Riffs in the Style of Slash #1
Major apologies to GT. I was in the progress of making the tab for this lesson when he posted his rendition of SCOM. No upstaging intended. Well, it just goes to show that the most important aspect of this site is that those of us with experience want to share it with you who want to learn. Timing is everything.
GT's excellent rendition of this tune supports the main reason for this lesson very well. If you'd like to hear it,
check it out here.
This has got to be one of the most recognizable guitar riffs of the '90's (the project from which it came,
Appetite for Destruction, was actually copyrighted in 1987. But what a lasting success this album had).
I was very impressed by GT's recording. He has a good rendition of the tune. But more impressive to me was that he took care to make sure that the signature riff was note-for-note. When doing a cover song, there's so much of it that's open to interpretation or embellishment or we just cover the song as we can within our talents. Or as I like to say (
sincerely),
when life gives you lemons, make lemonaid. But when it comes to the signature riff of a tune you should take care to learn it well. The average listeners are immediately impressed by this because they may not know music or how to play guitar, but they know that they're hearing a song that they know. If you can pull that off, then the average listener will give you the big thumbs up.
Below is the tab for this signature riff of SCOM. Note that if you're listening to the original tune, the recording was made a half a step lower. So the song is usually played in the key of D, but the recording is in Db. Just lower each number of the tab by one if you're trying to listen to the recording and look at this at the same time. No adjustment necessary if you're listening to GT's recording.
All the best,
Steve
