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List your best tips for anything music related


krock

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Learn to bend accurately. Play a note to fix it in your head

and then bend into the same note (over and over and over until

you can hit the bent note right every time.

 

While your at it develop your vibrato. It's what will make you

unique.

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Great stuff!

 

I especially like the metronome idea if your playing without a rhythm section.

 

Experiment with picks, they can have a big affect on your sound.

 

Take lessons. No one ever got worse from learning more. Plus, lessons force you to practice.

 

Learn how to mute strings.

 

Practice vibrato and string bending.

 

Don't get stuck just playing what you know, learn as many new songs as possible.

 

Learn to improvise. Learn to play what you hear in your head. Sing the notes you play while you're playing them.

 

When you love to play but have problems getting motivated to play every day, buy a new guitar. It can be expensive, but when I get a new guitar I don't ever want to put it down. Or buy a cheap guitar and experiment with different modifications.

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Some good advice but remember as others have said free advice is often worth just what you paid for it. The only free advice I'd add is get a Metronome and practice songs with it.

 

Plus 1 billion. I play to a click almost always at home and when i jam with guys who can't its really difficult...like comedy, timing is everything!

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Listen to your songs as an audience member for the first time.

 

It’s difficult to be unbiased to your own songs. You spent so much time writing and revising it that you can’t imagine it to be bad. It’s a good idea to pretend you’re an audience member listening to your song for the first time. Keep in mind that they may or may not know a thing about you. In fact, they may not care about you at all. You want the song to sell itself, and to give the audience a reason to pay attention. An easier method would be to have unbiased friends listen to them. Keep in mind the genres they prefer and how musically trained they are. Regardless, you are marketing your music to the average listener who probably does not have as much musical training and may not appreciate some of the subtleties involved.

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"The less knobs it has, the better it's going to sound."

 

-Some advice I got regarding amps from an old timer that I saw at a local bar. He seriously had one of the best tones I've ever heard. He played either a LP or a Telecaster, straight into this old (I mean old) tube amp. It looked like he dug it out of the ground. It was rusty, and dirty, and the tolex was all ripped to hell. I think there were maybe 2 knobs on the thing, but it sounded awesome.

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And, if you get nervous, look at the exit signs when you look out at the crowd. That way you're not looking directly at anyone, but you're still addressing the audience. And, as my Drama/Chorus teacher said, "If you get nerves on stage find the exit signs. There's comfort in knowing that's the way out."

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Here's one that sounds obvious, but it's surprising how many people don't know:

 

when tuning, always start below pitch and tune "up" to pitch. I always give the string a little tug before I tune "up" just to be double sure there's no slack in the string.

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Did you have Henry's Cat on tv? There was a similar thing at the beginning of the show. It said "he knows everything about nothing and not a lot about that"

 

Matt

 

LOL!

 

I know it's a little (!) off-topic but...

 

That reminded me of a (made up, I'm sure) school report card which said..."We thought John had reached rock-bottom. Unfortunately, he's started to dig..."

 

P.

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"The less knobs it has, the better it's going to sound."

 

-Some advice I got regarding amps from an old timer that I saw at a local bar. He seriously had one of the best tones I've ever heard. He played either a LP or a Telecaster, straight into this old (I mean old) tube amp. It looked like he dug it out of the ground. It was rusty, and dirty, and the tolex was all ripped to hell. I think there were maybe 2 knobs on the thing, but it sounded awesome.

 

The Fender Pro Jr....my favorite amp

 

Pro_Senior_top.jpg

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I've found a good starting order of pedals, from guitar to amplifier, is:

 

Filter effects

 

* Phaser

* Wah pedal

 

These effects sweep a peak (wah) or notches (phaser) in the frequency response. By placing these before distortion effects, they vary the distortion intensity of the affected frequencies at the same time.

 

The original Vox and Cry-Baby wah pedals did not use a true bypass when off, and can load your guitar signal. If this is a problem for you, you might want to have the switch replaced with a true bypass.

 

Another way around the problem is to use a "buffer preamp" before the wah, which can be any effect with electronic switching, turned off. If you use a phaser as well, plug that in first, and it will happily drive the wah pedal.

 

Compressor

 

Even though many players suggest compression should be first, there is benefit in placing it after filter effects. Filter effects can reduce volume at some settings (eg heel down on the wah pedal, notches in the middle frequencies from a phaser, etc), so placing a compressor after these effects can even out volume changes.

 

Overdrive & Distortion

 

Stomp-box overdrive effects, or your pre-amplifier drive channels placed after the filters gives them a more natural sound, like placing your wah pedal before a heavily overdriven amplifier. Using the filter effects after overdrive gives them a much stronger, more synth-like sound. You would not normally need to use heavy compression and heavy overdrive together.

 

There can be merit in using light EQ before the overdrives (used only when the overdrive is on); this gives you the ability to change the character of overdrive. For example, boosting the highs before overdrive, but cutting highs after overdrive (with the overdrive's tone control), will balance the highs overall, but cause them to be more heavily overdriven than the lower strings.

 

The overdrive could be the preamplifier in you amp. You can use this if your amplifier has an effects send and return, to allow you to use the remaining effects below. You may need to check the levels sent and expected by the send/return loop; often they are designed for line level only (eg rack equipment) and not the lower level stomp boxes.

 

Some send/return loops allow you to blend the return in an equal mix with the unaffected signal. This is great for not affecting your original signal, which can become quite unnatural if taken from the amp, processed by one or more analogue-to-digital-to-analogue conversions, then re-input. This increases the complexity though, when you want to remix chorus, flange, delay and reverb, all without any original component. Also, you may want some of these effects to be fed with inputs of a mix of original and other effects. These capabilities are often not provided in rack products.

 

Equalisers

 

Graphic or Parametric EQ and Speaker Simulators can be used on their own, to tailor solo or rhythm sounds, or after overdrives to give more control than you usually have with the overdrive tone control. For example, you could use heavy distortion, and use equalisation here to cut middle for a heavy sound, or tailor the highs for a creamy, yet "bitey" Santana sound, etc. EQ can also be used before overdrive effects to control the character of the overdrive. It's common to reduce bass before an overdrive to reduce "flabbiness" on lower strings.

 

Before using a volume pedal to control my on-stage volume, I used a graphic equaliser stompbox to set a nice rhythm tone, with reduced level. I set my amp for the lead sound I wanted, and (although it sounds strange) turn the equaliser OFF to play a solo.

 

Speaker simulators are mostly preset, and highly tailored equalisers to emulate speaker box resonances, and microphone techniques. Some include other subtle effects, such as short delays, as well. Placement is not as crucial as you might think. For example, most recorded sounds use a microphone in front of a speaker box, then studio effects, such as equalisation, chorus, delay, etc applied afterwards.

 

On the other hand, when you play live, and are using a variety of effects through a stage power amp and speaker box, you might want to use the simulator here only for the purpose of feeding the mixing desk (who apply their own delay and reverb for the front mix). You could bypass the simulator on stage, and apply just enough delay/reverb to give a natural on-stage sound.

 

Pitch Effects

 

These effects include Harmonisers, Vibrato, Pitch benders and octave dividers. Harmonisers in particular should be placed after overdrive. In the opposite order, sending several notes to the overdrive input causes strong inter-modulation distortion where additional, usually low, notes are added. These extra notes may have no relationship to the harmony you intend. Because the quality of most pitch effects is often quite poor, anything that changes pitch without including the original is best placed before overdrive which can help mask the change in pitch affected tone.

 

Modulation Effects

 

Flangers and Chorus are effectively combined filter, delay and pitch effects. Because each of these effects is subtle (unless you set high resonance), many players prefer them after distortion, and prior to echo effects.

 

Level controllers

 

Placing level effects such as noise gates, limiters, volume pedals, tremolo and panning before echo effects allows a natural echo sound. For example if you play a loud chord, but fade it out quickly with a volume pedal, you still want to hear the echo on what you played. The other way round, with echo first then a volume pedal, you would hear a loud chord with echo briefly, with both the main sound and the echo quickly cut out to silence. This sounds about as natural as turning the power off on your amp!

 

Echo Effects

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Learn to bend accurately. Play a note to fix it in your head

and then bend into the same note (over and over and over until

you can hit the bent note right every time.

 

While your at it develop your vibrato. It's what will make you

unique.

This has been my achilles heel. Many things came quickly or naturally to me, but after about 17 years of playing, I still can't do this very well. It's like every joint in my hand/wrist locks up, and I can't make that string dance for nothing (while bending). I'm fine when I pull down, but that's not right....and you're screwed on any string higher than the G.

 

I also refuse to rely on a whammy bar. I'll either finally improve enough to do it efficiently on my own, or not do it at all.

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Don't play "Covers," but only your original material, and make sure you

write your original lyrics down (not just keep them in your head), and

record your original music, on tape, or CD, so you have automatic

copyright proof. If you play "covers," of other people's copyright material,

you, or the venue you play in, could be subject to ASCAP/BMI penalties, ranging

from $30,000 to $150,000 dollars (PER SONG!). They don't have the resources,

(yet, anyway) to go after every person or band, but they can (and do) make it

nearly impossible, to get "gigs" in venues, if you play unauthorized, unpaid

royalties, "Cover" songs.

 

This is fast becoming a real problem, especially for venues, who hire bands.

Many venues, are hiring only the "original material only" bands, or NOT hiring

bands, at all...because of the ASCAP/BMI threats.

 

If you think I'm exagerating, or kidding...see the "Remember the BMI-ASCAP Discussion"

thread, here in the Lounge.

 

We (my band) recently became an unwitting "victim" of this, when we tried to book a

venue, we had played in, successfully, several times before, and were told that they

were no longer hiring ANY bands, because of their (recent) ASCAP/BMI threats. And,

this is out here, in the "Sticks," not in a larger City.

 

So, be aware, my friends! ;>b

 

CB

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