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Showing posts from 2009

6 Year Old Playing Beatles... Well!

I know Ive blogged a few kid prodigy guitarist videos before but this is one of the better. He's got great feel... especially for a six your old. As Ive said before and I'll say it again, next time you feel like dishing out an excuse like 'my hands are to small' or any other cheap cop out - remember this video. The full size Fender Strat is huge on him! Also worth watching through to where he gets given a new guitar, his facial expression is priceless!

Erik Mongrain Teaches His Acoustic Magic

One of the first videos I ever posted on Nail Guitar Bog was by Erik Mongrain playing an all tapping song with the guitar on his lap. I become an instant fan and have followed him since. The folks at Jamplay lined up an lesson with the great man and have juiced him for every drop of knowledge covering his approach, techniques and gear setup. The video and audio quality is top notch featuring multiple camera angles so you dont miss a note. It looks like this will be a regular thing for Jamplay having high profile guest lessons. When you add this to the multitude of teachers they have teaching different styles it makes their month subscription lessons service a very attractive option. I would have killed for this when I was learning (considering the thousands of dollars I paid for private guitar lessons.) Watch Erik's video below and if it sounds like the service is something you might be interested in click the link below and give Jamplay a try for a few months. If you follow the li

Amazing Mouth Guitarist

The skills of beat boxing to impersonate drums has been around for years so Im surprised Ive never actually seen anyone do the equivalent for guitar! Pretty impressive, Im sure his jaw must have been crafted by Gibson cos his tone is dead on :)

Creating The 'Heavy Sound'

If you enjoyed my last blog's video of Devin Townsend's musical wisdom but are more a fan of the heavy stuff check out this video. He digs into the technical side of recording heavy music with a clever tip on creating the 'heavy sound'. If you enjoyed this video check out his old band Strapping Young Lad . These guys define true potential of HEAVY :)

Playing True To Your Heart

Townsend is one of my favourite musicians, period. He covers the spectrum of beautiful ambiance through to mind smashingly heavy like no-one else. Check out this entertaining and wisdom filled little segment where Devin talks about playing from the heart and playing what's true to your heart. You can check out his website at www.hevydevy.com

Multi talented Mika Tyska

So last post I introduced you to Mr Fast Fingers, I hope you enjoyed jamming with him... loads of fun Im sure you'll agree! Check out Mr Fast Fingers brand new debut solo album, 'The Way Of The Exploding Guitar', I just bought it and its a good listen. http://www.guitarshredshow.com/ Creator and alter-ego Mika Tyska is tremendously multi talented also being the animator of Mr Fast Fingers. Still under the radar, I can see him growing in notoriety over the next year. Check out the film clip he did for Dream Theatre's 'Dark Eternal Night', very entertaining!

Keep your Guitar Hero, play Mr Fastfingers!

This is one of my all time fave guitar related sites. Seriously, just click the link and check it out. My girlfriend even enjoyed it, and she has no interest in guitar what so ever! Try the 'lesson and jam', that's the most fun. (Takes a little bit for it all to load, but its worth it.) Click here to jam with Mr Fast Fingers!

Country Fusion Shred Rock?

Well here's a first, I landed on the Candyrat Records youtube page and after watching 3 videos of Steffen Schackinger I bought his album. Great stuff, a little busy on the ears some times but an amazing mix of influences. Country-Fusion-Shred-Rock anybody? Here's one of his more laid back songs.

100 Famous Rock Guitar Riffs - All in 1 Take!

Here's something that is both entertaining and inspiring for ideas of classic rock songs to learn. Guitar teacher named Brodie Cumming put together a 1 take medley of 100 famous guitars. If your feeling bold I dare you to try and name them all as you hear them! You can find the song lists HERE .

Dave Matthews Band - Growing A Chorus

I remember a while back just after getting a hold of the new Dave Mathews album 'Big Whiskey & the Grugrux King' (weird name I know), I switched on tv late one night smack bang on time to see DMB playing playing my fave track off the album - 'Why I Am'. Great energy to it and a cool idea where the chorus line grows each repeat, clever. (45secs)

Needs more cowbell?

This is a bit of an in joke but I found it amusing... Talk to any drummer any drummer and they are familiar with the old gag that if a song sounds like its lacking something it needs more cowbell, and that the cowbell is secretly THE coolest thing ever.

7 year old plays Santana - Chilled

Continuing from last posts amazing kid guitarist theme, this 7 year old boy's playing stood out to me for his comfort with space. It made me realise you dont normally see that. Most 'amazing kid player' videos feature them playing things that are non stop, and as I said last time tend to be about physical skills. Its an illusive element that's a sure sign of a mature player, being comfortable with silence . It's sounds simple enough but in actual fact its not. *Andy puts his hand on his chin and looks into the distance ponderously*

Buy A Guitar, Get Chicks

One of my old favourites, so much social commentary in these 6 little animated cells. I remember someone once tell me the ability to be a good speaker is conveying all of your message in as few words as possible, this is a great example.

Little girl plays Satriani.. Well

With the advent of youtube, videos of young players with astonishing skills isn't that uncommon now. Some of them are technically gifted for their age, where as others really do send you for six when they play with feel that is considered to be reserved until one reaches early adulthood. With the acceptation of a few nerves this young lady falls into the later. To close your eyes you wouldn't believe your listening to a tiny little girl play.

Some Classic Satriani

It's no secret Im a Joe Satriani fan, but I realised I havent until now featured any Joe here on the blog. So here we go, this vid features a great extended outro jam. It's a video that I hadn't seen until only recently. Loads of vibe, tone to die for and plenty of blazing licks of glory!

Your Guitar Can Make You Funnier

Bill Bailey was the first comedy musician that made me realise how damn cool it is to be able to play atleast one bar of every popular song in history and atleast a dash of each style. If not for any other reason, it can be damn amusing! This video features the man better known as 'Papa Gates', as he is actually the father of Avenged Sevenfold guitarist Sinister Gates. He wears it on his sleeve to mentioning it with good humor in his videos. Disclaimer: This might not suit all tastes in humor. If that's you simply enjoy the song references.

Drumming With Vegetables

The is the $50 film clip for 'The Space on the Wall' by Dead Letter Circus. Cool band, funny clip. I always have a lot of admiration for bands who can come up good film clips on a budget of little to nothing. Think Ok Go's 50 million view treadmill clip . Not that this clip is particularly fitting for the song, but the sentiment is still the same entertaining, with out the big budget.

Tremolo Picking Made Easy

Some people find speed on the guitar comes naturally, for other its a little more difficult. Surf guitar uses the technique of tremolo picking (picking as fast as you can) to great effect but if you dont have the endurance in your picking hand for it your likely to konk out about 30 seconds into a song. These guys have found a novel solution :)

Ugliest Guitar Ever?

Many of us start our adventure learning the guitar with a pretty ugly guitar, simply because that's all our parents will spend on a first instrument for us. So it brings me to my point, does Greg Howe have the ugliest signature model guitar in history? Greg could have them design a guitar any way he wants and he gets them to make him THIS? Sure hope it plays well :)

Riff Writing, its like painting

Wes Borland formerly of Limp Bizkit these days heads his own band 'Black Light Burns'. Don't let the negative clout of his former band fool you. Borland has killer feel, ballsy tone and sweet signature model Yamaha axe to boot. In this clip he gives you a cool insight into his take on riff writing. If your a fan of industrial rock like Nine Inch Nails take a listen to Black light Burns album 'Cruel Melody', its well worth a listen.

Like Where's Wally But Easier...

Spot the FAIL :)

MUSE - Forced to lip synch?

This is pure gold... once you know the back story. Big bands do zillions of promo spots when releasing a new album, namely talk shows. Some are well equiped to host bands doing live performances, others are not. A long story short, MUSE turn up for a performance on this Italian soccer/talk show and are told they will not be playing live and must lip synch to the original recording of the song. Taking offense to this (as any true musician would) they decide that if that's how it must be they will do it on their own terms... and swap instruments!

Classic Rock - Organ for Guitar?

This is a sweet medley of classic rock guitar songs all performed by a cool ass band with organ replacing all the guitar parts. Some purists would hit the roof but their just old prudes. This kicks butt and I just had to share it with you! Pretty damn cool how he's got a great big stick coming out of the organ for vibrato!

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Play with your fave band... 1 night only!

This band was come up with the novel idea of having a new fan play keys for them at each location in their tour. They put song transcriptions on their website for fans to download and then choose someone to play live at a gig with them! Saves hiring a keys player :) Maybe not the best idea if your band anything like MUSE or Ben Folds where your piano parts have finger flying all over the place but for a pop rock band like this it's ideal. Innovative, daring and fun. Thumbs up.

George Lynch & Dave Navarro - Jamming / Talking Guitar

Dave Navarro jams with and interviews George Lynch. It's a cool and casual interview where the guys touch on the topics of creativity vs theory, teaching others, playing mannerisms, playing outside the pentatonic box and more. Something that stood out in this interview, that I always try impart to my students is that everyone has a distorted view of their idols . You see them as having reached the top, only seeing what they are good at but not their weaknesses. Its when you watch or listen to interviews like this that you can have a moment of clarity as heros confesses 'Im terrible at this other style', 'I wish I could do this technique better', 'I go wow when I see such and such play'.

Wierdest Guitar Playing Technique?

Ok so its not as freaky as last weeks video of the no armed guy playing with his feet but as far as folks 'with hands' go this guy has got one of the weirdest playing styles I've laid my eyes on. Such an awkwardly curved wrist , yet he still is able to play pretty damn fast even if it does come across as a bit messy.

An Air Guitar T-shirt?

...from no arms last post to this time... no guitar! Im gonna be straight, this invention is in all reality a bit crap , but there is a certain amusement factor so it's worth sharing. What I also thought funny was the fact is was made by the CSIRO , who are normally the brains behind practical scientific developments for the betterment of all man kind... and they make a tshirt with sensor in that makes a noise when you swing your arms in from of it? Who know's maybe it will lead on to better things that bring peace and joy to the world :) More details at the CSIRO website: HERE

Look ma, NO HANDS!

Django Reinhardt is a gypsy jazz guitar icon still to this day for his amazing playing, both in the chordal and lead department. The thing that always wows new comers to his music is when they learn that he did it all with severely disfigured fingers on his fretting hand. Django is an amazing inspiration for anyone feeling the urge to make excuses for their lousy playing with familiar calls like 'my fingers are to short' or 'to fat'. This next guy takes that idea to a whole new level. The audio is slightly out of sink but if you watch long enough you'll see its the real deal... this guy is playing guitar with NO HANDS, (or arms for that matter)!

New Steve Vai DVD - Sept 29th

A sizable and colorful line up feature on Steve Vai's latest live release. All the members are new except Dave Weiner and Jeremy Colson. Interesting instrumentation and some cool 'toys' also make an appearance. Video production looks top notch with lots of angles, panning shots (love those) and attractive staging. Its available on blu-ray aswell as dvd and cd. Links below the vid...

Instant Vocal Harmonies - cool toy!

I just ordered myself one of these awesome pedals, the Digitech Vocalist Live 2. You run your guitar and vocals through it and it creates vocal harmonies based on the chords you are playing. Pretty amazing stuff! I look forward to doing a demo with it and posting it on here soon... once Ive dusted up my vocals a bit that is :) (Harmonies kick in at the 1 minute mark.)

Humourous harmonics :)

Mattias IA Eklundh is one of my favorite guitarists. On top of that I would have to rank him as the funniest guitarist ever! If your wondering "is this guy always this chirpy?" check out any of his other videos and you'll soon realize the answer is a definitive yes! Think your pretty good with harmonics? This short video will give you some homework!

Channeling spirits, before their dead?

I had someone refer to Craig Ross the other day with words of praise so decided to check him out. He's the guitarists for Lenny Kravitz and Im glad to say I was suitably impressed. He really captures that 'classic 10 minute solo that makes the audience all go nuts with its energy - instead of boring them senseless' vibe. As any guitarist knows, playing a long solo and being able to keep the crowd into it is 'tough', plain and simple. What I find amusing is he seems to have really channeled the spirit (and hair) of Jimmy Page in his playing, which is funny cos Jimmy is still alive!

How well do you know your Rock'n'Roll?

Spot the references to band names... Click on the image for full size version This was a great thing that Virgin put together a few years back. Spot all rock and pop references in the image below. Lots of fun and quite challenging. There are over 70 to find , once you've guessed all you can check back on Tursday for answers (in the comments section).

iTunes, called me a whore...

'Morning Motivators' is an iTunes compilation I came across that features a bunch of songs that by their thoughts will make you feel good about yourself and start your day with a go get em attitude. Cueing Track 9, Gwen Stefani - 'What You Waiting For?' It seems like a logical pick by the title. It brings up themes of go get em, just do it, take a chance in life. But things go awfully wrong as soon as you consider the key catch line in the song... Wake in the morning to have Gwen Stefani tell you to 'take a chance you stupid whore'??? Nice work iTunes, I don't think that one was quite as well thought through as it could have been :) See what other not so inspirational lyrics you can find yourself. http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewMix?id=200949029&s=143460&wm=1

Tommy Emmanuel - 3 Minutes Of Inspiring Words

I landed on this this is a recent interview of Tommy Emmanuel and though it shared some good simple wisdom. Its the sort of stuff that some may scoff as being the same old, but when its coming from the mouth of someone like Tommy you realise getting good at your instrument is about the fundamental things like being dedicated and loving music in general. "Sometimes the best advice is not what you haven't heard before but rather what you already know, but just need reminding."

Great AMP, great PLAYER

I happened across a clip of Pete Thorn at the recent Namm festival after hearing lots of people speaking praise of both the Suhr amps he was demoing and him as a player. Gotta say Im pretty damn impressed with both. Pete is a session guitarist with plenty of worthy names under his belt and is the right hand man for Chris Cornell. Obviously a great player like Pete would sound good through almost anything but I've gotta say I was damn impressed with what I heard. Pretty decent prices aswell. Links: Suhr Guitar Website - Amp Details Pete Thorn Website - www.peterthorn.com Below is Pete Thorn demoing the Suhr Badger 30 (jump to 1:40mins if you want to skip the tech talk and go straight to the playing)...

Trash your beloved guitar for 4 million youtube views?

If you haven't already seen it now's the time... well, assuming you can handle a little bit of country music. Based on his own true story, country song writer Dave Carroll flew with United Airlines and his rather pricey Taylor got dealt some major damage in transit. After weeks of delays on his claim to the airline, United eventually blew him off and took no responsibility for the damage. He wrote a song about it, filmed this clip, put it on Youtube and the rest is history! Talk about turning a negative into a positive. The video has been huge, 4,000,000+ views in only 3 weeks! I bet United Airlines are regretting that decision :) Dave Carroll - 'United Break Guitars'

MIDI Triggered Flame Bursts Of Glory!

So if you have ever had anything to do with midi you'll know that the basic concept is TRIGGERING. Its most often used to trigger instrument sounds by pressing keys on a keyboard or to trigger drum samples with an electric drum kit. You can go further and do clever things like set up midi sequence events to trigger the change of guitar patches on pedal boards so that all complex pedal bashing is automated. (Mind you I have rarely seen it done out of practicality... its more a case of guys trying to hook two things together a get one device tell the other what to do purely out of manly conquest and feel proud of his own technical abilities.) So before I get any more side tracked, in a nut shell midi is both terribly geeky and self indulgent while also have the potential to do some really cool stuff. This video is a great example of the later (which is admittedly quite rare!) An electric drum kit has been rigged up to trigger gas flame bursts and it's been used at outdoor p

In the beginning

...and so it has begun, the nailguitar.com blog. The place to keep up with all the updates and news for Nail Guitar. This week is all about the Drum Backings product, the tentative titlise 'Give Me Drums' . The content is complete now I'm busy putting together info so people know what it is, how damn good it is and how it can help them! (Oh and ofcoarse how them can get it.)