Drop it down to C! In this roundup I have tested and reviewed the 3 best metal guitar lessons of 2021 that will bring you the most value and progress this year.

As there are now several sources of premium guitar lessons that include metal-specific lessons, we will be looking into the best of the best for their metal guitar lessons.

What Makes Metal Guitar Lessons Rock!

There are a few staples that make great metal guitar lessons. These include:

The above criteria is what makes a well-rounded, comprehensive guitar course, regardless of genre. Therefore, they will be the basis of my ratings in this review.

While all of these courses vary in skill level, I want to really focus on the lessons I felt made the most dramatic impact to my metal guitar playing and that I feel will do the same for you.

Kris Norris is the guitarist for the band Darkest Hour. If you’re familiar with Darkest Hour, you know how awesome their guitar riffs are. Fans of Darkest Hour will love the Kris Norris artist series. And if you’ve never heard of Darkest Hour, there’s definitely something for you in this course, too!

This course features 41 total lessons. That’s the 2nd most out of any course on this list. On top of that, each lesson averages around 19:30 min. That’s the longest average run time on this list!

With the Kris Norris course you can be confident you will be brought from Beginner to Advanced with dozens of high quality lessons.

Personally, I learned some of my favorite warm-ups for my practice sessions from this course and I still use it to this day. I also love how Kris works to incorporate just a little of theory into each of his lessons. There’s just enough music theory to not be overwhelming, but also make sure you are learning what you need to know.

Finally, this course is amazing if you want to really learn and master your sweep picking technique. In this 41 lessons series, 3 whole lessons (that’s roughly an hour of total instruction) exclusively on sweep picking and sweep picking applications. Before this course, I could barely sweep pick. I had only taken 1 lesson on it and barely practiced it. After this course, it’s a staple in many of my leads.

Sample Lesson (Without TAB):

Emil Werstler Artist Series

You may know Emil Werstler from his band Daath, who has been taking the metal scene by storm since 2004. The course features 48 total lessons with an average run time of 14 minutes.

In this course, Emil starts very simple with some heavy down picking exercises and bend practice. The courses quickly move to more intermediate and advanced topics such as sweep picking, economy picking, alternate picking, how to add passing tones to your licks and various soloing techniques.

As you can tell, the course focuses a lot on your picking abilities. However, there is a series of lessons in this course that I loved that really gives your fretting hand a major workout. This series is known as the Horizontal Lick Building Series.

In the Horizontal Lick Building series, Emil teaches you minor, major, pedal tone and pentatonic scale applications. In lesson 1 he teaches you a classic minor scale based metal lick that you’ll quickly recognize from dozens of songs. The first 4 lessons in the series teach the different applications of the lick. The 5th lesson in the series combines all 4 previous licks to create one “master lick” that scales nearly the whole fretboard.

Lessons in the Horizontal Lick Building course provide great alternative picking practice. Additionally, they give your fretting hand a major workout. Lastly, these exercises are going to allow you to develop air-tight synchronization between your left and right hands.

Songs With Machine Head Series

You might remember a few years back I wrote a new article about how Machine Head were going to be coming to JamPlay (if you’re interested, you can read that article here). Well, they’re here and the lessons are awesome. Machine Head Guitarists Rob Flynn and Phil Demmel walk you through 4 legendary Machine Head songs.

While I was at first disappointed to learn that Phil and Rob wouldn’t be teaching normal lessons on techniques and song writing, that was quickly washed away with excitement as I started the song lessons.

In these song lessons Rob & Phil break down 4 awesome Machine Head songs:

• Aesthetics of Hate
• Now I Lay Thee Down
• Be Still and Know
• Darkness Within

Be ready to put your skills to the test. These lessons are definitely the most advanced of the bunch, all ranked at 4-5/5 difficulty ratings on JamPlay’s difficulty scale.

However, the average run time for each of these song lessons is around 45 minutes, so you can be sure that Rob & Phil will walk you through each song at a comfortable pace. Each lesson also starts and ends with a demonstration of the piece you are learning.

While the lessons are amazing and brought great improvement to my lead guitar playing, specifically, I think my favorite part about these lessons is the guys. Rob & Phil have great personalities and are always sprinkling in their own humor into the lessons. They also talk a bit about the history of Machine Head, their songwriting process and how they wrote the song dubbed, “The Thrashterpiece”.

Though they are challenging, I highly recommend these metal guitar lessons for anyone who really wants to master the subject.

The Metal for Beginners II course is really good at teaching you really important fundamentals for metal guitar. The course features a total of 10 lessons, each lesson averaging around 3:30 min.

Personally, I felt the Metal for Beginners I course was way too basic. Especially since Guitar Tricks wants you to complete their Beginner Guitar Course first (don’t worry, you don’t have to. You can go straight to their metal guitar lessons), a lot of the Metal Guitar I lessons are redundant info you should already know if you followed GuitarTRicks’ own system.

However, Metal for beginners II is where the lessons start teaching valuable material. This course covers very important topics such as:

• Alternate picking exercises
• Palm Muting
• Hammer Ons
• Pull offs

Ways to improve tone and write metal with a clean guitar tone

That last one is the main reason I felt compelled to add this course to the list. While the other techniques are essential, tone is one of the hottest topics to all my students. I can’t tell you how many conversations I’ve had about what the best pedals are for metal, what are the best amp settings, pickups, etc. The list goes on and on. However, many guitarists don’t realize how much of your tone simply comes from your hands and how you play.

This lesson helps guide you through developing your own, unique guitar tone without the use of pedals, effects, etc.

My main complaint about these lessons is the same for most GuitarTricks lessons - they’re very short. That’s not to say the material is bad, it just feels a bit thin at times. Each lesson has a roughly 1 minute introduction/demonstration of what you’re about to learn, followed by a roughly 3-4 minute lesson on how to play what was demonstrated.

Metal Rhythm Workout III

The Metal Rhythm Workout III lessons were a lot of fun and really helpful. The course includes 10 total lessons with 7 JamTracks to practice the lesson material with. I find the exercise-specific JamTracks to be really helpful for getting a feel for different rhythms and tempos. Each lesson in this course has an average length of 3:30 min.

This course covers a handful of some of my favorite metal guitar techniques:

• Gallup Picking: If you’ve ever listened to bands like Iron Maiden, Megadeth or really any 80’s Thrash/Power Metal band, then you’ve heard gallop picking. Gallop picking is a specific rhythmic picking pattern that creates some really fun melodies to play. Gallop picking also just feels like you're playing faster It’s hard to explain, but try it out and you’ll see what I mean. Gallops are awesome because they are fun to play and not too hard to master.
• Reverse Gallops: A normal gallop, but backwards! Reverse gallops sound a lot more modern and can be a bit trickier to play. Though they aren’t much harder, they are very rewarding to learn. In this lesson, instructor Ben Lindholm explains the formula behind the reverse gallop and how to count it out, as well as how to apply it to your rhythms.
• Sliding Power Chord: Sliding power chords are really common in today’s metal rhythm guitar. However, many guitarists struggle in the beginning with very choppy, stuttery sounding chord slides. In this lesson you will learn how to make buttery smooth, legato transitions for much more melodic rhythms.

Essential Shred Licks I

Essential Shred Licks I is a series of 7 lessons, averaging about 2:30 minutes in length. There are also 4 practice tracks with tempos ranging from 60-200BPM to practice the lesson material over.

Though short, this course packs a challenging punch and a lot of great info. In it’s 7 lessons you will learn several “types of shred”, each with its own unique riff. The types of shred the instructor, Ben Lindholm, teaches are:

• The Shred Standard
• Pentatonic Cascades
• Pentatonic Shred
• Pedal Notes
• Endless Triplets

The final lesson is Ben offering some words of advice on how to continue to build on these concepts and apply them to your own playing.

Personally, I loved the section on Cascading Pentatonics. What drew me to them first was the really unique sound. The lick sounds like a weird mashup of genres, but in a pleasing way.

I also found the Cascading Pentatonics lesson to be really helpful for string skipping as it requires very little fretting hand movement, allowing you to really focus on the strings you need to play.

3. Metal Method

Summary
Metal Method guitar lessons are the only lessons on this list that aren’t part of a membership site. Metal Method lessons are bought on an individual basis, as opposed to a subscription. You have the choice to buy either a physical DVD or a digital download of your lessons.

One thing that I think really sets Metal Method apart is their inclusion of metal vocal lessons, constant revisions and improvements of all their courses and incredible customer service.

Additionally, Metal Method offers a support forum where you can upload and share your playing for Doug, the instructor, to personally review and critique for you. This feature is an option with JamPlay and GuitarTricks, but it will cost you extra. With metal Method, access to the forum and Doug’s reviews is included free with your purchase.

My Top 3 Recommended Metal Method Guitar Lessons:

Complete Rock Guitar Course

Metal Riffology

Metal Riffology is the work of Metal Method’s Sarah Spisack. In this 3 volume course Sarah teaches you various scales and modes. She breaks down over 100 popular metal riffs with genres ranging from doom metal to death metal to metalcore. This course is not broken up into lessons and is instead organized by riff for easy navigation.

Sarah also teaches you how to write your own riffs using these scales and modes. By first teaching the base scale, and then various riffs that are built on that scale, Sarah puts the pieces together for students to really understand how to apply these techniques.

Metal Riffology Covers a vast array of scales, modes and riffs. Some topics covered include:

• Dyads
• Syncopation and Rhythm Displacement
• Natural Minor Riffs
• Harmonized Riffs

If I am being honest, Metal Riffology is my favorite Metal Method course. I think the Complete Course developed my foundation in Rhythm and a little lead. Metal Riffology rounded out the education with scales, modes, a little theory, and how to apply them to rhythm and lead riffs.

Metal Riffology comes with supplemental TABs and Guitar Pro files.

Check Out Metal Riffology: Here

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