[Black Betty]

or . . . . a good way to practice chromatics. Ninjato if youre out there Id be interested to see what you think of this. This came as a result of a good deal of practicing chromatics and a conscious effort to include more chromatic runs.

http://www.soundclic...p;content=music

[noodle69]

quite a nice tune but a little out of time in places .

i think you may benefit from altering the tone of the rhythm guitar and adding a little reverb.
the lead guitar was a little plucked a little too hard which detracted from the general feeling of the piece .

but it was a nice tune all the same and didnt those things didnt make me turn it off !

[Black Betty]

yeah I know what you mean, I dont think the lead was plucked too hard, I think that I mixed it all wrong. I had to raise the volume of the lead to overcome for the fact that the tone was so similar to the rhythm, in order to make it stand out. I had some reverb on the lead, but I think next recording Ill try to put the reverb on the rhythm and see how that goes. Thanks for the listen.

And as for the time, Im still trying to conquer that. I spent a good deal of time on note/scale/pattern/chord memorization and now I need to really focus on timing and phrasing.

This post has been edited by Black Betty: 30 November 2007 - 06:29 AM

[noodle69]

a bit of compression may help on the rhythm and lead too .but not too much .

i guess if you turned the gain up afterwards it tends to show up any slight discrepancies .

but i still think that it may have been plucked a little too enthusiastically.

[ninjato]

Wow. This is very interesting. First of all ALTHEA is a tune I cover so I am very intimate w/ this tune, so don't tkae my "harsh" criticism too harshly LOL. My version comes out a little more bluesy but one thing if you notice, I try not to lose the melody of the song or the song itself...ESPECIALLY when it comes to an instrumental version because if you didn't tell me it was ALTHEA, I would have never figured it out. http://www.soundclic....cfm?ID=5302714

You almost had it in the chorus but you stall...and then run to catch up. What I mean is you are letting the chords ring out in your head before thinking of a passage so you rush in to make up for lost time. It sounds like what you are playing is an afterthought to the chords you are hearing....almost like a reaction to what you are hearing instead of being right in sync with it because you KNOW what is coming next. More work on metronome. I also think you have to break away from that very standard strum pattern you have and break up your rhythm into more individual components.

Speaking of being reactionary, I also thought there was no lead-ins. In ALTHEA, the song starts out w/ the melody, 2 counts ahead of the chords...there was non of that or any anticipation of that in your version. What you have IMO is a potentialy good "free jam" of ALTHEA after you have established to the listener's ears that it is ALTHEA that you are playing.

Always keep in mind when doing covers....it's ok to do your own thing, but you can't lose the tune. A good way to practice is to chart it out a few times. Once you get the hang of it it will get automatic.

Follow an AABA rule..especially w/ rock/folk tunes.

A/ - Do the song (especialy melody) as close to the original melody as possible. Keep flourishes minimal.
A/ - Do the same thing again but maybe add a little flourish here and there, but don't go crazy.
B/ - Again keep the melody and chorus as close to the original as possible. Don't lose it here because you need it to get back to the verses.
A/ - This time go for it. Add all the flourishes you want. Don't overdo it and don't lose the tune.

The next time thru AABA is the free jam...You can lose them here if you want like Jerry does, but you gotta do it so you can get back to the song.

One of the best tricks in a good song is repetition. You have to build that lick in their ear...that becomes what you call the hook. Your ver of ALTHEA had no HOOK to tell me it was ALTHEA.

All in all, I think you need to really get your timing down. Really get to the point where you can feel the space between the counts in a 4 count. This is hard to explain but you'll get it.

This post has been edited by ninjato: 02 December 2007 - 12:19 PM

[Black Betty]

Thanks for the listen and the response. And dont worry about the harsh criticism, its all helpful and if thats how you feel thats how you feel. I got thick skin and I think I read somewhere that you have been playing since like 85 . . . so as long as I have been alive. I suppose I should have tried harder to reproduce the melody as I hear it. In all truthfulness I didnt spend enough time doing that. I think Im gonna work for like a month or so to really do a quality cover and then throw it up. Again, thanks for the listen and the info.

[ninjato]

For the rhythm you want to do as much as you can without losing the rhythm. Find the pulse of the song and let go and see where your 4 count falls. I try to make the rhythm full but I can't stand that joan baez strumming and say that is rhythm guitar. Sure in some songs, keeping it simple is the thing to do but when using a Jamman, I try to think of how I can "flower" up the rhythm without losing the 4 count.....that's important. It's all gotta be built within the 4 count. By the time I kick the pedal, the loop is interesting.

IMO, you should be able to hear the song in the rhythm/chords without the melody. Those are the important "hooks" of familiar covers we like to do and that people know. Take for example FOTD. Sure you can just start strumming G D Am C D and hope people know what I'm playing or do the walk down on the G scale to queue people's ear to waht tune you are playing. From that point they can follow what you are doing rather than guessing what song you are playing. Playing the meody also relieves you a lot from that way out there improv "what the F should I do" kinda situations. Playing close to the melody also makes it easier to come back to the melody when you need to without it sounding abrupt or deliberate but rather you want it to sound intentional.

Also when I do the melody, it is not necessarily the lead guitar melody. I find that contrived and unoriginal. I try to play the melody as best I can. I may refer to a tab of sheet music for it or do it by ear if its' simple but I like to replicate the sung melody. My guitar replaces my need for singing, so I have to make my guitar be the voice of the melody so to speak. I also find it easier to solo when base your solo on a melody that is familiar to the song. That was waht Jerry Garcia did so well. He rarely lost a song although he did at time sound like he was way out there and BAM he's back into the song...or better yet, another song LOL ..

This post has been edited by ninjato: 03 December 2007 - 06:05 PM