Are you a shredder??!!

  • Thread starter Thread starter carlosguardia
  • Start date Start date

Are you a shredder?! How fast can you play?!

  • quarter notes at 90 bpm are kind of hard

    Votes: 15 12.7%

  • eight notes at 120 bpm is my limit

    Votes: 25 21.2%

  • sixteenth notes at 100 bpm!!! Wow I can almost shred!!!

    Votes: 29 24.6%

  • Sixteenth triplets at 130 bpm... watch out Malmsteen!!

    Votes: 26 22.0%

  • 32nd notes at 115 bpm ... shredding is my game!!!

    Votes: 23 19.5%
  • Total voters
    118
And nobody is measuring "musical" ability by how fast you can play notes.... musicianship is based on a number of aspects; technique (or lack of) is just one of these aspects; which is more important to some than others. There are different types of shredders, there's the ones who suck because they say nothing and there's the other bunch, that ROCK!!! I mean, Paul Gilbert, Marty Friedman, Jason Becker, Andy Timmons, Steve Morse, JOhn Petrucci, Tony MacAlpine and some many others shred and also are incredilbe musicians!!!!
 
I'm with BrettB on this one, to a certain extent. The greater part of musicianship is not being able to play fast - it's knowing when to play fast, and then being able to.
I used to manage a music store that had lots of teachers in the studios there. You could always tell the violin students that were learning the Suzuki Method. Fast, accurate, and boring as hell.
Have you ever noticed how a long, fast passge just starts to sound slow after a while? Have you ever noticed how a fast passage put in just the right spot can sound blazingly fast? It's all about context and taste, not sheer speed.
And for me, a passage that is all picked usually doesn't soud appealing. A passage with some notes picked and other pulled or hammered sounds much more fluid and really breathes.

If you enjoy something different and think I'm full of it, that's fine too. Wouldn't it be a boring world if we all thought the same?

Aaron
http://www.voodoovibe.com
 
carlosguardia said:
And nobody is measuring "musical" ability by how fast you can play notes.... musicianship is based on a number of aspects; technique (or lack of) is just one of these aspects; which is more important to some than others. There are different types of shredders, there's the ones who suck because they say nothing and there's the other bunch, that ROCK!!! I mean, Paul Gilbert, Marty Friedman, Jason Becker, Andy Timmons, Steve Morse, JOhn Petrucci, Tony MacAlpine and some many others shred and also are incredilbe musicians!!!!
Click to expand...

Ok, there may be technical great musicians, but take Macalpine for example: his music belongs in a porn movie. that dreadfull reverb guitar, those 100 notes each minute...pff..

Don't get me wrong: if you like that kinda stuff, go for it. But I think it is boring and useless
 
Brett- Have you heard MacAlpine's Chromaticity?! Incredible songwriting and amazing playing full of feeling and flavour. And his keyboard playing is SUPERB!!! If it was on any porn, I'd probably pay more attention to the music than the porn...well, depends, if Jenna stars in it forget it, it could be the G3 for all I care. ;)

Carlos
 
I am currently working on my picking speed with a metronome. I don't know exactly where I would fit in the poll, but unless I am having a good day, my brick wall is 16ths at 180 bpm.

I don't really give two shits about the shredder label. The complaint is only legit when the songs are crap. Today's best hard rock/metal/prog metal bands know this, and many of the guitarists are still shredding with the picking hand while fretting in a slower, more textural style. Either that, or they have gone way of the doom metal (aka Sabbath influenced) sound.

Either way is fine by me, as long as the song still rocks.

cy
 
Last edited:
Well yeah I can shred (with a name like Speeddemon you ain't gonna play 4ths at 70bpm, right? ;) )
but I'm kinda between blues/arabic and shredding...
my style has elements of George Lynch, Marty Friedman, Eddie Van Halen (all sorts of shred) and Slash, Sambora, Hendrix, Clapton, Angus and Blackmore (bluesy and 'arabic'...)

"I know all about virtuosos, trembalos and arpeggios... I can do it all." :cool: :D
 
carlosguardia said:
Brett- Have you heard MacAlpine's Chromaticity?! Incredible songwriting and amazing playing full of feeling and flavour. And his keyboard playing is SUPERB!!! If it was on any porn, I'd probably pay more attention to the music than the porn...well, depends, if Jenna stars in it forget it, it could be the G3 for all I care. ;)

Carlos
Click to expand...

yess, I even own it and sorry, I don't want to be rude but I really hate it. Slick, annoying and lacking any feeling. Call it a matter of taste, and technical he is superb, but as a 'musician who tries to tell a story' he is a complete zero in my eyes.

sorry, no hard feelings:)
 
I love alot of the shredders that do it correctly, but i am far from a shredder myself......

as far as measuring with a metrnome i have no clue.....lets say i have the metronome set to 120bpm....is each click a 1/4 note? in other words, is it 120 1/4notes per minute?
 
ok, figured it out....each click is a 1/4 note....

was able to get the 16th notes at 100bpm, but i can hardly call that "amost shredding"....

the rest of you guys should be posting some numbers so we can see how bad we suck......
 
When warmed up I can get 16th note triplets at 130 bpm (that's cramming 6 notes every click) and be able to go up and down the neck. I can push 135 but it doesn't sound "fluent".

Carlos
 
I can shred a little, not sure exactally how fast, dont own a metro-gnome..:p

But I get by....







:)
 
Speedy's current max tempi:

Just checked with metronome:

16ths at 115bpm when doing complete runs up and down.

16ths at 220bpm when doing trash-metal riffing.

I can play faster, but then the definition will drop.
 
Re: Speedy's current max tempi:

Speeddemon said:
Just checked with metronome:

16ths at 115bpm when doing complete runs up and down.

16ths at 220bpm when doing trash-metal riffing.

I can play faster, but then the definition will drop.
Click to expand...


speedy, is that 16 notes per beep?
 
no, 4 notes.

16th notes per beep would be 64ths!!! Not even Yngwie will pull THAT off at 115bpm.
 
:D :D :D

i have a "PETRUCCI instructional video".....GOOD LORD.....
he plays these little runs and scales...and i just sit there.....stunned.......




















....and then he says...."OK now lets try some UP TO SPEED.."...


i just turned it off....and cried for a while...



:D jamal
 
I use to be into that speed stuff, but I have to admit that I'm much more expressive when I slow it down. I think the first FEAR OF GOD album "Within the Veil" showed me the light on how you could be heavy and still be molodic.
 
I think shredding is obselete these days, like a lost art, like using a typewriter. The problem is is that the new musicians of today aren't talented enough to be shredders or aren't talented enough to be able to incorporate shredding into their songs. It is a dying trait of songs, but I believe shredding will probably make a triumphant return to popular music. It probably won't be as popular as it once was but there are artists out there who can still shred and do incorporate small hints of their shredding abilities in their music. I think maybe shredding is still around but it's done in moderation now and only used when deemed appropriate by the song. The problem is the 80's are still around and shredding today is being compared to that.

BP
 
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