Preston Black USX Wrist(?), same as Shawn Lane?

Playing Technique
#21

I understand. This is a case where we can tell by the clues: the arm position, the pick grip, the body part that is moving, the direction is moving, the line that is being played, and the pickstroke that is being started on. All of this suggests very strongly that this is the Shawn Lane technique which is a very particular type of wrist joint motion.

For people learning, that’s mostly not stuff they need to be worrying about. This is a situation where you copy this general form, including the pick grip, and then try to go fast to find smoothness. If you can figure it out, it will be fast and smooth. That’s how you know you’re in the ballpark. Refine from there.

#22

Are there many other players who use Shawn Lanes style of picking? I can’t recall if I’ve come across it, knowingly, before…

#23

I’m not aware of any, though I’m sure there must be some.

Generally, I believe that if you learn imitate the method, you can imitate the results. Shawn’s playing is difficult to analyze. Very little high quality video is available, and he almost always wore sleeves (to cover his psoriasis).

Shawn’s method was quite idiosyncratic to him, so I was unable to make solid conclusions about his mechanics from other players. I was mislead by some visual cues, and I though for a while that it was most likely an elbow movement. That explained the capability for speed. Some study on Power Licks made me realize that many of Shawn’s sequences could be swiped, so I came to the mistaken conclusion that Shawn’s playing was based on systematic swiping, similar to Jorge Strunz (who uses a similar grip).

However, I had a lot of difficulty getting any of Shawn’s sequences to feel natural with an elbow driven movement. I knew I was missing something.

Then, I had a shoulder injury on my picking arm. The elbow movement was painful to practice, so I left it aside and put more work into understanding fretting mechanics.

I came back to the problem with fresh eyes after the injury. I studied the anatomy of the forearm, and I decided that a dart-thrower action with some subtle rotation was a feasible solution.

After training the movement, I am totally convinced that the dart-thrower action is the answer.

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#24

I think Phil X might be using a similar joint motion for fast pentatonic stuff. Just given the arm position and the path the wrist appears to follow. You can correct my math on this.

I think a bunch of players that we previously thought were doing something more like Mike Stern are actually doing something more like Shawn, because the arm positions aren’t so super obviously different.

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#25

This is why I was trying to see if there were others, it’s extremely difficult to analyse in enough detail with the available clips!

I’ll have to check out some clips and see if I can work out the general setup.

#26

I’ll have to look into it, I’m not familiar enough with his mechanics to comment.

#27

Oh, and I’m such a dummy, totally forgot: @Bill_hall! This is one of the cool things we discovered in his interview. Pronated, or what I think is a pronated arm position (check that pinky side air gap), but lots of pentatonics starting on downstrokes:

I could be wrong about the arm position, and this could still be deviation, but it looks nothing like my setup so I think it’s dart thrower.

I think Guthrie might also be in this category:

Basically, any time you see a relatively flat arm position, the hockey stick (i.e. radial) wrist form, and where you see lots of evidence of DSX, but then the player pulls out fast pentas starting on a downstroke, that’s when I think you have to start suspecting this isn’t really deviation, but something else.

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#28

Also, and this is maybe the funniest: @tommo. Tommo do you have any videos of fast pentas starting on a downstroke? If so link them up let’s take a look.

All this stuff, hiding in plain sight.

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#29

Okay I need a major clarification here. Dart thrower and reverse dart thrower. I used to play darts in my basement so I understand the fundamental motions of throwing a dart. But when it comes to the picking hand, wouldn’t someone who has a dart thrower motion also have a reverse dart thrower motion? Wouldn’t it just be ulnar and radial deviation? I’m having trouble understanding how we can label someone’s picking as reverse dart throwing since that is only the wrist traveling in one direction

#30

Here’s your cheat sheet!

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#31

Is there a specific video or chapter from the list that talks about the reverse dart throw motion/setup

#32

I’m having a hard time picturing the difference as well. When I try to mimic it in the air it either looks like deviation if I hold the wrist ridged, or a rotational flick if I just let my wrist loose.

Maybe that’s why I was never good at darts.

#33

To me, this was where that clockface analogy was helpful. Throwing a dart is roughly 10 o’clock start, finish at 4 o’clock. What’s the reverse of this? 8 o’clock start, 2 o’clock finish.

#34

But I guess my question is: does this constitute a different motion or just it’s starting and ending position using a clock face analogy?

#35

Yeah, totally a different motion. Both in terms of what we ask our wrist to do and the escape trajectory we’ll see when applying this to playing guitar. It’s why Shawn Lane had a USX mechanic and Al Di has a DSX.

#36

Agree that the clock analogy is helpful here. I think confusion comes from what “reverse” means in this context though (since the 10-0-4 movement has a reciprocal “4-0-10” movement). Though as you observe, describing one movement as reciprocating along “10-0-4” and one as reciprocating along “8-0-2” should make things clear.

Essentially, in non-clock-face terms, if “Dart Thrower” is taking a deviation motion and adding some wrist extension to the radial deviation, and adding some wrist flexion to the ulnar deviation, “Reverse Dart Thrower” is reversing how flexion and extension get added to the deviation motion (adding wrist flexion to the radial deviation, and adding wrist extension to the ulnar deviation).

#37

I’ll take a look at it more closely when I’m at home and near an instrument.

#38

Only thing I could find is this potatovision thing from 2020 where I play ascending / descending pentas starting on both pickstrokes:

I can record something new if it can be useful, but I am pretty sure I would default to a USX slightly supinated form if you asked me to do my best impersonation of Zakk Wylde

#39

Awesome thanks. I just wanted to double check because you have that radial / hockey stick form going on at times. In this example it’s more obvious in the DSX attempt. The USX form looks more supinated, maybe with a little forearm. So maybe not dart thrower there.

#40

Hi, @Troy !

I would say I do play the pentatonic stuff with my arm pronated. I hardly ever touch the pinky side of my right hand on the bridge unless I am doing a muted lined. My motions all sort of come out of the pronated position. I guess it could be sort of the dart throwing motion. The motion feels different than if I move my wrist side to side. My strokes are sort of ending in the air a bit. When I play the Eric Johnson five type of licks with the economy picking I sort of just push the downstroke to the next string without changing my form. I am not real good at describing this stuff…but I think that is what I am doing. :slightly_smiling_face:

I notice that when I pick the pentatonic stuff the ball of my thumb rests on the lower strings on the downstroke and then goes in the air off the strings on the upstrokes.

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