"ALBATROSS" BY FLEETWOOD MAC ON ELECTRIC GUITAR: PART 3

Hey, how you doing? We’ve made it to Part 3 of my three-part Albatross series! How did you feel about the first two parts?

To quickly recap, there’s a recording of me playing both guitar parts in Part 1. Make sure to check that out first if you haven’t already. In Part 2, we cover the A section of the song with the iconic rhythm and lead parts.

As I mentioned in Part 2, this song contains a ton of slide work. I’ve swapped these for bends for those who don’t have a slide or aren’t confident using it.

You can exclude the bends if you’re not great with them, but they really add something special to the track. I have a lesson on string bending, so practice up a bit, then give the bends a go. :)

🚨 Bending Alert! Don’t kill your fingertips with your bending! Take it slow, take regular breaks, and don’t get frustrated if it takes time to get the sound you’re looking for.

If you’ve watched and practiced the whole series, you can now combine both sections with two guitars. Play it as a duet with a guitar buddy, or use the help of some savvy recording tech. Whichever way you choose, practicing with a metronome helps to sync up both parts really nicely.

Let’s check out that awesome guitar. :)

Albatross by Fleetwood Mac: Solo Part

We’re going to start with finger 3 at 2:10 (string 2, fret 10). Pick, play a tone bend, release it, then bend back up. Pick again, bend a tone, release it, then play 2:9. Go back to 2:10 and bend again.

The second time around, it’s tone bend, release, then bend again. Pick and bend again, release, then play 2:9. Then it’s another bend from 2:10. We dip the bend a little, move it up and hold it on the note, then dip again.

🎸 Slide Guitar Substitutions: This is one of the parts played with slide guitar. If you want to have a go, replace the tone bends from 2:10 with slides from 2:10 to 2:12.

After that, we play two tone ghost bends from 2:10, followed by a semitone ghost bend from 2:9. Then it’s 3:9, 2:10, 2:9.

Albatross by Fleetwood Mac: Second Lead Line

The second guitar part uses almost the exact same visual pattern. The two guitar parts are layered on the original. If you want to mimic the layering, your rhythm needs to be really tight.

Replace 2:10 with 2:7, 2:9 with 2:5, and 3:9 with 3:6, and you have the second part! You can also see this as the same part but moved down three frets and 2:9 moved back four frets. There’s just one caveat: instead of playing the semitone ghost bend from 2:9, pick 2:7, then 2:5.

🧐 Little Bit of Theory: A semitone ghost bend from 2:5 gives you the note F, which will sound pretty horrible in this context. That’s why we change it up. :)

Albatross by Fleetwood Mac: Second Section

After that melodic section, guitar 2 goes back to eighth notes on the bass strings, as discussed in Part 1 of this lesson. Guitar 1 plays slide guitar very high up the neck. I’ll play the notes fretted, and you can adapt it for slide guitar. The notes are 1:19, 1:21, 1:19, 2:19, and 2:21. Repeat this line, then finish with 1:21, followed by 1:19.

Then the original goes back to normal guitar. Play a 1:16 semitone ghost bend and release, pick 2:17, then play a tone bend. Repeat this. Then it’s 1:16 semitone bend, 1:14, 2:17. The final run of notes is 2:17, 2:16, 2:14, and 3:16.

🔥 Essential Slide Guitar: this song includes some killer slide guitar playing. Check out all the slide guitar essentials before diving in. :)

This is also layered with a similar second guitar part. The first line uses the same pattern of notes but moved down five frets. This is true except for the final run of notes. It’s 2:12, 2:10, 2:9, 3:11, 3:9.

Albatross by Fleetwood Mac: Outro

Guitar 2 goes back to eighth notes on string 6, but the pattern is a little different. It’s four bars of E, two of F#, then E, F#, E, F#, E. The last E is just a single bass note on beat 1.

The lead part for the outro starts with the chords and goes into the classic melody part. It differs a little bit from the usual part. Use your ears to work it out. :)

💡 Notes On The Neck: It’s almost incomprehensible that a pianist wouldn’t know the notes on the piano. But tons of guitarists have no idea what the notes on the guitar neck are. It’s bizarre! Knowing the notes completely transforms your guitar playing and understanding. You'll see a big shift after just a couple of months of committed practice.

Layering The Parts

This one is great to play with a guitar friend, looper pedal, or a metronome. The time has to be tight, so if you’re using a looper, I’d suggest a drum track or metronome to keep in good time. You could also use GarageBand to program a drum track and play along with that.

Whatever musical masterpiece you decide to make with all these great guitar parts, I’m sure it’ll sound wicked. Have loads of fun with Albatross, and I’ll see you for more song lessons real soon. :)

🎵 New to JustinGuitar? Create a free account and access incredible practice tools to help you learn faster!