What is Palm Muting?
Palm muting plays a big role in many genres of music. It can help you add dynamics to your playing, and it creates a great heavy sound when distorted. It’s not a difficult technique to apply, but one that can take a lot of work to master.
Musical Example:
A great example of palm muting is Metallica playing “Four Horsemen”. The opening power chord shots which are unmuted, followed by the muted main riff:
Featured Lesson:
To learn the basics of palm muting here is a lesson by Nate Savage from Guitareo:
Important takeaways from the lesson are:
- Musical application example with “Basketcase” by Green Day (0:12)
- How to put your palm on the bridge to get a good mute tone (0:55)
- Example of over-muting (1:05)
- Example of under-muting (1:10)
- Finding the perfect spot (1:20)
Metal Mutes:
Get your palm muting in a metal context down with Ben Eller.
Adjust Your Tone With Your Palm
Sean Daniel breaks down how you can use palm muting to adjust your tone, volume, and how it can improve your strumming consistency.
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