Progressive Metal Solo

This solo features a backing track with riffs reminiscent of Symphony X and Megadeth, and the soloing draws from the influences of Michael Romeo and Marty Friedman, among others

The main idea of the lesson is how to keep things interesting. A minute is actually a fairly long time for a rock solo, and this poses certain challenges.  Creating a long structure with light and shade, different textures, and more importantly, not running out of ideas.  the songwriter can help the soloist by creating changes in the riffs, this will help bring in variety and keep things moving.

The second pont of the lessons is coming up with good ideas at a normal speed. Lots of players fall into the trap of blasting out licks as fast as they can, which can lack groove and melody.  The licks presented here are no faster than sixteenth notes at 140bpm, and the runs have consistent speeds, which is good for working on your timing.  It is very important to work on this 'middle' gear as it's what sperates the pros form the rest, and it provides a crucial middle ground in a short structure of slow bends/dive bombs/groove/full blast shred.

The techniques require dhere are alternate picking, sweeping and some pull offs.  There is also some bent tapped notes which require the bend from the fretting hand.

Also, there are some more unusal scales than just the standard blues/pentatonic. Some chromatic and passing notes with an odd sound, these will definitely add another dimension to your playing!