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This Metal Licks free weekly guitar lesson series is by Scott Allen, who currently has an interactive TrueFire classroom called the “Metal Shop.” Tune in there for more from Scott, or subscribe to this series for more!

Video Guitar Lesson:

I am keen on looking at the history of rock guitar as we learn new tools to add to our arsenal, and this week’s tool was popularized by a certain Swede with a penchant for scalloped fret boards and Bach. Yngwie brought sweep picking to the masses and it can be argued that no one has done it better since he arrived on North American shores in the early eighties. That being said this sweep arpeggio example owes more to the brilliance of two modern day monsters, Chris Broderick and Jeff Loomis. These two fire breathers have raised the bar for technical playing considerably over the last few years as their bands Nevermore and Megadeth (which by the way also featured Marty Friedman another guy who knows his way around an arpeggio) have risen in the public spotlight.. This is all thanks to the modern revival of metal that has taken place in the last few years.

This example is an A major triad arpeggio that uses hammer ons to shift positions and also includes some tapping. It is critical to play this slow and gradually build up speed. Make sure to watch your picking hand and be sure to let the pick fall from string to string as you ascend and drag across the strings on the way back down. As always mute everything that you are not playing with a combination of your left and right hands. Remember one of the most critical aspects of playing rock and metal is taming the wild beast that is a loud and heavily distorted amp. Think of it as trying to tame a bucking bronco of destruction! Or is it distortion, hmm?!

This Metal Licks free weekly guitar lesson series is by Scott Allen, who currently has an interactive TrueFire classroom called the “Metal Shop.” Tune in there for more from Scott, or subscribe to this series for more!