BaTM help: How do you strum?

**Shorneh** · Joined: 13 Jun 2006 Posts: 129 Location: Danville, Illinois

If this has already been posted, I'm sorry.

I've seen movies of Phr34k, Krimsun, and some others playing BaTM, and have been wondering what is the easiet way to strum this song on Expert? Is it easier to go up-and-down, or just constantly down-strumming the bar?

Help would be greatly appreciated!

**dd3mon** · Joined: 28 Feb 2006 Posts: 68

Up and down. Very necessary if you wanna get a good score.

Difficult to learn (up and down strumming seems very foreign if you've never done it before, it takes alot of practice to hit even easy rhythms) - but this is a necessary skill to get very good scores on several hard and expert songs.

As I get better, I'm alternate strumming more and more parts of songs I used to single strum. Easier on the hands, overall more relaxed feel so in turn my scores go up. Just takes alot of time to get good at it.
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**MaximusDM** · Posted: Tue Jun 13, 2006 9:36 am Post subject:

Not sure what difficulty you are talking about here, you didn't specify.
But for the intro on both hard and expert you should be down, up, down on the 3 greens that come up and then down on ever note that comes after each of those greens.

If you are playing on hard, it is even a bit easier because you can keep your finger down on green the entire time because the chords after the greens only appear in the Expert difficulty.
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**quackadilly** · Joined: 11 Feb 2006 Posts: 1078 Location: Colorado

The way I do it is as follows....

The main rythym I tap the first note, then I double strum the 3(5) quick notes starting with a down strum.

So your strumming pattern would be like this from the start:

down, down, down, up, down, down, down, up, down, down, down, up, down..........
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**Shin** · Joined: 14 May 2006 Posts: 204 Location: The Netherlands

I do it like this: (from the very beginning of the song)

Down, Down, UpDownUp, Down, UpDownUp, Down, UpDownUp, Down, UpDownUp, Down, UpDownUpDownUp, Down, UpDownUp, Down, UpDownUp, Down, UpDownUp, Down, Down, Down

repeat

(on Expert btw)

**Genga** · Joined: 19 Apr 2006 Posts: 2474 Location: Glasgow, Scotland

Ive started to strum down more

on expert i strum down each time until it gets to

RY/RB/GGG/RB/GGG/RB/GGG/YB/GGG/YB/GGGGG/RY

for the 5 green i go down up down up down
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**krimsunmunkeys** · Posted: Tue Jun 13, 2006 5:34 pm Post subject:

**MaximusDM** · Posted: Wed Jun 14, 2006 3:22 am Post subject:

Oh snap.
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**JHetfield0816** · Joined: 10 Apr 2006 Posts: 2230 Location: New Jersey

Yeah I definitely concur with Master #2 krimsunmunkeys. Alternate strumming all the time really does help you to be more rhythmically accurate. Like when I alternate strum...I always hold the strum bar up or down after each strum and never let it go back to the middle unless I'm playing long held notes. It really helps you to be more precise. And also, you have to pay attention to whether you're better starting some passages strumming down or strumming up. Sometimes you may discover you're better when you start up in a certain passage, so you've gotta try switching it up. Although, in the case of BATM, you gotta be good at both...cause if you keep alternate strummming, you'll have to start up AND down at certain points of the main riff. Also, if you get good at alternate strumming, you can avoid doing pulloffs and stuff on solos of songs like Crossroads, Iron Man, etc. Lastly, with alternate strumming you've gotta keep your right hand loose, if you tighten up you'll screw up the rhythm on batm and you're screwed....um...ok i'm babbling again.

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**kriller** · Posted: Mon Jun 26, 2006 7:11 am Post subject:

i only down strum and son't hopo
but i only got 66% so dont do that if u want highscore

**JCirri** · Joined: 04 Feb 2006 Posts: 4576

I've tried to learn to always alternate strum and it does have a more easy feel to it, but I'm so used to strumming upwards that I'll tend to end a pattern by strumming up even if it should end on down resulting in a extra strum.

For now I still mostly rely on strumming upwards unless something is too fast and I'm forced to alternate where I'll spend time learning it. In the case of BatM I do alternate strum the faster parts in a way that feels natural to me (usually strumming upwards on the beat).
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**SkepticalMario** · Joined: 01 Mar 2006 Posts: 310 Location: Minneapolis, MN

I am so glad I decided to start alternate strumming on Easy.
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**Virux** · Posted: Tue Jun 27, 2006 2:10 am Post subject: Strummmmmmin

I find that strumming up and down is a lot easier. First of all its easy on your wrist and allows you to complete the rest of the song with less effort.

I used to have problems strumming up and down for this song and I found out the reason why. I would NOT take hold of the strum bar very tightly and would continue to go up and down very lightly with my pointer and thumb finger. This caused me to miss tons of notes. Eventually I learned that you have to be TOUGH with the strum bar. Get down the pattern and GRIP that mother hard. When you go up and down BE A MAN!! Move it HARD up and down and you will hit all the notes on the spot if you've got the pattern down. After doing that Im ranked in the 20's for BATM.

Well thats my strategy and advice. Just give it a try!!!

**Shorneh** · Joined: 13 Jun 2006 Posts: 129 Location: Danville, Illinois

I've started to strum up and down, and it's kind of helping me along. I went from 50% to 81-83% on Hard. I'm just still having a lot of trouble with the starting riff, and then the fast GGG-B-GGG-R-GGG-Y-GGG-B..I don't like it. =(

**silentlassassin** · Joined: 13 May 2006 Posts: 47

I only.. only only play constatly strumming down.. I alter in one part in texas flood and in heart full of black.. I never alter in most songs..
IN bark at the moon.. It's all down.. and I got five star .. so I'm happy..

And... at this point in my .. I guess.. status.. It would be very hard to learn alt over completely down