Slipknot-Grateful Dead-Transcript???

[Tonysounds]

Hey folks. I joined a Dead band recently, and I'm racking my brain over Slipknot. Has anyone ever played this, or seen a transcript of it? I'm burning out trying to transcribe it.

[Delaware Dave]

I have, although its been a long time ago and I've forgotten it. I remember it being a difficult song to learn correctly. I took it in chunks. I've never seen a transcript; just many hours of listening to it in small chunks and learning it that way.

[Morrissey]

I had this task to learn slipknot on keys several years ago. I'm not affiliated with this guy but I'll recommend him as a the best source of assistance I found. You can subscribe to his e-mail list to get the full transcription (as a PDF?). IIRC, the transcription is essentially what scrolls along the bottom of the associated youtube video, copied below. I realize these resources are targeted to guitar players but this guy wrote out the chords and the melody traditional music notation (not tablature) -- that is about as good as it is going to get. Not much market for materials like this for the keys player in Dead bands.

 

https://weepingwillowguitar.com/play-slipknot-grateful-dead-video-lesson/

 

 

[video:youtube]

[cphollis]

Best Dead tabs are on jdarks.com, including that one if I remember. I had to learn that sequence several years ago, it takes a bit of prep. Also useful: slow down feature on Youtube. Playing something at 50 or 75% speed makes it a heckuva lot easier to pick up by ear.

 

EDIT: found it!

[Delaware Dave]

cphollis just jarred my memory. try rukind.com for tabs.

[Morrissey]

Agreed -- rukind and J Darks are generally best resources for Dead songs. Slipknot is a special case, however. The tabs/chords on both sites weren't ideal for a keyboard player to learn the tune. The Weeping Willow resources I posted above were a better starting point for me. I think the J Darks pdf was a useful supplement.

[Tusker]

Glad you found the resources you need. I had to learn slipknot quickly once and also found it deceptively complex. Since there are so many different versions though, the band was pretty lax with me, I doubled some of the guitar parts in thirds, which seemed to hit the guitar player's happy place. Good times.

[cphollis]

I found that on Slipknot, tabs (or any notation) wasn't much help directly. I found a live version, put that segment on a loop, and slowed it down 50%. That, and glancing at the jdarks tab got me through after 10-20 minutes of focus. All you will likely find is guitar notation.

[cphollis]

I also will offer that rarely -- if ever -- do I find decent keys-friendly notation for complex GD tunes. I don't think there's much call for it.

 

You mentioned you had just joined this GD band, I just got done leaving mine. I would offer that -- outside playing signature parts -- play anything you damn want to as long as it sounds good. The purists will ask for more of a PigPen sound, or a Keith sound, or a Brent sound, etc. I put up with that for a while, and then decided it was me playing the music, and here's how I wanted it to sound. Besides, there appears to be an infinite number of songs with an infinite number of versions, so who cares?

 

 

Much more fun that way. Seriously, I used to troll the purists with "oh, you never heard that version? I think it was Philly 89" or some such nonsense.

[Tonysounds]

I"ve been playing with the "Jerry" since I moved to NM in a JGB band, and I have complete freedom. And when we folded the JGB and I joined this, same deal. It's about the jams anyway, although some of this songwriting is really outstanding on many fronts. But for this song, you need to do a little commiserating to do it right. (No SlipnFallKnot thank you.) Once I saw this guy's video (above) and his tab, and reconciled what I was reading and hearing, it made a lot more sense. I had been struggling with Youtubes at 75 and 50% speed, but I would just get distracted by the crazy bass stuff going on that I just ......my ADHD really was struggling.

 

In terms of gear, cuz we all like that stuff, for now, and likely a while, the rig is simple: SK1-88 into Booker Labs interface into 122 and midied to Roland Integra7 into a 40yr old ROland M120 mixer and DXr10. Covers it all, aside from a couple later songs requiring splits, I limit myself to 10 "favorites" for instant access, 2 of which are organ, one clav (through leslie, it's the shit), and the rest cycling through presets on a Studio Set. KILLER. Less time choosing more time playing. Less IS more.