10 Classic Riffs Every Guitarist Should Know

4. Enter Sandman - Metallica

Metallica's biggest selling album spawned a host of all-time headbanging classics, but 'Enter Sandman' is unquestionably the master. The intensity of the build up from clean to heavy riffage creates one of the greatest moments of tension and release in the classic rock catalogue.

As with many of the riffs in this list, the difficulty isn't in playing the riff itself, it is in maintaining the accuracy and intensity for a couple of minutes when the guitar part is sitting right at the forefront of the song - there's nowhere to hide if you flub this one bro!

Contributor

Lifelong music obsessive, regular contributor to US guitar magazines, sometime radio presenter, singer/guitarist in Star Studded Sham, true believer in the power of rock'n'roll and an amp turned up to 11, about to publish first novel, The Bulletproof Truth.