Skip to around the 41 minute mark of the video linked below and you will hear Andy allude to his picking system that he calls “the upstroke thing”. It is clear that he has a greater than average awareness of what he’s doing but I’m not sure he understands why it works the way it does (upward pickslanting). I’ve been lurking for a while and thought this would be of interest to folks around here.
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I’ve heard him talk about this a few times. And every time I wish somebody would tell him what’s going on. He’s such a perfect example of an upward pickslanter and it would be interesting to see if he would try to add something more to his technique (which is obviously amazing as it is) if he knew about it.
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Welcome!!
Great find. They look like brothers in this video.
Haha true. I put it on on my commute home so didn’t notice as was only listening. It was interesting and amusing hearing Andy describe his playing as a series of workarounds, something which we now know is the case with most elite players but you’d never know from just listening! Just goes to show that you don’t really need to master every technique to be thought of as a virtuoso.
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Cudos for you using the correct possessive form of “Andy James.”
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My next death metal band will be named “The Strunks & Whites”
Cool find! I don’t follow Rick’s channel so I’m glad this was posted here.
Both Rick and Andy are absolutely ridiculous.
I like to make the pentatonic now that i can do it better starting on an up but I also do it threes to make it so it dosn’t seem as awkward cause i can do DUD then UDU and then repeat so its more like the overlapping sixes thing and it works quite well with UPS or whatever troy is calling it these days. and if you dont like repeating the same notes just move up a position on the DUD to the next box area and repeat. it is way easier to do for me. I forgot to mention you can do this with two note per string arps and it works as well.
“If it’s odd numbers [of strokes] I’ll start with a down, and if it’s even numbers I’ll start with an up.” Hmm…