First guitar: Ibanez RG7321

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Arcane66

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I think part of the fret buzz resulted from me playing outside when it was sort of windy. Last night I didn't have much fret buzz. I am learning songs when I can. Thanks.
 

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If you can get a friend/teacher to show you proper technique. You really don't want to be developing bad habits.

I couldn't agree more, bad habits can be easy to start, really hard to break, and cause your speed, tone etc to all suffer... get a good teacher and learn the proper techniques before you venture too far on your own. It's always good to have a teacher give you feedback on your playing (something a book can't do).
 

Arcane66

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I couldn't agree more, bad habits can be easy to start, really hard to break, and cause your speed, tone etc to all suffer... get a good teacher and learn the proper techniques before you venture too far on your own. It's always good to have a teacher give you feedback on your playing (something a book can't do).
Yeah I actually got a teacher a couple of weeks ago and I see him once a week for an hour. He seems good so far and the price is fairly affordable at $22.50/hour. He gives me some stuff to practice and I do that. I been practicing every day still and I think I've gotten better, but there is definitely a lot more to do.
 

Ryan-ZenGtr-

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My tip would be....

There are two types of guitarist:
1. The guy who sits for hours noodling, collects his "good ideas" and then practices them VERY slowly playing along to a metronome or drum loop (etc. to keep precise time) until he can perform the music he is working towards comfortably and precisely at the desired speed.

2. The guy who always improvises insane complex playing that no one can comprehend.

He started out as the first guy.... :)

Once you've decided you're serious about guitar and want to invest more time to get "better", devote time to learning the major scale, with metronome, just like piano players or other traditional instrument players do. It's worth it and is the basis of theory, a language to describe music i.e. bar 4, beat 1, G major scale etc. It's easy but time consuming to learn the patterns and muscle memory at first.

Best thing to do is play scales really slowly with a metronome, pickup down-up-down- (alternate picking.... as in alternating between up and down)... Music only works because it uses notes from a scale, just as the notes in ANY chord come from a scale. It turns out there are only a very few possibilities once you get into the detail.

Essentially what I've suggested will KILL any FUN you may have on guitar, but it will make you better at playing. Check out John Petrucci's Rock Discipline DVD, has some great excercises and explains a lot of things.


Rule number 1, gear is pretty useless at the end of the day. As long as you have a comfortable guitar, you will probably sound the same or similar on any amp. Gear will not make you instantly amazing and there is a lot of information about it, too. Keep away from the salesmen for a while and get your playing into shape!

2. Metronome is king! Get one, or a drum machine or anything that you can set to a specific BPM (speed in beats Per Minute, also known as Tempo, meter, time etc.) and practice your excercises for 10 minutes every day, more if you can be bothered.

Best excercise ever...

12-13-14-15

Repeat that 1x on each string, starting on the lowest string and moving up each time. When you get to the last string, go backwards...
15-14-13-12

You can play it anywhere, but high is easier as the frets are closer together. Play that REALLY slow with a metronome and alternate picking, down up down, PRECISELY to iron out any errors. Is doesn't sound very musical, but by the time you understand what your doing, you'll already be benefiting from the excercise. :)

There's a lot of trends, fashions and bigotry (stuck in a school of thought, won't move on) in guitarland, so try to be open minded and check everyone out.

Now, GO LEARN FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS!!! :) Once you've got smoke on the water nailed, time to hit 'Tallica! Great 1st song to learn to play. Very easy to play, very hard to master! :)

Nice post SpiritCrusher!!!
 

CrushingAnvil

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If you have POD Farm, run that sucker through a noise gate. Noisy pickups. My tone patch I use to emulate Bulb's tone has seven noise gates in the chain.

Input > EQ > Gate > Gate > Gate > Gate > Screamer > Gate > Compressor > Big Bottom > Treadplate 4z12 > 57 off-axis > Gate > Gate > Out


If you don't... stay away from super high gain.

What kind of lame arse rule is that? :lol:

He can do whatever the hell he wants, it's music.
 

jcgss77

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One word that must be emphasized in learning guitar-PATIENCE.
I wanted to play guitar when I was younger, and picked up my grandfather's acoustic. I just started messing with it, and couldn't make anything nice come out of it. So I put down the guitar.

And didn't play for about 15 years. I have always loved music, and wanted to make the awesome sound my favorite bands made, but from that one experience wouldn't even look at another guitar. Then my girlfriend(who is now my wife) brought over her Squier Strat, and the rest is history.

The key is stick with it. Some people are gifted naturals, and everyone else has to work really hard to make any progress. I am one of those who are not a gifted natural, but I didn't give up, even though my first guitar was junk-but it really helped with my fret fingering and fretting strength.

I hope you do well, and I personally think it is awesome you are starting on a 7! There is a lot of versatility to be had with one, much more than a 6.
 

metalmania408

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For a beginer I would suggest taking your guitar into your local shop to get a tech to look at it and give it a good set up. These are all things you can do yourself but for now i would suggest focusing on learning to play as apposed to learning to set up the guitar, you will get a better understanding of this the more you learn / play.

+1000000

IMO, nothing more frustrating learning on a geet that isn't setup comfortably for you, whilst attempting to learn to play. I did this for a few of my geets until I figured I was paying for something i could eventually learn to do myself. I've since learned to setup my own fixed and floyd type bridges, which is now saving me some scratch. But in the beginning, having my guitar tech set me up properly saved me some major headache and frustration (totally worth it). Plus when i'd drop/pick up my geets after having them setup, i would just hang out and chat it up with my tech about everything and anything guitar related while i was there. Learning from someone who's experienced and competent = Priceless!
Good luck and stick with it!! :hbang:
 

Arcane66

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Ryan- I have not been using a metronome, but I will try to incorporate that into some of my practicing. I practice at least an hour a day. I try and run through scales and chord progressions. I know most of some songs (e.g. Wonderwall, For Whom the Bell Tolls, Hotel California). This doesn't mean I can play them to speed of course because my switching isn't good enough yet nor is my accuracy and finger strength (especially on barre chords). I do that four finger pattern that you're talking about. I start off around 5th fret usually and do that. There is room for improvement there because my timing between the notes when switching strings doesn't correspond to the timing between the notes on each string. I am going to look up Smoke on the Water soon to practice that. I've been practicing those songs listed above and other things (alternate picking, barre chords, etc). Not sure about buying DVDs just yet, but I'll consider your recommendation. By the way, I should be starting to learn more theory starting in May when classes get out.

jcgss77- Thanks for the advice. I am being very patient with my practice. I do practice every day and I know I'm no guitar talent, but I'm willing to put forth the effort and learn about theory and stuff. My biggest constraint right now is time. I am in graduate school and life isn't the easiest.

metalmania408- Thanks, but I'm not going to be doing much work on my guitar or set up for a while. Main things I will spend money on for my guitar are strings, picks, and possibly something to clean the guitar with.
 

Tranquilliser

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I'd definitely look at lessons.
also, practice, practice.
and +1 for learning multiple genres.
Learn Jazz (proper Jazz), Metal, Pop-punk, Classic Rock, everything.
It'll make you a more diverse player, and you'll be a better player for it.
 

Xalton

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Hey bro, Good job on your 7 strings of fury. I too just got mine a couple of days ago and am learning my ways around it. waiting till next month to get it Setup, and Also we have the same gear, an Ibanez RG7321 and a Line 6 Spider IV amp. Sick shit. I've also founf that when you play on the clean channel that you wanna maybe wanna turn on the Chorus to the bare minimum to the point to where you can barely hear it, and turn the Tape Echo up as much as possible before it hits the Reverb effect, I feel that it gets a really rich full sound out of the clean channel when you do this. Good luck on your adventures on the way to guruness.
 
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