What Are You Working On Right Now?

Had a breakthrough last night. I’ve been practicing descending pentatonic “fives” on and off and last night, it finally “clicked.”

This proves my theory (at least for myself) about breaking down and focusing on specific problematic areas of a lick or technique and practicing ONLY those. For me it was the “sweep” or the economy “down down” as well as the two note per string which I was fairly weak at playing with any speed.

Johnson and Bonamassa must have shedded this for years to get where they are today.
 
norminal said:
Had a breakthrough last night. I’ve been practicing descending pentatonic “fives” on and off and last night, it finally “clicked.”

This proves my theory (at least for myself) about breaking down and focusing on specific problematic areas of a lick or technique and practicing ONLY those. For me it was the “sweep” or the economy “down down” as well as the two note per string which I was fairly weak at playing with any speed.

Johnson and Bonamassa must have shedded this for years to get where they are today.
Click to expand...

The economy picking is what screwed me up, because whenever I saw it written as "economy picking" I assumed it was different from what I was already doing and was this special technique I couldn't figure out, when "just pick the next fucking string without changing directions" would have made things a lot clearer from the start. :rofl
 
Well, our band broke up about a month ago. The bass player left us to play with the singer's other band after his bass player quit, lol...

Anyway, over the past +6 months I noticed some "holes" in my game learning the songs for the band so I just started taking some lessons from a local guy to plug them up and be better next time.

Right now he has me doing a lot of finger exercises to make me a lot more efficient with individual finger motions. He noticed, and I already knew, I had a lot of "wasted" motions. Finger's flailing, tense-ness in both hands, etc. especially when tempos increased. Standard shit everyone experiences but I thought I could spend months sorting it out myself, or get some professional help.

Been doing these exercises for about 3 weeks and can already see and feel a difference. He is also just introduced week before last how CAGED and Pentatonic boxes can be merged/incorporated together. Just scratching the surface on CAGED. I understood the principals behind it and was using the CAGED Maj/Min Triads while learning songs that were more advanced in song structure to cheat a little, but now he says we are going back and filling in the holes.
 
I'm trying to learn the "Poundcake" solo but the literal drill parts are a bitch.

Edit- It's more of an issue of my JEM not being in the best shape, there's a lack of sustain in the guitar itself so when I go to hold out that bent B note on the G-string then grab the drill, the note's dying before I even get the drill back to the guitar. If I add more gain to the amp, it's way too distorted. There's multiple shims under the damn nut to try to get around the inability to adjust the truss rod and though the guitar plays fine, great even, it doesn't sound how I know it's capable of sounding.
 
Last edited:
Byrdman said:
Well, our band broke up about a month ago. The bass player left us to play with the singer's other band after his bass player quit, lol...

Anyway, over the past +6 months I noticed some "holes" in my game learning the songs for the band so I just started taking some lessons from a local guy to plug them up and be better next time.

Right now he has me doing a lot of finger exercises to make me a lot more efficient with individual finger motions. He noticed, and I already knew, I had a lot of "wasted" motions. Finger's flailing, tense-ness in both hands, etc. especially when tempos increased. Standard shit everyone experiences but I thought I could spend months sorting it out myself, or get some professional help.

Been doing these exercises for about 3 weeks and can already see and feel a difference. He is also just introduced week before last how CAGED and Pentatonic boxes can be merged/incorporated together. Just scratching the surface on CAGED. I understood the principals behind it and was using the CAGED Maj/Min Triads while learning songs that were more advanced in song structure to cheat a little, but now he says we are going back and filling in the holes.
Click to expand...
Keep at it man, it's a never-ending learning experience but that's why we keep going. (y)
Sorry about the band though.
 
FuzzyAce said:
It's funny, I use drills everyday now but couldn't tell you which is best for guitar. :LOL:

Been a long time since I did that trick.
Click to expand...

The slower ones. :rofl

To match the same pitch that's in the song I need to slowly pull the trigger in and if I pull it back further than an 1/8" it's getting into a different octave. It may be the right tool for many jobs, but not this one. :ROFLMAO:
 
DrewJD82 said:
The slower ones. :rofl

To match the same pitch that's in the song I need to slowly pull the trigger in and if I pull it back further than an 1/8" it's getting into a different octave. It may be the right tool for many jobs, but not this one. :ROFLMAO:
Click to expand...
Ed had his tech lock the trigger to the specific motor rotation speed for that trick.

:cool:
 
Searing this into my memory.

ugsTG82.jpg
 
Byrdman said:
I noticed some "holes" in my game....
to make me a lot more efficient with individual finger motions.
Click to expand...
The past few years, as I've been trying to up my own game, I've become painfully aware of many things in my technique that were holding me back, that really needed to be addressed.

I've changed-

Keeping my fingers (even that damn pinky!) close to the fretboard
Muting strings in various ways
Breaking the link between my pinky and ring finger,
Moving my pick grip further down my 1st finger, to help with switching slants, to better help with outside and inside string changes
Altering my picking motion to a side-to-side, instead of rotating it too much (like you would turn your hand when opening a door knob)
And working on being able to pick any lick just as fast, whether starting on a downstroke or an upstroke.

Getting these bad habits fixed, er, improved, has made such a huge difference in my being able to tackle harder stuff.

There's still one thing that I don't practice often enough- trills- that's still holding me back, but they are so boring.
 
Lots of clean to mostly clean tones drenched in Delay and Reverb. :wat

Someone make me stop!!!!!! :horse



:rofl
 
Not a damn thing. I've been in a playing drought as of late. Haven't felt inspired to pick up the guitar much although I feel the break is needed so I can hit it again with new perspective.
 
FuzzyAce said:
Keep at it man, it's a never-ending learning experience but that's why we keep going. (y)
Sorry about the band though.
Click to expand...
I appreciate that!! It's good to know that everyone probably has this happen and it's part of it. Not good that it happens, just that it does happen.

TSJMajesty said:
The past few years, as I've been trying to up my own game, I've become painfully aware of many things in my technique that were holding me back, that really needed to be addressed.

I've changed-

Keeping my fingers (even that damn pinky!) close to the fretboard
Muting strings in various ways
Breaking the link between my pinky and ring finger,
Moving my pick grip further down my 1st finger, to help with switching slants, to better help with outside and inside string changes
Altering my picking motion to a side-to-side, instead of rotating it too much (like you would turn your hand when opening a door knob)
And working on being able to pick any lick just as fast, whether starting on a downstroke or an upstroke.

Getting these bad habits fixed, er, improved, has made such a huge difference in my being able to tackle harder stuff.

There's still one thing that I don't practice often enough- trills- that's still holding me back, but they are so boring.
Click to expand...

Yeah the flailing pinky is a thing for me as well, so any suggestions on how to keep that pinky close and not move when the ring finger moves would be appreciated very much!
 
Sorry to hear about the band, Barry. Bummer. :(

I hope you keep on keeping on. There are good people
out there to connect with----even if you have to kiss a
few crappy ones to find them. :beer
 
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