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Metal Riff Montage

Chris Feener
IntermediateMetalRhythm 7 lessons7m

In my last tutorial, I spent a fair bit of time explaining and breaking down the factors that make up polymeters. In essence, we scratched the surface of the concept. This month, I chose to turn up the heavy knob just a little, and get your guys' brains back in motion, except this time, with some heavy metal riffs. What you're going to hear are a collaboration of three different riffs. I tried to cover three essential metal guitar topics by piecing together not only polymetric ideas, but cool key modulating ideas, picking patterns and much more. So let's break 'em down! These riffs are played in Dropped C tuning which is as follows: (Low E string first): C G C F A D Note: Each of these riffs will have their own separate backing tracks at the end of the tutorial.

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7 Lessons

  1. 1 0:31 Lesson · 1m Metal Riff Montage - Introduction In my last tutorial, I spent a fair bit of time explaining and breaking down the factors that make up polymeters. In essence, we scratched the surface of the concept. This month, I chose to turn up the heavy...
  2. 2 0:17 Lesson Metal Riff Montage - Style of Meshuggah This first riff is a Meshuggah-esque riff in the sense that we're playing a measure of 13/16 under a basic drum groove of 4/4. After three whole bars, the meter still has not reset, so you'll have to pay close... Tab
  3. 3 0:26 Lesson Metal Riff Montage - Dotted Eighth Feel This riff consists of almost solely dotted eighth beats, with the exception of one short phrase. The purpose for this riff is to demonstrate what dotted eighth beats sound like being carried from one bar to... Tab
  4. 4 0:23 Lesson Metal Riff Montage - Style of Lamb of God This riff, although not polymetric in nature, is a very common pattern in metal. Lamb of God and Meshuggah should very well come to mind  when playing some of these 32nd beat gallops.We learn early on that... Tab
  5. 5 1:17 Backing track · 1m Metal Riff Montage - Style of Meshuggah Backing Track Here's the backing track for "In the Style of Meshuggah". It's played at 120BPM at full-speed, but remember to check out the nifty built-in metronome and build gradually should you be having issues! Tab
  6. 6 2:07 Backing track · 2m Metal Riff Montage - Dotted Eighth Feel Backing Track Here's the backing track for "Dotted Eighth Feel". It's played at 120BPM at full-speed, but remember to check out the nifty built-in metronome and build gradually should you be having issues! Tab
  7. 7 2:14 Backing track · 2m Metal Riff Montage - Style of Lamb of God Backing Track Here's the backing track for "In the Style of Lamb of God". It's played at 120BPM at full-speed, but remember to check out the nifty built-in metronome and build gradually should you be having issues! Tab

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