Rock Essentials #1: Crunch Drive

Welcome to the Rock Essentials #1 lesson!


Here's a first portion of tools for rock playing. Most techniques are common for rock and metal but some of these are being used in a specific way - for example 1/4 step bends ornament. Rock guitar playing usually means less gain from the amp and more from the hand. Well known Plexi(1959, British crunch, Super Lead etc) amp/amp sim is one of best allies when it comes to creation a a tasty, chunky and sparkling rock tone. before going any further, get familiar with a few tips below.


How to make palm muting? Simply touch low strings with your soft part of the right palm. Spend some time to find a sweet spot moving your palm left and right across the strings. Proper palm muting should have very short sustain, a lot of percussive sound and that specific low boom for a very short moment, right after the hit. From the other side if You move your hand too far to the left, your sound will stay percussive, but will loose an information of what notes are being played, and will loose some of the low boost as well. You also need to find a sweet spot of palm pressure to the strings.

Make sure to use bridge pickup position. It's recommended to have humbucker pickup - it handles more distortion with less noise and it's much more tight/focused in the midrange.

Proper amount of gain (only as much as necessary) will be critical to keep things clear and tight. Too much gain will destroy good separation between notes, and will make the whole riffing sound blurry. Too much gain can cause less effort from player himself, and will affect the overall profit, that could have been taken from the lesson.


Gear used (in order of connection chain placement):

1. The Amber custom guitar (agathis body, maple neck, PRS SE low output bridge humbucker)
2. Presonus Inspire 1394 firewire audio interface (input gain 40%)
3. Poulin LeXtac vst plug-in:
- Channel - blue
- Input 50%
- Gain 70%
- Pre EQ - brighter
- Bass 50%
- Middle 40%
- Treble 60%
- Contour 100%
4. Kefir impulse loader (mix 100%)
5. Impulse - Catharsis s-preshigh

Tuning - Standard E

Backing track progression :

4/4
||: Am7 | % | Am6# | # | Am6 | % | Am | % :||
Dm | F | Am | C | D/F# | D/F G | Am6# | % |
Dm | F | Am | C | D/F# | D/F G | E7 | E7 Am ||



Tempo: Main song tempo is 130 bpm. There are also backing tracks available at 60, 75, 90, 110 and 130 bpm.

Time signature: 4/4

Scales used in this lesson:

A minor scale




A-dorian scale