If this file doesn't look right, try opening it in a better program like WordPad. From: Frode Andreas Thorkildsen Archived by: -=UMS=- http://members.tripod.com/~ums02/pantera Harmonic Sermons IN THE MINDS of many, Pantera's Dimebag Darrell is the most exciting rock guitarist to have surfaced since Edward Van Halen. When you hear his fiery fretwork on the albums [Cowboys From Hell, ATCO] it's easy to understand why. In addition to being one of the heaviest riff-mongers ever, Darrell's lead work displays all the essential ingredients of a true metal guitar master -melody, emotion, invention and a truly vulgular display of angst! In addition to his instantly recognizable farbeyond-driven tone, brand spankin'-new Washburn Dimebag Darrell Signature Guitar and purple goatee, one of Dime's most distinctive traits is his brilliant use of his whammy bar in conjunction with natural harm- onics ("N.H.") to create what he calls "harmonic squeals" or "screams." The outro of "Cemetary Gates" (6:20 to the track's fade) is a perfect showcase of his trademark technique. Below you'll fins examples of this technique. One example of a "harmonic scream" can be found in the outro of "Cemetary Gates." Here Dime skillfully uses his whammy bar to make the natural harmonic at the 4th fret on the G string mimic the melody of vocalist Phil Anselmo's high pitched scream. In Dime's own words, here's how he does it: "To make harmonics scream like this I dump my Floyd Rose real quick, hit a harmonic with my left hand while the strings are still flapping and then use the bar to pull it up to the pitch I wanna hit." Although this may sound like a somewhat complex maneuver at first, it's actually not that tough once you've gotten used to it -providing that you've got a locking tremolo system on your guitar of course (a non-locking trem would definetly get knocked way out of tune when subjected to this sort of abuse!). Also, if you want to be able to pull a harmonic up past its regular pitch lik Dime does in FIGURE1, your bridge needs to be floating so you can "yank the bar up as well as push it down," as Dime so eloquently explains. As you may already be aware, at the end of 1993, Dime dedicated two of his highly acclaimed "Riffer Madness" columns in Guitar World solely to this technique. So, rather than me walking you through it, let's learn how to do a simple harmonic scream from the master himself: "We're gonna do this in 'slow motion' by breaking the idea down into four easy-to-follow steps," Dime begins. "Let's use the harmonic that's directly above the 5th fret on the G string ('cause it's a pretty easy one to nail) and make it 'scream' up to its ori- ginal pitch of G. First though, dial up a distorted sound (remember, gain helps harmonics happen) and switch to your bridge pickup. Step 1: Position your left hand so you're ready to hit the 5th fret harmonic on the G string with your middle finger. Then mute the high E and B strings with your left index finger and the low E, A and D with your thumb by wrapping it around the top of the neck. Step 2: Flick the G string with your middle finger and dump the bar down to the pitch you want the scream to start out at. Step 3: As soon as the bar is dumped, sound the harmonic by lightly tapping the G string directly above the 5th fret with your middle finger. While you're doing this, make sure that you're still keeping the other strings quiet with your thumb and index finger. Step 4: As soon as you've hit the harmonic, release pressure on the bar and let the G string return back up to pitch. As long as you've sounded the harmonic properly it'll "scream" up to G. "The first few times you do this you're gonna hear the open G string 'growl' before the scream starts happening. This is because you're doing everything in 'slow motion.' Once you've got this technique down, though, you won't hear the growl because you'll be doing the first three steps so quickly they'll almost be simultaneous. If it takes you a while to get these 'squeals' happening, don't skid, it took me a while too!" -Dimebag Darrell Consequently, don't expect to be able to execute this harmonic scream perfectly on your first few tries. It could take you a while. If you perserve though - to quote Dimebag one last time - before you know it you'll be "cranking these sons-of-bitces so high that the dogs'll be barking!" - Nick Bowcott Harmonic scream examples: Album: Cowboys From Hell Song time string position/fret Psycho Holiday - 0:27 (G-String) 3 1:32 (B-String) 3 3:05 (B-String) 12 3:11 (G-String) 4 3:13 (G-String) 3 4:07 (G-String) 4 4:17 (G or B-String) 2 or 3 5:09 (D-String) 7 5:11 (G-String) 4 5:12 (B-String) 3 Heresy - 3:13 (G-String) 3 Cemetary Gates - 6:20 & till the end(G-String) Various Domination - 3:25 (X-XXXXXX) XXX 3:51 (G & D-String) 4 Shattered - 2:16 (G & D-String) 3 3:16 (G-String) 3 Medicine Man - 3:41 (G-String) 4 4:32 & till the end(G-String) Various The Sleep - 3:18 (G-String) 3 4:27 (G-String) 4 4:28 (G-String) 3 The Art Of Shredding - 0:18 (G-String) 2 3:37 to 3:45 V A R I O U S ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Album: Vulgar Display Of Power Song time string position/fret Mouth For War - 3:51 (G & D-String) 4 3:51 (G & D-String) 4 This Love - (lick at 1:09 below with a "scream" at 1:16) w/bar -5 0 -5 0 -5 0 -5 0 -5 | . | . | . | . | . | . | . | . eb|-----------------------------------|-----------------------------------| Bb|--------------____-----------------|-----------__---_-----------------_| Gb|-------------/11-------------------|-(11)~~~~----\_/-(11)\/p9--\/(8)\/-| Db|-------------x---------------------|-----------------------------------| Ab|------------x----------------------|-----------------------------------| Eb|-----------------------------------|-----------------------------------| N.H Gradually dive -5 0 -5 0 -5 +2 -5 +2 -5 bar to slack | . | . | . | . | . | . | . | . eb|-----------------------------------|-----------------------------------| Bb|-----------------------------------|---------------------_____---------| Gb|\/(8)-----s6\/(6)---------------/4-|-----------\/(4)\/(4)-----\--------| Db|-------------------------------x---|---------------------------\-------| Ab|------------------------------x----|----------------------------\------| Eb|-----------------------------------|-----------------------------\-----| This Love - 6:21 (G-String) 3 Rise - 3:23 (G-String) 3 Live In A Hole - 0:28 (G-String) 4 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Album: Far Beyond Driven Song time string position/fret Strength Beyond Strength - 2:02 (G-String) 3 If any questions about this technique then mail to sthorkil@online.no. -Frode Thorkildsen