Satyricon - Mother North - Guitar Tab

Nemesis Divina

1996 6:25

Listen on Spotify

About Mother North

Few Black Metal tracks land as hard on the rhythm guitar as "Mother North" from Satyricon's 1996 album Nemesis Divina. The Drop D tuning is central to the whole thing: that lowered sixth string lets you hammer power chords on the bottom two strings with a single finger, which is exactly what the relentless, churning riff sections demand. At 120 BPM the tempo is not extreme by genre standards, but sustaining tight, palm-muted drive across long stretches without losing precision is the real challenge here. The key of E minor suits Drop D perfectly, and you will feel that natural pull toward open low-E drone passages throughout. Pick attack consistency matters enormously: any unevenness in your downstrokes becomes very audible. Use the Practice Toolbar to loop the main riff slowed down until your fretting hand and pick hand are perfectly locked before bringing it back up to tempo. Satyricon built this track on atmosphere as much as aggression, so let the dynamics breathe rather than burying everything in volume.

• The Drop D tuning allows single-finger power chord shapes on the lowest two strings, which is key to executing the song's grinding riff sections cleanly.
• At 120 BPM, the challenge is not raw speed but maintaining consistent palm-muted pick attack over long, repetitive riff passages without tension creeping into your forearm.
• Practising the main riff in E minor with a focus on downstroke uniformity will prepare you for the dynamic shifts between the dense rhythm sections and the sparser, atmospheric parts.