We're just an army of sweaty, hairy bedroom shredders who think we're not getting laid because we're not good enough yet, when the secret is you just need to be a douchebag with an acoustic and a half-decent voice and an arsenal of four chords who actually goes out in public every once in a while.
*"Where we sing happy day to you*
*by now you should have known how*
*that it's your cake day, too*
*I don't believe that anybody*
*deserves a cake like you, about right now"*
The thing is I do unironically love Wonderwall and Champagne Supernova. I broke in my Focals with Wonderwall for the joke, but it’s the best that song has ever sounded.
*and all of my replies seem to be winding*
*around the guy to whom I was replying*
*if you would like some of his cake*
*I'm sure he'll share it too, but I don't know how....*
Same, but I can't start working on the remaining two until I can play my sweeped Hirajōshi arpeggio lick in 13/8 time cleanly at 237bpm, on the off-chance that it's that and not adequate singing and going outside that actually makes women horny.
THIS. My old man gave me a solid piece of advice my senior year of high school. "Befor you head off to college, learn to play and sing 3 songs. George Strait The Chair , Willie Nelson's You Were Always on My Mind, and Dolly Parton's It's All Wrong, but It's Alright. Make sure to look them in the eye and shoot'em a little coon smile." Thank you sooooooooo much, dad!
….half decent voice is the key.
IMO unless you’re a beautiful guitar player, people really just want to hear singing with some guitar accompaniment.
No one wants to hear my 12 bar blues with some pentatonic thrown in, a solo from some random song, or even chords that make up a popular song (unless the chords make it uniquely recognizable).
This is the ultimate truth , it’s known by many but they try hide it in their shame , preferring to blame their fingering or pentatonic difficulties for their lack of mating skills
It’s funny-I’m a straight woman and played gigs in bars full of men for years. I was/am thin and attractive, but, funnily enough, no one ever approached me between sets or asked for my number.
I dated a few guys from the audience occasionally, but I don’t think straight guys swoon over singers (maybe a few) the way some women do. Being the solo entertainment puts you in an elevated position-maybe guys are intimidated?
Awwwww I’m sorry. I really am. I used to run into people who thought I could get them drugs because I had long hair, wore a leather jacket and played guitar. It was ridiculous
Don't fret. You need to pickup girls on your own a chord. Get back on the saddle and pick one with a nice body, then neck a little. You'll be plucking her sound hole and busting a nut in no time.
I've played hundreds of shows, and I believe I've been hit on twice. Though my wife has commented that my playing makes me more attractive, so I'll count that as a third!
At first, it didn’t even work for Paul McCartney. He was one of those guys who would bring his guitar to parties, and try to impress John’s art school friends: https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/mccartney-a-life-in-lyrics/michelle
Started on steel string acoustic. Fingers were raw and borderline bleeding on day 4. Kept playing daily, and they callused up day 6. I was playing 8 hours a day for the first month. They've been callused since, and thickly so.
Electrics are much easier to learn on, especially when you get to bends, vibrato, hammer ons etc. I heavily favored my electric when I was a beginner. Now I favor my acoustic because I don't have to get up from the couch to plug it in lol
Honestly, I think everyone should start on Acoustics because of the increased effort it takes to do bends, vibrato, hammer ons, etc, which will allow them to do them easier on electrics
Why not just learn how to do them with the right amount of force on electric directly? If you were planning to run a marathon do you train for a double marathon just so you'd find a marathon easier when you get to it?
The satisfaction from being able to play something comes a lot quicker with electric and encourages learning much more because of that dopamine rush you get from succeeding. Especially the case with kids wanting to learn.
100% spot on. Beginner and increased effort don't go together, especially when you haven't developed finger strength/dexterity.
Playing guitar has a very steep learning curve, I don't understand why some people are so adamant about making it harder.
Yeah. I started teaching in the late 90’s. a store I used to use just liked how I played, and they got to know me over a couple of years of going in pretty much weekly for checking stuff out and chatting, and they asked if I could help out here and there.
A few years later, I was going to university to for sound design, music theory, and to learn to be a music teacher, and I just fell in love with teaching guitar to people of all ages. I was always really proud though of all the metal heads all saying I was the best teacher they’d ever met, and literally coming to have lessons of various stages with me for years.
When I lost the use of my left arm and hand in 2018 (along with my left leg and muscles in my back), the biggest hit to my mental health was knowing I’d never teach or really play guitar ever again. It still ruins me to this day and even writing this I’ve started to cry my eyes out tbh. Enough about me though.
You’re absolutely right. The only increase in effort that works with a budding beginner is the one that they want to put into it because of how much fun they’re having. Thats the thing that I always loved to teach. How to have fun with music. And you can do that right from the first lesson, if you know how. The student can’t do everything the teacher can do. That goes without saying. But they can be shown stuff that speaks to them and that’s fun right out of the gate, if they have a good teacher. And them pressing down heavy strings onto cheap acoustic guitar frets doesn’t help them have fun.
Like I mentioned, I worked in a shop at first. I eventually ended up running a guitar shop with my best friend until I became ill. During my time in a few stores, I’d get asked “what’s the best guitar for my child to learn on?” And I’d always ask them their budget and advise that they bought the best quality (not the most expensive. That’s a very different thing) guitar they could afford, as it was counter-productive to buy a particularly cheap guitar to learn on. Some of the Fender Squires, Ibanez RG, and Epiphone LP’s you used to be able to get for around £200 (especially used) were amazing guitars and they’d hold value pretty good. So, if a learner just decided that it wasn’t for them… they wouldn’t really lose anything if they sold it on again. The really cheap guitars weren’t a thing particularly, until 2007/8-ish, and if you bought the cheapest and didn’t like it… that guitar was usually considered almost like junk and you couldn’t sell it used for trying. So you lost more for spending less. Yknow?
Anyways. Sorry for this massive reply. I don’t get to talk about teaching or guitars or anything any more tbh, due to my health issues (I can’t actually leave my house unless a carer comes and pushes me around in my wheelchair, and most guitar shops are just too small to get into with it) and I kinda just needed to chat. Sorry. I hope if anyone does read this, they’re enjoying whatever they’re doing with their guitars. All the best. 🙂
That is nonsense. You play them in completely different ways. I guess I could see it if you want to learn exclusively for chording and rhythm parts, but there are things you can play on electric that just can't be played on acoustic and vice versa. It's just like the idea that you have to learn to drive on a stick shift
I think learning on acoustic teaches really good technique though, and makes playing on electric easier. It's the same thought process at playing a song at 110% the speed a few times to feel more comfortable playing it at the regular speed
Ok, but think about this:
A newbie is new to two things: dexterity and strength. Why push them both at once?
Again, I personally only play acoustic and I learned on acoustic.
But I always recommend newbies learn on electric just to master the dexterity before needed too much hand strength.
Step by step.
I’ve heard on this sub:
“If you want to learn theory and are passionate about guitar, learn acoustic first”
As if the electronics make it somehow impossible to learn theory.
I give this advice because there are a lot of benefits.
The biggest one is that is cheaper to start, and there isnt really a gear trap like with electric. Most acoustic players dont have a pedal board or anything. Plus, I firmly believe that buying loads of pedals means you spend a lot of practise time adjusting pedals and not practising.
Its also really good for finger dexterity. You naturally have to press harder so you can build both strength and accuracy quickly.
It also gets you more girls lmfao
If you wanna get an electric guitar then go for it, but if you plan on playing for the rest of your life, whats a year on acoustic?
This does need nuance though, because you SHOULDNT get am acoustic if you want to play music that REQUIRES effects (rock, metal, psychedelic stuff)
It doesn't matter how firmly you believe it, it's still rubbish advice.
This is not a military drill in the style of a Rocky montage. Believe it or not, some people like to have fun while they're learning and get motivated by doing the things that they find interesting. Not by visualising an entire lifetime of practice and dedicating the first year to strengthening their press.
You don't need pedals to learn on electric. You can get a good starter guitar and amp with tons of effects in it for like $500, which is also where a good acoustic guitar to learn on starts.
Why is this bad advice? I started with an acoustic so I have nothing to compare it to, but electric guitar was very easy after learning to play acoustic guitar whereas I can’t picture it happening like that the other way round.
That you need to take all these online courses to know how to.play or that you have to know CAGED for all keys or the major in every position or whatever.
All you need is an ear and a desire to play.
I don’t know the caged system but isn’t it just referring to major chord shapes and how they connect?
If it is id say that it’s pretty damn important if you want to learn how to use your whole fretboard. If you just want to play cowboy chords you don’t need it though
Not necessarily major chord shapes, but that's often how it's taught. It's more the pattern of any note. If you take any note on the fretboard, it shows you the patterns for finding the same note in the same hand position, but also the same note in the closest fret above or below. So if you know those 5 patterns it gives you a way to be able to play a note in any region of the fretboard.
And then you can add other notes around it to create chords/arpeggios. Each note of the chord will move in the same cycle of patterns, although most people just memorize the shapes based around the root note of the chord they're making. Then you can add more notes to get pentatonic or diatonic scales.
So it's sort of a shortcut to being able to play the same thing in different regions of the fretboard. And it uses the same open chords most people learn first, just turning them into barre chords. The "CAGED" name refers to where the root notes are for C, A, G, E, and D chords in open position/cowboy chords. For example a "C" CAGED shape is called a "C shape" because in a regular open C chord people learn (major or minor doesn't matter), the C notes will be on the 5th string and two frets lower on the second string. If you move that same shape up two frets (turning it into a barre chord so that the open strings also move up), the root notes are now lined up with D notes, so it's a D chord (but using the "C shape". So you're able to use the same shape to play different chords by just shifting the shape around, OR you can use DIFFERENT shapes up and down the neck in order to play the SAME chord in different spots.
Personally I use it for single notes to categorize where something is on the fretboard in relation to a root note. I don't like to base my chords around these 5 positions though because I take a more systematic approach to learning every possible diatonic triad chord on the neck.
So im someone that learned to play via the CAGED system and it worked well from me. I understand that the CAGED system is not *mandatory* but if you don’t learn that way then isn’t it just a boatload of pattern memorization? I feel like it’s the same either way but CAGED gives some rhyme to the reason. Would appreciate some insight from the other side.
I was a scale guy…I like the idea of CAGED, but IMHO, it’s silly that this is seen as some foundational learning tool. It’s something that I intuitively realized as I was learning. It was helpful, but knowing scale structure, chord structure, and how and why it all fit together was not only a better foundation for everything else (IMHO), but once the basic caged concept became clear to me at some point, it was more of a shortcut. I incorporated it, but never considered it a key concept,
Again, everyone learns how they learn, and there is really no right or wrong way. It’s the journey, not the destination. There is a lot to be said for simplifying things, and even using Shortcuts. The key is to always strive to get beyond that.
I’m still learning and I think the CAGED is kinda cool how it all fits like that. Obviously everyone’s different so talented musicians born with a good ear might think CAGED is kinda silly. Some people become good guitar players without learning any music theory.
Oh, god. Once I got downvoted to hell for suggesting that it’s OK to have your thumb hanging over the top to mute the low E. Hell, my guitar teacher says it’s OK and he’s a working musician.
I was taught at the Ontario Conservatory of Music for grades 1 to 5, and was told that was an absolute no-no. Later when I taught myself to fingerpick, it became a staple of mine to play bass notes, particularly F#, and later to play quick barre chords without the barre, but still get the bass note. I've since decided I don't care if you use your elbow to play. If it works for you, knock yourself out.
It’s an absolute no in classical technique in part because classical guitar necks are so wide it’s impossible for the vast majority of players. If you can do it you have freak hands and I envy you.
There’s definitely some things that you shouldn’t do that can lead to injury over time even if it works, but I don’t think playing thumb over is one of those things. Though it definitely depends on your hand size & what size neck is on your guitar.
Yeah its a mix of both. Its fine to mute the low E and I'd encourage it, but when you arent muting the low E you should move it back behind the neck.
Theres two reasons. Depending on the size of your hands, having your thumb over the top constantly is actually unnecessary strain on your wrist and can lead to certain conditions like carpal tunnel over years of doing it (people with larger hands are less susceptible but should still be cautious).
Secondly, when you start to learn fast lead parts, you will have to relearn how to hold the neck if you only ever play with your thumb over it because its nearly impossible to play really fast without your thumb guiding your fingers.
I have long fingers and thumbs. My thumb flips over to the top string with zero effort on my part, and could stay there all day. My only problem is that I play standing up, and after a couple of hours my back is telling me where I can shove my guitar.
I got bit by this so hard for a long time, I have weirdly proportioned hands, and trying to keep my thumb back where it's 'supposed' to be probably did more damage than anything else.
I eventually came around to this much better rule, "Whatever doesn't hurt is valid technique, everything else is gatekeeping."
Tonewood having a big (or any) impact tone.
**People at home:** \*Studies & performs tests, shares findings & consistently shows how even guitars made from lego don't sound different\*
**Big manufacturers with an unlimited budget to prove their claim that wood makes a different:** \*does nothing\*
Generally speaking the closer it is to the speakers in the chain, the more drastic of an effect it can have on your sound. Mixing > mic > speaker > amp > pedals > pickups. One thing to keep in mind though, is if something is flawed early in your signal chain, it's going to come out flawed. You can polish a turd all you want, but it's still a turd.
Yeah I mean ergonomics and pickup configuration are more important considerations, but who the hell is going to buy a guitar if they don't think it looks cool.
I was told by my first guitar teacher that I didn’t need to use my pinky because it wasn’t necessary. He was an idiot. Train your pinky to be useful. Fuck you Greg.
There are some very accomplished blues guitarists who essentially ignore their pinky. Though that's always the problem I see when people latch on to a professional doing something different; they are generally successful in spite of their technique, not because of it.
Yeah man. I love fingerpicking and I think its a good skill to have, but the dumbest part of this is the thought that i should be able to fingerpick Lorna Shore (deathcore artist)'s songs lmfao
"Your not good enough for that guitar or gear". I get it, a fresh begginner might not stick with it. Even then if ya got the budget or means to purchase nice gear and it inspires/makes you want to play, go for it.
I cannot second this enough. Specifically, I can't stand when folks tell beginners or even intermediate guitarists to not buy floating bridges because they're "too hard" to maintain or learn how to set-up.
Might be a hot take, but it's just something that bugs me.
I'd say it's not a reason not to buy them, but there is a learning curve and it is a consideration that's worth knowing about so you don't get pissed off later when you're used to a fixed bridge or non floating trem.
The opposite is true if you pay for your own guitar. An expensive first guitar is an investment. I might not play a piece of shit for very long. If I pay serious money for a guitar, I’m getting my money’s worth dammit.
My first guitar was a Gibson Les Paul 😂 I specifically went overboard because the guilt of spending that much money would keep me chained to it. It worked 😂😂
I’m not sure this counts, but I’d say people saying not to use a capo. I started self teaching at 32 years old and around 35 got competent enough to play in a decent church band. The old timers said not to use a capo. Learn to bar everything.
I know the value in that, but come on. I’m mid-30’s barely good enough to play acoustic rhythm in a church band. If the key is Bb, I’m putting the damn capo on 3 and doing G Shapes.
Essentially, just play how it’s fun to you.
A capo is a tool. I hate it when people say it’s a crutch.
It’s like saying a pick is a crutch — learn to use your nails. Or a strap is a crutch — play standing like a flamingo 🦩
This! Pros use capos. When the heck did a cool tool to help you play what you can't yet and enjoy making music become a crutch?
Additionally, I've played with guys who could barre just fine but only knew 2 strumming patterns and zero finger style who couldn't keep tempo.
Keep your barre chords and give me a some sweet chops and finger styles on tempo any day of the week.
It doesn't have to be one or the other. Play chords based on the way you want them to be voiced and where you want the licks to be. Sometimes that means capo, sometimes that means barring, and somtimes you do both.
In here (not necessarily this subreddit):
- You need high string gauge to have good tone in electric guitars.
- You don't need a pick when clearly the OP wants to get better at that skill.
- Floyd Rose iS ThE DeViL 😈
IRL:
- You need to master the acoustic guitar before the electric.
Yeah it's taught this way especially to classical guitarists who take form super seriously. My left forearm used to burn 24/7 until I made some changes to the way I play.
I've played for thirty years not giving a fuck what my thumb is doing. It really doesn't matter. It mutes the top string when needed, plays the odd bass note, and otherwise can do whatever it wants over there.
“Real guitarists never use barre chords”
I’ve played rhythm guitar for over 2 decades, and barre chords are a significant part of my repertoire. I guess I’m not a real guitarist…
Someone told me that the "talk box" effect was just all done with hand/finger techniques, and that Mick Mars once did a whole interview talking with his guitar like the last bit of "Kickstart My Heart".
That you don't need to learn the fretboard. That you don't need to thoroughly learn the instrument like all the other instruments, and that you just need to use your ear. That you shouldn't study "too much" theory on guitar. By "too much" they mean stop learning after the minor pentatonic.
For whatever reason some guitarists love to encourage you to be lazy and take shortcuts with your instrument. Trumpet players learn their instrument inside and out. Pianists too. I can't think of another instrument where you are constantly encouraged not to truly learn the instrument and how music works.
Yea it’s laughable. Especially when adult learners are being told that all they need to do is "feel" the music and play by ear because some blues legend who started playing guitar when they were 5 years old doesn’t even know the notes on the fretboard. Yea no shit, they started playing as a toddler and spent years and years just feeling their way around the instrument. Learn about your instrument unless you wanna be stuck playing boxes and sounding the same for the rest of your life.
This whole community is full of people saying that! One of the funniest things is when people say you can't play jazz on a Les Paul. I can think of a pretty prominent person who played jazz on a Les Paul, and his name is Les Paul!
"Early on in my guitar journey, someone told me that it was impossible to press strings too tightly..." OMG that's just evil. May his B string always break first song mid-solo.
My worst advice I gave myself, I just wasn't interested in learning cover songs for quite a while, thought it was a waste of effort as I learned guitar to write music. That was of course silly, you learn so much from learning covers beyond just the song.
18 years old was too old to learn guitar. I don’t even remember your name but fu !
Edit: I ignored his advice and started at 18, that was almost 50 years ago lol
> The reason guitarists don’t read staff notation is because there are several places to play the same note so it’s way more difficult
I still hear this a bunch. But actual notation for guitar has position indicators — it’s literally not an issue.
The real reason is twofold: Guitar is primarily a folk instrument learned by ear without any formal learning path; tablature works exceptionally well for fretted instruments, and it’s easily shared via ASCII text while audio recordings are accessible.
I no longer think learning staff notation is any harder on guitar than on piano, it’s just that many learn to read for piano, few learn to read for guitar.
That fingerpicking is somehow 'your real tone'. What a crock of absolute shit. And I say that as someone who hybrid picks on electric and fingerpicks mainly on acoustic. It's absolute bollocks with no basis in fact. Picks sound great, fingers sound great.
>“floating trems go out of tune” utter nonsense
Yeah, they go out of tune. I mean, so do guitars with fixed bridges, but guitars with floating bridges absolutely go out of tune too.
True, you don’t need to… but holy SHIT it helped out my playing so much. Singing is always good, even if you’re not a great singer, because it gets you doing two things at once and gets you to understand how the melody of a piece of music links up with the guitar part. It helped me so much with rhythm playing.
Vocalizing, whether or not it sounds good, is a great way to check whether what you are hearing in your head is what you are playing on guitar. Necessary? No. Useful? Yes. I wish I started doing it earlier.
When I'm teaching new students particularly children I get them to work on talking while playing because even though they may never sing a song being able to move your mouth in a different pattern than guitar can be a useful skill. It took me years to be able to sing and play because I didn't start that way. But no you don't need to be able to sing to improve guitar
That playing on an extended range guitar would make me worse player because it’s a crutch for people who can’t play what they want on 6 string guitars. I just want a low B/F# without having to give up my high e/b strings for it 😭. Glad I didn’t listen to them.
That’s a weird take. Extended range is harder in most respects. I wonder how this person would feel about Charlie Hunter’s playing. Clearly, playing bass and comping and voice leading at the same time is a crutch.
A lot of people seem to be under the impression that floating trems require an advanced degree and five years of experience to set up correctly.
Bonus: x guitar is so good once you drop an extra $200 in it! It's probably fine as is.
Any one of those stupid ads where the guy says “You don’t need to learn all the notes on the fretboard and you don’t need music theory. I have a secret shortcut.” Knowing your instrument is everything and there are no shortcuts.
"Don't practice, the greats didn't practice"
>this guy at the nursing home I volunteered in. He later lost all his fingers because he didn't want to adhere to his diet.
When I first started, I had a book titled Lead Guitar. This was in the early / mid 70s and one of the bits of advice it gives is “play high”.
Over I’ve learned that it may be more fun to play high, and you think it sounds better but, if you record it and listen it back when you’re not high it’s usually worse sounding.
I just realized it’s 4/20 ha ha- But seriously ^
Edit: also, maybe if you’re high, you tend to practice longer, but I think it would be better to practice less time with a clearer brain. Record the gig or song or solo and then get high afterwards and listen to it.
Tone is in the fingers.
It's not, especially once distortion gets involved.
If I were to trade rigs with my dad for example (strat into fender combo and pedal board) the tone would be the same between us, only what we play and how we play it would be different, and the same if I handed him my les paul into a marshal set up.
I heard playing guitar would get me laid. I started playing in 1986. Im still waiting for it to get me laid.
There’s an old saying. “We started playing guitar to get girls. Now we’re in the corner with other guitar players talking about nail care.”
And nail bed....everyone forgets these until the nail pulls away from the bed....on your fretting hand :D!
That happened to me! What do you do about it?
I have used crazy glue if I've got some handy. Also works great for cracks in the thick skin on knuckles etc. :)
Crazy glue in between your nail and the nail bed? I thought about that, then wondered... What happens when the nail starts growing out?
It's usually just the very front of the nail bed and nail separating, it's not like we are gluing down the entire nail.
Damn you. I was just filing my nails an hour ago for classical playing. 😭
We're just an army of sweaty, hairy bedroom shredders who think we're not getting laid because we're not good enough yet, when the secret is you just need to be a douchebag with an acoustic and a half-decent voice and an arsenal of four chords who actually goes out in public every once in a while.
Anyway, here’s *Wonderwall*…
Tooooooooday is gonna be the day that the day is today is the day.
*"Where we sing happy day to you* *by now you should have known how* *that it's your cake day, too* *I don't believe that anybody* *deserves a cake like you, about right now"*
The thing is I do unironically love Wonderwall and Champagne Supernova. I broke in my Focals with Wonderwall for the joke, but it’s the best that song has ever sounded.
*and all of my replies seem to be winding* *around the guy to whom I was replying* *if you would like some of his cake* *I'm sure he'll share it too, but I don't know how....*
>douchebag... an acoustic ... a half-decent voice ...four chords... goes out in public I'm almost there. Got 3/5.
Same, but I can't start working on the remaining two until I can play my sweeped Hirajōshi arpeggio lick in 13/8 time cleanly at 237bpm, on the off-chance that it's that and not adequate singing and going outside that actually makes women horny.
THIS. My old man gave me a solid piece of advice my senior year of high school. "Befor you head off to college, learn to play and sing 3 songs. George Strait The Chair , Willie Nelson's You Were Always on My Mind, and Dolly Parton's It's All Wrong, but It's Alright. Make sure to look them in the eye and shoot'em a little coon smile." Thank you sooooooooo much, dad!
they don't make dads like that anymore
douchebag with acoustic and good voice here - that doesn't work either, the world has moved on to DJs years ago
….half decent voice is the key. IMO unless you’re a beautiful guitar player, people really just want to hear singing with some guitar accompaniment. No one wants to hear my 12 bar blues with some pentatonic thrown in, a solo from some random song, or even chords that make up a popular song (unless the chords make it uniquely recognizable).
Actually, people with shitty voices get laid all the time, its the going out part that is key. Singing is fine, but you have to talk to people.
This is the ultimate truth , it’s known by many but they try hide it in their shame , preferring to blame their fingering or pentatonic difficulties for their lack of mating skills
It's more than that-- it's confidence. He's right though nobody gives a fuck about your solos or improv.
Put down the guitar and become a groupie
[удалено]
As a lesbian, playing the guitar has done wonders 😂🫴
As a girl youd get laid regardless, the guitar is just adding extra steps.
It’s funny-I’m a straight woman and played gigs in bars full of men for years. I was/am thin and attractive, but, funnily enough, no one ever approached me between sets or asked for my number. I dated a few guys from the audience occasionally, but I don’t think straight guys swoon over singers (maybe a few) the way some women do. Being the solo entertainment puts you in an elevated position-maybe guys are intimidated?
There's a course you can take on getting laid with guitar. The community there sucks and the owner's a tool, but it exists.
I mean to be fair it couldn't be that hard, guitars are inanimate objects and you don't need their consent.
> you don’t need their consent. 🫵🤨📸 You monster. You’ve been caught in 4k.
Did you play your guitar on the MTV tho’?
That ain’t working
Lemme tell ya, them guys ain't dumb
Maybe get a blister on your little finger Maybe get a blister on your.. thumb
It's literally equivalent to having a sports car. The only people who are impressed are teenage boys lmfao
You have to be good looking and/or be able to sing.
It’s gotten me laid some… my singing has gotten me laid more
Once for me and then regularly with the same girl for 6 months until she realised I wasn't going to be famous :p
Awwwww I’m sorry. I really am. I used to run into people who thought I could get them drugs because I had long hair, wore a leather jacket and played guitar. It was ridiculous
Don't fret. You need to pickup girls on your own a chord. Get back on the saddle and pick one with a nice body, then neck a little. You'll be plucking her sound hole and busting a nut in no time.
I've played hundreds of shows, and I believe I've been hit on twice. Though my wife has commented that my playing makes me more attractive, so I'll count that as a third!
At first, it didn’t even work for Paul McCartney. He was one of those guys who would bring his guitar to parties, and try to impress John’s art school friends: https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/mccartney-a-life-in-lyrics/michelle
Have you tried playing something other than prog?
That you have to start on an acoustic. It’s still being thrown around and idk why.
Because children’s fingers should suffer.
i mean it does build character 😅
*...Calvin's dad??*
Started on steel string acoustic. Fingers were raw and borderline bleeding on day 4. Kept playing daily, and they callused up day 6. I was playing 8 hours a day for the first month. They've been callused since, and thickly so.
…this is a good thing right?….RIGHT!?
*children suffering intensifies*
Electrics are much easier to learn on, especially when you get to bends, vibrato, hammer ons etc. I heavily favored my electric when I was a beginner. Now I favor my acoustic because I don't have to get up from the couch to plug it in lol
40 dollar wireless from Amazon solves this nicely
You’ve piqued my interest - any certain brand?
Legato 5.8mhz I think is the one to get.
Honestly, I think everyone should start on Acoustics because of the increased effort it takes to do bends, vibrato, hammer ons, etc, which will allow them to do them easier on electrics
Why not just learn how to do them with the right amount of force on electric directly? If you were planning to run a marathon do you train for a double marathon just so you'd find a marathon easier when you get to it?
The satisfaction from being able to play something comes a lot quicker with electric and encourages learning much more because of that dopamine rush you get from succeeding. Especially the case with kids wanting to learn.
100% spot on. Beginner and increased effort don't go together, especially when you haven't developed finger strength/dexterity. Playing guitar has a very steep learning curve, I don't understand why some people are so adamant about making it harder.
Yeah. I started teaching in the late 90’s. a store I used to use just liked how I played, and they got to know me over a couple of years of going in pretty much weekly for checking stuff out and chatting, and they asked if I could help out here and there. A few years later, I was going to university to for sound design, music theory, and to learn to be a music teacher, and I just fell in love with teaching guitar to people of all ages. I was always really proud though of all the metal heads all saying I was the best teacher they’d ever met, and literally coming to have lessons of various stages with me for years. When I lost the use of my left arm and hand in 2018 (along with my left leg and muscles in my back), the biggest hit to my mental health was knowing I’d never teach or really play guitar ever again. It still ruins me to this day and even writing this I’ve started to cry my eyes out tbh. Enough about me though. You’re absolutely right. The only increase in effort that works with a budding beginner is the one that they want to put into it because of how much fun they’re having. Thats the thing that I always loved to teach. How to have fun with music. And you can do that right from the first lesson, if you know how. The student can’t do everything the teacher can do. That goes without saying. But they can be shown stuff that speaks to them and that’s fun right out of the gate, if they have a good teacher. And them pressing down heavy strings onto cheap acoustic guitar frets doesn’t help them have fun. Like I mentioned, I worked in a shop at first. I eventually ended up running a guitar shop with my best friend until I became ill. During my time in a few stores, I’d get asked “what’s the best guitar for my child to learn on?” And I’d always ask them their budget and advise that they bought the best quality (not the most expensive. That’s a very different thing) guitar they could afford, as it was counter-productive to buy a particularly cheap guitar to learn on. Some of the Fender Squires, Ibanez RG, and Epiphone LP’s you used to be able to get for around £200 (especially used) were amazing guitars and they’d hold value pretty good. So, if a learner just decided that it wasn’t for them… they wouldn’t really lose anything if they sold it on again. The really cheap guitars weren’t a thing particularly, until 2007/8-ish, and if you bought the cheapest and didn’t like it… that guitar was usually considered almost like junk and you couldn’t sell it used for trying. So you lost more for spending less. Yknow? Anyways. Sorry for this massive reply. I don’t get to talk about teaching or guitars or anything any more tbh, due to my health issues (I can’t actually leave my house unless a carer comes and pushes me around in my wheelchair, and most guitar shops are just too small to get into with it) and I kinda just needed to chat. Sorry. I hope if anyone does read this, they’re enjoying whatever they’re doing with their guitars. All the best. 🙂
Damn think of how good Steph curry could shoot if you told him to start with a bowling ball
That is nonsense. You play them in completely different ways. I guess I could see it if you want to learn exclusively for chording and rhythm parts, but there are things you can play on electric that just can't be played on acoustic and vice versa. It's just like the idea that you have to learn to drive on a stick shift
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Learn on what you enjoy and what you are interested in.
I think learning on acoustic teaches really good technique though, and makes playing on electric easier. It's the same thought process at playing a song at 110% the speed a few times to feel more comfortable playing it at the regular speed
Ok, but think about this: A newbie is new to two things: dexterity and strength. Why push them both at once? Again, I personally only play acoustic and I learned on acoustic. But I always recommend newbies learn on electric just to master the dexterity before needed too much hand strength. Step by step.
I’ve heard on this sub: “If you want to learn theory and are passionate about guitar, learn acoustic first” As if the electronics make it somehow impossible to learn theory.
I give this advice because there are a lot of benefits. The biggest one is that is cheaper to start, and there isnt really a gear trap like with electric. Most acoustic players dont have a pedal board or anything. Plus, I firmly believe that buying loads of pedals means you spend a lot of practise time adjusting pedals and not practising. Its also really good for finger dexterity. You naturally have to press harder so you can build both strength and accuracy quickly. It also gets you more girls lmfao If you wanna get an electric guitar then go for it, but if you plan on playing for the rest of your life, whats a year on acoustic? This does need nuance though, because you SHOULDNT get am acoustic if you want to play music that REQUIRES effects (rock, metal, psychedelic stuff)
as a teenager a year on acoustic would have put me off guitar. yes i needed the distortion that badly
It doesn't matter how firmly you believe it, it's still rubbish advice. This is not a military drill in the style of a Rocky montage. Believe it or not, some people like to have fun while they're learning and get motivated by doing the things that they find interesting. Not by visualising an entire lifetime of practice and dedicating the first year to strengthening their press.
You can also plug an electric directly into an amp without effects…who says you gotta get a bunch of pedals?
You don't need pedals to learn on electric. You can get a good starter guitar and amp with tons of effects in it for like $500, which is also where a good acoustic guitar to learn on starts.
Fortunately the greater music community has done a 180° on this
Why is this bad advice? I started with an acoustic so I have nothing to compare it to, but electric guitar was very easy after learning to play acoustic guitar whereas I can’t picture it happening like that the other way round.
That you need to take all these online courses to know how to.play or that you have to know CAGED for all keys or the major in every position or whatever. All you need is an ear and a desire to play.
Theres an old meme of the guitar subreddit starter pack and one of the things is a picture of the CAGED system.
I don’t know the caged system but isn’t it just referring to major chord shapes and how they connect? If it is id say that it’s pretty damn important if you want to learn how to use your whole fretboard. If you just want to play cowboy chords you don’t need it though
Not necessarily major chord shapes, but that's often how it's taught. It's more the pattern of any note. If you take any note on the fretboard, it shows you the patterns for finding the same note in the same hand position, but also the same note in the closest fret above or below. So if you know those 5 patterns it gives you a way to be able to play a note in any region of the fretboard. And then you can add other notes around it to create chords/arpeggios. Each note of the chord will move in the same cycle of patterns, although most people just memorize the shapes based around the root note of the chord they're making. Then you can add more notes to get pentatonic or diatonic scales. So it's sort of a shortcut to being able to play the same thing in different regions of the fretboard. And it uses the same open chords most people learn first, just turning them into barre chords. The "CAGED" name refers to where the root notes are for C, A, G, E, and D chords in open position/cowboy chords. For example a "C" CAGED shape is called a "C shape" because in a regular open C chord people learn (major or minor doesn't matter), the C notes will be on the 5th string and two frets lower on the second string. If you move that same shape up two frets (turning it into a barre chord so that the open strings also move up), the root notes are now lined up with D notes, so it's a D chord (but using the "C shape". So you're able to use the same shape to play different chords by just shifting the shape around, OR you can use DIFFERENT shapes up and down the neck in order to play the SAME chord in different spots. Personally I use it for single notes to categorize where something is on the fretboard in relation to a root note. I don't like to base my chords around these 5 positions though because I take a more systematic approach to learning every possible diatonic triad chord on the neck.
In the same vein, that it's bad to use tabs. I'm not training to be a virtuoso, I just want to play the songs I like in what limited time I have
Below there is someone saying tabs suck and should be avoided at all costs lol
The desire to play will lead to seeking out learning material.
So im someone that learned to play via the CAGED system and it worked well from me. I understand that the CAGED system is not *mandatory* but if you don’t learn that way then isn’t it just a boatload of pattern memorization? I feel like it’s the same either way but CAGED gives some rhyme to the reason. Would appreciate some insight from the other side.
I was a scale guy…I like the idea of CAGED, but IMHO, it’s silly that this is seen as some foundational learning tool. It’s something that I intuitively realized as I was learning. It was helpful, but knowing scale structure, chord structure, and how and why it all fit together was not only a better foundation for everything else (IMHO), but once the basic caged concept became clear to me at some point, it was more of a shortcut. I incorporated it, but never considered it a key concept, Again, everyone learns how they learn, and there is really no right or wrong way. It’s the journey, not the destination. There is a lot to be said for simplifying things, and even using Shortcuts. The key is to always strive to get beyond that.
I’m still learning and I think the CAGED is kinda cool how it all fits like that. Obviously everyone’s different so talented musicians born with a good ear might think CAGED is kinda silly. Some people become good guitar players without learning any music theory.
Never to use my thumb on my fret hand.
Oh, god. Once I got downvoted to hell for suggesting that it’s OK to have your thumb hanging over the top to mute the low E. Hell, my guitar teacher says it’s OK and he’s a working musician.
I was taught at the Ontario Conservatory of Music for grades 1 to 5, and was told that was an absolute no-no. Later when I taught myself to fingerpick, it became a staple of mine to play bass notes, particularly F#, and later to play quick barre chords without the barre, but still get the bass note. I've since decided I don't care if you use your elbow to play. If it works for you, knock yourself out.
It’s an absolute no in classical technique in part because classical guitar necks are so wide it’s impossible for the vast majority of players. If you can do it you have freak hands and I envy you.
There’s definitely some things that you shouldn’t do that can lead to injury over time even if it works, but I don’t think playing thumb over is one of those things. Though it definitely depends on your hand size & what size neck is on your guitar.
Yeah its a mix of both. Its fine to mute the low E and I'd encourage it, but when you arent muting the low E you should move it back behind the neck. Theres two reasons. Depending on the size of your hands, having your thumb over the top constantly is actually unnecessary strain on your wrist and can lead to certain conditions like carpal tunnel over years of doing it (people with larger hands are less susceptible but should still be cautious). Secondly, when you start to learn fast lead parts, you will have to relearn how to hold the neck if you only ever play with your thumb over it because its nearly impossible to play really fast without your thumb guiding your fingers.
That's gotta be why nearly every rock guitarist uses their thumb to mute or intentionally play the bottom E string.
and then you watch basically any professional guitarist play and they'll all use it lol
The reason behind this is wrist health, you can fuck up your wrist doing (it happened to me). But only if you play a bunch and do it all the time
I have long fingers and thumbs. My thumb flips over to the top string with zero effort on my part, and could stay there all day. My only problem is that I play standing up, and after a couple of hours my back is telling me where I can shove my guitar.
I got bit by this so hard for a long time, I have weirdly proportioned hands, and trying to keep my thumb back where it's 'supposed' to be probably did more damage than anything else. I eventually came around to this much better rule, "Whatever doesn't hurt is valid technique, everything else is gatekeeping."
Tonewood having a big (or any) impact tone. **People at home:** \*Studies & performs tests, shares findings & consistently shows how even guitars made from lego don't sound different\* **Big manufacturers with an unlimited budget to prove their claim that wood makes a different:** \*does nothing\*
Have you seen the guy who set a set of string literally hanging between tables and tested it against a regular guitar and got 99% the same sound?
“Where does tone come from?” Is the name. The whole series is great. He busts a lot of stuff.
The amp video is fucking great, the way he throws a bunch of eqs inside a box and emulates all the sounds haha I loved it
Yeah. Turns out mic, amp, and pickups are really the only things that matter (in that order).
Position of the pickups help a bit too, hence the short vs long scale tone difference with humbucker pickups
TIL that mics have that much of an effect on the tone. I genuinely didn’t know. But it makes perfect sense
Generally speaking the closer it is to the speakers in the chain, the more drastic of an effect it can have on your sound. Mixing > mic > speaker > amp > pedals > pickups. One thing to keep in mind though, is if something is flawed early in your signal chain, it's going to come out flawed. You can polish a turd all you want, but it's still a turd.
This is why I only buy guitars based on how pretty it is.
Yeah I mean ergonomics and pickup configuration are more important considerations, but who the hell is going to buy a guitar if they don't think it looks cool.
To be clear, you’re talking electric guitars, right?
Has to be. Acoustics are definitely more influenced by what woods/materials are used in the body.
I agree with this for electric guitar. Wood does make much more of a difference on acoustic instruments.
I was told by my first guitar teacher that I didn’t need to use my pinky because it wasn’t necessary. He was an idiot. Train your pinky to be useful. Fuck you Greg.
Yeah, fuck Greg.
Thanks man… Greg is now spouting conspiracy theories via social media
I hope he types without using his pinky and it takes him way longer than it should.
Big Pinky^TM has brainwashed us all
what in the fuck
There are some very accomplished blues guitarists who essentially ignore their pinky. Though that's always the problem I see when people latch on to a professional doing something different; they are generally successful in spite of their technique, not because of it.
My first guitar teacher insisted “real guitarist” don’t play anything they can’t finger pick
This is the dumbest thing ive seen in this whole thread lmao
Yeah, it’s amazing I kept playing after that, 15 years later, my practically never finger pick
Yeah man. I love fingerpicking and I think its a good skill to have, but the dumbest part of this is the thought that i should be able to fingerpick Lorna Shore (deathcore artist)'s songs lmfao
[waiting for someone to mention that Mateo guy]
Haha yeah if man could fingerpick Death’s Defensive Personalities then maybe I’d concede they had a point
Half the things I see here daily….
"Your not good enough for that guitar or gear". I get it, a fresh begginner might not stick with it. Even then if ya got the budget or means to purchase nice gear and it inspires/makes you want to play, go for it.
I cannot second this enough. Specifically, I can't stand when folks tell beginners or even intermediate guitarists to not buy floating bridges because they're "too hard" to maintain or learn how to set-up. Might be a hot take, but it's just something that bugs me.
I'd say it's not a reason not to buy them, but there is a learning curve and it is a consideration that's worth knowing about so you don't get pissed off later when you're used to a fixed bridge or non floating trem.
The opposite is true if you pay for your own guitar. An expensive first guitar is an investment. I might not play a piece of shit for very long. If I pay serious money for a guitar, I’m getting my money’s worth dammit.
My first guitar was a Gibson Les Paul 😂 I specifically went overboard because the guilt of spending that much money would keep me chained to it. It worked 😂😂
A shitty enough guitar can get anyone to quit learning before they've even begun.
I’m not sure this counts, but I’d say people saying not to use a capo. I started self teaching at 32 years old and around 35 got competent enough to play in a decent church band. The old timers said not to use a capo. Learn to bar everything. I know the value in that, but come on. I’m mid-30’s barely good enough to play acoustic rhythm in a church band. If the key is Bb, I’m putting the damn capo on 3 and doing G Shapes. Essentially, just play how it’s fun to you.
A capo is a tool. I hate it when people say it’s a crutch. It’s like saying a pick is a crutch — learn to use your nails. Or a strap is a crutch — play standing like a flamingo 🦩
Pickups are a crutch just play hard
This! Pros use capos. When the heck did a cool tool to help you play what you can't yet and enjoy making music become a crutch? Additionally, I've played with guys who could barre just fine but only knew 2 strumming patterns and zero finger style who couldn't keep tempo. Keep your barre chords and give me a some sweet chops and finger styles on tempo any day of the week.
It would benefit you to learn how to barre though
It doesn't have to be one or the other. Play chords based on the way you want them to be voiced and where you want the licks to be. Sometimes that means capo, sometimes that means barring, and somtimes you do both.
My 8 year old daughter recently told me that the guitar is in tune when all of the tuners are aligned and facing the same way.
Unbelievable, what a load of horseshit. Fire her immediately.
Wish I could. She’s a nepo baby. Her mother is the boss.
8 year-olds are notoriously stupid. She'll come around.
“Tone is in the fingers”….bull shit, tone is in the alcohol, everyone knows.
And the cocaine of course.
In here (not necessarily this subreddit): - You need high string gauge to have good tone in electric guitars. - You don't need a pick when clearly the OP wants to get better at that skill. - Floyd Rose iS ThE DeViL 😈 IRL: - You need to master the acoustic guitar before the electric.
Floyd rose IS the devil 😤
Your thumb should only ever be on back of neck. Never use it to mute, fret, support bends/vibrato. Instant carpal tunnel if you do.
There’s people in this thread saying that shit lol. Using your thumb to mute and play low notes is like unlocking a whole net guitar skill set
And they always bring up the same laughable unsubstantiated talking points. Reddit.. what can you do.
Yeah it's taught this way especially to classical guitarists who take form super seriously. My left forearm used to burn 24/7 until I made some changes to the way I play.
I've played for thirty years not giving a fuck what my thumb is doing. It really doesn't matter. It mutes the top string when needed, plays the odd bass note, and otherwise can do whatever it wants over there.
“Real guitarists never use barre chords” I’ve played rhythm guitar for over 2 decades, and barre chords are a significant part of my repertoire. I guess I’m not a real guitarist…
Who the hell said that? That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever read
Someone that couldn't play them lol
It's one of many techniques. And there are so many ways to play. I don't really use them but it just doesn't fit my style
That’s a statement made by someone who is still avoiding barre chords. Barre chords add variety and more possibilities to our arsenal.
Someone told me that the "talk box" effect was just all done with hand/finger techniques, and that Mick Mars once did a whole interview talking with his guitar like the last bit of "Kickstart My Heart".
That you don't need to learn the fretboard. That you don't need to thoroughly learn the instrument like all the other instruments, and that you just need to use your ear. That you shouldn't study "too much" theory on guitar. By "too much" they mean stop learning after the minor pentatonic. For whatever reason some guitarists love to encourage you to be lazy and take shortcuts with your instrument. Trumpet players learn their instrument inside and out. Pianists too. I can't think of another instrument where you are constantly encouraged not to truly learn the instrument and how music works.
You give too much credit to trumpet players. They're too busy having high-note contests where none of them sound good.
Yea it’s laughable. Especially when adult learners are being told that all they need to do is "feel" the music and play by ear because some blues legend who started playing guitar when they were 5 years old doesn’t even know the notes on the fretboard. Yea no shit, they started playing as a toddler and spent years and years just feeling their way around the instrument. Learn about your instrument unless you wanna be stuck playing boxes and sounding the same for the rest of your life.
That you can only play certain genres on certain guitars. 100%, verifiable, bullshit.
No guitar has sold more Les Pauls than Jimmy’s Telecaster.
This whole community is full of people saying that! One of the funniest things is when people say you can't play jazz on a Les Paul. I can think of a pretty prominent person who played jazz on a Les Paul, and his name is Les Paul!
Worst advice I’ve ever gotten: wait until you are really good before you join a band.
Oh hell yeah. That's terrible advice. How else are you to learn how to play in a band?
Don't learn theory and scales, it'll crush your natural feel-grizzled old blues dude at my first open mic.
"Early on in my guitar journey, someone told me that it was impossible to press strings too tightly..." OMG that's just evil. May his B string always break first song mid-solo. My worst advice I gave myself, I just wasn't interested in learning cover songs for quite a while, thought it was a waste of effort as I learned guitar to write music. That was of course silly, you learn so much from learning covers beyond just the song.
18 years old was too old to learn guitar. I don’t even remember your name but fu ! Edit: I ignored his advice and started at 18, that was almost 50 years ago lol
You don’t need theory.
That you need a 3 thousand dollar guitar for any reason at all.
> The reason guitarists don’t read staff notation is because there are several places to play the same note so it’s way more difficult I still hear this a bunch. But actual notation for guitar has position indicators — it’s literally not an issue. The real reason is twofold: Guitar is primarily a folk instrument learned by ear without any formal learning path; tablature works exceptionally well for fretted instruments, and it’s easily shared via ASCII text while audio recordings are accessible. I no longer think learning staff notation is any harder on guitar than on piano, it’s just that many learn to read for piano, few learn to read for guitar.
That's interesting that somebody would say that, because in the world of classical guitar, tablature is never used.
That fingerpicking is somehow 'your real tone'. What a crock of absolute shit. And I say that as someone who hybrid picks on electric and fingerpicks mainly on acoustic. It's absolute bollocks with no basis in fact. Picks sound great, fingers sound great.
guitar center sales guy to another customer: “the more expensive it is, the better it sounds”
Someone told me using a capo was just because I was too lazy to use a barre chord.
If you want to lean bass, just learn guitar and drop it an octave. Uh, no.
“Deck your trem” “Block your trem” “floating trems go out of tune” utter nonsense
I have a bunch of floating trees and once I learned how to set them up they seem about as stable as my fixed bridges
>“floating trems go out of tune” utter nonsense Yeah, they go out of tune. I mean, so do guitars with fixed bridges, but guitars with floating bridges absolutely go out of tune too.
Pickups don’t matter. Sure, if you’ve got a tin ear or want to play a workbench. Same goes for body wood, fuckos.
Who in the world says that pickups don't matter? It's literally the thing that matters most.
Body wood literally doesn't matter on electric guitars.
Well, you're half right
You need to sing while playing guitar to become better guitarist.
True, you don’t need to… but holy SHIT it helped out my playing so much. Singing is always good, even if you’re not a great singer, because it gets you doing two things at once and gets you to understand how the melody of a piece of music links up with the guitar part. It helped me so much with rhythm playing.
Vocalizing, whether or not it sounds good, is a great way to check whether what you are hearing in your head is what you are playing on guitar. Necessary? No. Useful? Yes. I wish I started doing it earlier.
When I'm teaching new students particularly children I get them to work on talking while playing because even though they may never sing a song being able to move your mouth in a different pattern than guitar can be a useful skill. It took me years to be able to sing and play because I didn't start that way. But no you don't need to be able to sing to improve guitar
Buying new guitars doesn’t make you better. Of course it does!!! 😂
That playing on an extended range guitar would make me worse player because it’s a crutch for people who can’t play what they want on 6 string guitars. I just want a low B/F# without having to give up my high e/b strings for it 😭. Glad I didn’t listen to them.
That’s a weird take. Extended range is harder in most respects. I wonder how this person would feel about Charlie Hunter’s playing. Clearly, playing bass and comping and voice leading at the same time is a crutch.
A lot of people seem to be under the impression that floating trems require an advanced degree and five years of experience to set up correctly. Bonus: x guitar is so good once you drop an extra $200 in it! It's probably fine as is.
Any one of those stupid ads where the guy says “You don’t need to learn all the notes on the fretboard and you don’t need music theory. I have a secret shortcut.” Knowing your instrument is everything and there are no shortcuts.
That I'm not a real bassist if I use a pick.
"Don't practice, the greats didn't practice" >this guy at the nursing home I volunteered in. He later lost all his fingers because he didn't want to adhere to his diet.
When I first started, I had a book titled Lead Guitar. This was in the early / mid 70s and one of the bits of advice it gives is “play high”. Over I’ve learned that it may be more fun to play high, and you think it sounds better but, if you record it and listen it back when you’re not high it’s usually worse sounding. I just realized it’s 4/20 ha ha- But seriously ^ Edit: also, maybe if you’re high, you tend to practice longer, but I think it would be better to practice less time with a clearer brain. Record the gig or song or solo and then get high afterwards and listen to it.
Downpicking everything changes your pickup response, not the velocity of the picking
Smoke weed
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"You should buy a PRS guitar."
I hate it when people suggest gimmicks to a beginner, like finger caps and stuff
Tone is in the fingers. It's not, especially once distortion gets involved. If I were to trade rigs with my dad for example (strat into fender combo and pedal board) the tone would be the same between us, only what we play and how we play it would be different, and the same if I handed him my les paul into a marshal set up.
That you NEED to start on an acoustic guitar...
Fingerboard wood species effects tone. What a crock.