Justin, I really enjoy your courses and totally get that this is how you make a living. But if you are going to include a song in the course, PLEASE provide the tabs for the entire song. I’m one of these weird people that learn by reading, and having the tabs would make this so, so much easier to learn.
@thomas753 Its here: Enter Sandman by Metallica | JustinGuitar.com
You need a tab subscription for full song tabs.
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And well worth the investment. 
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Had another go at this. I can ‘play’ the riff but can’t get the 4th string to ring out, as my little finger (on the 5th string) lies too flat and deadens the string. If I place my 4th finger first then I can’t reach the 5th fret with my 2nd finger!! They have to be placed slowly the other way round. The ‘learn more’ bit talks about keeping the 2nd and 4th fingers down all the time but I have to lift the 4th off to get this to work. How important is it to know this one? How does it fit with future lessons?
You can see from my post on April 29th above I had the same problem as you. I worked at it a bit more and got it to ring out sometimes. Then I just moved on from it. Funny now I can play it pretty well when I go back and try the riff. Dexterity will come even when practicing other things.
Any specific riff isn’t important by itself. But this is a useful one for finger independence and flexibility.
Like both of you I couldn’t play it at all when I first tried it with the lesson fingering. My fingers would mute other strings. Did it daily for a couple of weeks, then forgot about it. Reintroduced it a couple of months back as a flexibility exercise I do for 1 minute each day. Progress was slow but now I can do the riff with all notes ringing clearly. It’s worth doing, the dexterity has made a lot of other things easier.
Had another go at this and things are getting better. I can make all strings ring out OK, but find that I have to press really hard to keep the pinky in the sweet spot otherwise it moves!
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“If it feels too stretchy, try using your third finger instead and an open string. Do what feels most comfortable to you!”
This became my first full song (well, except the solo). I started guitar with Justin’s course from zero June 15. I have practiced daily and often much more than the 10-30 min recommended. I did the song after 1 week of working on it 4.5 months into the course.
But not that little section. I cannot barre fast enough and I cannot do it well enough. I practice this along with getting into F cord separately but I don’t think I will get it for at least another two weeks.
SO, I just use the single notes and I do it going back to the clean channel.
With the guitar being alone, this change back to clean is actually cool and it sounds more interesting than doing it the “right” way.
There is something to be said not only about adapting in traditional sense, where you would be playing it live in a band, but also in the home-player, hobbyist sense where you are actually the only instrument. And so, guitar choices, amp choices, or even cord/note choices and clean/dirty channel choices will be different.
For me, I have two goals:
1/ being able to play songs I really like well enough
2/ experimenting and adapting said songs to my circumstances
3/ fooling around with my own riffs/cord progressions for the heck of it.
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Today I made my first attempts at playing Riff 7 the way Justin shows it within the song. I can only pull it off if I make the change while letting the E ring out. Which, on an instrument playing by itself, actually sounds better. I will have to see what the actual interval is supposed to be…
Yep, same here…
I prefer the original Grade 2 pathway.
Ideally, it would be good to have a basic pathway, but with this kind of electric distortion as an “add in” optional extra outside the pathway.
Where did you guys put your thumb? Behind which finger? And did you keep it pointed towards the ceiling or did you let it turn and point towards the headstock any?
Holy canoli, this is the weirdest feeling, almost impossible feeling positioning. My pinky’s reach up to the 5th string is abysmal, it can’t reach without the base of the finger touching the thin strings, which I guess is ok since I’m not playing them anyway. But then the 2nd finger almost can’t get to the fret it needs to be on. To make the stretch, my wrist goes all bent out of line. Justin’s wrist is perfectly straight, argh! Like someone said earlier in this thread, I think I might have to use 1, 2, and 3 fingers instead because its just too awkward of a hand shape to do the ‘correct’ fingering. Sheesh my hand/control goes wonky and immobile otherwise. Joy!
I have 0 interest in learning this. Meanwhile I’ve already spent 10 hours on Happy Birthday and REM’s Everybody Hurts over the past 4 -5 days, and pushed through to be able to fully play Wonderwall. I’m on an acoustic, mind. Though I must say, learning a song with Justin’s aid and patience makes things SO MUCH EASIER. I tend to gravitate towards his transcribing too.
I’m now confident I should focus more on acoustic but will give this a proper go as I can see that it teaches valuable skills and technique. I do like punk rock/pop rock when it comes to the electric guitar though.
The main reason I started to play the guitar 16 months ago was to be able to play the iconic riffs of my favorite bands like Metallica or Iron Maiden.
Enter Sandman has always been on the radar for the main riff to learn so I started to. I enjoyed that so much that did not stop at the main riff but learnt the full rhythm of the whole song.
This is my first ever full cover. 
I now it is far from being even very good, but to me this is really a big milestone on my path with such a little experience behind.
Now I am learning Master of Puppets intro and main riff. A huge challenge.
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Can someone please explain when in the video he played this:
Keep finger 1 down on 5:7, using the underside of the finger to mute strings 4, 3, 2, and 1. Keep playing the same rhythm on the open E string, then play 5:7 with finger 3 followed by 4:7 with finger 1.
does 4:7 refer to 4th string 7th fret?
Any help would be great thanks!
@Garth123 , if you read the whole page on the website, Justin explains that notation. Indeed, 5:7 means string 5, fret 7.
Thanks and is it possible to pinpoint where he uses 4:7 ? It doesnt sound right on my side and I dont see him play it when demonstrating the riff.
Just one caveat: I don’t play this song, but looking at the video, it seems like he plays 5:7 with the 3rd finger and 5:5 with the first finger. This happens at 5:10 of the video.
In fact, in the notation for Riff 3, you can see the 5:7, 5:5 pair of notes before going down to the F power chord.
Hi @Garth123
I think he is not playing what is written there. I believe you are looking at riff 2, the last text description.
That riff is just chug on the muted E, then unmute during that 5:5 to 5:7 slide, then go back to chugging on E.
The transition from Riff2 to riff3 will take some concentration to get it sounding in time. I don’t agree with what is written there either. Listen to the original studio recording, it is stands mostly alone, so isn’t hard to pick out.