I’m trying to learn Sir Duke, and generally succeeding apart from this one lick in the horn/bass sync part:
My brain really wants to “rake” when I play this with my plucking hand if that makes sense: so I play the first 11 - 9 with my middle finger followed by my pointer finger, which leaves the next 11 - 9 to be started by my pointer finger followed by my middle finger, leaving my fretting fingers and plucking fingers to move backwards from each other.
My brain melts when I try to do this. I feel like my technique isn’t overtly bad, it’s just that my brain is like “no. you aren’t doing this”. I’ve been practicing this slowly for months with very little improvement, though I feel compelled to keep trying it this way to get better.
There’s a lesson in B2B with root/octaves and then the next one is double root/octaves. In the octaves bit, Josh suggests (wants you to) pluck the root with index, and octave with middle finger. And keep those fingers there. Module 11 or 12, or, somewhere around there.
Anyway… the double octave one i found to be much simpler if i just assigned a plucking finger to a string, then kept it there. Forget the whole strictly alternating thing.
Alternatively, you could always cheat and do a pull-off on the 9
Sir Duke was the last song I learned in full and that part was and still is a pain. I find it to be a similar “tongue twister” to Billy Jean except different. I hate hammer ons and pull offs so I go with the Joe Dart school of “pluck faster”. It took over a week of just playing that bit over and over again starting annoyingly slow and just speeding it up over time. Once I started to get comfortable at one speed, I would speed it up until I couldn’t play it again then I would practice at that speed. Wash rinse repeat.
Just a whole week of playing nothing but “buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh, buh duh duhduh buh duh bu-duh…” until I was hearing and playing it in my sleep. Just before madness completely overtook me, I was finally able to bungle my way through it in time.
“An amateur practices until they get good. A pro practices until they fail.”
We all have that pass that we can get it right away while it seems like it’s an easy and straightforward for others. You just have to get your head down and trick your brain with muscle memory. Put enough reps in to it slowly the next thing you know it’s on autopilot.
You need to practice some raking exercises and work on finger independence. You should be able to pluck/rake equally well with either your index or middle fingers. Have you tried starting on the index finger instead of the middle and raking with the middle? Eventually you won’t really have to think about it much, other than choosing which fingers make more sense for efficiency.
Are you using raking for everything (possible) or using alternating plucking some of the time? If you want to rake and you’re not using it all the time, you need to use it all the time until you get proficient at it.
Hate to say it but the only answer (and the answer to almost every question) is more practice.
I used to struggle with my plucking fingers in certain songs, but it became too complicated for my brain to process what my fretting hand was doing at the same time as my plucking hand. Eventually my plucking fingers became second nature. I don’t think about what they’re doing at all anymore. Hundreds of hours of practice.
I don’t have my bass in hand but looking at the line I’d probably play it the way you’re struggling with.
Edit - at home with bass. I play this M-I-I-M-I-M-I-M. I am only raking once. If you’re raking the second D9-A11 that may be your problem
