Venting Spleen - A Blues in C

[VikingBlues]

There's been talk recently on DolphinStreet about the search for tone. As well as that endless search I'm also still searching for the ability to play half decent blues. I've been working on bends and vibrato recently and have been getting some good advice. Also been looking at some of Robert's lessons here of course.

I think I've made another step up on the journey (on that never ending staircase to try find the holy grail of a bit of blues mojo).
Fuelled in part by a very bad week and played over a jammer.net.ru backing track in C. I'd be grateful for any feedback if you'd be so kind as to give a listen.

http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=11176528

[Memory Lane Jr]

Hi VikingBlues, Mate I am the wrong person to give advice on guitar playing & technique, Robert is the man for that or some of the other guys & girls on this good forum that are more experienced players than I am, but Venting Spleen - A Blues in C is a really great bit of Blues playing, your tone is sweet that PRS sounds beautiful & in my humble opinion your bends,vibrato & timing are very good, I really enjoyed that. How long have you been playing for?

[VikingBlues]

Hey - thanks for those kind words - if it works for you as a listener I am very happy. 

I'm pleased to see your comment about the PRS. It's the SE Soapbar - I got it at a good price when the range was discontinued - great build quality. The pickups that came with it were 'hot' P90s and not to my taste - too coloured, when I like P90s for their clarity and sustain. Replace them with Tonerider Alnico II P90s and they're everything I hoped for and more - at a great price too!

Playing for how long? ... I played guitar in my later teens / early twenties, but guitar took a back seat for a long time - career, marriage, children etc. When I started to get a bit more time I took it up again (probably about 10 years ago) but not with any huge commitment. Took some classical lessons about 5 or 6 years ago for a couple of years till RSI kicked in. Then about 3 years ago I discovered (through my wife's advice) blues and tinkered with it for a while finding I enjoyed it - realised after nearly a year (!) I could play blues on an electric with fingers and not a pick and suddenly it started to feel right - so I started learning properly at JamPlay and haunting blues forums.

I only feel like I've been playing for real for a couple of years (though the accumulated knowledge from earlier has been useful (sometimes the rest was just faffing about). I've managed to get the pentatonics into my head, found a way to often hear what I wanted to play in my head and play the right notes on the fretboard, dicovered modes and found they made some sense at last. The bends and vibrato have only recently started to work for me though - it's been a bit of a long haul - but I'm an old dog learning these new tricks, and I regret my fingers and joints are a bit creaky and tend to suffer from heavy use these days. 

I'm looking forward to cintinuing this journey of discovery. 

[reb]

VB, like the new one 'Venting Spleen'.  smooth and tasty bends, too!

was gonna leave you a comment on soundclick, but comments were disabled. you and me need to hire a marketing consultant if we're ever going to make the casey casem top 40

[VikingBlues]

VB, like the new one 'Venting Spleen'.  smooth and tasty bends, too!

Cheers - appreciate your comment - thanks! 

was gonna leave you a comment on soundclick, but comments were disabled. you and me need to hire a marketing consultant if we're ever going to make the casey casem top 40

I hear the recording now and think 'how did I play that' and of course the doubts now set in because I'm not sure how - so I wonder can I manage that again? I'm never sure in this situation whether to immediately try and do something similar and in effect try to do it again, or do something different first and the come back to it later when I'll be less worried about it.

[reb]

i will say....i don't know what made me stop obsessing over 'can i repeat that?'. i don't. maybe something jarred loose in my brain, but i don't worry about details like i used to. am i a better guitar player because of it...hahahaha! no. but i'm more at peace.

i was thinking about some of the weird 'jazzy' stuff i try to do...if someone said to me 'what key is that in?', i could figure it out, but i don't care.  playing is my therapy.

....and, YES! you DID play that, and it was damn good, too what's even better is you recorded it and posted it to prove it to everyone, including you, later...

[VikingBlues]

You talk a great deal of sense Reb. Thanks for the advice and the encouragement - very helpful indeed.

'Playing is my therapy' - that is so true for me too - getting into that musical zone seems to leave the mind feeling soothed. Way better than medication.

[Memory Lane Jr]

I have had a couple of goes at recording  my interpretation of  Hendrix  "Machine Gun" But as soon as I HIT RECORD, I HIT all the duff notes. I have noticed you guys recordings sound pretty darned good. It must be something that takes a fair bit of experience to get right. Another thing is I can be noodling around & making up riffs & think to myself " I wish I had been recording that" because I don't think I can remember what I just did!!!!!!!!!!!!! That is one of my problems I can spend a lot of time practising something & get it pretty good (in my mind anyway) then next day sit down & for the life of me I can't get the same thing going as the night before, it is very frustrating.  I think I am too hard on myself I have only been playing a couple of years & I hear some of you guys great playing & think I should be as good but most of you have been into it for a lot of years & the guitar is not something that you can expect to be great at in a hurry that's for sure,unless you are one of those lucky ones you see on youtube that have only been playing six months & would put Clapton to shame. But you & reb are dead right the guitar is great therapy. I started too late in life to become the next SRV or Jeff Beck but I sure as hell enjoy trying YEEHAAAAAAAAA!!!!  PLAY ON.

[robert]

Great job! Just keep recording often, that helps too.

I find it is extremely helpful to transcribe other player's licks. Try and learn some SRV, Albert King, Hubert Sumlin, etc. Just a few licks that you hear them play often. This means of course, you have to LISTEN to them a lot, so that you can really hear these "signature licks."

Then you figure out how they play the licks. Go for easy ones first. Get the timing right, the feel. Then you try to add any of these licks when improvising over a jam track. Do it again over a jam track at a different tempo.

Rinse and repeat.

This is how I learned what I know - listening a lot, copying a lot, adding my own ideas and approach in the mix. Blend well, and you have your own concoction - your recipe for play'n da blues!!

[reb]

...and people will say, with justification, 'here he goes AGAIN!'. yes...

guitar playing, unless you are focused on playing as a pro, or trying to get to be a pro, is 'not about guitar' to me. in our minds, i think everyone has some sort of vague goal. some of us have very specific, non-vague goals. i am one of those with vague goals....but, with guitar and a few other things, i am very specific. i want my equipment to not let me down; i want to not have distractions when i get 'in the mindset of just playing'.

i do NOT want to be a pro. i don't even want to be an amateur. i want to enjoy myself, first, foremost, and maybe totally. i like that i can share what i do with others...but if i could not, i would still play for me.

that thing with recording, MLJ-i am usually aware that it is turned on in the middle of doing something. 20 years ago, it would have really bugged me. sometimes, now, it eats at me some. but...in some book when i was trying to learn about the new electronics and recording, the guy says something like 'it's your time, it's your studio, you can do as many takes as you want, or not'.  this is completely true. i aint payin' some guy to record. i can delete whatever i don't like. i can ignore what i don't like. it's all up to me, and this removes 'the pressure'. i aint trying to impress anyone...i doubt i'm going to...but it doesn't matter. i am doing the whole thing for me. i have to satisfy myself, and my inner critic frequently gets a ball bat up side the head.

i spent saturday and sunday running a rented trencher burying water lines before it gets cold. it beat the hoohoo out of me. my hands are sore all over....hit a rock, the thing bucks like a rodeo pony. i got lots of rock. i had to get the texas toothpick out a couple times (a 30# iron bar that you use to whack away at rocks/what have you).  sunday late i was tired, and trying to relax, and i got Robert's backing cd out...(thank you again, Robert).  i was just doing whatever i wanted along with the tracks...and i got very strange a couple times.  off key, trying to see if it 'fit' with the track. my dad used to tell me 'every wrinkle you get in your brain is learning. try to get as many wrinkles as you can.'.   a couple goes by this track, and i got like 'i'm going to record this'. i have a friend who really enjoys some of my silliness...in fact, i have a couple friends who say they enjoy what i do. this is icing on my cake...but my work on this track started out 'bad'. it doesn't please me for the first minute or so...but the ideas please me. my hands will not always do what i want them to do...they tell me i have arthritis in most of my joints....i would agree it's 'something'...whatever. so...airing my laundry to you guys...here's the track:

http://www.box.net/shared/sohb838c12asv68ll80l

my point is...if it doesn't bother me to share this kind of stuff (and i know it aint pristine-VB has already done pristine, and i think it scared him-it woulda scared me had i done that track, too), then...no one else pays your bills. if you ever get your head wrapped around that idea...it will free you.

[VikingBlues]

But as soon as I HIT RECORD, I HIT all the duff notes. I have noticed you guys recordings sound pretty darned good. It must be something that takes a fair bit of experience to get right.

I have recorded myself playing for a number of years but it was only for myown entertainment. The first time I recorded with the intention of posting the music so others could hear was just under a couple of years ago and it made me very much more nervous and error prone. You're right - the more recordings you do the easier it gets. I do find recording on video HUGELY difficult though - instant tension and stilted playing.

then next day sit down & for the life of me I can't get the same thing going as the night before, it is very frustrating.  I think I am too hard on myself I have only been playing a couple of years & I hear some of you guys great playing & think I should be as good but most of you have been into it for a lot of years

I still have problems repeating what I have previously played (now 57 and played on and off since mid teens).

Great job! Just keep recording often, that helps too.

I find it is extremely helpful to transcribe other player's licks. Try and learn some SRV, Albert King, Hubert Sumlin, etc. Just a few licks that you hear them play often. This means of course, you have to LISTEN to them a lot, so that you can really hear these "signature licks."

Then you figure out how they play the licks. Go for easy ones first. Get the timing right, the feel. Then you try to add any of these licks when improvising over a jam track. Do it again over a jam track at a different tempo.

Rinse and repeat.

This is how I learned what I know - listening a lot, copying a lot, adding my own ideas and approach in the mix. Blend well, and you have your own concoction - your recipe for play'n da blues!!

Thanks for the advice - much appreciated. I think I am starting to be able to have a go at hearing what another player has played and ripping off the idea to some extent. I am very bad at trying to learn a sequence of notes by memory - I think my old tired brain has no spare short term memory working any more. I try and learn it and it's OK thatnight, but next day it's gone. So I have to rely on hearing in my head what they played and hoping the brain / muscle memory works to recreate it. As you say it's a lot to do with really LISTENING - I don't think I knew how to do that properly until quite recently - still, better late than never.

But I love playing - so practicing isn't a chore.

[VikingBlues]

'it's your time, it's your studio, you can do as many takes as you want, or not'.  this is completely true. i aint payin' some guy to record. i can delete whatever i don't like. i can ignore what i don't like. it's all up to me, and this removes 'the pressure'. i aint trying to impress anyone...i doubt i'm going to...but it doesn't matter. i am doing the whole thing for me. i have to satisfy myself, and my inner critic frequently gets a ball bat up side the head.

All very true. Trying to impress is a dangerous risk too - only need to look at reviews/ratings on Amazon to realise even very high quality / high profile players don't impress all the people all the time. The inner critic can be a real ratbag mind you.

my hands will not always do what i want them to do...they tell me i have arthritis in most of my joints....i would agree it's 'something'...whatever. so...airing my laundry to you guys...here's the track:

Thanks for sharing the track - I enjoyed listening to it - and i wouldn;t have had a clue where to start on that backing track. Sorry to hear about the arthritis. I'm a bit cautious about straining my hands / joints because there's a bit of a family history of problems with joints pains. My father was a very fine piano player, capable of playing up to the standard needed for things like Mozart Piano Sonatas etc - but had to give up playing. I get some aches and pains and am careful not touse too heavy strings because it aggravates my joints - expecially with all those damn blues bends. I'd rather be a wuss using lighter strings and get to play till a much older age.

and i think it scared him-it woulda scared me had i done that track, too),

Hit the nail on the head there with 'scared'! Combination of an advance in technique suddenly clicking at the same time as getting a real focus and hitting that special zone when you play much better than usual. Very intimidating.

Got back on the horse today though - dragged out the amp tonight and it didn't go too bad. So I'm not so worried it was all a one off fluke. I guess I should just enjoy it when it goes well. 

[zagatron1]

Y'know, I hear alot of me in what I'm seeing here. No question, I can relate. I definately play for me.  My approach to music is to play with absolute truth and artfulness to the song. That's regardless of if I'm playing live or recording. I know my best years are behind me in terms of meeting and playing in shows with folks I consider big time (My day in the sun was mostly in the 70s!).  I made a few bucks until the gravy train ran out, but I kept some of the contacts I've acquired. I've had jam sessions with guys I look up to. Now it's just for me, but at the same time I have a venue to enjoy and that's listening to you guys. Yeah, Self recording is a disaster as I currently have no gear or ability (recording wise).  My living conditions aren't that great right now. Not much room and I'd rather have all my gear at home instead of in storage. I'll get it together soon. Good job VB by the way! Keep on doin' what ya doin'!

[pictoratus]

Nice playing, VB! I really like the tone you're getting with that PRS.

I hear you about wondering 'will I be able to play that again/how did I do that'. SOmetimes I have to go back and listen to a recording of my self over and over to reproduce something I came up with on the fly.

[VikingBlues]

That's regardless of if I'm playing live or recording. I know my best years are behind me in terms of meeting and playing in shows with folks I consider big time (My day in the sun was mostly in the 70s!). 

My respect to anyone with the guts for live shows - terrifies me. 

SOmetimes I have to go back and listen to a recording of my self over and over to reproduce something I came up with on the fly.

That's the only way it works for me if I want to try to recreate / redo / recapture a previous recording. There's a lot of freedom in pure improv - but there's no logic to it (when I do it) that let's me memorise what I've done - so it's all down to repeated listening to lodge teh original in my memory and then hope my ear does the rest.

My thanks to the two of you for listening - and for your encouraging words. 

And hope you manage to 'get it together' soon zag.