Metallica – Enter Sandman Video Guitar Lessons


In this video guitar lesson you will learn Metallica's biggest hit "Enter Sandman" note-for-note is an extremely easy to follow format. I will guide you through all of the rhythm guitar sections and lead fills PLUS take you note-for-note through the now legendary solo by Kirk Hammett.

It's hard to believe that this song is a couple of decades old now, it still sounds so fresh and exciting today. This is the song that catapulted Metallica to the status of the biggest heavy metal band ever and was the first single off of the classic Black Album.

The rhythm guitar parts to this song can be studied by just about any level of player and are a great workout in techniques such as palm muting, sliding, arpeggiated picking and string skipping. The solo is a textbook Kirk Hammett tour de force of fast pentatonics and two string arpeggios.

So go ahead and take a swing at this great track by Metallica, you will be glad you did. GOOD LUCK AND HAVE FUN!! ๐Ÿ˜€

If these free lessons help you, please donate to keep new ones coming daily. Thanks!! ๐Ÿ™‚

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Enter Sandman - Full Song

19 Comments

  1. Angus McLay on January 28, 2015 at 2:38 am

    Hey Carl I thought I’d leave my song request here. I’ve been watching your videos on youtube for ages since I first saw your lessons on Sultans of Swing and Stairway to Heaven about two years ago. You are just the best guitar teacher on youtube and I wouldn’t trust anyone else to teach a song on youtube as well as you do so I’m saying pretty please do a song from Audioslave? Preferably Bring Em Back Alive or Getaway Car but i would like to learn any song really cause I love Tom Morello’s guitar playing. Would deeply appreciate it. Cheers

    • Carl Brown on January 30, 2015 at 7:02 pm

      Hey Angus, I don’t have any Audioslave on the site yet but I will definitely check them out.

      Thanks a bunch for watching my lessons!

      Carl..

      • Angus McLay on February 20, 2015 at 6:20 pm

        Thanks Carl, you’re the best! ๐Ÿ˜€

    • Stephen Bukovac on September 22, 2019 at 12:36 pm

      Can you show how to play some Stryper songs ? I would really like to learn some of their songs,thx for your lessons.

  2. Mark Monbeck on March 9, 2015 at 12:53 pm

    Hey Carl. How do you get the backround music to just play the drums only?

    • Carl Brown on March 9, 2015 at 2:39 pm

      Hey Mark, sorry I didn’t create this backing track. You can find the backing track at guitarbackingtrack.com though. ๐Ÿ™‚

      • Mark Monbeck on April 1, 2015 at 9:36 am

        Holly cow. Carl, Thank you so much. I had know idea guitarbackingtrack.com even existed. I have been trying to find this concept for a while now. Thanks again

  3. Kevin Fron on March 21, 2015 at 3:49 pm

    Carl……Love the site!!!!!!

    I’m learning Sandman. I have the ESP LTD Ride the lightning guitar (#14 of 300…SCHWING!!)

    Anyway, I think I have the clean intro sound down perfect. I have a Marshall 30amp with some effects).

    I’m trying to dial in the best sound for the heavy distorted part. I have the BOSS Metal Zone MT-2 ( Level at 1000 O’ Clock, High and low at around 3 O’ clock, Middle at 10 O’ clock, Mid Frequency at around 1 O’clock), Distortion is at 1200 O’ clock. I think I’m getting close……….Any suggestions to get the sound closer to yours??????

    • Carl Brown on March 22, 2015 at 11:32 am

      Hey Kevin, the metal zone pedal is great, I used it for years.

      I used an amp modeler for this lesson so I can’t recall what preset or amp types I used. Sorry about that. I teach so many lessons on this site that trying to figure what tone I used for each one would be impossible.

      I do think you are on the right track though. If you research Hetfield’s guitar tone for the Black album I am sure you can find a ton of info on the web as to what equipment he was using and his settings.

      It will obviously be rather difficult to completely recreate that guitar sound since it is really just many guitar layers, but you should be able to get a nice metal sound none-the-less. His sound is definitely much different on the Black Album from “And Justice For All” and “Master of Puppets”. Good Luck!!

      Carl..

  4. Kevin Fron on March 22, 2015 at 2:16 pm

    Thanks for your input and help. Keep up the great work please.

  5. mueid noor on December 8, 2016 at 9:37 pm

    I need lesson for all songs of metallica but at first i need the halo on fire . And i have log in in here just right now . I really wants to thank you beacause i have leared all metallica song from you . You are amazingly accurate . Before i used to strum few easy chords but now i play riffs,solos,licks,pluckings . This all is just happening for you , thank you:-)

    • Carl Brown on December 10, 2016 at 9:48 am

      Hey thanks a bunch! Yes I plan of doing more and more Metallica. The really are the gift that keeps on giving.

      In the recent poll I just had on the site, “Spit out The Bone” got the most votes for me to teach so that will be released this weekend.

      I will then do “To Live Is To Die” since I have been getting many requests for it for years. Finally, sometime in early January, I will do “Halo On Fire”. ๐Ÿ™‚

  6. Ron Martorella on April 2, 2017 at 11:30 pm

    Hi Carl. I’ve been watching your YouTube videos for a couple of months now and thought I would support you by joining this site. Seems only fair, if you are going to work that hard. There are so many songs on here that I want to learn and it’s absolutely fantastic. Like you, I lean to the rock and heavy metal side of the music spectrum. However, I have a song request where I can’t find any credible sheet music anywhere. It’s an old song and definitely not in the thrash metal genre. Chuck Mangione’s “Feel So Good” has so many different guitars in it and I would love to learn each one. There is an incredible long electric guitar solo that I have found some guidance in some other parts of YouTube, but I can’t find anything regarding the intro (classical/acoustic), the electric rhythm parts, or the first smaller electric guitar solo. I’m talking the long version of the recording (9:39 playing time). If you can put it on your list, I would definitely appreciate it. Meanwhile, I’m really digging the Metallica, AC/DC, and the rest of it. Thanks so much for the extensive library of songs here!

    • Carl Brown on April 3, 2017 at 10:16 am

      Thanks a bunch for supporting the site Ron!

      I will definitely keep the new songs coming and also check out “Feel so Good”. I am not familiar with it. ๐Ÿ™‚

      Carl…

  7. Ron Martorella on April 3, 2017 at 1:35 pm

    One other thing Carl, I wanted to say thank you for clarifying how to use the pick to attack the strings. An example is the solo for “Smoke on the Water.” I kept getting the pick stuck in the strings. Attacking from the outside of the string seems like such a simple solution but one is not thinking when trying to learn the technique. It’s made a much better and faster guitar player just addressing simple little solutions like these. Thanks a ton!

  8. amurray on February 5, 2018 at 1:27 pm

    Hey Carl, one of the most viewed covers of Enter Sandman on YouTube is done by the band The Warning which is made up of 3 teenage sisters from Mexico. They just released their first CD of 13 original rock songs (XXI Century Blood). They write and play all their own music (in English because it’s the language of rock) and put on a good live show. Amazing since they were 16, 14 and 12 when they recorded it. Daniela (the oldest) plays the guitar. Thought it might be cool to teach one of their songs to support a talented band who plays solid rock and does it on their own terms. Maybe the title track. Thanks for considering it.

  9. Arek Tom on September 25, 2018 at 3:03 am

    Hi Carl,
    It’s a pleasure to listen and learn songs that you play.
    I used to play classic guitar when i was a about ten and then stopped and after more than 20 years returned to guitar and decided to buy first electric guitar.
    I searched for many lessons but yours are the best. Thank you for your work.
    I’ve got question , maybe it seems obvious but not to me, what guitar and amp did you use in this song, I see Fender but can you give model and amp name? did you use pedal or built presets ?

    • Carl Brown on September 25, 2018 at 8:47 am

      Hey Arek, thanks for watching my lessons!

      This lesson series is probably one of the very first ever shot for the site and is 8 or 9 years old. The guitar I am using is my Eric Johnson strat that I have heavily customized.

      I have used Line 6 processors for almost all of the videos over the years. Back when this was filmed I think I was using the Line 6 POD X3 Live pedalboard. I have since upgraded to using their Helix LT for all of my lessons. ๐Ÿ™‚

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