I’ve been learning since September 2025 so I’m in my 9th month of learning with JG.
Take Justins advice about dreamer songs and take a shot at learning them. Even though they are above your ability. As a beginner guitarist still learning the basics, you might feel like everything is a “dreamer” song or at least “developer” song if your skill set is pretty small.
I went down a rabbit hole of Damien Rice live performances on YouTube (and haven’t really come out yet) As a vocalist learning to play guitar, he’s been a true inspirational person for me. Not just the singing and playing, but his ability to convey emotions is incredible. Some of his best songs are unreleased deep cuts. My favourite is the song “insane” wrote back in the 90’s while in a band before going solo (And becoming super successful). Even though he doesn’t have a recorded version on iTunes etc. In live concerts people still yell out for it as a song request and he will play it.
There are no instructional videos for this song on YouTube. I have scavenged the internet for resources and there is like one chord/lyrics tab on ultimate guitar tabs I found. And only a few people have covered the song on YT. It was truly a labour of love for me to learn and I’m still refining my interpretation of it. Reading the tab while watching his live performances and making notes, trying things on the guitar, messing it up and playing it wrong for several months, not knowing how he transitions from bridge to chorus etc… I had to attempt quite a few things quite far ahead of my JG modules. Slash chords, a B7 chord, 16th strumming, alternating thumb/pick strumming. Above all. SINGING AND PLAYING. This is a the reason I started learning guitar. I’m a singer and wanted to accompany myself, play small gigs someday etc. I have never even watched lessons on how to transcribe yet.
I am still refining it and will likely never stop. I can’t play it super smoothly yet. Singing and playing it gets rough. REALLY rough. But last night I felt good enough to play and sing for her finally.
She hugged me and cried and said “I’m so proud of you”
I said “This is why I’ve been spending so much time in basement”
Don’t shy away from trying to learn the songs you love. Even if the resources aren’t there and your skill set isn’t there. This is THE hack to BUILD your skill set. Once you go back to 3 chord strumming songs it makes what once felt impossible seem easy…
Here’s the Damien rice performance that sucked me in, if anyone’s interested:
Cheers,
-James
