Lick Breakdown Guitar Lessons

I recently received some great feedback on one of my YouTube videos from Mike, who is an amazing guitarist. He was impressed by a specific section in the video where I played a G major 13 chord and then went into a cool lick, showcasing some interesting guitar techniques.

A lot of the time when I’m improvising the things I play are pretty much instantly forgotten, so I decided to grab a guitar, hit record and cast my mind back to that moment to figure out what I was doing and break the whole thing down for you!

In this lesson, I’m going to break down a section from a track of mine called Rising Up. This solo sounds very intense, but once I take you through the different approaches I used you’ll learn that it’s actually quite simple.

Instead of trying to learn the solo note-for-note, we’re going to focus on the various techniques involved so that you can apply them to different note combinations and come up with riffs that are uniquely yours.

In this lesson, we’re gonna dive into a couple of big-time shred licks which both use very specific approaches that you’ll need to learn if you want to deliver them at speed.

If you go ahead and start trying to approach these licks without the right preparation you’re going to have a very bad time. The good news is I’m going to break down everything you need to know, including how to translate these techniques to other solos and melodies to add more variation and speed to your shred arsenal!

Have you ever struggled with phrasing and note choice when writing solos? If so, this is a great lesson for you to check out. Follow along as I break down a solo from my track SUDO which contains some quirky phrasing and explosive lead lines.

In addition to breaking this solo down I’m also gonna show you how I wrote and constructed it – including how I almost trashed the song entirely (twice) because I just couldn’t come up with lines that I felt worked in the track. You don’t want to miss this one!

In this lesson, I’m going to break down the full track from the Polychrome DSP launch video, which is an absolute banger! This song had a lot of fireworks and exciting parts to showcase the plugin to the best of its ability.

Throughout the lesson, I’ll focus on a couple of phrases that are less about technique and more about delivery, with simpler note choices that are more based on emotion, feelings, and expression. There are a couple of solos and certain parts of the song that really dive into that style of playing in a big way. Don’t worry, I’ll break everything down nice and slowly, so you’ll be fine. I have every confidence in you, so grab the backing track that’s included with this lesson, and let’s go!

Do you want to gain speed, power and momentum on the fretboard? In this lesson, I’m going to teach you two metal-inspired licks that will build up your chops in no time.

These licks feature some sinister note choices – perfect for the genre – and are a lot of fun to play. I’ll take you through them step-by-step as I break everything down so get your gain cranked and let’s go!

In this lesson, I break down two key sections from a track called “Black Line” by my band, McRocklin and Hutch. The first riff is based on F# minor but includes one note outside of the scale that makes all the difference and sets the tone for a lot of the themes in this song.

The next section focuses more on lead playing than the riff-heavy first half. Over time, I’ve added some variations and embellishments to this section, especially when playing it on live streams. While the album version may sound more simplified, my current approach incorporates different techniques and sounds that I’ll break down for you.

In this lesson I’m going to break down one of the most difficult solos I’ve written, from my track ‘Square Dreamz’… with huge stretches and many intricate techniques packed into it, this solo is deceivingly complex to play.

I think you should challenge yourself and let me know if you can get this solo nailed by the end of the year… but if not, I guarantee you’ll pick up tons of tips and approaches during this lesson that you can use within your own licks!

Hi, I’m Al Joseph and today I’m going to teach you how to play the last solo section of my song “Elemental”.

This solo makes heavy use of legato techniques, and in order to help you understand how it’s put together, I’m going to break down the harmony and patterns that I used to build this solo so that you can nail the mechanics and be able to apply these techniques to your own playing in different situations.

In this lesson, I’m going to teach you the 2nd solo from my track SUDO. This is an incredibly difficult solo to perform, but what’s interesting about it is that it doesn’t take too long for you to learn the notes, and even be able to play along at the pace of the record – it’s all of the additional details that make it so difficult but interesting to play.

So first I’ll break the solo down for you, but then I’m gonna show you every little piece of the puzzle that you need to deliver it with the same attitude and phrasing of the record. It’s a lot of fun, and the impact it has on your finger dexterity is amazing, after playing this solo for a while I felt like my fingers had been taken to the next level!