Chords for This Van Halen Lick Will Transform Your Guitar Playing

_ _ [A] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ [Cm] _ _ _ [Em] _ [A] _ _ [Am] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [F] _ _ _
_ [Am] _ _ _ [G] _ _ [C] _ _
[Db] _ _ _ [N] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [C] _ _ _ _
[Em] _ [Cm] _ _ _ _ [E] _ _ [C] _
_ [A] _ _ _ [G] _ _ _ _
_ [N] Hey guys, how are you all doing?
It's Ken McAteer again.
Today I bring you a Van Halen
lick that totally transformed my playing.
And it's an ascending run from Spanish Fly.
And what's great about this is it essentially unlocked a fretboard for one.
It told me a
load of different passages you can go down.
It taught me a really cool alternate picking
sequence and this lick can be really chopped and changed around.
It can be played in reverse,
it can be played in a really long staggered sequence, repetitive sequences that sound
dead impressive _ and you'll like it.
Let's go.
_ So we're in standard [D] tuning.
[Bm] _ _
_ [E] _ _ _ _ And [N] essentially to take you _ through the lick very quickly
we have [A] essentially this sequence.
[C] We're focusing on the picking hand here at this [Gb] point.
What
we do is we hammer on _ [G] _ _ the first [E] three notes, [G] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ then alternate pick the [Gb] rest.
_ So _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [C] _ [D] you get that
sequence down and then we start to move it around into different scale shapes.
So the
sequence I did [G] was this. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [N] _ _ _ _ _
And I'll take you through what that is really, really [G] slowly. _ _
I [C] _ _ [B] _ [G] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [N] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ understand that's a bit fast but I'm trying to keep in [E] time here. _
So the sequence when
we start to build it up to speed goes [G] thusly. _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [Bb] _
_ _ _ [N] _ _ _ _
And once you've got that down it totally transformed
my playing because you've got the whole fretboard at your disposal _ [G] and you can [B] move around into
different keys.
As I say you can do [Gm] it in G if you want.
_ [Bb] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[N] _ _ _ _ _ _ You get the idea.
And also
to take it a whole step further you can even play this in reverse.
So to keep in with the
original lick in [A] A [D] you can do it like this where you pull off the [N] first three notes and
then alternate pick the rest. _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ You've got to practice this one as I say in one place
until you get the sequence right and then speed it up and move it around.
_ [C] _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [N] What this
lick has taught me is that all of this stuff was possible. _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [D] _ [C] _
_ _ [E] _ _ _ [Ab] _ _ _
And _ _ _ _ _ _
_ [Gm] _ [D] _ _ _ [N] you can do whatever you
like.
And to take it a whole step further you can even stagger it out and make it really,
really long if this makes sense.
Almost Paul Gilbert-erise it.
And let me [G] show you what
I mean.
I'm going to play it first and then break it down.
So it's the same sequence but
then you go back on yourself.
It combines a bit of both.
_ [Gb] _ _ [Bm] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ [N] _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[G] _ _ _ _ _ [Ab] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
You can mix it around, match
it with loads of stuff.
[E] _ [G] _ _
_ _ _ You can _
[N] even do the descending shape [Ab] in an ascending motion.
_ _ [G] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ There we go.
That's that whole lick essentially _ and what it can do for your playing.
And it
totally, totally transformed my mindset.
You can do it all over the place and in different
keys.
But that's up to you to decide.
Thank you very much.
_ [N] _