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GMC Forum _ PRACTICE ROOM _ Struggling

Posted by: OrganisedConfusion Dec 1 2007, 02:24 AM

I'm really down about my guitaring as I never seem to get anywhere. I've nearly been playing 6 years but I still can't play my favourite bands like Death or stuff like Townes Van Zandt and I never know what to practice. I'm nearly reaching 24 now and its impossible to tell what stage I'm at. I always feel like quitting but I want to get to be as good a guitarist as I can be. I never seem to have time to practice anymore with work and I don't really enjoy the band I'm in as I think the songs I write are rubbish and that I'm just not good enough.

Any help or advice would be great and if you want to hear my sort of stuff then I have uploaded two songs in Uploads called New Song and Clean Piece. I'm in dire need of help in getting past a few hurdles that I'm up to.

I'm gonna get better on guitar and I'm determined to.

Posted by: mattacuk Dec 1 2007, 05:15 PM

Hi man! smile.gif

After reading your post it seems you have the will and desire to become a great player, but perhaps lack structure and routine with your practiceing ?

Im not familiar with the types of music you wish to play, but perhaps if you start to select exercises from our libary, or other good sources and work on these daily you might start to feel some solid progress. I belive its best to put technique at the forefront of practice, but when your ready start to study theory and concepts that will support what your doing.

If you would like some help with selecting lessons, I will be glad to help. It would be cool if you could tell me specifically what tecniques interest you! smile.gif

all the best

Matt

Posted by: OrganisedConfusion Dec 1 2007, 05:18 PM

Yeah. It is what I struggle with a lot. I have no practicing regime or structure to my learning so just pick up a guitar and play around. I know no theory but I can play most songs to a decent level. I'd say I'm at intermediate level wanting to get better at soloing and at metal riffing at faster speeds.

Posted by: mattacuk Dec 1 2007, 05:33 PM

Ok, thanks for the info. Do you or have you ever practiced with a metronome at all?

Im wondering if working through Kris's 101 solo series might be a solid foundation for you to start working off. You could then work your way into some more advanced lessons like Marcus's Three level solo. Pavels Slow solo is also a great place to start I enjoyed that alot.

With regards to riffing if you do a search there are many that are sure to take your fancy!

I would seriously look at practicing some of these lessons daily, prefrably with a metronome so you can keep good time and map your progress.

Make sure you Nail these lessons, and I mean nail them because this is exactly where you feel your big steps in progress. I belive alot of people who dont feel they make progress, is because they are moveing around from one thing to the next without really finishing what they started properly.

The most important thing is to keep motivated of course, so if you start to tire with one exercise for example, just move onto another one but try to keep that old one up also.

I hope I have helped a little ! smile.gif

Posted by: OrganisedConfusion Dec 1 2007, 05:45 PM

QUOTE (mattacuk @ Dec 1 2007, 04:33 PM) *
Ok, thanks for the info. Do you or have you ever practiced with a metronome at all?

Im wondering if working through Kris's 101 solo series might be a solid foundation for you to start working off. You could then work your way into some more advanced lessons like Marcus's Three level solo. Pavels Slow solo is also a great place to start I enjoyed that alot.

With regards to riffing if you do a search there are many that are sure to take your fancy!

I would seriously look at practicing some of these lessons daily, prefrably with a metronome so you can keep good time and map your progress.

Make sure you Nail these lessons, and I mean nail them because this is exactly where you feel your big steps in progress. I belive alot of people who dont feel they make progress, is because they are moveing around from one thing to the next without really finishing what they started properly.

The most important thing is to keep motivated of course, so if you start to tire with one exercise for example, just move onto another one but try to keep that old one up also.

I hope I have helped a little ! smile.gif

I always practice to a metronome as my band do weird timings in places in our prog style songs. I will work through the Kris 101 solo videos and let you know how they go. Cheers for the help. Hopefully I can get my soloing and fast riffing a lot better.

Posted by: mattacuk Dec 1 2007, 05:48 PM

QUOTE (OrganisedConfusion @ Dec 1 2007, 04:45 PM) *
I always practice to a metronome as my band do weird timings in places in our prog style songs. I will work through the Kris 101 solo videos and let you know how they go. Cheers for the help. Hopefully I can get my soloing and fast riffing a lot better.


I have absolutley no doubt you can man smile.gif Just try to be a little more organised with your studys. Some people will say the opposite, but I can only tell you what I have tried and tested myself smile.gif

regards

Matt

Posted by: OrganisedConfusion Dec 1 2007, 05:51 PM

Maybe I'll be able to play Buckethead songs one day biggrin.gif

Posted by: mattacuk Dec 1 2007, 05:54 PM

Absolutley, why not smile.gif I have been practicing some of his signature licks and runs. But that is bottom on the pile to the GMC exercise I do daily! wink.gif

Posted by: MickeM Dec 1 2007, 05:59 PM

QUOTE (OrganisedConfusion @ Dec 1 2007, 02:24 AM) *
I'm really down about my guitaring as I never seem to get anywhere. I've nearly been playing 6 years but I still can't play my favourite bands like Death or stuff like Townes Van Zandt and I never know what to practice. I'm nearly reaching 24 now and its impossible to tell what stage I'm at. I always feel like quitting but I want to get to be as good a guitarist as I can be. I never seem to have time to practice anymore with work and I don't really enjoy the band I'm in as I think the songs I write are rubbish and that I'm just not good enough.

Any help or advice would be great and if you want to hear my sort of stuff then I have uploaded two songs in Uploads called New Song and Clean Piece. I'm in dire need of help in getting past a few hurdles that I'm up to.

I'm gonna get better on guitar and I'm determined to.

Everything takes time. Keep playing the guitar and realize you have to practice a lot to get better. Same with songwrirting, I think the songs you uploaded were good and same thing there, with years of experience of writing you'll be a lot better at that too. Though I think your good already.
So put the two together, you learn to write songs from more experience and practice guitar here at GMC in a year from now it will show you have improved on both.

Try to see what you can do to find the time you need to practice! Doing the lessons here is definitly giving you a kick start compared to being selftaught

Posted by: OrganisedConfusion Dec 1 2007, 06:26 PM

Is it useful to learn a song at the same time as doing the lessons on soloing. So maybe try and get something like Dire Straits - Sultans of Swing learnt simultaneously with the lessons?

Posted by: mattacuk Dec 1 2007, 07:27 PM

It wont hurt !! Music is music, "famous" or not, so it all adds to your technique smile.gif

Posted by: Milenkovic Ivan Dec 2 2007, 06:25 PM

Don`t worry man, we to have our own strugling times. It is just a faze, trust me smile.gif If you are here than you are determined. Just practise and the results will come in time. And i mean musical results - not financial smile.gif Just make your routine. GIve yourself a day to make a system of exercies that you will do in the next couple of weeks for example. Write down the tempo at the end of every exercise and carry on tomorrow. Try to comprehend as many techniques as you can. Practise all, don`t practise the things that you know allready as you will waste time. Hope this helps smile.gif

Posted by: fatb0t Dec 4 2007, 12:22 AM

Hey man, I know how to feel. I checked out your recordings they sound good.
Do yourself a favor and immerse yourself into theory, you'll be pleasantly surprising how your talent catapults.

If you don't know it already, learn the minor pentatonic scale - all five box positions. This scale fits nicely into most genres of music and has a very small margin of error.. meaning most notes always sound good in a given key!

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