drop d tuning

[ivannalespaul]

hey folks,
im an old 80's style metal player. ive noticed quite a few bands out that i want to play now are in drop d tuning. ive never worked with this before, i realize you can get a more
low crunchier sound. but what im kind of confused on is, do you just play one finger
bar chords when doing major chords? i can pick out most tunes in standard tuning but when i switch to drop d tuning im having
some trouble. any input?

[ghodaddyyo]

Ivanalespaul, Austin Powers fan? LOL! I started playing guitar in the 80's as well. I first learned of dropped D tuning when I went to learn songs by Helmet, Alice In Chains, and Rage Against the Machine. These guys dropped to D frequently, but still retained the rest of their guitar playing abilities by using the rest of their strings! These days, all of the MTV "new metal" guys are content to bang away on 3 string power chords with very little lead playing.

In Drop D, you only need one finger to play a 2 or 3 string power chord such as: (E5 -remember the low e is tuned to D)

e-----
b-----
g-----
d--2--
a--2--
e--2--

These chords are moveable like a typical power chord. If you want to play barre chords in dropped D, you have to compensate for the low E string being tuned a whole step lower. This would make a barre chord look like this: (GMaj)

e---3--
b---3--
g---4--
d---5--
a---5--
e---5--

Hope this helps. http://www.zentao.com/ubb/smilies/smile.gif


[This message has been edited by ghodaddyyo (edited December 06, 2000).]

[ivannalespaul]

thanks ghodaddyyo it does help im going
to need to practice that a bit it seems
a little awkward. by the way i couldnt agree
with you more about the new metal on mtv
i like some of the stuff from godsmack,p-roach, etc. but its not real difficult and the days of the guitar solo
is pretty much dying. mtv if your listening
please bring back the headbangers heavy metal
ball! later man, thanks for your help