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Showing Tag: "malmsteen" (Show all posts)

Shred Lesson - Metal Guitar Techniques

Posted by The Wizard Of Shred on Thursday, December 1, 2011, In : Classical Ideas 
Shred Lesson
Classical ideas



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This is a great alternate picking exercise. Performing the frequent string shifts can be a challenge but if you persist and refuse to give up, you will get them down. Remember to practice slow and with precision. Keep working at a pace where it feels effortless and easy - and speed will follow naturally.


Shred Lesson



"I don't believe you have to be better than everybody else. I believe you have to be better than you ever thought you c...

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The Reversed Malmsteen Variation

Posted by The Wizard on Sunday, October 18, 2009, In : Amazing Licks 
The Reversed Malmsteen Variation


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In this lick, I use position shifting and a lick from one of the previous articles, to create a third lick. Combining licks in this way is a great way to develop the ability to improvise at very high levels of speed. The more you can combine what you know, the more choices you have.

As an exercise, try to come up with at least one new way of using these ideas used in today's lick. See if you can play the whole thing backwards. Play the...
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One String Flying Triplets

Posted by The Wizard on Saturday, October 10, 2009, In : Amazing Licks 
One String Flying Triplets


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Playing this lick always makes me smile. It's an insane way to utilize position shifting to create a one string sequence that looks and sounds this frantic. But it's also an incredible left hand exercise (If you're a right handed person) Think about it: In order to play any 3 notes per string scale pattern from string to string, you have to change fingering to match the notes on each of the six strings you play. You do the same thing here, ...
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The Reversed Malmsteen Sequence

Posted by The Wizard on Sunday, October 4, 2009, In : Amazing Licks 
The Reversed Malmsteen Sequence



I've decided to create a category with nothing but licks in it. This allows me to offer you some value even when I haven't got much time on my hands. This is a sequence I came up with by reversing a well known Yngwie lick. I haven't included the original lick in this video but if you wonder what it is just reverse today's sequence. It feels extremely awkward to play these notes in the beginning. It's almost like there's something wrong with the lick! But be pers...
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Feed The Beast & Make Your Passion A Priority

Posted by Pure Speed on Monday, July 27, 2009, In : The Malmsteen Study 

Feed the beast and make your passion a priority


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The final Malmsteen lesson

In this last article in this series, I would like to bring your attention to the obvious. From my perspective Malmsteen has one final lesson to teach us mortals and it revolves around the concept of passion. Most of us start out in life with a lot of hope, enthusiasm and passion. But as the years go by we find ourselves with an increasing amount of responsibilities and “stuff” that clutt...


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Phrasing Fast VS Playing Fast

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, July 21, 2009, In : The Malmsteen Study 
Phrasing fast VS playing fast


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The art of phrasing fast

Is it possible to play a solo that only consists of fast runs, without it getting boring to listen to? Some would say no. But in my experience there's a perpetually long haired swedish male who masters this art to perfection. Whether you like Yngwie Malmsteen's music and style or not, his playing is a treasure chest of ideas and insights that you can use to radically improve your playing, no matter what style or...

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Breaking Free From The Tyranny Of Time

Posted by Pure Speed on Monday, July 20, 2009, In : The Malmsteen Study 

Breaking free from the tyranny of time


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A simple but radical idea

This article contains one very important distinction when it comes to soloing. It’s applicable to any style of music and any instrument really. When I figured this one out, I couldn’t believe I hadn’t heard about it anywhere. At the time, I had read my way through a lot of material on music theory and improvising, but nowhere had I come across this simple idea. I promise you this: If you will, no...

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How To Create The Solo Of Your Dreams

Posted by Pure Speed on Thursday, July 9, 2009, In : The Malmsteen Study 

How to create the solo of your dreams


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Improvised or prepared?

What's best: A totally improvised solo or one that is carefully prepared and structured in advance? I used to not like the improvised solos very much. "Go home and come up with something worth listening to" I thought to myself whenever I heard Jazz players dive into mass quantities of, what seemed like, random notes. But at the same time I was convinced that you should be able to improvise your way thor...


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How To Never Run Out Of Licks Again

Posted by Pure Speed on Wednesday, July 8, 2009, In : The Malmsteen Study 

How to never run out of licks again


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A key lesson

This article contains one very important lesson that we can draw from the playing of Yngwie Malmsteen. It represents an important key to building effective solos while having immense fun. When you apply it consciously to your own playing, you will experience a greater sense of freedom and playfulness than perhaps ever before.

How to get beyond repetitive playing

Why is it that Malmsteen's solos seem so alive? Wh...


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The Secret Malmsteen Rule

Posted by Pure Speed on Monday, July 6, 2009, In : The Malmsteen Study 

The secret Malmsteen rule


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If it doesn't feel great, get rid of it!

The second principle that Yngwies brain seems to work by is the concept of “The path of least resistance” Choosing the easiest way around anything sounds like a no-brainer but in this case it isn't. This principle can make or break your success in shredding and when I started applying it to everything I did, I made so much progress in so little time, I couldn't believe it.

When I first began to s...


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How To Shred Like Yngwie Malmsteen

Posted by Pure Speed on Monday, June 22, 2009, In : The Malmsteen Study 

How to shred like Yngwie Malmsteen


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If you want to play like the best, you should know how the best became the best. If you know that, you can do the same thing they did, and achieve the same results. In the next series of articles I’m going to give you every little nugget that I’ve picked up in my study of Yngwie Malmsteen. I've found that there are two sides to cover when it comes to this guy. 1. How to play like Yngwie and 2. How to think like him. It's...


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Integrating Major & Diminshed Arpeggios

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, June 16, 2009, In : Sweep Picking Perfection 

Integrating Major & Diminished Arpeggios


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Yesterday I gave you some ideas on how you can integrate sweep picking with economy picking. Today let's look at the Major and Diminished shapes. But before we begin let's repeat the "integration recipe" that I talked about yesterday, here it is again:

1. Come up with a simple lick that uses sweep picking and another picking technique

2. Repeat that lick until it's easy

3. Come up with another lick and repeat the process

New...

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The Practice Motivation Formula

Posted by Pure Speed on Saturday, May 30, 2009, In : Motivate Yourself To Practice 

The practice motivation formula


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The second requirement of mastery

You basically need two things in order to become a world class shredder:

1. A strategy that will get you there
2. The motivation to implement that strategy

You must know how to acquire the skills you want. And the more efficient your strategy, the faster you'll arrive at your destination. I’ve described the strategies I used to build my skills in the articles in the category “Get more out of pract...


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How To Create The Malmsteen Sound

Posted by Pure Speed on Saturday, May 23, 2009, In : Instant Fretboard Vision 

How to create the Malmsteen sound


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Change one note and everything changes

The last tool you need to be able to improvise over any rock, pop or metal chord progression, is the Harmonic minor scale. This scale is our old friend the Minor / Major scale with a slight change and a new name. You take your natural A-Minor scale but change the 7th step and push it up one fret. Here's our well known A-Minor / C-Major pattern:



Now let's push the 7th step up one fret (The G not...


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Celebrating Your Victory

Posted by Pure Speed on Wednesday, May 13, 2009, In : The Ten Day Break Through Strategy 

Celebrating your victory


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A powerful experiment

I'd like to add a little note to yesterdays article. Most people that I have introduced these two methods to, has been very sceptical to whether they would really work or not. If you feel the same way, here's my recommendation:

Pick a one or two string lick that you would like to master. Then practice playing it to the point where you can do it without referring to the tablature. Then use the methods I described in th...


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Two Strategies That Will Triple Your Results

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, May 12, 2009, In : The Ten Day Break Through Strategy 

Two strategies that will triple your results


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How to improve your chops when you are away from your instrument

In this article I'm going to give you two methods that you can use to practice when you don't have a guitar. With these two strategies, you can practice everywhere. Depending on what you do for a living, you might add as much as 6 to 8 hours of valuable practice time to your daily shedule. When you use them enough, they become automatic and you'll start to...


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Turbo Charge Your Practice Sessions

Posted by Pure Speed on Monday, May 11, 2009, In : The Ten Day Break Through Strategy 

Turbo charge your practice sessions


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How to program your mind to achieve extraordinary results

Greetings fellow shredder. This article will give you a vital strategy that you can use to improve your results dramatically. It's a little long but reading it is well worth your effort. By now you should have laid down a plan for the ten days. You have scheduled every possible 30 minute session during this period and should be clear about the rules of the game. Now it's t...


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Essential Rules of Engagement

Posted by Pure Speed on Saturday, May 9, 2009, In : The Ten Day Break Through Strategy 

Essential Rules of Engagement


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Now that you've laid down a plan for the next ten days, let's talk about the rules of the game. The first thing to be very conscious of, is what kind of practice routine you are preparing for. It's important to distinguish between these two kinds of practice:

1. Technique
2. Integration

Practicing technique

Improving your technical skills requires repeating a certain pattern of movement until it's embedded in the brain. When you engage...


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Expand Your Practice Regimen Explosively

Posted by Pure Speed on Friday, May 8, 2009, In : The Ten Day Break Through Strategy 

Expand Your Practice Regimen Explosively


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Select three dream licks

Let's begin the planning part of your ten day challenge. The first thing you must do is to find three licks that you would really, really like to master. Don't aim too low when you select them: They have to be so far away from your current skill level that they really inspire you. Ideally, the thought of "acquiring" them should make you feel like a little kid before Christmas eve.

Also the three lic...


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The 10 Day Breakthrough Strategy

Posted by Pure Speed on Thursday, May 7, 2009, In : The Ten Day Break Through Strategy 

The 10 day breakthrough strategy


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I'm very excited about this particular subject. This ten day strategy has meant more to the development of my skills than any other single thing. You will not believe what will happen to your skills when you use this strategy on a regular basis. This is the way to crush your challenges in the fastest way possible.

Here's the basic mistake that we all tend to make:

When ever we are confronted with a challenge of any kind, we estimat...


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The Secret Picking Method...

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, May 5, 2009, In : Economy Picking Revealed 

The Secret Picking Method...


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The most effective and versatile technique


Today I'm going to introduce you to a simple but radical picking technique: It's the "Pick-the-notes-in-the-easiest-way-possible-technique" It's the most versatile and effective way to pick, that I know of. Alternate picking has a vital advantage. It doesn't care much about how many notes you play on each string. It's based on such a simple mathematical up and down process that you can use it ...
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The Magic of Mastery

Posted by Pure Speed on Monday, May 4, 2009, In : Economy Picking Revealed 

The Magic of Mastery


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Making economy picking more versatile

If economy picking is the only picking style you master, you have to be very careful with how you structure your licks. You have to have an uneven number of notes on each string in order to be able to make the string shifts happen. Also there are a few things that are practically impossible to play with economy picking only, because of this mathematical limitation. But there's a quick and easy way around thi...
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How to make super fast picking easy

Posted by Pure Speed on Sunday, May 3, 2009, In : Economy Picking Revealed 

How to make super fast picking easy


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Guaranteeing success

As with alternate picking, the hardest lick to play is a full three-notes-per-string scale pattern over all six strings. That's why it's so essential to start with very few string shifts and build from there. If you do that, you virtually guarantee that you'll progress faster than most people around you, and you'll create those little successes - that will motivate you to go for more. In the last article we we...
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The hidden key to learning economy picking fast

Posted by Pure Speed on Saturday, May 2, 2009, In : Economy Picking Revealed 

The hidden key to learning economy picking fast


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A radically different process

Practicing economy picking is a radically different process than practicing alternate picking. And the reason is this: Because economy picking involves a sweeping motion, you have to use two different practice routines to get the best results fast:

1. Playing the metronome game
2. Chunking several movements into one
3. Integrate immediately

1. Playing the metronome game

If you are unfamili...


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How to pick like a Swedish virtuoso

Posted by Pure Speed on Friday, May 1, 2009, In : Economy Picking Revealed 

How to pick like a Swedish virtuoso


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Play with flow and ease

If you want to play like the wind and the water, economy picking is for you. Alternate picking feels and sounds like a machine gun, where as economy picking flows like a river. Once you have it down, economy picking feels easy in comparison to alternate picking. It feels completely effortless and that frees up a lot of energy to focus on other things. As a consequence, I always use economy picking unless I...


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My best alternate alternate picking exercises

Posted by Pure Speed on Thursday, April 30, 2009, In : The Ultimate Guide To Alternate Picking 
My best alternate alternate picking exercises

Six notes up and down

Before I end this series on alternate picking I want to give you some of the "exercises" that I have used to build my picking speed. Please pick the ones that you are most comfortable with. The first two are super simple but also very fundamental. I use these licks all the time and you will too once you have them down. You can take these two licks and use them to go all the way up and down the neck. Try going all the way up an ...
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How to pimp your axe for maximum speed

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, April 28, 2009, In : The Ultimate Guide To Alternate Picking 

How to pimp your axe for maximum speed


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Creating the ultimate shred machine

Years ago, I thought that any skilled guitar player should be able to play fast on any guitar. Even though I loved playing on a guitar that had all the qualities that I'm going to discuss in this article, I still did nothing to make my own instrument more playable. "Playing on an impossible instrument will just harden me and make me better in the end" I thought. but I missed the point. ...


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The killer strategy for mastering string shifts

Posted by Pure Speed on Monday, April 27, 2009, In : The Ultimate Guide To Alternate Picking 

The killer strategy for mastering string shifts


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The two headed monster
 

Every technique has its challenges. When it comes to alternate picking, shifting strings is definitely one of them. What most people aren’t aware of is that this is a two headed monster. There are two different string shifts that you can make:

1. Outside shifting

2. Inside shifting

Outside shifting is when you go from picking down on, let’s say the B-string, and then picking up on the high ...


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How to break through the speed barrier

Posted by Pure Speed on Sunday, April 26, 2009, In : The Ultimate Guide To Alternate Picking 

How to break through the speed barrier



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The strategy described in this article could increase your speed instantly! (Seriously)

I assume that you are using the methods described in the category “Get more out of praticing”. If you are not, you are going to experience a lot more challenges than I describe in these articles. But even though you do everything right, at some point, you are going to hit the wall. You are going to reach a level of speed that you cannot ...
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How to increase picking speed by 500 %

Posted by Pure Speed on Saturday, April 25, 2009, In : The Ultimate Guide To Alternate Picking 

How to increase picking speed by 500 %


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A crucial factor in alternate picking

The engine in a car is a complex piece of machinery where everything has to fit together to produce the power needed to drive the car. Imagine if some part of the engine suddenly started to loose it's place. If the explosions in one cylinder suddenly misfired and worked against the rest of the engine, then what would happen? The way to ensure that our alternate picking engine works perfect...


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The one key that makes all the difference

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, April 21, 2009, In : Get More Out of Practice 

The one key that determines whether or not you will become a master


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You now have all the tools you need to practice effectively and get the most out of what you put in. But what’s going to make you practice? Why would anyone spend hours performing very small and repetitive movements with their fingers? Why do we bother? Well, it’s really quite simple right? We’re doing it to get something. It’s not a new car we want and it’s not a thing really, it’...


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Triple your musical vocabulary in months

Posted by Pure Speed on Monday, April 20, 2009, In : Get More Out of Practice 

Triple your musical vocabulary in months


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"Wasn't that a nice trick? I mean lick..."

How do you put together a jigsaw puzzle? Do you look at the picture on the box, then pick a pice up in your hand and try to place it in the correct spot right away? Or du you find pieces that are similar and try to fit them together until you have something that makes sense? Most people choose the latter.

But because of our curiousity and drive to learn something new, we nearly a...


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8 things that keep us from getting better, part 2

Posted by Pure Speed on Sunday, April 19, 2009, In : Get More Out of Practice 

8 things that keep us from getting better, part 2


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Mistake number 5

Practicing licks in an uneven tempo

This seems like a small sin but it isn't. This will totally sabotage your chances of becomming a world class shredder. When you practice a lick, don't play the easy parts faster than the hard parts. Put your focus on getting the hard parts to be easy instead. If you fall into this trap, buy a metronome and make sure that it is your constant practice companion.

Ant...


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8 things that keep us from getting better, Part 1

Posted by Pure Speed on Saturday, April 18, 2009, In : Get More Out of Practice 

8 things that keep us from getting better, Part 1


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Mistake number one:
Biting of more than you can chew

Because we humans are impatient by nature, we tend to bite of more than we can chew. This is quite normal, but it is not an effective strategy. We suddenly decide to loose weight and since it has to happen now rather than later, we go for a 20 mile run. Then one of two things happen: Etiher we actually run the 20 miles, but because or body isn't ready for that kin...


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How to nail that new lick in minutes instead of days

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, April 14, 2009, In : Get More Out of Practice 



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How to nail that new lick in minutes instead of days

I once heard of a guy who ate his bicycle... Really! He sawed it into little pill sized peices and swallowed them one by one. You can do anything if you eat your challenges one bite at a time, but if you don't, nothing is possible...

3. Challenge Isolation

Rule number three: Never take on more than one challenge at a time!

The third principle is the principle of challenge isolation. It’s about how much informatio...


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Get faster, faster and with less effort

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, April 14, 2009, In : Get More Out of Practice 
Get faster, faster - and with less effort


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To shred, thou must learn when to not shred

In this blog, I’m going to cover the second principle of effective practice. Learning a new lick to the point where it becomes easy and effortless to do, is all about the right kind of communication between your brain and you. Basically we want to send this message to the brain: “Put this lick in the part of the brain where I’ll never forget it and where it becomes automatic...
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How to develop insane shredding skills

Posted by Pure Speed on Tuesday, April 14, 2009, In : Get More Out of Practice 

How to develop insane shredding skills


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4 keys to getting better fast!

In this blog, and in the next to come, I’m going to show you specific ways in which you can speed up your learning curve. I will take you through each and everyone of the principles I developed and used to build my own level of playing skill. I’m also going to show you a way to predict the future. Let me explain: When ever people are super motivated to practice, it's because they have a clear...


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