Many of us have had our practice routines severely disrupted by the sudden removal of many key songs in the JustinGuitar app.
Hopefully, this will be resolved quickly, but in the meantime, so we can keep moving forward, I would like this topic to provide a list of “best alternatives” for the most popular missing songs.
To other app users, please post links to the best resources you have found so you can keep working on these songs.
@moderators, I’m going to ask that you be a little more relaxed on policing the “no links that duplicate Justin’s lessons” policy…at least until the missing songs are back in the app.
This one has a full Tab, and some nice fretboard and strumming animations.
Also, note that most YouTube apps have a “Playback Speed” setting that lets you slow down the video to 75% or 50%, which is handy if you can’t play the song at full tempo (unfortunately, this can also add a lot of distortion).
Be careful no to dump Justin into a copyright lawsuit by posting unauthorised material. You and everyone else, may just lose access to all the free lessons he provides. This is an issue with Musopia who provide the app and out of Justin’s control to some degree and theirs’s and also reflects the current state of the music industry, where artists are selling off the back catalogue to all an sundry. And copyrights are bounced from pillar to post whilst investment companies seek to gain the smallest off profits and off load at the nearest opportunity.
If I am not mistaken the image is from Dave at Zero2Hero, who is a good teacher, provides good material for which I am sure he has the appropriate agreements to post.
I am not a moderator but have been here for close on 10 years. I am also not an app user but understand the frustration out there but don’t beat Justin up or put him in a compromising position, just because copyright owners have changed the ball game and are seeking to make further profit on their commodities.
My 2 cents. hey and most folks complain the lesson was too difficult anyway
On YouTube, copyright owner takes 100% revenue. Which is frankly bull and must really hurt guys like Justin & Marty.
For covers that are sold, I was reading about this the other day. Because I was curious and annoyed at YouTube’s copyright claims. There is a standard per copy licensing fee in the USA, unsure on rest of world: Do You Need Permission To Cover A Song On Youtube | DRUM! Magazine
Not being funny here but I never learnt anything using the app. We had this conversation all together after latest open mic and I appreciate app is a great tool especially for beginners but I wonder if it isn’t (excuse my wording) spoiling some of beginners not to try out playing along to original songs/backing tracks without a help from appearing chords on screen? After all this is an end goal isn’t it, being able to play to others without an app running in the background?
I think with those songs that are missing now it presents a fantastic opportunity to anyone to try out playing without an app. I am not sure how Wish you were here was looking in the app but I assume it were just chords not all the embellishments like hammer ons and pull offs etc? Regardless of this track all people should try to print off lyrics, annotate which chords are to be played when and try to play along original track. Slow it down on youtube if it’s too fast, you can change it every 0.05x increments.
Many of those missing songs can still be found on Justin’s website. Learn how to play it from those videos and play along to originals or to backing tracks available on YouTube, even if it’s just a karaoke version. That would be my advice for beginners
For more intermediate folk who wish to follow tabs during more complicated songs I recommend guy called Mr Tabs, he has plenty of great covers play alongs with really good tabs. This is an excellent resource to anyone
I think you would have started a long time before the app was around? I started October last year so started with the app.
Yes it shows you chords and lyrics, but not tab - no riffs etc. It’s moving chord sheet that you can slow down and speed up.
I found it really good through Grade 1 and about 3/4 of Grade 2, I could easily find songs to play along with using familiar chords. Also good with helping beginners keep time. Personally as I got more advanced I stopped using the app and started playing just by myself more, or with Spotify or Guitar Pro. I only fire up the app now to enter competitions as my 1 year subscription is still current .
So I agree you’re 100% right that playing without the app is better once you hit a certain level, but early on it was very useful and fun to play along with songs in the app.
Yeah, anybody can search…but then you have to wade through all the search results and figure out which are the ones that work for you. For a beginner, this can be very time consuming, and you may not have enough knowledge yet to even recognize a good resource.
My intent on creating this topic was to provide a list of the best resources for missing songs that would be hand picked by other Community members…with an emphasis on being beginner friendly, and providing as many of the benefits of the app as possible.
@jkahn, my experience with the app is almost identical to yours.
Super useful and fun during the early lessons, but the limitations become more obvious as you progress, and you start to use other tools, like lead sheets and tabs.
For those app users who might want to start working with lead sheets, here’s the first page of the one I made for WYWH.
I’ve gone to a lot of trouble to make sure the lyrics are exactly aligned with the beat (the numbers between the chords), because that’s something I have to work on when I sing.
I wouldn’t mind taking a crack at helping some folks out and recreate a missing chord sequence for some easy songs that you could play along with spotify. Would be a good exercise for me to help with my transcribing and converting to the open chords mostly used on the app.
I still use the app but started doing some transcribing and playing to a backing track. The app is great as a beginner but playing to a backing track and getting away from the karoke play has been helping my playing. I’m am working on transcribing and playing a few songs that were not on the app. It’s been a challanging, but fun journey.
I am using the app to supplement the content on the Justin Website. For anyone the was using the app exclusively i would recomend to follow the plan on the website. Stinks that Justin has to go back and update the website for any mention of the songs that were removed from the app.
