Shred With Shifty
Chris Shiflett
In each episode Chris Shiflett sits down with a legendary guitarist and aims to answer a singular question: “How did you do that?” Each guitarist will give rare insight into the art of the guitar solo and what makes a great one so memorable.
Zakk Wylde Says "Pick Every Note!"
From Ozzy Osbourne to Black Label Society to Zakk Sabbath to, most recently, his stint filling in for his old friend “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott in Pantera, Zakk Wylde has left an unmistakable mark on the hard-rock and metal music worlds. Fresh off performing “The Star Spangled Banner” at the Cleveland Browns game in October, and paying homage to his boss Ozzy at the 2024 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, Wylde joins this episode of Shred With Shifty to share his teachings from the boo
Dec 19, 2024 • 58:19
Derek Trucks Teaches His Classical Indian-Inflected Solo on “Midnight in Harlem”
Break out your glass, steel, or beer bottle: This time on Shred With Shifty, we’re sliding into glory with southern-rock great Derek Trucks, leader of the Derek Trucks Band, co-leader (along with wife Susan Tedeschi) of the Tedeschi Trucks Band, and, from 1999 to 2014, member of the Allman Brothers Band.Reared in Jacksonville, Florida, Trucks was born into rock ’n’ roll: His uncle, Butch Trucks, was a founding member of the Allman Brothers Band, and from the time he was nine years old, Derek was
Dec 12, 2024 • 49:19
Learn Michael Schenker’s Improv-Shred on UFO’S “Only You Can Rock Me”
This episode has three main ingredients: Shifty, Schenker, and shredding. What more do you need?Schenker was just 11 when he played his first gig with The Scorpions, and recorded on their debut LP, Lonesome Crow, when he was 16. He’s been playing a Gibson Flying V since those early days, so it's only natural that both he and Shifty bust out the Vs for this occasion.While gigging with Scorpions in Germany, Schenker met and was poached by British rockers UFO, with whom he recorded five studio reco
Dec 5, 2024 • 1:00:24
Keith Urban Talks Waylon, Knopfler, and His Love-Hate Relationship with Modelers
Next up on this action-packed season of Shred With Shifty, country superstar Keith Urban joins Chris Shiflett to walk through some of his most iconic solos and unpack some fine details behind his successful music career.Strapped with the ’51 Fender “Nocaster” that he used to record the solo on “Tumbleweed,” Urban walks Shifty through some of his guitar secrets, like how he came to own Waylon Jennings’ iconic, leatherbound 1950 Fender Broadcaster (hats off to his wife, Nicole Kidman, for
Nov 21, 2024 • 53:35
Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl, Pat Smear, and Chris Shiflett Reveal Their Triple-Guitar Recipe
The moment you’ve all been waiting for has finally arrived. That’s right: Shred With Shifty is back, and your beloved host Chris Shiflett is kicking off season two of the podcast with a super-special episode.Shifty’s Foo Fighters shredders-in-arms Dave Grohl and Pat Smear join him for this season premier that reveals some of the magic and maneuvering behind the Foos’ triple-guitar attack. The three friends and bandmates start off with some history lessons, discussing their earliest infl
Nov 14, 2024 • 59:50
Richie Sambora is Ready to Rock!
As the premier season of the show comes to a close, Richie Sambora sends it off with a fun, free-wheeling episode that looks at his high-drama fingerwork on “Only Lonely” from Bon Jovi’s second record, 1985’s 7800° Fahrenheit. (The song’s music video is everything you’d ever want from mid-’80s hard rock.) Richie joins Shifty subterranean-style, from his mother’s basement in New Jersey, where he’s equipped with a reverse-headstock Charvel, complete with a Floyd Rose system. It’s a busy time for S
May 10, 2024 • 54:42
Learn the “Last Child” Solo With Aerosmith’s Brad Whitford
The Aerosmith axeman recounts how he ripped the blazing lead on the Rocks hit, dishing some critical history along the way. Behind Steven Tyler’s unhinged howls, Aerosmith’s twin-guitar attack with Joe Perry and Brad Whitford cemented them as one of the greatest hard-rock bands of the ’70s. “Last Child,” the street-strutting, hard-blues hit off their breakout 1976 record Rocks, is one of the greatest demonstrations of this dangerous duo’s interplay. While Perry holds down the funky rhythmic cho
May 2, 2024 • 57:06
Def Leppard and Dive Bombs: Phil Collen on His Bombastic “Photograph” Solo
The influential British shredder talks about how he formed his playing style and demonstrates how to rip one of his most iconic leads. To hear Phil Collen tell it, he joined Def Leppard almost by accident. He had loaned the band one of his amps, and when they asked him to play some leads on their upcoming record Pyromania, Collen thought he was just doing his friends a solid. The rest is history. He and Shifty talk through Collen’s formative years on guitar, where he soaked up the scorching pl
Apr 25, 2024 • 59:40
Wolf Van Halen’s Tornado of Tapping on “Take a Bow”
Being born into rock royalty doesn’t make you a rock star—you’ve gotta earn it with your own chops. And whether it’s the classical pedigree of his first name or the hard-rock infamy of his surname, Wolfgang Van Halen has a long lineage to live up to. As he displays on this episode of Shred With Shifty, he’s more than up to the task. Wolf joins Shifty to teach the blistering, tap-heavy solo for his song “Take a Bow,” from 2023’s Mammoth II. It follows in his dad’s footsteps, sure, but it also sho
Mar 28, 2024 • 1:00:07
Joe Bonamassa: Bursts, Dumbles, and the Blues
If you can’t figure out how to play Joe Bonamassa’s solo from “Blues Deluxe,” don’t worry. It all changes when Shifty sits down with Bonamassa for this special episode of Shred With Shifty. No surprise that both of them reach for their Les Pauls, and Bonamassa even reveals why he switched from Strats to Gibsons in the early 2000s. Bonamassa is known for his dazzling collection of vintage guitars—which he says has become a target for haters—but he explains that you don’t need a ’58 Les Paul to
Mar 20, 2024 • 1:36:46
“KISS” Shiflett Takes on Fan Solos and Issues a Challenge
It’s time for Chris Shiflett to rip another solo—solo episode, that is. During this first season of Shred With Shifty, our host has been keeping an eye on fan submissions of the lead parts explained in each episode, hand-picking sharp renditions to share. This time, he spotlights takes on the guitar theatrics from “Alive” by Pearl Jam, “Stay a Little Longer” by Brothers Osborne, and “The Waiting” by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, plus a snippet of a Hendrix classic that inspired a listener to
Feb 29, 2024 • 34:12
Brent Mason’s Furious Fingerstyle Shred
Brent Mason has picked for the biggest and best names in country music: Alan Jackson, Willie Nelson, Shania Twain, Brooks & Dunn, Blake Shelton, and George Strait are just a few of the country stars on whose records you can hear Mason’s Fender-on-Fender fretwork. But his solo on “Southbound Train,” the closing track on Travis Tritt’s 2000 record Down the Road I Go, might be his hottest work of all. As Mason explains, the song scoots along at his favorite country tempo—a Cajun two-step, Mason sa
Feb 15, 2024 • 1:21:01
Free-Wheelin’ Ace Frehley Fires Up His “Shock Me” Solo
Shifty’s biggest guitar hero joins the podcast to run down his unique lead picking on the 1977 Love Gun hit. Ace Frehley is the reason Chris Shiflett picked up a guitar in the first place, so it’s only natural that Shifty invites his original tone teacher onto the pod to recap one his iconic solos. Frehley, saddled with a classic black-and-cream triple-humbucker Les Paul, shares that “Shock Me” was the first KISS track on which he took lead vocal duty. The first time he sang it live, he remembe
Feb 1, 2024 • 1:06:48
Mike Campbell’s Electric Spontaneity
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ lead guitarist shows Shifty how he bottled an electric reaction to “The Waiting” on the song’s simple, iconic solo. Mike Campbell knows how to write the perfect parts to a song, and records them with the perfect guitar, amp, and tone to match. That’s why Shifty has the Heartbreakers’ lead man on this episode to get a look under the hood at what drives Campbell’s solo on “The Waiting.” The song, from 1981’s Hard Promises, was tracked at Sound City, where Campbell
Jan 19, 2024 • 52:42
John Osborne’s Tele-Style Spank on “Stay a Little Longer”
“I think it’s safe to say John Osborne is a fuckin’ beast!” That’s how Chris Shiflett kicks off this episode of Shred With Shifty, featuring bearded Brothers Osborne shredder-in-chief John Osborne. Osborne joins Shifty to dissect his blistering country-rock ripping on the band’s breakout single, “Stay A Little Longer.” Osborne tells Shifty about failing miserably at guitar in college, where he learned to read and play bass clef but never got the hang of the treble clef. It’s no surprise when O
Dec 21, 2023 • 1:24:42
Odds & Ends and Q&A Vol. 2
This time on Shred With Shifty, Chris Shiflett steps out on his own. Shiflett starts up with a video montage of fan-submitted solo takes on leads from Charlie Starr, Rivers Cuomo, Mike McCready, and others. Some are more faithful than others, and Shifty celebrates the originality. “Learn it kinda, and then put your own twist on it,” he encourages. Next, he’s cued up clips from his sit-downs with Paisley, Starr, McCready, and one of his favorite guitarists, Jawbreaker’s Blake Schwarzenbach. Then
Dec 7, 2023 • 50:38
Pearl Jam’s Mike McCready Comes “Alive”
Host Chris Shiflett starts things off with a discussion on the musical context McCready emerged from. “If you didn’t have this punk rock background, then you were looked down upon,” remembers McCready. As he explains, his upbringing was less punk rock and more Cub Scouts until he picked up the guitar. He and PJ rhythm guitarist Stone Gossard preferred the likes of Iron Maiden and Judas Priest, and after Gossard caught McCready shredding Stevie Ray Vaughan licks at a party, he phoned him up to st
Nov 9, 2023 • 1:09:58
Jawbreaker’s Blake Schwarzenbach on the Emo-Meets-Zeppelin Magic of “Accident Prone”
On this week’s Shred With Shifty, Chris Shiflett is joined by one of his all-time favorite players: Blake Schwarzenbach, the 6-string architect behind California punk band Jawbreaker’s simple, noisy, orchestral rippers. But before things really get rolling, Shifty gets his heartbroken as Schwarzenbach squashes rumors that Jawbreaker might have a new record in the works: “There’s no truth to it,” he says. Shifty and Schwarzenbach talk about the band’s trajectory up to and after Dear You, their m
Oct 26, 2023 • 1:19:35
Charlie Starr Brings the Thunder
Blackberry Smoke frontman Charlie Starr joins Shred With Shifty to deconstruct his solo on the Smoke’s 2016 track, “Waiting for the Thunder.” Starr, whom Shifty credits with owning one of the best vintage guitar collections he’s ever seen, explains how he got into guitar at age six thanks to the influence of his dad, who was a bluegrass rhythm player. But he turned to his mum, the rocker in the family, to help him get his first electric guitar: a Mosrite copy which he played through his sister’
Oct 12, 2023 • 1:09:12
Brad Paisley's G-Bender Magic on “Mud on the Tires”
"It's maybe the most important thing to me that the solos [I record] are things that I haven't done a million times," country guitarist and singer/songwriter Brad Paisley shares on this episode of Shred With Shifty. "That's getting harder and harder to do." But as Paisley walks host Chris Shiflett through his solo on "Mud on the Tires," the centerpiece of the interview, it's clear that Paisley can improvise melodies that don't necessarily need to clear that bar in order to hook and make a lastin
Sep 28, 2023 • 1:17:16
Richie Sambora Teaches the Attitude and Emotion of the “Wanted Dead or Alive” Solo
This episode of Shred With Shifty starts with a stern reminder from our host: learn and record yourself playing these solos, folks! Shiflett needs more submissions from our not-so-amateurs in the audience taking passes at the leads learned on the show. “Pick up the pace, people!” Shiflett cries. “We need your help here!”After the reprimand, Shifty is joined by former Bon Jovi guitarist Richie Sambora, who together with Jon Bon Jovi himself formed the band’s songwriting braintrust. It’s Sambora’s
Sep 14, 2023 • 1:18:02
Chris Shiflett Rates Your Solos and Shares His Pedal Philosophy
In this solo installment of Shred With Shifty, host Chris Shiflett shares juicy unreleased footage from previous episodes, rates fan submission solos, and fields questions from viewers. This week’s Shred With Shifty keeps the spotlight on our intrepid host and shameless shredmeister, as Shifty kicks things off with a swift hammer-on ascent up the neck. Next, he shares a few ace videos submitted by fans where they tackle Alex Lifeson’s solo on Rush’s “Limelight,” though Shifty has some choice wor
Sep 7, 2023 • 43:44
Nile Rodgers on the Magic of “I’m Coming Out”
CHIC bandleader Nile Rodgers and his Hitmaker spill the history behind writing the unforgettable music and lyrics for Diana Ross’ iconic smash, “I’m Coming Out” When CHIC guitar wizard Nile Rodgers tells Chris Shiflett that he was at Woodstock, Shiflett quips, “You didn’t take the brown acid, did you?” Rodgers grins and chuckles, “I took every color acid they had!” This is the tongue-in-cheek tenor of the latest episode of Shred With Shifty, a fun, often hilarious conversational romp through Rod
Aug 24, 2023 • 1:19:46
Lindsay Ell's One-Woman Guitarmony
On this episode, the country guitarist walks Shifty through her blazing solo on "Hits Me," after sharing all about what makes her guitar-mind tick. "I've always looked at guitar solos as additional lyrics to the song," says Lindsay Ell. She approaches guitar solos by balancing their voice with that of the actual vocal, and on this episode of Shred With Shifty, the country guitarist and songwriter—who really draws from a host of genres, including rock, jazz, and blues—breaks down her epic solo on
Aug 10, 2023 • 1:04:47
Rivers Cuomo's Anti-Pedal Approach to “Only in Dreams”
Weezer's Rivers Cuomo sits down with Shifty to talk Yngwie, Phish, and the outro solo to "Only in Dreams" off the “Blue” album. Head to http://volume.com/shifty to watch the full episodes! "I don't use effects," Rivers Cuomo states, matter-of-factly, to Chris Shiflett on this second episode of Shred With Shifty. That might come as a bit of a shock to all the Weezer fans out there who went and bought a Big Muff in an effort to imitate the alt-rock guitarist's sound. For his tones on the band’s
Jul 27, 2023 • 1:04:05
Alex Lifeson Breaks Down The Haunting, Legendary Solo On Rush’s “Limelight”
On the first episode of the new podcast series Shred With Shifty, which features host and Foo Fighters guitarist Chris Shiflett getting a front-row lesson from our favorite guitar heroes, Shiflett learns the solo from Rush’s “Limelight” with a little help from the man who wrote it, Alex Lifeson. According to Shiflett, Lifeson’s lead on the song “does exactly what a great solo should do. It’s a scene change, it’s kind of emotional, it builds, and yes, it shreds.” Shiflett recalls that in context,
Jul 13, 2023 • 1:09:19