Guitar Tuning Tips

Here's a few we found for all you guitarists out there

#1 - A Tuner Is Just a Gadget

Tuners are nice little devices. They tell you the frequency of the note a person has struck. The problem is strings go sharp when you first hit them and go flat immediately afterwards. This means that just because you got a string to land on “E” or whatever on the tuner doesn't mean when you strike it with 10x more (or less) force in the take that the string will go sharp.

#2 - Never Tune Flat

One of my favorite tactics that I use daily is to never turn the tuning peg flat. If I'm tuning the G string and I end up being a little sharp, I don't grab the tuning peg. I simply bend the G string HARD. There is always slack hiding in the string and a hard bend will yank that slack right out of there. If you leave this slack in there, it will slowly come out over time and the guitar will drift flat as you play it.

If you aren't so great at bends (it amazes me as a crappy lead guitar player that some really talented guitar players look like something is wrong with them when they attempt to bend a string!) it's okay to physically grab the string with your right and and pull on it a bit. You don't want to yank TOO hard, but you can probably pull a little harder than you think.

This one takes a bit of practice as you have to nail your pitch by SLOWLY turning the tuning peg sharper and sharper. (Kinda like when getting gas for your car. No one wants to go over the magic dollar amount in your head.) Of course, if you go too far, you should just bend the string, and repeat.

In rare occasions when you go too sharp and there isn't enough slack, always go way down so

you can come back up, bend the string, and tighten it some more. Repeat.

#3 - Stretch 'em Hard!

I see guitar players all the time who toss brand new strings on, tune up, and think they are ready to track. I'm not sure where they got that idea, but I'm positive all of 'em have fought through wild tuning fluctuations at first. I stretch strings AGGRESSIVELY. I always start with by placing my left hand over the 22th fret and press down pretty hard. My right hand will be under the 24nd fret pulling up. I give it a good, slow tug and attempt to pull everything I can out of that 23rd fret. Then I move down a fret and repeat. I do this for the entire guitar. I can do it pretty quickly and it's not a huge deal if you skip a fret here or there.

My right hand is usually fairly torn up, so I try to use some kind of cloth as padding.
If you take a guitar that was freshly strung and just tuned up without stretching, you can often pull a full step out of the thing. Some of that is going to be slippage in the tuning peg, obviously, but a nice chunk of that is slack that you would have had to deal with during tracking. Always stretch 'em!

#4 - Tune Up If You Have To Wait

While not an Earth shattering tactic, if I know I'm not tracking for a few hours, I'll go ahead and tune up an extra half step after doing all that stretching. Why? I figure the extra tension while I'm not doing anything will help work out a bit of the slack. It's probably not perfect, but it only takes a second. Anything that saves a ruined take is worth doing.

#5 - How Do You Tune?

I know there are quite a few guitar players that debate over how you should tune. Some guys claim they want the initial attack to land exactly on the note. The problem with this is the string will drop in pitch in a hurry immediately afterwards making sustained notes and chords go flat. Some guys claim you should wait a good three seconds to let the pitch fall. This will get the guitar in tune for the long sustained stuff, but the initial attack will always be a bit sharp.

I tend to take a hybrid approach. I like to give about one second to make sure the note just after the initial attack is in tune. This method is the best of both worlds approach for me. There are certain notes that I have to deal with during tracking, but this approach tends to be the most effective for me.

#6 - Take Note Of How You Play

I'm not sure why so many guys who smash their strings with the sledgehammer known as their right hand turn into delicate fairy princess mode when they stomp on the tuner, but it's an epidemic. Make sure you tune how you play. It'll save you decades of trouble.

#7 - Throw The Tuner Out

When it comes time to really get a guitar in tune, it usually takes a bit of abandonment of the tuner. The tuner is a good tool, but it can't compensate for problems with a guitar or with the hands. Almost everyone needs a little sweetening on the G string. (Usually this requires tuning it just a hair sharp, but not always.) The B and High E string are optional, but often benefit as well.

#8 - Tune Specific To The Chord

If one chord is giving you ultra-trouble, I recommend tuning to that chord and punching in. 95% of the time it's the player at fault, but you can compensate for that by tuning specifically to that chord. This is no different than a singer re-singing a phrase because of pitch. Take your time and get it right.

#9 - Can You Play A D Chord?

99% of all guitar players thing that playing a good ol' D chord is for babies. Then they start recording and can't the damn thing in tune. I've seen it happen hundreds of times. This happens to the seemingly best of guitar players. Usually, there is some much crappier guitar player in the band that can do it no problem. You may want to double check and make sure you can play a D chord in tune. The odds are not in your favor.

#10 - Practice Playing In Tune

I see plenty of guitar players who just obsess over flashy playing. I'm usually shocked by how few of them play in tune consistently. It's as if they never even thought about it. This is one reason why I love practicing guitar using an emulator through my studio monitors to drum loops. It forces me to play in tune and on time as if it were a real take. This skill is dramatically different from anything a person does in their practice area. It's something any serious guitar player SHOULD work on. If you aren't a guitar player, but just a recording guy, you should push this message. Make a big deal about this tuning business.

Selling Out or Moving up?

In the history of modern music there are plenty of well-known, almost classic examples of talented, inspired, oftentimes experimental musicians who at some point in their career have decided to change direction and to begin making commercially orientated music deliberately designed to have a wide mass appeal as possible – Bob Dylan, Fleetwood Mac, Phil Collins, even Metallica, and the list goes on.

When this happens to a well-known act, there is at least a sense of gratitude in their fans for the fact that a band had still managed to record and release a few albums where they sound like no-one else - genuine, sincere and unique. It's a different story when an unsigned band who you have known, whose music you have admired and who you have hoped would get signed so that a wider audience would hear their inimitable music, suddenly decides to abandon true creativity and makes a calculated move for pure commercial success. You start feeling melancholy knowing that their early material which was honest and daring will remain buried and undiscovered.

All musicians want to be signed and be successful, but all need to establish what their priorities are - to expand creativity and develop as serious musicians or to target the teeny or mainstream market in a hope to get a profitable record deal as well as recognition which most likely will be short-lived. What most people forget is that if you are really smart and not afraid of hard work you can still become successful and win respect as well. Real talent doesn't need to compromise much. A truly talented musician can still forge a long-lasting career out of music that he or she believes in, but this is what people forget when they are tempted by a quick reward.

The reason why most talented bands struggle for years without getting signed isn't because there is something wrong with their style or because their genre isn't 'in' or trendy. Sincerity has always been in fashion. A sincere musician will never stray in a wrong direction. He or she will never have to worry about style, gimmicks or publicity stunts. The only thing that talented and genuine bands need to work on are usually instrumental skill, clarity of expression and an ability to write in a way that people can easily remember their music, and if it's all in place, trends and fashions will not matter.

It is doubly disappointing when people try to sell out at a young age, because it will inevitably damage them both as musicians and individuals. It is often managers and A&R people who pressure young bands to write simple, trendy stuff and to sideline their truly creative and experimental ideas. If there are any young musicians reading this, I have only one thing to say to them - don't let other people's greed, vanity and short-sightedness ruin your talent and damage your self-respect.

Take COVER! or Not?

is an age old question. Should unsigned bands cover well known bands? Should you start or end with a much loved tune or simply stick to your own material.

I am in two minds here to be honest:

When a Cover Works:

In previous bands and projects we have often thrown a well known cover that everyone can get into - think "Whole lotta love" by Zepplin, "Paradise City" by Guns or "sex is on Fire" by the kings of Leon. They can really grab the audiences attention and make them engage with you then you can take them along the trip with your tunes or finish with a much loved song to end on a huge crescendo. Yep I have had some of my best audience reactions from playing covers live plus it's so easy to learn someone else's stuff.

The Problem

The problem is no matter how good your stuff is due to the audiences familiarity with the cover your material just won't stand up. You run the risk of people simply going away remembering that 1 song (albeit, an awesome rendition of it) and you can fast become the band/artist that covers "xxxxxx". I have also seen many a fine musician love the reaction to a cover that they throw in another, then another and soon your playing 50% original and 50% cover versions.
My 2 Cents (about 4p for us Brits)

I have a few feelings on this one:

1) have 2-3 create covers in your arsenal ready to bring out if a crowd is flagging and you want to grab their attention. Do not play them in consecutive gigs and replace them every 3-6 months, so you don't get too known for that song alone. The constants should be your material.

2) Make it different - many artists have changed a cover significantly and really made it their own. In fact many launch their careers in such a way. Look at Limp Bizkit with Faith, Robbie Williams with Freedom or the late Sid Vicious with My Way!

3) A little bit of honest plagiarism. Lets face it you probably have a few artists in your CD collection that most people won't have heard of but one or 2 of their songs are simply awesome on first listen. Why not cover them! DON'T Claim they are yours, just don't claim anything! This is honestly what Metallica did in their early days - they didn't have enough songs to fill a set so padded it out with obscure yet catchy covers.

Use covers sparingly and cleverly. Plus if you are going down the road of altering an original to make it your own be prepared to play it a fair bit, as people really latch onto this.

Good Luck

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The Importance of Websites!

We are often asked if in the times of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter whether you really need your own website. Our answer is always the same.Band websites are extremely important. Having your own domain name is also a key to your success. Let us show you just a few reasons why:

Band Website vs. MySpace/Facebook/Other
First of all, you never want to put all of your eggs in one basket. Relying on a service like MySpace, and not having your own website is extremely dangerous. Many bands think that due to MySpace's popularity, it's the website that they should focus all of their time and energy on. Yes, MySpace/Facebook,etc is important for musicians, but relying on someone else's service can be a ticking time-bomb waiting to go off. What would happen if MySpace was suddenly shut down? It's not as impossible as it may seem. Just think of all of the problems that MySpace has had, with predators using the social-media site for preying on people and how much trouble MySpace has gotten into with parental-control groups. Having your own site, and mailing listeliminates a lot of those issues because you have complete control of what happens to your site and gives you the ability to contact your fans, should something go wrong with MySpace (or similar sites). One other reason why it is important that you have your own domain name, is that it's usually much easier to remember than a MySpace URL!

Your Band's Domain Name
You want to have a domain name that is easy to remember; hopefully your band's name, if it is available. You'll want to put it on everything that your band puts out, postcard mailers, flyers, cds, t-shirts, everything! Matter of fact, make some t-shirts up and wear them all the time! You also want to make sure that every person you know, knows your web address. Make absolutely sure that your fans are told, many times a night, what your website is...and tell them to go there!
Registering Your Band's Domain Name
Registering your own domain name is no longer expensive (under £10/year for .com's). Some of the most popular domain registration sites out there also have web hosting available.

Awesome Performance

Now I am totally against any form of organised dance routine but a bit of choreography wouldn't go a miss here!!

Start the Juices Flowing

So I had a bit of writers block the other day and was talking to a good friend of mine about it. He recommended 7 “famous” chord progressions to play with. I don’t know if it was the chords or simply working within a frame work but I came up with some great new stuff which sounded really varied and separate from my usual writing.

So thought I would pass it on – let us know how you get on

1) C D/F C D/F C/E Am Dm G C

2) C A Dm G7 C

3) C F E7 Am D7 G C

4) C D7 G7 Am D7 G C

5) C Am Ab7 G C

6) C F F/A Ab7 G Am

7) C E7 A Ab7 G C

p.s – don’t forget there are only a few days left to enter our artist of the month competition – so let us know if you want a review!

Ok so we have had a few emails about writing lyrics. This can be really tough for some people. The focus on fronting a band and singing well is not enough you need the words and they need to be real so listeners can relate and believe in you. Bands are emotional creatures and people live them.

So here are a few top tips

#1:
Is there an incident which happened that you think may have some song value? Write a song about that incident. If it were something you personally experienced, then that's probably even better.

#2:
Practice writing lyrics that have absolutely nothing to do with anything you've actually experienced. This could really add more variety to your lyric writing. Was it something experienced by someone you know? Write about it.

#3:
Take a very good concept and write several songs about it. Each song should give a different twist or perspective to the concept. This may very soon add up to a complete concept album.

#4:
At times, you may have written a song with a great melody but you just don't like the lyrics. You should probably just keep the melody and completely rewrite the lyrics, based on a new topic.

#5:
Write lyrics about something you have read about in a newspaper or magazine. Or perhaps something you saw on tv. How about your favorite movies? Do they have interesting ideas for writing lyrics?

One thing that can really enhance your lyric writing is brainstorming. This is one preliminary step that we sometimes neglect when we write lyrics. As songwriters we should try to dig dip to come up with ideas. Sometimes we simply underestimate our imaginative capabilities.
A good rhyming dictionary is a very useful lyric writing tool. It has helped me get out of a lot of jams. Just reading through the entries can really inspire you. Why beat your head against the wall when you can use a good rhyming dictionary to help you write lyrics?

More soon but I hope this helps!