OK. Mutley and DaveB are in. I think I might be getting parts from @Scapegoat and @root-n-5th ?

Current roster is:-

Bazzer – Orange
Edukator – Shocking (Pink….for the avoidance of doubt 🙂 )!
Chipps – The brown sound
AdamT – Toxic lime
Superficial – Cyan
Guitarhero – Red
Mutley – Yellow
DaveB – Navy

Oh, thought I’d missed the deadline. I’d just been jamming along.

@Scapegoat….if you wanna record something then go for it! I can just about squeeze stuff in

Ok, give me an hour or so. What do you want, lead or bass? Crap at both so your call…..

Either is fine….both if you’re able? It good to have some variation. 🙂

don’t hang on for anything from me, I have been noodling (thanks Edukator for the tips) but nowhere near ready to commit yet – and that’s before I even think of practicalities or recording it!

Next question, because my lad’s switched options this year to music and trying to catch up. He’s struggling with the circle of fifths. I’ve been reading and I get it on a maths basis as much as anything, but why? What ‘use’ is it in practical music making?

Hi all.
Count me out I’m afraid as I’m not going to have time. Sorry about that.

I was jamming around and nothing inspiring came out. Look forward to hearing it.

Cheers

Dropped the price of my Line6 DT25 in the classifieds to £325.
Also got a 3 month old TC Ditto X4 stereo dual loop looper in there for £115 posted.

Looking forward to hearing your guys tracks on the mixtape.

This stw mix track thing sounds great fun. Not going to add to it now but intrigued, maybe for a future thing.

Not sure how to record though, I have a Laney cub valve amp and we have a Behringer audio interface. I’ve never connected the two, but I’m guessing the best way is a mic on the amp speaker into the audio interface? Any suggestions for a non too expensive mic to do the job?

What Windows program is good for recording?

Amp sold elsewhere folks.

@supersessions9-2 The Cub doesn’t look as though it has a line out so you’ll need to mic it up. I’ve got a Behringer interface and it’s been pretty good. Spend as much as you can on the mic but a Shure SM57 would be a good start. Reaper is excellent and very reasonably priced but try a few and see what suits you best

I used the W10 “enregistreur vocal” which translates to “vocal recorder”. It’s the one with a microphone symbol on my computer. There are expanding circles to indicate the record level (I wasted a lot of time till I realised this). When you hit the biggest circle occasionally it’s about right. More and it compresses, less and it’s too quiet (though Adam can fix that so I stayed on the quiet side).

The first effort I recorded was just the headphone out from the amp into the computer. It was OK. I persisted with recording the cab just to get closer to “my” sound.

My old Samsumg phone used to record sound really well, but the new Moto G (5S) doesn’t have a dictophone app, I should perhaps download one to try.

If you have a laptop try the microphone/dictophone function on that.

Almost any mic you can find a way of plugging into your computer’s mic socket will allow you to record. The quality and level might not be perfect but if you experiment with how far you put the mic from the cab and the volume you play at you should get something useable for this exercise.

If you want to record all sorts of different things I recommend a Zoom. It does everything from voice to a bass cab remarkably well – but junior has ours so I had to think of something else.

@mutley thanks for this, I’ve been researching since I posted and I found a recent you tube video about recording with a Laney cub. Seems the FX loop out is also a line out and can be connected directly into an audio interface.

So I have all the cables and kit already. I will have to have a tinker later this week.

@supersessions9-2 if you are using the FX loop out you will need an IR loader in the DAW to makeit sound like a speaker. Again there are loads out there but http://www.igniteamps.com/ do some great free stuff. I suggest in the DAW you have have input – TPA – NadIR as your signal chain. Select an IR that sounds good to you and off you go 🙂

Well, I’ve finally managed to make a bit of a noise that’ll fill out a bit of the track. On its way Adam!

Fender Modern Player Jazz Bass if any one cares, bridge pickup backed off a bit to add a bit of treble, DI into a Scarlett Solo. Go easy on me…..my enthusiasm outweighs my ability by an order of magnitude!

Righto! As Scapegoat said. His bit is delivered and already in the track! That’s the last bit now, so just the final mastering. I hate this bit cos you can end up tweaking it till the cows come home. I’m basically going to stop though as I’ve been trying to get it all balanced as I go along….I just need to commit! 👍

I can render out all the processed stems (pre master bus) if there are any budding mixers out there!?

Might even get it out tonight!!! (Including “video” 😀)

@theotherjonv

Next question, because my lad’s switched options this year to music and trying to catch up. He’s struggling with the circle of fifths. I’ve been reading and I get it on a maths basis as much as anything, but why? What ‘use’ is it in practical music making?

I’m not an expert in music theory but I’ll have a bash at answering this.

The way I think of it is that the circle is a way of organising several different music theory concepts into one reference tool. I’ll start by saying I don’t personally find it that useful as a reference tool since my brain isn’t really wired that way, but understanding the circle has improved my music theory. Some people keep a printout in their guitar case.

(Image ripped off from this article which itself may be useful: https://www.classicfm.com/discover-music/music-theory/what-is-the-circle-of-fifths/ )

Refer to the diagram at each step. For each example, I’ll use C major since it’s the easy one and it’s at the top.

1) Establishing what is the ‘fifth’ of your root:
At its most basic, it’ll show you what the fifth of your root note is by looking at the letter clockwise. E.g. G is the fifth of C. It’ll also work backwards, the fourth degree of your scale (F) is the letter anticlockwise. I don’t find that useful per se but it raised an interesting concept for me; scales are not equally spaced and so they don’t work the same counting forward as they do backwards. C is the fifth degree of the F (major scale), but F is the fourth degree of C major.

2) Parallel minor key
C major has a ‘parallel’ minor key which is the letter ‘inside’ your major letter. So C major –> Am. They both share all the same notes.

3) Chords in your key:
The six chords that fit neatly into your key are the 6 letters around your root. So for C major it’s F C G (major, on the outside of the circle) and D A E (minor, on the inside).

4) It helps explain which keys have which accidentals (sharps or flats)
I’d always known from learning the piano as a kid that C major has no sharps, G major has one (F#), D major has two (F# and C#). I never knew beyond those, and I never thought there was any pattern to this – I just thought you had to memorise them. But as you move clockwise around the circle of fifths (C -> G -> D -> A), you gain a sharp accidental. If you go anticlockwise, you gain a flat note (until you get to the bottom (C flat Maj) when they ‘cross over’.

5) Modes
You can also use the circle to identify the notes and chords within the more unusual scales and modes. This is getting fairly advanced and I have to say I only have a passing knowledge of this. But I know that for, say, myxolydian mode, you can select the notes / chords anticlockwise around your root. So for C myxolydian, your chords would be C, (then, going anticlockwise) F, Bb, along with their parallel minors (on the inner circle) Am Dm Gm.

Semi related: This video cropped up in my feed I thought it was a very good introduction to music theory. For anyone who wants to learn some theory, it’s a great starting point.


@Tagnut69

Right then everyone. Here it is. Thanks to everyone involved and whoever it was who suggested doing it again. I really enjoyed putting it together and would happily do it again. Happy to answer questions on the process etc.

The video shows what’s going on in the tool. Most of the tracks had some light compression and EQ on it. A few had some delay effects at the end etc. If you’re really eagle-eyed you’ll see some automated parameters….they have a red dot alongside them.

Here are the contributors. There are links to each part in the description so you can go straight to my bit and listen to it over and over again 🙂

Obviously, like and subscribe 😉

00:43 Bazzer
01:24 Edukator
02:24 Chipps
03:05 AdamT
03:45 Superficial
04:26 Scapegoat
04:45 Guitarhero
05:45 Mutley
06:47 DaveB

Awesome, really enjoyed listening to that and how people did different things.

Sounds great. It’s amazing that given the same backing everyone has come up with something that is SO different. Well done to all participants and especially to @AdamT for putting this together.

Agreed, no right or wrong way , just each guitarist with their style and interpretation. The previous blues jam produced similar pieces but these contributions were much more varied, a good backing track then, Adam.

Yes thanks again to @AdamT for putting it all together.

I think its quite a good learning exercise too. Made me really think about it when doing my bit, but also listening to others makes me think what I could have done.

I hang around the tonal centre a little bit too much, where as others are bit more varied which is more interesting.

Also tones that sound good on their own don’t necessarily translate into sounding good in a mix.

Thanks so much AdamT for pulling this together you’ve done an amazing job.

Fantastic stuff!

That is excellent, well done everyone! And thanks Adam for putting it together. Look forward to the next one

Really good stuff from everyone on there. I’ll play it a couple of more times while I’m working this morning and try to work out what folk are doing.
As said above so many different ideas. 👍🏼

Woohoo, that was fab! Thanks Adam and well done everyone else. Great to hear what a mix of tunes and tones and chops and feel there is here… Yay!

Great stuff everyone

Look forward to participation if there a next one

My submission would no doubt have been close to my 80s inspired jam on the early pages of this thread

I always end up sounding the same 🙂

This could be good if you have lots of time to waste in front of a computer tomorrow. working from home planned for tomorrow.
Some good names on there. Jon Gomm, Lari Basilio and Paul Gilbert are usually worth listening to.

https://tracking.andertons.co.uk/u/gm.php?prm=EhiknAPoWf_545596053_8633897_12873

@Superficial I just learnt more in your post about the circle then I have from various books, videos etc. over the years. Wow! Thanks.

Glad it was useful!

Thanks @AdamT for putting it all together. An interesting little project which I certainly enjoyed.

If you ever feel like moaning about the limitations of using Garageband, Ableton or whatever then check this out:

https://blog.line6.com/2021/01/20/how-les-paul-created-his-extraordinary-new-sound/?utm_source=Marketo&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Blog_LesPaul&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTlRjek1tUmpORGcyWkRNeSIsInQiOiI3N1J6V2Q2NU53V1B3Wkk2M0tMa3FjdGdiUTJlWHlxVTJ1NXBZYkNudnJQbGtoM0FPQlZQVHNCdFJzMG45UkVTQ2lDbGMxZ1cxWnJQc0xlRGlGeDE5UFwvNzg3dVwvR2liN2VNTU1raDNRZk5ZYng0eHdSS1B3cGcya3R3czMya0pGIn0%3D

Nice link. I read a book “birth of loud” about fender and Les Paul, so knew about the tricks. Nice to have the audio linked next to the text though

Yep, he was pretty special and its good to hear the results alongside the wordage.
Lets hope Mickey Baker gets similar respect eventually.

Anyways, found a couple of scorching Jeff Beck things with a pair of great ladies singing. Always impressed by the way he fits in and doesn’t need to overplay. Probably the most distinctive voice in rock guitar.

Love a bit of Jeff Beck. Saw a video of him doing ‘People Get Ready’….can’t remember whom was doing vox, but it was Brill.

Edit….it was that first video, it hadn’t loaded when I first posted! One of my fav songs to play with a long time vocal collaborator of mine….never quite comes out like that though!

I love a bit of Jeff Beck as well 🙂

Been following Dave Simpson on YouTube for a while now, he posted a lesson yesterday so I’m trying to learn some blues. Have only practised for a few minutes as my hands are sore from work but hopefully be able to spend a bit more time tomorrow or Monday practising.

Yup, I love Dave Simpson. Top feller.

Really enjoying this thread with some great playing. Dave Simpson is a top guy puts out a lot of content. Another player who has blown me away is Chris Buck from Buck and Evans. Wow tone and feeling for days and never overplays anything he does.

Just put my TC Electronics Ditto X4 looper in the classifieds.

Latest Classified Ads

If any of you fancied some online jamming then I can recommend using Ninjam/Jamtaba. It’s pretty clever in that you don’t have to have extreme low latency as it relies on having a repeating interval over say 16 bars. You would swear you were playing live…it works really well. The wikipedia entry below describes how it works.

Ninjam is integrated into Reaper DAW and other folk tend to use Jamtaba as a VST in whatever other DAW they’re using. I just add the VST into my master channel, so I can route drum patterns, guitar or bass into it.

There are some amazing musicians on there. Why not give it a go. I tend to use “adz” as my username (there’s no “login” as such…it’s just a straight up plugin)

I’m just going in there now….since I’m very bored and it’s a fantastic waste of time! 🙂

Wikipedia description
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninjam

Link to jamtaba VST
https://jamtaba-music-web-site.appspot.com/