When You've Lost It; Look Back.

When you think you've clearly lost it, and the world's against you. This is what you do.

Sit back, think about the past, reanalyse yourself and understand what made you the person you are today.

Yes, I'm talking about taking a big step backwards, understanding yourself, and seeing if you can actually accept what you did before that made you the person you are today.

And if you think you've lost all sorts of beliefs, turn back, and start your metronome.

I'm rather happy to share that I've turned myself back to 2004, understanding how I picked up speed and endurance on the guitar in fast playing on some certain licks.

Until today, there's a specific lick that I can play with speed. But if you slow me down and look at how I play, I'm cheating the notes I played. In fact, nothing comes out clearly sometimes (my case, all the time).

So, I decided to put "playing the guitar" one side, and take up "practicing the guitar". Sure, if you're playing a song and all that, that's really cool. But paying attention to the details on how you're playing and perfecting your mistakes - and UNDERSTANDING your mistakes, that's another different blow to yourself.

If you're a weakling, you might find that a bit demotivating. But if you're really up for a change, and improvement, I think that's the best step so far.

What pushed me to "go back to the roots?". Simple. Rhythm Knowledge by Mike Mangini. To cut things short, he and his students found a study that if you were to practice a certain technique, or part of a song, for 90 minutes per day, 4 days a week for 6 weeks, you'll sustain the ability to play that practice session for quite a bit, until you degrade.

Which is pretty interesting, because I used to play the A minor scale in reverse with quadruplets to familiarise myself with scales for the first time in 2004. Every single day without fail, I'd play that. Only because, that's the only thing I knew how to play back then. Exactly after a month of hard practice, I realised that I "shredded" on that quadruplet riff taught by my guitar instructor, and learnt the concept of scales on a guitar's neck.

But here's the magic. I never thought of "playing fast" or "shredding". I just wanted to play that A minor scale right. And playing it right and well, was my objective rather than "shredding".

If you were to ask me to play that A minor passage today, I won't be able to do it as well as I used to in 2004. My problem is that, BECAUSE I already mastered it back then (and not applying it to songs and jam tracks anyway), I am not able to play that passage at the same speed as I used to in 2004.

The common, and most saddest thing, about instrumentalists these days (drummers, guitarists, bassists, percussionists, violinists, cellists, violists, fluters (??), keyboardists, pianists), is that when they're self taught, they just want to jump into hyper speed on the first try. I'm not kidding about this. I've seen a couple of friends (and family?) of mine doing this. And it's really hard to let them know that to play quickly, you have to play slowly first. Master everything, and build up speed with patience.

Little do they know that they're actually killing their muscles to achieve what they have in mind.

I built my speed picking naturally, and I must admit that it isn't perfect. That's why I'm going through this whole "therapy" of "slowing down" (I even had issues playing clean & properly at 100bpm when I was doing a simple semiquaver [notes in 16th] practice!).

It took me a month of long hours of practice per day to realise that I was actually building up speed gradually, and naturally.

If you don't believe me, just attend Mike Mangini's next clinic and ask him about training on speed. Drummers have it as the worst when it comes to building speed without applying the right techniques and concepts. What Mike Mangini said back in 2004 when someone asked him that question, he said to never go against nature - this means never go against what your body can NOT take.

You have to build speed, gradually. The best way is to practice from slow, and eventually, it'll be quick. I did 2 repetitions of 90 minutes of the same thing with tempo variation (a few in 90, a few in 100.. a few in 120.. But didn't go more than that). And I realised that I was having fun rediscovering myself on what I did when I was a younger guitarist.

I was a guitarist back then, not a musician.

Of course, with life as it is now, since some of us might have jobs, or are attending school, or doing both at the same time (!!), all we want is to go home, and just pick up our musical instruments and start playing what we feel like playing. That's because we've already "mastered" the instrument based on our own expectations.

But we're never the master of our instruments. Even professional musicians are constantly seeking ways and methods to get better. And you can ask most professional musicians, I bet you most of them (or all of them) would say that they really missed the times when they could just sit down and practice, rather than to play, their instrument as they did when they were younger.

On another note, do not forget the most important thing. If you're not recording your 90-minute practice sessions, then pay attention to what you're playing:

- Make sure you're playing clean. Watch unethical habits that you could have applied (like mine was to string-rake when I wanted every note to sound clean).

- Make sure you're hitting the right note/notes at a time

- Make sure you're playing with the metronome.

More importantly, don't underestimate yourself. Playing the 6 same notes in a single measure for 90 minutes, you're bound to throw yourself off somewhere. So pay details to yourself.

Also, know what you're playing. Make sure you understand what you're playing. The notes that you strike, timing, and everything else. It's all part of the learning curve.

February 2011 Update!

Hello fellow readers!

So you must be wondering what is up since the last update?

I finally gotten my American Fender Deluxe Stratocaster - Where pictures can be found here on my Flickr site.

Besides the guitar, it's being hooked onto several BOSS pedals and a Jim Dunlop Wah Pedal in respective order:

1) Jim Dunlop Buddy Guy Signature Series Wah Pedal (BG-95 .. Which I recommend you to check out with its unique two-tone switching system. I find it very handy during live performances even if you have to consider how many people are there in the band)
2) BOSS Distortion (DS-1)
3) BOSS Blues Driver (BD-2)
4) BOSS Digital Delay (DD-3)

All of these pedals and the guitar are being run through a "practice amp" that I prefer to call it - the Roland Cube 30X.

The American Fender Deluxe Stratocaster is a very interesting instrument. It's my first proper Stratocaster and it's somewhat magical. It's versatile in terms of its conventional 5-way switching system that's hooked to 3 single coil pickups. All of them are the Noiseless N3 pickups, which is somewhat mind-bloggling.

There is no hum, or noise, from the neck pickup when you leave it alone for it to be idle! Something different compared to the pickups I have from my other guitars.

But something tells me that this has a minor catch to it. For the moment, I still don't see any cons out from it. It still gets the same amount of bite, gain and sustain. It's pretty hard to control, and switching from an Ibanez JEM JR to this guitar is like a kid skipping puberty, but he has all the hormones required to be a man.

I never really messed around with the tone knob on guitars before, and most of the friends I have usually cut off the tone knob from their humbuckers to get less resistance from their wiring.. and… a lot of technical terms that I will never understand until I see what's in the guitar, and learn about electronics.

I tried the BOSS BD-2 that ran through my practice guitar before the Fender Stratocaster came - the Samick Interceptor (Made in Indonesia), and the HSS setting really ruined the BD-2. But when I plugged the Stratocaster in, I had to re-set all of my tone controls on my amp, on the pedals (except for the DD-3). Shows how different this guitar is, with the wood, and the hardware on it. I was really happy with the BD-2 because it gave me the ideal tone I was looking for in Blues music.

And listening to my long-time guitar mentor - Kelvyn Yeang (from Penang, Malaysia), he suggested (if I was looking for a compound sound) to layer a BD-2 and DS-1. Now, if you were to be new in guitar stuff, you probably thought he was insane. But if you really paid attention to guitar music, you'd notice that Steve Vai runs through a MIDI-setup for his distortion sound, and he layers a DS-1 on his pedal board for his rhythm sections (Easiest to spot when he plays Bad Horsie), and that is why some pedals comes with 2 distortion functions instead of one. Like the Jemini pedal Steve Vai designed.

The whole effect board is one way how a guitarist gets about. But sometimes if you were to have a really good amplifier, you won't really bother with the effects. Like Eddie Van Halen. If I'm not mistaken, he usually does a direct run from his guitar to his amp, and boosts the gain up to its maximum for his recognised style of playing (tapping, anyone?)

Of course, tube amps play a bizarre role in tone as well besides effects. I ran a Gibson SG-61 through an Orange Dual Terror pre-amp and an Orange 4x12 stacked amp, and I admit that I have very shitty playing on and off..

.. But I sounded pretty good. And after that, I never liked Gibsons because of its odd proportions. But the tone that came out from that amp and the guitar sounded really good.

Like the time when I went back to Malaysia last December in 2010, I tried a 2x12 Marshall tube amp (I forgot which model - it was going for about RM2300 - which was about AUD$750-ish), and it was absolutely mind blowing!

But that's it for my musical experience throughout the update and the new guitar.

I know that I need to revamp my effects board because I need probably one more fuzz pedal that's not too piercing (BD-2), or something too crunchy (DS-1). I want something in between. I sent another email (which means more money to be spent) to my guitar salesman for fuzz pedals as he understands my situation (as he goes through the same too), and he mentioned something about Hughes & Kettner Tube Factor.

I have no idea what a Hughes & Kettner is, but it looks really good. Problem is, it's tube-technology and I'm running through a transistor-based amp.

This ought to be interesting. But until then, I will try to give a clearer update on perceptions of music and all.

Till then, keep on rocking on!

The "Wrong" Notes.

Hi guys.

I've been really busy for the past few weeks. Trust me, there is plenty I would love to write and share to the public, but I've been dead busy with work and studies at the same time. It is that period of time that the university decides to go on a full-assignment spree.

I had it easy, compared to some of my university/course-mates. They have quizzes, tests and stuff piled up on the same week or so. The weight for mine is seperated into different weeks, so I had enough time to finish up whatever I needed to.

Then again, they had enough time to complete their stuff, unless if..

*Stares at blog header*

.. I'll keep that for mglacius.blogspot.com some time around.

Anyway! I was watching Victor Wooten's Groove Workshop DVD, for at least an hour, and it's great to watch versatile musicians like him. And finally, a workshop/clinic that he shares what he thinks, instead of techniques, and how you're supposed to play something.

He puts his studies and what he has learnt in metaphors that you would understand.

95% of the time, we're always worried about notes, scales, melodies, harmonies, and whatever it is.

But with the most recent jam that I still find it hard to believe (that also made me pause and watch the video in slow motion), is that Victor Wooten was solo-ing with the "wrong" notes.

Now if they were the wrong notes, why are they the "wrong" notes? Are they even "wrong", in any way?

The scenario was simple. The jam was based on a simple 3 chord progression that's in the key of Gm. We all understand that the 7 notes that we use to stay safe would be G, A, Bb, C, D, D#, F and back to G again.

I got that right, right?

Guess what notes Victor Wooten was solo-ing in?

G#, B, C#, E and F#.

The 5 "wrong" notes that is definitely in contrast of any conventional Gm scale.

After the first part of the solo, he went back into the Gm scale and solo'ed there instead.

Believe my words as you read this. The solo that he played with the 5 notes, sounded better than the solo he played in the Gm scale.











Of course, that's just the 1st hour of his geniusly created DVD.

I'll write again when I have more time.

If you find that an odd thing, and if you think that the 5 notes should not be used and is fairly impossible, drop the Lydian, mixolydian, dorian, docrian, phyrigian modes then.

Victor Wooten also abused the chromatic scale in a way that I never knew that chromatics actually made sense.

The Basics of Basics

Like in the words of John Petrucci in his instructional CD, Rock Discipline, the first few things you want to consider about the guitar, are the types of practices you will be performing on the fretboard with your fretting hand, and the picking hand.

So the first thing you should do with the guitar, is to put away the guitar.

What you have to think, and consider, is a very important step before you begin touching the guitar. A few things you should keep in mind when it comes to the physical side:

• You should never slouch. Even I tend to slouch naturally whenever I play the guitar due to long hours of practice. But it’s just not good because it’ll become a habit eventually.
• Be disciplined.
• Always be aware if what you’re playing is right. Just because you nailed your first tough solo, it doesn’t mean that you’ve made it through in a ‘clean’ sounding sense. It’s common to hear your guitar instructor, or guitar buddies, to tell you to record yourself while you’re practising certain riffs, so you can listen to your own playback, which is the best advice to offer, really.
• As much as you hate it, practice with the metronome. I begin to do that daily and it’s pretty beneficial. Especially when you plan to record your own material.
• Never think that solo-ing is hard. Rhythm guitar riffs are usually harder than expected, and harder to record. This will be covered if there were to be a recording section in this blog. Try to treat both aspects equally.
• Watch your practices. Try not to be a rock star in an instant by pushing yourself beyond your limit in certain aspects, such as finger stretching, power bending or, commonly, playing really fast at light speed. Never ever go against your body’s nature and capabilities as it will affect the muscles responsible in playing the guitar.

On a mental note, sometimes what you think in your mind, would be the best presentable notes that you might have. Remember to try and practice all sorts of tunes, and know what you’re actually playing. It’ll help out drastically whenever you listen to a song, and try to pick up the tune, keys and the chords being used over its respective scales or modal progressions.

That, we shall cover in the near future about the types of basic scales and modes.

For modes, the easiest way I can explain, would be the alternate “scales” that you can use in certain parts of songs. It could be an augmented 4th note (sharpened 4th note) that produces a Lydian mode if it were to be a major scale. That sort of a sound can be usually heard by the playing likes of Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, Eric Johnson and plenty more. It gives a very dynamic twist, and usually an aero-ic sort of sound.

Just keep this in mind. Get a proper stool that has no handles, or a chair with a backrest without handles, and always sit straight to play, and never ever go beyond your nature talent in playing the guitar.

Sometimes the best way to play the guitar, is to play as little notes as possible. It’s not a compulsory thing to play in ultra speed to be a good guitarist. A good example would be that there is this kid that goes by the name of Tallan Latz. For a boy who got recognised at 8 years old, he had idolised the likes of Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Albert King, and mark my words, he is not a shredder of any sort. But the way he plays the Blues, is no joke at all. It’s a fact to many guitar buddies I know, that to play blues, you require a different talent. If it were possible, you dissect your soul, and place it as the strings. That’s how you play blues – through your feelings. And Tallan Latz plays it extremely natural. You can YouTube him up, to check out how a small kid is able to play such riffs. It's always great to learn and appreciate music of other people.