It's all good, man...

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Here's my latest project. We're going for a 60s country rock sound (don't laugh). Just demos and all very messy at the mo. Trying to figure out which ones are keepers. Feedback would be welcome!

http://www.myspace.com/isc2010

OK.

First song, the 60s country rock influence is clear. Very Dylan (with better singing) - the harmonica is a nice touch. You're right about the roughness - a little is good, but there's a fine line. I'm sure you'll find it when you do the proper mixdown/re-record. I think, personally, the bass could do with some fattening up.

Much the same vibe for Carry Me Home, too.

I like the 'dirtier' voice on Heavy Throbber - got more of a sneer, if you know what I mean.

Crack Election Blues - again, very raw but I'm sure you know that. What I think needs attention here is the very strong room acoustics. Either do it in a dead room, then add (a little) reverb later or redo it in a room with a nicer ambience.

Musically, Chessboard sounds OK but I can't understand a word of it I'm sorry.

This kind of music has never really been my cup of tea, but I can appreciate the songwriting and you've definitely achieved what you set out to, with the 60s country rock.

I prefer arrangements that are more 'dense' and varied - with more layers and a bit of fatness, too. I also like to explore strange chord progressions, I have a 'jazzier' approach if you will (whereas yours is more bluesy) - I don't like to rely too much on tried and tested forms like 12-bar blues (although I am a sucker for the tried and tested 'pop' song structure with verse/chorus/mid 8/coda/etc I will admit).

I can certainly see a market for your music though.

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Cool thanks for the feedback, much appreciated.

The last two songs on there (Crack Election Blues, chessboard) were kinda jokes to be honest. Especially the chessboard song - that's just me making gooseberry fool up as I go along (probably best you couldn't hear it).

It's nice to see that we're hitting the sound I'm aiming for. Obviously we're coming at songwriting from very different angles. I used to have a similar approach as you (much more alternative, varied, left field chord progressions etc - alt rock basically) but over the last two years my influences changed quite a bit. It's weird. You'd think going into a more traditional style would be easier, but it's tough to innovate and write original songs when you're so heavily constrained by your genre's forms.

Recorded 2 new songs with the band today. Memory Lane, the drummer failed miserabley at the timing ffs but we tried to work through it as well as we could, it isnt too bad i dont think.

http://www.myspace.com/kickinghabits

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhbC3424rI4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgFJoReYnzs

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First tune is a bit messy, second one is cool but sounds a little bit too much like Oasis maybe? not sure if that's just me, but nice one anyway.

Follow this link to a fresh batch of stuff i've been working on lately...

http://soundcloud.com/jigsoreriffs/tracks

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Not bad! Very Artic Monkeys, which isnt really my thing, but i liked Same Again, cool song.

I really like this! Would love to hear some geeky, videogame-inspired, rapping over the tracks. Nice work.

Since then, nothing.

That is, until about two weeks ago. Trying to practice every day now. Mostly just practicing chords, and changing between them.
Also trying to learn the solo to Fields of Gold. It sounds nice and it feels easy enough, though it's awfully short.

I'm getting started on barre chords as well, but it feels like it's impossible for me to make them sound right. I've been told by a few guitarists I know that it'll just come with time and practice, so hopefully I'll get there one day.


Any tips on where to take it from here?

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Barre chords and most guitar techniques will seem unattainable before you've practised them for quite some time. You could try starting out with half barres to see if you can improve the strength of those knuckles muscles. Try rotating your index finger slightly leftward by leaning your hand into the frets a little more - this part of the finger is a bit easier to keep flat, fretting all the strings. Although actually this will be moving your whole hand slightly as obviously it's impossible to rotate your fingers (although that would be pretty cool ).

Don't worry if you have a lot of buzz starting out with barre chords just keep playing them and the strength of your hand in that area will naturally develop. Don't stress your hand too much because it'll just be painful and detract from your enjoyment of playing and put you off progressing (this is what seems to happen to most people who give up the instrument because they have unrealistic expectations).

Barres are something you'd use occasionally around grade 4 or higher in solo guitar music - their popularity for simplifying pop songs makes them introduced too early I think, before the left hand's strength is developed well enough to actually play them clearly. If you can't quite get barre chords yet just play open chords instead - you can then at least play the song and every chord exists for both open and closed (barre) chords.

You might want to try and alternative string tension to ease in the strength needed.

Also experiment with changing not only your wrist position but your entire arm - sometimes it's too easy to assume a left hand position that's inevitably uncomfortable because the elbow is at some contorted angle. Your whole arms should move while changing chords if you're making things easier for yourself.

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Came down with a cold today. So for my medicine I wrote some fat brute blues rock riff thing through recently acquired 1971 Sound City B120 120W valve amp (with 1x 15" Carlsbro MASSIVE speaker).

http://www.thegreengecko.co.uk/misc/ben ... a_cold.mp3

Pretty happy with the tone if anything, I'm loving the front-end distortion I can get using Big Muff sustainer/distortion (as the amp is just too strawberry floating loud to distort naturally with the gain control - and there's no master volume ).

Those interested:

Ibanez S2170SE with EMG 81 selected > Dunlop Crybaby wah-wah > Big Muff Pi (Russian) distortion/sustainer> Boss DD-6 delay > Sound City B120 > Carlsbro 15" cab (no idea what brand the speaker is) > M-Audio Microtrack II with standard electret mic > Waves L3 Multi-maximiser multi-band compressor/limiter.

The Waves maximiser really just boosts the whole EQ range a bit and hits -0.2dB for a quick master. Besides that, it doesn't colour the sound much. It just sounds more satisfying without having to spend forever doing more tailored mastering to get a similar effect (or something more vintage or lo-fi or whatever you want).

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Thanks for the tips mr. Gecko!

Just done a mammoth practice session playing various video game songs. Mostly tunes from Ocarina of Time, but also Cranky's Cabin from Donkey Kong Country and Valley of the Fallen Star from Final Fantasy VII.
Well, not that mammoth, but I played for like an hour and a half and hardly noticed. Only felt like twenty minutes really...

I was playing the Song of Time a lot. That explains it.

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It's good that you're getting into your playing like that. Remember to rest but before you know it you'll be doing long sessions like 2-3 or even 4 hours, and if you do that frequently you're really getting in a lot of practice and your fretting strength etc. will improve dramatically.

I've played for up to 12 hours before, I just forget the time and play however much I want. I've even fallen asleep playing my Ibanez on my back.

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Just did 2.5 hours... of restringing and tuning the guitar (by ear).

Still doesn't sound right.
At least I got 4 of the strings to sound about right.

Getting a tuner tomorrow to sort this out.

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Don't suppose anyone can give me a noob's guide to using auto-tune on Reaper? No matter how much I play with it I just can't see to change the pitch of anything.

Thanks.

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i had a similar experience with an auto tune vst.

anyway, i made a new tune.

http://soundcloud.com/jigsoreriffs/the-furthest-star

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Do you have a MIDI controller? You need one to "play" the pitch into the plug-in.

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yeah did it ages ago when i had nothing, i was literally auto mapping it over an accapella i had, bad times.

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I like the tune by the way. For some reason that weird little revesed, clarinet/horn-sounding sound is strawberry floating cool, that 1 second sound is my favourite part of the whole track.

I'm liking this little improv jam from a combined strip club / bar / live music venue / rehearsal studio in London last weekend: http://www.thegreengecko.co.uk/tbs/trac ... -11-27.mp3

especially when it goes a bit ska/reggae at the end. Just a progression I came up with and started playing with the band, which is usually how things work (or I play off the bassist.. or some gooseberry fool just happens out of nowhere). Bear in mind this band of mine from Brighton only rehearses about once a month, and that's if we're lucky. We're gonna try to rehearse more in London though and get gigs in Camden (seems to be the best place for us).

Also check out the sustained feedback from this guitar and Marshall 100 Mosfet (or any valve amp really) at the very start of this track:

http://www.thegreengecko.co.uk/tbs/trac ... -11-27.mp3

strawberry floating love being able to get those sounds with that axe. Nearly always happen by accident and it just makes you feel strawberry floating epic.

Other stuff but just getting to grips with the Logic Pro workflow.. trying to do everything in one app to speed things up, cos until I got Logic (through my uni though so I didn't pay squat - wouldn't be able to justify the cost) I did stuff in Ableton, Reaper, Audacity and SoundForge for different tasks..

Bit pissed I can't find any working cracks for Waves mastering plug-ins for OSX... they're amazing and I relied on them a lot. Totally took 10-band parametric EQ for granted. Logic's EQ only really has 5 bands which doesn't feel like enough..

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Those jams are ace mate, nice warm guitar.

And the 'reversed clarinet thing' and the general crackly sound in the background is just the first three seconds of this tune.



I did some pitch alteration to make it suit my melodies and bassline, and obviously some time stretching and layering for the beakdown, yo.

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