The New Tone Thread

[Greg_L]

Yeah, he does sound good as a drummer - don't know how technically good he actually is. Another drummer I really like the sound of is Danny Carey from Tool. He just sounds like he's hitting them really hard.

Yes, they're both good drummers. I'm not a Dave Grohl fan, but he is a great rock drummer. Taylor Hawkins is good too. They're both really good drummers for the music they play. That's all you can ask for. That's all I personally try to be - appropriate for the music I play. I drum about as good as I'd ever need to drum. I certainly have room to improve on guitar, but whatever.

 

[JDOD]

I certainly have room to improve on guitar, but whatever.

Yeah, practice your modal scale shapes with a metronome, gradually increasing by 2 bpm at a time... you'll be wearing a spandex catsuit by christmas.

This is another drum sound I quite like quite and open sound and they sound like they're being hit hard:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LipcAZzXGw4
I like the sound of the vocal too. In fact its not a dissimilar style to In Utero - sounds quite live.

 

[Greg_L]

Yeah, practice your modal scale shapes with a metronome, gradually increasing by 2 bpm at a time... you'll be wearing a spandex catsuit by christmas.

Lol. That's what I'm trying to avoid.

For me, I think my hands and fingers could do more things, it's just more that my vocabulary is very limited. I don't have this vast pile of influences to draw from. Like I said, I haven't spent my life listening to, admiring, studying guitar greats. Coming up with leads is the problem. Once I come up with something, then I just play it the same way every time. But coming up with something that doesn't sound like everything else I've already come up with is my issue.

 

[JDOD]

Coming up with leads is the problem. Once I come up with something, then I just play it the same way every time. But coming up with something that doesn't sound like everything else I've already come up with is my issue.

I just stick the rhythm bit that I'm trying to work out the lead for on a loop and play over it until I find some licks I like. Knowing your scale shapes and stuff does help with this as helps you generate ideas.

 

[Greg_L]

I just stick the rhythm bit that I'm trying to work out the lead for on a loop and play over it until I find some licks I like. Knowing your scale shapes and stuff does help with this as helps you generate ideas.

I am at least that far along coming from where we talked about this stuff several months ago. That was helpful. All those phrygians and dorians and shit. I kind of get it and can apply those modes across sections of songs where I'd put a lead. I just don't ever really like any of them. They all sound too wanky or like something from a renaissance fair. I always seem to go back to a major shape or pentatonic minor thing because they just seem to work better for my neanderthal music. But then again, there's the problem...it all sounds like everything else.

 

[JDOD]

I am at least that far along coming from where we talked about this stuff several months ago. That was helpful. All those phrygians and dorians and shit. I kind of get it and can apply those modes across sections of songs where I'd put a lead. I just don't ever really like any of them. They all sound too wanky or like something from a renaissance fair. I always seem to go back to a major shape or pentatonic minor thing because they just seem to work better for my neanderthal music. But then again, there's the problem...it all sounds like everything else.

If you decide to just chug along on one chord but play a Dorian scale shape it will sound shit... and probably like jazz.

Take that track I put in the clinic yesterday - there's a lead lick that comes in at just after 1:00. If the song riff was still resolving around Em it would just sound like generic minor scale. But when it comes in the song switches to C (octave chord thing) so the lead has a Lydian feel. The next bit of that section I go back to sliding octave chords around E minor so it has a generic minor pentatonic feel... now I like that Lydian bit, you might think it sounds like I've been poured in to leather trousers.

 

[Greg_L]

Lol, yeah, that's what I'm talking about. I don't have that "Oh I'll just add some lydian here" kind of depth to my well. My well is more like a kiddie pool.

Remember that song I sent you to come up with a solo on? I've got another one and I wanna hear what you do to it. I have my own solo for it, but I wanna hear what you'd come up with using your modes and shit.

 

[JDOD]

Lol, yeah, that's what I'm talking about. I don't have that "Oh I'll just add some lydian here" kind of depth to my well. My well is more like a kiddie pool.

Remember that song I sent you to come up with a solo on? I've got another one and I wanna hear what you do to it. I have my own solo for it, but I wanna hear what you'd come up with using your modes and shit.

Yeah, no worries. I have fuck all else to do during the week day evenings other than play the guitar. Strangely on soundcloud, the really shreddy version with the harmonies I did of your track gets a lot more likes than the serious version.

On that track I wasn't really thinking "ooo I'd like lydian here" it just happened but then I guess having a bit of theory you can then chose to exaggerate it and play and the bits that give it that lydian feel. For example, with that one, when the song changes to C, I start hammering and pulling between F# and G as it's the flat 5th which really gives it that feel.

 

[miroslav]

For me, this is a perfect example of why I dislike classic rock guitar music. It's hard for me because I do love the sounds and tones of much of that stuff...but goddamn the songs are fucking hard to listen to. While I think the guitar sounds cool in that song, it's 5 minutes of the same plodding droning thing over and over. If something happened and I missed it, it's because my mind drifted to something else as it was playing because it was so boring for me. Guitar music made by guitar players for guitar players does nothing for me, even though I like tones and playing guitars myself.

It's all about the context in which you first hear something, IMO...If you miss a certain period, odds are it won't appeal to you as much. I kinda went through it all over the years.
There's nothing special about that "song" AFA songs go...but I think you can say the same thing about some short, up-tempo tunes that just circles around three chords and not much more....yet it can be a real good listen for some, while others would say it's boring etc.

I was never a Trower follower...but the way that song opens with the big droning chords and changes, and the vocal riding all of that...well, it fits a certain sound, and certain period. It provides a mood that back in those day, was where Rock was at, and like a lot of other Rock styles, it came and went. I'm sure if some current band put out a tune like that it wouldn't have the same effect.
I don't think I could listen to that style of Rock all day long, and I can't listen to any one style over and over...anything will sound boring when I do that...but something like that could certainly fit on my broad song playlist when I wanted that mood...along with a lot of other stuff that came afterward and up to today.
Anyway...I was getting off on the tone of the song...not so much the guitar playing or the whole classic Rock thing.

 

[minerman]

Last clip does sound pretty good Jdude, I've always liked harmony guitars...

On the scale thing, I know a few different scales, but my problem is always where/how the fuck to use 'em in a song. For 99% of the music I play/record, the pentatonic thing usually fits better than anything. And I don't have the mental capacity to really understand how to really use those other scales either, so I just stick with my simple little blues-based stuff...

 

[ShanPeyton]

Hey all, i am home for some days off, maybe a week maybe a more? Worked the last like.... 6 weeks with two days off. I am going to sleep for a day and then get some stuff done with the musics hopefully and get some shits up for you all to hear. Been way way way too long.

MISSED YOU DUDES!

 

[minerman]

Worked the last like.... 6 weeks with two days off.

Damn Shan, glad you're still working & all, but holy fuck dude...Prop your feet up a little while, you definitely deserve a break...

I'd been wondering where you had been, now I know...


BTW, I figured the Gerg would've posted some new Lester clips by now...

 

[Greg_L]

Hey all, i am home for some days off, maybe a week maybe a more? Worked the last like.... 6 weeks with two days off. I am going to sleep for a day and then get some stuff done with the musics hopefully and get some shits up for you all to hear. Been way way way too long.

MISSED YOU DUDES!

Hey man! Good to see you back and not burned up!

BTW, I figured the Gerg would've posted some new Lester clips by now...

Haven't had the chance yet. Been working on time sensitive recording shit that's gotta be done by this weekend.

 

[minerman]

Haven't had the chance yet. Been working on time sensitive recording shit that's gotta be done by this weekend.

It's cool man, didn't know you were in the middle of something, sounds like it's a pretty big project...Shoot me a song or two whenever you get it finished up dude, I'd like to hear it...

In other news, GAS is absolutely killin' me over here....

 

[Armistice]

In other news, GAS is absolutely killin' me over here....

Here miner, this will help...

 

[miroslav]

This can help too:




But this works best:






I was planning on having an amp custom built by the Carl's Custom Amps out in Las Cruces, NM having purchased one of his regular builds about a year and a half ago (bought it used from someone)...and Carl ended up replacing the power tranny a couple of month back, and we got to talking...and he said let's discuss what kind of amp you are looking for, and I can build it custom to your goals.

Anyway...$565 last week for a front tire & wheel after hitting a #!#*&! huge pot hole, ripping the sidewall and then the rim hit and got bent...and now tomorrow, I gotta go try and talk my way out a traffic ticket or at least get it reduced, not to mention one of my caps got loose, so I see the dentist after I go to court.
So fuck me...I think the amp's gonna wait a bit.

 

[minerman]

Lol....thanks guys....the last option you all suggested is it for me, but, it'll happen. Just have to wait a little longer....

 

[Bill L]

From my gig last Friday night. The song is called Chocolate Cake by The Honey Island Swamp Band from their Be Good To You CD. This is our barnburner song that we still haven't nailed yet (of course, the fact that we don't practice may have something to do that). Again, this is my Fool SG, '61 Fender Princeton and a Jekyll and Hyde using the distortion portion and a Sennheiser E609 mic. No delay, no reverb, no EQ.

Greg: Looking forward to hearing some new Lester tones.

Everyone else I was with a friend today and we were talking about singing and he was talking about head singing, etc and mentioned this clip (Hocus Pocus - Focus Live '73) . What struck me most was the incredible guitar tone (as well as some amazing vocal acrobatics).

Just thought I'd throw that out there for shits and giggles.

 

[RAMI]

(Hocus Pocus - Focus Live '73)[/URL] .

I've seen that clip. It's absolutely incredible. The drumming, the guitar playing, the hilarious but awesome vocals. AND they're playing the tune about 87 times faster than the studio version, which is fast enough. This is sick.

 

[Bill L]

I've seen that clip. It's absolutely incredible. The drumming, the guitar playing, the hilarious but awesome vocals. AND they're playing the tune about 87 times faster than the studio version, which is fast enough. This is sick.

I'm going to have to assume that large amounts of cocaine had been imbibed just prior to the gig. Call it an educated guess.