Post by grampalerxst on Apr 21, 2024 3:45:12 GMT -6
Hey Guys,
Some of you might remember me, I used to post here quite a bit. 
I've had quite a run of distractions but I'm still around and still playing on a regular basis, although I haven't recorded anything in ages.
I've been through an exercise recently where I've been going through a number of classic rock-type songs with easily recognizable guitar parts and learning at least the main parts of them and gradually expanding to the surrounding parts. Mostly I've been cheating and using tabs but the tabs I have are often not quite right so I do get a little bit of ear training getting them to sound closer to my ear. There are also a few songs I'm still working on--a couple in the same vein that I started on last summer, and even a couple I've been working on for years. I decided to take this approach because of those songs that have been hanging around for years. I felt like getting some new things under my fingers and in my ear would be beneficial, even if older things still remain in the cue and I'm not nailing things start to finish with a high degree of perfection.
The newer songs are:
Aerosmith - Walk This Way
Jethro Tull - Auqualung
Kansas - Carry On My Wayward Son
Led Zeppelin - Black Dog
Doobie Brothess - Listen To The Music
Free - All Right Now
Edgar Winters Group - Free Ride
The Police - Every Breath You Take
The Romantics - What I Like About You
ZZ Top - La Grange
Alice Cooper - School's Out
From last summer:
Doobie Brothers - China Grove
ELP - From The Beginning
BTO - You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet
From the vault:
Rush - Limelight
Andy Timmons - Electric Gypsy
(some others from the vault come up occasionally, more Rush, some SRV, etc.)
I also spend time every day working on what I call "micro technique". Things like picking dynamics, cleaner fret hand technique, bend intonation, etc.
The list might appear more impressive than it is. Especially with the newer songs many of them are still in a very nascent state. Every Breath You Take has some stretches I find quite difficult so getting through the verse progression even one time exhausts my left hand. 16th note strumming has always been a huge weakness for me, so Listen to the Music and Free Ride are still still way below tempo, etc. But I mostly have the sections I've worked on across the list memorized, so they can go into bag of things to pull out for my "fun playing" time, which I do a lot of over the summer up in the woods.
The thing that has me most pleased is that with Limelight and Electric Gypsy I've seen significant improvements over the last two months. They're still both WIPs but I can get through them better than I thought I ever would after being stuck at stages for years.
This may sound a little woo-ish but I attribute the recent expanding of my ability mainly to my ongoing health and fitness regimen rather than diligent practice (I think I've been diligent in that regard for some time, just without seeing any of the commensurate improvements one would expect). When it comes to practicing I'm doing the same thing, just getting much more noticeable results. I must be insane. Some of it is mental/neurological, some of it is physiological.
I've been saying this for months, but as I was typing this I paused to actually get my BLYCU book out. I want to finish it before the end of 2024. The laptop I've had for the last 10-12 years is on its last legs so I got a new one. I think the new one has enough horsepower to allow me to do some basic recording while I'm up at the hideout. I also got myself a POD Express to be my main tone generator up there. I'm hoping to get at least one recording out of BLYCU done in the month before I leave for the summer, and if the setup works, knock out 1 or 2 per month from the cabin. It will be interesting to see if any of my perceived improvement shows through when the red light comes on. Even if I've deluded myself, playing feels more fun recently.
Hope everyone is doing well.
And believe it or not I've actually been spending some time with the mandolin lately. Like I said last week, it's not really a hard part, but on the tiny fretboard with the double strings, it just takes a lot of repetitions to get it sounding smooth.