Video: The Unforgiven Solo

The Unforgiven Guitar Solo Cover

Metallica, The self titled album often referred to as the ”Black Album”, was a defining moment in my musical life.

Along side this, they released on VHS (yes VHS!) a studio documentary, ‘A Year in a Half in the life of Metallica’. I must have worn this VHS out, watching it over and over again, rewinding, listening, picking up tips, and most importantly inspiration.

Hetfield’s crushing, super tight rhythm playing, Kirk’s solos, and how they build the riffs and their songs. Not only one of my favourite albums of all time, a time in my guitar life of pure inspiration. This coupled with the San Diego and Seattle Live performances, still remain a favourite to watch to this day.

Learning

This is the first in line of covers from this fantastic album, I hope you enjoy.

Part of playing is of course learning, but importantly getting the feel, the phrasing.

Although I’ve been playing for years, it’s great revisiting old solos I thought I knew, listening again, honing again and again. There are also ones I’ve always wanted to play, so fun learning these, but constantly improving and pushing myself out of that comfort zone.

Whilst every guitarist strives too, it’s not about exact note for note precision as per the studio album, if you listen to the studio version, the recording takes, the live versions, they all differ slightly. For me it’s about the feel, the vibrato on the bends and having fun!

Thank you for taking the time to watch!