losing faith

[peacock1987]

ugh hi guys im loosing faith i feel like im at a brick wall and have been for ages. I have just been trying to get to grips with the play like kirk hammett tutorial and its just another nail in my seemingly tin head. I need to improve but dont quite know how. I hsave tried bying guitar techniques magazine but that is just as difficult for me. What do i do lol?

[sfocata]

Originally Posted by peacock1987

ugh hi guys im loosing faith i feel like im at a brick wall and have been for ages. I have just been trying to get to grips with the play like kirk hammett tutorial and its just another nail in my seemingly tin head. I need to improve but dont quite know how. I hsave tried bying guitar techniques magazine but that is just as difficult for me. What do i do lol?

Slow down. Go back to basics and look at everything. Take apart bits of the Kirk Hammett tutorial and look at what's happening... if there's an alternate-picked 16th note pattern at 150bpm, get your metronome and make sure you can play perfect 16th notes at half that (75bpm).

If there's a legato passage, take apart your legato technique... can you do loud, clean hammer-ons and pull-offs with any finger, on any string, with both clean and distorted sounds.

Sometimes what happens is that we're so keen to work on the latest project, we forget that maybe there's still some basic groundwork to do

[peacock1987]

yeah u cud b right. sometimes i just think its ridiculous without a video tutorial to try n do it i have to go from tab page to listen to a blisering audio piece. ill get me head round it hopefully. cheers.

[arrowodd]

Originally Posted by peacock1987

ugh hi guys im loosing faith i feel like im at a brick wall and have been for ages. I have just been trying to get to grips with the play like kirk hammett tutorial and its just another nail in my seemingly tin head. I need to improve but dont quite know how. I hsave tried bying guitar techniques magazine but that is just as difficult for me. What do i do lol?

May sound a bit glib but why not try some lessons? IME a good teacher will move you past brick walls a lot more effectively than you will yourself. Having someone watch and listen to you play and providing advice and feedback is invaluable and unattainable from a video.

[peacock1987]

yeah i was toying with the idea of getting a tutor but i dont know. Ill have to look around locally

[ZombyWoof]

Originally Posted by peacock1987

ugh hi guys im loosing faith i feel like im at a brick wall and have been for ages. I have just been trying to get to grips with the play like kirk hammett tutorial and its just another nail in my seemingly tin head. I need to improve but dont quite know how. I hsave tried bying guitar techniques magazine but that is just as difficult for me. What do i do lol?

Sometimes you just have to stop learning for a while and focus on having fun with the stuff you can do. Been there so many times, and its frustrating. Once you are more comfortable with the stuff you have already learned, you;ll find the new stuff easier to get to grips with.

[danki]

Step away from the guitar.

Take a break and do something else for a week or so. Dosn't matter who you ae or what you do, you can' do the same thing for ages and not get burnt off with it.

Chill with it and try listening to some new music. theres always inspiration to be had some where..

[thereformant]

If your not already then I cant urge you enough to get in a band. If you can get in one with people substantially better than you all the better. Playing with people above your level really helps you up your game subconsciously. It doesnt even seem like effort!

[dafuzz]

Don't underestimate the sheer physicality of playing fast and precisely. If you were going for a 100m world record you'd work a hell of a lot on your legs right? Weight training, stretching - not just do 100m after 100m and hope one day to break the record.

So it is with guitar. You've got tiny muscles in your fingers and they need strengthening. Take time to run robotically up and down the neck using spider exercise variations - preferably when you're sat in front of the telly so you don't get bored. Rusty Cooley did the most boring video ever on a million exercise variations - its probably on youtube. It is d-u-l-l but it works.

You'll get there if you put the time in