Lick Autopsy: Nightmare (4:26-4:29) - Avenged Sevenfold

In this post I'm going to dissect a lick on Avenged Sevenfold's newest audio work, "Nightmare". On 4:26 to 4:29, you can hear a short lick that fills the vacant spot on the rhythm, right after Shadows sings "die/die again/drenched in sin/with no respect for another".

What I found interesting in this lick is the scale. Synyster Gates and Zacky Vengeance played a harmonic minor on D that finished on the second octave from where it first begins (D second octave). Another interesting thing is how they recorded the lick; either Synyster/Vengeance on first guitar played the lick firstly, and then the second guitar began the lick seconds after the first guitar played the lick, so that it imitates a delay-effect sound.

Basically, a harmonic minor goes:

1-2-2#-4-5-5#-7-8

So when applied in D, it goes:

D-E-F-G-A-A#-C#-D

In this lick, Synyster and Vengeance developed the scale quite simple. They played octave of the scale and drive forward to the second octave of the scale but they didn't finished it off to D in the third octave. They also changed the arrangement of the scale itself.

To make it easy to learn, the lick can be chopped off into 3 parts,

1st part is a normal ascending harmonic minor scale, but finished on A# and pulled back to F:

D-E-F-G-A-A#-A, then add one more note (F) so it goes D-E-F-G-A-A#-A-F. The second F is the same F as the F played before.

2nd part is a development of the scale:

E-F-A-A#-C#-D-C#-A#


3rd part actually contains ascending minor harmonic scale in the second octave from where it began, but started with 3 notes from the first octave area.

The ascending part goes D-E-F-G-A-A#, but you have to add 3 notes in the start which are A, A# and C# and arranged consecutively, A-A#-C#. So the 3rd part goes: A-A#-C#-D-E-F-G-A-A#.

The lick is the combination of all 3 parts, so you can mix all 3 parts up like:

D-E-F-G-A-A#-A-F-E-F-A-A#-C#-D-C#-A#-A-A#-C#-D-E-F-G-A-A#.

Quite easy isn't it? For note, this lick is played in the second D octave, and for easier and more similar playing to Avenged Sevenfold it is recommended to start the lick on 5th string on 17th fret. Don't forget to add heavy distortion to blow those ears hearing you play this lick ;)

Here is the video of how the lick sounds like

See you on the next lick autopsy, NOW YOUR NIGHTMARE COMES TO LIFE!