I’m not sure what you mean by:
What I’m doing is not a sweep from E to B, it’s two outside picking movements, with a momentary pause on B. Its fully alternated beside the muted swipe.
Either way man, I have to thank you for introducing me to Troy’s swiping video a few years ago as it really enlightened me to a lot of eddies playing. With out your efforts in driving towards the truth of Ed’s playing I’d probably of given up on it ages ago 
The main thing that I’ve learned is that D-H-H on the B string and D-H-H on the high E is not a repeatable pattern that does any justice to the sound or feel of the recording. D-H-H on the B string and U-D-U on the high E isn’t a good method either. This is what 99% of people do.
Picking all six notes as Eddie likely intended isn’t right either, though that is closer than the other two methods above.
So I don’t want to get into the whole race trap… seeing as it’s not even about race, but I’ve posted multiple times about eddies hands on here and I feel it’s not been taken to seriously.
If you hold the pick with the middle finger, that uses far more powerful muscles in the forearm compared to using the index, also the construction of Ed’s hands let’s him grip the pick closer to the palm enabling more powerful leverage angles. I honestly believe this is a huge contributor to his strong picking/attack. I’ll try do a short vid. It’s also a reason James Hetfield is able to do down strokes so easily, he is using different muscles compared to most guitarists.
Here:
No doubt many of you are aware of this already, but I have never seen it spelled out before in any serious way. Holding the pick with a middle finger grip gives such freedom and power compared to the index. But it is not economical for a lot of hand types, mine included.
Steve Morse has an interesting video on it.
Yeah, I use a Middle finger and Thumb grip like Eddie. That has nothing to do with genetics.
But your grip compared to Ed’s, is down to genetics, I can guarantee that Ed could grip the pick more firmly and with more force than either of us can with the middle finger. That allows a large range of force or finesse in that grip compared to ours. And the use of more powerful forearm muscles with a real tight clarity that we can only dream of, idk why you’re so reluctant to accept that fact.
Some people are honestly more genetically gifted than others. Thats part of evolution.
With all due respect, I completely disagree. You have no evidence to back up your claim and even if you did (and you don’t) it wouldn’t make any appreciable difference. As has been discussed and proven many times on this site, the force with which you strike a string quickly reaches a point of diminishing returns. IF someone has someone has some sort of genetic advantage of being able to strike a string with more force, it just plain doesn’t matter…Eddie striking a string with the brown celluloid Fender Medium pick with more force than me has ZERO impact on anything. The result is the same.
I have only had a passing interest and understanding in this thread and aren’t picking sides here, but it taken a funny turn that interests me. I don’t quite get where you are going with this. Regarding the above - I get that how our bodies are may determine what we can or cannot EASILY do, but what does it have to do with the force applied to a string with a pick? I’m pretty sure I can pick with enough force to break a string with any grip. Does that mean that I’m stronger than EVH? No, I’m sure he could have done too! 
All that seems to matter (in my humble/ignorant opinion) is how much pick hits the string, note choice, swiping etc. Which is likely to be possible to approximate with a few different mechanics to the point where you might not tell the difference (if all other things are considered equal which they are not).
I completely agree. Now let’s try to get back to a repeatable version of Eddie’s sextuplets that captures the flavor whilst being repeatable!
It’s not about how hard the pick hits the string, it’s about how much control and finesse you have with the pick holding it with middle thumb due to the flexibility and range of motion of the thumb. I do have evidence and can continue this. Though you’ve already made up your minds. And I don’t wish to derail the topic even tho I feel its very relevant to how Eddie played.
I’m all for hearing it provided everyone keeps their hats on 
. If you think its relevent, then by all means. I’m gonna put my hands up and say that even as an EVH fan, I’m not sure that I understand what you guys are striving for - aggressively played sixes sound great both super clean and ‘raw’ ie with some swipes/airballs/mutes (many of which may not be particularly audible in a mix anyhow).
*confused face 
Rock on guys
I know I’m trying to find something that doesn’t exist. But hopefully what I’m attempting is at least somewhat clear, so I’ll try to explain it this way:
So given all of this, I’m trying to come up with a regimented, repeatable way of playing these sextuplets to try to capture at least some of the flavor of what Eddie played on the album.
In my opinion, picking all six-notes, even when paying close attention to dynamics and palm muting, doesn’t yield a satisfactory “flavor” of the many random accidents on the recording. D-H-H followed by U-D-U doesn’t either.
So far, my best compromise is to go with Down-Hammer-Down on the lower string and Up-Down-Up on the higher string. This is what I did in my short clip of me exercising the drum/guitar synch riff from “Girl Gone Bad”. I’m happy with my results on the synch riff, but I’m still working on applying this to the “Spanish Fly” sextuplets. I’m getting there, but I’m actually playing it on essentially the same instrument that Eddie used for the original recording-a non-cutaway Ovation classical guitar-and it is slow going, especially when I’m contorting to play the last two sequences of the sextuplets…bloody difficult! But so far, this seems to be the best solution for me.
Drink, drugs and agression is the perfect combination to invite some randon mistakes into your playing… only joking… or am I?
Not that I did any real analysis, but I always thought that EVH’s 6s feel was just in the timing that the first 3 notes were a little more relaxed/slower//lazy/behind the beat and the last 3 notes were crammed in/rushed in order to get it to finish in time. Combine that with say legato/semi picked on the 1st 3 notes and aggresive picking on the last 3, gives it more of a whipping feel - slippery but nasty kinda sound…on the edge.
One thing I notice is the muted sweep to get through the E string is more delayed than if you just whack the B and in same motion swipe through the E.
It’s more pushed through rather than swiped if that makes sense. The mute is part of the run and should be accentuated on purpose, not just a swipe through not to be heard. I think it captures the sound very well.
I personally think I’ve got it. As the muted note being incorporated into the run rather than just swiping through it makes it sound like the record.
I think I need to stop now as I have been here before and spent to much time being obsessed with others playing in past. I’m quite satisfied with it atm.
I’m still working on it because I’ve never heard anyone play it anywhere near what happened on the record. As I’ve said and as most agree, it’s impossible to play it as it was played on the record and I’ll continue to try work-arounds to get a repeatable pattern that gets the general feel close. Which is something, because no one has it close.
Check out the sound at 1:10 on the vid.
It is very close to me. I am quite an obsessive person and I’m happy with it. I’m doing it on electric so it will sound different, but the rythem is there. The speed is different and I’d need to practice it but adding the mute as an expressed part of the run really gives it the favor to me.
If you are not then I can only wish you luck man and I look forward to your attempts as it is a cool sounding run. And I’m genuinely interested in your efforts to get it down.
Here’s a quick comparison. And I’ll leave it at that.
And here I tried to get them playing closer making sure I pause on the B
I feel this is the way he did it, I’m not pausing enough on the second B string note to give it the gallop but I’m pretty confidant it’s how he played it. But then confidence comes before a fall right Either way I enjoyed our back n forth. We got a mutual appreciation of eddies amazing playing.
I can see where you are going and I might try to incorporate some of those extra muted picks in there. I’ll see how it goes…
Ok, so are you saying it is seven notes instead of six? Would it be Down-Hammer-Down on the B string, then an accentuated Down on the muted high E, then Up-Down-Up to complete the pattern? Or is the muted string the B string in this scenario?