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The Smashing Pumpkins - Bullet with Butterfly Wings - Guitar Lesson

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Key E minor
The Smashing Pumpkins - Bullet with Butterfly Wings guitar lesson video
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Roll back the gain slightly and pick near the neck for a warmer, more open crunch.
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The Smashing Pumpkins Alternative Rock E minor
Capo Advisor 0 E minor · Original key

About Bullet with Butterfly Wings

Few riffs from the 1990s hit as hard as the opening of "Bullet with Butterfly Wings," and getting it right on guitar takes more than just knowing the notes. The Smashing Pumpkins recorded this in Eb Standard tuning, so drop every string down a half step before you start. The main riff sits in E minor and drives forward at 120 BPM with a relentless, almost mechanical intensity. The challenge is keeping that aggression controlled: the picking needs to be tight and consistent, not sloppy, or the riff loses its punch. Pay close attention to the muting between notes, since dead air is part of what gives the groove its locked-in feel. Use the Practice Toolbar to loop the verse riff slowed down until your picking hand is locked to the rhythm before you bring it back up to speed. The pre-chorus build and the explosive chorus also reward careful, section-by-section work rather than running the whole song from the top each time.

  • The song is played in Eb Standard tuning, meaning every string is tuned down one half step from standard E.
  • The main verse riff relies heavily on palm muting and precise alternate picking to achieve its aggressive, coiled feel.
  • At 120 BPM in E minor, the chorus demands stamina in the fretting hand to sustain the intensity through repeated, hard-strummed chords.

How to Play Bullet with Butterfly Wings

Tuning: Eb Standard · Key: E minor · Tempo: 120 BPM

It is played in Eb standard, a half step down, so tune down before you start or every position and bend will sit a half step sharp against the recording.

Use the section loop to isolate a passage, drop the speed below 100%, and set the metronome to 120 BPM to build it up to tempo.

Fender Stratocaster
Guitar

Fender Stratocaster

Billy Corgan's primary weapon, particularly his late-'70s hardtail model with stock single-coils that create the Pumpkins' signature scooped, fizzy fuzz tone when slammed into a Big Muff. The single-coil bridge pickup delivers that aggressive high-end sizzle and cutting sustain central to their distorted sound.

Fender Telecaster
Guitar

Fender Telecaster

James Iha's go-to rhythm guitar, providing bright, cutting tones that complement Corgan's Strat-based layers and add definition to the band's wall-of-sound approach without sacrificing the clarity needed in their dense arrangements.

Gibson Les Paul Standard
Guitar

Gibson Les Paul Standard

Corgan used Les Pauls with stock PAF-style humbuckers for warmer, thicker lead tones that contrast with his Strat's fizz, allowing him to shift between aggressive rhythm fuzz and fat, sustaining solos throughout the Pumpkins' catalog.

Gibson Les Paul Custom
Guitar

Gibson Les Paul Custom

A variation of Corgan's Les Paul arsenal, the Custom offered similar warm humbucker character for lead work while its thicker body resonance provided deeper low-end support for the band's heavier passages on later recordings.

Gibson ES-335
Guitar

Gibson ES-335

Corgan deployed this semi-hollow body for textured, slightly more organic tones that provided sonic variety beyond his Strat and Les Paul, particularly useful for cleaner, more nuanced passages that needed definition without harsh high-end artifacts.

Marshall JCM800
Amp

Marshall JCM800

The core of Corgan's distortion tone, cranked to the edge of breakup and pushed harder by his Big Muff pedal, the JCM800's natural tube compression and high-volume sustain became synonymous with the Pumpkins' crushing wall-of-sound aesthetic.

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