Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! As I started to write this, my neighbors finished shooting off fireworks to celebrate the new year. I could also see some great fireworks displays off in the distance. Despite the time stamp on this post, it is actually past midnight where I am, so it is 2011! Well, December was pretty uneventful as far as learning new stuff on the guitar goes. I did work out some Blues turnarounds in different keys, but that was it. I still have my Ibanez Jet King out. I've had it out since November - yikes! The Ibanez is one of my favorite guitars, and I want to try it out with all of the new 'toys' I have picked up since the last time I had it out.

Speaking of new 'toys', I did pick up a couple of new, older guitars for Christmas. I found them on Craigslist just before Christmas, and they were a bargain! I decided to get them for my son as part of his Christmas presents. One is an older Squier Strat, and the other is a no-name acoustic that was thrown in with the Strat. The Strat's trem. was too high off of the body, so I adjusted it and put on some new strings. It sounds pretty sweet! The acoustic sounds sweet too, except that it had some fret buzz at the second fret on the A string. Some tiny pieces of cardboard placed between the bridge and the A string solved the problem. My son is very happy with his 'new' guitars! He loves using the whammy bar to make the strings sound different (he is only six)! Hopefully, in a couple of years, I will have someone to jam with!

Aside from hoping to have a jam partner in a few years, this year I hope to get my first USA-made electric! I also want to devote more time to actually playing. I've gotten into the bad habit of reading more about guitars than actually playing them! I plan to remedy that this year.

Wishing everyone a great new year, this is G Man signing off for now!

What Seems Like Nothing is Something!

It seems I'm getting into the habit of only posting once a month. Hopefully I can start posting more often again soon. I have not been doing anything new with the guitar. I've been doing my usual routine of rotating my guitars and trying out my new 'toys' on them. Right now, I have my Ibanez Jet King out again. I put away my Strat copy after I finished trying out all of my Vox DA5 settings on it. All of the settings I have from the Vox Tone Room sounded pretty good through my Strat copy (with a little adjustments on some). Now I am going through those same settings using my Jet King. So far, I love everything that is coming out of my DA5!

I've also been playing around with my Tube Driver and my Jet King together. This is the first time I try the Tube Driver with a humbucker-equipped guitar. The Tube Driver works well with both single coils and humbuckers. I have come to the conclusion that my particular Tube Driver works best with my DA5 amp (as opposed to my Champ 600) and it works best at higher gain settings. I have to work at finding the sweet spots on the Tube Driver, but when I do, it's pretty awesome!

Although I haven't been working on anything new, I have discovered one thing: My guitar playing has improved! All of the noodlin' I've been doing with my amps and my pedals through my various guitars has payed off! While I've been experimenting with all of these new tones, I've actually been practicing, but it doesn't feel that way (it feels like I've just been having fun!). My point is that practicing can take on many forms: From a formal practice session where you concentrate on chords and scales, to just having fun experimenting and jamming. The important thing is to pick up your guitar and play. It doesn't have to be something new, just play (something I need to do more of myself!).

My Harmony Electric - Plus: Playing with Pedals!

It's been over a month since my last post! In that time, I've put away my Tradition Tele-style guitar and brought out my Harmony Strat copy. My Harmony Strat copy was my first electric guitar. I bought it in 2007, after years of only having an acoustic guitar. The acoustic guitar that I was playing on and off at the time is also a Harmony. It is one of the last U.S.A. made Harmony guitars (made in 1975). I've always loved my Harmony acoustic, so when I had the chance of buying a Harmony electric at a very reasonable price, I took the chance and ordered it. I had not been playing guitar that often up until that point, so I did not want to buy an expensive guitar. I did not want to buy something expensive, not knowing if I was going to continue playing on a regular basis. There are a lot of people that buy an inexpensive guitar as their first guitar, only to be discouraged because the guitar is poorly made and set up and is hard to play. This was not the case with my Harmony electric. I loved it from the first day I got it! It is made very well, considering the price. It was also set up very well when I got it. I have researched the model number on the internet, and it seems this guitar model was made in 1990 or 1991, but it was brand new when I bought it in 2007 (new old stock).

Now that I am using my Harmony, I have been testing it out on my Vox DA5 amp (as I have been testing all of my guitars since I bought my amp). So far, my Harmony sounds great with all of the different amps settings I have used. I still need a few more settings to try out on my Harmony.

I have also been using my Harmony to test out my two pedals that I bought last month. The RAT 2 pedal was great from the start, so I have not really been testing it all that much. The Tube Driver pedal needed a different tube to make it sound better, so that is what I have been focusing on lately. I was able to get two tubes from a great member of one of the forums I belong to. As soon as I got the tubes, I began experimenting with them. I swapped out the 12AX7A tube in the Tube Driver with one of the 12AU7 tubes I was sent. The first tube I tried was an improvement, but I was not totally satisfied with the sound I was getting out of my pedal. I then tried the second tube with great results! I am now very happy with my Tube Driver pedal! I've been testing it with my Fender Champ 6oo and with my Vox DA5. To my ears, it sounds better through the Vox. I am thinking of putting up a demo recording of both of my pedals in the near future (I just have to get up the courage to record myself again!). As I've been saying lately, "Stay Tuned" to see if I go through with it!

Pedals!

I can't believe it has been a month since I last posted! I have really not been doing anything new on the guitar lately, just my usual routine (when I make time to pick up my guitar). Ever since I got my Vox DA5 amp, I have been trying out all of the settings on each guitar that I have been using. I'm still using my Tradition Tele-style guitar, so I've been putting it through it's paces on the DA5. I have to say, it sounds great! Now I know why they say that Telecasters are probably the most versatile guitars out there!

Now that I have the Vox DA5, I've been using the built in effects a lot in my practicing, but before I acquired it, I hardly ever used effects. I have my DigiTech RP50 processor that I demo in my little audio clip, but I don't use it that often. Early on, I also bought a Danelectro FAB distortion pedal, which I had planned to use with my Fender Champ 600 tube amp when I bought the amp. I ended up giving my son the FAB pedal for his little electric guitar. This brought about a chain of events that led me to obtain two great vintage pedals. When I gave my son the FAB, he needed an extra cable to hook it up, so that left me with no extra cables. I started looking for cables on Craigslist, and I found an old ad advertising cables and pedals. Well, to make a long story short, I ended up bringing home the two pedals in the photo along with some cables!

The black pedal is a RAT 2 distortion pedal. From what I have read on the web, these first came out in 1987. It was made in the USA and is built like a tank! I love the sounds I can get out of this pedal. It is a keeper for sure! The other pedal is a Tube Driver overdrive pedal. This pedal has a tube in it, just like the tubes that are found in tube amplifiers. When I first plugged it in, I didn't like what I heard. It produced a lot of muddy and inconsistent distortion (too much for an overdrive pedal IMHO). I later opened it up and found that the tube in it was not seated properly in the socket. I pushed the tube all the way into the socket and started using it. I used it for about two hours, and it sounded better, but not great. It seems that I am going to have to replace the tube in it. I've already research what kinds of tubes I can use in it, and have contacted a guitar forum member that says he has tubes. Let's see what happens when I put a new tube in it! Stay tuned!

My Guitar: From Problem to Prized.

I finally got around to posting again. August has been a very busy month for me and I have not played as much as I would want. I kept my Epi Les Paul Custom out longer than I usually do, wanting to record with it, but I ran into problems. When I record, I use Audacity. I currently have Audacity installed in my secondary PC, which I use mainly for the disk space. It's an older PC with Windows 98 installed in it. I tried recording my Les Paul on it, and every time I would start recording, the PC would freeze up! I would end up cutting the power to the PC just to be able to reboot! Anyway, I will have to install Audacity on this laptop that I am using now in order to record anything.

Since I was not able to record, I put my Les Paul away and brought out my tele-style Tradition CAB10T. The Tradition is the last guitar I bought. I bought it last December at my local music store. It is the only electric guitar that I have bought at a music store. All of my other electrics have been bought either through on-line retailers or through Craigslist. I was disappointed after I bought it because, even though it was my first "music store" electric, it had some problems.

When I went in to buy the guitar, the owner of the store was giving a guitar lesson, so I tried out the guitar at the lowest volume possible so as not to disturb the lesson going on. I really liked the guitar because it was very well made and it felt great in my hands, so I bought it. When I got it home and played it at regular volume, I noticed that the volume control was not as effective as it should be. I also noticed that the neck pickup sounded weak. I found some information on the internet that suggested that the volume control problem was due to a stock capacitor that should be replaced with a lower rated capacitor. Since I don't know anything about modding guitars, I decided to leave it be and just learn to live with this little imperfection. I was able to resolve the neck pickup problem by adjusting the pickup height and getting the pickup closer to the strings. This little adjustment made a big difference! Now, I consider my CAB10T to be one of my prized guitars! It is a beautiful guitar, very well made, and it has a great tone! I can't believe I considered selling it at one point! I have been testing it out with my Vox DA5 modeling amp, and so far the settings I have tried sound great on this guitar.

I guess the moral of this story is: If you are going to buy a used guitar (or even a new one), check it out completely. Don't assume everything works as it should, because chances are, you will find something wrong later on. I was lucky that the problems with my guitar were with the electronics, because those can be fixed rather easily. I still wish I knew how to mod...

Tones, Tones, and More Tones!

I have been preoccupied with other stuff these past two weeks, hence the late and unusual time of this post. When I have had time to noodle around with my guitar, I have been working with my Vox DA5. Thanks to a post in one of the forums I belong to, I discovered the 'VOX Tone Room' http://www.voxamps.com/toneroom/. This is a site where users of Vox amps post settings they have come up with. The site has settings for all sorts of Vox amps, including the DA5. I found all sorts of settings that I really liked: Everything from AC/DC and Guns N Roses to SRV and John Lee Hooker. I was able to find settings that use almost every amp style and effect available on the DA5. I tried out the settings I was interested in, and if I liked them, I wrote them down for future reference. When I was done, I found that only a few amp styles and effects had not been used. I was able to create settings for those myself very easily. So far, I have 24 settings that I can use. Most from the 'Tone Room' and some that I created myself. For users of Vox amps, the 'Tone Room' is a great resource. I encourage Vox users to check it out.

My Epiphone Les Paul Custom

The lazy days of summer still have a hold on me! Since my last post, I haven't done anything new on the guitar, except rotate guitars again. This time, I am using my Epiphone Les Paul Custom. It is a 1995 made in Korea model that I bought almost a year ago through Craigslist. It is everything a Les Paul should be: a true Rock machine in every way!

I have been practicing my usual routine with my LP, just like I was practicing with my Epi Dot before I put it away. The main differences between the Dot and the LP physically are the size and weight. The Dot is a bigger bodied guitar, but because the Dot is semi-hollow, the LP is a lot heavier. The weight does not bother me because I usually play sitting down, but I do have to re-adjust to having a regular-sized guitar body on my lap as opposed to the bigger body of the Dot. As for the sound, I have always considered the LP to be on one end of the extreme in tone (with the Telecaster being at the other end). I consider all of my guitars to have what I call a 'middle of the road' tone, except for my LP and my Tele-style guitar. Because of this, I always end up tinkering with my effects devices more when I use my LP than when I use my other guitars (I haven't used effects with my Tele-style guitar yet).

Last night I spent some time playing my LP through my new Vox DA5 for the first time. I found that the DA5 settings I was using with my Jet King and my Dot had to be adjusted to work well with my LP, but that was to be expected. One thing for sure: The LP sounded great after I got everything adjusted! Now it's time to go play some more!

Playing with my toys and the need to catch up!

I have to admit, I haven't played my guitar in about five days! I think the lazy days of summer are getting to me. This is also the reason I had not posted anything here sooner. The last time I played, I was trying to reproduce some of my favorite settings from my DigiTech RP50 modeling guitar processor on my new Vox DA5 amp. So far, I have been able to reproduce all of my favorites on my DA5. The only real difference is that I can save settings on the RP50. It has 40 user preset locations where I can save settings. The DA5 doesn't have the capability to save settings, but it is easy enough to dial in my settings, so it is really not a problem. I use a pre-printed form that came in the DA5 manual to record my various settings. Once on paper, all I have to do is dial in any setting I want. It may seem easier to have a setting saved and just go to it instead of having to dial it in every time, but I see benefits in both methods. On the RP50, once a setting is saved in a specific location, I have to know where that particular setting is, so I have to use a chart for reference. On the DA5, I use the pre-printed form I mentioned above. I don't mind dialing in a setting because it gives me a chance to experiment with that setting whenever I dial it in. On an RP50 setting, I tend to just go to it and use it as it was originally saved. It comes down to convenience versus creativity for me when using my RP50 and my DA5 to get a desired sound, but I love both of these devices.

Now, if you will excuse me, I have some guitar practicing and playing to catch up with!

New Amp!

A week ago yesterday, I received my latest amp. It's a new Vox DA5 that I bought from a member of one of the forums I belong to. It's a small, portable, 5 watt practice amp. I had been wanting a practice amp with an earphone jack and an AUX input for a while now. This little amp has those two features plus a whole lot more! It has 11 amp sounds/styles and 11 effects, with some being multiple effects. It also has a separate MIC input with it's own volume control AND it can run on batteries! If that wasn't enough, it has a power select switch which allows the output wattage of the power amp to be adjusted. The switch can be set to 0.5 watts, 1.5 watts, or 5 watts. I am currently using it with batteries, so I have the switch set to 0.5 watts to prolong battery life. The switch can also be used to control the volume of the amp. If I had the switch set at 5 watts, and I wanted to turn up the volume to the maximum to drive the power amp, the resulting volume would be too loud. With the power select switch, I could lower the volume without losing tone by setting the switch to 1.5 or 0.5 watts. The parameters of each effect on the amp can also be adjusted via three edit modes and a 'tap' button (used to 'tap' in the desired speed of certain effects).

I compared my new Vox to my Fender Champ 600 tube amp, which is also 5 watts. The Vox compliments my Fender very nicely! Even though the Vox is a digital amp, I can get it to sound very close to my Fender tube amp. This Vox amp has a very nice tube-like sound to it. It sounds better than my previous solid state amp. I have been experimenting with the different settings and have been able to get great tones out of it for different types of music. Needless to say, I am very happy with my new little amp! I'll try to record my next sound clip with it, but for now, back to 'experimenting'!

My Solo Turned Into A Song!

My Blues solo turned into a complete song this week! I started working on the solo with the goal of being able to play for the duration of the backing track, which is over three minutes in length. I started out playing licks that sounded good together a little at a time (BTW, I actually ended up using both box 4 and box 5 of the pentatonic scale in the key of E.). I continued building my solo this way, increasing the duration of it as I went along. I got to the point where it sounded like a complete solo, but the time it took to play was only one minute! As I played it over a few times, I realized that my 'solo' sounded more like the melody of a song instead of a solo. I started trying to think of lyrics that would fit my little tune/solo. I ended up working into the wee hours of the morning, writing lyrics down as I played little bits of my composition. I finally got through it, creating a pretty good song (IMHO)!

I have written lyrics to three songs in the past, but this is the first time I write the lyrics based on a tune that I came up with. Now I have to put it all together so it will sound good. I have to figure out how to sing it and where to emphasize the lyrics with different phrases (something that might be tougher for me, because I am not a singer!). Needless to say, it will be a while before I post my song here! Stay tuned!

Solo Time On Another Great Guitar!

This week I have been working on my Blues solo. I am playing it using box 4 of the minor pentatonic scale in the key of E. All this means is that I am playing it in the middle of the neck, between frets seven and ten, instead of playing it in box 1 (between frets one and three plus the open strings). The minor pentatonic scale and all five 'boxes' or 'positions' are explained very well by Justin Sandercoe in his website, so check it out. I got the idea to play my solo in this key and in this 'box' from the intro. to 'Voodoo Chile (Slight Return)'. I am also using a backing track in the key of E that I got from Scott Grove. It is one of 30 backing tracks that I got from Scott. They are all great tracks, in different keys and different tempos and styles. Check them out at his site if interested. The track I am using is over three minutes long, so it will be a challenge to play a solo for that amount of time without getting too repetitive or too boring. A challenge like this is always fun!

This weekend I am rotating guitars again. This time I am going to be bringing out my Epiphone ES-335 Dot. It is the guitar I have in my profile photo. It is also my favorite, along with the Jet King I have been using until now. The Epi Dot is one of the best values out there. It sells brand new for $400. It's a great instrument, and I highly recommend it. My Epi Dot is a 2001 model (made in Korea). I believe all current Epiphones are made in China, but isn't most everything made in China these days??!! Bottom line: Great guitars for the price. Get one!

Bend It With A Great Guitar!

This week I've been going through some Blues instructional videos on soloing. I've been looking at my Guitar World DVD that I mentioned in my last post, as well as the 'Four Note Solo' video by Griff Hamlin. I've also been improvising on a solo in the key of E. The 'Four Note Solo' is very simple, and it can sound great, but the trick to making it sound great is all in the ability to bend notes correctly. In playing Blues, knowing how to bend notes is very important. In my last post, I listed the internet resources I've used, and one of those resources is Justin Sandercoe. He has a great Blues section on his site, and that includes a great video on bending notes properly. I highly recommend this video to anyone wanting to play Blues.

Since I started this blog, I've been using my Ibanez Jet King II guitar. I usually rotate my guitars to give them all more or less equal playing time, and it just so happens that I am using my Jet King at this time. The Jet King is a great guitar, and reasonably priced too. The Jet Kings out now are the Jet King III (JTK30) and IV (JTK40) models. The Jet King III comes with P-90 type pickups and the Jet King IV comes with humbuckers and a 'Vintage Vibrato' (trem). My Jet King came with humbuckers and 'rocker-type' switches to split each pickup, thereby getting single coil tones as well as humbucker tones. It is a very versatile guitar. Want a great guitar with a mahogany body for around $300? Check it out!

After Electrics and Internet...

In my last post, I wrote about the resources I used when I first started learning to play the guitar. In this post, I decided to write about the resources I have used since I bought my first electric guitar. Shortly after buying my first electric (a Harmony Strat-style guitar), I was at a local grocery store looking at the magazine section, when I noticed a booklet-type magazine wrapped up along with a DVD. It was an instructional booklet and DVD from Guitar World Magazine. I bought it and put it in my DVD player when I got home. It was my first ever instructional video and a very good one at that. It was the 'How to Play Blues and Blues Rock Guitar' DVD, with Andy Aledort as the instructor. I still have the DVD, and I still use it. Andy Aledort is a great musician and instructor, and I highly recommend this DVD for anyone interested in learning to play the Blues.

Once I got a good internet connection, I started surfing the web for more guitar lessons. The following is a list of the instructors I have used. I am not including the links to their sites, but anyone interested in these instructors can access their sites using any search engine:

1. Mojo at ThreeChordGuitar

2. Justin Sandercoe at JustinGuitar

3. Josh Cho at CheapGuitarZine

4. Griff Hamlin at BluesGuitarUnleashed

5. Haywyre at LearnBluesLicks

6. Scott Grove at GroovyMusicLessons

All of these guys are excellent instructors. I suggest to anybody interested in learning to play to check out all of these instructors and choose the one (or ones) that they feel will meet their needs. I use all of them. As a side note, I did not list them in any order of preference. I listed them roughly as to when I discovered their sites on the web, with Mojo's site being the first one I started using, and Scott being my latest discovery. One other site that I use, and actually discovered before any of the ones above, is Betty Lou's Site for Guitar Underdogs. This site, unlike the ones above, provides hundreds of song lyrics along with the chord progressions used to play them. In addition to the lyrics and chord progressions, most of the songs on this site have a midi version that people can listen to.

There are so many instructional sites on the web that it is impossible to say there is a 'best' one out there. What might work for some people might not work for others. This post is just my way of pointing people in the direction that has worked for me, so rev up those search engines and have fun learning on-line!

The Beginning...

When I started trying to learn to play, people had no internet to rely on. Either you tried teaching yourself and learning by ear, or you took private lessons, or bought lesson books and tried to follow them. I did a variation of all three. I had a little Magnus organ and the books that came with it. I would play the melody of a song on the organ using the simple 'numbered keys' method the music books offered. My father would also teach me simple songs using the same method. It was here that I noticed the relationship between where the note appeared on the staff and the number of the key above it. This was my foundation for recognizing the different notes. When I got my first guitar lesson book (a Mel Bay one), I was already familiar with notes, so learning to tune a guitar was pretty easy. That first book was a chord book, so I learn some basic chords, even though it was hard for me to form those chords. Later on, I found a Mel Bay book that taught me where the notes were on the fretboard, which I thought was pretty cool!

The lessons I took were through school and college. I took a guitar class for a short time in junior high school, and then I took a music theory course in college. Both of these were extremely helpful. The guitar class helped put together what I had been learning in the Mel Bay books. The music theory course helped me understand music as a whole, regardless of what instrument I was playing or wanted to play. I believe knowing at least the basics of music theory is essential for anybody wanting to play an instrument.

These were the initial steps I took to learn music and to learn to play. I am sharing this hoping it will inspire the total novice out there to take the first steps toward a great hobby (or even more). I hope this will also give ideas to parents out there with little children who show an interest in music.

WELCOME!!!

Welcome to my blog! I'm just a middle-aged guy who's been messing with guitars for a long, long time. This doesn't necessarily mean I am a good player (far from it), but I love to play and more importantly, learn (I am in love with learning). I got my first guitar when I was six, and I've been noodlin', trying to learn how to play, ever since. I got my present acoustic guitar when I was about 12 years old. I played it on and off (mostly off) up until 2007, when I got my first electric guitar. Since then, I've acquired four other modestly-priced electrics (I have no top-of-the-line instruments).

I belong to several guitar forums, so I decided to create this blog as a personal diary of sorts to keep track of my guitar-playing activities and to share what I do to learn to play guitar. To me, it's a never-ending process, but that's what makes it fun! It's all about 'putting a smile on my face' for me, not being a rock star or virtuoso by any means. So, if you're reading this and share my views on playing and learning, stick around and see what happens in this blog!