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I haven’t seen this lesson before, it’s a good topic. These rhythm patterns are hard to get under the fingers and into muscle memory.
I don’t know how advanced a player you are but we are all beginners when faced with a new challenge. It’s probably best to practice just the bass shuffle very slowly counting ‘ONE and two and three and four and TWO and two and three and…’ etc in your head, counting up through twelve bars. Knowing where you are in the chord progression and when to change chords has to be a very conscious thing until you really get the ‘feel’ of it and the changes become automatic. Then add any muting and the high string upstrokes and brief fills Brian shows in the lesson.
I need to revisit these lessons a few times while practicing something that won’t just click. It will all fall into place but it takes time so be patient and enjoy the journey.
Also you are building a percussive texture, it’s more vital to accurately hit the beat and chord changes than play the notes cleanly. Let that be the first focus. Perfect muting will follow naturally. Good luck!
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“I’m having trouble getting the kick and snare groove. Are strings muted for the snare part?”
The higher 2/3’rds of the strings are muted with the left had through that whole rhythm except on the up strokes for the A chord. So for just the first part its all driving down strokes for the two note blues chords and there is an actual HIT on the top (already muted) strings. Try accenting the hit and playing chords lightly to get it to sound in the groove. This is essentially what the drummer does, accenting every off beat for this particular groove.
First get the actual groove down by muting all the strings and play the bottom two strings lightly on each down stroke with a small hitting motion and accenting the muted upper strings. This is a groove thing. If you can do that, then just start to add in some palm muted chords. If you get that groove down, adjust your palm muting so the chords ring out a little more for the chords and you should get the same sound and feel for it.
The bass drum is the chord hits, but it doesn’t have to ring out massively. Control the boom and let that Chick hit straight down into the strings. Don’t strum the muted high strings, HIT them like a drummer hits his snare. It’s just a different way to attack the strings and produce a different sound verses strumming.
Believe it or not you can hit strings and partial chords to create your sound. Just experiment with it and see what you can come up with. I use the hitting motion a lot in my playing as I feel that it gives me better rhythm. Done in a small controlled way it sounds like normal picking to anyone listening.
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I didn’t have my guitar after posting the above to verify, but that’s not what he’s doing now that I had a chance to play through this. It is more of a short jabbey strum with muting. You will have to experiment with different muting to get it to sound right. I was getting some harmonics coming through so I angled my fingers back out of line from the 5th fret area to eliminate that. The off beats are on that C# or F# note and after the riffs, you have to hit that C# right in the flow of the rhythm. Just slow it down a bit and make sure you get the rhythm right.
The other thing I noticed is that he is playing the bottom strings on the off beats as well, I didn’t see that on first viewing. So it all boils down to muting the off beats mostly on the higher strings to get that muted string sound with the chord sound as well. I really like this driving sound and my wife came in and said it sounded really good, so I must be doing something right because she never talks about my guitar playing. It sounds pretty good on acoustic as well.
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It would be easy to over-analyze what’s going on. I think the main thing is to just listen to the sound he’s got and use your own technique to get as close to it as you can. I found that I can get that quick-muted sound in several different ways, some mentioned above. It’s easier if you can add in a fast delay using a pedal or whatever. I’ve just been working on some ZZ Top (Billy Gibbons) techniques which give a similar sound. It’s all about not letting strings ring out, and I use all parts of my hand to achieve that, depending on where I am on the neck, and what chords and licks I’m playing. The muted downstroke (called “slapfret”, or “chuck” to reggae players) has been described by Brian in several of his percussion style guitar lessons. If you want to get into that, check with our member Jola, who is better at it than anyone else I’ve heard among us AM people.
Sunjamr Steve
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That’s funny you would say that Steve, if you only knew how much I analyze things. I am the analyzer and I hate not knowing. I totally understand the frustration of seeing a player create great sounding vibrato, or well placed stabs in rhythm tracks that sound amazing, but when you try to duplicate it, you realize you really don’t know what your even trying to do let alone get that sound that you just heard.
Some things are just better learned in person with a great guitar teacher that can correct, or show you on the spot. How many of us see others use great vibrato technique and simply cannot duplicate it from a video?
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Thanks all! These responses have been immensely helpful. In addition to the technique advice, Ron’s statement that “we are all beginners when faced with a new challenge” was just as helpful because it diffused the level of frustration I felt and inspired me to think differently when I don’t pick something up right away.
I consider myself an advanced intermediate player WRT rhythm guitar. Since joining AM, I’ve discovered that I have a lot to learn. This site has expanded my world past doing the same things over and over!
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