Harmonies

What harmonies sound best for metal lead playing? (if you know what i mean, the sort of thing that iron maiden use and stuff, like one guitarist plays the main riff/melody whilst another comes in with the same thing played a fifth, 7th or 9th or something) And does anyone know particularly what is used in the trooper?

Can Someone please give a good link about all that harmony stuff. I don't know much about theory, but i would like to learn something about it.

Most of Iron Maiden's harmonies are done in thirds. Ever since their album "Killers," it's been their trademark sound.

So is that relative to the major/minor/other scales that you are using in the song, eg if you were in c major (easiest eg) when one guitarist plays a c, the guitarist playing the harmony may play e?.

it depends what key u r in. when people say u play 3rds above the lead line to make a harmony they do not mean all majour thirds. this depends on the key and the note you are harmonising with. it could be a majour or minor third.

for example we play in e majour. and we have a harmony in thirds. if a note is played the third of that note is played, this is the note after the next note in the scale. the key of e majour which has the following notes; E, G flat, A flat, A, B, D flat, E flat, and then repeats. so if an e is played the harmony note would be an A flat. if an A is played the harmony note is a D flat. if an e flat is played a g flat is played. the interval between the notes is either a majour third ( 4 semitones) or a minor third (3 semitones). these intervals hold true in all the basic keys but there are a few weird keys were the harmonie would be an augmented third (five semitones).

you can harmonise in any interval so try them all, i quite like doing it in fourths.

hope this helps

yeah, cheers guys.