Yngwie J. Malmsteen's - Rising Force: Guitar Recorded Versions, with Notes & Tab [Paperback]

Yngwie J. Malmsteen (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 1987

Note-for-note transcriptions with tab for all the songs from Yngwie's metal masterpiece: As Above, So Below * Black Star * Evil Eye * Far Beyond the Sun * Farewell * Icarus Dream Suite Opus 4 * Little Savage * Now Your Ships Are Burned. A must for every aspiring shredder!

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Hal Leonard Corporation (April 1, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 088188622X
• ISBN-13: 978-0881886221
• Product Dimensions: 11.7 x 8.8 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #406,405 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Yngwie's masterpiece, July 18, 2000

By 

Gaspare La Sala (Zug Switzerland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Yngwie J. Malmsteen's - Rising Force: Guitar Recorded Versions, with Notes & Tab (Paperback)

Yngwie Malmsteen's first album, note by note. A classic of neoclassic rock and metal, a masterpiece. Contains big part of all his techniques and some extraordinarily nice melodies and harmonies, "easy" to learn with tabulature. A must for every rock and metal guitarist!

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Rising Force Book, April 8, 2001

By 

Gerbil (PAYSON, ARIZONA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Yngwie J. Malmsteen's - Rising Force: Guitar Recorded Versions, with Notes & Tab (Paperback)

This is a great book. Its a great way to pick up Yngwie's picking and sweeping style. Great exercises for more dexterity as well. The material in it is hard, so I recommend you buy "Speed Mechanics" by Troy Stetina, before you try Yngwie's stuff. Have fun.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars First Real Attempt At Transcribing Yngwie In The US, August 17, 2010

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YJM "amazon fan" (Somewhere In The South) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Yngwie J. Malmsteen's - Rising Force: Guitar Recorded Versions, with Notes & Tab (Paperback)

Okay, so why do I specify the "US" in my title, well because the Japanese had been transcribing Yngwie from his days in Steeler and Alcatraz, but America didn't really become hip to Yngwie until the release of Rising Force. Before then he was more like an underground cult figure than a major international artist, which he became after Rising Force.

I can remember as though it were yesterday the release of this book so many years ago. Finally, all of us guitar players trying to figure out how Yngwie did it, long before Youtube, Windows Media Player, the Internet, and all of the other wonderful resources guitar players have these days, had a book to learn from. Transcribed by none other than the great Wolf Marshal. I knew about Wolf from his days as a transcriber for Guitar for the Practicing Musician, and his transcriptions were always cleaner and more accurate than the rest. You could tell Wolf was simply on a different level from the other transcribers working for the magazine at the time. Of course now Wolf is legendary in the guitar world, but back then he was hardly the name he is now. Still, those of us who knew about were even more excited the book was transcribed by him. I remember the countless hours pouring over the songs, doing my best to get them up to speed with the record, and usually failing. I would follow the transcriptions note for note, including the suggested fingering for solo's. It is only now many years later, as a much more advanced musician, and years of studying Yngwie's technique that I can pick out the various errors in the book.

So much of the suggested fingering is flat out wrong, or at least not the way Yngwie plays it. The arpeggios are tabbed incorrectly, especially the arpeggio work for the interlude of As Above So Below. Plus when you slow the songs down you will hear various passages transcribed incorrectly, not just the fingering, but the actual notes (see the transcriptions for Evil Eye and Far Beyond the Sun for examples of passages transcribed incorrectly). If you know how to read music I would suggest going that route, as the notation is more correct generally than the tablature. If you can't read music notation, the tab will work, but as always with any guitar tab book, it is also best to slow the song/solo down and listen to it with your own ears. It also helps to study the artist and learn how he does the things he does. Knowing the techniques the artist uses and how he does what he does will make learning songs that much easier, and more accurate.

Much credit to Wolf for wading out in the waters alone, he was really the first guy to transcribe Yngwie. And while his work for Rising Force was okay, it got much better on subsequent releases (Marching Out and Trilogy), after Wolf had more time to study Yngwie's technique. Even they are not 100% correct however, but better. This is definitely a three star effort however, and a good way to learn the songs off the album, with the caveat you learn Yngwies way of playing, and listen to the songs slowed down for verification. I would also suggest instead of just being a tablature only guitar player, to learn to read music and understand theory. While it's not essential to read music to become a great guitar player, the best guitar players do have a basic understanding of theory. Some guitar players think learning music theory will stifle their creativity, wrong! Learning the language of music will do the opposite, it will allow your true creativity to shine through. Just ask Steve Vai about that.