HOW TO PLAY THIS MONTH'S SONGS

GUITARIST TRAVIS STEVER kicks off this driving, uptempo rock song with a punchy, syncopated lead riff in the key of D minor, playing in the 10th-position D minor penta-tonic “box” and aggressively digging into his note attacks with both hands (see bars 1-12).

- JIMMY BROWN

COHEED AND CAMBRIA

"Blind Side Sonny"

To keep things tight sounding, he applies a heavy palm mute (P.M.) on his low strings. On the studio recording, the muted “X” notes on the 6th string, which aren't intentional, sound low F notes, which is surprising, considering that the riff is performed in standard tuning. It's possible that those in-between notes might have been digitally pitch shifted up a half step (from E to F) in the mixing stage. In any case, when playing the song live, Travis avoids scratching his low E string here and focuses mainly on the intended melody notes played on the D, G and B strings, with any palm-muted scratches occurring on the A and/or D strings.

A key element that makes this riff come alive and speak is Stever's use of whole- and half-step string bends ("1" and “1/2") on the G string's 12th fret and fierce finger vibratos on the 10th-fret F notes. Notice how, starting in bar 3, the guitarist adds double-stops to these bent and shaken notes, by barring his 3rd and 1st fingers across the G and B strings at the 12th and 10th frets, respectively. Stever performs all the bends and vibratos here by pulling the string(s) downward, toward the palm, which produces a distinctly different sound and feel than that attained by pushing the string(s) upward, away from the palm.

The guitarist uses this same pulling technique for the vibratos he applies to the 10th-fret F and A notes during the chorus, in bars 31 and 35, and elsewhere in the song, except in bar 49. Here, the vibratos are on the high E string, where bending downward is simply not an option, as you'll end up pulling the string off the fretboard. In this case, Travis uses a push-bend technique to create vibrato.

THE RED CLAY STRAYS