I am currently trying to master Dittohead by Slayer by using downpicking only.
I have been looking at the tab for this song at this pages and a number of other pages. All tabs says that this is the way the intro is played:

4 4 4 4 4 4 5 5 3 3 3 3 3 3 5 5 2 2 2 2 2 2 5 5 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

on the E string

If you listen to the song this is got to be much faster than 228bpm.

228bpm isn`t that much faster than 220bpm just to compare, and Master of Puppets is at that speed, and I can manage to play that song by only downpicking.

Any suggestions to how Slayer really plays it?

its actually 230bpm and thats from the official tab book.

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Does the original tab book show the same tablature for the intro that I wrote?

Sure does. It's played just like that.

Master Of Puppets is in 8th notes. Dittohead is in 16ths. If you were to play MoP at Dittohead's 16th note pace it would be 440bpm and if you were to play Dittohead at MoP's 8th note pace it would be 115bpm. To see this, try playing Dittohead at the same pace you play MoP. You'll find it's roughly half the pace it should be.

You're playing Dittohead right, it's just hard to play using all downstrokes that's all.

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Maybe i`m stupid for asking this, but does that mean that kerry and jeff are able to play downstrokes at 440 bpm.
That seems like impossible, but they are great players..

umm buddy downpicking isnt the only way to play

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Well, sort of. It depends on how you want to notate the music. They play in 16ths at 230bpm but I suppose you could notate that as 8ths at 460bpm but it wouldn't fit in with the rest of the music.

Yes, it does seem impossible but when you think that Kerry and Jeff have been playing for probably 25 years or more, it seems more feasible. I prefer to play it using alternate picking. Frankly, I don't think it makes much of a difference at that speed whether you downpick or alternate pick.

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thanks

dittohead sounds like tremelo picking to me....much too fast for only downstrokes.

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I agree with Father Death and John. I saw the video for DittoHead when it first came out and didn't really see what they were doing. But from playing experience, it sounds more of alternate/tremolo picking..

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I play it tremolo picked.

I play it tremelo picked as well, there is no advantage to playing it with all downstrokes. Songs like 'Postmortem'need to be all down to make it sound right.

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i just can't see how Dittohead could be play with downstrokes at that speed.
Even if you're playing since 15 or 20 years,

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Yeah, it does seem improbable but Kerry himself said he plays it using downstrokes in his Guitar World column a few years back. I think this was said in another thread in the Guitar Forum. Like I said, I can't see any possible advantages in playing something that fast with just downstrokes except for showing off.

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If i recall it right he corrected it in a later issue.I've seen a few dittohead clips and all of them show alternate picking.

Who cares, you can hardly tell the difference.