Musicians check in here. If you play, tell us about it!

[DaveP]

I went by Guitar Center and bought a headstock tuner yesterday. My Peavey Vypyr Tube 60 has a built in tuner, but I brought it home and took my Roland Cube 60 back to church a couple of weeks ago. I got tired of lugging the Tube 60 around and the Roland is a small format amp with a 12" speaker that just screams for its size. I can pick it up and walk off with everything at once ... gig bag, guitar case, and amp all at once.

I have a Fender pedal tuner that's good, but I've been thinking about a headstock tuner for a while. The one I bought is the Snark SS-20. I haven't actually stuck it on a guitar, but it gets rave reviews. At $29 this one is suppose to be more accurate than it's cheaper brothers. They all are chromatic, so you can do various tunings.

Apparently, the Super Snark SS-20 is made for Guitar Center. They seem to be the only vendor that comes up when you search for that model. The rest are SN-nn models.

GuitarCenter

 

[DaveP]

I know what you mean DaveP! I don't have have problem with guys like that showing off their chops. The 32nd note solos do get a little monotonous (Al Dimeloa/Return to Chick Corea's Mahavishnu Freak out, etc) BUT it's still good stuff. A competent player that can listen to what's going on around them impresses me more than the woo-hoo guys. That's how you make your band sound like a band instead of a bunch of master-baiters.

You know, it's kinda interesting to see what the kidseses are saying these days. I may have to terrorize y'all more often.

I rip 32nd notes in trills here and there and I'm a 16th note picker, but I'm more of a Warren Haynes, Dickie Betts, Duane Allman style player when I'm doing what I love. Copying other people note for note is good, but sometimes I just jam on it until I come up with something that feels right.

There's a Christian contemporary artist, Lincoln Brewster, that we cover. On this song he's showing his Eddie Van Halen roots. This solo is one that people expect you to do like the recording.

Check out the solo at 2:15. He apparently has a clip on video camera. He plays it in A on a Strat. I play a Les Paul these days and it's a push to get up into the high range to do the pull-off licks toward the end of his solo. Needless to say, church music has changed in the last decade.

 

[KattMamma]

wow church music has changed! lol

That solo was nice... something about it reminded me of Neil Schon

 

[DaveP]

wow church music has changed! lol

That solo was nice... something about it reminded me of Neil Schon

I can do it note for note until he gets to where he pulls off A E D Db E repetitively. It gets pushy at that point on a Les Paul. I'm doing a modified pull off repetition there that fits and sounds just about as good. There are so many licks that are easy on a Strat that are tough on a Paul. I guess that's why EVH liked the Strat. It's an effortless guitar to play, but it's harder to make it growl like the LP without grinding out the bridge pickup slot for a humbucker and rewiring.

 

[suspectK]

I picked up my bass for the first time in a while the other night since I had a speaker functioning.. At least until I played my Warwick through it...lol.

After that session, instant blood blister that was about a half inch tall off my middle finger. Not only do your calluses fade quickly, but apparently my skill and ease of bass playing does as well.

I've always considered myself as a bassist first, but it felt so awkward, and rather painful, just to basically walk around E and D for ten minutes..it's a horrible tragedy to not walk off a session with your head in the clouds from what was just done.

But my friend brought over some A custom hihats and a wonderful ludwig snare..so going to try to zap this pitty bs out of my system..the hihats only really sound different operating the foot pedal..but the snare is worlds apart from my stock catalina snare.

Just amazed on how many years I've put into playing bass, and just a few months of not playing, it seemed like I've never operated the instrument before.

 

[KattMamma]

Just amazed on how many years I've put into playing bass, and just a few months of not playing, it seemed like I've never operated the instrument before.

Yeah, since I retired from gigging, I play my keys less and less. And the less I play them, the less I want to, because when I DO play, it's harder, and I get mad at myself because I SUCK AT IT lol.

 

[DaveP]

KattMamma wrote: Yeah, since I retired from gigging, I play my keys less and less. And the less I play them, the less I want to, because when I DO play, it's harder, and I get mad at myself because I SUCK AT IT lol.

It's easy to lose the chops, but the mind is where the licks are stored. If the fingers can't play them the mind has no output device. I've been through long periods of not practicing or gigging and it's hard to build the chops again, but they always come back and I learn new licks in the process.

I refer to my Alvarez acoustic as my "warmup bat". It plays like my Les Paul, but with bigger strings and more required effort. The more I practice on the Alvarez the faster I get on the Paul.

 

[Hypnophone]

It's easy to lose the chops, but the mind is where the licks are stored. If the fingers can't play them the mind has no output device. I've been through long periods of not practicing or gigging and it's hard to build the chops again, but they always come back and I learn new licks in the process.

I refer to my Alvarez acoustic as my "warmup bat". It plays like my Les Paul, but with bigger strings and more required effort. The more I practice on the Alvarez the faster I get on the Paul.

I pracKtice with heavy sticks. I gig with light sticks.

 

[Hypnophone]

Y'all will dig this:

 

[Hypnophone]

...fretseses, stringseses, ampseses, Geez, Why don't you start a "guitar-boy" thread?

Here's a "guitar-boy", and his band. RIP Frank, RIP George Duke.
I'd suggest that y'all pay attention to this:

 

[Hypnophone]

Drums/Bass/Guitar:
Horns/Lip-Flappin'
It's badass.

 

[DaveP]

Watching those videos reminded me of a time when I was 15 or 16 and in my first band. The bass player told me, "You are a good player, but you'll never be great until you learn to use all your fingers". I looked puzzled and asked him what he meant. He said, "You don't use you little finger in solos". I told him my little finger was too weak. His response was, "That's because you don't use it. Use it and it will get stronger."

He was right. I worked on four finger left hand playing and have done it ever since. I see famous lead guitar players on TV who stretch the 3rd finger to hit 4th fret notes. They lose all the economy of motion when they do that. It's much more natural to use four fingers for four frets. One of my finger exercises is to run up the strings and back down, double picking all
the time and covering all four frets with all four fingers. It's so natural that I can't see going back to the old three finger method.

Zappa's fingers are like ... way long! It's no wonder he could rip solos as fast as he did using all four fingers.

 

[KattMamma]

Y'all will dig this:

OH HELL YEAH!!

 

[suspectK]

Yeah, the image posted in the thumbnail looks like some sort of freaky Photoshop edit..lol, but he was a genious, and used what god(short version for me) gave him amazingly.

I pracKtice with heavy sticks. I gig with light sticks.

I use to use light(never ever twirled glow sticks.. NEVER) sticks rather exclusively, but I felt like it was more effort to play with them..mainly with hard hitting stuff...The skinny sticks definitely

I can't ever settle on a stick size...but I do dig Vader fusions consistent enough.

Who was that first band you posted?(oh my...that set(drum), mainly the cymbals=dream...I'd be happy with just the hihats..and while we're at it, I really need a nice ride too)
Reminded me a lot of Sound Tribe, with the few minutes I've made into it so far...even though they were way before sts9's time.

Thanks for the video tunes!


To keep going on with the trend of my over exposing and drawn out posts...

I think I had issues with bass the other night because it was immediately after playing guitar...skinny jazz style. The feeling was so off, but picked it up yesterday, and I had to stop from how hot and steamy the room was getting.

So needless to say, much better mood towards my bass life after that...even though it was through headphones, that couldn't handle what was going down..and even further.

 

[DaveP]

After a week of using the Super Snark headstock tuner I'm sold on it. It's quick and accurate and a breeze to use. Some have said they are fragile, but with a little care it will probably last a long time. Reviewers have said that Snark replaced theirs without question when it broke, so there's that sense of security associated with it.

The really good part is that you can turn down the guitar volume knob and tune quietly since it only needs vibrations from the neck to work.

 

[dabbott416]

Played solo trumpet in high school and on and off since then. Recently I got way back into it and am participating in an "open orchestra" in a few weeks. My sound quality is down from those days, but my love for the instrument, its sound, and the music I can make is as strong as ever. But I gotta say, it's not nearly as "sexy" as the drums or a guitar

 

[bassnut]

According to His law, having a low B string is allowable so long as it's use is restricted to act as a thumb rest and nothing more. Verily, I say unto you, a special Hell awaits those who presume to use it otherwise. And there is yet another, more hideous damnation, usually reserved for overly egotistical guitar players with marginal talent, who ad extra strings to their bass above the blessed G. Take heed.

 

[DaveP]

I once played with a bass player while I was a teen in the late 60s who had a Gibson SG 6 string bass (the traditional wine color). It was tuned like a six string guitar, so it was a snap for a guitar player to pick it up and play.

Evidently, it evolved into the official Jack Bruce model.

 

[DaveP]

According to His law, having a low B string is allowable so long as it's use is restricted to act as a thumb rest and nothing more. Verily, I say unto you, a special Hell awaits those who presume to use it otherwise. And there is yet another, more hideous damnation, usually reserved for overly egotistical guitar players with marginal talent, who ad extra strings to their bass above the blessed G. Take heed.

I used to cringe in my pickup when one of those low B string basses (or synths) are used in a song. After the recent software update my truck stereo reproduces low end really well without stressing the speakers. Go figure. I guess they were killing speakers on test drives. Anyway, since Ram put out the radio firmware update I can play with the equalizer in flat mode and it sounds like a million dollars. I no longer feel the need to tweak the equalizer.

 

[Vape Suzette]

I started playing ukulele at age six. When I started figuring out Led Zeppelin on my uke, my parents reluctantly bought me a guitar to pacify my tenacious begging for one. I loved my first nylon string guitar. Then it was onto Bach at age eight and I still remember it was a challenge to contort my fingers in that fashion. I also learned everything by Neil Young and Dylan and began placing my focus on fingerpicking, playing bottleneck and fingerstyle guitar. I got a beautiful high-end Guild at sixteen and soon moved to Boston where I actually started to fit in for the first time in my life. I had lived in several other cities and after being there so long studying privately, an opportunity took me away from New England. I just had the L.R. Baggs Anthem pickup built into my vintage Guild.

I love Robert Johnson and have learned all 29! I have been playing out, but not nearly as much due to health problems. I have had four surgeries in just two and a half years, but am lucky to have made it through -- due to the best surgeons we could find. I had four ruptured discs in my cervical spine and nearly lost the ability to play from loss of sensation and nerve damage in my fingers.

It has been nearly four and a half years since I have touched a cigarette! My vocals have also improved. If I had not found this place filled with information on how to quit, I firmly believe I'd be dead by now. Thanks to all.