Whole Lotta Love Guitar Lesson – Led Zeppelin
Whole Lotta Love is not only Led Zeppelin's first hit single in the US, it is also consistently rated one of the greatest guitar tracks of all-time by virtually every major music outlet.
The main reason for that success is Jimmy Page's driving riff that not only opens the song, but continues throughout a large part of the song.
As iconic as this riff is, it is actually quite easy to play. In this Whole Lotta Love guitar lesson video I will show you what is going on in this riff for both hands adn also give you a note-for-note lesson for the guitar solo.
If you are just starting to learn to play the guitar you will have some good things to practice here including chord muting and alternate picking.
However, the alternate picking required for this riff doesn't involve any synchronization with the fret-hand (just picking on one open string) so it is still pretty easy to play.
Jimmy Page's classic solo in Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love" seems to jump out at you from out of nowhere.
To help with this effect, Jimmy Page uses an in your face guitar tone created by leaving his wah pedal engaged and left all the way in the forward position.
With that tone he plays a series of blistering guitar licks and gigantic bends. Really, the bends Jimmy Page plays in this solo are simply ridiculous. 🙂
The first lick in this Whole Lotta Love guitar solo lesson is pretty much a sped up blues lick. Easy enough I guess. But then Jimmy Page launches into a flurry of pull-offs across multiple strings. In order to help you fully grasp this particular lick I break it down into two different parts. You will get it down in no time. 🙂
From there we start to run into all of those bends. Like I say in the video, don't spend hours at a time trying to master those bends. If you do you probably won't have any calluses left at all. 🙂 Just work on them a few minutes at a time to give your hands a break and I am sure you will still get everything down rather quickly.
The bends in question include one that is the distance of TWO whole steps. Yikes!! Then in addition to that we have a couple more bends encompassing 1 1/2 steps. That is no walk in the park either.
But, it is well worth the time and effort put into making sure those bends are in tune. The effect of pulling them all off correctly is very cool.
So I hope you enjoy this classic riff and solo that inspired millions of people to learn to play the guitar. 🙂 Carl..
If these free lessons help you, please donate to keep new ones coming daily. Thanks!! 🙂
gotta say a whole lotta thanks on this one!
thanks Carl
Carl:
Hey bro,
Thanks again.
Tommy Rad
Carl:
Good one again! I have played that solo millions of times over 30 years but, never exactly as you show it done. I think that Page would be amazed that you are able to hear the little
neuances from that original live studio recording that made it onto the album. The huge stretches to the little half step smears and such. I believe that Page wrote “songs” by attaching licks and riffs together, unlike anyone before. Wow, that 4th riff, that requires a 4 bar stretch up above the 12th octave is getting painful, and that’s on my PRS Custom 24 fret. Anyway, it is getting into “Season” down here in Sarasota, Florida when all the Snow-birds come down and the clubs are full every night. Simply put, it is live band jamin’ season! And, we do a lot of Zeppelin. Anyway, thanks again.
TommyRad
Ok time to get down to business, I practice your Blues Mastery course for an hour a day and for the next hour I am learning songs to give myself a break from the course I just finished up the lead for a whole lot of love how can I keep my guitar in tune after those step and a Half bends? I have to really good Jackson’s and a Gibson Les Paul special do you use locking tuning keys any suggestions you may have would really help and only one of my guitars has a Floyd Rose
Hey Frank, do you stretch out your strings really well after you restring? I always do that first thing.
Hey Carl, How you doing? I’m jamming’ along still. Thought I’d look back onto some of my favorite Classic Rock solos…man this one is really so simple(basic blues riffs) but it has always intrigued me with the great stretch neuances brilliant quickness and quiteness between riffs…ya so anyway I noticed that on the videoyou don’t show the folks the chord progress for the chorus, you know, “gotta whole lotta love da da da, da da da, gotta whole lotta love”…isn’t it the same riff to E then E,Eflat,D…? That’s the way I’ve been playing it for 42 years….
Thanks Carl,
Tommy Rad…