Guitar tabs,electric guitars,acoustic guitars

Last night I have seen on CarbonFiberGear.com, through Guitarz, a great looking guitar that I didn’t know about. The guitar is called The Handle and comes from XOXAudioTools.com. The guitar is made of carbon fiber, with a hallow body that enhances the sound resonance. I find this to be a great looking guitar, and somehow reminds me of Yamaha Silent Guitar.

I was also curious to see how it plays, how this guitar sounds since more than how it looks, a guitar needs to sound well, so I have searched on YouTube (of course!) for a video test. Here’s what I found:

Also, XOX Audio Tools seems that has a whole line of carbon fiber guitars, electric and acoustic and not only. Theyhave a mandolin too! A carbon fiber mandolin! Now, isn’t that cool or what?!

Later edit: Thanks to Dave from CarbonFiberGear.com,  who reminded me that only The Handle guitar comes from XOX, not the rest of the guitars presented there. What I can say? This guitar had all my love so it totally got my attention and I missed this! Mea culpa!

I saw this on YouTube, man what creepy sounds you can make with an electric guitar and a slide…

Today, because I watched a video on YouTube, I asked myself how many ways of playing the guitar we know. Ways like in how to keep the guitar, how to use it, not as in electric vs acoustic or musical styles. However, in some cases, particular techniques can be defined as an other way of playing the guitar, case when I will put a separate entry for them. Let’s see:

1) The normal way

I didn’t know how to call it in an other way than the normal way, because this is exactly what it is, in my opinion, the normal way of playing the guitar: you hold the guitar hung by your neck/shoulder and you pick/strum strings with one hand while pushing them with the other hand to get particular notes. Doh! Like this.

1b) Guitar tapping

Well, here there are many things to say. Guitar tapping is one of the favorite techniques of the 80’s, starting with Van Halen and remembering Michael Angelo Batio’s 2 hand playing/tapping. But I want to put here an other style of music, not hard/heavy rock , but Jazz. See Stanley Jordan’s version of Stair to heaven here:

2) Lap playing styleOK, this one is one of those moments when I am not sure how to categorize it since the position is different and at the same time the way of playing, usually with a metal or glass slide thus forcing me to refer to this as an other (4rd) style also. Used a lot for Hawaiian music(with specific guitars) but also for blues.
As Wikipedia says:

“The lap steel guitar is typically placed on the player’s lap, or on a stool in front of the player, who is seated.

The strings are not pressed to a fret when sounding a note, rather, the player holds a metal slide called a steel in the left hand, which is moved along the strings to change the instrument’s pitch while the right hand plucks or picks the strings.

This method of playing greatly restricts the number of chords available, so lap steel music often features a restricted set of harmonies (such as in blues). Alternatively, the lap steel guitar player can play the melody or another single part.“

Like this:

2b) Playing with a slide

I called this 4rd way of playing (since I consider it to be a different mode, not just a technique) 2b because it is somehow similar to the second because of the slide being used. We are speaking now mostly about blues music, the guitar being hold in “the normal way” while the the notes are obtained by sliding a piece of round glass or metal on guitar strings. Like this:

3) Andy McKee unique finger-style

OK, if you can or know better than me, find a better name for this cause I can’t. Composed of a series of techniques such as normal string picking,tapping, hitting and beating the poor guitar box, his style is truly unique. Here’s Andy McKee:

I would also put here Dominic Frasca with his way of playing, in the same category, in a way. More taping than Andy McKee. Also related to 1b)
Or Erik Mongrain with his lap style of playing the guitar combined with the 2 above. Of course, there is always THE FUNNY AND EXTREME WAY!!! where 2 guys share the same guitar

I ask also my fellow guitar bloggers to help me add more styles here, if they know more. Guys?!! (Jon, GuitarMX, JP, Dr. J,Cary , Ignacio and all of you blogging the guitar!)If you liked this, subscribe to RSS and please remember to Digg and Stumble this! Spread the word! Thank you!

Today somebody entered my site searching for 12 strings fretless guitars. Man, is there such thing as 12 strings fretless guitar? What would you do with such an instrument? What would be the use? The exact use of those 12 string would be for strumming while I would find difficult to use chords while fretless…

Anyway, maybe use it like a mandolin? The mandolins I think that have the strings doubled to sound full and can be used at “soloing” at the same time. Because I couldn’t find a picture with a 12 string fretless guitar, here’s a mandolin!

By the way, if you know somebody knowing somebody who has a friend owning a 12 string fretless axe, let us know!

I didn’t know Benjamin Lechuga since the only Chile music I listen from time to time is that acoustic folk that some Latin America musicians play in the middle of the city square. Actually I think they are from Peru, not from Chile. Anyway, I didn’t know him or his music and I found about him or his band, Delta(playing progressive rock music), this morning by reading GuitarPlayerZen. Benjamin Lechuga is not the regular hero everybody posts about since he has not such a great visibility for the moment but he has the support of Ibanez after winning the Ibanez Project when 17, has his part of recognition, playing with Andy Timmons and a lot of talent, in my opinion.

Find more about him on his website here. Enjoy and comment, Digg and Stumble! Thank you !

Well, this post is about Chris Broderick of Nevermore. There is a rumor on the internet that he is going to join Megadeth, Glen Drover wishing to leave the band due to family reasons. At least this is what some say…

However, this is not the reason of this post. The reason is an other one. After reading this news and watching a short movie with Chris Broderick playing five-octave arpeggios, I wanted to watch more and I did on YouTube. Of course, he can play electric guitars like hell, this it is what he does. He is a rock guitar player, he knows to shred and play both hands arpeggios, right?

OK, fine!!But now comes the thing that made me write this post! Man, this guy really knows how to play the guitar, beyond rock boundaries! He plays classical guitar and I am not speaking about dark arpeggios or futuristic sounds like Satriani does on his acoustic guitar, no! I am speaking pure classical guitar! Bach!



What do you know?Also see some jazz slap but I can not tell if he is good or not since I am not into jazz, but if you are, let us know what you think!

Well, when you thought you have seen it all, think twice! Take a look at this astonishing black beauty, this ESP DV8 Double-Neck electric guitar, 18 strings of violent, crunchy tone, “Mustaine-approved” as they say.

The interesting part it is the 12 strings neck with 2 sides string tuners. Also, I seems unusual to me the fact that it looks like
it has 2 bodies stuck together instead of one larger body, but this is because of the particular shape of the original guitar. However, I must admit this was not an electric guitar that I would have expected to see in double-neck version.

More about it here (no affiliate link, I swear, just the specs)

I don’t know what it’s happening to me but this post is again about Paul Gilbert! And I didn’t even intend to write again about him, I was actually looking for some materials of Ritchie Kotzen and I stumbled upon this video on YouTube where Gilbert plays a 3 string acoustic guitar, all 3 strings being tuned to E… (by the way, skip the 5 seconds electric guitar shredding in order to get to the interesting acoustic part)

Don’t ask me what he wanted to do with it, he says it works well for arpeggios due to open strings. Anyway, here’s the video.

I have just visited Paul Gilbert’s website, www.paulgilbert.com. He has a section called magazines featuring magazine covers presenting him. Used to seeing him with his signature models, it was strange to see him using some guitar that I think it is a Danelectro Longhorn. Check the picture, I think I am not wrong and compare it to the one here.

I think it is Danelectro, no doubt here. Check the round pickguard , the horns and the 2(I think) volume/tone controls plus the switch.

Later edit: searching on Google, I have found the guitar collection of Paul Gilbert and indeed, he seems to own at least one Danelectro electric guitar. Check here the collection and here the guitar itself. However, it is not the one in the picture above.

Considering my previous post here about Danelectro Longhorn could we consider Paul Gilbert as being brave?

I was thinking about every guitar player’s dream, about that part where you are the solo guitar player and everybody is cheering you, loving you, adoring you, in a spot where everybody would love to be. It is somehow like in that movie I saw some years back with one guitar player that was no good, selling his soul for becoming a great guitar player playing astonishing solos. Of course…

Anyway, every guitar player wants to be the bad ass solo guitar in a famous rock band. Every guitar player dreams it….

But! There is a but here… I had the opportunity to go with this friend of mine in ‘97 to get a job (my friend, not I) as a professional guitar player in the local theater big band. He was good, really good. Now, as I have already told you a few times before here, he is one of the best rock guitar players in Romania, in my opinion. So, he got the job as the lead guitar in a big band with about 30 instruments, a band that used to play along the lead singers working for the local theater.

There was that other guitar player there, about 45 or something, the second guitar. Of course he didn’t have leading parts, he was always there but nobody saw him. However, I couldn’t help myself thinking that if that guy wouldn’t have been there, the music would have been missing something…

If you think about it, you can not play a guitar solo without somebody being the rhythm guitar, to keep you on chords and to help you be creative. I don’t speak about somebody playing C, F, G only. I am speaking about a better guitar player. A bit of 9 here, some 7+ there, a small 13 chord, well, you know what I mean… Did you ever notice that if you play with a rhythm guitar who is a great at playing chords, you just become more creative, you feel the music better and you are better, playing better solos? It feeds you with his chord harmony instead of playing those plan C, F, G…

That guy there is the second guitar that nobody knows or notice.

I have been in this second position while playing in Kapela (I am not saying I was that guy that inspired the lead guitar, I was not in such a position, unfortunately). I was there for about 1 year and all that I had in front of my eyes was to be the lead guitar in an other band. Of course, the dream…

I am sure you are familiar with TV shows such as “So, you think you can dance?” Next time you watch it, watch the second guitar there and see how important is that part: rhythm, chords, melody, technique but no glory. Is it right this way?

Take the man out of the band and see how it sound. Then, if it sounds bad, put him back in the band and put the lights on him, giving him those moments of glory that he deserves. I say that because our similar TV show here had such a moment, cheering the rhythm guitar while playing on a large screen some great moments with him on stage. Unfortunately it was because his sudden death  a few days ago, he was 70 or something…

But he had his part. Unfortunately, one moment too late…