Guitarists of Singletrack…

Joni Mitchell uses a lot of different open tunings, so you play a chord without even using your fingers. Plonk one finger down, you get a different chord. Yes it means you have to stick to songs that are ok with the chords you can play but it didn’t hurt her career.

I always think that the magic happens when you actually play a recognisable song, or can play along to one*. As you suggest, it doesn’t make the slightest difference how you achieve it, and open tunings are great for this approach. With very little work you can play something that sounds good and can then build on it. The problem is that most beginner tutorials start with standard tuning though, so diving into open tunings as a beginner may be a little intimidating?

Keep attempting Wish You Were Here. It’s not too difficult and will give you a benchmark to how you’re progressing.

* The TV was on in background the other night, with a Bruce Springsteen gig on Sky Arts. I heard him play an unfamiliar song with a really nice chord progression, so looked it up and started playing along. It was just a  simple D-A-G, but it sounded glorious playing along with Bruce!

Thanks everyone, my son was heavily into Oasis also and I tried Don’t Look back in anger but was struggling, so had a look at Live Forever which I’m finding a bit more doable I suppose practice and practice, but realise I’ll need help along the way.

Open tuning use doesn’t seem to have held Keith Richards back !

If you fancy a real challenge, try playing along to Soundgarden’s “Superunknown” album. Tunings used:

Drop D
C-G-D-G-B-E
E-E-B-B-B-B
C-G-C-G-G-C
C-B-G-D-G-D

Pedals: get a TC electronic Flashback Delay – this has a looper in it as well as lots of good delays, get a good overdrive like a Boss BluesDriver or a NobelsODR and a pedal tuner is handy, these will be permanent on a pedal board as others come and go

@brennak get this https://www.musicroom.com/complete-chord-songbook-vocal-guitar-musam997733?glid=gb&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=18700177633&gad_source=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIwd2G6-D4ggMVhfntCh2tZQSFEAQYAiABEgLrV_D_BwE

It shows the chord fingering for each chord in each song. No need to read music. Oh and search YouTube for “song name” + guitar lesson

A good teacher would help you get going and could help with alternative chord shapes for your hands

@brennak – you can give Brian Acton a shout. He’s based in Tod and is a great teacher (and rides bikes). He likes a challenge, too… 🙂 I have his number if needed. 

I’m just starting out and what has helped me the most so far is using Justin guitar’s strumming course. I learned a bunch of chords and couldn’t work out why my playing sounded SO bad. Then I realised my rhythm was just all over the place and did the online strumming course. It is really really boring but is also really really helping. You just have to set aside 20 mins or so every day for a month or 2 and practice strumming. Did I say it was boring? yes it is. But it really helped me to understand ‘how’ to play rhythm guitar.

Yeah, learning to strum properly is dead boring but really rather important. I should spend more time on it.

I’ve been ill this week, still trying to learn to play Fire and Rain in between coughing fits though 😅
Think it’ll be rather a long time until I can play it well enough for me to think it sounds okay!

Sounds pretty good to me!!!!

Saturday’s gig was just a compere in a wheelchair away from the full phoenix nights experience.  Super fun though & they asked us back 😄

spent this afternoon assembling a mini pedal board with left over bits from my main rig. Perfect for the punk band I haven’t formed yet! 😂

Epi Jr was 75 quid  but sounds great

Can’t beat the simplicity and value of an epi jr. mine is 26 yrs old, though I only bought it a few months ago to learn with.

Added an Epi LP Jr to the list of guitars that would look great on my wall 🙂

I was browsing black Friday sales, and it seems my finger slipped and this arrived…

PRS SE Hollowbody II…I was so close to buying one last year when they were being punted at ~£600 (originally >£1k) but the price came down even more and I couldn’t resist….

Plays really well out of the box – I’m not even inclined to tinker with the setup. Tis awesome!

Help, I’ve got an irrational want to buy one of the Squire Single humbucker sonic guitars, only the dilemma of choosing the Strat or Tele version is holding me back!

Oh, and anyone fancy buying my excellent condition blonde tokai breezy sound Tele? It’s a coincidence but selling for the exact same price as the sonic costs ⬆️ 🤔

Help, I’ve got an irrational want to buy one of the Squire Single humbucker sonic guitars, only the dilemma of choosing the Strat or Tele version is holding me back!

Tele!

In the latest instalment of me trying to learn songs that are way beyond my skill level…

The USB-C port on my phone is still playing silly buggers so I can’t use my external mic. I might try and dig out an old phone and see if I can use that for recording instead.

A bit of progress since yesterday? Acoustic guitar hurts my fingertips (not helped by not actually picking up a guitar over the summer) so practice is currently limited by pain!

Picked up a few new pedals since selling the Helix.

2 from Sonicake: the Levitate which is a dual reverb and delay pedal and Warped Dimension which has Chorus, Flanger, Phaser and Tremelo. Both absolute bargains and sound fantastic. 

The real standout though is the Joyo King of Kings which is a clone of the Analogman King Of Tone, except it costs £50 instead of £800 second hand thanks to the 5 year wait list for a new one!!! It’s an absolutely stunning pedal. After half an hour of playing around with it I had the realisation it actually made me play better. It gives so much confidence in my sound that I attack more and play with more commitment.

https://www.sonicake.com/

https://www.joyoaudio.co.uk/guitar-effect-types-JOYO/Distortion/joyo-king-of-kings-dual-channel-tone-guitar-pedal-r-20

Nice side by side demo with the King of Tone to show how close it is

I dont need a review to know the king of tine is pretty crap (for me)

Glad to sell if for twice what I paid (waiting list for mine was circa 2 year)

I just got the King of Kings. Works better for me than my Halcyon Gold.
Other new pedals”
Chase Bliss Tonal Recall
Chase Bliss Dark World

Just got myself an early Christmas pressie 🙂  Its very, very loud for a 15W amp, and nice to have a proper clean channel again

@jca Nice PRS. Welcome to the SE Hollowbody fan club… 🙂 Mine has been awesome. Love it straight into an amp for hours of noodling.

Talking of amps… Deluxe Reverb Tone Master. Tried one when I bought my Blackstar Amped 1 and kept thinking about how great an open E sounds on one with the volume on about 6. A B-stock opportunity at Thomann then had to make it this way. It’s fab!

I’ve just added another one to the fleet

It’s a “fusion” or “crossover” nylon string Yamaha. Basically a classical guitar but with a narrower and radiused neck compared to the wide flat ones of a conventional Spanish guitar. Joined at 14th fret instead of 12th.

I’m mighty impressed and can’t stop playing it. There’s a very familiar feel to my steel acoustic – and you can get your thumb over to the bottom E string. I just need to get the solo from Make me Smile sorted before taking it down to the acoustic night at my local next Tuesday.

That’s not a PRS behind it, that’s a £200 Harley Benton with a bunch of upgrades. And the Tele is one I made from scratch, with the (considerable) mentoring by Martin Dixon, now of East Durham Guitars.

I’ve been looking at one of those PRS amps? How does it work out for use at home?

What are you running it into?

Love the deluxe reverb Chipps, thankfully I haven’t got the space for something like that!

2023 was a year of trying not to buy anything new and practising more. Other than some strings and a 3ish month break when life got in the way I’ve succeeded. I think I’ll try something similar again in 2024 although I would like an electro acoustic (I need to get a job first though!)

I gave Babe I’m Gonna Leave You a go on my Strat this morning to give my fingers a break from the acoustic I’ve been mainly playing recently. It’s definitely easier on the fingers although could do with a string change. 

@ali69er I run it in full power mode, half power mode changes the tone quite a bit, into a Two Notes Captor either as an attenuator for my 2×12 or a load box into my interface. Even at low volumes it sounds excellent. Buy one 😁

I didn’t really gel with the MT15 but I really liked the PRS HDRX 20 I tried. Sadly at £799 for the head I don’t play live enough to justify it.

I’ll be sticking with my Tonex or Origin amp in a box pedals through an Ox Stomp into my FRFR.

Speaking which it’s time for another pedal cull. I realised I have the Revival Drive (full fat) plus the Compact and  Compact Hotrod plus the Magma57 and Deluxe61 plus Cali76 Compressors and the Halcyon Gold and Green. 5 of them are going at least…

Got my daughter a squier telecaster for Xmas, recommendations for using headphones? 3.5m jack from amp to headphones or something Bluetooth etc? She’s driving her sister mad.

If the amp has a headphone out, then yes wired headphones will work. Forget bluetooth, too much lag so there’s a noticeable delay between hearing what you’re playing.

A Vox Amplug with 3.5 jack to headphones for walking around playing.

Great thanks will try the cable from amp 1st then maybe invest in the Vox if she’s still keen. She’s just picked up the guitar now as her sister has gone out.

vox amplug or blackstar version are really good for this & only £40ish. use the aux cable in to play along to stuff

positive spark go is really awesome but spendier (£120) – tiny bluetooth speaker with headphone jack, app modeling of everything you want. Allows you to play to anything on your phone / youtube too

Here’s the Amplug with a cheap JBL bluetooth speaker plugged in:

For comparison, everything including the music through the spark go.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CzO2n-HNGSb/?igsh=amxjMWZjMHk5ZHV3

Both of them sound a bit tinny cos both the speakers in my vid and educators are the size of a phone! There’s a much richer sound through decent headphones!

vox amplug or blackstar version are really good for this & only £40ish. use the aux cable in to play along to stuff

Harley Benton Rockplug version < £15, but then postage on top will make it < £25. But if buying some other stuff too.

Just got my new PRS DGT SE and the fret board is a bit wonky would you be sending this back? I have emailed the shop asking for a swap.. not sure how to post a photo so link to the picture on Reddit

https://www.reddit.com/r/PRSGuitars/s/SkBM4ofjUa

Yeah, I’d talk to the shop about that. Doesn’t look right to me

There are plenty around, send it back if you are not happy

Thanks yeah it looks like some of the frets were too short so they sanded down the fretboard weird. Emailed peach guitars hoping it won’t be an issue they had about 10 in stock when I ordered.

Other than that it’s a lovely guitar

I am debating getting an HX stomp, is there a safe method of running it from a normal pedalboard power supply? The manual would have you believe they only work on their separate PSU but lots of them are board mounted. Also if anyone has any tips on how to use or feel free to tell me they are overrated

Also is anyone selling one 🙂?

I’ve had no problem running my stomp and stomp xl from a strymon zuma and ola
I can run from one 12v outlet with the necessary cabling
Stomps are super useful and though I have a full helix I have 2 stomp XLs as they are so useful for different parts of my setups, often 1 for synths and one for guitars
I would defiantly go for the XL over a standard stomp
Feel free to ask any questions