Here’s a cover of John Norum’s solo from Europe’s The Final Countdown.
A lot of folks have asked me for advice on how to play this one. The phrasing of the fast triad/arpeggios is deceptively difficult as the accented note of each phrase “rotates”. The first time around, the first note is accented, second time around it’s the second note, then the third note… The best advice I can give to anybody trying to play it is to practise it slowly until you have the phrasing right. If you have some software to slow the original down, so much the better – it’ll give you a clearer idea. Getting it up to speed is another matter altogether… The triads are not alternate picked, they’re a combination of sweeps, hammers and pull-offs. The picking pattern is down, down, hammer, pull-off then repeat. That pattern is a hallmark of John Norum’s playing and is common to several other European players from that era – John Sykes, Vivian Campbell – but they all got it from Gary Moore.
Gear-wise, I borrowed a Strat from a good friend of mine (thanks Göran!), which has true single coils (bridge is a Seymour Duncan of some type), so I had to use a NS2 noise suppressor for the hum. The amp is a Laney Ironheart Studio and there’s a TS9 Tubescreamer giving it a clean boost.
Hope you like it!