LESSON: The Blues / Metal Connection
Andrew Wasson of Creative Guitar Studio answers a viewers question...
Q: One of my favorite players of all time is Kirk Hammett from Metallica. His riffs and leads are great. But, one thing I keep noticing is that he uses a lot of different notes around the basic Minor Scale. The most common one seems to be the flatted-5 from the Blues scale. Can you make a video on the, "Blues-Metal Connection," used by guys like Kirk?
Chris - Auckland, New Zealand
A: Almost every guitar player out there will get into messing around with at least some blues at some point... There's almost no way to escape it. The Blues scale is one of the most popular, (and one of the most foundational), scales for nearly all of the styles of music that we find the guitar used in. Plus, almost every famous player from, Hendrix, to Kirk Hammett will use the Blues scale in their solos. However, when it comes down to Hard-Rock and Heavy Metal, the use of the Blues scale keeps the riffs, and the leads flowing along in a much more vocal manner. Blues scale also adds some attitude to Metal. We can certainly hear this in Metallica's, "Enter Sandman," (which is based almost entirely upon the Minor Blues). In the video I will dig into building riffs and melodies using Blues scale, plus I'll take a quick look at the music theory connection.
Q: One of my favorite players of all time is Kirk Hammett from Metallica. His riffs and leads are great. But, one thing I keep noticing is that he uses a lot of different notes around the basic Minor Scale. The most common one seems to be the flatted-5 from the Blues scale. Can you make a video on the, "Blues-Metal Connection," used by guys like Kirk?
Chris - Auckland, New Zealand
A: Almost every guitar player out there will get into messing around with at least some blues at some point... There's almost no way to escape it. The Blues scale is one of the most popular, (and one of the most foundational), scales for nearly all of the styles of music that we find the guitar used in. Plus, almost every famous player from, Hendrix, to Kirk Hammett will use the Blues scale in their solos. However, when it comes down to Hard-Rock and Heavy Metal, the use of the Blues scale keeps the riffs, and the leads flowing along in a much more vocal manner. Blues scale also adds some attitude to Metal. We can certainly hear this in Metallica's, "Enter Sandman," (which is based almost entirely upon the Minor Blues). In the video I will dig into building riffs and melodies using Blues scale, plus I'll take a quick look at the music theory connection.
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