The Top 40 Common Newbie Guitarist Mistakes

[Nuno]

This month Guitar Player (p. 78) includes a list with the Top 40 common newbie guitarist mistakes. They make reference to the Harmony Central Forum as the authors. I was searching if it was available online but I didn't found it in the magazine website. There are really good sentences. Here it is the list:

Investing in distortion boxes instead of a good amp.
Learning 100 intros and no songs.
Limiting yourself to one style of music – usually metal.
Not taking the time to learn music theory.
Playing "Smoke on the Water" on the high-E string.
Playing too loud, and with too much distortion.
Setting your amp's Gain on 10, and Mids on 0.
Relying on picks.
Not learning how to perform a basic setup.
Not maintaining your gear.
Not jamming with other players.
Over use of legato with a complete disregard for tempo.
Poor Phrasing.
Weak vibrato.
Buying too many effects.
Listening to tone snobs.
Immediately launching into thirty-second-notes during a blues solo.
Thinking that playing the local bar circuit constitutes a "tour".
Believing that opening for a national act means you're on your way.
Not knowing the difference between tube watts and solid-state watts.
Relying too much on printed music and tabs.
Thinking a year of lessons and $5,000 worth of gear makes you ready to play in a band.
Wearing the guitar way too low.
Using too much hand pressure when fretting.
Taking guitar lessons from a friend.
Giving up immediately because you sound like dog doo.
Not learning how all your gear works.
Tuning every guitar at Guitar Center to dropped D and then not retuning them to standard pitch.
Bringing full stacks to tiny bar gigs.
Saying "All [insert hated style of music] sucks, dude!"
Learning with your eyes, instead of your ears.
Not learning to play in time with good groove and feel.
Not investing in good earplugs for playing loud gigs.
Obsessing about playing burning solos, and not caring about rhythm guitar.
Thinking that playing fast pentatonic-box patterns makes you a hot guitarist.
Not putting casters on viciously heavy amps.
Wearing bowling shirts emblazoned with flames and dragons.
Realizing guitar is too difficult and taking up bass instead.
Spending more time on Harmony Central than actually practicing.
Forgetting that playing music is meant to be fun.

[dogbite]

I could add a few.
not listening.
knowing when to not play.
playing like a robot.
playing without feeling (see above).
and for the over fifty crowd...wearing hawaiian shirts at gigs.
(the last one is a connudrum for me. I don't get it.)

[Musenfreund]

I could add a few.
not listening.
knowing when to not play.
playing like a robot.
playing without feeling (see above).
and for the over fifty crowd...wearing hawaiian shirts at gigs.
(the last one is a connudrum for me. I don't get it.)

You will when you're over 50. It ties into remembering that playing music is supposed to be fun so why not wear that shirt!

[Peejay]

I've only made about 10-15 of of those so far.

Although a few of them I wonder about the newbieness of...like, if you've done an entire bar circuit, you're probably not a newbie, right? (Doesn't mean you're good, but at least means you're not new.) Same for the year of lessons and $5000 spent. I mean, a year of lessons takes at least a year.

[dogbite]

I could add a few.
not listening.
knowing when to not play.
playing like a robot.
playing without feeling (see above).
and for the over fifty crowd...wearing hawaiian shirts at gigs.
(the last one is a connudrum for me. I don't get it.)

You will when you're over 50. It ties into remembering that playing music is supposed to be fun so why not wear that shirt!

haha. I am way over fifty. never liked Hawaiian shirts, bowling shirts, baseball jerseys.
I threw out my flannel shirts. now I dress like Cash. basic black.
so mysterious and serious. haha.

[jenny b]

thanks for this Nuno, a great list, some good advice there.. now if I can only get good enough to avail of any of it!

[Nuno]

thanks for this Nuno, a great list, some good advice there.. now if I can only get good enough to avail of any of it!

As Peejay said, perhaps there are not-so-newbie mistakes (although there are several levels for newbies as well: guitar playing, bands, gigs, techniques, something...) but it is a good list for thinking about it.

[stellabloo]

... damm! and now I have told all my friends that I am an international recording artist as featured on youtube

hehe, I am working my way up to busking at the local farmer's market... then I will be ON MY WAY ...
...seriously. I want to put the girls on a leash and teach them to sing along.

[Musenfreund]

I could add a few.
not listening.
knowing when to not play.
playing like a robot.
playing without feeling (see above).
and for the over fifty crowd...wearing hawaiian shirts at gigs.
(the last one is a connudrum for me. I don't get it.)

You will when you're over 50. It ties into remembering that playing music is supposed to be fun so why not wear that shirt!

haha. I am way over fifty. never liked Hawaiian shirts, bowling shirts, baseball jerseys.
I threw out my flannel shirts. now I dress like Cash. basic black.
so mysterious and serious. haha.

Aha -- Johnny Cash Black is your Hawaiian!

[Hyperborea]

and for the over fifty crowd...wearing hawaiian shirts at gigs.
(the last one is a connudrum for me. I don't get it.)

I know a few people who wear them at work - I'm in the computer industry so just about anything that covers your nakedness is ok (and in some cases even that is relaxed - http://www.pobronson.com/Nudist_Introduction.htm). I think a lot of 40-50+ guys wear them just like women wear mumus - they think it hides the extra around the middle and that nobody notices.

[Ricochet]

Yeah, many of the above mistakes aren't confined to newbies. Far from it.

[BigTyler]

That's too much!!

You can't go and make those kinds of broad sweeping statements about pentatonic box patterns and dragon shirts! I don't care what anyone says.

[corbind]

Thanks for that list. Pretty funny for sure.

[dubyatf]

Aha -- Johnny Cash Black is your Hawaiian!

I heard Hawaiian is the new black!

[rparker]

Thanks for taking the time for posting the list, Nuno. It's pretty good.

OK, so Black and Hawaiian shirts are already done, huh? Darn it. I gotta find a new look if I ever get good enough to gig. Speedo and a bowler hat maybe?

Dogbite, I agree about the playing without feeling thing. Not only does it sound better, it enhances my own playing enjoyment. Playing something like Down By The River, Melissa, Breathe or the easy version of Hey Joe gives me a real high because I can feel it.

Phrasings. Like voicings I guess? I've got only one gripe about that one. The D7 chord. I can't make that sound any good at all. Well, except for that little tiny riff in American Pie. Aside from that, my D7 is as shameful as my fashion sense.

Last but not least, listening to tone snobs. I wonder in what manner they're speaking of? Something like "if it ain't Gibson, it doesn't sound like a Les Paul"?