"Eureka" Moments

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TelePaul

TelePaul

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Had something of a break-through today. Have you ever had one of those moments where your sound comes together? When you're jamming or practicing and things just work out well; your guitar sounds great, you've nailed that tone you'e been after, you're stringing runs together effortlessly and everything sounds...well, great?

I dunno about you guys, but as a guitarist I have a fair few 'off' days...where everything goes badly; your tone sucks, your pedals start acting up, your strings feel two years old...

Does this happen to anyone else? Forgive the ecoteric nature of this post!
 
TelePaul said:
Had something of a break-through today. Have you ever had one of those moments where your sound comes together? When you're jamming or practicing and things just work out well; your guitar sounds great, you've nailed that tone you'e been after, you're stringing runs together effortlessly and everything sounds...well, great?

I dunno about you guys, but as a guitarist I have a fair few 'off' days...where everything goes badly; your tone sucks, your pedals start acting up, your strings feel two years old...

Does this happen to anyone else? Forgive the ecoteric nature of this post!
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No forgiveness needed for this thread. Great topic.

I know just what you mean. For me, the hard part is to keep playing on an off day, knowing that the discipline and practice still do me good. It's harder when it's not clicking. I often hang up a guitar and mutter (usually out loud, but to my empty studio) "sometimes ya got it, sometimes ya don't!"

But when it does come together--it's so worth the work...
 
WhiteStrat said:
I often hang up a guitar and mutter (usually out loud, but to my empty studio) "sometimes ya got it, sometimes ya don't!"
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I know exactly what you mean. If things aren't going well, or rather, if they're going badly, I'll switch off the amp and go do something else. I might come back to my set-up later that day, or might hit the drums or tweak a mix or something.

Funnily enough, my mood doesn't seem to impact much on how I play, or how I perceive my own playing; today, for example, I was in a pretty bad mood and tore it up for an hour! Another day I could feel great, nice and relaxed, play awfully and pack it in afetr ten minutes.

The guitar gods sure are fickle!
 
Yes!

Some time ago, I was recording a pretty decent song and things were going great until I had to lay down the guitar part. I was recording in a strange key and I was having a hell of a time trying to nail the lead. Over and over I went on my brand new ES 175...finally, I was tracking a decent lead (non of my leads are great, but sometimes decent works) and what happens, I break a string!! I was pissed. I put the guitar away, came back 2 or 3 days later and did the whole thing in one take (after replacing the string)...just the way it goes I guess.
 
Perfect timing for this thread! I had "one of those days" yesterday, when nothing seemed quite right. I do mean nothing! I couldn't even seem to get a guitar in tune, get a decent tone from an amp, had a stuffy head and couldn't sing if my life depended on it... I mean everything was going wrong! We (my band) had a practice session planned for last night so I was getting worried. Something happened about 3 notes into the first song we decided to work on and it was like the disharmony gremlins that had plagued me all day magicly vanished and we had one of the most productive sessions we had had in a long time.
 
i usually play with volume/tone knobs on the guitar fully cranked (open). sometimes, if i play around with volume and forget that I turned it down some, the amp will feel weird at the given level, it'll be not only quieter but also sound worse than expected - THEN I'll realize what happened (after a few minutes) AND it's an easy fix - instant, low-cost EUREKA.
 
TelePaul said:
Had something of a break-through today. Have you ever had one of those moments where your sound comes together? When you're jamming or practicing and things just work out well; your guitar sounds great, you've nailed that tone you'e been after, you're stringing runs together effortlessly and everything sounds...well, great?

I dunno about you guys, but as a guitarist I have a fair few 'off' days...where everything goes badly; your tone sucks, your pedals start acting up, your strings feel two years old...

Does this happen to anyone else? Forgive the ecoteric nature of this post!
Click to expand...

Good topic,

I get far too few of the days you just described. That makes me appreciate them all the more.

Congratulations on your eureka day. Reading about yours brightened mine.
 
My eureka moments come when i put the guitar down. *WOW! what is this amazing sound i've discovered, the best tone i've had all day!* silence.
 
Over the years I've had several various eureka moments (on various instruments) and a few of those days where it seems I've forgotten half of what I've learned.

Some of the eureka moments involved working on a difficult chop and having if suddenly fall into place, some involved suddenly learning something new about a piece of equipment and some involved suddenly finding a tone that I had heard in my head but could never quite figure out. I think the tone eureka mo moments are the most "special" - developing chops or learning how gear works is simply a matter of spending time.....but sometimes, finding great tone involves both time and a little voodoo.

I do find that the more time I spend with instruments in my hands - the more eureka moments present themselves to me:D
 
TelePaul said:
I dunno about you guys, but as a guitarist I have a fair few 'off' days...where everything goes badly; your tone sucks, your pedals start acting up, your strings feel two years old...
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I had a tone-Eureka recently. Usually, however, tone-changes are much more of a progress than a single event with me.
BUT I know the off-days, and they're never tone-related. I might not always have my desired dream-tone, but it's always decent. Usually my off-days are technique and creativity related. It's actually more off-months than -days... (I'm within one right now). To my ears, I play the same old same all the time and I don't even get better at it (technique). And then there really are people who like my impros. I'm not one of them :p. I don't even improvise anymore if I don't have to. Maybe that's a doom loop... I pray for a Eureka moment here! :(
 
Most days after putting in a full day's work, my technique sucks and I just have to push through it and keep the fingers moving. The reward is that on the weekends when I'm mentally and physically fresh, all that noodling has its rewards and occasionally I even impress myself! :D
 
Yeah, those moments are rare. I like them when they happen. Most of the time, for me, the Eureka moments come after a few months of listening to an old song I produced. You catch things you didn't hear the first time. Like, maybe at first, you didn't like the chorus to one of your songs, but after a few months of sitting on it, you hear it in a different light.. and it takes on a life of its own. It's more powerful and meaningful to you than it was in the beginning. I call these, Creeper Eurekas lol.
 
Byron Yang said:
Yeah, those moments are rare. I like them when they happen. Most of the time, for me, the Eureka moments come after a few months of listening to an old song I produced. You catch things you didn't hear the first time. Like, maybe at first, you didn't like the chorus to one of your songs, but after a few months of sitting on it, you hear it in a different light.. and it takes on a life of its own. It's more powerful and meaningful to you than it was in the beginning. I call these, Creeper Eurekas lol.
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Creeper Eureka--I like it. I know just what you mean.
 
Oh god, totally... Some days, everything just feels right - your tone is there, your technique is there, your phrasing is there, and you feel like you could do just about anything.

Byron Yang said:
Yeah, those moments are rare. I like them when they happen. Most of the time, for me, the Eureka moments come after a few months of listening to an old song I produced. You catch things you didn't hear the first time. Like, maybe at first, you didn't like the chorus to one of your songs, but after a few months of sitting on it, you hear it in a different light.. and it takes on a life of its own. It's more powerful and meaningful to you than it was in the beginning. I call these, Creeper Eurekas lol.
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Haha, that's awesome. I totally know what you mean, too - there have been times where I've recorded solos and (since I improv everything) listened back "in the heat of the moment" and thought that while it wasn't really what I was going for, it was good enough that I didn't want to bother re-recording it, at least for the sake of cutting a demo. Then, a week or two later, I'll listen back and think, "Hey, what was I thinking? This isn't bad at all."

I think sometimes it's tough, getting enough distance between you as guitarist and you as listener, to objectively judge a performance within the context of the song.
 
What gets me is how I can pick up my guitar and turn on my amp, having changed absolutely nothing in my setup since the last time I played, and it sounds completely different to me.
 
Great thread topic.

Any time I can stay on pitch it's a eureka moment for me.
 
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