Joining vs. starting a band
If you can't find a band no matter how hard you try, perhaps it's time you change your approach.
There's no rule that says you can't be the leader of your own band. If you've tried joining bands in the past and it hasn't worked, start your own.
Many guitar players are afraid to take the leadership role because it sounds scary. Leading your own band is leading a team of people, and the thought of that may may you uncomfortable.
All I can say to that is that you're going to have to get comfortable with your discomfort. If you've tried everything you know and all you've ended up with is the wrong people or nothing at all, stop trying to join a band and start one instead.
Starting a band is not difficult. All you have to do is change the way your musicians classifieds listings.
What you change specifically is to stop talking about you and start detailing what you want instead.
For example, Instead of "guitar player seeking," you would put "need a bass player" or "need a drummer." And of course you add in extra details such as stating the type of genre of music you're into, state other bands you want to sound like, and so on.
Tips on starting a band
Drummer first and always
This is the guy who most likely lives in a house of his own, meaning that would be your practice space. Drummers need a space where they can set up and play loud, and in my experience the vast majority of drummers do live in a house (even if they don't own it.)
Yes, I am saying to look for a drummer first just to establish a practice spot.
Simplify, simplify, simplify
Most musicians aren't wizards at their instruments, so don't expect technical mastery. For the songs you bring to the table, purposely make them really easy to play, else you'll be wasting time teaching your band members how to play, and that's not fun at all.
Have standards
You're not looking for expert players, but there are things you should consider mandatory.
- Drummers and bass players: Good timing. Any drummer or bass player who can't keep time is worthless.
- Drummers: Ability to play straight beats. This means a drummer who can play simple 4/4 without the need to fill, fill, fill, fill and fill again "because he's bored".
- Bass players: Staying in tune. This one is fairly obvious but I have seen bass players who, incredibly, can't stay in tune (even on a 4-string!)
- Bass players: Working knowledge of root notes. This means when you say, "This song is in the key of C", the bass player should know where C is on the fretboard. If you have to actually point out where C is, that's not a good sign.
Getting paid?
This directly depends on the style of music your band plays.
I've said it before and will say again that the #1 music genre that guitar players get paid for is country. You stand the best chance of making actual real money playing music of that style. It is one of the few genres where a guitar player is required just to get that sound.
You can play other genres if you wish, but if you want the fastest way to get that green, play country.
Aside from that, two other things help to get paid. Being entertaining and having someone that actually knows how to get gigs.
Being entertaining basically means not standing like lumps on stage. Move around. Use stage props. Maybe even tell a joke between songs. Just do something and don't just stand there.
Where finding that someone to get gigs is concerned, that's a manager. You need someone that knows the local area, and yes you will have to pay this person. This is your booking manager. Work a deal that for any gig booked, the manager gets a percentage (at least 15%.) If that sounds too expensive, then guess what? You're the manager.
Tip for RECORDING the band
Ordinarily I recommend the ZOOM R8 for recording yourself, but for a band you need something larger with more inputs. I suggest the ZOOM R24 for that. That unit has all the inputs you need, easily does double duty as a mixer and for what it does, it's definitely priced right.
Also, yes there is the R16 model, but it doesn't have a drum machine in it. You can get that one if you wish, but if you want a recording unit that works both for you and your band, the R24 is the better choice.
Be picky, find the right people, have fun
You, as the band leader, can be as picky as you want. But be reasonable. It is unlikely you will find perfect people for your band, and it is okay to settle for "good enough," but as said above, have standards. Pick people who keep good time and know their notes, and have fun.
ESP LTD Eclipse EC-256FM is the best Les Paul for the money
This guitar is the best bang for the buck when you want a Les Paul style axe that really delivers.
Before starting, the only guitar that actually beats this in value is also from LTD, the EC-10 model. So if absolute rock-bottom price is your main concern, see that guitar first.
The EC-256FM from LTD is without question the best Les Paul style guitar for the money (at least at the time I write this).
It has the 24.75" scale length that Les Paul players are familiar with. It also has set-neck construction, binding everywhere, Tune-O-Matic style bridge and tailpiece, coil-tap push/pull tone control and chrome hardware.
As for the price, it beats the Epiphone Les Paul Standard Plus Top PRO (the closest competitor in specifications) by being over $100 less. And as far as any guitar at or below the LTD's price that offers the same features, I couldn't find one.
Summed up, the EC-256FM has everything LP players want. Looks-wise, it has the flame top, the binding, the fancy inlays and all the chrome. Performance-wise, it has the proper scale length, proper bridge, fast neck and enhanced electronics.
The only thing the EC-256FM doesn't have is a high price tag. And again, if you want cheap, just get the EC-10 model. But for what the 256 has, it's truly a needs-nothing guitar. Just plug in and go.
How to get great clean tone for electric guitar
Let's talk about clean tone and how to get it right the first time.
Getting a good clean sound out of a guitar is actually not that hard to get, but it has to be approached in a specific way.
Step 1. Use the bridge pickup
Easy to do. Switch your guitar to use the bridge side pickup. You do this because to get the most treble tone. Later on you can experiment with other pickup positions, but for now, switch to bridge.
Step 2. Compression
Most guitar players simply think "turning off everything" is the only way to clean tone. It isn't. Compression is necessary. You can do this with a BOSS CS-3, the (much) more affordable Behringer CS400 or use a muilti-effects unit like the DigiTech RP360 that I use.
No matter what style of music you play, if you're going clean, compression is mandatory. Why? Three reasons.
First, it evens out the string volume so the wound strings don't "boom" over the plain strings.
Second, it makes every note heard clearly no matter where you are on the fretboard.
Third, it allows you to play softer so you're not getting fret buzz all over the place. When playing with an overdrive or distortion effect, that masks just about all the fret buzz. But when playing clean, all the buzz is heard. And no matter what guitar you play or how perfectly set it up it is, there will be times you will hear small amounts of fret buzz when playing clean. The simple solution around that? Play softer. The way to bring up the quiet notes when playing softer? Use compression. Problem solved.
Step 3. Purposely use a tone that's slightly broken up
If you have ever played guitar through an amplifier cabinet that uses Celestion speakers, you know that there is no way to get 100% crystal clear clean tone through those. And the reason for that is that Celestions naturally break up and distort the more they're driven. This can easily be heard when playing live with a band when the amp has to be turned up to be heard.
As a side note, this is a big reason why there are many guitar players who prefer bass amps such as a 100-watt Fender Rumble (which by the way can be had up to 500 watts if you want something that really thunders). If you play a lot of clean tone stuff, it's typically true the bass amp will serve you a lot better...
BUT...
...there is something pretty cool about the sound of a broken-up Celestion when played clean.
My sound isn't 100% clean. I purposely use an amp model out of my DigiTech RP360 that isn't crystal clear in its sound, and in fact has slight distortion to it with some treble cutoff. That kind of tone is similar to a guitar amp played clean at a medium volume using Celestion speakers.
In the end, a slightly broken up clean tone sounds "more real". There are many hit songs from the late '70s that have that broken up Celestion tone to it. Three examples are Back on the Chain Gang by The Pretenders, Roxanne by The Police and My Sharona by The Knack.
Step 4. Washy chorus
Not required, but it helps for one simple reason. It helps make chords sound more in-tune.
As all guitar players know, the enemy when playing clean is that G string. How you tune that G when playing clean determines which chords sound in-tune and which sound out-of-tune.
The standard advice given is to purposely tune the G string 15 cents flat. This is a very slight detune of the G and you need a tuner that can display cents such as the tried-and-true Korg GA-1.
However, even with that G tuned to 15 cents flat, there are some chords that will still sound slightly out-of-tune...
...which is where washy chorus comes in. The chorus effect liberally applied will mask that slightly-out G string.
Step 5. Multi-tap delay
When I want to go no-reverb that still sounds like reverb, I use a specific delay type.
The RP360 I use has many delay effects in it, and one of them is 2-tap. This style of delay uses repeats at varying rates. This means that instead of a sound repeated at a rate of every X milliseconds, it introduces differing rates. Think of it the same way as if you chained two delay pedals together with one set at 400ms at 50% volume and the next one set to 600ms at 25% volume. The end result of this is a "dreamy" style delay that sounds like a reverberation effect but is in fact all delay.
If using pedals, the easiest way to get multi-tap without breaking the bank is just use two. My recommendation here is to get two smaller pedals with a lot of range. The Tom'sline digital delay is the best solution here. Chain a pair of those together and it's easy to get multi-tap goodness.
Single pedal offerings for multi-tap aren't cheap. Far from it, actually. And they're complicated. The Pigtronix Echolution, while a very cool pedal, is really expensive, not user-friendly at all and outright intimidating. I'd recommend the the RP360 over the Echolution any day of the week. Even if you use the RP360 for delay and nothing else, it's way cheaper and easier to use.
Clean is not really clean?
For electric guitar tone, total absolute clean tone actually doesn't sound that good. It is OK to dress up the sound with compression, very light overdrive (broken up tone,) chorus and delay.
Remember that the only guitar that absolutely sounds right 100% clean is, of course, acoustic. For electric, yes you have to apply some effects to get the clean tone sounding right, and it's not a sin to do so.
The worst guitar color of all time
There are some guitar finishes that look just plain bad...
...and this one is the worst, the Fender Jim Root Telecaster. This guitar at the time I write this is the ugliest guitar made because of its white finish.
Now bear in mind the white on the JR Tele isn't just any white. It's flat white, meaning it has no gloss, no sheen and has the appearance of being unfinished in the worst possible way.
The reason people hate white guitars is the same reason people hate white rental cars. It looks lifeless, dull, boring and cheap. It doesn't matter how well-made the instrument is. Stark, bright white, especially a flat white, is literally the worst possible color one could choose to put on a guitar.
History time!
The reason almost zero white vintage electric guitars exist is because they looked horrific on television. In the black-and-white days of TV, white guitars would always "wash out" when filmed, hence the reason Gibson came up with the color TV Yellow which on camera would look white but in reality was a yellow finish.
And guess what? Stark white guitars even today still look terrible when filmed with HD cameras. There is simply no way to make a bright white guitar look good.
"But the JR Tele is a tool guitar!"
So what? It's still fugly.
Back in the day, the #1 finish Fender used on their solid-body electrics was sunburst. This was chosen not only because it was cheap to apply but it also gave the guitar a woody look to it. Sunburst isn't a solid finish so you can see the nice wood grain come through and it just works.
Gibson did the same thing by offering a ton of their guitars in sunburst as well, with the difference being there was more red in the finish (hence Heritage Cherry Sunburst).
Both companies avoided white like the plague. This isn't to say there aren't a few examples of vintage white electrics, but it was never stark white. Olympic White has some blue in it, Arctic White has yellow in it and so on.
Avoid bright white guitars, and especially avoid the Jim Root Telecaster in that finish because it's the worst.
On a final note, the JR Tele is one of the few electrics I've ever known that actually looks worse in person compared to online photos like the 7UP Green Clapton Stratocaster. Yes, it's that bad.
Best Christmas guitar gifts for 2017
It's no surprise at all that almost all the best seller guitar gifts this year are on the low-priced end of the spectrum.
Why are lower-priced guitars selling better? It's not just because of price. Build quality has increased tremendously across the board compared to 10 years ago. The only time you get something truly bad is if the guitar is a toy. None of what's listed below are toys. And with that said, here are the hot guitar gifts for 2017.
This bundle includes a gig bag, tuner, extra pack of strings, strap, picks, polishing cloth and an instructional DVD. The guitar itself is Fender's FA-100 model. You can get just the guitar to shave off a few bucks, but if giving the gift to a total beginner who has never played guitar before, giving the bundle is better and doesn't cost that much more. The price is already cheap as it is.
This full-size acoustic sells for well under $100 new and easily beats the price at guitar stores considering the shipping is free. It's very highly rated as a genuinely good acoustic guitar by those who have bought it.
Simply put, this is as cheap as you can get while still getting a good acoustic guitar. Anything cheaper than this goes into "toy that will break in a week" territory.
Hinkler EBB Electric Blues Box Slide Guitar Kit
This is a very simple guitar, but it's fun and has genuine character to it. Even if it's never played, it would still look cool hanging on a wall. This is traditionally known as a cigar box guitar.
Squier Bullet Strat HSS Hard Tail
The Hard Tail Bullet Strat was introduced this year, and many are flocking to it because a lot of players consider it the easier guitar to deal with since it has no tremolo system. This guitar has sold well since its introduction and continues to do so.
Squier Vintage Modified '70s Stratocaster
The '70s look for guitars is definitely the "in" thing at the moment, but aside from that, some players genuinely like an all-black Strat with the all-maple neck. This guitar definitely delivers that. Compared to the Bullet Strat HSS Hard Tail seen above, this is a traditional SSS with the tremolo system.
I was genuinely surprised to see this one make the list, but upon closer examination I was able to see why. This guitar is just plain gorgeous, has set-neck construction, 24.75" scale, jumbo frets, thin "U" shape neck, and most importantly, also comes in a lefty version. A lot of guitar companies ignore lefty players. LTD did not.
This guitar is best for players that prefer a "fast" thin neck on a guitar that turns heads, sounds great and plays great. This is a mid-priced guitar but is arguably better than anything Epiphone could offer, and at a cheaper price.
Also be sure to see the Lemon Drop finish option. Very cool looking.