Bullet with Butterfly Wings Guitar Lesson – The Smashing Pumpkins
In this Bullet with Butterfly Wings guitar lesson, I will teach you note-for-note how to play this monster hit by The Smashing Pumpkins.
Guitarist/vocalist Billy Corgan created what pretty much became THE hard rock anthem of a generation with "Bullet with Butterfly Wings". Released on their massively successful Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness album, the song eventually won them the Grammy award for best hard rock performance.
You will need to tune your guitar down one half-step in order to play along with this lesson and the original recording. That will be starting from the 6th string (Eb Ab Db Gb Bb Eb).
The guitar chords used throughout the song are pretty basic, but Billy Corgan uses those chords to create some of the most instantly recognizable guitar riffs of the 90's. The opening chord sequence is based around a B power chord with bass line that is constantly moving. This same type of riff continues during the pre-chorus.
During the chorus the distortion is kicked in and some simple power chords accompany what is perhaps the greatest chorus of the entire grunge era. There is tons on energy and angst in this section of the song and it makes for a lot of fun to play.
The other sections of the song includes a musical interlude with a short guitar solo, a powerful bridge section and a low key arpeggio picking version of the chorus.
I will cover all of those sections and in addition, I will take you note-for-note through any guitar fills that occur over those chords.
I think all-in-all, this Bullet with Butterfly Wing guitar lesson would be great to learn for any player at an upper-beginner level or above.
Have fun learning this classic from The Smashing Pumpkins and the infinitely talented Billy Corgan.
Carl...
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