1) I really love your tone on New Born Race. I think I saw once on a video that you were using a Pod Pro thru a Marshall, and was wondering what you recorded that solo through? Also the envelope filter/wah effect you are using in it, what is it? I love it, It’s sort of bubbly round and screamy all at the same time (can’t find a better description) – I just cant seem to come up with that tone/effect my self (always comes off sounding more ‘whiny’ and ‘thin’ rather than screamy and round)

First of all Lainee, thanks for the compliments! In the video below, you can see the solo Lainee is referring to (playback version for the album trailer):

For Newborn Race I used the bridge pickup on my Luna Andromeda, the Pod Pro, and the Dunlop 535-Q wah pedal, recorded directly into my computer’s sound card (the photo shows the whole chain). I always record with no added effects or EQ. During mixing, Arjen made many adjustments: EQ, compression, limiting, short reverb, long reverb, and delay. EQ usually involves hunting down and reducing any ugly frequencies, and often adding a bit of top. It depends on the solo sound used, and the characteristics of the backing.

You mention having a problem with only getting thin, whiny sounds. The only solution I know of is to try a load of different wah pedals until you find one you like. So far the Dunlop 535-Q is my “go to” wah, but sometimes I use a Bad Horsie II. The Dunlop Crybaby classic seems good as well — that will probably be the next wah pedal added to my own collection.

Another thing you can try is to “tune” your wah by opening it up and adjusting the range of the pot under the treadle to find the “sweet spot.” (see img below)

2) Your trem technique is brilliant, so fluid. Was wondering (for example on the Luna andromeda) when you set up your trem, how many springs do you have on the Floyd to get such a smooth and fluid motion and tone with it?

There are 2 springs on my Luna Andromeda (9-42s, standard tuning).The number of springs will depend on what gauge strings you use and whether you tune to standard pitch or some other tuning.

All of my guitars’ bridges are set up to be “floating,” which means that I can pull slightly up on the bar as well as press downwards towards the body. Floating trems have both advantages and disadvantages: you get a silky smooth trem action, but have to be careful when muting so as not to press too hard on the bridge and make the tuning go sharp. In general, tuning takes longer with a floating trem (for me, anyway).

I hope this answers your questions, Lainee. Best of luck with your music!

…Sweeping is fairly easy for me. I have the movements of my right hand sweep down just fine, and I can sort of figure out the Arps. I am self taught of a year or so, a little less and already I have associated myself among the best shredders around. =D Or so my friends say. I have been learning sweeps for about 2 weeks, and I need to know how you make it cleaner, with a distorted sound. I play Technical stuff, if you have ever heard of Necrophagist or something like Abigail Williams, and I can play the sweeps and arps just fine, except I leave all the notes ringing after the sweep on the string.

So, how do I..not do that? I try and palm mute, run my thumb over the strings as I sweep, but I end up making more noise. So I tried playing sweeps on clean just to get the motions down without banging on the strings with my fingers when playing fast. I know I am rambling, but sweeping is so frustrating when you can only hear static. My efforts in trying to clean by distorted sweeps have been destroyed…So as the only person to ever WANT to help me, Thank you.

Oh dear. Two weeks is nowhere near enough time to master a challenging new technique. Our fast-paced culture of instant gratification leads many people to expect to totally kick ass at new skills within an extremely short time. If they can’t manage, they think they either don’t have the “talent” for it or that they must be doing something horribly wrong.

Some skills just take time to develop. And beware: there are plenty of guitarists out there who will lie about grossly underestimate the amount of time and effort they need to master a given technique, just so they will appear more “talented.” This is total bovine excrement. So cut yourself some slack, realize that any skill takes time to develop, and don’t compare your own progress with other people’s.

OK then, without having seen or heard you play, my guess is that you are trying to play your sweeps too fast too soon.

You need to slow way the heck down, and here is why.

If you play very slowly, you can observe what you’re doing in detail and discover the exact source of the noise. It could be coming from either your left hand, or your right hand, or a combination of both. If you slow way down and still can’t tell where the noise is coming from, then ask a friend to help observe you. You might also find that the noisy problem disappears at a very slow tempo. In that case, gradually increase the tempo until the problem starts to occur.

Once you’ve identified the problem, THEN you can work on fixing it.

Sweep like a girl

For what it’s worth, here are some of my own observations about sweeping arpeggio technique.

• It’s not necessary to mute with the right hand unless you’re going for that Al DiMeola percussive effect. Try letting the heel of your right-hand palm glide lightly over the strings as you sweep to keep them from ringing.
• As you sweep through the arpeggio, your left hand should finger each note separately as you strike the string with the pick (or play a legato note). As you move to each new note, the preceding finger lifts off the string. So you only actually fret one note at a time. When you do a “bar roll,” make sure to actually ROLL your finger so that only the note you want to play is being fully fretted.
• I tend to keep my right hand and forearm fairly relaxed and loose, but I’ve noticed that some guitarists sweep with a much stiffer right hand and forearm. You can experiment with different feels to determine what’s right for you.
• Try practicing with varying levels of distortion, from clean to “more gain than God.” Using a clean sound will help you develop an even pick attack (you can hear if it’s not), whereas using lots of distortion will reveal any sloppiness that you need to clear up.

Just remember that the following applies to almost everything you’ll ever try to play: if you can’t play it at a slow-to-moderate tempo, then you’re not ready to play it fast. Period.

Good luck!

…I was wondering: do you think notes up first before you get a cool run to practice or how do you make up these melodic surreal sounds?
— Jas

“Melodic surreal sounds” — I love it!

I wish I had a genuinely instructive answer to this question, but I’m not really sure where my melodies come from. However, I can outline the steps I take to get there — perhaps they will work for you, too.

When I have a solo to do, I loop the solo section in my recording software and improvise over it until something “clicks.” (Clickage is totally subjective, of course!) Theory isn’t relevant for me at this stage; I play by ear, only resorting to theory if I have absolutely no inspiration whatsoever and need to take a more analytical approach just to get rolling.

Sooner or later, an idea will emerge (from wherever the heck they come from) and then I record it. Sometimes I can do a solo all in one sitting, but if I’m not feeling inspired it can take several sessions before I’ve got enough ideas. If inspiration is lacking, I’d much rather shorten a solo than spend a lot of time filling up the measures with uninspiring wankage that isn’t fun to play.

Additionally, if it’s hard to play an idea up to speed, I use a program called Transcribe to loop the backing at a slower tempo , increasing gradually to where it should be.

That’s really all there is to it, but here are some of the general principles that I keep in mind:

1. Go for strong notes rather than weak ones, particularly at the beginning and end of phrases.
2. Add unexpected-but-cool notes if possible.
3. Go for melodies and phrases, rather than widdly, meandering stuff.
4. “Just say no” to uninspiring chords — or change them until they work!

For some backings it’s easy to come up with a ton of ideas, for others it’s a royal pain. It helps to have chord progressions with lots of “movement” in them. If you’re familiar with the solo section from the Stream of Passion songs “Haunted” or “Embrace the Storm,” those are good examples of what I mean by chords with “movement.” In “Haunted” I think I even asked to change one of the E minor chords to major to be able to add more movement. A more mainstream example would be Steve Vai’s “For the Love of God.” Lots of movement there.

Finally, if you just can’t make the chords work for you (or aren’t allowed to change them), I’d decline to play on the song. Life is too short to play over shitty chords.

Arpeggios, arpeggios. You guitar players just can’t get enough of sweeping arpeggios! Since posting my guitar arpeggio videos on LoserTube I’ve been getting lots of email questions about how to practice them. My first reaction is always, “Why are you asking me? Go ask someone who knows, like Rusty Cooley!”

But because 1) it’s rude not to answer (polite) questions, and 2) I want to share the answers with as many people as possible, I’ve recently decided to answer your guitar-related questions here on my blog rather than in email.

Right then, enough background. Let’s get to today’s question!

John Oentoro emailed to ask:

Hi Ms. Lori, I’m John and I’ve stumbled upon your lesson/article on playing fast. I love it. I understand playing in 16th notes which is 4 notes played every beat. How do you play sweeping arpeggios to a metronome, though? Is it the same 16th note technique? Please use an easy example, something like an Amaj arpeggio (not the rolling one) hehe.

John, you can play ANYTHING YOU WANT to a metronome. You just need to set the metronome to the time signature that fits what you want to practice. When you practice arpeggios, for example, you don’t have to stick to sixteenth notes. You can play triplets, or dotted thirty-second notes, or whatever the heck kind of notes you want. I’m not sure how much you know about music theory, but the basics about meter and time signatures are useful to know. (Readers, please post in comments if you know of good online tutorials about time signatures, meter and note values.)

Because you asked so nicely, John, I’ve braved tabbing hell to create a couple of examples for you. The two examples incorporate the same number of notes, but they are arranged in different rhythmic groupings. The first uses straight sixteenth notes in 3/4 time, the second uses eighth note triplets in 4/4 time. Same notes, different feel.

Aaug sweep with sixteenths 3/4 time (guitar pro 5 file)

Aaug sweep with triplets in 4/4 (guitar pro 5 file)

I hope this clears things up for you, John. If you have any more questions, please post in comments rather than email so that everyone can benefit from the discussion