25 - Walk (Pantera)

Known from the dawn of time! One of Dimebag Darrell's coolest guitar riffs and solos. Took me a WHILE to get this down. And even still...it's just so fast and articulate. He his style is one of a kind. 

Let's breakdown your song:

https://learn.danbarracuda.com/breakdown

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Alright, let's get into some Pantera. Here's the lock. Dimebag Daryl is incredibly authentic. But he reminds me of Eddie and Randy Rhodes. They kind of have this playful but virtuosic approach to the guitar. You know, within like the hard rock category. Obviously, Pantera's metal. But Dimebag has such a unique tone, too, right? And we'll get to the solo, but let me just cover some of the riffs that go along with the song. Uh the riff is incredibly simple. It's just one fret. So we got the open string. It really is like a walking riff, like bum bada down up. It's like a great walking pace, like you're strolling along. It's so heavy, it's so easy to headbang to. Now when it starts doing the other chords, we got so those three chords we got that's the minor six. That's the tritone, that's a devil note. And then this is great. So that's just one and one on the A and D string, but that is actually the E flat power chord. What's the major seventh power chord? By the way, I am tuned down a full step across, right? I'm in D standard. So Minor six. Tritone. Major seventh, like perfect intervals to create like a demonic kind of sinister sound because the minor six is like sad. And the tritone is devilish. And then the major seventh is the major seventh is like a tritone in the sky, and putting them together. I love that. And that's actually the chorus riff, but they play it early on in the song, right? Before the singing starts. And in this part, that's 1-3-4-3-1. Those are the frets. I know they didn't approach it this way, but they're playing around with the Phrygian scale and the Phrygian dominant scale. Because when you do the first fret, that's Phrygian, right? It's a flat second, but then when you go play that major third, that's Phrygian dominant, because dominant, it's got a major third now. Just more sinister notes when you put them together like that, the minor third and the major third, along with the flat second. And then Phil Anselmo's melody. Can't you see? I'm easily bothered by persistence! Like just bluesy. I love the call, just have a friend! He has such a crazy delivery. And then when it goes to this next section, I can't do it. But that's the minor seventh. More colors being introduced. I've been belong. Self self-step wave. This part's sick. I wish I could scream like him. Oh my god! Just descending into madness. Oh here's a minor third.

SPEAKER_02 3:57

Dramatic style, one by one. What do you say?

SPEAKER_00 4:22

I think the lyrics are actually pretty cool. It takes who I am, where I've been, belong. Be yourself by yourself, stay away from me. Take life. Respect walk. What did you say? Respect walk. Are you talking to me? No way, punk! And something about the arrangement of the song and just the band in general, like it's like so dry, right? Like the guitar is so in your face with the bass and like and the drums. And it's just like very dry and it's vocal. It feels very bare, but like super powerful. And now let's get to the solo. So let's get the rhythm pickup on. And we got and we got the pinky on the 15th fret, ring finger on the 14th. And then the That's key, the bend. And then as you come down from the bend, watch, you pull off to the 12th fret after that bend. That's just like the pentatonic scale, but the blues pentatonic scale, right? But when you play the fifth with the tritone, they kind of like blur together, so it sounds like okay, so I'll do it super slow. I love that, but it's so fast. I'm still practicing it to like I want to be able to play it like up to speed, but it's just incredibly fast. Insane, and it's it's so clean. He's playing it so cleanly. And I learned how he did it by looking it up on YouTube and slowing it down to like 50% or 25% and like practicing movement. I'm right now I'm at like 80%, 90% I can kind of hit, but it's like it feels like inhuman how fast he's going. That's the hardest part of the solo, in my opinion. And then after he goes. Okay, so you bend that up a half step. And then you bend the 15. And then you do this. This is great. That's a major third. Like, what's the major third doing here? It's like a happy major note, but like putting it in here makes it even more like demonic, unpredictable, wild. And you explode into more of that major third. Look at that. Okay, so slowly it's like what a moment. And the timing of the riff is like insane how he's in the pocket. He's like so in the pocket in the most unconventional signature, like wild way. Like he's in, like he's in beast mode, man. It's crazy. And this part is so slurry and like it's like slippery, but with the neck pickup, it's like it's like such a good texture. He's combining the minor third and the major third, but he's bending that major third, so it's just like so ambiguous, like what he's doing. Like he's going up. It's like he's like jumping up even higher with God then, and if that wasn't enough, he's like It's like so much exploding, right? Like And then like the I love that. 15, 17, 18, 19, those chromatics right there. And then he jumps to the next section of the riff. So let me just bring the gain down a little bit because essentially the rhythm, like the bass, is outlining blues, just like E blues, but it's actually D, right? Because we're in D standard. So I guess D blues. So so far in the solo, we've been on the one chord. And the bass is like and then it goes to the four chord. But he's doing these crazy notes over, so he's like something like that. So he goes to the four chord, but it's like demonic. Like it's like a demonic blues. It's so cool. And Dimebag is outlining that when he goes, right? There's A blues or whatever, G blues. We'll just call it A. I'm just labeling everything as standard tunic. Right? Typical blues lick right there, but then I love that. I love how he didn't go He didn't go like typical like minor scale. He does like eight, nine, eight, five. So I love that. Oh, it's like so. It's crazy. Make sure you hit the drum hits right when he goes. Insane. And also when he goes, like that's cool. He's hitting the major third there again, like he's doing like unexpected notes, and it all contributes to this like chromatic dissonant. That's like really what it is. It's like dissonant, eerie, and unexpected, and just I keep saying wild, but that really is what it is. And now this crazy section where he goes all in the second fret on the G string, so he goes. Oh my god. So he taps it, and as he drags it up, he's getting the other finger ready, then he pulls off. The other finger ready, and then he pulls off. Landing on the 14th frame. Oh, it's all in the G string, or we're just jumping in octave, but he's like slurring his way up there, right? It happens fast too. Like texture, like he was smart to zoom out and be like, what's the texture of this solo, right? I love that. And then the strolling part just like in this section, we're now at the five chord, right? So we start on the root, the bass went to the four, and now it goes to the five. Like blues one, four, five progression. So dime bags like that's just nine, eight, nine, eight, nine on the G, and then always going back to the ten on the B. And then the sick diminished try at ascension. Now diminished chord is just minor third tritone. Look how demonic that sounds. So he's moving up, but he's doing two strings at a time, two frets at a time, too, two notes. Okay. Those first three notes are diminished triads. Those next three notes are also diminished triads. So he's ascending in diminished triads, and it's just again, it's very dissonant, and it's beautiful. Like, and him with his tone, it's like and then when he's at the top, he goes. He brings that it's hard to do all the time. It's hard to really nail, but like you bring it, you get up there, and then you grab the other string. You just gotta bend it, right? It's kind of hard on this V. It helps to have a whammy bar with with that dissension. And then of course it keeps I love how it just goes right back to the main riff, like just right in your face. It reminds me a lot of Crazy Train, right? Randy Rhodes, like after the solo, it goes right to dunno nano nano nano na no, and it's just like the riff, like right in your face. Such a great effect to do that. But yeah, a lot of you guys asked about this guitar. This is a blast cult. Okay, and if you want one, let me know, and I can probably get you like a slight discount. The guy Jason is the owner over there in London. Uh I got a custom made. I just love this thing, man. Back in 2022, I went to Region's guitar store in uh in London in um Denmark Street, I think it's called. I'm kinda blanking on it right now. But I saw something that looked like this, uh, but it was red. And I don't think it had a pick card, and it didn't have a Bigsby. But it was like red and it had F holes, and it was a flying V, and I was like, what the heck is that? And they gave me the card to the guy Jason, so I contacted him and then he started building it. Like I went and met him like the next week. Uh and then I went to his website and I saw that he had some V that had a Bigsby, and I had never seen a V with a Bigsby with F holes, right? And like bindings, like it was like immaculate. I was like, I have to get that. And so this is one of a kind, like it's custom made, there's nothing else like this that he's made. And uh I just love this thing, yeah. But thanks for watching, guys. Thanks for tuning in. And if you want a private breakdown video of your original song, I love doing that. I love critiquing people's songs and giving my two cents. Just go to learn.damberacuda.com slash feedback. I'll see you guys in the next episode.