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Commisaur
Metal newbie

Joined: Thu Apr 04, 2013 1:16 am
Posts: 269
PostPosted: Wed Mar 23, 2022 9:21 pm 
 

The "Mass Obliteration" riff at 00:39 is a prime example of the type of riff I am talking about. I can do straight tremolo picking with ease up to 240 BPM but for the riff type I am referring to my BPM is reduced to a pitiful 180 BPM! For example, I can do straight tremolo picking in the sense that if all the notes are just sixteenth notes, then that is easy for me to deal with, BUT if there are multiple EIGHTH notes peppering the string of sixteenth notes then that is when my picking arm just gives out. And it seems no amount of practice consisting of slowing the tempo down significantly and then slowly speeding it up has helped at all. It's like I hit a wall. Every time I speed the riff up beyond 180 BPM my picking arm immediately becomes tense and impossible to use no matter how relaxed I try to make myself feel and no matter how tight I keep my picking hand. It seems I just have to accept its impossible for me to play that type of riff beyond 180 BPM? The riffing style is something that Suffocation uses in almost everyone of their songs on Effigy album. Slayer uses it a lot too.

For further reference, the tab of the riff is shown in the Ultimateguitar.com link below. The riff starts where it says “Riff 4” in the tablature.

Is there anything I could do to get me playing that riff type at Suffocation speed?

https://tabs.ultimate-guitar.com/tab/su ... ro-1733708


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coupdebleus
Metal newbie

Joined: Thu Sep 05, 2019 3:11 pm
Posts: 281
PostPosted: Thu Mar 24, 2022 9:08 am 
 

Unless you've got some impediment in the form of a physical disability, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to reach the speed with enough practice. But repeating a motion while taking the bpm up and down will only take you so far if the method isn't appropriate. There's a lot of missing information in your post to assess what is it that's stopping your progress, but if we're being pragmatic, the best solution for this kind of issues is to save some money and book a couple of private lessons with a good instructor.
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thrashinbatman
Metalhead

Joined: Mon Feb 22, 2010 6:31 pm
Posts: 1534
PostPosted: Fri Mar 25, 2022 8:47 am 
 

coupdebleus wrote:
Unless you've got some impediment in the form of a physical disability, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to reach the speed with enough practice. But repeating a motion while taking the bpm up and down will only take you so far if the method isn't appropriate. There's a lot of missing information in your post to assess what is it that's stopping your progress, but if we're being pragmatic, the best solution for this kind of issues is to save some money and book a couple of private lessons with a good instructor.

Agreed. This seems like a bit of a weird problem to have. Not being able to make it work even with slowing it down does suggest a technique issue.

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Belastbar
Metal newbie

Joined: Wed Jun 24, 2009 6:43 am
Posts: 76
Location: Germany
PostPosted: Sat Mar 26, 2022 1:25 pm 
 

When there is a certain point of BPM where your technique breaks downs, this might be a problem of how you practice with a metronome. The normal reflex, when you practice a technique at low speed, is to use a "lazy" technique. Because your hands don't have to be hyper efficient to play correct at such a tempo, they can do all kind of inefficient stuff. When you then increase the tempo, your hands learn to play the lazy technique faster. This works fine, after all, you are practicing in an efficient way, but only until you reach a point where the "lazy" technique can not keep up. And then you have to go back to the slow tempo, and start practicing the "efficient" technique. Try playing in "bullet time", imagine that time is slowed down, and your hands have to make the most efficient moves. What changes?

Furthermore, I have an idea. The riff is written in a way so that you can kind of finger a power chord, and your fingers are mostly in the correct place. Now, with your picking hand, try to hit all the strings of the power chord, but you mute the strings you don't want to here with your left hand. This way, you don't have to aim at the right string, you just hit them all. This is often done by funk guitarists, because they prefer doing a fluid grooving motion with their hands to keep time, and it adds a nice percussive sound. With death metal distortion, you don't here a difference any way. Killing in the name of by Rage against the Machine uses this kind of picking in a more metallish context.

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FLIPPITYFLOOP
Metalhead

Joined: Thu Aug 12, 2010 9:09 pm
Posts: 1436
Location: CHRAWNA, Canada
PostPosted: Sat Mar 26, 2022 6:01 pm 
 

Belastbar wrote:
Furthermore, I have an idea. The riff is written in a way so that you can kind of finger a power chord, and your fingers are mostly in the correct place. Now, with your picking hand, try to hit all the strings of the power chord, but you mute the strings you don't want to here with your left hand. This way, you don't have to aim at the right string, you just hit them all. This is often done by funk guitarists, because they prefer doing a fluid grooving motion with their hands to keep time, and it adds a nice percussive sound. With death metal distortion, you don't here a difference any way. Killing in the name of by Rage against the Machine uses this kind of picking in a more metallish context.


Wait, are you suggesting that OP just strums all the strings while muting those that aren't supposed to ring out? For a riff like this, you will DEFINITELY hear chucking alongside the notes, especially if amplified by the compression of the distortion. You also won't get proper articulation on the notes you're playing since you're using a brushing strum technique as opposed to the precise and hard-edged proper tremolo picking, so it will still sound different.

@Commisaur, if you were to go to a doctor for a sore throat, that doctor would take a small light and say "okay, open your mouth, let's take a look" - the same principle applies here. While I can take some educated guesses as to what the issues might be (I'm suspecting the movements in your wrist/forearm, picking direction and potentially pick travel; maybe even the way you're holding it), it's impossible to say for sure what the problem is unless you can upload a video so we can see you play it.

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Belastbar
Metal newbie

Joined: Wed Jun 24, 2009 6:43 am
Posts: 76
Location: Germany
PostPosted: Sat Mar 26, 2022 10:45 pm 
 

FLIPPITYFLOOP wrote:
Wait, are you suggesting that OP just strums all the strings while muting those that aren't supposed to ring out? For a riff like this, you will DEFINITELY hear chucking alongside the notes, especially if amplified by the compression of the distortion. You also won't get proper articulation on the notes you're playing since you're using a brushing strum technique as opposed to the precise and hard-edged proper tremolo picking, so it will still sound different.



Hitting all the strings is not necessary, but what I would suggest is hitting the A and the D string to play the single note on the D string, and hitting the E and A strings to play the single note on the A string. This way, OP can work around the hardest part in the picking, which is going from 16th note tremolo picking to hitting a single note on another string, sometimes even having to skip a string.

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FLIPPITYFLOOP
Metalhead

Joined: Thu Aug 12, 2010 9:09 pm
Posts: 1436
Location: CHRAWNA, Canada
PostPosted: Mon Mar 28, 2022 12:18 am 
 

Belastbar wrote:
FLIPPITYFLOOP wrote:
Wait, are you suggesting that OP just strums all the strings while muting those that aren't supposed to ring out? For a riff like this, you will DEFINITELY hear chucking alongside the notes, especially if amplified by the compression of the distortion. You also won't get proper articulation on the notes you're playing since you're using a brushing strum technique as opposed to the precise and hard-edged proper tremolo picking, so it will still sound different.



Hitting all the strings is not necessary, but what I would suggest is hitting the A and the D string to play the single note on the D string, and hitting the E and A strings to play the single note on the A string. This way, OP can work around the hardest part in the picking, which is going from 16th note tremolo picking to hitting a single note on another string, sometimes even having to skip a string.


Sorry, but I don't really like this idea. This is the kind of riff that requires precision in the picking hand for the notes to have the right articulation you're aiming for, and doing that semi-strum as you're implying poses some potential problems.

Firstly, you're going to need just the right amount of dampening in the fretting hand so that the string is properly muted, but also not too much or else you'll accidentally fret the note and play a chord. Normally this isn't an issue, but you also have to do this at pretty high speed as well as transition in and out of this sort of positioning frequently in between single notes. Not impossible, but will pose a new challenge when the approach in itself is a way to work around the problem, rather than address it directly.

Secondly, while 'Killing In The Name' is indeed an example of the technique/style you're talking about, keep in mind that in that song, Tom Morello isn't playing NEARLY as fast as Terrance Hobbs here and that plays a factor to how the strings will react when you do that strum. 16th notes at 215bpm is 860 notes per minute, and at that speed you'll need a rather thick, stiff pick to have tight response from the string (and less pick flex), and a thicker pick going for that semi-strum in the middle of tremolo picking at that speed will very likely hit that muted string very aggressively (much moreso than Tom Morello in Killing In The Name, whom I would suspect is playing something thinner with more give that lends itself well to funk rhythm guitar chucking).

That tough attack on the string will increase the difficulty of maintaining muting, and even if you do, the articulation on the ringing note won't be as sharp as what is being aimed for. It will sound bubbly, and I'm also not convinced that the muted string wouldn't cause noise in the process.

When I'm with my students, the only time I choose to work around things is if there's a real physical inhibition, or if we're allowing slop in the playing for the purpose of focusing only on developing a very specific technique (such as moving the 2 hands at the same time for beginners). Otherwise it's important to address problems directly. Just my own philosophy.

--

An exercise I've done myself and have had my students do, is to practice the picking hand only (mute the strings with the fretting hand, and pick the muted strings). Of course you still need to put both hands together later (it's not a magic trick), but what this does is help you focus on the specific picking motions needed to play the lick/riff without getting distracted by the fretting hand, which makes it easier to spot potential flaws in how your hand is moving (or get more clear on how the hand needs to move to do it).

I would also combine this with speed bursts. Aside from the lead notes at the tail end of the riff, it's a repeating sequence of a single hit on the A or D string (8th note), followed by 6 hits on the low E (16ths). I would drill a single repetition of this at a time, to a metronome. Do it until that single rep is clean (practice starting from both the A and D strings), then do 2 reps back to back. Then 2 reps where the starting point alternates, then go for 3. This is a mixture of both endurance and precision practicing.

Luckily, you only need 3 reps before the lead notes at the tail end of the riff come in, so from there you can add those in. You may also need to practice going from the 3rd rep into the lead notes, to focus specifically on that transition. Keep in mind that this is still picking hand only; you can try adding the fretting hand back in along the way.

Keep in mind though that this method will only get you so far if the technique itself needs tweaking, because as someone else alluded to earlier - poor or lazy technique will fall apart at extreme speeds and will have you frequently experiencing plateaus until properly dealt with. It sucks, believe me, I've been there more than once, but you when you deal with it, you're glad you did. But we can't know for sure if OP's technique is an issue unless we see a video of them playing. So let's see a video!

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