# What are some good songs to practice sweeping?



## QuantumCybin (Jun 9, 2015)

I'm absolutely terrible at sweeping at respectable speeds. I have the technique pretty well understood but it's just a matter of practicing diligently to build speed. What are some good songs I can use to practice relatively simple sweep patterns? I slow down songs in Audacity, I know Chelsea grin's early stuff features some straightforward sweeps but I would like more material! Thanks people.


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## ncfiala (Jun 9, 2015)

These types of questions get asked a lot and most people will probably say the same thing: BTBAM Selkies The Endless Obsession.

My advice would be to not get to into sweeps. Sure it's ok to use them sparingly and tastefully, but that is not what is done most of the time. A lot of bands way overuse them.

When I first started playing I was obsessed with sweeping since I was listening to a lot of Jeff Loomis and whatnot, but I quickly became bored with the technique and the way it sounded and now I don't use them much. Learn to play arpeggios in a variety of ways. I know it may come as a shock to some guitarists, but there are other ways to play them. Sweep and arpeggio are not synonomous.


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## Lorcan Ward (Jun 9, 2015)

I'm putting together an arpeggio video lesson package with a list of sweep arpeggio to learn from songs. Here are a bunch that I'd really recommend. 

After the Burial - My Frailty
After the Burial - To Carry You Away
Avenged Sevenfold - Seize the Day
Between the Buried and Me - Selkies: The Endless Obsession
Between the Buried and Me - White Walls
Born of Osiris - Follow the Signs
Born of Osiris - XIV/Behold
Born of Osiris - Machine
Children of Bodom - Deadnight Warrior
Children of Bodom - The Nail
Children of Bodom - Warheart
Children of Bodom - Towards Dead End
Children of Bodom - Kissing the Shadows
Dethklok - Duncan Hills Coffee Jingle
Dragonforce - Fury of the Storm
Dragonforce - Once in a Lifetime
Dream Theater - The Glass Prison
Galneryus - Struggle for the Freedom Flag
Jason Becker - Altitudes
Jason Becker - Serrena
Luca Turilli - Prince of the Starlight
Michael Angelo Batio - Speed Kills(No Boundaries)
Necrophagist - Fermented Offal Discharge
Necrophagist - Stabwound
Nevermore - I,Voyager
Nevermore - The psalm of Lydia
Nevermore - This Godless Endeavour
Obscura - The Anticosmic Overload
Protest the Hero - Bloodmeat
Protest the Hero - Sequoia Throne
Protest the Hero - Palms Read
Rhapsody - Dagor, Shadowlord of the Black Mountain
Rhapsody - Holy Thunderforce
Rhapsody - Unholy Warcry
Rusty Cooley - Under the Influence
Rusty Cooley - Riders
Rusty Cooley - The Butcher
Scar Symmetry - Holographic Universe
Steve Vai - For the Love of God
Symphony X - Smoke & Mirrors
The Human Abstract - Mea Culpa
Unearth - My Will be Done
Unearth - Arise the Warcry
Wintersun - Beyond the Dark Sun
Wintersun - Death and the Healing
Wintersun - Beautiful Death

Enjoy!


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## MaxOfMetal (Jun 9, 2015)

Look up Frank Gamble's old VHS lessons on YouTube, if you can get through the awful 80's fusion tone you'll get some great practice riffs and tips. Dude is the king of sweeps.


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## OmegaSlayer (Jun 9, 2015)

If you want to practice "sweeping" I suggest Queen - "I Want To Break Free", some hoovering there too 

If you want to practice sweep picking, you must try to focus on single shapes and understand what goes wrong in each of it.
I suggest to play them in clean, no gain tone, and eventually remove anything that dampens your strings at the nut, if you use it.
You want to be sure you're CLEAN.

Lorcan suggests some really good arpeggios there, but some stuff is really advanced, and you shouldn't even attempt those if you don't feel confident enough.
Those are mostly arpeggios you must look forward to play, and when you nail them, you pat yourself on the back and say "Jesus Christ I'm GOOOOOOD!"


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## QuantumCybin (Jun 9, 2015)

Cool advice, thanks! I'm not looking to learn sweeps to throw them in as a "luk wut i cn do guiz" type thing, but it would be nice to know how! And yeah, if you could show me any good lessons on how to approach arpeggiating in different ways that would be much appreciated!


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## OmegaSlayer (Jun 10, 2015)

For what regards arpeggios...think outside the box, probably you won't have arpeggios as fast as arpeggios in sweep picking (but not necessarily) but with very different dynamics and flavour.

Consider that when you play 2 notes which are not consecutive in a scale you've already played 2/3 of a one octave arpeggio.
And if you think about it the classic tappings you learn (7-10-12) are one octave arpeggios.

If you look at the keyboard with this idea in mind, the possibilities are not endless, but very close 

When you avoid the "sweeps" in your arpeggios you can find very interesting solutions to colour up your arpeggios with fourths, sixths and sevenths.

I'll show you a particular pattern that I really like a lot, I will not explain it, so I encourage you to understand it and find your solutions and ideas starting from this little phrasing.

You can use this as a Em6 arpeggio or a Cmaj7, I like it more over an Em chord actually.
Marty Friedman use this kind of solution quite a lot, and you can find a slight variation of this one (with added tapping and in another position) in the solo of Anticosmic Overload by Obscura.

So...
E---------------------------------12-15-
B-------------------------12-13---------
G-------------------9-12----------------
D-------------9-10----------------------
A-------7-10----------------------------
E-(7-8)----------------------------------

I put the B and C on the 6th string in bracket as the arpeggio usually starts on the root note, but not necessarily, and starting with the fifth could be interesting nonetheless.

You can play this pattern in alternate picking or legato.
Usually when I play this kind of arpeggio I pick it as I want that kind of dynamic, while if I want a legato dynamic I play the same note in different position and using tapping.

Now, I mentioned Anticosmic...if I remember correctly the arpeggio in the song starts on a C# (but the guitars are tuned to D standard) and Christian Muenzner would play the notes of that arpeggio in this fashion

E-------------------------------------------------------12-15-(T19)-
B--------------------------------------------13-12-13---------------
G-------------------------------9-12-(T16)--------------------------
D---------------------10-9-10---------------------------------------
A--------7-10-(T14)-------------------------------------------------
E-8-7-8---------------------------------------------------------------

Everything in legato, with hammer-ons from nowhere and tapping and a nice triplets feel.

So, yeah, try different flavours of things.
Eventually mixing sweeps with other sorts of arpeggios, maybe ascend a way and descend in another.

For example from that last arpeggio you can slide your tapping to the 24th fret on the first string and close with

E-(T24)-19-15----------------------
B---------------19-17--------------
G-----------------------16----------
D---------------------------17-14---
A------------------------------(19)-
E-------------------------------------

As you see I put the fret 19 on the fifth string in brackets as in the dynamic of the arpeggio I think that sliding the ring finger from fret 17 to fret 14 on the fourth string would be preferable to start another legato section or another pattern which is not a sweep, otherwise, if you're willing to start another sweep you would rather hit fret 19 on the fifth string.
Also notice I added a 7th on the second string for added flavour, and that you can change your dynamic from the triplet feel to "normal" 1/8 or 1/16 feel.


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## Dayn (Jun 10, 2015)

For pure sweeping motion on 5 strings, try 'Ketchup is a Vegetable' by Mattias Eklundh. That's what it mostly is. Just a straight 5-note sweep across 5 strings. Fun and good at getting your right hand technique down if you take it a couple of strings at a time.


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## Solodini (Jun 11, 2015)

OmegaSlayer said:


> If you want to practice sweep picking, you must try to focus on single shapes and understand what goes wrong in each of it.


 Or at least a single idea at a time to make sure you have it sounding good. Better to do one bit and have it sound good than a whole bunch sounding bad. Doesn't mean you can't work on one idea one day, another idea the next, then go back to the first idea. You'll probably learn useful lessons by trying different things, and be able to bring what you've learned into helping with other things you've been learning.




OmegaSlayer said:


> Lorcan suggests some really good arpeggios there, but some stuff is really advanced, and you shouldn't even attempt those if you don't feel confident enough.


 
I entirely disagree. You can break it down into tiny chunks and work on them slowly, but you might be discouraged if it takes a while to get the whole thing up to speed. I find using what you learn in your own creative pursuits helps with staving off frustration. That one idea can be applied in countless ways, especially if you adjust the idea a little bit, change a note here and there. 

But if you have the patience to work at it in small pieces, it will probably aid your confidence, as you realise that it's not too difficult if you take it bit by bit. Most things which seem difficult can be learned if you take it one small challenge at a time.


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## OmegaSlayer (Jun 11, 2015)

Solodini said:


> I find using what you learn in your own creative pursuits helps with staving off frustration. That one idea can be applied in countless ways, especially if you adjust the idea a little bit, change a note here and there.
> 
> But if you have the patience to work at it in small pieces, it will probably aid your confidence, as you realise that it's not too difficult if you take it bit by bit. Most things which seem difficult can be learned if you take it one small challenge at a time.



You have a good point here actually


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## starslight (Jun 11, 2015)

"Holy Wars," "Hangar 18," and "A Tout le Monde" by Megadeth. One of the things I love about Marty Friedman's playing is his tasteful and musical use of arpeggios.

Also, the arpeggios in "Antebellum" by the Human Abstract are super badass.


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## Konfyouzd (Jun 11, 2015)

Just learn some arpeggios and sweep them. That's how I learned. I swept arpeggios REALLY REALLY REALLY slow to get a feel for how my hand(s) would have to move as I moved across the strings. You can NOT play something fast until you learn to play that slow. If you don't believe me, then have fun trying.

As it became more and more comfortable I just kept upping the speed until it got to a point that I could control it at various speeds. At that point it was safe to say I could "sweep".


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## Aion (Jun 11, 2015)

For sweeping exercises, sometimes I'll take a simple song that you can play just as block chords and sweep them instead. On a micro level you're learning all of these shapes, and on a macro level you learn how different chord progressions work, which can help your playing in general. It's also fun because it also forces you to make some creative choices. What position do you start with, do you then try and keep all of the sweeps as close as possible, do you keep doing the same shape and just move it around, something in between, etc. The first songs I did that for were Working Class Hero and House of the Rising Sun.


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## meteor685 (Jun 11, 2015)

Paul wardingham , and per nillson solos teach you all about the sweep picking!!!.


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## MrPepperoniNipples (Jun 11, 2015)

Fvck everything else, the intro sweep section in Altitudes by Jason Becker

goes over 3 and 5 string arpeggio shapes, and is a relatively slow section, so you're not going 1 million miles per hour right from the start.

This is the section that essentially taught me how to sweep pick.


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## FRETPICK (Jun 18, 2015)

Step in time.


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## Nil0201 (Jun 19, 2015)

Demon Driver by Yngwie Malmsteen! 
It's only triads, with hammer on and pull off.


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## QuantumCybin (Jun 23, 2015)

Thanks for all the replies guys, you're all so helpful


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## TheFranMan (Jul 1, 2015)

I have to second Jason Becker- Altitudes. You get a good range of shapes and nothing is too "over the top" technically. Also, he does a good job of breaking up shapes, rather than just playing the standard 3 or 5 string sweeps.

I also learned sweeping on the ending of Children of Bodom's Kissing the Shadows. Can't go wrong there either.


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## KBIBBY89 (Jul 20, 2015)

Dream Theater-Glass Prison
Nevermore- I, Voyager
Jason Becker- Perpetual Burn
Nevermore- This Godless Endeavor


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## Konfyouzd (Jul 20, 2015)




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## Konfyouzd (Jul 20, 2015)

Nil0201 said:


> Demon Driver by Yngwie Malmsteen!
> It's only triads, with hammer on and pull off.





The bigger sweeps are just stacked triads.


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