Ok, so I decided to take my love of black/death metal one step further, and bought a Schecter Diamond Series Omen-7. After fucking around with some tabs on here for a bit, I figured it'd probably be a good idea to start with something more basic.

So I practiced a few tutorials I found elsewhere on the net, and got bored with them, because they're too fucking pussy. Then I found a tutorial on alternate picking for metal guitar, and have been practicing that for several hours now.

Now comes the problem. A few minutes ago, I realized that my fingers are bleeding, and it was getting all over my strings and fretboard. My wrist is also killing me.

Is this normal for starting out? Should I wait until my fingers heal until I play again? Will the blood mess up my strings or fretboard? I don't mind the blood or pain, but I just want to know if I'm pushing too fast, and if I should maybe slow down.

Also, this is my first post on the board, so hello and all that other shit. If anyone could point me in a good direction to learn the techniques of black/death metal guitar, I'd be grateful

well i dont think that oyur fingers bleeding is a natural thing to happen but pace yourslef man your not gonna be a god in like a week it takes time so just pace your self and dont kill yourself from practising too much you may be hurting yourself more in the long run by doing so

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Yes and no...

Yes it is normal to feel pain being new to guitar, seeing your fingers have yet to Calous(sp?) and therefore, not used to the strings. Clean up your strings, and your fretboard, and quit for the night.

And no, its not normal for your fingers to bleed

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Bleeding is bad. I don't think it's too major for strings, since you can replace those easily for about 5-10$, but the blood will almost certainly ruin the wood on the fretboard.

As for techniques to learn Black/Death metal......you should practice palm muting, alternate picking, tremolo picking, string skipping......for scales and such, it's basically whatever you're comfortable with, but start learning the Major and Minor scales, Minor being very big for metal in general.

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the only pain you should feel is somewhat sharpish pain on your fingertips 'cause you don't have calluses.
take it slow in the beginning, and if you feel sharp pain, definitely stop for a while.
if it's dull pain, that's good because you've been playing and practicing, and you're muscles are tired. but still stop, take a day break.

you may think blood and pain is cool when playing guitar, you're putting passion into it etc; Stevie Ray Vaughan used to literally play till the skin from his fingertips was peeling off, then he'd superglue the skin back on, and continue playing on his thicker than normal strings (.13 gauge, half-step down, which feels like .12 gauge tuned normal, you're guitar is probably .9 tuned normal), doing mad bends

but, he was also addicted to crack

so slow down

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Try some stretches, I know that sound dumb but i sawa john petrucci video where he showed you some stretches to do and it acually helped relieve a pain i used to get in my wrist after playing for lengthy periods of time. As for the bleeding....... Use a band aid???

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hmmm... Thanks for the advice guys. I stopped playing for the night right after I poseted this, and got some sleep. Now my fingers are tender, but they look ok to play on, which I'm going to get to in a minute.

@memnoch: is there a book or website that I can learn the scales from? I found a website that taught me some exercises for alternate and tremolo picking, and also palm muting. I have no idea what string skipping entails. It sounds simple, but I'm sure there's a technique to it

@atifman: wow, I didn't know that about SRV, he was definitely crazy. As for my strings, they're .11 through ..68 (it's 7-string). Is it better to play on .09 gauge?

@BLS: what kind of stretches? where is this john petrucci video? My wrist still hurts this morning when I woke up, so I could probably use those stretches/


Anyway, sorry for asking so many questios, but this is really the first thing in my life I've felt very driven to do. Music has literally saved my life before, when I was suicidal from being abused by my parents. And it's what gives my life meaning now, so I really wanna be able to contribute to it by being in a band someday.

No, its good to ask questions. I asked ALOT of questions when i first started...

Here is a link to a forum with THOUSANDS of excersises.

http://www.musicianforums.com/forum...rumid=57&ref=mx

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I have a question for you. Could you show me this tutorial. I wanna learn to speed pick and be comfortable with it. Thanks man.

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There are tons, literally tons of books out there for all the scales you could ever need. The internet also has them (for free too), but they don't have nice pictures and colours like books do.

I myself have 3 books, all about scales and modes, some of them actually showing techniques like sweep-picking, tapping, and all the basics that i previously mentionned. Hell, i even have a scale book designed for 7-string guitars.....even though i don't own one! haha. I think it's endorsed by Ibanez because the cover is full of them, and only them.

But anyways, go to a music store and look at some books, they can range in price from about 10-50$.

As for your question about string skipping, it is a very easy concept. It's just playing a riff which goes accross multiple strings, sometimes not just 2 in a row but 3 or 4, or even 6....or 7.

For example, check out Martyr's chorus to Warp Zone:


|----------------------------------------|
|-------------------------------6--------|
|----------------------------------------|
|--------7\6----------0h4----------3-|
|----------------------------------------|
|--4-------------3----------------------|


It's played quite fast, i have a hard time playing it up too speed without muting a string here or leting one buzz there, but it's a perfect example of string skipping.

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Check out the book Rock Discipline by John Petrucci, 20$

if you're guitar is tuned to D, then it's okay for .11s, but if you're a beginner trying to play .11s standard tuned, no wonder you're fingers are bleeding....

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your a legend....

your going hard and your gonna love the end results....just go fucken nuts and clean your fretboard....buy new strings if u have to....just dont bleed in your wires and shit..

and drink heaps of grog(alchohol) cause when u make it u can never play str8...cause this is metal..

and all you pussies out there stop complaining...


drink more...play hard....bleed forever!!

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I used to bleed a lot. I'd clean it up and put epoxy or superglue on my finger tips to keep playing. They don't bleed now...plus I can't feel with my fingertips.

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I never bleed or have, and I used those zakk wylde ghs' for awhile in standard, it helped build calluses but didnt make me bleed.

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Hmmm....I just realized....11 years of playing guitar and I've never bled. Maybe because I started with acoustic, by the time I got to electric (about 9 years ago) I already had calluses. My advice to you is don't force yourself to play. The way I see it, playing guitar should be fun, if you force yourself it becomes more like a duty. I don't play Blackmetal too much but when it comes to Deathmetal, learn certain tricks like: Palm muting (Of course), chord changes and scales, hammer-on/pull-off, pinch harmonics, tremolo picking, trilling, that's type of shit. Also, I remember when I was strarting out I used to listen to songs that I liked and tried to play them with out getting tabs, I guess that can help develop an "ear". After you think you got it down the best you can, then go and look for tabs to see if you were on the right direction.

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apart from the first sentence....all you did was wank on about your sorry ass....the dude bleeds....give him respect or go to hell..

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So if you bleed you deserve respect??? well in that case ill start cutting myself tonight

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Bleeding usally means its time to stop. Though the blood will accelerate the oxidization of the strings causing them to rust (as already pointed out) just wait for your fingers to heal completly untill you play again and next time stop when you start getting sore, let me tell you from experiance rust slivers suck ass.

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yes...while your at it carve a band name into your penis..thats the ultimate respect..

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Not enough room, i already got scares of bands names all over my dick!

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I think that's enough for this thread.

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