guitar NEWB thread

it's more common than you think, historically. i learned of it as a 'grunge' thing to do -- it certainly was seen as such in the guitar mag universe when metallica did it on load. but long before that i think r&b players would tune down to Eb (or up to F!) to be able to fit in better in horn-driven arrangements

also dreaded stevie ray vaughan

i don't know if DJP specifically would like this, but i'm enjoying this web series on vice's music page called "guitar moves" that has matt sweeney (of chavez and other bands, one of my personal musical heroes) interviewing guitarists from various bands (so far including josh homme from queens of the stone age and james williamson from the stooges) about their guitar playing. it's not tech-y, it's more just cool dudes sitting around bullshitting about playing guitar, but if you're into these kinds of bands, it could be useful/inspirational in learning guitar i think

http://noisey.vice.com/guitar-moves

Some Neil Young songs are in Eb tuning and only sound right to me in that tuning

Jimi often tuned Eb

that looks super interesting and is really conflicting with my "avoid Vice at all costs" personal stance

holy shit that blake mills kid

i like Eb tuning. you can play along with a keyboard easily by mucking around with the black keys, don't have to worry about all those white keys

those vids are fun. the josh homme one is cool, i realise i've never heard him speak before and his voice is not what i was expecting.

just FYI, I am putting guitar on my contribution the NIN pre-cover comp

I am still horrible at playing chords in time but, with some drilling, I can do simple lead melodies, which is exciting to me.

bernard sumner over here

So I am (for real) finally getting a guitar. I think I want a Jaguar. I want a couple pedals, maybe a practical one and a fun one. Any suggestions? I am not really interested in rocking out, more in being weird/annoying.

Awesome! The hotbed for ilx pedal talk is over here:

Pedal geeks i need u (help jjjusten make decisions about awesome pedals for his store)

But I guess the first question is what's your pedal budget looking like?

And what kind of weird?

and what's your amp situation?

Little practice amp, probat. They have a little Fender amp and a little Silvertone at the store.

Pedal budget- maybe couple hundred, for now, little less.

Kind of weird - give me some choices.

Probat=probably

Reverb. I want reverb.

everyone does

Tc electronics hall of fame and hall of fame minidi some weird shit,esp with the toneprint options

Blue box sounds cool?

I don't understand jjustens last post at all!

Budget weirdness options - mooer lofi, mooer slow engine

my unhelpful opinion is to do nothing re: pedals until you love your amp

Toneprint allows you to use your smartphone to play a modem sounding noise into your bridge pickup and change the settings in the pedal.

Also low budget weird - pretty much every single idiotbox pedal.

my unhelpful opinion is to do nothing re: pedals until you love your amp

^^^^ THIS

Sometimes I think people learning guitar should be banned from pedals for at least 1 year, maybe 3 years.

I would say that they should be banned from playing with them for longer than 3 minutes in a space where others can hear. Otherwise, it's too much fun.

yeah, i regret not waiting to use pedals, they really atrophied my playing skills. not!
Guitars are for making sounds

fucking how do you turn pedals off anyway, do they make pedals that turn off?

A bistable multivibrator

they don't make pedals that 14 year olds can figure out how to turn off

Pedals for your pedals.

http://www.loop-master.com/images/Five%20Loop%20with%20Master%20Bypass%201506.jpg

I like that Slow Engine

Tc electronics hall of fame and hall of fame minidi some weird shit,esp with the toneprint options

― Everyone is awful except you. Wait, no, you are also awful. (jjjusten), Wednesday, June 4, 2014 10:58 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

These are hella cheap right now too. I accidentally bought a Hall of Fame the other week when I entered a half-serious high bid on one on ebay and it turned out to be the winning bid.

Speaking of reverb, jjusten (or anyone else) how do you like the Dispatch Master? It looks like a nice, simple-to-operate pedal with the added benefit of being two effects. Does it lose anything in its simplicity? How does it stack up against other delay/reverb combos like the Boss RV-5 or whatever?

I bought a Jagmaster! =)

Nice! Would shred.

A bistable multivibrator

― Sufjenga Cat Giffin (Sufjan Grafton), Thursday, June 5, 2014 6:10 AM (13 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

insert TRS jack Boss joek

Alright so tell me about

-amps

-vetting teachers

My friend P says not to get a teacher, just to make noises. What u think of that?

If you're not going to get a teacher, at least get Rocksmith and some teach-yrself-guitar books with some music theory in them

I think I want a teacher, but what is Rocksmith?

I understand the importance of learning, but I am also doing this as something of an escape from a sorta daily preponderance of theory and technology fetish in my day job (film/video), so I'm hoping to sort of avoid the pro thing and the head-of-a-pin obsession with gear and technique. That said, said day job also leaves me with a pretty good understanding of the lie behind the assumption that anyone can get by on intuition, etc.

Kool, I see Rocksmith. Seems cheap enough to give a try, but does it actually work?

if there's a certain style that you want to play, a teacher can be very helpful. if you've got enough time to practice, it should also accelerate things. I practiced obsessively in high school by just learning songs, and I developed many bad habits that needed to be broken later. try to 'alternate pick' everything you play starting now if it's not too annoying. and do some exercises! a guitar teacher can be useful in that she'll make you learn some exercises.

and since you have an electric, you can do exercises while watching netflix or something. so it doesn't need to be grueling.

Yeah, even if you just want to "make noises", some basic instruction in picking and left-hand technique will strengthen your fingers and muscle memory and allow you to make a greater variety of noises.

I dragged my feet on getting a teacher (to the point where I STILL don't have one, even though I still want one; the leads I tried didn't pan out and then I got distracted) but sporadically playing Rocksmith in three week chunks has gotten me to the point where I can play the majority of open chords, plus barre chords, plus simple melodies, and I can credibly play a rhythm guitar part to "Night Shift" by Siouxsie and the Banshees which was the main reason I wanted a guitar in the first place. Plus, it's a great teaching tool for a variety of songs across a bunch of genres that can turn into a bunch of other songs (ie, playing around with Rocksmith led me to noodling around on my own and then suddenly I realized I was playing "Classic Girl" by Jane's Addiction)

Yeah all this depends a lot on what you want to be able to do on guitar. But if you are trying to play in a certain style, or you want to know how to play what someone else played, a teacher can save you a lot of time and bad habits.

I have a good ear and started out learning by ear and I learned a lot of things not merely "wrong" but in a way that made things much harder for myself. Although I guess there's some benefit to some of it, like trying to come up with ways to play stuff that is actually in alternate tuning in a standard tuning.