Monday, December 28, 2009
I recently read John Smit's book, Captain in the Cauldron and in it, he speaks of how they arrived in France for the 2007 Rugby World Cup. He said the team decided to act as if they had won the Cup already. From my perspective as someone watching, they did play very well and I could see they were going to win, just by the attitude they took on the field.

Here's something I take for myself as a musician from that. I may not be the most talented musician currently, nor am I even remotely famous but I am going to act like I am, so that I can believe it and practice and perform like I am. It is my first step into being as great as I can be...
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
It is no secret that I am a HUGE John Mayer fan. Not so much because I am fat, but that I love his work.

I have been trying so hard to get his tone right. I played a little bit with my GT8 and VOX VT50 and came very close to his tone in "Somethings Missing." but now I am very stoked.

I was playing around with the sound of  "I dont trust myself (With Loving You)" and found the Boss Slow Gear on the GT8 can get you fairly close.

This is what My guitar sounds like so far. I am trying to get it as close to the original as possible. I don't even know why I just want to conquer this...

Using the GT8 and the Slow gear effect, quite a bit of EQ as well but the slow gear is set with Sensitivity at 47, and rise time 79.

here's my sample...
http://www.box.net/shared/dt7isgqi09

its a little louder than the backing track.
If any GT8 owners can get it closer let me know.
For the record the Preamp was the Tweed, gain 22, bass 83, mid 60, treble 43, presence 7, level 48
and added some reverb and very slight chorus in.
I took a chance and bought a no-name strat copy. I bought it on the premise that maybe someone was stupid enough to remove the real branding. I guess someone was clever enough to because it isn't anything if interest. Except a really cool beginner guitar.

Everything feels cheap to me but if this were my first guitar I would have been stoked. It also came with a Marshall MG15DFX which is surprisingly cool.

Here is a little recording I did using this guitar into the Boss BR600...


Feel free to comment, let me know about cool stuff or subscribe to this blog...
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
In 2005 I went to the World Youth Day in Köln, Germany. You can read more about it by following the link. I took a cheap guitar, in case it got lost or damaged, as I was involved in music and they asked me to bring one so we could sing songs as well as so I could lead the music in Masses.

When we were leaving for Germany, Tyler, Calvin and I were sitting in the departure lounge of JHB International (OR Tambo) airport. Tyler was playing the guitar and I was playing trumpet like melodies on a vuvuzela. The kids around us were so amused and it appeared to be quite entertaining for everyone waiting with us. It was so great to just be free and make music with no hindrances, no rules and no boundaries.

I made people sign the guitar and just looking at it brings back such great memories.



You can see the remains of Mich signing, We found a brochure on 100 ways to say no to sex. One of them was "sorry, I have sunburn." so she wrote that on my guitar.


We met Brad in JHB Airport. Tyler's signature is there as well.


We met a young priest who always drew a fish. His name has rubbed off but you can make out OFM just under the fish.


I remember Maggie, she was older than us but she was a music teacher. I can't recall where we met her but I remember why she drew the notes.


We played soccer with Jose and his mates from Honduras

Most have rubbed off because I played the guitar a lot on the trip. I couldn't not but I do wish they had stayed on...


Carrying the guitar around Germany was quite a hassle, but worth it all the time. We met a lot of people and in the end we had just over a million people in the final mass. It was astounding. There were a lot of guitars floating around and I was particularly intrested to see some Mexicans playing and singing, it was such an amazing experience.

As we were leaving it seemed we were due to start our departure lounge tricks again. Our whole group of 36 were sitting in the depature lounge at Dusseldorf Airport and I started playing again and the whole group sang along. We did everything from Children's Christian songs to playing The Calling, Damien Rice, That 500 miles song who I forget the artist. It was such a hoot. Even the other passengers joined in. Tyler was drumming on a plastic chair, there was a man in a suit shaking his Tic-Tacs, some women behind us were clapping their hands. It was such an amazing experience to be part of. The music erased all barriers and feelings of shyness, it removed any language differences and gave a jovial mood to everyone in the lounge.

What an experience and it was made all the better because of a hunk of wood with some string on it. I am very glad I took the time to learn to play.
Monday, December 7, 2009
Basically I pan two tracks left and right to make it feel like a wall, but here are the videos...





Enjoy.
Please feel free to comment and also take some time to visit the sponsors of this blog...
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
A short Video Demo on how to Export Tracks using the BOSS BR600

Monday, November 30, 2009
I know a few people battle with this so I put together this video on putting together rhythm arrangements for the BR600. I know the concept is the same for the Micro BR so knock yourself out.




The Song sheet can be found here...
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
I notice so many YouTube videos with sub standard audio. The audio on my videos aren't great, but if I were to use the camera audio as my main audio it would be terrible. As with everything you need to edit and clean things up a bit.

If I talk I use the camera audio. I will be getting a lapel microphone soon so that will be clearer as well but for now I just use the camera.

For the guitar I mainly run into my Boss GT8, then into a small mixing desk and into my Computer.


I use Samplitude 10 as my DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) and Magix Movie Edit Pro 15 as my video editing software.

recording the guitar separate gives me a great clean way to record without external noise influence such as the size of my room etc, so you hear the guitar clearly.

Take a look at my channel and see for yourself.
Yes it is....
Recently you may recall I was playing with a Boss Micro BR. I loved it however I was slightly put off by the lack of variety in the drum rhythm patterns.

I looked up the BR600 and it has a built in, velocity sensitive drum machine. I loved the idea and although I am not sued to fiddling around with a drum machine, it turns out to be easy enough if I have the manual handy.

It has a whole lot more rhythm presets to it than the Micro BR and even has more effects using COSM modelling for the guitar effects and a bass and acoustic simulator for the guitar. The bass simulator is a little slow for my liking so I'd rather use a bass guitar anyway.

It has 8 tracks available for recording and I figured I'd post a sample for you to hear.

I love the mastering toolkit and I plan on playing around with it a lot more. The only problem with this is now that I have used the Micro BR, and the BR600 I want the bigger Boss recorders... But for now I'll stick with what I have.
Friday, October 30, 2009
I got a Fender Jeff Beck Hot Noiseless pickup for a Strat. Its supposed to be a hotter pup with more gain and stronger tone.

The result is fantastic and I also changed the look slightly of my guitar.

Before


After

I need to find a cover that fits the HN.

Inside before


Inside After


Tonally it sounds very cool. I made a video of that as well,
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
I made a backing track to practice my scales. The first one is a simple blues progression in C#m.
The chords are C#m and A. Then E, F# and A.
Download the mp3 from my soundclick page.

Here I was messing about with it and my Strat.


I'll be doing some more soon. Maybe some Jazz and rock soon.
Monday, October 26, 2009
I wanted to see how different the Epiphone Les Paul and Epiphone Flying V sound.



I don't hear much major difference due to the distortion. Next time it will be clean. But the Les Paul has EMG pickups in and the V has Alcino Classic humbuckers in.

They both sound very usable to me.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
There is one great lesson that playing music has taught me. When learning to play an instrument there are a lot of barriers that prevent you from being a maestro straight away.

Playing guitar you battle to get your fingers to be so precise. Then you have to battle to understand music itself, rhythms and timing. Then you try get even better and play faster, with different techniques, bending notes, vibrato, hammer ons and pull offs. You see masters playing amazing pieces of music and you want to do it so you try and try and you practice for hours until you can do it to.
we focus so much on the final result that all the work in between is nothing to us, it is a few steps we take to achieve our goal.

Why, then, do we look at other areas of life and not try as hard at it. School, University, Maths (I had to throw that in there), Sports, work, relationships, ourselves? We have proven that it is easy, there are only a few steps.

  1. Identify what you want
  2. find out what steps you need to take to get there
  3. Do it
Isn't it simple. Sure, maybe the steps may seem difficult, but if there are millions of musicians in the word, millions of athletes millions of successful people, why do we still think we can't do something, when in fact, we can do anything!!!
Monday, October 12, 2009
Zerothirtyone recently went into Andiamo studio to record ourselves a demo.

We asked Neil Snyman to do it for us as most of us had worked with him before and he is one of the best around. (Plus he's a mate and a genius)

Our aim was to spend as little time and money as possible but to get the best quality recording for our bucks. We chose to do it live, seeing as we had 5 songs to do it should have been quick, and it was. Some of the songs we did in one take, with vocals being done over afterwards.

I wasn't entirely happy with my guitar parts but they will do for a demo. I'm sure with an endless budget we could spend weeks in there doing take after take in small patches. Kudos to the band, what a tight bunch to have done so much in such a short time, especially with Gareth having to use an electric kit. It must be a drastic change moving from an acoustic kit to an electric kit in such a short time with no practice on it.

I'm looking forward to hearing the final mixed product and then we'll take over the world from there...


Brendan and William


Steff doing his ting


Me in my Corner


Annien "Onion"


Gareth Rocking it up

What an absolute jol. I could do that all day every day....
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
I pulled the tread plate off the V. It was stuck on with double sided tape. The Goth Epiphones have a matte finish so any damage can't just be polished away.

It was quite difficult getting the plate off and in places the paint was slightly damaged but I got most of it off without much trouble. The main problem was getting the glue off the paint that was left behind by the tape.

I used Industrial methylated spirits and a lot of slow rubbing with a cloth. I did eventually get it all of.

I was also glad to see no electrical damage so the main problem was appearance. I then changed the nut and set the intonation and action. Next step is to redo the paint but I have too many guitars to think about that now.



Monday, October 5, 2009
This weekend we tried to break the world record for the most guitarists playing together. The record is held by a group in Germany with 1802 guitarists playing at once. I think in Durban we had over 1600 registered but only just over 1000 pitched.

It is stipulated to play Smoke on the Water which I guess most people weren't happy with but it was loads of fun.
There were some of Durban's best muso's out and about including Tree63's John Ellis, Steve Fataar and local guitar hero Barry Thompson. One of my Swell Bad Mates John Skuy was playing bass in the stage band and the guys from Zero thirty one were there as well.

It was good fun, if it happens in your area I suggest doing it. Even just to see some of the interesting guitars that pop up. I was astounded by the variety of people playing there.

enjoy the pics..


Zaine Higgins (right) and I


Richard Davies and his prize JEM guitar


Part of the crowd


More of the crowd


John Skuy on stage


The Helicopter that took our picture to count everyone


A group of youngsters at the "gig"
I wanted this photo because it shows how diverse the crowd was.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Well it has been incredibly busy lately, not on the blog but in general.
I have now moved home, had to get my new Internet connection up and running, thanks to cybersmart.
I also have some new gear, I bought a mexican power strat, a Vox VT50 and a Boss BR600. I need to play with all of them a little more so soon you will hear sound clips etc.

I have to get playing soon so I'll get into this soon again, if anyone out there cares?
Thursday, September 10, 2009
I currently play in 2 bands, Swell band, and Zero thirty one.

Friday night (4th September) ZeroThirtyOne did our maiden gig at the Winston Pub. It was rocking!!! I got the flying V into a playable shape and used it on the night. Aside from being an odd shape that guitar plays amazingly well and I am proud to say I rocked out that night....



But it was short lived by an outside gig I did the next day. I plugged in my GT8 and found it was broken. The volume control had been pushed into the chassis and broke off the circuit board rendering it unusable. It is fixable but I will advise you all (anybody out there?) what happens
The wind was howling that day and I found it messed with the resonance of my guitar. Strangely enough it stopped my strings from vibrating as much as they normally do and I sounded terrible. I will have to experiment with this phenomenon and conquer it. Until then I'm afraid outside gigs are a bit much for me.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
I know that's a bold statement but I truly believe it.

If you look at what can be done on a guitar, try and find another instrument that you can do so much on. It has a greater range than most, except a piano, You can play slow, fast, single notes, chords, pick chords, strum chords. Buy playing with a pick it sounds different, if you use your fingers and have nails it sounds different, you can get percussion going, you can have harmonics in almost any position and you can pretty much cover for a whole band on that one instrument.

With most instruments you have variations in design, but they still sound the same. a guitar can sound so very different with steel strings, nylon strings, a deep body, a shallow body, fibreglass bodies, wood bodies, painted, treated, eaten by worms the variations are amazing.

That said I have to elaborate on Tuck Andress. He is one of the few guitarists I watch and I still want to play guitar. I find him interesting, inspiring and downright incredible. I'll let his playing do the rest.




Your Honour, the defence rests
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
I am getting myself an Epiphone Flying V. It is the Goth Series and made in 2002.

I like second hand guitars. They tell a story. I also particularly like guitars that I have to restore a little. It makes me feel like I have rescued an orphan that was being abused.










Now the next thing to do is take off that metal plate stuck on the front and restore it to the original goth beauty. I love the roman numeral inlay on the 12th fret.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Last night I played at the Blues Train with Swell Band at Zack's on Wilson's Wharf in Durban. I've been going on and off to watch some of the finest older musicians around play for a while. They are very good and it's a little intimidating to play in their company and I felt a little like I didn't belong there. That turned out to be one of my downfalls.

We were unprepared as a band and had no idea what to play or how we were going to. So we just hacked through some numbers we thought were bluesy enough.

I used someone else's amp which is never good for me. I found my tone wasn't the way I wanted and the GT8 responded differently to this amp. Although that was the least of my worries, I forgot all the chords. I had a shocker of an evening. Thankfully it was short.

My learning points were;
a) don't be intimidated by your surroundings. You deserve to be there.
b) Practice at least once, if not have some sort of discussion before or a plan in place.
c) Check the gear. I tell myself this all the time and I don't practice it. I like my amp and I know my amp so I should use my amp.

All in all, I had a rough one. I got a few compliments which means it was worse by my standards than others. But we are booked there again in September so I can implement my learning's.

The one thing I know above all is that Swell Band is good. We had an off night, so what. We all had our moments and I had a good, blazing solo in "Holding Back the Years." Most importantly, we live and we learn. Rock on!
Monday, July 20, 2009
This weekend I played at the Awakening as part of Nelisa Kala's band. We've been working for a few weeks to put together this show (hence the quiet blog).

We have a good band with very talented musicians, Keith Naidoo on guitar, Lazarus Pillay on Keys and Ross Viljoen on Drums.

We had some issues that we could learn from this weekend.

Friday: We arrived to do a sound check to discover they had a 6 channel sound desk with 2 monitor sends, they had no monitors and their equipment was shocking. One would normally expect a theatre to have top level sound systems and be well equipped for anything. We took it for granted that the venue provided what they said they would. As a result we had to fix it by borrowing equipment and using a separate feed as monitors and to try boost the quality of the house sound.

Saturday: The gig went very well. Keith played outstanding solo's and people loved it. Nelisa did something amazing in that she forgot the words to one of her poems but she covered it so well and nobody was the wiser. Being a professional is not about never making mistakes, it's about being able to handle them. The crowd LOVED the way she did so that night. She was brilliant and it showed in the audience reaction.

Sunday: we had a substantially smaller crowd. We were comfortable with the venue and sound by now so we were set to have a smooth gig. Keith had issues with his pedal which was buzzing badly every time he tried to change effects. This, of course, happened mid song. There are a few learning points here that we can look at.
  1. check your gear before you play. If there are any problems that can't be fixed, and if there is a chance it would happen in the set, remove it and make do. A clean guitar solo can be just as effective as an over driven one. It is also impressive at times to see just raw guitaring. While effects can add to the ambiance, as long as your guitar works you are able to play.
  2. Nelisa had walked over to the opposite side of the stage to give Keith focus at his solo time. That's when his gear failed so he could do nothing. She could have turned her focus to either the keys or even the bass to fill in the solo gap. Take the focus off the problem and get the audience looking somewhere else so the problem can be sorted out on the side.
  3. When a lead guitarists gear fails on him, there is obviously a big gap. Other guitarists in the band should be able to cover the empty space. Again, get the focus off the problem so it can be handled quickly. If not another guitarist, the keys, bass or even drums can sort it out. You should generate a good enough feel for each other so you know who will step in if something goes wrong.
These are all things you learn from experience. I hope you can learn from my experience so you avoid embarrassing situations in front of your fans or potential clients.

Keep an eye out for Nelisa Kala and the Awakening. We'll be doing the rounds soon enough and it is something definitely worth watching.
Friday, July 17, 2009
I was playing bass on a Fender Bassman 100 recently. It had a constant annoying hum, but when the lead was unplugged or muted it went away. I asked the owner if he knew what the problem was and he said it had been like that since he got it.

It was being used in a church. On the stage each instrument is connected straight into a DI box, the signal is then split. One to the desk, and one to the amp for monitoring.

what happens with some DI boxes is that the desk supplies phantom power. It sends 48V up the cable to the DI box. In this case the phantom power was passing through the DI box and being fed into the amp, thereby creating the hum.
when I flicked the ground switch, the power was no longer passing through the DI but was being used up instead so the humming went.


I had a Fender Bassman 50 previously and it too had an annoying hum. although I never used a DI box the ground switch on that amp too was in the wrong position. If you have a hum, check that first before you start replacing costly parts. It could save you some good time and money in the long run.
Monday, June 8, 2009
When I learned to play guitar I never bothered learning to read staff notation. As a result every time I wanted to learn a new song I had to hear it, memorise it and then try play along with whatever guidance was given to me, which was usually either "fake books" or Tabs. Recently I have been reading and the best way to explain it is like this:
If you speak mainly English and try speak another language, like German, there are subtle nuances and pronunciations you will miss out. I went to Germany and was given a basic run down of phrases, like how to order a beer, "Ein Bitter." I was even taught to count and got given a dictionary with a few phrases.
I got lost one day looking for Mülheim. I asked a lot of people how I could get there and nobody had heard of it. After asking everyone one guy looked eager to help so I showed him the map, "OOooh,"he exclaimed,"M(ule) heim. That's round the corner."
I was utterly disappointed that all those people couldn't help me, but I was saying, "Mullheim," when it was supposed to be pronounced, "Muleheim"
I had completely failed to communicate. While I had learned a few phrases, I certainly wasn't well versed at communicating, like I though I was.
Music is another language altogether. We can speak it, play it, write it and read it. By writing a letter in English, we have the ability to communicate well with other English speaking people. When we write down a piece of music, a musician (who can read!) will pick it up and play it exactly as you wrote it.
If you learn the language of music fluently, you will be able to create, understand and communicate in a language of Gods. Once you know the language you can make people feel how you want them to, think what you want them to. You can make people fall in love, be excited or you can make them scared, sad or angry.
Yet so many of us try to learn a few phrases, then we try communicate anything and everything we feel. Sometimes we get lucky but one has to look at great composers and wonder why they never had a song consisting of only 3 chords.
At least we'll always know where the bus station is.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
One of the outstanding tasks for the Ibanez RG was to get the Trem arm which was proving rather difficult. In the end I popped into Coastal Music to see what they had. Oddly I was told there was nothing but Dieter dragged me into the back room where they had all sorts of parts and we found what looked like a trem arm for a strat but it fit my guitar. He gave it to me for nothing.
Seeing as I was so stoked I decided to look at their Classical guitars.
Now I've been in the market for a good Nylon string for a while now. Since I sold the Bassman I also had the cash on hand for it. Now a really good Nylon String could set you back a few thousand rand, I had a limit of R2000, less because I wanted a bag with it and some spare available for strings. That didn't leave me with much of an option.

I believe every guitarist needs a good Acoustic-Electric. It gives you another dimension in your music, not everything must be loud and thrashing, there are times when people want to see you play without major 'electronic assistance.' I wanted a Nylon string because I love the mellow sound, and I also love playing with my fingers. It is not the guitar for everyone but I enjoy it immensely and I feel it gives me a competitive edge over other working guitarists in the area who all run the risk of sounding the same. Think "Rodrigo y Gabriella" vs any rock band you hear doing unplugged, aside from Incubus' "A certain shade of Green" that was phenomenal.

I played a Crafter at Turnkey Music which was OK, but on further jamming the action was a bit high and the price was over my budget. I also tried the Ashland guitars which were within the price range but not good enough so I left it.

My previous classical was an Aria which I liked the action and feel, but at the time I had just acquired an Ibanez which had much better electronics and sound, although the action, once again, was a bit high.

Back to Coastal Music, I was shown a few, there were some nice Ibanez guitars and they are reasonably priced for the quality. I had put Coastal Music in the category of stocking only expensive to very expensive guitars but to find a fair range from R1500 to R2500 was impressive.
I was shown a second hand classical which was OK, I would have taken it at R1495 and played it for a short while in the shop.
Then I was handed the G5ECEAM. It is a budget Ibanez Nylon String with a piezo pickup and AEQ200T Preamp with a built in Tuner. Now, that's all a bunch of useless numbers, but this guitar had a great sound, great feel and was priced at R1700.

I'm not too sure about how the business side of music shops work, and maybe they picked up my reluctance to pay that much for this guitar, but I was offered a good discount and bought the guitar and a cheap carry bag for R1550.
What a deal!

Now there isn't much that stands out from this guitar, in fact it feels very much like the guitar I first learned on. Maybe that's what I love so much about it. It feels like home, but it has a few features that my first guitar didn't have.


As a kid I was fascinated by the decoration around the sound hole, I believe it's called a Rosette. I haven't paid much attention to them but in the process of scrutinising the guitar for this blog, I noticed that while this one isn't striking, it reminds me of the quality finish old guitars have and it gives me that little bit of useless nostalgia and reminds me of watching my father play.




My early guitars never had a cutaway, which never mattered as I never ventured into that region of the fretboard as much as I do now.

The preamp is fairly decent, with a 2 band equaliser (bass and treble) which I still need to figure out the right settings for when I do use it. I generally play into a PA system. The general rule is that you need a balanced input into a PA which I never needed for my previous Ibanez which had a balanced output. This guitar doesn't have that, I wouldn't expect it to for the price although I have noticed that I could previously get away without a DI box but with this guitar it is necessary. There is a hum present that goes away when the signal is balanced.


What I found amusing is that inside the guitar is written "Salvador Ibanez" then something that looks like Spanish. Not far beneath that it says "Made in China." Mind you, as Chinese products go I think it will be a while before they get some respect (much like blonde's and the Irish) but this is a very good quality item so far. They have done well to keep the look, sound and feel like a hand made Spanish guitar.
Overall I feel this guitar is exactly what I was looking for. It is a quality instrument, well built and sounds great. It feels easy to play and makes me want to play more, exactly what I expect from a guitar. Ibanez have done very well to provide a low price instrument and they will ensure that everybody can play a great guitar, unlike other manufacturers who are extremely overpriced and lacking in the quality you expect.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
In case you're wondering I thought I'd tell you about my gear.

1990 Squier Stratocaster
I bought this guitar off a friend of mine in 1999. He had a similar design in stuck on Vinyl, i just painted it on rather badly. It needs a bit of a clean up and now that I have more guitars I can afford to "decommission" them one by one and get them up to scratch. The N Series Squiers were remarkable and the neck on this guitar is pristine. It still has the original pickups and I reckon its about time for new ones. I am thinking of the Jeff Beck Noiseless pups. I love the tone and feel of this guitar and it was my first that I bought myself.








2006 Epiphone Les Paul 100
I found this guitar online for very cheap. I had a Les Paul Special before which was absolute rubbish. The difference between the LP100 and other Les Pauls (excluding the studio) is that the body of this guitar is very thin and excludes binding. This makes it a lot lighter than a standard Les paul but with similar electronics and neck. One major flaw in these is that they are made very cheap. I am changing the selector switch as it doens't work 100% and the D and G strings go out of tune after a song or two of heavy bending. New Machine heads are on the cards but I am going for grover Rotamatics when I have the budget available. I love the tone but I don't give full credit to the pups on this baby. They are standard but sound very sweet. I may keep them on. I also like the finish on this as it looks great

You have seen my Ibanez.

The amplifier pictured with the Strat is a Fender Bassman 50, made sometime in the 70's. It was black I recovered it with white vinyl and it looks sweeeeeeeet!!! I recently sold it as it was too big for me to use in gigs and I have a small car and an even smaller apartment.

I currently use a Laney TF200 amp. I'll get a picture sometime soon. Its a standard 120W combo amp with two lead channels (that I dont really use) and a Spring reverb unit which is quite nice.

For effects I have the Boss GT-8 effects processor. I am still learning to use it but the more I play with it, the more I learn. It is a superb item and is definitely cheaper than buying even 10% of the effects it holds.

I am in the process of getting a Boss Micro BR recorder. I say in the process as it belongs to a friend who wants to sell it and I am playing with it at the moment. It is a fantastic item and I will write more about it soon.

Feel free to tell me about your gear, I love guitar stuff in all shapes and sizes.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Well in the interim there are some people that impress me greatly, mostly for different reasons but I think they rock.

Andy Mckee
I found this video on Youtube and was amazed. He totally defies traditional guitar playing. There are videos where he plays normally but the creativity here is amazing.





Tony Melendez
For a guy with no arms he plays with Spirit. He has a beautiful voice too.

Orianthi
Man this girl can play! There aren't many spirited musicians around like this these days.


Tal Wilkenfeld
Anyone who gets to play with Jeff Beck must be good, but I reckon Jeff Beck is more stoked to be playing on stage with her than the other way around.


Then there's this....

I love it.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
I bought an Ibanez (I don't care how you pronounce it, I say `eye`bun`ez and people correct me saying `e`bunez. It wasn't made by apple or the Zulu's) RG470 made in the mid 90's.
It was fairly abused so I took it for under R2000. If I consider that Glenwood Village music were willing to give me the new RG, not sure which one i assume it was the bottom range for R2500 i think mine wasn't at a bad price with a hard case.

When I saw it there was one of the three locking nuts and the tremolo arm missing. The pickups had fallen in through the mountings and when I tested it the switch didn't work so well. Yet I took it anyway. I was feeling generous as it was a student selling it and money tends to burn a hole in my pocket.


I also love the colour blue although I might just end up getting it resprayed a more metallic colour... yum!


I'm not sure how many people do this, but I always have big regrets after buying anything, especially if I can't start the repair process immediately.

On further examination I found the pickup mountings were wrong, taken from a Les Paul and the pups were screwed into the body with big self tapping screws. I took those off and discovered the two humbuckers are DiMarzio's. Not sure which ones but that's a definite upgrade from the Ibanez pups. If I can get this guitar playing and sounding even close to the Ibanez Steve Vai signature series, the JEM's I will be stoked. The neck is similar so I'm nearly there...

When I started pricing parts, the guys at Glenwood village music have been helpful, particularly Grant Lazenby who they say is their expert at Floyd Rose Trem guitars. He gave me some good tips and I found I don't need the genuine Ibanez part that the Mighty Mite ones could fit and are way cheaper. So far I have a new set of locking nuts and the pickup mountings. I am still looking for the appropriate Trem arm.

Mounting the pups proved to be a bigger mission that I thought it would. The holes in the bracket were damaged so I had to fill them in and re-tap it so I could adjust the height. So far so good.


I put new strings on as well. I used 10-46's as it was set up for them anyway but I see now 9-42's would be much better. I like the light touch that would accompany this neck. This guitar has the Wizard II neck which is a 3piece maple construction and a rosewood fretboard. I favour rosewood as I find it softer on the fingers and the eyes. The neck is out a bit so I am going to need to adjust the Truss rod.
















There is one piece of hardware that I do not like touching, and that is the truss rod. We are generally hard on things like nuts and bolts and do our best to make them as tight is possible. with the truss rod it is best to be very gentle and very patient. Going in quarter turns is best and remember loosening allows the neck to move upward from the string tension and tightening pulls it back.
So after I replace the selector switch, volume pot, and after the neck adjustment, Pickup mountings, lock nuts and trem bar replacement I'll have a near new guitar and I will definitely have a special attachment to it.













Remember that whatever maintenance you do on a guitar, find a manual and follow the specifications given. Unless you are a luthier you will need some sort of guidelines. Trying to wing it is not a good idea and can be expensive if you botch it up.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Hey,
I play in a cover band called Swell. In fact its more of a corporate band as we are not specific to any genre. I will get into the band more as this blog develops but for now you only need to know that we are developing as a band and we regard ourselves as professionals and hold our trade in high esteem.

We played at HighField House in Hillary, Durban on Friday night (22 May 2009) it was a quiet evening and we were ready to do our usual 3 sets. Bearing in mind this isn't exactly a music venue we had to improvise on our placement (read squeeze into a corner) but our sound was once again very good thanks to Niel Snyman.
Highfield house is a small conference/wedding centre with a lovely garden and a great atmosphere. They set up braais for everyone to cook on and it felt like a family gathering. There were children and dogs running around, it just felt like home. ( I also had what I rate as the BEST roasted potatoes ever!)

I had a few problems at this gig I want to mention so others can learn from it;

Steve Fataar was there. He's a very nice guy but as far as my playing goes I've always felt like a hack. In other words I can cut it when there are no muso's around but as soon as someone I consider to be a real guitarist is around I get more nervous and worry that I will be uncovered and pointed out as a novice. I'm not sure why this worries me, I think it is my lack of formal training but I must learn to get over it. He was very nice though and he gave me a piece of advice which I think is very valuable to any and every guitarist.
A sound engineer will mix your levels to how HE sees fit. So if you are playing with your guitar (especially an acoustic guitar) at max volume on your preamp that is as loud as it will go. So do a sound check with your volume slightly lower, that way when you play and you need to break into a solo, you can crank it up slightly so you can be heard.

Not all sound engineers will mix the same as well, if your engineer is a drummer for example, he will favour the drums in the mix, as a pianist will favour piano, a singer vocals and a guitarist the guitars. You need to know who you are working with. Thankfully Niel is very good and his mix comes out beautifully, but he isn't at the desk to turn me up when I need to solo so I need to make provisions for that in the future.

I had a technical problem which you also need to be aware of. I was playing a nylon string semi acoustic guitar. The pre-amp runs on a battery like most of these instruments. I did two things wrong here, I bought a cheap battery and never carried a spare. what happened was that the battery died mid song. The result was that I started out hearing myself clearly then halfway through the song I couldn't hear myself at all. Batteries are funny objects, when a battery is running low, the chemicals inside are still reacting and once it has generated enough voltage again it send out the current, once again draining all energy from it. This resulted in me having surges of volume in the song. The guitar would be soft one second and loud the next. It's not an easy thing to control.

The last issue I had is a bit of a gripe... I have a pick holder that is on the mic stand and I have a few picks stuck in there in case I drop one. During one of our breaks someone pinched 2 of my picks. Now I'm not sure what to think, did someone think I was that good and wanted a memento? Or is someone that cheap that they have to steal a pick from a mic stand when nobody is looking. I'll take the first option though, so thanks to whoever took them, I feel like a rock star...

Until next time, rock on and if you're in the Durban area pull in to Highfield House for next time we play.
Welcome to my ramblings and scribblings. If you are interested in music, guitar, recording and performing live then I hope to make this interesting for you.

I am an average guy living an average life but with above average ambitions. I started playing guitar when I was about 12 but never went for any lessons. I do regret that decision but as a youngster you sometimes don't know your real ambition until much later. I played at church since then in a small folk group which isn't very challenging as a guitarist, but certainly tough on your patience and discipline. It is hard to play C-Am-F -G over and over again...

You will get to read about some of the bands I have played in and what I have learnt from them. I have always learnt something and I encourage everyone to do the same. Always try and learn something from everyone.

I live in Durban, South Africa and most of my blog will be in and around here, if we do meet then be prepared to read your name here, and never feel bad, if I mention your name in this blog you must have done something right, be it a moment of musical genius or just teaching me one thing you will probably get a mention here.

Feel free to subscribe, read more, contact me or comment. I'd much rather feel like there is some conversing through this medium as opposed to my writings disappearing into the abyss...

rock on!!

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Donovan Banks
Durban, KZN, South Africa
I am a musician who does anything and everything else. I write about what I do and how I do it. Enjoy and feel free to comment.
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