Come As You Are - Nirvana - (Solo String Bending)

In this video we're gonna be looking at the technique of string bending, which is probably the most essential thing that's really specific to lead guitar playing. We have to bend strings in a very specific way to make sure that we don't hurt our hand, to make sure that we're getting it to sound right, but this is also perhaps the most expressive technique. And the thing that's the most awesome thing, gives the most awesome sounds with lead guitar playing, so don't miss this one, and we're gonna be learning a very easy solo by the band Nirvana a little later in this video. Let's start by having a look at the technique of string bending. OK, so first of all, we're gonna look at this technique of string bending, which is this. This is where we pick a note. And then we bend it up, and here we're bending it up a full pitch, so a whole step bend. And we're gonna talk about what that means as well. So we wanna play the 9th fret of string 3 with the 3rd finger, but we're gonna support this, which means put down other fingers, and we're gonna put down the 2nd finger and the 1st finger. Um, to have what I've heard called, or poor Gilbert calls the giant first finger, we want these three fingers to act like one finger. Little finger's not gonna get used, but keep it somewhere close by. Try not to have it sticking out or anything. We need our thumb on top because we need something to push up against, but really, we're not going to push up at all. What we're gonna do is twist or pivot around this thumb. This is the technique point that we need, so. We're aiming for this 9th fret, but think about this for a second. Imagine you're going in for a handshake with your chord playing hand, with your fretting hand, to the guitar neck. That is what we need to do first of all, go in for that handshake and how you kind of grip the guitar neck like that, that is exactly what we do but we do it very lightly. My thumb is just sat on top and I also have purchased just about here. We then fret, string 3, fret 9, support with the middle and first finger, and just try and do this in a comfortable manner. Get used to these positions, have the elbow into the side, fingers curled over right on their tips as you normally would, but we're still in that kind of handshake position. Which puts our fingers on this angle as well, this is so important, my fingers are pointing towards my strumming hand shoulder. OK, so now let's think about actually what we do to bend this string. Now what we do, this is really important, keep your fingers still. Keep your fingers perfectly still and move your wrist up. Which sort of causes this pivot to happen, now, the string's not moving at the moment cos I'm keeping my fingers loosey goosey, but um I'm just keeping them relaxed and keeping them still. Now this is a really important thing. If I had my fingers totally kind of stiff like this, gone in for that handshake, this is what would happen, and this is exactly the thing that we want to happen, but it's not as exaggerated as that, it is this. Now watch this again, you're gonna see my wrist come up. Uh, above the guitar neck and then back down, and that's exactly what we want to happen because that is what is happening to bend this string, that wrist is coming up and then back down like that. So my wrist is down low, basically level, it's not really bent at all, and then the wrist moves up and the fingers move with it, that is the correct string bending technique. And we're using finger 12 and 3, all as one giant finger to push it up together and just keeping that little finger just right next to it like this. We do need a good amount of chord playing and rhythm guitar playing experience for you to have the strength of your fingers to be able to do this. It is strength of very small muscles and ligaments in your fingers, and really your fingers, as I say, are staying still. And it's your wrist that's moving up in this kind of fashion. It's just twisting of the wrist. How much do we twist and how high does this string have to go? Well, we're wanting the sound of two frets higher than that note. Which is about here, it's almost hitting string 5, but just not quite, we're definitely pushing string 4 up as well. And when you push this string 3 up, just think about kind of pushing it up and holding the strings, you know, don't let the other strings all slip behind like this, try and keep them just in between. Try and get them just to sit on the top of your fingers like this. Once we're comfortable with that. We are looking for that sound. Do a whole tone sound, which is the same note as the 11th fret on string 3. I'll leave a link below to some more help with string bending, but to play the riff itself. There's a couple of ways to play the riff itself. The first way would be to slide with the 1st finger from the 4th fret. To fret 7. And then hit the 3rd finger down, and then we'll go for the bend, so it's like this. That's the preferred way. We also have this way which might make some more sense to those of you that have gone for perhaps minor pentatonic position 1. This will be at the 7th threat position. It's the same notes as here. Same bend That some of you may have done before, but let's try this. Sliding all on string 3, because this slide is going to be a really cool technique to get down if we can. The way we're playing this, we'll keep in tune with the original recording, but on the original recording they are tuned down a couple of steps, so if you look at tab for this, you may see it at different notes and that kind of thing. The way we're playing it, we don't need to retune our guitars, and these will be the frets, just to jam along to the original recording right away. So this is starting at fret 4, all on string 3. Everything is just picking string 3. Slide without picking again. To fret 7. And then put 3rd finger down on fret 9. 3 notes, 1. 2 is the slide, and then 3. Now I'm now gonna actually change the settings on my Boss Cortana to be a bit more er grunge, a little bit more overdrive, and to do that, I'm gonna go on the lead settings, so I've gone from crunch to lead, cos this is solo, and that just gives us a little bit more gain. I don't need to change anything else on the amplifier because that is already. Giving us plenty. Of overdrive, of fuzz, but also the most important thing is sustain. Actually when we slide from fret 4 to fret 3, we want it still to ring out, and if it's really, really clean, like if I'm on the clean setting. It kind of, the note dies down, the note's not as powerful on its own, so we wanna be on the lead setting. Or something, or just turn the gain up on your amplifier so that we have. Plenty of overdrive. So we do these 3 notes. 3 times. Join in with me in 234. Slide to 7th fret. Third finger goes down at 9th fat. Same again, 34. Slide to 7th fret, have your eyes at the 7th fret, boom, there we go. 3rd finger. Goes down, same again. Now if that 2nd fret note isn't ringing out, you can pick it again, but just try and pick it when you arrive there. When we played that 3 times, we then do this bend, but we have to then put the middle finger down, put the first finger down, thumb over the top, and push up with the wrist, not the fingers. Push up like this. And then it's unbent, same note but unbent, to first finger. In total, 234. Same again, 234. Let's play that along to some chords now, which I will record using my looper pedal. Uh, we're gonna start off at 50% tempo, and I'm just gonna play the chords E minor and D to keep everything in tune and in standard tuning. Um, but before we do that, an optional extra would be to add a couple of effects, um, such as a reverb, so my guitar without reverb. With reverb. We sort of get this You know, this sound of a space sounds like we're in a large room, a hall, or a cathedral. It gives that shimmer to it and sounds really good. With these kind of lead lines, the other um effect that's on there is a chorus, which I can also add on the Boscatana, that sounds like this. It's a little bit subtle, let me make it kind of crazy. Hear that wobble. Hey, it sounds like a Dalek or something. That's an extreme of the chorus. a little bit, it sounds like that. And there's some optional extras with this song. Let's start off by playing along to this at 50% of the original BPM ready on string three and join in with me in one. To 34. Hopefully that's something that you can do. Now let's go for 75% of this, and remember you can create this um if you have a looper pedal also, um, I will leave a link in the description below to my how to use a looper pedal so you can do this kind of thing yourself. Really pay attention to that tuning when you're uh bending the string up. It needs to be in tune. OK, that's what we're looking for, so keep that in mind. And also, if you're struggling with the slide at all, this slide. Is not easy, and therefore if that's too difficult for you or you don't like the slide, we can go for this nut at the 9th fret, 7th fret, 9th fret. As I showed earlier in the video. That keeps everything in one position, it means we don't need the slide, that is an option as well. Whichever option you want to go for, join in with me in 1234. The string bending, if it's new to you, is not easy. Give it time. Uh, the other thing that we can do, just if string bending isn't happening at all, is just slide two frets from the 9th fret to the 11th fret, instead of doing the bend up. If the bend up just isn't happening and you're just not happy doing that, um, please just do a slide by 2 frets. If it's a 2 fret bend, do a 2 fret slide instead. Um, but string bend is one of those techniques we want to get down if you want more help with that. My lead guitar syllabus would be my recommendation for you. It's got loads of other exercises to help you with this kind of thing. Take care, bye for now.