All this week’s licks use Drop-D Tuning. Here’s a quick break down for each of them:

Lick 33: Meshuggah Style

Metal bands like Meshuggah use dissonant clusters along with their punchy riffs to provide loads of tension. In this example a minor 2nd interval is played on the fifth string with the root against the chord stabs. Don’t forget to detune the sixth string from E down to D!

Lick 34: Using Two Time Signatures

Loads of metal bands use open and clean intros like this one before unleashing the fury of their almighty riffs. This ‘quiet to loud’ approach filtered into the style of grunge – albeit far more accentuated. This example uses a mixture of 6/4 & 4/4 time signatures and Drop-D Tuning.

Lick 35: Reverse Gallop

Slayer are well known for their use of the ‘reversed gallop’ -a mirror image of the normal gallop rhythm that bands like Iron Maiden popularised. Aim for a tight and focused sound by using palm muting for the gallops and releasing the muting when playing the chord stabs so they ring out more.

Lick 36: Breaking Benjamin Style

Nu-metal bands used natural harmonics a lot to create interesting melodic phrases along with their riffy playing. The harmonics played in this context is the 9th, b3rd and b7th which strangely enough is a very common occurrence on loads of pop records.

Below the YouTube video you’ll find the tablature, and please feel free to ask questions or just share your thoughts in the comments.

Watch the video:

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