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p p p p
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Palm Muting is a technique where you rest part of your picking hand palm on top of the strings near the bridge saddles while picking those strings. The effect is that the string's high frequency energy is quickly absorbed by your palm, so you can only hear it during the attack portion of the note, while the lower frequencies continue to resonate. This technique is absolutely essential for most hard rock and metal styles - when used with distortion it provides a signature "djent" sound. It's overall effect is a more percussive sound.
Tab often uses a 'pm', 'p.m.', 'p', 'm', '*' above or below the tab to indicate a palm muted note. '*' can sometimes mean artificial harmonic, though, so be aware.
p p p p
------7---5---
--0-0---0---0-
In the above example, all the open string notes are palm mutes, while the fretted notes are not.