Anyone play guitar?

One of my friends told me that there is a guitar shop in London with a huge sign on the wall which reads:
"Please don't play Stairway to Heaven"
 
Question: I haven't done anything (besides change strings) to my guitars in probably 4-5 years. Should I bring them in to a shop to get them looked at or are they fine?
 
Intonation might have gone out a little over that time, but if nothing is wrong with the feel or the sound, they're most likely just fine.
 
Ohhh glad to see this thread bumped! I'm currently rewiring my pedalboard to hookup a Carl Martin Octaswitch. Let me tell you, its a major PITA
 
photo34.jpg


I'm still in bed so I snapped a picture of two of my axes set up right now. It's a baby taylor acoustic, really fun to play great sound. Then next to that I have my Epi Les Paul standard, it has a gibson 57 in the neck and a 57 plus in the bridge, it fucking wails. Behind those two I have a Marshall Valvestate 8080 and on top is my old crate practice amp which literally has some of the most quality sounding reverb of any amp I have plugged into. I use it for my mic now it's tight.

Keep on jamming guys! We should make a thread where we can post some songs we have written and recorded that'd be cool I know there are some super talented guitarists on the site.
 
how much was that crate? I've been looking for something small like that cause right now all I have is a line 6 half stack and I'm moving to college in september so I need a quality small one.

nice shit by the way.
 
Sheeeit If you're used to playing a line-6 half stack i'd recommend spending a little more and getting a nicer practice amp. BUT I did/do like my crate so I think ones this size are like 150-200 probably. Maybe even less shit. I don't know but i'd say this one was 125-150 when I bought it. Idk I'd go to a guitar shop and try a few out see what sound you like best. The crate can get a little muddy you have to work with the controls.
 
I bought a Vox VT20+ a few months ago because I live in a duplex and didn't want to terrorize my neighbors haha. It's a nice little amp and has a headphone jack so you can plug in and not disturb anybody. I think I only paid like $160 for it. I use a Marshall half stack if I'm at my parents' house.

vox-vt20-plus-valvetronix-mvo.jpg
 
oh word I have a small marshall one that was like $150 mg15 or something but I was going to sell it cause I don't like it that much, it's really buzzy and I can't seem to make it sound good.
 
thanks man! they're EMG active 81 in the bridge and 60 in the neck. I'm saving up for a G&L Asat Special custom but that's $1,500 out of my pocket i don't have at the moment. also if anyones into heavy music i recorded an instrumental with my friends last night http://www.divshare.com/download/23670967-bca it was my first time using a 7 string so i was loving it haha
 
i mean not really, it's all about what kind of musician you are. theory helps but it doesn't make you fit with other musicians automatically just because you know your scales and chords and time signatures. that comes with experience and you either have it or you don't tbh, i know kids that major in theory and are obsessed with it but when it comes to being in a band collaborating and writing music they just can't do it. IMO it's al about the people you're with, i've been in a band with the same people for the past 4 1/2 years and none of us have taken theory yet we write songs ever day and make a living off of it
 
The way I see it there's such a thing as functional theory - if you can tell someone else what chords you're playing, technically you know some theory. I think that theory can give you a good starting point, like you might say to someone "Ok, lets jam on E minor and G major chords" and then you have a starting point, but the real magic happens when you have musicians that have a good feel for their instruments and some imagination. Amazing things can happen with just 2 chords if you have 2 people that know what they're doing. Obviously it helps if someone knows what key E minor and G major chords fit into, because then they can find a scale to play over the progression and have some fun. In the end everyone uses the theory whether they know it or not. Just a good thing to know to communicate with other musicians IMO.

So basically, I'm agreeing with you haha.

 
yeah i feel you man, I can legitimately say i don't really know much theory., i know names of some chords and shit but barely even that. all i do is play and write and whatever, i learn songs by ear and i figure everything out by ear it's just always been a lot easier than staring at sheet music or even tabs really. but like you said if someone came to me and wanted to start i would definitely recommend theory as it'll be easier for you to understand it rather than spending a few months by yourself get frustrated and give up haha
 
okay first of all nobody gives a shitsecondly he's wrong because I've been sitting around playing tabs my whole life and once you start to write your own things theory should come naturally. I guess I learned a bit of theory from school (grade 9 viola) but I mostly picked up all my knowledge of theory from jamming with people, listening to a lot of metal and writing songs on guitar pro. studying theory won't really help you become better, it will just help you understand what you're playing so that you can learn tricks to develop your own writing.

if you're just chilling in your room doing covers you don't need to know jack shit about your key or time signature.

that's just what I think.
 
and it doesn't really help you play with other people, in my experience. when a friend shows me a part he's come up with he doesn't go "okay it's in blah blah timing major 3rd progression" and a whole bunch of shit nobody cares about, he'll play it then I'll try to repeat it and if I fuck it up then he shows me slowly.

playing with people is really simple and fun if you have the right people.
 
Hey guys here is an instrumental/ atmospheric post-rock song I wrote with my band

/images/flash_video_placeholder.png
 
Bump.

Can anyone give me some advice on using theory to build chords?

Instead of memorizing the finger positions for all the chords all over the neck, I'd rather simply use my knowledge of theory to do it. For example, I know that a minor chord is built using a minor 3rd and a perfect 5th above the root note.

If I wanted to build an E minor chord using the 5th fret of my A string as the root note, how would I do that? Do I just memorize how different intervals work between different strings and then build it based on that?

Hope this makes sense to someone, I feel like I'm on the verge of discovering something amazing that will really open up my guitar for me (and save me the trouble of memorizing hundreds of different chords). +K to anyone who can help me out.
 
you don't need to memorize anything besides what the intervals of a major key are and what notes go into the chord you're making. then it's just practice
 
Man, if the last time you replaced your frets was last year, you are wasting time/money for a refret. It takes a loooooong time before that is necessary. Usually you just need to redress the frets.

 
Serious. Just get a fret file and get them back towards round again. Only time i'd refret is when you start to fret out on the bends. And even then a truss rod adjustment can solve that problem!
 
I actually got this neck 2 years ago. Last redress was less than a year ago, and they're too low for another redress. Besides, I hate low frets.
 
Which is precisely the predicament I'm in right now. Unless I'm missing something, I don't see how a truss rod is going to fix that considering how my finger anchors the string to the level of the fret, not the nut.
 
Bump.

Hopefully still some active people down to shoot the shit about stuff. Bought one of them damn things in april for covid survival. It's my favorite thing, pretty much all I do if I'm home. Take the thing hiking and stuff sometimes too. I play every day, sometimes for a while.

I fucking love it. I'm a drummer mostly and used to be pretty decent at trumpet but stopped playing. Love drumming but it just isn't that fun for me playing alone these days. The acoustic and being able to play bad music and sing along is fucking great.

I need to get back into learning different scales and practicing the ones I know more often. I do sometimes but have kinda fallen off on that. I just want to be able to riff around.

Been playing with a pick a lot more so that's more comfty. Forced myself to learn to finger pick from the start because it seemed easier to do it then, than come back later.

Idk guitars are sweet. Not sure why I never got into it before.
 
14193511:theabortionator said:
Bump.

Bought one of them damn things in april for covid survival.
Click to expand...

Me too, Bought mine the week before lockdowns happened. Super good to pass the time just trying to relearn what I knew in 6th grade. Haven't put it down since.
 
I just started in September, and it's coming along. The hard part is forcing myself to learn new scales instead of playing the same songs I know over and over again. The best way I've found to learn bar chords is to learn a song with one bar chord in them so you can practice switching to barring. I still suck at it, but it's coming. My personal choice for this is highwayman by the white buffalo. Also, trying to learn to strum a different rhythm from what you're singing is so hard.
 
14193511:theabortionator said:
Bump.

Hopefully still some active people down to shoot the shit about stuff. Bought one of them damn things in april for covid survival. It's my favorite thing, pretty much all I do if I'm home. Take the thing hiking and stuff sometimes too. I play every day, sometimes for a while.

I fucking love it. I'm a drummer mostly and used to be pretty decent at trumpet but stopped playing. Love drumming but it just isn't that fun for me playing alone these days. The acoustic and being able to play bad music and sing along is fucking great.

I need to get back into learning different scales and practicing the ones I know more often. I do sometimes but have kinda fallen off on that. I just want to be able to riff around.

Been playing with a pick a lot more so that's more comfty. Forced myself to learn to finger pick from the start because it seemed easier to do it then, than come back later.

Idk guitars are sweet. Not sure why I never got into it before.
Click to expand...

I did the exact same thing. Started playing in March and now I'm addicted and play for at least an hour a day.
 
I played guitar for a few years and then switched to bass & drums (6 strings is just too damn many no one needs all that). Picked up the guitar just for kicks pretty recently and my fingers are still in good shape from bass, but that one picky little bar chord muscle is totally gone. Actually kinda embarrassing cause I was in front of some homies and it took me a few minutes to make it work with those hendrix style wraparound chords. Anyway bass is where its at. Try it sometime.
 
14193691:BigPurpleSkiSuit said:
I just started in September, and it's coming along. The hard part is forcing myself to learn new scales instead of playing the same songs I know over and over again. The best way I've found to learn bar chords is to learn a song with one bar chord in them so you can practice switching to barring. I still suck at it, but it's coming. My personal choice for this is highwayman by the white buffalo. Also, trying to learn to strum a different rhythm from what you're singing is so hard.
Click to expand...

Dude, I thought bar chords were impossible shit that good people good magically do. I started barring my fs. Fucking hated it. Would have a bunch of muted strings, it was terrible. Just started playing songs with bars regularly. Took a while but not too long, shits easy.

I need to get back on scales more though.

Also was anyone else kind shocked at how easy some songs were to play? Like sometimes I'll fuck around with diferent chord progressions and I'm like wait wut, and I'll start singing and I'm like woah, I just accidentally learned another song.

Seems like AM, F, C, G, in various patterns makes up a lot of stuff.

I've got one song I play that has 3 or 4 bar chords in it some up the next a bit. Idk. I just need to force myself to fuck with the scales more. But sometimes playing the same songs as usual gets me playing. And maybe I want to learn something new maybe I dont, but I've def seen a lot of improvement. And not that I have a decent amount of chords it's easy to "learn" a lot of songs.

I generally just play my own versions of shit though. I think a creed song was the only song I tried to learn accurately.

The strumming thing I've struggled with a bit because I hadn't learned to pick really, but that's gotten better for me from just doing it. I think if I keep it up it will be ok.

Im rambling fuck.
 
14193691:BigPurpleSkiSuit said:
I just started in September, and it's coming along. The hard part is forcing myself to learn new scales instead of playing the same songs I know over and over again. The best way I've found to learn bar chords is to learn a song with one bar chord in them so you can practice switching to barring. I still suck at it, but it's coming. My personal choice for this is highwayman by the white buffalo. Also, trying to learn to strum a different rhythm from what you're singing is so hard.
Click to expand...

Some voicings/finger positions that let you play bar chords without the bar:

For major bar chords with their root on the E string, I think it's easier to play it like this with the thumb on the root. Below voicing example would be for A major. The x's are muted strings

e a d g b e

5 x 7 6 5 x

It's kinda hard to do this lower than the 3rd fret, cuz the strings get pretty spaced out. If you have big hands, though, it could potentially be easier than barring.

978959.jpeg

For bar chords with their root on the a string, I usually play the root with my pointer finger and don't even worry about the bar. You can then just lightly mute the top string with your pointer finger, as opposed to barring all the strings. This example would be for D major

e a d g b e

x 5 7 7 7 x

978960.jpeg

and D minor...

e a d g b e

x 5 7 7 6 x

978961.jpeg

The only type of basic chord (like not a 7th or other kind of extension) that I don't really have a good one for is minor bar chords with their root on the E string, like G minor. The thumb thing I do for the A major example above is way harder with a minor, you just have to contort your hand more for the minor version. Probably not much easier than playing a bar.

Muting the strings can be a pain at first, but is easier than barring imo. Hope this helps anyone getting annoyed with bar chords! Most 7th chords can also use similar techniques to these. Go beyond that and you probably aren't barring it anyway
 
My Washburn dreadnaught fell on the ground and the neck is all wigged out. I realized I am the kind of person that probably shouldn’t have expensive guitars- so I went for another beater/budget guitar. I bought a mahogany top acoustic from Orangewood. Thing is super well set up and sounds really smooth, 195 dollars shipped I am super pleased. ?
 
Prolly sent another at least 5 hours today. Also realized parents garsge is dope because nobody csn here me and I can sing and play at full volume. Played down at the point at the lake earlier. Was like 67 here.

Didnt really play anything new. I did wake up with a mellow solo idea for let it be and learned that so that was kinda chill.

And just now started learning a bayside song. Blame it on bad luck. It's got some nice bar chord movement. I dig it and I like the song. Itll take me a bit before I can play it clean though. There one chord im not sure about still but trying to figure out if it works or change it. Idk.

Guitar is fucking fun. Im sitting at my drumset now playing guitar. I did smash the drums a bit but really dig the guitar so much more. Its fucking captivating.

Possibly the best purchase ive ever made and thing has gotten me through some tough times already. No relationships coming my way but at least i got this chunk of wood woth some metal strings on it.
 
Hopefully I can find a place to play loudly that isn't freezing this winter. I'll have 3 days off a week, so might even just drive out of the mountains one of those days to skate and play.

Worst case ontario will probably play in my car. Would be cool if I can find a building that's not being used to play in. Will def play in my room but just gonna finger pick and sing quietly. But even then to anxious to really make much for sounds.

Idk, I just wanna play every day. Shits exciting and I'm not even good at it.

Digging the small breakthroughs though and just love every time I touch the thing and can play some songs badly. Now I know enough songs where I can rotate them a bit. It got a little annoying when I kind of knew like part of 1-3 songs and that was all I had to play. Even just playing random chord progressions and scales is fun.

Guitars are friggin dope. Prolly gonna sell my electric drum kit. I don't think I'm going to play it much anymore.
 
Just learn the blues scale, you can play most songs with it. And just by tweaking a few notes you can get the major and minor scales. I would also recommend learning how to sing while you play.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top