Crazy behind the nut bends and contrary motion tricks

missmisstreater

I've been playing fixed bridge guitars since virtually day 1 of my playing life. I've always felt a connection to the tele and done what needed to be done to make it "special", taking all those Jerry Donahue and Jim Campilongo things.

The behind the nut bend is a staple of any flashy tele bend, especially if you're holding other notes doing it. Just recently though I realised I could do these all on my Vigiers, which is fantastic for a modern player (I could certainly never do this on an Ibanez!). If youc an do this on your axe, it's worth a go!

I also do a cool Jerry Donahue lick in this one when I bend the D up a semitone, then the G up a tone, catch the B and bend it up and I release the D and G - that's a REAL tricky one!!!

viz

That scale at the end is awse! Nice one. 

Legionreturns

My mate did this to one of my guitars and knackered the nut groove on my g string  

missmisstreater

Legionreturns said:

My mate did this to one of my guitars and knackered the nut groove on my g string  

What was the nut made out of? Butter? haha

I tease lol

Yeah, you need to make sure you're set up with gear for the job, but eventually, you're going to get wear anyway just as with fret wire (though a nut is much easier to replace than frets! haha)

DLM

missmisstreater said:

(I could certainly never do this on an Ibanez!)

Surely that would have worked on your PGM400? You'd get more upward travel that way than with the whammy.

I've been all over this technique from day one because the bloke who's shop sold me my first electric did it when he demoed the guitar for me, and I thought it looked and sounded awesome.

missmisstreater

DLM said:

missmisstreater said:

(I could certainly never do this on an Ibanez!)

Surely that would have worked on your PGM400? You'd get more upward travel that way than with the whammy.

I've been all over this technique from day one because the bloke who's shop sold me my first electric did it when he demoed the guitar for me, and I thought it looked and sounded awesome.

ughhh I miss that guitar

IIRC it still only had a tiny distance between the strings behind the nut and the truss cover - I'd bet you'd struggle to get a semitone

TBH though, I didn't know what a behind the nut bend was when I had that axe

http://i221.photobucket.com/albums/dd209/kent912/A9luvu085.jpg

EricTheWeary

I'll have to watch that, I can't say I'm good at them but I do like a behind the nut bend and JC is a bit of a hero to me, although I think I first heard them done by Rory Gallagher ( maybe Tony Iommi as well?). 

Rocker

Impressive.  It would be really impressive if he played those behind the nut bends in a real song....

DLM

Ah, I see. With the back-angled headstock on the PGM there's not much space to push down. You'd need a Timmons or a Satriani 600 or something.

@EricTheWeary Wis'd. Iron Man intro.

octatonic

Rocker said:

Impressive.  It would be really impressive if he played those behind the nut bends in a real song....

You mean like Jim Campilongo does?

EricTheWeary

octatonic said:

Rocker said:

Impressive.  It would be really impressive if he played those behind the nut bends in a real song....

You mean like Jim Campilongo does?

The main riff in Monkey in a Movie uses twisting the machinehead which I don't think I've ever seen used by anyone else other than just as noise. 

Jim, Rory Gallagher, Tony Iommi ( as noted above Iron Man wouldn't be the same without behind the nut bends), Jerry Donahue, John 5 and plenty of country guitarists use them - you're not necessarily aware that's what you are hearing. 

They're slipped in here for example ( it's a fairly recognisable song/ instrumental), not a great version of JC doing this on YouTube but this guy does an excellent version:

EricTheWeary

Sorry, answering my own point here - no behind the nut bends but more tuner tweaking. Plus any excuse for some Junior Brown. 

octatonic

EricTheWeary said:

octatonic said:

Rocker said:

Impressive.  It would be really impressive if he played those behind the nut bends in a real song....

You mean like Jim Campilongo does?

The main riff in Monkey in a Movie uses twisting the machinehead which I don't think I've ever seen used by anyone else other than just as noise. 

Yes but Jim also bends behind the nut at various points in the song as well.
I know this because I transcribed it.
I also have a copy of Jim's notation on this song- he has a really weird way of doing it- it is a combination of chord charts and tab in one.
It is actually harder to figure out than reading dots.

digitalscream

I've always found these techniques incredibly impressive, ever since I saw Jerry Donahue do it on the Equinox guitar special (the one with Frank Dunnery showing off his ridiculous alien hands too). Thing is, I find the behind-the-nut bends to be ridiculously painful on my finger tips...no idea why...so I just stick to my boring, conventional bends

EricTheWeary

octatonic said:

EricTheWeary said:

octatonic said:

Rocker said:

Impressive.  It would be really impressive if he played those behind the nut bends in a real song....

You mean like Jim Campilongo does?

The main riff in Monkey in a Movie uses twisting the machinehead which I don't think I've ever seen used by anyone else other than just as noise. 

Yes but Jim also bends behind the nut at various points in the song as well.
I know this because I transcribed it.
I also have a copy of Jim's notation on this song- he has a really weird way of doing it- it is a combination of chord charts and tab in one.
It is actually harder to figure out than reading dots.

He uses them a lot! He also uses tone swells a lot which is something I don't think many other people do. I think a lot of this stuff comes from Roy Buchanan but Jim knows about jazz and punk and Hendrix and reggae. He's a great interviewee if nothing else. He used to do a techniques column in Guitar Player many, many years ago which I remember reading and having no idea what he was on about! 

This is is a terrible quality video but he's using behind the nut bends and tone swells ( that wahhh thing) on this:

octatonic

EricTheWeary said:

octatonic said:

EricTheWeary said:

octatonic said:

Rocker said:

Impressive.  It would be really impressive if he played those behind the nut bends in a real song....

You mean like Jim Campilongo does?

The main riff in Monkey in a Movie uses twisting the machinehead which I don't think I've ever seen used by anyone else other than just as noise. 

Yes but Jim also bends behind the nut at various points in the song as well.
I know this because I transcribed it.
I also have a copy of Jim's notation on this song- he has a really weird way of doing it- it is a combination of chord charts and tab in one.
It is actually harder to figure out than reading dots.

He uses them a lot! He also uses tone swells a lot which is something I don't think many other people do. I think a lot of this stuff comes from Roy Buchanan but Jim knows about jazz and punk and Hendrix and reggae. He's a great interviewee if nothing else. He used to do a techniques column in Guitar Player many, many years ago which I remember reading and having no idea what he was on about! 

This is is a terrible quality video but he's using behind the nut bends and tone swells ( that wahhh thing) on this:

Yeah he clearly studied Roy as well as Danny Gatton.
Jim is probably my favourite modern guitar player- he has such an advanced level of technique but his style is still very much rooted in playing the song, rather than showing the technique.
He's a monster player.

missmisstreater

Man... the first time I saw Jim live... I couldn't believe what I was seeing - such a unique voice, but with nods to some of the greats