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How Weird is...well, WEIRD???

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 Cat
(@cat)
Noble Member
Joined: 16 years ago
Posts: 1224
Topic starter  

Hendrix picked at his strat from time to time by his teeth. This certainly can be categorised as "weird".

So...okay...whaddya'll do out there in GN land that's...well, weird! (Keep it to guitar...PLEASE!)

Tuning? Picking? Sounds past the nut or bridge? Chimes in consort with twisting the tuners? Violin bows (Jimmy Page)...studio addendums to your original playing? Effects?????

Maybe we can all learn not just the generics...but the "how"...like we did a while back with Pinch Harmonics...

Cat

(Hey...this should be interesting!)

"Feel what you play...play what you feel!"


   
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(@vic-lewis-vl)
Illustrious Member
Joined: 20 years ago
Posts: 10264
 

Weirdest thing I've done? well, I wrote a song for the SSG not long ago - always had it in my mind that it'd be in open D tuning. Didn't work out. Tried DADGAD - didn't like the open G string. So I decided to raise it to A - so's I'd got DADAAD. Seemed to work fine after that....couple of hours (OK, DAYS!) working on the melody line while playing the bottom strings for a drone effect....

http://www.soundclick.com/player/single_player.cfm?songid=6873072&q=hi&newref=1

See/hear for yourselves....

:D :D :D

Vic

"Sometimes the beauty of music can help us all find strength to deal with all the curves life can throw us." (D. Hodge.)


   
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(@dogbite)
Illustrious Member
Joined: 19 years ago
Posts: 6348
 

might be weird...when I play the blues on my little ukulele I bend the stings. who'd of thought that those little nylon strings could sound so fine.

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pagemusic.cfm?bandID=644552
http://www.soundclick.com/couleerockinvaders


   
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 Cat
(@cat)
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Joined: 16 years ago
Posts: 1224
Topic starter  

Cool! I saw Tiny Tim (Johnny Carson Show) end a song's last note with one twist up 'n down on a tuning peg!

Noticed my kid trying to play with his guitar backwards behind his neck. He actually thinks "he discovered it"!!! So, okay...after maybe 30 years I thought I's show him he wasn't alone. Geez...I can't!!! No blood gets into my left triceps!

I guess Redd Foxx was right: "Lizbeth...I'm comin' darlin!!!" :?

Cat

"Feel what you play...play what you feel!"


   
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(@chris-c)
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Joined: 19 years ago
Posts: 3454
 

Hi,

Well, this is only vaguely related to guitar.... but it is musical and slightly weird....

A couple a weeks ago I bought a violin, which is perhaps slightly weird in itself... But they're a bugger to play and I don't really have the time or the patience to learn properly, so I added some frets. Now the usual way to approximate some frets for beginners is to put narrow strips of tape where the frets would be, and then take them off again a few months later once your fingers have learned where to go. But I wanted something a bit more than that... so I tried making frets by tying fine wire around the neck (some lute type instruments do something similar with gut) but couldn't get it to work all that well. So I combined the two ideas and cut some short lengths of wire from an old guitar G string and taped them on (that's the guitar connection...). Even under a layer of tape they still worked well.

So far so good, but violins are still awkward and initially very uncomfortable to hold under your chin. So I sat down and used the shoulder rest that clamps on the back but held it between my knees instead - with the scroll end of the violin leaning against my chest. So now I had a violin that was fretted like a guitar, but playing like a cello, and I could see what I was doing. It worked too. I successfully Twinkled my Little Star! :)

After doing all that I Googled around and found that I was far from alone. Fretted violins have been around for hundreds of years, and you can still buy them today, or get your standard one fretted by people that specialise in doing it. Indian violin players typically use a completely different hold (many play seated and rest the scroll end against a foot for instance). I also read of a woman in the west who was an excellent traditional violinist but who (successfully) switched to playing in a similar cello-like position due to a crippling physical injury.

So it seems it's quite hard to be originally weird... :wink:

Cheers,

Chris


   
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(@gnease)
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Joined: 20 years ago
Posts: 5038
 

weird? nah. it's just annoyingly conventional and boring when players/teachers/luthiers insist there is only one proper way of approaching guitar. it helps many noobs to start them on the relatively straight and narrow. but once one gains a bit of confidence: do whatever.

-=tension & release=-


   
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(@vic-lewis-vl)
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Joined: 20 years ago
Posts: 10264
 

I bought a violin, which is perhaps slightly weird in itself... But they're a bugger to play

Probably because they're upside down, from a guitarist's point of view - aren't they tuned GDAE? In fifths instead of fourths?
That's actually how you tune a bass guitar - except backwards, a bass is tuned EADG. So if you were playing chords - or arpeggiated chords - on a violin - wouldn't you have to play them backwards? ie, 2200 for an A chord (always providing where you know where the frets are, of course! Or 0023 for a G chord? And of course, they'll be inversions of "normal" guitar chords since the root notes are on the high strings....

Oh, I don't think I'm going to go into this any further - I feel a headache coming on!!!

Chris - trade the violin in towards a violin-style bass NOW - trust me on this one, the violin bass is much more fun - I know, I've played both in my time! And the violin bass has the advantage of being tuned the same as the bottom four strings of a guitar - so all that theory you've learned here won't be wasted!

:D :D :D

Vic

Vic

"Sometimes the beauty of music can help us all find strength to deal with all the curves life can throw us." (D. Hodge.)


   
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(@gnease)
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Joined: 20 years ago
Posts: 5038
 

Chris: I've got a violin too. been very slow to learn to play it, but there's a cool mystique about it ... so primitive and vocal-like ... or screechinganimaldyinginahorribleway-like. I'm debate how much I should learn to do "wrong"butinteresting before I get professional help to teach me the "right" way. hmm Dremel tool + violin => ...

-=tension & release=-


   
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(@chris-c)
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Joined: 19 years ago
Posts: 3454
 

Chris: I've got a violin too. been very slow to learn to play it, but there's a cool mystique about it ... so primitive and vocal-like ...

Exactly. :) I always told my wife not to worry, that I'd never get a violin, but they are just so beautiful and mysterious and tricky that they're hard to resist.... like that mad, dangerous girl that you knew would be bad news to go out with, but when you got the chance.....

I know that I'll never be any good at it, but I do hope to be able to at least sample a few sounds from it to mess around with. Even though it's only a cheap Chinese made student instrument the sounds it can make when you briefly get it right are amazing.

Vic, I think you're about right on the tuning. I think it's the same as mandolin (or was it...um... one of the other instruments I've got hidden under the bed for later... :oops: ). I actually was really struck by a cello or upright bass (we have a cello regularly join our group, and a double bass on one occasion) but apart from the expense they just take up more room than I have to spare. Maybe I could just squeeze a violin bass in somewhere though....hmm...

Chris


   
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(@akflyingv)
Honorable Member
Joined: 18 years ago
Posts: 406
 

Its gotta be pretty horrible to break a string on a violin when you are playing, they are so close to your face.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaTyghRq-cM

One thing that I do that is weird is that I hardly ever play with an amp when using my electric guitars. I use to practice late at night a lot and just got used to playing without one. Is that weird?


   
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(@chris-c)
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One thing that I do that is weird is that I hardly ever play with an amp when using my electric guitars. I use to practice late at night a lot and just got used to playing without one. Is that weird?

I'm not sure how weird it is, but it can cause problems. I used to do the same - in fact I rarely plugged in at one stage (and i still play acoustically a lot more than through amps). It was easier on the family and I liked the light unplugged sound of an electric. But I was playing mostly rhythm, and when I did plug in again my technique for playing chords was all wrong for electric. It was fine for acoustic, but on electric you need to be more selective about which strings you hit and also be able to damp out the sounds so that they don't all run into each other and end up a mess of noise. I had to re-learn how to play differently when the amp was turned on. Just something to watch out for, at least it was for me.

Cheers,

Chris


   
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 Cat
(@cat)
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Joined: 16 years ago
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Topic starter  

weird? nah. it's just annoyingly conventional and boring when players/teachers/luthiers insist there is only one proper way of approaching guitar. it helps many noobs to start them on the relatively straight and narrow. but once one gains a bit of confidence: do whatever.

THANK YOU, Gnease! :wink:

Cat

"Feel what you play...play what you feel!"


   
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 Cat
(@cat)
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Topic starter  

Hey, Chris...wrapping up that violin in wire is certainly...seeing as it works...weird!!!

Cat

"Feel what you play...play what you feel!"


   
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(@vic-lewis-vl)
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Joined: 20 years ago
Posts: 10264
 

Been trying to think of a few good songs that feature violins (or something similar - violas, fiddles...etc) and the furthest I've got so far is....

Coz I Luv You, by Slade - electric violin solo. They did the same thing about 12/13 years later with Run Run Away. One from the glam rock days, but don't let it put you off - there were some good musicians in that band.

Hurricane, by Dylan - could have been a long, boring though well-meant song that no-one listened to - well, more than the first three minutes, anyway. The violin solos lifted it out of the ordinary and into the "must listen" category.

Devil Went Down To Georgia, by the Charlie Daniels Band. Just a great rock/pop/country crossover song - if your feet don't tap to this one, you've probably had them amputated!

Don't want to divert your thread, Cat, but it did sort of gravitate towards violin....

:D :D :D

Vic

"Sometimes the beauty of music can help us all find strength to deal with all the curves life can throw us." (D. Hodge.)


   
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 Ande
(@ande)
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Joined: 16 years ago
Posts: 652
 

DOn't know if this is weird enough-

But I have a friend who puts all his music on myspace. But he's too shy to "own" it, so he invents bands. Makes up biographies, puts up photos, the whole nine yards. Exactly as if they were real bands...

Best,
Ande

PS- and he and I are working on writing some stuff together, When we get a website I'll let you all know who it is...


   
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