Okay,

I thought this would make an excellent thread for all of us to share any tricks of the trade. Example would be that whammy flutter or dimebag natural harmonic dive/yank that was posted eariler. Don't post theory or practice routines, just post what little things you've discovered that sound cool and whatnot. Please post either a tab of how to do it, video, some example in a song or something to explain the trick.

Guitar One has an article called "Guitar Tricks", so I've decided to scan it off to start this thread.

One trick I never knew that sounds cool was inspired by kirk hammett during the master of puppets era was the dragging of the bottom e string off the fretboard while playing. There's a few more I didn't know of. It's in the scans. Enjoy and please share!

Guitar Tricks Page 1
Guitar Tricks Page 2

__________________

do a vibrato just pass the bar of the fret, at the very tip of the top of the next fret. vibrato as you strike the note. it sounds like a vibrato alternating, almost trilling between the two

__________________

i didnt get the idea of the 1A figuer, the verry first one

__________________

I've found this out awhile ago. It raises the note up three/four frets. I don't really have a use for it yet. You can do it on both the high and low e strings.

What i've done in the past with my picks is that I stroke the heavy strings sideways with varying slides to produce a 'scrape' sound. Not too tricky. Works well on Acoustic guitars.

__________________

Lemme explain. Zakk does this all the time.

Just do a legato, strike say the G string open, then do pull-offs from like 4 to 2 to open, keep doing this, when pulling off from 2 to open keeping the sound alive. Then while pulling off take your pick hand say pinkie and lighty slide it up and down slowly from the bridge pickup to the neck pickup on the G string. You'll get some wacky harmonics. Change up the pull-offs to get different sounds/keys. Lemme know how it goes.

__________________

hey cool thread, anybody know how to do the satch scream or squeal? i forget what its called exactly

oh i know a trick, if you take a higher string say B string and cross it over on top of the G string and press it down, then plucking the strings at the same time, you get a steel drum sounding type of thing, its best on acoustic , but it works on electric somewhat.

Try pinch harmonics on two strings at once. Try a major third interval, sounds cool.

Thats all stuff I knew anyways if im honest, cept the zakk wylde thing. In the post your riffs thread, I recorded a riff that uses the pull off fretboard technique. Sounds like a bird.



If done correctly youll hear something like a pinch harmonic in terms of texture of note, being played from the lowest string, though why this happens i have NO clue. If anyone gets this working, let me know, all I know for sure is that it happens on my set up.

Edit: Also try playing on the treble strings, but pick the string on the fretboard behind where you are fretting. Playing chords in this manner can lead to some very weird sounds. I began documenting a few, a while ago, though it sounds a lot better when you put some reverb in your tone too. Seriously, some of the sound effects I was getting from that were unreal...

Lastly, anyone know how to up-pick pinch harmonics? I think itd be useful for getting a higher note voiced in the attack when playing two or more simultaneously (sic.) ( I also tried an arpeggio in terms of pinch harmonics once, though i could only pick them one-way. Tis interesting.)

__________________

bar anywhere with your picking hand, and do you legato pull offs. Pretty obvious one, but still cool

__________________

i found this funny to read and i guess could fit into this thread in some way

http://vai.com/LittleBlackDots/84/weird_noises.html

__________________

Try vibrato when fretting power chords. I sometimes push the trem unit back a little with the side of my hand to bend chords up.

Play, say, the 2nd fret on the g-string, then with your picking hand lower a finger over the 14th fret on the g-string till your finger lightly touches the string and causes a harmonic. Use with wads of vibrato.

__________________

ooww ok now i get it.. thnx havent tryd it but i get the idea

__________________

say u hold the pick with thumb and index, then downpick pinch is with the tumb, and upward pinch is with the index, verry tricky, i tryd this and its fucked up

and the arpeggios pinchedsweeps... i discovered that a while ago, pretty hard to rilli sweep it though :P

__________________

lol, cheers, im sorta getting it, but argh, its like learning pinch harmonics all over again!

__________________

I dunno if anyone else has tried this:

But if you hold your pick right, have your index finger hanging down a bit, you can tremelo pick pinch harmonics (i think its a pinch harmonic ) Anyway, i mean the one when you pick and touch the string with your thumb of your picking hand. If you balance your fingers so your index hits it on an upstroke, or practise upward picked pitch-harmonics, you can tremelo them

Im rambling

Tapping your strings over the pickups with the side of your pick is cool too. If you do it on the high strings it give this eerie alien kinda sound.

__________________

the space between your fretboard and the front pickup can me used as an extra fret. thats pretty cool ehy? i think thats what steve vai did on crossroads for that high high sound. well anyways it works

__________________

put ur tongue on ur pickups when playing. well if u have passive, then whammy that note. that sounds cool

__________________

Get some delay, reverb, and or pitch shifter going and shoot your pickups with a T.V. remote (or anything that sends out a signal). Every remote has a different sound. Phones work especially well, too.

Put your cell on vibrate and put it near your strings.

Connect something to your whammy bar so that you can rest it under your arm. Doing this you can whammy anytime playing anything.

(Carefully) Bend the neck while playing.

I enjoy playing with a pitch shifter when I've got some narly feedback going. This adds alot of flavor if you can time it right into a riff.

Connect pedals incorrectly(Amp > Guitar; Guitar > Amp). Some pedals give off some wierd sounds that can be altered into unique things.

All I can think of for now.

__________________

unplug your guitar and touch the cord on stuff to make different noises and run it through a whammy pedal or sumthing. you can turn that noise in to controlled notes.

__________________

hey you guys remember that vid of Paul Gilbert and Marty Friedman shredoff video? How did Paul Gilbert do that sweep with his teeth or tongue!?

Flick of the switch was pretty nice, i've done it before. I think that Randy Rhoads did it sometime too.

instead of using the index pinky whilst tremelo picking harmonics, i just lightly rest the side of my palm on the string, and keep it steady enough while picking it

try this one, take your fretting hand and hammer/pull on the 4th, 2nd and open, then lightly drag your palm of you picking hand up the neck, it should sound like alot of harmonics and a slid technique at the same time

__________________

I've had buddies speaking to me on the phone and I would put the phone up to my pickups and turn up the volume on my amp. They could here themselves!!!

__________________

take a round surface like a battery or ur whammy bar and lighty tapp it on ur strings while their muted to sort of give a sound like a cartoon. dont forget sliding the round surface. try with delay. and always on clean

__________________

Rhandy does it on the live Tribute album during his stand alone guitar solo, Kirk Hammett used it on the To Live Is To Die solo and various punk bands used it at the end of songs to give that morse code feedback effect.

__________________

squeal then slide into another squeal. Pretty neat. Simple, but sounds cool

__________________

Turn your Pick sideways and make a slicing motion with it across your strings while muting them with your left hand. Makes an awesomely High pitched slice sound.

__________________

Take your whammy bar out, turn up the delay, chorus and gain, (on distortion of course) and have it set on your bridge pickup (or w/e picks up harmonics best on your guitar) and then lightly slide your whammy bar across the strings. High e works the best. Its really fun and cool sounding.

__________________

On the "thing that should not be" ending,

Doesn't kirk stroke the strings with his hand up and down over the pickups?

It's the muffled sounding stuff. What's that called?

__________________

to the guy bout upstroke pinhed harmonics, its on the 1st page somewhere.

i sayd that u could use ur index finger while picking.
but u can also use ur thumb for upstroke pinch harmonics, juts plece ur thumb all the weay over the string, and pick, u can trempick they thatway aswell.

i just noticed this 10 mins ago, works pretty good

__________________

Play a 3 note tapping riff on the bottom e string and when you tapp with your pick hand, bend the string around the neck to add a fourth note to it. it sounds crazy if its done right.

__________________

I just came up with a new floyd rose trick!!! push the wammy all the way down and pluck the top E string open with your pick. then right after you pluck the note, pull up on the wammy as hard as you can and vibrate it a little...... if done right, it sounds exactly like a chainsaw reving!!!! make sure you use a bit of chorus and alot of distortion.

__________________

Van Halen and a bunch of other people already use this trick. Listen to Wildside by Motley Crue, same technique.

It's not actually sweeping with his tongue, it's a carefully planned trick with his delay, that plays the sweeping again while he's pretending to sweep with his tongue. Still pretty cool though.

__________________

hold one note and tap the note on the oposite end the same number of frets from the 12 as from the nut on your fretting hand, you get that note, as a harmonic

ex: hold 3, tap 15
hold 1, tap 13
hold 5, tap 17
etc..

__________________

Delay??It looked like a sampler to me?

that's the one - forgot the name for it!

__________________

play your guitar with a drumstick.

Siriously it kicks ass better try to not hit the guitar very much though as it might cause a few dings It sounds cool thoug and you can slide the drumstick up and down and push the strings with it and get all kinds of cool crazy sounds!

__________________

Or Use the mic stand as a slide,with some delay/whammy ect.

slide your left hand up the strings as you push the whammy bar down with the right hand, keeping the pitch the same the whole time. sounds awesome if its done right.

push down on the 24th fret on the high E and scrape your pick up and down fromm the bridge to the neck, it sounds like in the cartoons when someone drops something. weeeeeeeeeeeooooooooooooooohhhhhhhh!

Do a whammy dive on the low E with quick-repeating delay/repeaton and reverb. You get all kinds of extra lower overtones than you would without the reverb delay. I use an RV-3 pedal so I can use delay and reverb simultaneously but it might work with just one or the other.

A very easy trick but a fun one that I like to do is tapping while divebombing.
Make sure your tremelo bar is tight (like so it doesn't swing around) and place it over your strings. Do a tapping position with your hands and while tapping use your elbow or forearm to depress the bar up and down. A buddy of mine knows Trey from Morbid Angel and Trey taught him this technique then my buddy showed it to me.

It's very simple but it sounds pretty cool.

Also another one that I learned (mention by amerok) from a Steve Vai lesson is drivebombing while sliding up the neck. Like say place your finger on the B string on the second fret and slide up while pushing the tremelo bar down. This creates a very odd sound.

I also like doing sweep picking combined with tapping/sliding (a.k.a. Michael Angelo Batio's "Whipper Sweeper". Although I can only manage to do it once. It's insanely hard keeping it going over and over again...well for me anyway. But when I can manage to pull it off everyone looks so amazed.

Another Micheal Angelo Batio trick I like is the famous overhand/underhand technique. While tremelo picking each string, alternately fret notes underhand (conventionally) and overhand, meaning that you bring your fret hand up and over the top side of the neck in order to finger the notes. It's very simple but it looks cool as hell and people look astontished when you show them.

__________________

I was just wondering...

Listen to Necrophagist - Diminished to Be, listen to the solo.

Right at the very end of it he does like a harmonic divebomb i think, but then its followed by this fucked up scream thing, which is probably done with the whammy too.

How the fuck do you do that???

__________________

That 'scream' thing, you can do if you have a slight delay on it, and bend it hard sharply

__________________

Cool thanks man

It kinda sounds like a Steve Vai - going fuckin hard on the tremelo thing. Coz it has that vibrato kinda sound to it

__________________

Thats just a 'gargle'? He is fretting a high note, and he gargles the trem, which is when you strike the bar with the palm of your hand and it wobbles on it's springs before the string tension/trem springs pull pulls it level again (very quickly) This happens while the note still rings out, so it's a lightning fast tremolo vibrato effect. It's pretty limited though.

__________________

Ohhh i get it, thanks dude. Ill give it a go some time, its almost midnight here and the old lady probably wont appreciate me practising Necrophagist techniques

__________________

Doesn't Laiho use that alot? Is that also called a whammy flutter?

__________________

Yeah, I think it might also be known as a flutter.

__________________

in diminished to be, he just hits the 24th fret, and pluks the trem arm (tis trick only works nice on edgepro tremolo, etter than others atleast)

basicaly, grab the trem arm, pull it up a bit and let it go, think of shooting an arrow or sumtin, that makes the trembar bounce literaly.

__________________

Awesome dude thanks, it sounds fuckin sweet

__________________

It may not be a cool "Sounds" thing

But as far as cool "looks" go. I have been working on some Batio Under and overs and damn they look good. Bloody hard though

Ok this technique is pretty awesome. Done live even cooler.

Amp On.
Lead In guitar.

After some sloppy soloing start to thrash around, take the guitar off your shoulder and simply throw it at a large solid object.
The guitar will most probably break but if lucky (or if you have a crappy throw) you may try again. As the lead is in the guitar, carnage will be maximal. Walk away as if you're Kurt Kobain.

If done probably, You should look like a rich retard that doesn't know how to play the guitar!!! Awesome huh?!?!?!

Why are you so gay?

Jusr found a cool one, i was blowing some shit off my fretboard, and it makes a really eerie fuckin sound if you blow across the sstrings as hard as you can.
You need an effect which is really fucking sensitive, but yeah, you can blow over the strings while fretting a chord and it gives this fuckin windy ebow kinda sound

__________________

Ok serious one. Cool eerie effect,

Simply hold the pick perpendicular to a string and do a small 'violin' type motion. It makes a scratchy sound, but can also convey a cool melody if you fet some notes. It sounds better on the high notes but meh. I only do it on the highest string as you dont get interference from other strings.
If the edge of your pick is imperfect it can have pretty cooleffects too.
Meh, just an idea

Natural Harmonic around the 4th fret of the G string and pull up on whmmy bar. Total cliche.

__________________

A similar trick can be done to create an R2D2 sound (yes, from Star Wars). With distortion on, lightly mute the strings by resting your fret hand on top of them somewhere along the neck. Hold the pick sideways and tap the HIGH E string above the pickups. Not just once, but do it in a repeated, quick fashion. As you're tapping the muted string, go higher and lower (toward and away from the bridge), which will raise and lower the pitch. Thus creating (at least when I do so) an R2D2 effect. If you want to just tap the same spot on the string, you can also use a whammy pedal to raise and lower the pitch.

for this you'll need to have your trem arm facing out like vai does
and all you do is strike a note or 2 notes and as you pick them
slide your hand down the trem bar of the guitar

__________________