hey guys, as you know, paul gilbert is probably one of the best shredders(or players in general) out there. that being said, we all want to play like him.

I know many of you are more experienced than me so, I have a question

if you listen to "Frenzy" from Street Lethal I believe, around :30 - :40 into the song paul plays a 3 note per string lick over and over a few times before shredding off somewhere else.

here's a youtube link if you dont have the recording.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbURQ8xZXxs

my questions is, how does he get that really choppy, clear sound even when playing the low notes on the low E and A strings? when I play it, I do whatever I can to help my Tone in the first place to get a crisp sound. use bridge pick up, extra treble and presence. but it still sounds kinda muddy. I have PAF Pro's so I don't think it's the pickups. I am palm muting it, because thats how I guess he gets that sound, but it didn't help.

I heard paul picks pretty hard, maybe thats it? I'm not sure.

Help please! thanks :)

I know he puts a lot of emphasis on dynamics in his playing. It's all to do with how he picks a note. There's some real fast picking going on there. For me it's not palm muting. It's all about how much contact the pick has with the string and how much you attack the string with the pick. You can lightly brush the string with the pick or pick down into it to get a completely different tone.

EDIT: Hmm.... ran over that again and it could be a combination of light muting and varying pick attack.

Here's the man himself explaining:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROYgceF8LrI

hmm, sounds like a combination of picking and muting. thanks for the input ID !

Ok, the secret to this one is in the way you hold the pick, as well as your guitar tone. PAF pros are perfect, but what amp are you using? also try the neck pickup. Most importantly experiment with how you hold the pick. My alternate picking tone is really inspired by PGs picking tone. I like to use closer to the tips of my fingers for holding the pick, especially the thumb, rather than using the fleshy part of the thumb. Also the pick angle is important.

I'm using A JCM2000 head and a 1960 marshal 4x12 cab. so you leave very little of the pick showing?

I believe he meant that he holds the pick at the tip of his fingers, which I think would leave out quite a lot of the pick showing.

okay, so yeah I think he gets that sound by just picking hard and with a lot of the pick... haha I'm gonna have fun trying to get this down :/

A good video where Paul describes the mechanics of his picking is this one. That's where he goes over exactly how he gets the sound by using angles and finger positioning.

Haha, I've always liked Gilbert's instructional clips.

"THEY'RE BIGGER! AND BIGGER SOUNDS LOUDER AND MORE ROCK AND BETTER!"

Then again, sometimes I have an issue when it comes to his tone. Like in that video.

To comment the video, I knew that Gilbert holds the pick in such fashion, but isn't it adviced to hold the pick as parallel to the strings as possible?

I think that would be the traditional and 'proper' technique (whatever that means). During the clip, you might have noticed that the parallel pick gave each note a very clear sound, while the tilting made it scratchy and imperfect (how could you miss that with Gilbert proclaiming how rockin' it is?). You may also notice that a perfectly parallel pick makes those alternate picking runs a lot tougher, unless you're Guthrie Govan. To answer your question, Paul Gilbert probably just doesn't care about proper technique if it doesn't get the results he likes. More power to him.

I personally use a combination of different pick angles to get more tones, because more tones is "more rockin'", but for straight alternate picking, slight angling works well. I also happen to love PG's tone.

EDIT: Here's a Guthrie Govan alternate picking lesson from Lick Library. Looks like he angles it a bit too.

I'm also curious how he achieved his sound in Y.R.O. from 1:10 to around 1:37

True. I've gotten used to the traditional style, so I pick almost parallel to the strings. The lower strings push back a lot harder that way, though.

I think the idea of having it exactly parallel (perpendicular maybe?) isn't what you all think. I think they mean that you don't want to have the pick angle pointing UP or DOWN ... PG's parallel to the strings, but he just angles the pick to get a different sound.

if that Makes Any sense?

Nah, we're all on the same page (at least, I assume so).

Hahaha, I second Lektro!