Thank you all for watching this video! Why do you think Slayer has changed this awesome bridge riff from Angel of Death over the years? What do you think of Kerry King’s indoor shades/outdoor beard look?
Ben Eller Bet its as simple as he forgot and when it was time for the tour he didn't go back and check the record. And since they usually don't do fancy harmonies he just went with it. Also agree, the energy gets lost with the tech. Motörhead and AC/DC didn't need any grids! That's rock and roll.
Based on my Metallica experience ("riffs they play wrong live" sh*t), there are several reason to change the way of playing riffs: 1) boredom from playing the same over decades 2) when they re-learn songs after not performing them for a while (it happens quickly, on rehearsals, no tabs). Idk if Slayer ever stopped doing Angel of Death tho. 3) if it's a new member, he might adjust it to his own technique or body, so to speak, or to stand out among previous musicians who played it 4) simplifying and cutting corners, if a riff turned out to be too complicated or energy consuming for concerts (e.g. "Blackened" main riff got simplified yet in 1988, or the new way James performs the verse riff from Master of Puppets - single notes instead power chords). 5) a few other reasons I might forget
I had never noticed that MoP thing before, but sure enough, I go check this clip out ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-v0YJmb3okk8.html and he's playing single notes during the verse.
I'm a pre-school/kindergarten teacher and I play guitar with the kids sometimes. Usually pretty mellow happy stuff, but I like to show them different styles of music so they can experience it and hear the difference. Usually they dance along and change their dance according to the song. Some of their favourites are Tears in Heaven by Clapton (slow, floaty sort of dance), Peaches & Cream by John Butler Trio (a bit more active, bobbing up and down), You and Your Heart by Jack Johnson (whirling and clapping) and...the Angel of Death bridge riff + the chuggy bit that comes after. I legit didn't tell them how to dance or tell them what the genre/song name is (for any of them) and have no bias - but they all did the Meshuggah face and started head-banging when I first played Angel of Death. Brought a tear to my eye.
I think Kerry played the harmony part on the record and thought it sounded better, so when he plays the "low" part, he plays it the way he thought it should go. You've probably played with other guitarist and disagreed on small things like that. I sure have. But that's an interesting little quirk you stumbled across there. Thanks, uncle Ben!
Kerry never played Jeff's parts as he claims. You can clearly tell it's two different guitar players on those early slayer albums. Kerry and Jeff sound totally different. I don't buy that story at all.
"indoor sunglasses and outdoor beard" should be something we all strive for when we reach our golden years, unkie ben. like i always say, "you can get lupus pretending to have lupus and still be the King".
This is awesome! I like how you explain these really atonal Slayer-isms in terms of theory. Having listened to Slayer since the 80s, I’ve always been under the impression that they wrote these riffs without really knowing what they were doing, and they just followed their ear to the evil sound. If you probably asked them about the harmony with the non-diatonic 5, then switching the the flat 5 harmony at the end of the riff, they would probably have no idea what your taking about....lol! I don’t even know if Slayer knows how to write in a key, but I still love them. Slayer has always been about feel to me.
I think the original way of playing it sounds better. The lower part ends on the tritone (in relation to the note on the lowest open string, which is what the whole riff is centered around) which just sounds more fitting than ending on the fourth. The original way is more chromatic. The newer way sounds like certain notes get too much emphasis and it sounds less atonal (the 7th fret on the "D string" is played twice, whereas in the original version all of the notes on the D string are played only once). In other words, the original way sounds more chaotic, the newer way sounds more stable.
I really love your lessons Ben. Really appreciate taking the time to explain which fingers you like to fret the riff with, Makes it way easier to play. Just makes the riff feel right
the quality of the information you provide in every single video is magnificent!!you are the best teacher i ever had! thank you! i have made a lot of improvement in guitar playing while watching your videos.
Love your content man I bought a non working peavey 6505+ 112 and in watching your channel I took it apart and saw that the filter compactors were bad through eye sight replaced them with a full tube change this amp is fucking brutal more shit post Friday please
The way you teach guitar is so accessible. You teach complicated processes in such a laid back and understandable way. You make things click in my mind, thanks man!
Hearing this song /album in 86 as a 13 year old beginning to love metal changed me for the better forever. Still listening to this album in its entirety fairly often, soooo good!
I started playing guitar november last year. Right now I can play crystal mountain, all the rhythm and most of the lead, except for the shredding parts but im getting close. That being said, deaths songs in general are wayyyyy easier than necrophagist songs. Right now I'm starting to approach the speed required to play fermented offal discharge rhythm. I figure in two months I should have it down. I feel like I'm bragging lol but my point is, learning music from these two bands is very doable. The way Ive been learning is by starting with the easiest riffs in the song then trying harder and harder riffs. Wish you luck on your guitar journey. I've also started learning the solo for fermented offal discharge but I can barely sweep pick sl I figure ill be good enough to play it in 8 months to a year
Joshua Salgado yeah this lowkey annoys me. I learned from a tab sheet of someone who tabbed out how chuck schuldiner plays it. Much easier to play this way. But on yt I see so many people playing the intro riff wrong on the 9th fret
Hell yeah, finally someone (guitar instructor) who likes Slayer! Everyone rags on them for sucking, but they write some awesome riffs and have stamina for days when playing live (saw them in Chicago a few months ago) RIP Jeff.
when a guitar instructor says a famous guitar player is bad they don't immediately mean the music is bad, only that he's bad at performing it. Slayer wrote some very good songs, but can barely play them.
@@jeffheff71 Have you ever seen him play? They would turn his rhythm down lower than Kerry's during live sets because of how sloppy he played. It was because of his arthritis.
@@cdsmetalhead99 wrong! I've seen slayer more times then I care to count. I got to know him personally the last 2 years of his life because he stayed with a close friend of mine here in central texas alot. And, it was Kerry who had lower volume on his rig.
For the people who say Slayer is shitty. Maybe, but they got a gold record without radio play or you tube or any other social media. They achieved it through word of mouth
you're partly right, but Slayer did have big label promotion. There was a huge Slayer billboard in Pacific Beach (SD) in 87 that said 'Do You Want to Die ?' plus nobody had social media then . it didnt exist. that doesnt mean bands in 87 relied on word of mouth. Similar to metallica, the tours opening for Ozzy, Priest + others helped.
Daniel Simon but the label didnt care about them untill people started seeing their shows. And Ozzy didnt untill labels did. They werent discovered through some mass media. I realize social media didnt exist. In my day social media was having a pen pal through metal magazines where we traded tapes and dubbed them.
FuckingFluteBeater -WTF did you just SAY!!! I like each new one better and better, they never went soft. Take it back in 10.....9.....8.....7.... nevermind, I'm too tired. -- /w\SlayeriZer/w\
I prefer the the original way, with the 2nd guitar starting the "spider finger thing" part harmonizing on the 5th and finishing on the flat 5th. Sounds way cooler to me, both as an idea and as a riff. Anyway they play it, though, it's a monster of a song! Loved the video, Uncle Ben :D Rock on!
I noticed it sounded different than the record right away when I watched the video with the close up hand and I was SO CONFUSED on what was going on!!!! Whenever I played it like Kerry in the video there was something about it that just didn’t sound right at all. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR CLEARING THIS UP!!!! Honestly the most helpful riff video on your channel!!
Came here hoping to see someone discuss the "shapes" as you mentioned for the original album riff. Thanks for going over that thoroughly! It was hanging me up trying to figure out when to "jump" and with what fingers.
To be honest, I'm pretty sure they didn't notice it or just didn't bothered to change the damn thing. Which is kinda cool, makes it more human as you said in the video.
If I remember correctly Jeff wrote angel of death. A cool thing to look into would be the demo version of angel of death from the Soundtrack to the Apocalypse album, since I believe that was arranged entirely by Jeff.
They seem to have randomly changed a lot of stuff over the years. On the record and on live videos from around the time of RiB, Jeff used to play what you're referring to as "guitar 1" in this video. Somewhere along the lines he and Kerry switched parts there. Same deal with the breakdown riff in Raining Blood right before "Raining blood from a lacerated sky" part.
I think all of the single guitar parts are played live by Kerry because his rhythm playing is very tight and Jeff became really sloppy as time went on. So Kerry would play the "guitar 1" part once and then Jeff would start playing and Kerry would switch to the part he played on the record. Not really sure about Raining Blood though. I guess Kerry is just less likely to fuck that riff up, even though it's pretty simple.
I've read somewhere, that Jeff started having some health problems affecting his playing, already on Divine Intervention tour. If that's true, it would make sense that Kerry started playing parts when only one guitar plays, so Jeff had "easier" job.
Amazing and interesting video! These type of videos are so good becouse you teach the riff very well and then you talk about how its changed trough years:)! Keep up and have nice day🤘
Not sure how I needed up down the RU-vid rabbit hole and ended here as I mainly enjoy 90s to earl y2k hip hop... but dope video man. Love the way you teach it and love skill.
This reminds me of the well-known Hypocrisy song 'Eraser': during live shows Peter has some different lyrics in the second verse and he ends the choruses differently. I guess he changed his mind about the lyrics and decided to keep the changes for shows.
Didn't Jeff used to play the start of the bridge and Kerry joined? I know at the live shows in the 80's they did least and then Kerry to over the riff and Jeff jumped in with the harmony for some reason.
UNCLE BEN. Thank you so much!! Been asking for this for a very long time, and it was much better than I could've ever expected! How about Beatin' Around the Bush by AC/DC? Freaking impossible riff that I'd love to get the picking down on. Or the main F# riff to Lords of Summer by Metallica...seriously have never been able to get that picking even close. Thanks again for another great one.
DUDE me and my friends would love it! I honestly don't know how they did it...it was never played live, but there is a mimed "performance" on some Spanish TV show from early 1980 that might provide a little picking insight. I haven't seen it in a while, but it might help. One crazy riff that I've never ever heard sound quite like the original! PLEASE do a breakdown and give us any insight you could...having those upstrokes/downstrokes broken down would be like finding the guitar-player Meaning of Life.
I'm guessing they were going for simple P5s throughout, but didn't quite work it out correctly on the original studio version, and now Kerry modifies his part to "correct" it. The original version still sounds cool, though. Even with dissonant tritones, the harmony being split across two guitars keeps it cleaner.
I watched an interview where he was actually not douchy and was pleasant. Yeah, I know ! I thought, "Was I tripping on his douchiness all these years??" Wtf
Finally!! Someone who actually plays it right lol. I looked at 7 different tabs that were all wrong !! So frustrating. Thank you for an awesome video man! 🤘🏻
I think i seen a lesson long ago on a cd rom that came with guitar one or world cant remember, it was 10 plus years ago. He mentioned he was tuned a whole tone down as apposed half.
Its cool you mentioned how the song has changed over years. If you're lucky enough to see a band/artist a bunch of time over the years (well you can just watch it on the Y tube now, but I digress) you'll notice how songs seems to "change" a little when they play them live. Be it the tempo, or a minor re-arrangement or even the instruments and tuning when playing it. I've found it fairly common for songs to be recorded in one tuning but when played live, use a different tuning and they just compensate for the change. I personally do it all the time when playing with friends. I'm not down tuning unless there are some notes that are too much work to just drop a fret or 2 and adjust. (Okay I'll be honest here, I have a small arsenal all set at different tunings, but I still tend to compensate before changing guitars, unless changing the guitar was the real purpose in the first place. I hope that makes sense.) Compensating alters the tone slightly, but it's the same song/notes. Just different tone sometimes. (I don't get into tone wars. If you like how it sounds it's a good tone. If you don't like it, It's not for you. Move on, but never forget. That garbage sound you made today might be the exact sound you're looking for in 2 years. Tastes change.) I think there are a variety of reasons why "songs" as we know them "change" over time, it was great that you brought the concept to attention.
Damn Ben. You got some ears to pick this up! Good job. Never learned that riff but now I can play it. Thanks. I like the later version. It's easier too.
and here at frame 238 you can clearly see that instead of the 9th fret, kerry's index finger is back and to the left at the 8th. back and to the left. back. and to the left. back. and to the left.
Well, Im 4 yrs late. I think the diminished/dissonance of this riff emphasizes the lyrical picture and helps deliver the agony the song conjures. Either way still works.
I notice stuff like this sometimes when bands play live they either forget the riff or just try to make it easier or something. It's weird and it always stands out to me.
I have no idea why they changed it but they dropped the harmony live years ago also Jeff used to lead it off but Kerry has been doing it since I think Divine Intervention dsys as well as the melody towards the end of Ranning Blood.
So I went and experimented with how the two sounded (something I wish you'd done in the video, show how the change affects the harmony) and to be totally honest I prefer the straight diatonic fifths, as opposed to the change to flat 5ths of the original. It just gels and feels more "slayer" than the flat 5ths, weirdly enough
I know this video is old but I just came across it. Here is the thing. Kerry just doesn’t realize he’s playing the riff “wrong”. The lower section was recorded and performed live by Jeff. Kerry comes in with the harmony. Kerry is simply showing everyone what he thinks is Jeff’s part. Jeff always played the original part, creating the flat-5 interval. The only reason I know this is that I’ve had to study Slayer’s material extensively, as I play in a Xmas-themed tribute called Sleigher every December, that we do for a children’s charity. So I’ve been playing Kerry’s parts for 8 years. And yeah, I can already hear the nerds typing about how Kerry tracked all the rhythms on Slayer records, and they’d be half right. Let me out-nerd them by clarifying that Kerry didn’t start doing that until South Of Heaven. Anyway, to clarify, the riff hasn’t actually changed. Kerry just shows it to people incorrectly.
What riffs do we want?! The riff at 8:20 of "The Last Baron" by Mastodon. When do we want it?! Now! Um, I mean at your leisure. You do great work. Can't rush great work. This riff is the balls, you know it, I know it, the balls know it. Let's learn it!
Hearing to slow sounds like a DooM song from 1994. May have played a lot of doom as a child. Might be playing it later. Might still hack doom and make levels.
Tons of songs in doom are actually just midi versions of slayer, Metallica and pantera songs. E1m1 is master of puppets and I dont remember the level but one of them is very clearly at dawn they sleep
Thats the cool thing about writing your own music, its yours to do whatever you want to with it. If someone gets mad and complains "THAT'S NOT HOW YOU PLAY IT!" You can say "I wrote it, it's mine and it's played how I say it's played, punk bi-ch!"
Why the cucumber jar instead of a proper pint? Cool lesson though. But I have doubts about the neighbors and how much they will enjoy when I have time to get jiggy with this one 😅
