Phrase By Phrase Guitar Method: Classic Metallica

These are 3 stars at best, not trying to ding the author too badly.I only listened through Eruption and parts of Panama so far. I'm not enticed right now to listend to anything else on the DVD. Here where the two star deduction comes from.First of all, Mark's tone is pretty sucky. This does not sound like EVH at all. This DVD shamelessly pitches Carl Martin pedals, and unfortunately you would not want to buy any of those after hearing the DVD. First of all, you can't tell that there is any Phaser, Flanger or Chorus at all on the recording. Then, the distortion is totally tame and brittle, far from anything close to "brown" that EVH produced with his setup.Second star deduction is from certain obvious inaccuracies in Mark's transcription (talking about Eruption now) and the lack of needed chops to pull off Eddie's stuff. I'm not saying I can do better, but c'mon, Mark, you are creating an instructional DVD, you better do some more woodshedding, man! If you (regular audience who is reading this) want to learn Eruption for example, buy the Guitar World March 2003 edition (no idea whether you can backorder), it has a fantastic transcription in which I only found a few "inaccuracies" (meaning my ears hear something slightly different than what's transcribed), and also buy the paramount Transcribe! slower-downer software by Seventh String (the best $25 I ever spent!). (I also have a Guitar One transcription of Eruption that is more of an approximation, don't recommend that one).If you search on YouTube (most sucky video sharing web page you could ever nightmare of, with absolutely horrible streaming video technology and the most disgusting reader comments possible), you will find one guy who got an astoundingly close sound out of his Axe-Fx, and at least one guy who teaches you Eruption who sounds really close to the original.Dude, that was a rant! Trying to kill off my back pain with beer ...

This video is what it says it is a breakdown of the songs listed by Van Halen during the best (in my opinion) period of the band. It starts by showing you the settings (close enough) to what Eddie used on said song such as distortion, phase, tone, volume, mid's, etc..., then goes in to braking the song down into "phrases" or riffs if you will played super slow then at half speed. Most of the info could be obtained off youtube or some other fan site, the tabs could be bought and dissected personally - but to have it all in one place already done for you on a whopping 5hr dvd for 25 dollars isn't too bad really. It was worth the money for the time gained, Mark John Sternal (dude has serious hair not to be f'ed with!!) does a good job coping Eddie's tone just wish the tab's had been included. I mean their showed on screen in clear to read notation I just like hard copies (old fashioned). I'm really just holding out for a "hotlicks" type video with Eddie himself now that would be totally sweet!!

I almost didn't order this based on some negative reviews by some expert advanced players I would guess, anyways I ordered and I'm glad I did. I'm only a intermediate level player and I find this DVD very helpful I wouldn't otherwise learn as fast as I have. I have books and cds from Troy Stetina and DVDs from Lick library which are also good, the only thing about lick library is it has no tabs on the dvd. I think the best I like about Mark Sternal DVDs is his instructions on different techniques and especially the 75% slowed down versions of the phrases which I have looped and play along until I nail it and then move on. I've been playing eruption for the past few days and still haven't made through the first part at 75% but getting real close. I have a copy of the Eruption transcription from Guitar world May 1995 and compare transcriptions with Mark Sternals, sure there are some differences but nothing to make a stink about, close enough to me. I'm just a hobbyist copying other peoples stuff. I also have the phrase by phrase Led Zeppelin and Metallica's DVDs but haven't started on them yet. Van Halen is more the style I prefer so I started with that. I hope this review was helpful

This is a good DVD because it breaks the song into small parts and reviews what youve learned.Tab is on the screen... Thats not that a big of a deal i guess. I use every other dvd out there and sometimes they dont have tab. That never bothered me, but what does bother me is when they teach big chunks. I want to remember what I learned and not spend a buch of time going back to remember parts. This small chunk approach is great. I can stop and come back the next day and pick up right where I left off. This guy doesnt have the budget that lick library and other companies have , but thats what is kind of cool about it. Its kind of like learning from the local "ripper". Guys that care about the effects...do you even play? I mean who cares about the tone. I want to play the song... I can play with any tone or effect I want. Anyway,great DVD. I wasn't expecting to like it that much. Now that I know what they are like, I'm going to get the Van Halen. Yeah son!!!!!!

Good teacher. Walks you through it slowly breaking everything into small pieces - "phrase by phrase". Great for learning the short leads and the riffs.The issues are with longer leads, they should have a review after every 4 or so phrases - something like "so far we have this, this and this" - but instead we are left waiting until the end of a whole 15 phrase lead before it gets put back together at half speed. Another plus would be backing tracks, but he does play whole leads at full speed at the start of each section.also too much time is spent on the pedals - they must have recieved free pedals from the company.

This is my 2nd Phrase X Phase disc ( Van Hallen) Its well done and slow enough to absorb each part ...can get a little dry...but will teach you the whole song.....I am only an Intimidate level basement player but if you willing to take it slow and i highly suggest taking the time to TAB out the parts you are learning ( since Metallica songs tend to be long i am currently learning Welcome Home Sanitarium and its not a short track .) then you will get a lot out of this.