More classic metal, to follow up the Black Sabbath from last week. Recorded live by Judas Priest, this is by far the best take they ever did of this song!! No film footage, unfortunately. For students, this song would help develop right hand strumming, simple riffs, and the efficient use of “power chords.” For the more advanced players, there are plenty of great guitar hooks and little leads between the vocal melody.

Be sure to TURN UP your speakers for this one:

A quintessentially classic ‘heavy metal’ guitar riff by Tony Iommi:

I can remember when I started playing the guitar and how challenging even the simplest riffs seemed at first. What sparked your interest in picking up the guitar? For me, it was a desire to be able to play Led Zeppelin songs, or whatever music I’d hear and like and want to be able to recreate myself. That was the driving force for me in the beginning. After a while I got good enough to noodle around a little more, but it all began with the fascination the simple guitar riff had over me. I’d hear a song and have to get my guitar teacher to show me how to play it. As my skill improved, I got to where I could ‘pick’ things off of a record myself, by listening to it (sometimes repeatedly) until I got it down.

Perseverance furthers when it comes to learning the guitar; there is inevitably a certain amount of difficulty at the beginning (much of it is due to the physical adaptation your hand muscles have to make at that stage, as well as the development of callouses on the fingertips.)

So, why do you want to learn how to play the guitar?

What do you hope to learn how to do, and which style appeals to you most?

Keith Richards tells the story behind the Rolling Stones song “Satisfaction”:

When I wrote the song, I didn’t think of that particular riff as the big guitar riff. That all fell into place at RCA [studio in L.A.] when Gibson dumped on me one of those first Fuzz-Tone pedals. I actually thought of that guitar line as a horn riff. The way Otis Redding ended up doing it is probably closer to my original conception for the song. It’s an obvious horn riff. And when this new Fuzz Tone pedal arrived in the studio from the local dealership or something, I said, “Oh, this is good. It’s got a bit of sustain, so I can use it to sketch out the horn line.” So we left the track and went back out on the road. And two weeks later I hear it on the radio. I said, “No, that was just a demo!” They said, “No, it’s a hit.” At least Otis got it right. Our version was a demo for Otis.