CTC and master in mech. has really boosted my playing techniques over the last 2 years. Playing accurate and fast
on D,G,B,E strings works perfect but for some reason playing fast metal rhythm parts on low E and A string is very hard for me. It’s like there is too much friction alternative picking these strings.
Doesn’t anyone have any tips/trick to overcome this?
Would be great if “metal” rhythm technique (a la megadeth,metallica) would be covered by Troy.
/Andy
Take whatever you want to play (can I recommend Zero Signal by Fear Factory, possibly the best metal rhythm practise routine available), and play it, really, really, really, obnoxiously ridiculously slowly, like a quarter of the original speed, super relaxedly, focusing on getting the sound how you want it, the articulation precise and correct, let your ears (and ease of playing) guide the angle of your pick, the movement of your hand and arm. Experiment with different sources of motion at this slow speed.
When you’ve done this for a while, jump all the way back to top speed, and suddenly you’ll be absolutely flying along and thinking “why couldn’t I do this 10 minutes ago?”
I’d like to see the magnet on James Hetfield or Vogg from Decapitated but I don’t know if it would throw up anything too surprising.
Are you talking mainly about single note rhythm lines on those strings, or chords and diads that include the low E or A string?
Any specific song that’s a particularly illustrative instance of the problem?
And if you’re feeling up to it, posting a clip of yourself playing a problem passage might help us understand better.
Interesting. I play my fastest on those two strings due to how fat those strings are. My pick can glide across them much easier than the higher strings.
Are you digging your pick into the strings? Have you tried choking up on the pick so barely any of it is showing? Better yet, do you have a video to demonstrate what it looks like when you’re playing? That would be most helpful 
I would suggest the Teemu interview for this. If you haven’t yet seen it, there’s a whole section where he demonstrates and we discuss how he uses dwps to play some very fast chuggy parts on the low strings.
By the way, there’s a video of Vogg that shows his picking hand pretty well – it looks to me like he does the opposite of what most guitarists do, and rearranges things in order to inside pick stuff, at least for lead lines.
DWPS certainly seems to work very well for super palm muted chuggy parts.
True, you were playing this way for rhythms the first time I met you. What’s interesting is it’s a completely different approach than your uwps lead technique. The picking motion is more forearm rotation. Have you ever tried to do leads like this? Like any of the sixes patterns for example - you’d have to finish on an upstroke so you’d basically just do each three-note sequence twice per string.
If I’m playing stuff that has me changing to a new string after hitting an up stroke, I do notice my tendency to DWPS. Like those McGlaughlin 4 note per string deals you showed me. Starting those with an up stroke is just too weird. Sticking with some DWPS gives me more control. I may not be able to play as fast as I possibly can, but hitting things at 200 bpm with DWPS on a lot of things is something I’m quite satisfied with.
Thanks for all the comments. I’ll watch th Teemu interview and also upload a video so that you can see what I mean.
Best regards
Andy