Critique & what needs adjusting

Technique Critique
#1

What’s up guys & gals. I attached a few videos below on my current state of picking. I’ve been playing on & off for a few years but only since the pandemic started have I thrown all my chips into getting good at the instrument seriously. In January when I “started my real guitar journey” I only remembered a handful of scales & a few licks most would recognize (crazy train, enter sandman main riffs). All the songs I learned years prior I forgot, so I went back & learned them again, plus some new ones. I’m up to 26 songs for the year so far. I got majorly bit by the black metal bug & have been learning a lot of that lately. I can make it through songs like Transylvanian hunger without cramping, but I’m unsure if my current technique is good or not.

I haven’t tinkered with my setup much picking hand wise, I broke my picking wrist playing football in my youth in 3 places. I can’t do a push-up with a flat hand because of how it healed, but any other motion is ok & doesn’t hurt.

I’m not sure what kind of videos are worth looking at other than picking on one string, so I included a mayhem riff, a 4NPS scale & an exercise I found from a Michael Angelo video.

Any & all critique; good, bad & ugly is wanted!

Hope everyone is staying safe out there :slight_smile:

#2

Looks effortless to me, this form is really good. I think a little bit of cleaning up might happen independent of you trying to do anything. As in, over time, these passages will get cleaner if you let them sit in the oven and do what I recommend below.

The only slight recommendation/modification would be to uncurl your fingers and have more of an open hand position. I’m not sure if your picking hand being curled in is something you are trying to do, but if it doesn’t happen naturally, I’d ditch it. I did notice a slight “drag” of the pick when you are tremolo picking on one string, as if you’re losing a bit of tone due to some hidden tension. If I had to guess, it could be from the fist grip. This is something I’ve noticed in the Brendon Small interview. I should add the caveat that I have an overly sensitive ear for this; I used to work as an intern in an extreme metal studio and the producer to whom I reported had an incredible ear and would regularly point this out. So just realize my opinion is likely “OCD” by conventional standards.

In general, I find that for tremolo endurance, the introduction of any tension by making a fist or clenching up the unused picking hand fingers results in lower top speed and a degradation of tone.

The pickslanting primer has an interesting chapter on supporting fingers if you have five minutes to kill:

I don’t think it’s mandatory you change it, but given that everything else looks right, I can’t find much else to add.

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#3

Thanks for the input :slight_smile:

I’ve noticed that I curl the fingers because if I go open hand I tend to drop the pick when speeding up. Not sure if it’s me convincing myself that a closed fist will help support it or not, but whenever I close up I feel more secure. The only time I find myself opening the hand up is when I pick the high E string continuously. With a closed hand I can’t find the right angle to glide through the string. I’ll usually anchor a pinkie near the bridge pickup for that. That is one thing I have a lot of issue speeding up on though. Tremolo on the low 5 feel ok, that high E though feels like it’s gonna snap on me lol.

I’ll post a few more videos tomorrow on a few things I have noticed issue on. The High E tremolo being one of them.

Would you guys get better insight if I were to post anything starting on an upstroke? I’m still trying to learn what style my picking is so I can hone in on it & make it a strong point as best I can

#4

Interesting, I figured you were doing the closed hand for a reason. It seems like in your case it might be of a mental block. I can’t tell you how many times on this forum we’ve seen people talk about the mental block they have regarding picking on low vs. high strings. You definitely should not be dropping the pick with an open position. I don’t think I’ve done that in years.

Hazarding a guess: I’d say you are likely overcompensating for a lack of control by clutching your fingers, and going open hand exposes this weakness once the tension from the muscles dissipates. Excess tension can be used to fake control, but it backfires in tone loss and speed caps.

To this end I’d recommend spending time on your weakest string and then trying both open and closed hand positions. Give them a few days each, and then go with what is truly working best. The problem only starts when you convince yourself one style is actually inferior without first putting the work in, so you have to give both an equal shot. It’s not enough to try something for 30 seconds and say “Yeah, I don’t like this at all.”

Regarding upstrokes, sure, try it out, but in the long run most metal players would tell you for accenting and chunking purposes starting most (not all) riffs on a downstroke is easier.

Here are two examples of forms to try:

If you listen closely on the string changes, Brendon suffers a bit of that “drag” effect I mentioned above, but to what extent this features regularly in his playing I wouldn’t know. I would try both forms and see ultimately what serves you best.

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#5

I’m gonna give what you said a shot & see if the open hand will be an asset going forward. I’m going to make a few more videos of things that I am having issue with lately (I’ll just update this post instead of being the guy that makes a million posts lol)

The thing I’m a little confused on is whether or not it’s wise to hone in on one style (assuming mine is a DWPS by the videos I posted) or give ample time to stuff starting with upstrokes as well. I just look at it as wanting to be prepared for whatever. I’ve never sweep picked once in my life, until only recently I recognized what economy picking is & tried it briefly.

As far as building speed goes I know it’s better to start with it & refine, but I’m a bit lost on the appropriate way to do it. Usually I will put the metronome at a speed that’s a bit out of my wheelhouse & do 8th notes & occasionally burst 16s to change it up.

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#6

That is a Nice Mayhem riff hehe. You can try to accent The first note of every group of 4 a lot more. Then move The accents around. That is how i practice stuff like that anyway.

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#7

Starting on an upstroke or downstroke - for me - is mostly a timing thing. Conventional metal guitar is big on accenting with downstrokes due to the force you can generate. However, if I’m starting on the “&” of a beat I sometimes use upstrokes. You really just need to try and see what is easiest. I wouldn’t build a playing style that is enslaved to one stroke over the other.

As far as the metronome goes, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with using it to build speed provided your motion mechanics are efficient. Based on the speeds you’re playing at I don’t think that’s a problem, but check this video out:

John also has a free e-book on his site that you can sign up for that teaches you how to build speed with a metronome.

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#8

+1 for the clip of Ronnie Coleman at the end :slight_smile:

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#9

Today I messed around with various hand positions while tremolo picking the high E. I think it’s safe to say it’s more of a mental block with keeping the hand closed, but I still find it more comfortable doing so. Having the extra fingers brush the body/anchor on the pickup felt pretty good though too. So I’ll work on that just to have in my arsenal. I can’t remember the exact bpm I made it up to before losing some form/keeping in time, but I wanna say it was in the 175-180 range. I noticed I suck at keeping on beat when just banging away on 1 string, but on the same note. As soon as I switch to 4 notes per finger it seems to line up a whole lot better for me

Here is trying a few different hand/finger positions

& here’s one showing what I explained above with keeping time as soon as changing fingers

To warm up today I filmed myself playing Transylvanian hunger & decided to purposely change hand positions throughout (from open to closed hand). I definitely feel like I get more attack with a closed hand, but the openness definitely makes brushing through the strings easier…still found myself fiddling with the pick as soon as I switch hand positions though in fear of dropping it. I’m gonna keep on implementing some open hand work, if I can get comfortable with both I think that would be good.

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