Premier Guitar recently had BTBAM guitarist Paul Waggoner recently on their “Riff Rundown” series, in which they have a guitarist from a band teach a part of their song to the audience (wow that’s a cool idea, maybe we should do something like that here on Gear Gods, maybe we’ll call it, I dunno, The Weekly Riff or something). He chose a cool series of heavy arpeggios from their song “Silent Flight Parliament” and takes us through what it looks like on guitar.
Paul gives us a great breakdown of what’s going on in this riff, including the names of each chord in the progression and what their basic function is in the progression. I love getting little insights into how artists think about the music they write, it’s always such an inspiration to know that they’re only human, even if their music is god-tier. This is also beautifully framed in his little hiccup when playing the part and he says, “I mess up sometimes.” Me too, Paul. Me too.
