of the "Vulgar Display of Power" album. It starts out with some easy slow progression and then switches to a really powerful low end rhythm that will keep a beginner busy for a while. Not to mention that it sounds very cool once you accomplish it correctly. Take that song and practice it all the time. It will help improve your picking style greatly. Experiment with it and branch it off into something of your own. Do not ever forget to do that. The best things that you will ever play in this world are the things that you have created yourself. Other peoples material can only be copied. Your very own material has your very guitar essence within it. That is so very important to develop.

Guitar Tunings

This is my main guitar. It is a Westone Spectrum LX. I have had it since the 80's and boy do I love this guitar. It has really taken a beating yet it just keeps on going for me. Not many people know about these guitars. I have played a few different brands of guitar but the fast action and great pick up quality is the best on my Westone. I really do love it. Here are the specs for those of you who really want to know.

Solid Maple body, Hard Maple neck, Rosewood fingerboard with graphite nut
25.5 inch scale, 22 frets.
Pickups - two Magnaflux II UBC (Neck and bridge) and one Magnaflux IV (Mid)
Master volume control (Push/pull for coil tap), two tone controls (Push/pull for mid pickup on/off and bridge pickup phase reverse)
Bendmaster FT trem with FT string lock

My floating bridge went to hell eventually but I am not much of a whammy bar user in the first place. I only use whammy when I make recordings to add some effects, drops, or screams.

I understand that many people love to play guitar. I started playing back when I was wearing Pac-Man pajamas in the early 80's. That means that I have about 27 or so yrs. playing experience. I have learned over the yrs. that a lot of people when learning to play seem to gravitate to the soloing and don't spend enough time on rhythm guitar. This blog will be about mostly rhythm guitar. I prefer very low heavy tones when I am playing but when I get the 80's feel back inside I always return to the higher tunings. A regularly tuned guitar is usually from low string to high

E - A - D - G - B - E

bands like Metallica and White Lion for example use this tuning most the time. Another tuning type would be.

D# - G# - C# - F# - A# - D#

This is the same tuning only one note lower on each string. An example would be guitarists like Randy Rhoads, George Lynch, or Yngwie Malmsteen.

The # symbol means sharp. So C# means one note higher than C. Or one could say Db. The symbol b means flat. So Db means one note lower than D. I will stick to C#. All the notes in sequance are as follows.

E - F - F# - G - G# - A - A# - B - C - C# - D - D# - E

When you tune differently you also get a difference in pinch harmonics or more or less bend on a string. Now those two tunings or for a more 80's style music but that does not mean you cannot use them to this day of course.

The tunings that I use most of the time are much lower. I use

D - G - C - F - A - D

My favorite band, which is Prong, uses this type of tuning a lot. I, as well as Prong for example, also like to drop the low string down to C.

C - G - C - F - A - D

Which is referred to as Drop D tuning. It can apply to any standard tuning you use.

Standard
E - A - D - G - B - E

Drop D
D - A - D - G - B - E

Another tuning I use a lot is the lowest my guitar can handle. It is

C# - F# - B - E - G# - C#.

Any lower than that and my guitar strings are too loose and it sounds terrible. One way to be able to go lower and have a thicker song is to have a thicker string. The strings that I use are Ernie Ball Super Slinky. The gauge that I use are

.09
.11
.16
.24
.32
.42

You can go as thin as .08 or as thick as, well I don't know. .56 or something. If you want to go thicker than that you might as well play the bass.

There are of course many different types of tunings. Each with its own unique sound and feel. Most of the heavy music of today is always in the lower tunings. It gives a thicker heavy tone naturally. However it is not against the rules to tune higher and still play heavy. Metallica, for example, usually tunes standard E. They use to be a pretty heavy band. As for nowadays who really cares because Metallica sucks but they will suffice for my example.

Having a good tuner is a very effective way to tune differently. I don't care how well of a trained ear a person might have. It is still difficult to tune accurately form one type to the next. The best way would be to have a guitar for each type of tuning style but we all know that most of us are not made of money. It would certainly be nice to have all the guitars needed though wouldn't it?

Anyway, play around with tunings. If you are trying to learn a song and it doesn't seem to be coming out correctly then maybe you are not tuned the way you should be. I usually listen for the lowest note and then I determine weather it is standard or dropped D. I am not going to get into how you go about doing that. The purpose of this post is simply to get you to think about the different types of tunings. An experienced guitarist would already know but someone who is not to far in there quest will greatly benefit form this.