JAMTRACKCENTRAL.COM ‘SHRED CLUB 7’ – an exclusive track by Paul Gilbert

General notes

Paul tuned down a whole tone for this track, so the tuning is DGCFAD, low to high. This can make things a little confusing when we talk about what notes you should play. So…

• If you’re learning from the Tab, all notes and chords are named as if you were in standard tuning. If you see the open 5

th string in the Tab, it’s shown as an A, even though it actually

sounds a whole tone lower. The first chord is shown as F#7, even though it’s a whole tone lower. This makes it easier to study what Paul is playing and apply it to your own solos. The downside is that you’ll have to tune down to use the backing properly. Unless…

• If you’re just soloing over the backing track, scroll down to the end of the Tab file and you’ll see the chord progression shown at actual pitch, designed for standard tuning.

If you’d like to experiment with adapting Paul’s solo for standard tuning, don’t forget that you can edit our Powertab files. Remember to make a copy, so you can always return to the original if necessary! Bars 1-8

First things first… we’re in 7/8 time, so there are seven pulses per bar. It might feel weird at first, but keep trying. After a while the groove will start to feel more natural, and you’ll develop a more instinctive feel for when the downbeat is going to arrive. The backing alternates between static sections of F#7 and a shorter D7-B7-F#7 sequence. For this introduction part, Paul is superimposing partial chords over the F#7. His partial chords suggest F#7-B7-E7-F#7. Bars 9-12

Paul shows off his considerable knowledge of the fretboard here, switching between scales to fit the underlying chords. The D7-B7-F#7 progression doesn’t fit any single scale, so he starts with D Mixolydian (D E F# G A B C), B Mixolydian (B C# D# E F# G# A). Notice in bar 9 how he smoothly moves from the D note (10

th fret) at the top of the D Mixolydian run to a D# (11

th fret) which is the start of

a little B major triad leading into the B7 chord. For the F#7 in bars 11-12, he plays the familiar blues scale box shape at the 14

th fret, but look how he

uses both the minor 3rd (A, 17

th fret) and major 3

rd (A#, 18

th fret) for a bluesy sound.

Bars 13-16

Paul starts off using F# Mixolydian (F# G# A B C# D# E) over the F#7 here – remember, the Mixolydian is the safest scale to use over a static dominant 7 chord. At the start of bar 15, he’s playing the F# major pentatonic (F# G# A# C# D#) but that scale’s notes are all found within the Mixolydian anyway. Bars 17-20 He uses arpeggio-based patterns for the D7 and B7 chord, with some typically Pablo-style string-skipping. Bars 21-24

Instead of switching scales here, Paul plays right through the progression with just the F# minor pentatonic (F# A B C# E) and blues scale (F# A B C C# E). Bars 25-32

This is the hardest part of the solo, and it takes some serious technique (and stamina) to maintain this sort of speed with such fluency and consistency. There’s nothing particularly melodic here, but that’s not the point – it’s almost like a rock version of John Coltrane’s “Sheets of Sound” concept in the late 50s… instead of listening for individual target notes, you focus on the bigger picture… an undulating wash of general F# Mixolydian sound. For most of this section, Paul is using his efficient combination of picking and legato, but in bar 30, almost every note is picked!

Bars 33-37

Again, Paul plays through the progression with the F# blues scale, but this time he’s adding the G# and D# (16

th fret on the E and B strings) so it’s more like the F# Dorian (F# G# A B C# D# E). He returns to

the Mixolydian at the end of bar 36.