The New Tone Thread

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Greg_L said:
My library of licks. I just don't have enough lead guitar influences to have ever learned any licks, chops, techniques, etc.
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To tell the truth...in all the years I've been playing...I've never copied specific licks from any of the guitar players I admired.
My thing was to learn the standard "boxes" for blues/rock and whatnot...and then I learned the actual scales that make up those "boxes"...and after awhile, I learned how to mix Major/Minor scales...
...and from all of that, I just developed my own basic licks, though honestly, once you know where what is, and what works for different style of music and songs...you will end up playing many of the licks that other people play, because many will just fall into place naturally.
Of course...each lick can be played in a variety of ways...so the signature licks are nothing more than personalized versions of basic blues/rock licks, coming from the same scales and those "boxes".
Whenever I took a look at what someone like Page or Clapton (or insert your favorite player) was doing...I realized that they were playing using the same available notes...they just found creative ways to tie 2-3 notes, 2-3 notes, 2-3 notes...together into a "lick" containing 7-8 notes.
I mean...certainly not rocket science....they just kept at it and made those licks work for them.:)

IMO...the best way to learn licks and leads is to play against some backing tracks...over and over...find the scales, find the boxes...and the licks will take shape based on what feels comfortable to you. Once you are able to *see* the fretboard as a whole, and how things repeat and move up/down the neck...it opens up your playing, though don't feel cheap if the majority of your playing is focused in one area of the fretboard, as a lot of big name players do that over, and over....and they just know how to make it sound good.
IOW...you DON'T have to blaze and shred like a maniac up/down the neck to sound good. You could hang on 3-4 notes and just work them, and make it sound like really good Rock licks.

I think if you only learn specific licks that other people play...you can certainly make use of them...but you won't know how to go from there or how to do anything on your own. So learn the fretboard too...not just the canned licks.
 
Greg_L said:
People have told me that my own hardheaded punk background has irreparably stunted my musical growth.
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There's nothing wrong with playing what you like and sticking to what you do best. As we said the other day - Bad Religion have been repeating the same album since Suffer and its always good. They probably know plenty of music theory too - it hasn't turned them into perm haired wankers. Except for that weird album with the keyboards on it.
 
It's the same with my drumming. I learned how to play some drums and have never gotten any better. Lol. I got as good as I need to be on guitar and drums and here I am. I don't have the advanced influences. I've never paid attention to Bonham and shit like that. I don't know any rudiments. Think about it - 25 years. 25 years I've been able to play a beat on a full drum kit. 25 years I've been able to play notes on a guitar. I should be WAY WAY WAY better at both. 25 fucking years! That's an entire human from birth to adulthood, and I'm really not much further along than I was at 16. :laughings:
 
miroslav said:
IMO...the best way to learn licks and leads is to play against some backing tracks...over and over...find the scales, find the boxes...and the licks will take shape based on what feels comfortable to you.
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I do this a lot, its fun! That last track, I just the sequence on a loop and riffed over it.
 
JDOD said:
The trade off though is that you've managed to get very, very good at using guitars and drums for one purpose: Punk Rock!
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Yes that is true. At my kind of music I'm basically a fucking PhD. I can run circles around pretty much every "punk rocker" there is. That aint saying much though. :laughings:

It's actually kind of frustrating trying to find people skilled enough to keep up with me while still playing music that appeals to me. Like in any punk band, I'm the best guy that can already do what everyone else does. It makes people mad that I can drop my guitar and sit at the drums and show the drummer whatever I'm trying to explain to him. Just the other day the other guitar player forgot one of his leads so I just started playing it. I'd never played it before, I just knew it. He didn't like that, but damn fucker, know your shit!

This is what I'm up against in the meat world. I don't wanna be in some wanky shred-rock band, but punk rock bands are excessively dumb and un-skilled most of the time.
 
I'm a better guitarist now than I was five years ago. I do practice my scales a bit, but I never did when I was younger. None of the bands I was into had blistering leads in them, or if they did they tended towards being slower, more expressive, not derived from the blues and with a more avant-garde, dissonant feel. They were angsty and disquieting. I've spent a couple of years working on my vibrato because honestly, I had none! I couldn't do the vibrato where you fret the string with your index finger and pivot your whole hand levering against the neck at all. I'm still not great at it, but like Greg, I spent most of my life liking music that you didn't need to be able to do that stuff to play it. Which is why learning modes and scales at my age is bloody hard.
 
Bubba po said:
I'm a better guitarist now than I was five years ago. I do practice my scales a bit, but I never did when I was younger. None of the bands I was into had blistering leads in them, or if they did they tended towards being slower, more expressive, not derived from the blues and with a more avant-garde, dissonant feel. They were angsty and disquieting. I've spent a couple of years working on my vibrato because honestly, I had none! I couldn't do the vibrato where you fret the string with your index finger and pivot your whole hand levering against the neck at all. I'm still not great at it, but like Greg, I spent most of my life liking music that you didn't need to be able to do that stuff to play it. Which is why learning modes and scales at my age is bloody hard.
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I'm probably better now that I ever have been. I probably can't play as fast as I could when I was a kid but I can play a lot better - I don't think I realised then that fast wasn't necessarily good!
 
Okay here's another off my bands' influences album - Love Gun by KISS.

Again, no vocals, just mainly focused on drums and scratch demo-ing for the other guys, but it's fun to do the guitars and shit.

I don't have much info for this one since I did the guitars the other day and I've already changed the settings and shit. I didn't write anything down. What I know though is...
The centered "Paul Stanley" guitar is the Les Paul Goldtop, Plexi 1959, and G12-65 speakers.
The wide "Ace" guitars are the Les Paul Custom, Plexi 1959, and Greenbacks.
The end leads are the Ace setup boosted with a Tube Screamer.
All of this was done pretty near cranked, but I wanted to control feedback, so the cabs were moved out to the front entryway. My dogs damn near had their heads blown off, but they're used to it. Anyway, I thought it came out pretty cool so here it is.

Love Guuuuuuuuun, Looooooooove Gun

See whatcha think.
 
Damn guys, I've got a lot of catching up to do here, been feeling like shit the past few days & been busy with songs, shit around the house, & life in general...I'll try to get around to the rest of everybody's clip(s) sometime today...


Greg: Sounds pretty damn good man, especially the lead parts, they've got that 70's raw, in your face thing that I associate with Ace...I'm almost ashamed to post any of my cover tunes I've been working on now....:laughings:
 
Thanks fellas. :)

I really like the drums and guitars on that one. I'm in a good recording groove right now I think.
 
Ok, I went back quite a few pages & I think I've got caught up here, if not, sorry, lemme know where it's at & I'll get around to it...

JDOD: Much better man, especially in the ska part, the volume is much better...IMO you still need to work on when the dirty guitars come back in, there should be more "balls" there, but you'll get it man, it just takes time...

Bill: As usual, your clip sounds really good dude, good separation on the instruments & good clarity on everything...

Bubba: Those guitars are tracked pretty tight, almost sounds like one guitar with a delay on it until you hear a little variation in 'em....Good stuff man....

Greg: I've already commented on your clip, but again, just wanted you to know I think it sounds great man. The cover(s) I'm working on, I'm not worried about being "authentic" sounding (I already know I'm gonna sound like me anyway, so I'm gonna just try for a decent cover that sounds kinda modern...lol), but your clips sound really fuckin' close to the real thing man, especially the lead licks on the last one...In short, I'm fuckin' impressed...
 
Cool gunguitars Greg. I'd stopped listening to Kiss by then - R N Roll Over was my last.
Nice voicing for the diff guitarists.
The boosted parts sound perfect for the part.
Your bass tone is different though isn't it? Was Gene still using the Grabber/Gripper at that stage? I think he was into the custom silly ones by then.
 
Thanks Miner and Ray.

Ray, my bass is a little different on this one - good catch. I actually EQ'd it this time. Lol. I just humped up the mids a little. I don't know what bass Gene used in this time period. He was probably still on Rippers/Grabbers at that point. Love Gun was, as far as I'm concerned, their last tolerable album. 1977 I believe? I'm not ashamed to like those earliest KISS records. They're just solid basic rock and roll albums. And my inner-child still likes the gimmick. Ace's smoking guitar shooting rockets? Yes please.

But...everything from KISS after 1977/Love Gun is pretty much absolute shit.

So I've got one more cover to demo for this album, and it's a doozie. It's gonna be my hardest one - Ozzy's "I Don't Know". There's no chance of me getting anything right on that one. But, all I gotta do is good drums and some scratch guitar tracks so I can probably fumblefuck my way through it. My guitarist can probably do his part in one take. He's a Randy Rhoads retardo. :D
 
While I'm not a big Kiss fan (saw them in '77 and '79 when I was a young lad), that clip sounds great. Of course almost everything you put up here sounds great, Greg.

And I just wanted to take a moment to thank everyone in this thread. I've followed it for years but only recently started posting consistently. And the fact is, my recording has gotten way better and my knowledge of the how's and why's and what-not-do's seems to increase every day and mostly from stuff I've gotten from this thread. It's a shame the rest of the site isn't more like this thread. It used to be back when I joined all those years ago.
 
Thanks Bill. I like your live recordings. Your new setup has me pretty intrigued and I might give it a try myself. Recording a live band in a studio is one thing, recording a live band LIVE is something else and your results are pretty damn good.
 
Oh yeah, one more thing, I got my hands on this beast...



This is my buddy's amp. Diamond Nitrox. Super heavy mega-gain monstrosity. It's got like 40 preamp tubes in it. Well, maybe like 6 or 7. Anyway, it's got tons and tons of thick gain. Not my thing, but I have it because he's getting it modded by another guy I know. So I'm passing it along and I'll try to get some tones out of it before I hand it over to the other guy.
 
Greg!

Sounds great man ..... I'm far behind but I'm stupid-gigging and 95 year old mom-in-law has been in the hospital 4 times in the last six weeks which has me at the hospital all the time because otherwise they will kill your family member.
So I'm behind .... sue me!
:D

More gerg love from me on this .... ah, here's the ride ..... nice pinch harmonics ..... nice solid ride .... I like the presence that mid boost gives it ...... not a lot of gain either .... pretty cleanish ...... very cool!
 
Hey thanks Boob. Sorry about your mom, man. Hang in there and make sure they don't kill her!
 
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