Wild Thing revisited, and other stuff

So, a lot's gone on since my last post.  I've been BUSY.  Let's see - my practice schedule is erratic, but I seem to be getting a fair bit out of it.  Recently I've focussed on power chords - I first took that course for it like 3 months ago, and promptly failed to use any of it, so didn't learn.  So, I'm back to struggling with Wild Thing - because it's a song I know and can do, so now I'm just doing it with different chords.  In some ways it feels like a step backwards, but it also feels like a huge step forwards.

So that's coming along, and is kind of cool.  What's REALLY cool, though, is I bought a telecaster kit guitar, and have started work on it.  Not very far yet, but I've cut the headstock and done a TON of sanding.  I had to wait like a month for the stain for it to come in the mail, but it finally got here this week - though I don't know when I'm going to get a chance to use it now.  So, I've been busy with that.  I've also started a community of guitar builders online - we're up to about 130 people or so, which is awesome.  We're pretty much all amateurs, like me, just trying to do builds, fixes, and upgrades on our own.

The community is the luthiers community on reddit

Here's my pictoral log of the build - there's not much here yet, but it will get bigger as I get further in the project

so yes - very exciting.  And a lot of fun!  But it's eaten up a lot of my spare time, and I have been thinking of my poor neglected blog, and wanting to get here, but finding myself too busy.  And now I have two blogs, plus a community to look out for.

Where does the time go?

So, here's me, barely practicing.  And not blogging.  I guess since this is supposed to be about my experiences learning guitar, and I'm barely practicing, there isn't much to write.

So, I barely touched my guitar for about a week.  A couple of days ago, I picked it up and played for about 10 minutes, got frustrated, and put it back down.  Since then, I've been forcing myself to pick it up and play, but it's a struggle.  Probably the real reason I'm blogging now is so I don't have to play.

I want to play.  Really.  I just don't want to suck.  My gal says I'm good - or did when she saw me play last.  But I listen to it, and my tempo's off, and my fingers don't do what I want them to, and there are muted strings, buzzing, and general grossness.

*sigh*

Well, I have to keep at it.  I really, really wish I'd started playing when I was, like, 15.  But, you know - if wishes were horses, we'd all be eating steak.  Or something.

FYI, the new amp is awesome, I love it.  Just wish I could make cool sounds and songs come out of it.

Plugged back in

After my brief stint without an amp, I've gone ahead and replaced it with the Orange Crush PIX 20 LDX that I was looking at.  I kind of love the thing.  It's not too loud, it's got a boatload of effects, it's really nice. It's a very proper, british sounding amp.  Next time, I'll probably get something a little more bluesie, but right now, I couldn't be happier.

I'm getting back on track with Justin Guitar, which I'm pretty happy about.  I did the Power Chords lesson, and got a lot out of it - based on that, I'm learning the fretboard and lots of theory.  It's good stuff.  To me, that one little thing is the most important lesson I can walk away with - which frets are which notes, etc.  The power chords themselves are dead simple - it's one shape, and it can do ALL of them - there's, like, 11 of them.  And, I've been doing exercises - the finger gym and the picking exercise.

I've also picked up a few new songs I'm learning.  Not doing overly well with them, but learning.  Mr Jones by Counting Crows, and an old celtic song, Johnny Jump Up.

Still not getting as much chance to practice as I used to, but I'm at least sticking to daily practice, and doing as much as I can.

Unplugged

Well, hello, everyone reading my poor, neglected blog.  It's been a long time, but I'm still here, still learning, and still getting better.  Sort of.

There's lots of news in my world these days.  I gave my wife's brother his amp back - my intention was to go down to Steve's and pick up either an Orange Crush Pix 20 LDX, or a VOX DA-5.  However, both were out of stock, and I wanted to play some and pick the one that I liked best.  They have an Orange Crush in now, but no VOX.  I'm tempted to just go and buy the Orange, as I don't think it's a decision I'll regret, but it's a bit more money than I have saved at the moment.  It's also a bit more amp than I really need, but at the same time, it'll last me until they pry the guitar out of my cold, dead hands.

So, I'm without an amp, and back on the acoustic.  And honestly, I think it's a good thing, this switching back & forth.  I have a bit more fun on the electric, but the acoustic DOES make me a better player - I can't cheat to get something to sound right.  If I play it right, it sounds good, if I play it poorly, it sounds like sheer hell.

I'm also on (as of today) to songs that feature F in a major way - specifically, Counting Crows Mr Jones. Awesome song, but F is everywhere in it.  Which is good - I need the practice in transitioning to/from F in a song - it's much harder in a song than it is doing an exercise like the 1 minute changes.

Also, I'm trying to get back on course with doing proper exercises.  Not so much with the 1 minute changes - after I managed to make F work with 1 minute changes in a decent way, I kind of abandoned it.  But, I've replaced it with something Justin calls the "finger gym", and also, a picking exercise for picking individual strings.  The picking one is a little boring, but I know it's necessary, but the finger gym - oooh, that one hurts.  I can't even get through the whole thing before my hand starts to hurt.  At that point, I stop so I don't injure myself.  It's a pretty hurtie exercise, but is good for getting your fingers to work independently.  Also for finger strength.  Hopefully it's worth it.

Anyway, I've not been improving with the break-neck speed of when I first started - but that's to be expected.  I guess most people plateau, and get discouraged.  I'm not discouraged, however I AM having trouble finding the time to get in a practice.  I'm trying to do things to inspire myself, though - we just recently got a guitar rack for the electric - one of the wall hanging ones.  So my electric's out for all the world to see now, and I can't sit on the couch without my eye being drawn to it.  It makes me want to practice, which is awesome - but it's also making me want to practice on IT, and, without an amp, it's not going to happen.

So, that's the state of my world.  Things are good, still learning and improving, though more slowly now.  Added more exercises to my routine, but ignoring some older ones which I shouldn't.  I'll probably get back to those once I learn some new chords, and really need the one-minute-changes.

Also, I'm really chomping at the bit to learn scales - I haven't learned any yet, but the minor pentatonic scale is up soon.  It's the Blues scale, so I'm very excited.  Hopefully one day soon, I'll start to learn how music...  works...  the theory, which I know absolutely nothing about.  I think that's it for now - but I'm going to try to update here more often (though I'm not sure if that will actually happen).

Still working on F

F is slowly killing me.  But I'm getting it.  I can do a fairly decent change now from C to F, finally, so there's progress.  I'm working on some new songs, and trying to work on the hardest ones I can.  That C-F change?  My latest song does that change, like, 5 times in a row, then switches it up a bit, and back to C-F for a bit.

My practice schedule - I briefly got it back on track, and then dropped it to do nothing but changes from C to F, and back.  I'll do just that change for, like, 20 minutes or so, then switch up to a couple of exercises.  So I'm still practicing, and working it out.  And it seems to be progress - slow, agonizing progress.  But moving forward, slowly though it may be.

I think I'm working towards cresting the F hurdle, though.  Apparently it's a rite of passage - it's also a work in progress, for me.

F... I'm getting it.

So, I have a bunch of random stuff to report.

F sucks.  Starting to do the 1 minute changes.  Yes, just starting - the last few weeks have been completely insane.  Starting to calm down now - those two really stressful things?  One is behind me, the other I'm in the process of.  Hopefully I'll be able to get back on track shortly.

So, I'm way behind in practice.  I have been just playing (not doing any exercises, just playing "music", for certain values of music) for about 20 minutes, and that's generally all I can manage.  I need to get back on track with a practice routing that includes EXERCISES.  The problem is they are no fun.

I did a full practice today - including my exercises (the finger exercises, as well as the 1 minute changes and basic chord practice), so, that's good, I guess.


I *finally* figured out what I've been doing wrong with F - I needed to choke-up on it a bit, so my barre is starting at my first knuckle, instead of ending with my fingertip.  With my fingertip, the B string falls in a crack of a knuckle, and ends up muted, but this way, everything sounds great.  And I'm starting to be able to do it semi-quickly.  I've noticed improvement even since last night.

So, going better than it was, and seeing improvement again, instead of just hanging on.

Back from the dead

So, it's been a few weeks.  I've been stressed and running around like an idiot.

Of the 5 most stressful things a person can do, I'm currently in the middle of two of them, so my free time has taken a bit of a dive.  But I digress...

I've been working on F, trying to make a decent one I can just hit.  Not making much progress on that front - mostly because my practice routine has gone in the toilet.  I'm practicing once per day, if I'm lucky.  I would like to get it back to twice per day, but I don't know at what point that will happen.  So, I can pull an F, but I can't switch to/from it - I need to start doing 1 minute changes that are F based, but haven't had time to really get into it.

On another front, though, I found that I can do the finger-picking Robyn left me with at our last jam session, and miraculously, I have made progress on that front.  Don't know how - without practice - but I'll take it.

Anyways, the rest of my day awaits - I'll try to say more next week.  And hopefully things will start to calm down in the next week or so, though it's entirely possible that the opposite will happen.