blisterguy

“…which I’ll hopefully get finished later this week.” – March 8th, 2010

Well that clearly didn’t happen, and then continued to not happen for an extended period of time. That’s my bad, but sometimes life just gets in the way, and whatnot, but at least I’m finishing this, right?

Anyway, last time I covered the rhythm under the second solo and the transition into the last chorus, which continues to use the same rhythm established with the first chorus and continued through the second solo. Being only 8 16th notes long, it’s repeated twice each bar and fits perfectly, which is relatively un-Meshuggah-like. Just to be difficult though, most of the notes are syncopated, they fall off the count, like this:

.   .   .   .
xx-x-x-xxx-x-x-x

The melody follows a similar structure to the first chorus, but instead of being two bars long and repeated four times, it’s now four bars long, and repeated only twice. This is quite a shame, in my opinion, as between this passage and the rhythm under the first solo; they’re the parts that make the song so awesome.

The melody for this section poses a problem for the notation I’ve used until now, in that it goes as high as the 10th and 11th frets. Where each dash represented the interval of a 16th note, they’re now 32nd notes, so the rhythm looks like this:

x-x---x---x---x-x-x---x---x---x-  x-x---x---x---x-x-x---x---x---x-

The first half of the melody starts the way it did in the first chorus, but progresses further afield than it did the first time:

-5---4--10---11- -8---7--4---5- -1--
---------------- -------------- ----
--2-3-----9-8--- --5-6----3-2-- --0-

The second half pretty much reverses the patterns in the first half.

--5-4----10-11-- --8-7----4-5-- -----5---4-
---------------- -------------- --6--------
-2---3--9-----8- -5---6--3---2- -0----2-3-

In the first chorus, we had two groups of four, followed by a group of two, whereas this time we have four groups of four followed by a group of two. This means that one repetition of the second chorus ends up being slightly shorter than two repetitions of the first one. As you can see, there is an addition group of four at the end, which happens to be the same as the first group of four. Once these notes are imposed over the rhythm, you end up with this:

-------------------------------- --------------------------------
5---------4---10------11--8----- --7---4---------5-1-----------5-
-------------------------------- --------------------------------
--2---3---------9-8-----------5- 6---------3---2-------0---2-----

-------------------------------- --------------------------------
4---------10--11------8---7----- --4---5-----------5-----------4-
-------------------------------- ----------------6---------------
--3---9---------8-5-----------6- 3---------2---0-------2---3-----

As with the first chorus, I found the easiest way to learn this was to separate it into the ‘long notes’ and the ‘short notes’, playing one half of the melody only and then the other, substituting muted notes for the part of the melody I was skipping over, like this:

-------------------------------- --------------------------------
x-x-------4---x-x-x---11--8---x- x-x---4-------x-x-x-----------x-
x-x-----------x-x-x-----------x- x-x-----------x-x-x-----------x-
x-x---3-------x-x-x-----------x- x-x-------3---x-x-x---0---2---x-

-------------------------------- --------------------------------
x-x-------10--x-x-x---8---7---x- x-x---5-------x-x-x-----------x-
x-x-----------x-x-x-----------x- x-x-----------x-x-x-----------x-
x-x---9-------x-x-x-----------x- x-x-------2---x-x-x---2---3---x-

And then this:

-------------------------------- --------------------------------
5-----x---x---10------x---x----- --7---x---x-----5-1---x---x---5-
------x---x-----------x---x----- ------x---x-----------x---x-----
--2---x---x-----9-8---x---x---5- 6-----x---x---2-------x---x-----

-------------------------------- --------------------------------
4-----x---x---11------x---x----- --4---x---x-------5---x---x---4-
------x---x-----------x---x----- ------x---x-----6-----x---x-----
--3---x---x-----8-5---x---x---6- 3-----x---x---0-------x---x-----

However, once you’ve got this sorted, you also need to factor in when to slide your hand to the next part of the fretboard. If you just play the parts above as they’re notated, you’d be playing the 11-8 in the first part (the second two notes) with your pinky finger, then your index finger. Similarly, when you’re playing the second part, the 11-8-5 might seem a little daunting, until you realise you’ll be sliding your index finger from the 8th to the 5th fret. Even though you’re sliding, I think it’s best to pick the note at either end of the slide, but that’s purely up to you, and probably won’t make much difference if your amp’s up loud enough. Here is the entire riff with finger notations above.

1  = index
2  = middle
3  = ring
4  = pinky
(0)= open
/  = slide up
\  = slide down

4 1   2   3 /(3)2 1   4 \(4)  1  2 3 \(3)  2   1 4 1  (0)  1   4
-------------------------------- --------------------------------
5---------4---10------11--8----- --7---4---------5-1-----------5-
-------------------------------- --------------------------------
--2---3---------9-8-----------5- 6---------3---2-------0---2-----

3 2 /(2)  3   4 1\(1) 4   3   2\(2)3   4   1  (0)4 3   1   2   3
-------------------------------- --------------------------------
4---------10--11------8---7----- --4---5-----------5-----------4-
-------------------------------- ----------------6---------------
--3---9---------8-5-----------6- 3---------2---0-------2---3-----

The only part where I’ve deviated from the expected pattern is near the end of the second half, where you play a quick 0-6-5 where you’d expect to play a quick 0-1-5. As with the first chorus, this is to make it easier to dampen the open low string with your index and middle fingers as you fret the 6 with your pinky. If you play it as a 1, you’d have to fret that with your index finger, and use one of your other fingers to dampen the lower string, curved over so as not to dampen the string you’re actually trying to play. And before any of you suggest it, I’ve found palm muting the open low string insufficient for completely choking it off. Your results may differ, but the louder you’ve got your amp turned up, the harder it will be to completely stop that note with your picking hand. The downside to fretting it as a 6 is you’re then stretching from the 5 with your ring finger back to the 2 with your index, which can be slightly uncomfortable, but isn’t the end of the world. Additionally, any time you’re fretting a note on the higher string with your ring finger, you can get away with using your pinky. I usually do, which probably means I won’t grow up to be Steve Vai or Yngwie Malmsteen, but whatever.

Surprisingly, the picking style established over the majority of this song is relatively light and smooth, so the first time you go to transition into the outro, you’ll find yourself probably losing your grip on the pick, or sounding like some kind of un-Heavy Metal wuss who can’t play fast notes. As you near the end of the second repetition of the section above, it pays to consciously tighten your grip on the pick.

The outro is quite unlike the rest of the song, and not just because of the picking style, it also moves away from being 4/4 to being the equivalent of 9/4. Ordinarily this could make it feel like the pacing is suddenly dragging, but in this case, it just kinda throws you off your count. The riff is basically the open low string, and the complimentary ‘outside octave’ (the note one above the octave). It would be easier to play this on the 8th fret of the second string, but I suspect it’s actually played on the 3rd fret of the third string, so that it sounds brighter tonally. (Or just to be difficult, who knows?) The rhythm can be divided into sections based on how many times you play the higher note, as follows. Remember we’re breaking it down to 32nd note intervals now, not 16ths like we have in the previous parts of this series.

A
------------
--------3---
------------
0---000---0-

B
----------------
--------3---3---
----------------
0---000---0---0-

A
------------
--------3---
------------
0---000---0-

C
--------------------
--------3---3---3---
--------------------
0---000---0---0-----

A
------------
--------3---
------------
0---000---0-

So as you can see, it breaks down into A-B-A-C-A. The ‘A’s are 3/8, ‘B’ is 4/8 and ‘C’ is 5/8, combining to a grand total of 18/8, and because the 8 in this case is 8th notes, it’s actually 9/4. Or two bars of 9/8, whatever floats your boat. While I could notate the outro as two bars of 9/8, I think you’re better off just counting it as above. Where you’ll trip up is that last segment in the repetition, often heading on to the ‘B’ instead of playing a second ‘A’.

That’s it, that’s the whole song – well, the rhythm part, anyway – broken down purely for my own edification, and shared partly because it might be useful to someone somewhere, partly because it seems a waste not to, and entirely because I am an attention whore. Also, because I’m such a massive Meshuggah fanboy enthusiast, I’ll be doing this again with other Meshuggah songs, and while I know which songs I want to do, I’m certainly open to suggestions if anyone else wants me to tackle a Meshuggah song of their liking. No, I won’t be doing non-Meshuggah songs unless another band happens to catch my ear the same way as they have, but I rate that as reasonably unlikely in the short term.

Coming out of the first guitar solo, we transition – for the first time in this song – into a 4/4 rhythm, which makes the song feel like it’s shifted into a slightly higher gear without actually changing the tempo. You might have noticed the first verse and the section after the second verse did the opposite, when they broke out of 6/4, giving those a more laid back feel. This rhythm is played through this chorus, through the second guitar solo and through the second chorus as well. The rhythm is two 16th notes and three 8th notes (which is half a bar) and is heavily syncopated.

xx-x-x-xxx-x-x-x

In the same way as the intro rhythm, committing it to memory really helps when it comes to learning the melody that plays over it. Unlike the earlier sections and the upcoming second solo, the melodies over the choruses even divide evenly into the rhythm they play over. Something they do take from earlier though, is the use of ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ octaves – but now they’re combined as ‘outside’ octaves are turned in, and ‘inside’ turned out – within the melody, like this.

-5-----4--7-----8------
-------------------6---
---2-3------6-5------0-

As you can see, the 5-2 is immediately reversed into its inside counterpart, the 3-4. If your index finger is 1 and your pinky finger 4, then obviously the first three notes are fretted 4-1-2 and the last one can be played with either 3 or 4 – your ring finger or pinky. That’s then slid up to an ‘inside’ 7-6 and then reversed into an ‘outside’ 5-8, the fingering echoing the first half. The last two notes complete this half of the melody, and are also an ‘inside’ octave. You could play the 6 on the 1st fret of the higher string, but getting there from the 8th fret can be awkward, often resulting in a nasty finger wound from your locking nut. It can also create complications later on, potentially clashing with the open lower string half of the inside octave, and playing it on the 6th fret helps choke off the lower string, instead of having to use your palm. The second half of the melody is basically the reverse of the first half, like this:

---5-4------7-8--------
---------------------6-
-2-----3--6-----5--0---

It can be a little tricky when you first play this over the rhythm pattern, but listening to the song should help show you just how it fits. With the rhythm included, the following is the first chorus riff, which is played four times. I’ve included the last part of the first guitar solo section to show you the transition, which even fits in rhythmically and melodically:

3-----5--||----------------|----------------||
---5----1||5----4-7---8----|-5-4----78------||
-0-------||-------------6--|---------------6||
----2----||-2-3----65-----0|2----3-6---5-0--||

The best way to learn this part, I think, is to think of it as a group of three fast notes, followed by two long notes. Technically, the first of the fast group is the last note of the bar before. In the transition, it’s the 1st fret, but once you’re rolling through the chorus, I think it’s technically better to play it on the 6th. That means the first time you play the first note of the riff, it’s with your pinky finger, but on the remaining repetitions, it’s with your ring finger. This makes it a wee bit of a stretch down to the 2nd fret for the lower note, but as I said, if you play the last note as a 1st fret, that open low note before it is more difficult to control.

Anyway, I found this part a wee bit harder to learn than I probably should have, so in a similar way to the first solo section, I learned the rhythm first, and substituted in one section of notes at a time. I actually practiced both sets of notes separately, like this:

|----------------|----------------|
|xx---4-xxx-8---x|xx-4---xxx-----x|
|xx-----xxx---6-x|xx-----xxx-----x|
|xx-3---xxx-----x|xx---3-xxx-5-0-x|

|----------------|----------------|
|5--x-x-7---x-x--|-5-x-x--78-x-x--|
|---x-x-----x-x--|---x-x-----x-x-6|
|-2-x-x--65-x-x-0|2--x-x-6---x-x--|

Once it comes together, it seems quite easy, which is probably why I felt a bit like the slow kid in a Class of One while learning this part. To make matters worse, the next part should be even easier, because it uses the same rhythm, but it took me even longer to get. The melody under the second solo is six notes long over a rhythm of five notes, so once again we’re back to a cyclical pattern. This is the melody:

-------------
-5---4-------
---------6---
---2---3---0-

While the rhythm is the same as the choruses either side of it, the notes in the rhythm are not played on the same strings. In the first chorus, the note pattern is upupdown, down, up, updowndown, up, up, downdownup, up, down, downupup, down, down (wow, that looks silly). For the second solo, the note pattern is upupdown, up, down, updownup, down, up, downupdown, and so on. Yep, that’s a ridiculous way to put it. To put it another way, if the 6th fret note was instead played on the 1st fret of the same string of the other notes – which is an option, and I’ve learned to play it that way as well – then the rhythm pattern would look like this for all eight bars:

|----------------|
|x--x---x-x---x--|
|----------------|
|-x---x--x--x---x|

Again, a group of three fast notes and two longer notes. This time, alternating up-down all the way through. The rhythm and melody patterns cycle back to meet each other after only three bars, so it’s not too bad to keep track of. I found that the second to last note in the bar – the last high note – was the best way to follow where I was up to. Here are the three bars of the cycle. The first key note being 4, the second 5 and the third 6:

|----------------|----------------|----------------|
|5--4-----5---4--|---5---4-----5--|4------5-4------|
|-------6--------|6--------6------|---6---------6--|
|-2---3--0--2---3|-0---2--3--0---2|-3---0--2--3---0|

I like to label each bar by that note, so the order over the eight bars is 4-5-6-4 then 5-6-4-5. The last bar is unique in this song in that it actually has an actual fill (omg) at the end to lead into the second chorus, like this:

|----------------|-------
|---5---4-----54-|5----4-
|6--------6------|-------
|-0---2--3--0---0|-2-3---

You’ll notice that the rhythm breaks the pattern as well, making it three 16th notes leading into the second chorus, which – because it shares the rhythm with this section and the first chorus – also starts with a 16th note, making it a relatively fast chain of notes, as far as the rest of song goes. Until the outro, of course, but that’ll be covered in the final part of this series, which I’ll hopefully get finished later this week.

And now on to the section we’ve all been waiting for! Yeah, that’s probably the royal ‘we’ but whatever. The first guitar solo marks a definite change in the overall voice of the song. The first half of the song plays around the lower register, fiddling about with ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ octaves, but not straying far from the second fret, preferring to make its movements chromatically. While this section does have a guitar solo playing over it, it’s the rhythm guitar that really shines here – the solo melody is mostly complimentary to the rhythm melody. Finally breaking the ‘almost octave’ patterns from the first half of the song, this part thankfully uses the same rhythm pattern as the intro, the second verse and the part before it. Here it is again, although you should really have this one down, by now;

xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-xx-x--xx-

As I’ve described previously, this is 24 16th notes long, making this rhythm 6/4. This section is, of course, 16 4/4 bars, so the rhythm is once again repeated ten and a bit times. Previously, the melodies played over this rhythm have been shorter than it, making it relatively easy to fit over the rhythm. I advised the best way to do this was to master the rhythm, and while it’s not really that important to do that for those earlier sections, it’s even more important now than it was with the section before the pre chorus.

You know, I’m beginning to think I should have numbered the sections, or something.

While the rhythm is 24 16th notes long, it has 14 notes in it. Previously the melody patterns have usually been 8 notes long. Through this section, the melody pattern is 36 notes long, but it’s not nearly as bad as it sounds, as this is really just two different 8 note patterns repeated twice with a 2 note fill thrown in. These are the melody pattern sub-sections:

|-3-----5--2--|-3-----------|----|
|----5---1----|----5--5--2--|-4--|
|--0--------3-|--0-----4--1-|----|
|-----2-------|-----2-------|--2-|

The 36 notes are separated into two halves that both end with those last two notes, which are strangely enough, an actual proper octave, for once. The first half is what’s written above. In the second half, the first section is played second, and the second played first. Like this:

|-3-----------|-3-----5--2--|----|
|----5--5--2--|----5---1----|-4--|
|--0-----4--1-|--0--------3-|----|
|-----2-------|-----2-------|--2-|

Another way to look at it is once you get going, you basically play one sub-section twice, with the 4-2 in between them, then the other sub-section twice, again with the 4-2 jammed in the middle. Before taking this anywhere near the rhythm, just play through it slowly until you get how it goes. It’ll sound kind of odd, but it’ll get your fingers used to playing the pattern of the melody. As to which fingers to use for each note, it should be reasonably straight forward. If your index finger is 1 and your pinky is 4, then I would suggest this would be the best way to fret the melody:

3- 41 41 12 3- 41 43 21 31 3- 41 43 21 3- 41 41 12 31

3-----5--2--3--------------3-----------3-----5--2-----
---5---1-------5--5--2--4-----5--5--2-----5---1----4--
-0--------3--0-----4--1-----0-----4--1--0--------3----
----2-----------2--------2-----2-----------2--------2-

If you remember back in part two, I presented a way of expressing these riffs as a single string of notes instead of all three or four strings. Clearly not something that would make sense without the above sections, but once you know which strings you’re playing the notes on, it’s fine. However, when I was typing out a reference line like that while I was learning this part, I found it helpful to separate it across to two lines, instead of one, to at least help me visualise what I was playing.

3--5--5--2--3--5--5--2--4--3--5--5--2--3--5--5--2--4--
-0--2--1--3--0--2--4--1--2--0--2--4--1--0--2--1--3--2-

Once you impose this melody over the 6/4 rhythm, it starts to look like this. This is two repetitions of the rhythm, and not quite a full repetition of the melody:

3--5---5--2--3--5----5--2--4---3--5--5--2----3--
-0---2--1--3---0--2---4--1---2--0--2---4--1---0-

I’ll type out the whole section in a moment, but it shouldn’t really be necessary. If you have the rhythm down well enough, playing the melody over it isn’t as bad as it sounds. Given the fact that the first repetition of the melody has a different overall rhythm to the second one, each repetition of the melody is technically a slightly different length. That said, each one ends up being almost four bars long, so it’s easy to figure out where you are throughout this part based on which repetition you’re playing.

The way I eased myself into playing through the whole section was to first just play the rhythm as muted notes (where your left hand lays flat over the strings instead of fretting an actual note, achieving a percussive sound). I then substituted in the notes as they land on ‘the fill’, like this.

-------------3----------------------------------
xx-x-x-xx-xx----5----xx-xx-x-x-xx-xx-5--2----xx-
xx-x-x-xx-xx---0-----xx-xx-x-x-xx-xx---4--1--xx-
xx-x-x-xx-xx------2--xx-xx-x-x-xx-xx---------xx-

Once I had that sorted, I added in the long pair of notes, like this:

-------------3----------------------------------
xx-5---xx-xx----5----xx-xx-4---xx-xx-5--2----xx-
xx-----xx-xx---0-----xx-xx-----xx-xx---4--1--xx-
xx---2-xx-xx------2--xx-xx---2-xx-xx---------xx-

It may seem like this is just a way of wrote-learning the section, but for me, it was just a way of familiarising myself with how it flowed. I certainly couldn’t recite any given bar of this part, if prompted, but I can pick it up at any point and slip into playing the melody over the rhythm based on what notes I’m playing over the fill or the long pair of notes. From there, the rest of it just fills itself in. Here is the entire section separated into the repetitions of the melody. I’ve marked with dots each bar, and with x’s each repetition of the rhythm, for ease of navigation:

x               .       x       .               x
3--5---5--2--3--5----5--2--4---3--5--5--2----3--5--5---2--4--
-0---2--1--3---0--2---4--1---2--0--2---4--1---0--2---1--3--2-

   .       x       .               x               .       x
3--5----5--2--3---5--5--2--4----3--5--5---2--3--5--5----2--4--
--0--2---1--3---0--2--4---1--2---0--2---4--1--0---2--1---3--2-

     .               x               .       x       .
3---5--5--2--3----5--5--2---4--3--5--5----2--3--5---5--2--4--
--0--2--1---3--0---2--4---1--2--0---2--4---1--0---2--1--3---2

        x               .       x       .               x
3----5--5--2---3--5--5--2----4--3--5---5--2--3--5----5--2--4---
--0---2--1---3--0--2---4--1---2--0---2--4--1---0--2---1--3---2-

3--5--5--
-0--2---1

As you can see, the last six notes are the start of a new melodic repetition, but there’s so few of them I like to consider them part of the transition to the first chorus. Don’t let the name of that section alarm you, though, we’re not far from the end of the song. There’s just the first chorus and the second guitar solo, which we’ll cover next time, and the second chorus and the outro, which we’ll cover in the final part.

This part will be the last part before the song gets really interesting, but don’t take this to mean that what I’m about to cover is easy. There are two sections left to cover before the first guitar solo. What I like to describe as the ‘pre chorus’ – even though the song doesn’t fit the classic verse/chorus pattern – and the section that precedes it, following the second verse. The pre chorus is probably the easiest part of the song, I’ll probably cover that in like, five and a half words at the end of this, so let’s get stuck into the part of this song I left until last when learning it.

Up until this section, with the exception of the first verse and its ‘almost free-form’ feel, the song has been a 6/4 rhythm over a 4/4 skeleton. Through the next eight bars, the rhythm changes to 9/8 over the 4/4. With 128 16th notes available in these eight bars, the 9/8 rhythm pattern can be repeated 7 times with an 8th note left over. This is the rhythm:

xx-x-x-x-xx-x-x-x-

Okay, that could be two repetitions of a shorter 9/16 rhythm, but with the way it interacts with the melody, I think it’s better to express it as 9/8. Playing the rhythm isn’t really that difficult, especially once you listen to the recording. The string selection in the melody follows the intro and first verse, as opposed to the ‘inside octave’ section and the second verse, so when you look at the rhythm with the melody in mind, it looks like this:

x--x---x--x---x---
------------------
-x---x---x--x---x-

This should hopefully show why I prefer to think of the rhythm as 9/8 instead of 9/16. Because it’s an uneven number of notes, the second time you play the rhythm, you’re playing the pattern in the opposite direction, as far as the strings are concerned. Updown, up, down, up, downup, down, up, down.

Previously, the melody patterns have been shorter than the 6/4 rhythm pattern, 8 melody notes played over 14 rhythm notes. Now the rhythm is only 10 notes long, and the melody is 14 notes long, characterised by a jump from 4-1 back up to 6-3.

6--5--4--6--5--4--5--
---------------------
-3--2--1--3--2--1--2-

I find the best way to keep track of this whole section is to again keep track of when and how you play the 6-3, but this time, also paying attention to the rhythm around it. The first time you play the 6-3, it’s a 16th note followed by an 8th, making it a fast pair. The second time the 16th note lands immediately before the 6-3, and the third time immediately after it. To help illustrate this, and to demonstrate the transition, here are the first two bars and the bar leading up to them.

                  vv        v v             v v
----------------||6--5---4--6---5-|--4--5---6--5---|
----------------||----------------|----------------|
2-1--32-43-3-2-2||-3---2---1--3---|2--1---2---3--2-|

Playing through this part following the rhythm and letting the melody flow doesn’t work especially well here. Before you know it, you’ll be jumping back to the 6-3 when you should be stepping back to it via a 5-2. You need to be able to play the rhythm without thinking about it, practicing the updown, up, down, up, and so on, until it becomes second nature. I recommended this with the intro, but this is where it actually pays off. Now that the melody is a little more complicated, I find that it’s still important to know where the rhythm interacts with the key points in the melody, the 6-3’s. Here are all eight bars, separated into the melodic repetitions, with the rhythm around the 6-3’s marked out and numbered. Note; the first note in the first repetition is actually the last note of the previous section – the transition note. The first note in subsequent repetitions is actually the last note of the repetition before it:

 1         2
vvv v     vv v v
-6--5---4--6---5---4--5-
------------------------
2-3---2---1--3---2--1---

  3          1
v v vv     v vv v
--6--5---4---6--5---4--5-
-------------------------
2---3--2---1--3---2---1--

  4          3
v v v v    v v vv
--6---5--4---6--5---4---5
-------------------------
2---3--2---1---3--2---1--

 5          4
v v v v    v v v v
--6---5--4---6---5--4---5
-------------------------
2---3---2--1---3--2---1--

  2          5
 vv v v    v v v v
--6---5---4--6---5--4---5-
--------------------------
-2--3---2--1---3---2--1---

  1
v vv
--6-|
----|
2--3|

The numbers highlight a rhythmic pattern (just watch out for the transition note; it can be a little off-putting). Each repetition of the melody, the second 6-3 is the same as the first 6-3 in the repetition before it. This still takes some practice, but you’ll get there. Personally, I kept stumbling on the fourth melodic repetition, and for some reason, ended up playing the third one again.

(Practice it again, and again!)

Anyway, on to the easy part, because after that is the awesome part. This is what I described earlier as the pre chorus. It uses a variation of the intro rhythm, and lasts 16 bars, just like the intro did. This means that once again, the rhythm repeats ten times over 15 bars, and the last bar has the first two thirds of it. Where this rhythm differs from that of the intro is that the last two notes are skipped in favour of extending the dotted 8th note into a dotted fourth, like this.

xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-xx-x-----

What makes this easy is the melody, or in this case, the lack of it. The dotted fourth is the only note not played on the open low string, and it’s just an octave up. It is gradually bent up half a step towards the dotted end of the note, but that’s about it. The only thing remotely difficult is the palm-muting, which is the same as in the second verse. Here are two repetitions of this riff, with the transition from the previous section:

--5---6-|----------------|----------------|----------------|
--------|----------------|--7-------------|----------7-----|
1---2--3|00-0-0-00-00-0-0|0-------00-0-0-0|0-00-0-00-------|
         .  .   .  .  .   .       .  .   .   .  .  .

Next up we’ll get stuck into the part of this song that initially caught my ear. It’s also the most complicated section of the song, but don’t despair, if I can learn it, then even a half deaf, all blind, fermented cabbage leaf can learn it. Err, not that I’m suggesting you’re a half deaf, all blind, fermented cabbage leaf…

Bonus section!

Just now as I’m posting this, I realised that the next section is going to go long if I don’t write about the transition now. As I mentioned earlier, the last bar of the pre chorus is just the first two thirds of the pre chorus riff. Unlike the transition from the intro to the second verse, the rhythm doesn’t just continue along, it restarts the intro rhythm again. (Yes, the rhythm under the first solo helpfully uses the intro rhythm.) Here is the last bar of the pre chorus and the first few notes under the solo:

|----------------|3-----
|----------------|---5--
|----------------|-0----
|00-0-0-00-00-0-0|-----2
 .  .   .  .  .

The skip from the open low string up to that 3rd fret can be a little awkward, so for the first note of this section, I prefer to fret it on the 8th fret – down a string – instead. I only do this on the first note of this section, though, the rest are on the 3rd fret. This is how I play the transition:

|----------------|------
|----------------|8--5--
|----------------|-0----
|00-0-0-00-00-0-0|-----2
 .  .   .  .  .

So until next time, keep practicing. Or don’t, it doesn’t really matter to me if anyone is actually learning this with me, I’m just enjoying writing it down. ^_^

When I started learning this song, I skipped straight from the intro to the rhythm under the first solo. I had intended to learn it sequentially, but couldn’t resist diving headfirst into my favourite part. From there I learned the last half of the song before heading back to pick up what amounts to the less interesting half of the song. I’m embarrassed to relate that I assumed these parts were more complicated than actually are. Based on the fact that the first verse was (what appeared to be) practically random, I expected the subsequent sections to be just as haphazard. The next two sections – the second verse and the eight bars preceding it – both use the same rhythm as the intro, and I didn’t actually figure that out until I cracked out the pen and paper and got stuck into them.

Okay, so I used notepad. That’s possibly doubly embarrassing.

The intro rhythm, just to refresh your memory, is 24 16th notes long, therefore taking up a bar and a half.

xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-xx-x–xx-

The first of our two sections today reverses the melody from the intro somewhat. Previously the first note in the shape was an octave and a semitone higher than the second. This time the first note is the same but down an octave, and the second note is the same but up an octave. For now, I’m going to call the original shape an ‘outside octave’ and the one shown below an “inside octave’. Later on in the song, we’ll be mixing those up quite a bit, so I’m naming them now to make it easier when we get to it. The Melody (minus the rhythm) is now:

-4–3–4–5-
————
3–2–3–4–

Just to be confusing – of course – the first notes of this section are not 3-4 (3rd fret on the lower string this time, then the 4th fret on the higher string). While this section is played to the intro rhythm, it starts with the last third of it, in the same way the first verse does (known in Learning PGO part two as rhythm grouping number 2). However, this time it isn’t to continue a repetition of the rhythm, so the transition isn’t as obvious as before. But fear not, there is a reason for this. The eight bars can be broken down to 128 16th notes, which leaves room for five repetitions of the 24 16th note rhythm, with 8 16th notes in change. With the 8 16th note partial rhythm at the start, the last bar ends on time with fifth repetition of the rhythm. The following is the rhythm for the last bar of the first verse, and the two bars that follow:

      intro rhythm begins|
x-x--xx-xx-x-x-x||x-x--xx-xx-x-x-x|x-xx-x-xx-x--xx-|

Now with the melody included:

      intro rhythm begins|
3----4--5--4---3||--5---4--3---4--|5--4---3--4---5-|
----------------||----------------|----------------|
--0---1--2---1--||4----3--2--3---4|--3--2--3----4--|

By the end of the second bar, the last third of the rhythm and one repetition of it have been completed exactly. With six bars left, there’s exactly enough room for the remaining four repetitions before the second verse.

The second verse continues the rhythm seamlessly, and also being eight bars long, means it ends up with an extra 8 16th notes in the same way the section before it had them at the start. Because the section following the second verse does something yet unseen rhythmically in the song, it doesn’t need to flow through like it did going from the intro to the verse, or from the joining section to the second verse. We’ll talk about this transition later; let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

The Melody over the second verse is again similar to both the intro melody and the section leading into it. This time, it’s using the low notes from each, to create the following notes:

------------
------------
32-21-32-43-

The first note in each of these pairs is always palm-muted (the string is dampened by the palm on the picking hand to muffle the note partially). This means your palm will be pressing and releasing frequently over the course of this verse. If it feels too difficult to get right now, the section that’s probably best described as the pre-chorus leading into the first solo uses this same technique but on the open low string, so it’s a much better riff to practice it on. The following is the first two bars of the second verse and the bar leading into it. I’ve marked the palm-muting with dots under the notes:

 2nd verse begins|                        |
5--4---3--4---5-||----------------|----------------|
----------------||----------------|----------------|
--3--2--3----4--||32-2-1-32-43-3-2|2-1--32-43-3-2-2|
                  .  .   .  .  .   .    .  .  .   .

You might notice that that last bar before the second verse is the same as the second bar in that section rhythmically and melodically. Remember, while the melody and the rhythm are different lengths, they will cycle around to meet each other again. The fifth bar in that section is also the same as the second and eighth rhythmically, but not melodically, because they’re out of sync at that point. Here is the entire eight bars and the first far of the second verse. I’ve put three bars to a line, in part because that’s what fits within wordpress, but also because three bars is two repetitions of the rhythm, so you can see how it repeats out of sync with the melody.

|--5---4--3---4--|5--4---3--4---5-|-4---3--4--5---4|
|----------------|----------------|----------------|
|4----3--2--3---4|--3--2--3----4--|3--2---3--4--3--|

|--3---4--5---4--|3--4---5--4---3-|-4---5--4--3---4|
|----------------|----------------|----------------|
|2----3--4--3---2|--3--4--3----2--|3--4---3--2--3--|

|--5---4--3---4--|5--4---3--4---5-|----------------|
|----------------|----------------|----------------|
|4----3--2--3---4|--3--2--3----4--|32-2-1-32-43-3-2|

Next time we’ll go over the transition of the second verse into the section that plays before the pre-chorus, the unusual rhythm within that section (9/8 over 4/4 – intimidating!) and the pre-chorus, which is much easier. A nice break before things get really complicated.

If you missed my correction in Part One, I woke up one night realizing what I had described as “a pair of 16th notes” was actually a 16th note followed by an 8th note, and I have no idea why I decided to call them that, other than the fact that I’m clearly very rusty when it comes to notating guitar tab. So onwards, let’s all pretend I got that one right from the offset. Cough, and so on.

The first verse of this song is the one section of the song that doesn’t seem to adhere to a set pattern, rhythmically, or if there is one (which is quite possible) I haven’t found it. Parts of the Rhythm are similar to the rhythm in the intro, and the melody is almost exactly the same, but down half a step. This means that the chord shape is broken at the lowest point, where the low note is the open string. At first the rhythm follows that of the intro, which helps the fact that the sixteen bars of the intro ended two thirds of the way through the eleventh repetition of the rhythm. The last bar of the intro and the transition into the first two bars of the verse are as follows. I’ve marked where the eleventh repetition of the rhythm ends above:

Intro rhythm ends - - ->|
5--6---5--4--5--|6----5--4--3---4|--5--4----3--4--
----------------|----------------|----------------
-2---3--2--1---2|--3---2--1---0--|1--2---1---0---1

As you can see, while the rhythm continues on track for the first bar, the melody moves down a half step. The second bar is where the rhythm falls away from what was established during the intro. There are three different rhythm groupings played through the verse, which could be considered part of a pattern, but as there are only eight bars in this verse, and this potential pattern is four and a half bars long, there’s no real way to verify that it is actually a pattern. These are the three rhythm groupings, which I have numbered:

xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-x--xx- (1)
x-x--xx- (2)
x-xx-x--xx- (3)

The first grouping is practically the same as the intro rhythm, but the first two notes of ‘the fill’ have been left out, making it 21 16th notes long instead of 24. The second grouping is the last four notes of both the first grouping and the intro rhythm, at 8 16th notes long. The last grouping is the last six notes of the intro rhythm, at 11 16th notes long. This seems easy enough, but once arranged it isn’t quite as easy as it sounds. Once again, it’s the last two notes of ‘the fill’ that help you keep track of what’s going on. You’ll notice each grouping ends in those two notes, followed by the pair of 16ths that follow them in the intro rhythm as well. The verse actually begins with the second grouping, because as I said, it’s quite conveniently what was left of the intro rhythm going into the verse. The order goes like this, with numberings to help:

x-x--xx- (2)
xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-x--xx- (1)
x-x--xx- (2)
x-xx-x--xx- (3)
xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-x--xx- (1)
x-xx-x--xx- (3)
xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-x--xx- (1)
x-x--xx- (2)
x-xx-x--xx- (3)
xx-x-x-x (1, partially)

Note that the last line is just the first part of the first grouping, before it goes into the eight bars between the first and second verse. Thankfully, the melody that’s transposed over this rhythm is easy; otherwise this part would be a real headache. Concentrate on the rhythm groupings, and the melody should flow over it nicely. This is the last bar of the intro followed by all eight bars of the verse, with the rhythm groupings marked out.

Intro rhythm ends  - - ->|                     |
5--6---5--4--5--||6----5--4--3---4|--5--4----3--4--
----------------||----------------|----------------
-2---3--2--1---2||--3---2--1---0--|1--2---1---0---1

    |          |                      |          |
--5--4--3----4--|5--4---3--4--5--|--4--3--4----5--
----------------|----------------|----------------
---2---1--0---1-|-2---1--0--1---2|---1---0--1---2-

                     |       |           |
4--3---4--5--4--|--3--4----5--4--|3----4--5--4---3
----------------|----------------|----------------
-1---0--1--2---1|---0---1---2---1|--0---1--2---1--

Admittedly, this looks a little difficult to follow, so here is a version I wrote out for myself, where I have grouped both strings together:

Intro rhythm ends - - ->|                     |
52-6-3-52-41-5-2|6-3--52-41-3-0-4|1-52-4-1--30-4-1

    |          |                      |          |
--52-4-13-0--41-|52-4-1-30-41-5-2|--41-3-04-1--52-

                     |       |           |
41-3-0-41-52-4-1|--30-4-1--52-4-1|3-0--41-52-4-1-3

Okay, this too can be a little difficult to follow, so here is again, but split up into the rhythm groupings:

6-3--52-
41-3-0-41-52-4-1--30-
4-1--52-
4-13-0--41-
52-4-1-30-41-5-2--41-
3-04-1--52-
41-3-0-41-52-4-1--30-
4-1--52-
4-13-0--41-
52-4-1-3

What’s interesting here, is that the pattern that I suspect exists, starts on the second line, and plays through the next two groupings, then the next long one, and the shorter one after that (lines two through six). It begins again on line seven, and is not just rhythmically the same as the first repetition, but is even the same notes melodically, which is probably just a co-incidence more than anything. Of course, the verse runs out of space before the second repetition can resolve and transitions into the next part, which I will cover next time.

Last week I mentioned I was going show you how to play “Pineal Gland Optics,” a song I’ve been slowly learning over the last few months. I’ve been meaning to break it down in writing for some time now, and go over each part, describing how I went about learning it, and in some ways, am still learning it. It’s actually one of the reasons I wanted to kick this blog off, so I had somewhere to post about it. As of right now, I pretty much have the entire song down, technically and as far as memorising it goes. I’m quite certain I’m not feeling the groove how the band would just yet.

The song starts relatively low-key, rolling and grooving around the lower registers until the breaking open half way through, into a seemingly complicated instrumental break. I say ‘seemingly’ because it doesn’t seem so difficult to play now, and ‘instrumental break’ instead of guitar solo, because the lead guitar plays a simple melody while it’s the rhythm guitar that seems like it goes everywhere.

The main rhythm that gets the song going is 6/4 over 4/4, which is pretty simple, as far as Meshuggah rhythms go, and features a great deal of tasty syncopation (playing off the beat). 6/4 over 4/4 means the rhythmic pattern lasts a bar and a half, and has been repeated twice after three bars, and so on. While most bands toying with unusual time signatures would just repeat the 6/4 riff a certain number of times, probably a number that isn’t a power of two, just to be ‘interesting’, Meshuggah will somehow make it flow through the 4/4 base time. For this intro, they fit ten and two thirds of this 6/4 rhythm into the opening 16 bars. More on how this works within the song later. This is the riffs rhythm, with the dots above showing where the beat is:

.   .   .   .   .   .
xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-xx-x--xx-

Twenty four 16th notes is pretty straight forward, and barely even feels like a polyrhythm (which technically, it isn’t, I’m learning). The first thing I did was commit this rhythm to memory by tapping it out on my thigh while my mind wandered at the computer, or as I rode the bus, or waited to cross the street, and I suspect, in my sleep. The first thing I noticed is that the rhythm actually flows more like this:

xx-xx-x-x-xx-xx-x-xx-x--

Two pairs of 16th notes, followed by a two 8th notes, then another two pairs of 16th notes, then a little flourish into the longest note in the pattern, a dotted 8th note (which means the note lasts 50% longer than normal). This ‘flourish and long note’ is what stands out in each repetition, and is an 8th note, then a 16th note, then a 8th note again, before the dotted 8th. It sounds like the riff has a skip in its step, the dotted 8th highlighting the moment just enough that your ear is attracted to it. For lack of a better word, I’m going to call it ‘the fill’ from here on in. If you were to get lost, it would be the easiest part of the riff to pick up the beat. While it’s easier to think of the rhythm being like the second example, it’s not only better practice to count it as in the first example, but it’s easier in the long run, as far as the rest of this song is concerned. A pair of 16ths, two 8ths, two pairs of 16ths, the fill and then another pair of 16ths.

(CORRECTION: I’m aware they aren’t actually ‘pairs of 16th notes’ but rather a 16th note followed by an 8th note. I don’t know why I called them that, I’m way too out of practice when it comes to notating music I guess, but it’s certainly easier than saying ‘a 16th note followed by an 8th note’. I’ll try to come up with a better description in future entries.)

The notes played over this rhythm are also pretty simple. It’s a popular Meshuggah interval, 13 semitones apart, which is just a fancy way of saying the higher note is an octave and a half-step higher than the low one. An octave shape on a guitar is usually the index finger on the low note, and either the ring or pinky on the high note, two frets and two strings up. With this interval, the higher note is three frets up, and should pretty much always be fretted with the ring finger, unless you’re like, capable of palming a medium to large frying pan. This shape is moved up and down one fret at a time, and played as single notes as opposed to chords, which makes it feel a bit like an amputee spider crawling up and down the fretboard. The notes of the opening riff, without the rhythm, are as follows:

5---4---5---6---
----------------
--2---1---2---3-

What’s interesting about this is when you overlay the note pattern over the rhythm pattern, they don’t immediately sync up. In a random aside, it reminds me of a passage from Neal Stephenson’s ‘Cryptonomicon’ comparing a cryptographic system to a bike chain and its interactions with the cogs and an errant spoke on the bike. Ordinarily, with most music, the number of notes in the melody and the rhythm would be equal, or would at least sub-divide into the other. The melody would repeat at the same rate as the rhythm. With this song, there are 8 notes in the melody, and 14 notes in the rhythm, so by the time the first repetition of the rhythm is ending, you’re three quarters of the way through second repetition of the melody. Eventually, the two will sync up again, so what we’re looking for here is the common denominator, which is 56. 4×14, and 7×8. When you’ve played the rhythm four times, you’ve played the melody seven times.

While you could memorise six bars of music, it’s much easier to learn the rhythm to the point it becomes second nature, and then impose the melody over it. With this melody, it’s very easy, but later on in the song, it gets much more difficult, so this is definitely the approach you’d want to take. Once you can play the rhythm and melody together naturally, you can either count the bars or the number of times you’ve played the rhythm, or you can find other cues. As I mentioned earlier, ‘the fill’ stands out nicely. I use the last two notes of the fill, as shown here, to tell me when I am:

5--4---5--6--5--|4----5-- 6--5---4|--5--6--5----4--
----------------|-------- --------|----------------
-2---1--2--3---2|--1---2- -3---2--|1--2---3--2---1-
                 ^ ^                       ^ ^

5--6---5--4--5--|6----5-- 4--5---6|--5--4--5----6--
----------------|-------- --------|----------------
-2---3--2--1---2|--3---2- -1---2--|3--2---1--2---3-
                 ^ ^                       ^ ^

The first time you come to it, the last pair of notes in the fill are 4-1 (as in 4th fret on the higher string, then 1st fret on the lower string) the second time you play 5-2, then 6-3, and then 5-2 again, and so on. I’ve found it easiest to count every time I play the last two notes of the fill as 6-3. The first verse starts on the third repetition of the 6-3 fill, so following that makes counting through the sixteen bars of the intro a breeze, even though I’ve only posted six of those bars here (four repetitions of the rhythm, and seven of the melody) that’s all you need to play it. More about this transition and the first verse it plays into, next time!

One of the upsides to living in Sydney is the dramatic increase in International Live Music traipsing across my doorstep, and it’s actually stuff I want to see! Usually, when a band heads down this way, they might make it to New Zealand. If they do, it’ll be one show in Auckland only. Unless they’re Tool. I’m pretty sure Tool have played in Christchurch like, five times now. When I moved to Sydney a year ago, I didn’t consider the ramifications of it being the first place a band would stop in at, if they packed their gear and headed south to entertain a few thousand fans. Therefore, in May last year, I was oblivious when Morbid Angel played what was apparently a kick-ass show within twenty minutes walk of my work. In October, I happened upon a whiteboard in a shop window advertising an Opeth show, but I couldn’t quite find money for a ticket, with our impending trip to the States after Christmas.

There are two artists who I would probably travel to Sydney to see, if I still lived in New Zealand. Two artists I would sell a kidney to raise funds to get to, I would crawl over crushed glass, I would swim through freezing Arctic waters, I would flap my arms as hard as I could to fly as far as I had to just to… okay, well, I’d try really hard, anyway. One of them, Devin Townsend, has retired from touring to raise a child. No wait, he’s recording four consecutive albums as the Devin Townsend Project. No wait, he’s touring for the first time in three years as the Devin Townsend Project. In Australia and New Zealand, no less. The DTP will be playing a Saturday night in March up the street from my work. Naturally, I’ll be in Kuala Lumpur, getting all journalistic about the Magic; the Gathering Grand Prix that weekend. heh. I plan on flying back to New Zealand the weekend after to catch him in Auckland, fingers crossed I can pull that off.

In two weeks, the other artist, Meshuggah (obviously) will be playing a bar on the opposite side of the very campus I work on. How could it get any better than that? Well, I’ll tell you. Mat, the man behind imwiththeband.com has offered me the chance to review and photograph the gig. Not because I’m some crash-hot reviewer or photographer, mind you, but because Mat’s wife Cath used to work with Heidi. That and he’s a nice guy. It’s who you know, folks. So, I’ll have to brush up my concert photography skills, which currently don’t exist, but I have a couple of weeks, right?