This month Phil Short returns with a deep dive into the melodic blues-rock stylings of a top hatwearing, Les Paul-toting, 24-carat guitar hero!
Few guitarists are so synonymous with the wider culture as this month’s pick. Slash is one of the most iconic rock stars the world has ever seen. Emerging in the late 80s from LA’s hard rock scene, Slash, and his band mates in Gun ‘N Roses, defined rock and roll for a whole generation.
Post EVH in the late 70s and early 80s, the rock world had become dominated by the ‘glam’ movement, with huge hair, dive bombs and trying to play things as fast as possible. It might even be argued that rock was losing its attitude and had become a tad, well, let’s say cheesy. Enter Guns N’ Roses who, almost overnight, re-injected that missing badass attitude and gravitas to the world of rock. A perfect blend of attitude and grit coupled with skilful songwriting and exciting playing, put this band ahead of its peers and re-captured the imaginations of the true rock-loving masses.
Many factors contributed, but one singular undeniable aspect is, of course, the man himself. Slash, along with six-string counterpart Izzy Stradlin, created some of the coolest riffs in rock. Combining that with Slash’s ballsy and melodic lead guitar approach, it was a welcome departure from the status quo of EVH copycats.
Slash’s playing is ballsy and gritty, with rapid-fire licks where needed. But it was his sense of melody that really made him stand out. It will be no surprise to GT readers that Slash is a lifelong fan of Queen and Brian May, and will certainly have developed his ear and love of melody from listening to these UK icons’ records while growing up.
But Slash also has tons of blues DNA in his playing. His sound is instantly recognisable, with the gutsy punch and attitude of punk, combined with a mature ear for melody and a deep grounding in blues language. As guitarists there are many things we can learn from Slash, but in particular is his mastery of playing over Major tonalities in a fresh and exciting way.
In his recent work with Myles Kennedy there is a lot of awesome hard rocking Pentatonic shred to enjoy, and loads we can learn from him there. But in this month’s article we will be homing in on the iconic era for which he is most famously known.
Our studies will explore two favoured approaches. First, we will observe his use of Major triads on which he so beautifully hangs his melodic ideas. With occasional added 2nd and perfect 4th, Slash is able to create soulful, memorable melodies that follow the chords, giving his playing that beautifully fluid and grounded
