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INSTRUCTIONAL PROFILE
UNLOCKING THE SECRETS OF
SHRED
Troy Grady & Cracking the Code
the shred gods and bring fire back to Earth. I think I do a decent job of synthesizing
To hear Troy Grady discuss his Investing in a $2,500 dollar camera capable critical observations into digestible nug-
project, you can only help but feel of capturing over 130 frames of full color gets. I’ve done a lot of thinking and also
a sense of urgency and adventure. video per second (for reference, the typi- a little writing on the subject of guitar
cal movie camera captures 30 frames per technique going back at least fifteen years
Grady, a lifelong guitar devotee second), Grady set out to produce a docu- – some of which appears on my web site
and shredder himself, realized one mentary, now titled Cracking the Code, and is perhaps the best available example
fateful day that a select group of which will attempt to dissect the playing of whatever strengths I may have as a
and mechanics of some of the fastest gui- technician and critic. I also have a healthy
guitar gods could perform musical tarists around. appreciation for the scientific method.
feats that shock the mind and numb I’m innately curious about the way things
the hands. The unfortunate catch Make no mistake; this isn’t just a movie work – in a “hey, let’s drop the old TV tube
of metal-heads pounding out lightning-fast off that abandoned building” kind of way
was very few of us could figure out riffs. Grady looked up players with blue- – and as a player I can execute much of
just how to replicate those wicked grass, jazz and even classical inclinations, the material you’ll see in the film.
fast runs. While a dedicated group all in an attempt to discover what tech-
niques and tricks unite these various musi- But the truth is, I wasn’t really thinking
(including Grady) would spend cians. He has set up an informative blog about any of this when I decided to make
hours watching and rewinding to track his effort, and he’s even garnered the movie, and it would be more than a
Yngwie Malmsteen instructional the attention of national press outfits like little egotistical if I was. The story of the
Newsweek and MTV News. It’s an inter- Code is essentially autobiographical – it’s
videos, the rest of us were more esting and impressive effort, and he was the story of how I learned to play, charting
content to just shrug our shoulders kind enough to give us a few minutes to a path from novice to able practitioner that
and cop slower licks. discuss what he’s learned so far. probably mirrors what most guitar players
struggle with as they learn the instrument.
So I’m an entirely ordinary guy, and this will
By Adam Moore What brought you to this shred cross- hopefully hit home with anyone who’s ever
Eventually Grady’s innate curiousity got roads? Do you feel you’re qualified to watched one of the masters at work and
the best of him; the humble Brooklynite explore such a mysterious, alluring thought, hell, how do they do that?
recently set out to discover the secrets of area of the guitar?
60 PREMIER GUITAR FEBRUARY 2007 w w w. p re m i e rg u i t a r. c o m
The title of the documentary, Cracking Eight or ten years out of college, I decided pocket digital camera for a private lesson.
the Code, sounds incredibly intense. to put a band together, and in the process With this thing a few inches from his pick-
As the secrets unfolded, was there a figured I should polish the chops. So I ing hand, I still wasn’t able to get clear
eureka moment, where everything just went out and bought a stack of instruc- footage of what was going on – Rusty
clicked? tional videos I had always wanted to see; was faster than the camera was – and I
these were things like Michael Angelo’s knew I needed better tools. That’s when I
Sophomore year of college, I had been Star Licks and Speed Kills videos, and Paul found the Basler camera that I use in the
watching Yngwie’s instructional REH Gilbert’s Intense Rock. Intense Rock was film, which can do hundreds of frames per
video all year, pissing off my roommates a landmark, a ton of players cite it as an second depending on the resolution you
to no end. One day I was working on influence, and Mike’s videos are, of course, request of it. I started writing the software
a lick I had developed, a three-octave as scary as they come. And lo and behold, for it, and I went back a couple more times
harmonic minor run, fully picked, and for the technique I’m seeing is entirely differ- to film Rusty and iron out the kinks.
whatever reason it was going well – very ent from Yngwie’s.
well. In fact by the end of the day it had Overall it was hours and hours of foot-
gone from a non-starter to total burn, At some point along the way I began think- age. And playing for the shredcam is not
completely clean. Shocking. ing, ok, for as many star players that exist, easy. The camera records uncompressed
are there as many effective mechanical video, so even a 5-second clip is hundreds
After looking at it for several weeks, in con- formulae? I had a little recurring daydream of megabytes. It records directly to RAM
cert with the video, I decided there were about retiring from a rock guitar career to because disks aren’t fast enough, so I can
things Yngwie was doing – and things he a comfy spot in the guitar department at only record up to about 15 seconds per clip
wasn’t doing – that were true of this lick Berklee, and using my academic clout to on the laptop I use. So when I say go, you
as well. I was off and running. I spent the convince master players to submit to vid- basically have a few seconds to nail your
next couple years elaborating the concept eotaped pseudo-scientific investigations of best stuff. Do this for an hour or two, it’s
and analyzing a zillion players, who all, I their technique. Then I thought, hell, I’m a like doing wind sprints.
had decided, used the same technique as recruiter with guitar skills – I don’t need a
Yngwie. I ended up writing a manuscript rock career or a chair at Berklee, all I need Who are some of the players you’ve
on these observations and getting course is a camera! tapped (sorry) to explore the world
credit for it at Yale. of shred?
Rusty Cooley was my guinea pig. I had not
Tell us a little about the “shredcam” yet worked out the details of the shred- Rusty figures prominently in the film
and its origins. cam, so I flew down to Houston with my because of his role in the story of devel-
oping the shredcam, and of course also
because he’s about as scary a player as
you’re likely to find. Marshall Harrison also
lives in Houston and was one of the early
guys I filmed. He’s an interesting case – a
Gambale-level sweep picker and fusion
harmonist who’s also done interesting
work in translating Romantic piano works
– Romantic as in Chopin, Beethoven, that
era – to the guitar.
Otherwise I’m knee-deep in filming as we
speak. I filmed this fantastic player and
songwriter from Canada, Conrad Simon.
If you haven’t heard his demo, The Wrath
of Con, you’re missing out – amazing play-
ing with highly developed compositional
sensibilities. I met Joe Stump at Berklee a
few weeks ago, who is a rigorous techni-
cian and also greatly relaxed beneath the
Rusty Cooley playing for the shredcam
shredcam. I’m meeting Stephane Wrembel,
w w w. p re m i e rg u i t a r. c o m PREMIER GUITAR FEBRUARY 2007 61
CRACKING THE CODE
“The idea that virtuoso players can play “anything” without really thinking about it is a fantasy.”
a world-class gypsy jazz player, and have the layout of the strings and the imple- plays it. Paul on the other hand does not
dates to speak with Frank Gambale and ment we use to play them, i.e. the pick. It commonly use combinations of sweeping,
Jimmy Bruno. I’ve spoken to Ron Thal’s was designed to be fingerpicked, where alternate, and legato to play strictly scalar
people and to Chris Impellitteri via email. the multiplicity of fingers (unless you’re passages, though this complex stew of
It’s not just about metal players, it’s about Django!) makes it much easier to select techniques would be routine for Yngwie.
the universality of great technique, and the a particular string to play on. The major Doesn’t mean Paul hasn’t done it, and
many forms it can take. obstacle therefore in plectrum-based play- doesn’t mean he couldn’t do it, of course
ing is getting from one string to another – it’s just not part of his active right hand
How did you go about approaching with a degree of efficiency. The second- vocabulary, what I call his pick model.
these players about your project? Were ary concern is synchronizing the hands
they generally receptive to the idea? such that each pickstroke is mated to only You might tend to see all this as a limiting
the note you intend. If you can succeed factor but the truth is that the guitar is a
I’ve been pleased with the reception so far. in doing these two things, you can play limited instrument anyway. On a keyboard
More people seem to share my curiosity cleanly, and you can do so at speed. instrument like a piano, you press a button,
than I initially expected, particularly in the and sound comes out. As many buttons
mainstream (i.e. non-guitar) media, which Witness, for example, that playing cleanly as you can press simultaneously, that’s
was surprising. My initial thought was, on a single string is relatively elementary. how many sounds you can make. It’s very
how do I explain and pitch this project, The only issue to deal with in this case is powerful. If you lift the lid and peek inside,
and who’s going to care? I was a little wor- the issue of hand synchronicity. Yngwie you realize just how much complexity is
ried that advanced players would see the has a great formula for this – you create being shielded from you by the instrument
whole technical focus of the investigation patterns that repeat with the same pick- itself. The guitar exposes all this. It’s up
as less than relevant to the goal of mak- stroke, and you lock that pickstroke to met- to you, the player, to discover the most
ing good music. But in certain genres of rically strong divisions of the time. efficient way to play something – and that
music, like the metal/shred scene, the idea involves whatever combination of left-hand
of technical development is at one with When you get into multi-string licks, all hell fingerings and right-hand pick motions your
the creative process – great riffs often breaks loose, and the film will delve into pick model gives you.
emerge from mechanical practice, for the various combinations of techniques
example, and everybody, even the players that players use to execute them. Yngwie, The idea that virtuoso players can play
that already have the technique, practices for example, only ascends via sweep pick- “anything” without really thinking about it is
when they can. ing, though he descends with a combina- a fantasy. It’s a question of what your pick
model can handle. Once you accept this
reality, you can start to make the music
you want to make, without worrying that
you don’t have enough technique to do it.
What about all the guitarists you’ve
interviewed? Is there something that
ties them all together, that even they
might not realize?
The concept of a pick model is what ties
them together. I know this is a bit like
saying the concept of gravity is what ties
everyone together on planet earth, but it’s
true. Even non-shredders have movements
The shredcam in action which are comfortable for them based
on their default hand position and which
What have you learned so far about tion of alternate picking and legato – but are therefore commonplace in their play-
technique? almost never sweeping. Something like ing. Many of the clichés of modern rock
what shred guys call the Paul Gilbert Lick, guitar exist because they fit neatly into
The basic idea is that the guitar is an inher- for example, would be completely alien one or more common pick models, and
ently inefficient instrument to play given to Yngwie, and for that reason he never not because of anything inherently musi-
62 PREMIER GUITAR FEBRUARY 2007 w w w. p re m i e rg u i t a r. c o m
“…many important pick motions happen only at high speed…”
posed to “feel the burn” like you do at the I would love to get this done in the next
gym, that’s different. In fact it’s dangerous, six months, but let’s just say 2007, to be
and can lead to tendonitis if you’re not care- conservative. Readers in search of more
ful. In musical practice, when you’re learning granular updates on the film’s progress can
new motions, you’re teaching the brain a sign up for the mailing list on my site.
new way of organization, and to do this
correctly, the frequency of repetitions, and
Rusty Cooley’s pickwork up close the exactitude of those repetitions, matters
most. You need to repeat something soon
cal about the licks. That unison bend that enough after the last repetition – a matter of
everyone plays on the top two strings of seconds, typically – and you need to repeat
the box position blues scale, that’s one it enough times. And you need some way
of them. of certifying that you’re playing it exactly the
same way every time. Marking the relevant
Your website has some interesting hand motions to different time divisions on a
words about metronome usage and metronome or drum machine is a good way
practicing. How do you view a metro- to do this when the tempo you’re practicing
nome’s effectiveness in improving a at might not be fast enough to supply the
guitarist’s speed? necessary momentum.
You shouldn’t expect a metronome to tell The fact that many important pick
you how to maneuver the pick any more motions happen only at high speed is Conrad Simon plays for the camera
than you should expect a speedometer to also why, when it comes to some of
tell you how to steer. But both are useful the more esoteric ones, the players There’s been a fair amount of interest from
tools in telling you how fast you can take themselves are only partially aware of the community on the instructional side,
the next turn without wiping out, and both them. Every guy I’ve filmed so far has and a few music schools have even got-
can help you gauge your progress in prac- had some lick he plays where he doesn’t ten in touch. But I’m wary of milking the
tice situations. There’s no question that you exactly know what’s going on, and we concept, so I’ll only do an instructional if
should develop cleanliness and efficiency have to film it to find out. Each time, it’s there’s significant interest. I’d love to get
before speed, and in the context of the like, hurry, get it quick before I forget what past the mechanics and into the creative
film, metronome usage takes an interest- it is. I know from my own playing that if zone, write some songs and get a band
ing twist. Some of the techniques you see you stop me mid-sequence and ask me thing going. I’ve also considered putting
under the shredcam are actually difficult to what I just played, or what pickstroke I together a concert with some of the guys
play slowly, because they rely on momen- used, I very often cannot tell you. And in the film. I am in New York after all. Other
tum. So metronome usage can help in this is me, the guy with the film, and I’m than that, I would like to use my vast ana-
simulating what happens at high speed. supposed to be the expert on this stuff. lytical abilities to explain why Ginsu knives
never need resharpening and to quantify
Most practice is a memorization exercise – When can we expect this documentary just how much quicker of a picker-upper
it’s not an athletic workout, you’re not sup- to hit the streets? What’s after that? Bounty is.
Troy Grady
Cracking the Code
troygrady.com
Joe Stump warming up
w w w. p re m i e rg u i t a r. c o m PREMIER GUITAR FEBRUARY 2007 63
