*Cry* I absolutely SUCK...please re-asure me I will get better.

[Venger]

I started playing the guitar 7 days ago. My friend who has been playing bass for 2 years and is in a band and has a CD out and plays gigs all the time is a great guitarist and plays lead realy well. He's only 16!!! He's also going to be on T.V (In the UK on a program called 'The next best thing'. It's due on in february BBC1. I forgot the date) He showed me how to play 'smells like teen spirit' by nirvana. He hasn't got time to teach me as he has other things to do and besides he doesn't play lead he is a bassist.
Now I have been practacing loads. My fingers suck ass. They sorta make the notes buzz and the strings don't sound right.
Suerly I should have nailed this simple track in 4 days right?
Why do some people seem to get it right away?
How long "Realisticaly" should I give myself to play this song without it sounding like a 3 fingered monkey is playing?
I know I should "just give it time" but I have looked at online books and I sorta get it, but......Damn. I just think I should chill out and relax, but it's annoying to say the least. I will hopefuly start lessons soon as teaching yourself is hard. I think seeing somebody and actualy physicaly being corrected when I am wrong will help enormously.
Any opinions will be greatly apreciated.
BTW I'm no spring chicken at 25 either.

(Wants to play like Wes Borland)

[slaughteredsoul]

i re-assure you,you will get better :)
7 days..unless youre a prodigy,dont expect much after seven days.If u dont have the patience,you shouldn't be learning guitar,cause you'll need a lot of that.
The buzzing isn't cause you've got deformed fingers,it's cause you're not pressing hard enough..it's hard at first but then your fingers get so used to it.
Good for your friend,but if youre planning to be as good,give yourself AT LEAST those two years and see how you are.
And if you 'get it' thats cool,but you don't really get it unless you start practising..u know? to learn to play you gotta play,and the only way to learn to play is to play!
Good luck!!!!

[The Fury]

to learn to play you gotta play,and the only way to learn to play is to play!

I can already play the guitar and I'm confused by that one.:p

Venger-7 days is nothing, it may take months. Lessons will definately help though.

[smfulla]

I've gotta back that up and say dude, 7 days???? I bet ya Joe Satriani couldn't play smells like teen spirit if he just started playing guitar 7 days ago.

You will get better with practise, and as slaughteredsoul said
to learn to play, you've gotta play, and the only way to learn to play is to play (it kinda repeats itself, but its good nonetheless)

Btw, Wes Borland isn't that great a guitarist

[lam]

Hi, I think there is two ways to learn faster.
-First, Play and play and play, but take a break ( 10 or 15min.) each hour.
- Take some private lesson with a good teacher, and follow him even if you don t understand why you must do it like this or that, you will see the point soon.

Also, listen to a lot of music, many kind of.
Listen to the beat. The principal problem of beginers is the beat, they just want to solo and they forget the beat. Always practice with metronome, start slowly. Be shure your in the beat! it is very important if you want to play with other soon.also, playing with the original track is not to bad but be shure to ear yourself!

Good luck, and play because you really want to play, not because
your friend have a band ect.
lam

[Krieselman13]

I just started in November, Ive gottemn alot better with other peoples advice and lessons on thois site, books, and on www.wholenote.com. check out wholenotes beginner lessons, you will get a LOT better if you do what they sauy and not feel sorry for yourself.

[Venger]

Thanks for all the advice and support. I don't just wanna play cos my mate is in a band. I've wanted to play for ages and ages, but you know how it is sometime. You keep putting it off, putting it off. Then one day you think "Damn. If I don't start soon I'll be in my 30's"

Yeah. Wes Borland might not be THAT good a guitarist, but I like his stuff. Jerry Horton of pApA rOACh is probably the best guitarist I have seen play live (BTW I haven't seen many)
Lots of bands have good guitarists...But I guess ANYONE on these boards would sound like Hendrix compared to me.

Besides...My fingers hurt......Just another 30 mins practice of..Teen sirit played very badly.......
Talking of fingers..I dunno if this is true or not. Some bloke told me to...Get this....Piss on my fingers cos the acid makes the skin go hard.
Sorry, but I ain't taking a slash (Not the guns and roses bloke) on my fingers...Ergh..Disgusting.

[The Fury]

Hmmm..I could be true, but how did he find something like that out?

I think aftershave/perfume will work instead and at least it will smell nicer.

[eische]

hmmm, well as urine is a complete branch in natural medicine, I may disappoint you: it softens the skin better than any baby-oil and is used by poeple having extreme dry.

I can't even approve the alkohol-thing - didn't work with my fingers. The only thing is play, play, play.....and at the point you can't bear the pain, take a day off - you really have to be patient, that's it

[Krieselman13]

The only thing is play, play, play.....and at the point you can't bear the pain, take a day off - you really have to be patient, that's it

Hey, Ididnt take a day off when I couldnt bear the pain of the strings on my fingers. That just helped my fingers get used to it quicker. Just something that happened to me, thats all. Well,

LATERS

[slaughteredsoul]

Dont piss on your fingers

[gck]

well, I wouldn't piss on my finger either. The calluses came very quickly (at least for me) and the pain wasn't too bad. So be a man and go through it!

BTW: if the the strings buzz, there might be 1000 reasons: fingers pressing not hard enough, fingers to far away from fret, too low action, etc... but if it's not the guitar (which I assume) but your playing, don't worry, this will go away with practice!

And again: a week is less than nothing!! If somebody told you that you should get "smells like teen spirit" in just 4 days without having ever played before, he/she has lost the sense of reality :)

oh, and one more thing: I think that everyone considers him/herself to be untalented and so on from time to time -> don't get depressed by that.
And if your friend is just 16 and a good player, and you're older but a bad player, don't get depressed either! If you practice with diligence, you will also get that good, and if you are very consequent, you'll probably even catch up (because many good players tend to practice only little, so they don't get any better, they just keep their level)

[eische]

Originally posted by Krieselman13


Hey, Ididnt take a day off when I couldnt bear the pain of the strings on my fingers. That just helped my fingers get used to it quicker. Just something that happened to me, thats all. Well,

LATERS

wow, krieselmann, you seem to be a really tough boy then:D . I remember my fingers hurting so much, I thought that blood would shoot out any moment, and I just had to stop then. But maybe your fingers had a harder skin before:rolleyes: .

[jaytee]

LOL...omg i hope none of you guys piss on yourselves.

my callouses suck and they always will....why you ask? because they always get softened up when i do the dishes. ive noticed if we eat out several days in a row and i play alot those days, i get really nice callouses no problem, but as soon as i dont have a chance to play and i have to do dishes, my callouses disappear in about 3 days, they are almost gone it seems. (from soaking them in dishwater then having to use tons of cream...keeps your skin from busting open in the winter)
despite the continuous pain of creating callouses, you wont catch me pissin on my fingers... :D ewwwwwwwwwwwwwww

--jt

[Venger]

I didn't suggest you actually piss on your fingers. It's just this guy said he saw a program on 'fire acts' YOu know where they swallow fire and run the torch up their arms. Well on that show he said they use urine on their skin to toughen it up.
I ain't gonna use urine on my skin. Besides. My skin isn't too soft anyway. Only problem I have realy is building up strength on my
pinky finger.
More practice is what I need I guess.
Thanks for all the posts BTW.

[smfulla]

oops.... I sorta went ahead and well... I ummmm.... bought new strings =P
Seeing as we're talking about callouses, I find that using 0.09's on my guitar gives me callouses in a greater amount of time than when I was using 0.10's. Like 10's made the callouses come up faster.

[jaytee]

yeah id say that stands to reason....since you dont have to press as hard on the lighter strings, therefore irritating your fingertips less.
the difference is even more noticeable when you go from an acoustic to an electric or vice versa

[Xniper]

:rolleyes: i got my electric guitar for Christmas and i suck too. I do get some easy tabs to try and i practice and get better. Don't piss on your fingers you evil person. Also, i dont get callouses on my fingers.........you guys must be playing too much......I only play for about and hour or so everyday. What i found helpful was a few of the online lessons and tabs. Also my m8s dad plays guitar and he gave me chord books which help a bit.


Xniper

[smfulla]

maybe you don't understand the purpose of calouses... they are to help cushion your finger and to cause it less pain when fretting a string

[gck]

calluses also help you to play faster and more efficiently, because it's easier to press the strings down with a hard fingertip than with a soft finger tip: if your finger is soft, the string can dig into it and therefore you have to press pretty hard to get it on the fretboard firmly and avoid buzzing. When it's hard, you need less power for that, and less pressing means faster playing.

However, there are some things that are "callus killers": having your hands in water for longer periods, applying oily things to the fingers, certain types of soaps (for longer periods), not playing for a long time, etc...
Some of those "callus killers" can easily be avoided, like when using doctor's gloves (available at almost every pharmacy, rather cheap) when washing the dishes or something, etc...
Calluses are an important thing.

[musichead_62]

the best advice i can give ya is to slow down!!
better to do one thing right than ten
things wrong!
play slowly and deliberately at first, make sure
you got th' sound right , pay attention to form too!! ya gotta make th' fingers work first!!
the're yer tool!!
KEEP YER GUITAR IN TUNE!!!!!!!!!!!!
HAVE FUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[hopkins6]

OK WHO MADE THE COMMENT ABOUT BEING 30 AND JUST STARTING TO PLAY ?? I'M 38 JUST STARTED PLAYIN 3 MONTHS AGO, I TAKE LESSONS $70 A MONTH. I CAN ALREADY PLAY- SABATH, METALICA, SOME SANTANA. I DIDN'T START OUT TRYING TO PLAY A SONG FIRST THING. YOU HAVE TO DO THINGS IN STAGES. FIRST LEARN YOUR BASIC CORDS A-G THIS WILL HELP BREAK IN YOUR FINGERS BUILD CALASSES. THEN LEARN YOUR POWER CHORDS PLAY SOME SABATH -IRON MAN & METALICA- FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS THESE SONGS WILL HELP YOUR POWER CHORDS DEVELOPE, THEN MOVE ON TO BARR CHORDS. I PRACTICE ABOUT 3 HRS A DAY SO, PRACTICE PRACTICE PRACTICE
TRY BUYING BELWINS GUITAR ROCK SHOP 1 AT YOU LOCAL MUSIC STORE THEN BUY ROCK 2,3,4,&5 I BET YOU WILL GET ALOT BETTER DONT GIVE UP!!! YOU WILL GET BETTER WITH TIME

[eische]

I think that was me, becoming 33 soon and then being just a month away from my first »guitarists-birthday« :D - well congrats to you good progress....., but just as in some other thread, I have to slightly disagree with you:

There are simply two ways starting out, one is to begin with strumming and chords, the other is begin with playing note by note and therfore one-voiced songs.
If you are so successful with your chord-way, brilliant, then this must be the perfect way for YOU.
But different people, different ways: I tried coping with chords at the beginning and just got depressed, because it wouldn't work. So I did it note by note first, and increased slowly to two-voiced-songs and chords now. At this point of time chords are just easy and fun, even though I sometimes struggle with changing them quickly enough.
Also, playing note by note builds up your calluses just as well........

[Xniper]

MORE BLOODY callouses, thats all you talk about......................some people dont have any or get any, i dont! aaaaaaaaaaaaah bloody callouses stop talking bout em!!!!!:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

[hopkins6]

TRY PRACTICING FOR MORE THAN 5 MIN. JUST KIDDING

[eische]

Originally posted by Xniper
MORE BLOODY callouses, thats all you talk about......................some people dont have any or get any, i dont! aaaaaaaaaaaaah bloody callouses stop talking bout em!!!!!:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

eeeeeeeeeeeh:confused: , no we were talking about the two major differnces in learning to play:confused:

please, calm down, I won't ever use the c-word again:(

[gck]

Well, chords vs. single note playing: I think starting out with "note-by-note" practicing is a better idea because you have to train to use each for your fingers individually first.
For example, in the first 3 months I didn't play any chords at all, but concentrated on single note exercises. Learning chords was very easy then because I didn't have to focus on forming a chord shape with my hand, I just had to focus on getting each single finger in the position so that they all form the chord shape together. It doesn't sound like there is much of a difference, but there is :) (By the way, I don't mean you should form a chord by placing it down finger by finger (should be all at once), it's just a mental difference).
I don't know if it's the same for everyone, but the faster/more accurate I got with fretting single notes, the cleaner/faster I could switch chords.

[Xero13]

hmm... pissing on your fingers... not a bad idea... oops I mean um.... ye thats sick!!