Becky, I see @TheMadman_tobyjenner answered your questions bar this one. This was my little word game. A loodle is when I make use of my looper pedal to record a loop over which I then noodle.
Thank you, I am impressed you noticed. I am enjoying it.
It does indeed. He advocates that same thing. Pick a few notes … 2,3,4 … and make music by getting into the groove (my word for his ‘pulse’) and varying up the patterns of note lengths. And implicit in that is the rests where you play nothing to let it ‘breathe’ (I have to work harder at my ‘breathing’).
As Toby said, in our 3-2-1 we are playing three notes from the minor pentatonic and using a full tone bend to sound a forth note.
It is an excellent exercise and has certainly made a difference to me in terms of exporing more lead technique, being more expressive, and getting into the groove.
@Socio thanks James, appreciate the listen and positive feedback. Now if you find it inspirational then be inspired to have a go. You can take this up without having to (try to in my case) bend up to the forth note. Just getting into the groove and mixing up note lengths, phrases, rests is a beneficial exercise and surprisingly great fun.
@TheMadman_tobyjenner you got it Toby, baby steps to the Simple Bluesy than going all in to one of your funkier shares. Listening back to both, I think overall the second was better but I got a little carried away in the last 40s and played longer phrases with less breathing space, after I think doing better initially. I think one can also use this to try and get a call and response thing going.
Something I have noticed is that your touch with the left hand influences the bend to hit the pitch. Not surprising given that heavy touch can cause a note to sound sharp even if the guitar intonation is spot on. So lots of moving parts to get the bends right and I feel I have made progress and know I have a long way to go. But as you say, the journey is great fun.
@Mari63 thanks, Mari. I think not worrying about finding the ‘right’ notes frees up the mind to give attention to things like bending and vibrato as well as being more expressive, getting into the groove more. Certainly that is my experience. So I’m most definitely not done with this exercise … yup there’ll be oodles more of these loodles and noodles
So when this all started and I saw the 3 notes involved, it immediately got me thinking of an unfinished project, again instigated by our man in Alberta. So it just so happens Stitch and I love a bit of Southern Rock and just a touch of Skynyrd. So the plan was to borrow part of the intro to I Need You but I just could not get it to fit with the backing tracks I created.
Realising that the original is in 3/4 and all the BTs are in 4/4 solved the mystery, it was the just a matter of creating a suitable backing track using the Am and D7. A quick lift of the opening bars from Jacksonville’s finest that was already in GuitarPro and a new track was built on 20 bar cycle using our 2 chords (yes there is a C in the intro but don’t tell anyone!)
So a couple of days noodling around adapting licks and chewing the fat with Rick via message, I finally got the “Inspired By Skynyrd” impro recorded. I had loads of issues with ASIO losing sight of my Audio Interface in Reaper (which hosted the BT) and it took way longer than it should have done and could have been better, as the tech issues started messing with me head.
So here you go. Oh I couldn’t resist a little blague at the end
This BT is just 1:49 in length which I found restrictive but used to target 3 positions.
I will upload that and the others I created, which are 2:19, 5:19 and 10:19 into the shared folder who’s link appears earlier in the thread.
Usual comments and feedback welcome.
Cheers
Toby
PS anyone who does not have a clue what I have been rambling on about, this may help !
Edit : It was 45 years ago last Thursday Those that know know.
I thought I knew and and could put 2 and 2 together. A quick check and yes I sort of knew but not the exact day, month, and year.
What a fabulous intro. Multiple guitar players plus the keys, so much rich texture and delightful tone. As I oft say, it is thse that can really rock that do the best job when going all slow and ballady … not those poppy folk that specialise … just my 2cs worth.
Those waggling eyebrows and delightful homage to one of the all time legendary lick maestros to wrap it up.
Loved the solo, much more than just an exercise to be musically creative with limited notes. Fabulous tone. Especially liked the slide from the first position up to the octave.
It’s another loodle. 2 layer BT recorded in the looper. Amp tone based on the Blackstar warm, clean voice, with some reverb. For those that were asking, @Rossco01 in particular as I recall, turned the gain up on the overdrive pedal, and got a hold of the whammy bar for extra fun. Unfortunately all a bit too hot for the phone mic to handle, so those with good ears may hear some clipping.
Some ok moments and a few not so OK, but again lots of fun while I continue to work at getting back to where I was with the NYLSB solo before the inconvenient intervention of that op.
Good to see you rocking out on this one, certainly giving the whammy some wellie !
You are obviously having fun exploring different options and got pretty busy at times. What I would say it that the bends seemed much better and more consistent to my ears. Watch that vibrato at the top of the bend and make sure you go all the way back to the 5, a little short here and there but moving in the right direction. I have a tip using visual references rather than just using your ears, if you are interested ?
The Skynyrd homage ? Yeah had to be done when I saw the notes, just took a while to suss out I needed a 3/4 BT. Very impressed with the virtual instruments in GP8. Tasty.
Feel there are parts that could have been better and I completely missed one lick I’d fabricated, as the ASIO issues were wearing me down.
As to slow bluesy rock solos, you will not get any finer, even nearly 50 years on. Check out Tuesdays Gone and lets face it they ain’t burning up the fretboard at the start of Freebird !
@TheMadman_tobyjenner
Thanks Toby, slowly slowly I progress on the lead techniques. I hear you on the business, playing phrases that go on a little too long. I’ve noticed a couple of habits that may be worth breaking.
I was also paying (trying to) attention to visual cues on the bends, noticing how far to bend to reach the the right pitch, And that is more or less since I don’t think my technique is consistent which makes the bend vary a bit.
As for the whammy, fair to say I probably over did it a bit but was enjoying the fast vibrato and how it sometimes ended in something that sounded a little like feedback.
As for Skynyrd, I have listened to a couple of the studio albums, but my go-to when the mood takes me is…
Fabulous stuff. One of my favourite live albums, and I do like live albums, especially when the songs are played a little differently, not just replicating the studio version note for note.
A good topic for a list …
One more for from the road
Made in Japan - Deep Purple
Get Yer Ya Yas Out - Rolling Stones
Live and Dangerous - Thin Lizzy
Live After Death - Iron Maiden
Live Era '87-'93 - Guns n Roses
Live 1975-85 - Bruce Springsteen
Guess I am showing my age, colours to the mast on that list
@TheMadman_tobyjenner@DavidP
Loved Rounds 2 and 3 you guys. Toby, that’s an awesome tone, and the 3/4 timing is excellent. David, yes perhaps overdone but I really liked the whammy bar. I took the whammy bar off my strat, been thinking about putting it back on, you convinced me!
A lot of good entries here for the improv bin! Really cool. Rather than comment on any particular entry I thought I would offer a few general observations:
Try and say something. A pretty good challenge in three notes or less.
Keep it to a minute or less. You should be able to do your “thing” in that time frame and also give your session a clear beginning, a middle and end.
You are limited to three notes, but why limit yourselves to the same three notes in same the location? Use the fret board and play that same riff and same notes in another location.
Use the cliches and embellishments that the founding fathers of guitar have passed down to us from the stone tablets of yore. The hammer-ons/offs, etc. Slide into one or more of those notes or some such.
As previously mentioned by sir @Richard_close2u , start the phrase on a beat other than the one beat. Mix it up, shake it up, stir it up, Baby!
Change your tone somewhere in the ruckus. Turn down your tone knob, change pickups, kick on a different pedal, alter your pick attack.
Again, this is just my worldview. You are all doing great, so hats off.
I would share my most sparse lead here but that would be four notes, which I think is a better playground because most of the “boxes” on the fret board are primarily four note boxes.
I now return you to your regularly scheduled plinking.
That’s more like it David, you’ve found wiggle stick goodness - but don’t abuse it! One little trick you could try that I used to do is bend up, keep the bend up and drop it down using the wiggle stick and then let it down with the bend but only as a passing note. Your tremolo picking was good, you’re starting to find you voice now, keep on building up these new ideas and how you use them! Definitely a great step forward
I like your input, Clint, this in particular. When I was trying this over the last week I was thinking about how do I tell a story with these notes. I hadn’t quite figured it out, and then when I sat down today to record something the entire idea of trying to say something flew out the window. Next time. Hopefully.
Those that know know.
the end and work backwards
