Notice
All right, this is it.
Before you get into this I would like to give you some, hopefully helpful pointers, on how to play this piece. Michael Lee has an exceptional playing style and it's very hard to achieve his clean and smooth tone, but with determination and practice you will get there.
The Intro/Outro - Main Theme is strictly finger plucked, and would be very hard to play using a pick. You could Chicken Pick it but that would loose the smoothness of the plucking. When Michael Lee finger plucks, he keeps his pick in his ring finger, and also he holds the tremolo bar with his pinky, which I will get back to further on. When you play this think in the shape of a major/minor bar chord. The pre-verse is also finger plucked. The verse and the solo is obviously played using a pick. A lot of the verse/pre verse is based on pentatonic scales, but Michael Lee does not in any way over use pentas in his playing.
This song includes alot of slides, acciaccaturas, ghost notes and semi harmonics. Semi meaning that the artificial harmonics aren't quite as rich, so to speak. I did tab out the most noticeable artificial harmonics, but would recommend taking them with a pinch of salt, rather than playing exactly after the tab just do what feels best for you. This is also the case with the ghost notes and acciaccaturas. Michael Lee often varies when he plays the track live, just like with anything else. Alot of this is purely based on feel, it's not strict in the way of playing. The sliding has alot to do with Michael Lees country/blues influences, and is a big part of his style, you can hear it on everything he does, also with the bar, which is explained further in the next section.
The vibratos are one thing that are also very feel based, because Michael Lee has an exceptional vibrato technique. He does the vibrato with his fingers, like usual, but he also uses his tremolo bar to achieve a slide kind of effect, by pulling the nose of the bridge upwards when holding a note, or sliding into a note. He does this on pretty much every note longer than a 8th, and on every vibrato. To make this most comfortable you have to make the bar loose, so it follows your hand while playing, Michael Lee holds the bar with his right hand pinky, like stated above. I'd recommend you to listen to the track intensely to get the feeling going.
In Measure 98 - 98 Michael Lee uses a capo on the 8th fret, allowing him to create a different tonality. I tabbed this the 'normal' way, meaning every note on the 8th fret would be a pull off to the 'open' note. The glissandos are actually legato slides, but it sounds better with normal slides when being in playback by MIDI. This lick is also played with finger plucking. Michael Lee plays this differently live. I've added an indicator to make it more convenient when being printed.
The pick scrapes are done by starting at the 5th fret, going up all the way to the neck pickup. The reason why I did separate notes was that Michael Lee 'hops' with the pick at the end, cutting the slide.
When the second pre-verse comes in Michael Lee shifts the pattern up one string, meaning that the rhythm guitar does the same with the chords, only using the top two string of the Bb5 and C5 chords, that's why the chords have an alternate bass note, meaning that the root of the chord isn't played, except for the octave. The chords can also be kind of loud at points, because single notes and chords play at different volumes, and if I lowered it more, the single notes wouldn't be audible. You could change this by adding another guitar in the guitar setup with a lower volume for the chords. I chose not to because it would get a little messy.
The natural harmonic right before the solo is done by slightly dipping the nose of the bridge, and picking, or with your left hand hitting the harmonic, then pulling the nose of the bridge upward until you reach the G note. Michael Lee picks the harmonic. The whole note duration is a whole note, the tied 8th note is there for the soundless release, so to speak. The solo has alot of complicated, feel type of bends, and doesn't have to be played exactly that way, meaning being released at a certain point etc. The solo/verse also involves Sweep Picking. I've included the pick strokes for the sweeping, but a few strokes can be played different if that's what you want. The solo is in G Aeolian.
A lot of these things can sound a little weird when being played by MIDI, so I'd advice you not to rely on the playback, but on the written notes instead. The slides in particular might be sounding a little fucked at occasions
I would like to say that Michael Lee is one of the most amazing guitar players I've ever heard, so if you're not familiar with his music, listen to it.
I would also like to recommend Michael Lees instructional video 'Mastering Lead Guitar' from Hot Licks. In it, he explains and demonstrates his style, which is very helpful. It's also very hard to explain something like this, so a visual, like a video would be to better to help.
If you have any questions, just send me a message.
