curing the blues noodle

blobb

Trio +

newi123

are Jam nights or joining a band out of the question?

joetele

My favourite looper is the TC Electronic Ditto X2. The benefit of either playing with a looper or with other musicians is getting that inspiration from building on top of something simple. In technical terms I'm an awful guitarist despite having played for 26 years, but I just play very simple melodies and shapes that please me and embellish them with some pedals. 

EricTheWeary

My default in picking up a guitar is noodly blues crap . I have played in bands but there seems to be two halves of my brain doing different things. My gigs haven't required particularly complex playing but I've had to learn approaches that I wouldn't normally do and acquire some of the discipline around musicianship ( timing, dynamics, listening to others,etc). Playing a non guitar oriented track often doesn't require much music to be learned. Maybe an intro, short solo, verse riff, chorus chords,etc, and then putting it all together. Being the next Hendrix requires a lot more grit and determination and time than playing in an Amy Winehouse tribute or a wedding band or Bob Marley tunes at a jam night but those things are playing the guitar as part of a piece of music. If you struggle to challenge yourself then get other people to do it - they probably won't think of it that way of course, they'll just assume you wave your fingers and the right notes come out.        

prlgmnr

Do you write your own songs? Maybe that's more your style than learning other peoples.

NelsonP

Also check out elevated jam tracks on Youtube. They have a chord progression and a suggested scale to play over it. They even put a picture up of where those notes are on the fretboard so that you know where to put your fingers to play B Mixolydian. Requires some discipline not to just slip back into pentatonic noodling though.

Fez

HAL9000 said:

Have you considered jam nights? I go to a weekly one in Crawley. Essentially the format is that whoever is leading teaches the chords for a song. (There will about 10 songs in an evening). Then everyone who wants to takes a solo while the rest play the backing.  It's a good way of learning some songs, meeting other musicians, and getting a chance to try some soloing over some 'real' music.

Which one in Crawley do you go to. I am not a regular attendee as I play in a band  but I do like jam nights.

sawyer

But what would we play in guitar shops if not bluesy noodling?

HAL9000

Fez said:

HAL9000 said:

Have you considered jam nights? I go to a weekly one in Crawley. Essentially the format is that whoever is leading teaches the chords for a song. (There will about 10 songs in an evening). Then everyone who wants to takes a solo while the rest play the backing.  It's a good way of learning some songs, meeting other musicians, and getting a chance to try some soloing over some 'real' music.

Which one in Crawley do you go to. I am not a regular attendee as I play in a band  but I do like jam nights.

Northgate community hall - Tuesday evenings.

OilCityPickups

Play melodies ... play the vocal lines of songs (if you get a looper, against the chords of that song). Even if it's a blues song ... play the vocal line, fill in with runs when you feel confidant, but make everything melody related. Try throwing in all sorts of chromatic runs and notes that don't conventionally fit the blues scale ... you'll find out what sounds good and different without doing tons more theory. Play in different areas of the neck where you perhaps wouldn't normally.
Play with partial chords in your soloing ... it gives you a nice full sound to land on and keeps you wired into the chord structure.
Listen to styles you wouldn't normally play and have a go at them ... even if the style isn't your 'bag' it'll help you broaden your approach. 

SimonC

Try to Learn some Johnny Marr stuff.
Even if it’s not your thing, it’ll open your eyes to how to weave chords and melody together.
Alternatively have a look at Eric Haugens channel on YouTube, he’s got some great lessons which have helped me branch out a bit away from mindless noodling.

BBBlues

You need to buy at least 2 more guitars and maybe some boutique pedals. That always improves my..., oh wait.

brojangles

Probably different for everyone but my way through this stage (where you know the major and minor and pentatonic scales and open chords and barre chords but can't figure out where to go next) was playing only acoustic for a few years. Bluesy noodling doesn't really cut it on an acoustic, where if you're playing on your own it's more about pulse and rhythm and, well, songs. It also encourages you to learn more about double stops and different chord voicings and inversions and so on, again because single notes aren't as much fun on an acoustic, or as full sounding. Once you've got the rhythm thing going you can start building the fiddly flourishes back into it and it's a lot more satisfying (and yes by "you" I mean "me").

The other thing that made a huge difference was learning to harmonise the major scale by way of I, IV, V and the relative minors, so you can figure songs out by ear much more easily, which was something I didn't understand at all. I literally went to a guitar teacher and asked him how chords, like, fit together, and he taught me that. It was the most useful hour of learning in my guitar playing experience, speaking as a musical ignoramus. 

robgilmo

Get a looper. (note to self) or online backing tracks.

gringopig

.

57Deluxe

try and learn the outro solo to Since You Been Gone by Rainbow - some real complex Country bends/Clapton crossovers....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eI_7P5q5ryU

Blaendulais

57Deluxe said:

try and learn the outro solo to Since You Been Gone by Rainbow - some real complex Country bends/Clapton crossovers....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eI_7P5q5ryU

Even Danny Gill gave up before the end!!

Grunfeld

SimonC said:

Try to Learn some Johnny Marr stuff.
Even if it’s not your thing, it’ll open your eyes to how to weave chords and melody together.

He's an interesting one for me.  I always thought he was a bit difficult to figure out.  I didn't listen to The Smiths much therefore never really understood Marr's playing.  I was a bit lost... till recently.  The penny dropped as I was learning something completely different** which sounded like Johnny Marr had been dropped in over the top, but over a really clear chord structure... and I sussed it:  Marr's Smith's sound is the top guitar lines without the obvious strumming that you could fit in underneath it.  I know I'm several decades late to the party on this one but it's nice to get there in the end!

** Sauti Sol, "Sura Yako"

bloomer

some really insightful ideas here, thanks to all who've made suggestions. I'm definitely putting a looper on my GAS list and meanwhile download some backing tracks so at least I'll be learning to use the ole blues licks in a more musical context. This evening I cracked out a little zoom recording device I have and recorded myself playing some bits and pieces. The results weren't that pretty, I had a metronome going too and it turns out my timing stinks. On a more positive note I found that after just a few play throughs with the metronome most things improved quite significantly. I think when I'm doing my usual noodling around my concentration isn't really all there and I don't pick up on all the mistakes I'm making such as bending slightly out of tune or not holding a note for long enough so all the notes flow together nicely. Recording myself encourages the concentration, knowing you're going to have to listen back gives that little extra motivation to give it your best shot.

Good tip re Johnny Marr and also Eric Haugen. He has a nice approach to arranging songs and they don't seem too impossible to play, enough going on to make them interesting but not overly technical. I'll have a crack at his version of aint no sunshine.  

rossi

Martin Taylor does a multi part blues jazz lessons that will expand y our horizons .I fake my Jazz open mikes by playing jazzy blues ,especially mixing chords  and lead every  chance I get .Usually blues with some 9ths and other gubbins some i dont know the name of ..I even sing for my sins .Goes down well and will  expand your horizons .I agree blues jam nights are great .I sing and play a couple of numbers and it sorts you out makes you learn to play with others which for me is much more important than being the worlds greatest bedroom rock god according to you mum .