Why should I learn licks?

Hellwig

Well firstly, adapting licks to different keys & scales & positions on the fret board is obv. going to be a useful skill, and adapting licks is a practical/useful way to increase your working knowledge of all these things, rather than trying to memorize a bunch of diagrams by rote or something.
 Secondly, you can learn em & them adapt them a little to suit your own style (if you know how, ^ see above). Thirdly, you can understand how other players get some of their own style. Fourtherly, they can be a good way to practice a particular technique with something that sounds cool also - the main riff from Sweet Child is a good riff to practice for those starting out in string skipping, for example.

missmisstreater

Hopefully y'all are cool with this - I thought the question was so good it inspired a new series on Youtube!

Sambostar

It's about getting outside your box.

I'm so used to hair metal, rock and blues and how to get the sounds of Lynch and Demartini that I can basically hear everything these days and can play it or sit down work it out fairly quickly, speed doesn't bother me.

So I'm trying to get to grips with the basics of Country and Bluegrass.  Much of the improvisation has locomotive, unrelenting timing and is solely based around loose patterns in the open position.

I should have started out learning this stuff as it's really the basics of folk, country and bluegrass fills and the basis of pub playing with strangers, but same old story,  I didn't really appreciate it at the time, probably because of that locomotive timing, always preferred stuff that was off the beat.

  Although I can make stuff up on the electric like this and pick fast and know the notes, the scales and the modes and the patterns, it's more metal or blues inspired and these sorts of unrelenting bluegrass licks are fairly new territory for me, even though Demartini and a few others builds stuff up in a kind of similar vein.   Also my cross picking isn't the best.

So learning licks, definitely helps your mental perception and co-ordination with regard to timing and note choice and how the notes interact, so you can improvise so much more fluidly.  They also give you more places to go without needing to go anywhere.  You can stick to patterns, but really they are as communicative as scales on their own. 

With these sorts of country bluegrass licks your timing has to be impeccable as well, you might be able to smudge a slide or a hammer on trill or a note break, but there isn't much room for negotiation.  I can hear it and still hold it in my head, but bolloxed if am I used to playing it.

I'd challenge any mostly bedroom blues or rock/metal player to sit down with an acoustic and improvise fast flat picking.  It doesn't take any prisoners.  Everyone should learn this stuff when they start out, it's really why Nashville is full of such great musicians.

This is what it's all about, wish I'd done it years ago.  Hopefully after learning a bit it'll come together quick quickly but still need to work on alternate cross picking and thumb picking though.

Teetonetal

Sporky said:

A lot of guitarists seem to think that music is about historical re-enactment.

If you agree, certainly learn lots of cliched musical phrases to trot out over 12-bore-blues.

A lot of musicians think that music is about historical re-enactment - just take a peek at the classical world. 

So learning licks along with working out what the player is doing, is a good way of building connection from ears to brain to finger. It's an additional element to learn that will help you get what's in your head to come out on the guitar.

Very few people have the ability to be revolutionary in their creativity and earn from it. Lots of people making a living out of the guitar are doing so as a session guys, writers, teachers, covers / party band gigs. Learning licks will help you do all of that should you choose as well as open up your playing.


@Sporky's comment is not really valid imo - most hobby musicians do not push boundaries and want to play in an existing style that they enjoy listening too. Learning licks and whether it makes you cliched is much more about why you play guitar and how creative you are.

Veganic

This one is easy.

Do you want to play licks?

If yes.....