“BLUE ON BLACK”

Five Finger Death Punch (featuring Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Brantley Gilbert and Brian May)

THIS STARSTUDDED 2019 cover of a popular rock song originally recorded in 1998 by blues-rock sensation Kenny Wayne Shepherd [pictured] features KWS and legendary Queen axman Brian May as guest soloists, with Five Finger Death Punch guitarists Jason Hook and Zoltan Bathory accompanying.

As they customarily do, Hook and Bathory employed unusually low baritone tunings for their parts, while Shepherd went with drop-D and May played in either standard or drop-D. For the sake of convenience, practicality and chord shape familiarity, we’ve arranged most of the guitar parts in our transcription for drop-D tuning.

Hook and Bathory kick off the arrangement with their tastefully layered reconfiguration of the song’s repeating three-chord progression (see bars 1-5, Gtrs. 1 and 2), which then serves as the foundational accompaniment for the verses. Notice how the 12-string acoustic guitar (Gtr. 1) exploits the rich timbre of the open, octave-doubled strings while an electric six-string with overdrive and tremolo provides a complementary higher part, with both guitars arpeggiating the shapes and letting the notes of each chord ring as much as possible.

At the chorus (section C) the groove takes a decidedly metal turn, with high-gain electric guitars providing a roaring downpicked power-chord reading of the repeating progression, in signature FFDP fashion. To prevent any unwanted open notes from sounding during the percussive “scratch” strums (indicated by X’s), lightly lay all four fret-hand fingers across the strings.

Shepherd’s and May’s solos (sections D and F) feature the two celebrated guitarists’ distinctive tones, touches and phrasing approaches, especially when it comes to string bending and vibrato. It’s interesting to note that Kenny took a mostly D minor pentatonic approach to his lines (D, F, G, A, C), whereas Brian, perhaps for the sake of providing contrast, opted to utilize the warmersounding parallel D major pentatonic scale

F#,

(D, E, A, B) for most of his licks.