I've recently delved into using rythm patterns (i.e Savatage-Hall of the Mountain King) which utilizes the dead note technique. First off I need a definition of what it technically is, and then I need to know how to properly do it, if anyone out there knows I'd appreciate it.

Dead notes are just notes that you mute with your fretting hand and marked as XXXX's on tabs. You just mute all the strings or a few that are next to each other and strum those strings. You'll get a hucka chucka kinda sound and sounds badass when you add wahwah and other effects. Its good to use a few fingers to mute or you'll get harmonics.

Easy way to do them is to just relieve the pressure from the fretting hand on a given power chord so it dampens the string. The only thing to look out for is the tone (as in note) that the dead note is to be - ie you get a different tone at different positions across the neck. The one thing that differentiates this with harmonics (besides the string postion) is the fact that you leave your finger on the string to dampen the note, otherwise you will get the ringing harmonic (which can work very well when interspersed with dead notes).