Hello all, Brendan from Canberra here. Some of you might have already seen my posts in the “record yourself” section, so I’m doing this introduction slightly out of order 
I’m 40 years old and first bought a basic electric guitar kit many years ago on a whim. It was a Fender Squier and Peavey Rage 158 which I’m still using. I think it was seeing funtwo’s playthrough of Canon Rock on YouTube that prompted the purchase. Some of you might be of a vintage to know the video I’m talking about 
I have never been naturally talented with music. I’m okay with the theory stuff, but my ear for pitch is not good, and it seems like I have a hard time learning new physical skills. Back when I was a teenager I got to grade 3 on piano but that was all I ever achieved music-wise.
With my guitar, I never invested the time and energy to really learn the instrument. I tinkered around and tried to teach myself songs from tabs, but rapidly got discouraged. I now realise that I wasn’t choosing songs that were appropriate to my level and wasn’t putting in the time to build up fundamental skills. But at the time my thinking was “oh I’m just no good at this, it’s not for me”, etc.
A few years later, I picked up Rocksmith 2014 on the PS3 and spent quite a lot of time learning with that program. In the end, though, it was the same kind of problem. I kept focussing my time on trying to learn cool songs and tricky riffs and not building up the basic skills. It was pretty fun but eventually I hit a plateau and wasn’t sure how to progress, so gave it up again.
Over the years I had seen a few of Justin’s video tutorials and found them very helpful, but it was only this year, as I was considering getting professional lessons, that I found out about his learning app and decided to give it a go in late April, nearly 3 months ago now. Since then it’s been a totally different learning experience, the structured practice and the gradual approach has been great for me. I’m improving at a speed I never thought I was capable of. Still very much a beginner (grade 2) but the sense of progress feels good and motivates me to continue.
I’m really liking this forum so far, and I look forward to getting to know you folks better.
