In A Rut
sigma7
Nov 25 2009, 09:47 PM
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Hey GMC, I am stuck. Not with my learning abilities but with my solo compositions. I recently started a metal band at college and I am lead guitar. I got a solo in a song we just created but I can't finish it. Every time I have a lick of sorts, I throw it out as garbage because I feel like its nothing spectacular. Obviously, if I feel like my solos are generic, they are. I know I just need some inspiration or something to work off of. Can you terll me what inspires your solos. What do you do to write one?

-Alex

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Lian Gerbino
Nov 25 2009, 09:55 PM
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well man, it is not that easy... you know inspiration could be far away sometimes.
are you using a BT already composed? I mean, if you got the chords behind your solo defined.
sometimes if you got a rigid base it quite hard to make a great solo over it. ´cause base is not spectacular.
you could try doing a solo letting in a side the base for a moment, or changing some chords.

if you can´t, well... pay attention on the note you are using to start your solo, may it is a root note, or a 3er, or whatever, change them, and start your solo from another note and jam for a while, and you´ll find new things for sure.

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Kizaze44
Nov 25 2009, 10:19 PM
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I find that my best solos come when I'm not thinking so much. Like Happy Gilmore - find your "happy place" and it'll happen. Maybe solo over the progression without the pressure of "I have to compose a solo now" and just jam with the tune strictly for fun.

Kiz

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fkalich
Nov 25 2009, 10:26 PM
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QUOTE (Kizaze44 @ Nov 25 2009, 04:19 PM) *
I find that my best solos come when I'm not thinking so much. Like Happy Gilmore - find your "happy place" and it'll happen. Maybe solo over the progression without the pressure of "I have to compose a solo now" and just jam with the tune strictly for fun.

Kiz


I agree with you. I would say that the poster is looking at the issue as an external one, I think it is an internal one, a guy banging out 3 chords can captivate an audience (like the Ramones did) because of the attitude. A guy playing more notes than you can count in a week may put them to sleep. It's the singer, not the song.

Nice guitar on your avator. Looks like mine, I have a 58 Reissue, love it. But it looks similar to yours.

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Bogdan Radovic
Nov 25 2009, 10:28 PM
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Usually its a cool concert, or a cool new song you hear on radio which kicks you back into gear. Also solo endings are often hard to get "convincing", maybe you could listen to a song with a solo your really like and try to do something similar ? Its hard to get all the licks in a solo to be spectacular, try to record as much as you can- and then go back to the recordings after few days to hear which ones sounds best to you as a whole.

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This post has been edited by Bogdan Radovic: Nov 25 2009, 10:28 PM


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fkalich
Nov 25 2009, 10:56 PM
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Rather than say just look internally rather than externally, I thought to give some advice. Anymore I base my practice on my study of recent findings in brain research. And I have discovered the secret to speed and precision, it works. However that is my secret for now. But there are two other elements of interest, one that I have not figured out yet, one is creativity.

I will lay that out for you, how I am approaching that, and you can think about it. If I can help a kid to get an edge, good deal. I have seen you here before, and you seem like a nice kid.

You have two sides to your brain. Now the brain is more plastic that recently thought, more has been learned in the past 10 years how the brain works, and how it learns things, than was understood in the past 10 thousand. For example some people are born with just half a brain hemisphere, and their brain can learn to handle all functions tolerably. However the left side does tend to be the controlling factor for the most part, the right side the creative part. And you are looking for creativity.

The left side is the side which inhibits that. There is an evolutionary reason for this. If there was not a controlling factor in the brain, it would go out of control, like flooring the gas pedal on a car. So the left side tends to shut down the right side when it thinks the tasks are complete, when it has the details it thinks are required. Problem is, the right side of your brain may not feel the same way, the creative part. But the left tends to have the authority, unless the right side can trick it. So your right side has got to get out from under the whip of the left.

I am thinking about this myself, and have no answers. But I have read of techniques to trick the left side of the brain. For example, artists may be instructed to copy some classic portrait, but to do so upside down. This tricks the left brain into thinking the job is not done yet, so it does not shut down creativity. I am trying to figure out ways to do that with the guitar. You can to. However whatever I figure out, if it works, it will be my secret for awhile.

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sigma7
Nov 26 2009, 12:06 AM
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wow, just wow! biggrin.gif I wasn't expecting an answer so scientific like that fkalich but thank you. That is a good idea if somehow I am able to trick the proper side by my creative side. I wish I could look more into depth with that but it seems like you called dibs on it haha let me know when you find the secret.

and Lian, your words made me feel better. I guess inspiration just comes at the weirdest time and I have no control over that. Its nice to know that I just have to let it hit me.

and Kizaze, I hope you are right...loosy goosy style

and Bogdan, yes, I am taking a break right now just listening to songs or doing a couple of lessons. I listened to an entire Iced earth album haha

Thanks guys, this helped a lot

-Alexander

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Daniel Realpe
Nov 27 2009, 05:03 PM
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I've been struggling with that recently too for a song of mine.

But I sorted it out and now I'm pretty happy with the result. What I did was to listen to some similar solos on the same style and same backing track style. From there I came with the first ideas and got me rolling,

The other thing that got me going was to re-use material already put in the solo. By doing this you are going to give your solos a sense of wholeness and not just bits put together.

This solo comes to my mind, you can see how he re-uses some material in the same solo (I just grabbed a version on youtube)

Souls of black solo

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Ivan Milenkovic
Nov 28 2009, 04:11 PM
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Try to sing the solo in your head and play it, it will sound right. We all have natural ability to compose melody in our heads, we are all "musicians". We are not all "players" tho, but you are, so you can translate what you hear to the guitar. It's all about that. Remember that good solo doesn't have to be a fast flashy solo. Good solo is anything catchy that people will appreciate, so make it a good one, not "spectacular" one.

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