Since I first heard the Allan Holdsworth record Metal Fatigue as a teenager, I’ve been trying to learn how to play Devil Take The Hindmost. I’ve tried on multiple occasions to learn the ridiculous lick Allan plays around 2:24 seconds. It’s always stuck with me as an important one because I hear him do certain elements of this line in other places, however I’ve never managed to quite get it…until recently…
It’s absolutely bonkers, yet really fun to play. I can’t imagine how he managed to just improvise this on the fly. It took me several attempts to work out the best place on the fretboard to play everything before I found something that fell under the fingers enough to get this anywhere close to full speed – give it a go and see how it works for you.
I now need to sit down and learn how to play the rest of the song!
I’ll hopefully be doing a few short breakdown lessons on this over on my TikTok account in the near future, keep your eyes open.
If you’re interested in lessons by the way, head over to the teaching section of my site for more info! Why not join the mailing list too while you’re here – I won’t spam you, ever, but might drop you an email every now and then to let you know what I’m up to and to let you know about new lessons.