I'm just bummed the musicians we actually like are doing it tough right now.

Years ago they still had album sales and writing for guitar magazines. Credit to the Music is Win guy for unlocking the way to make a lot of money online from driving people to his guitar courses via his clickbait videos but I have no interest in his music if it sounds like that.

A few months back Al DiMeola was charging something ridiculous for a couple of people to tour his studio and have dinner with him at his home listening to his stories. That highlights how tough things would be getting for a lot of musicians right now. Meanwhile Home Depot guy is boasting about buying $5000 Klon pedals. Full disclosure: I'm salty. I hate this situation.

Damn she can play, different style than Lari but her vibratos and bends are hnnng..
Music is Win is actually a really good player, yeah that song sucked but when he's doing demos and chit the solos he plays are really,really good.. I'm way more salty towards female guitarists if you guys can't tell (lol).. Spend days working on a song from writing to production and playing and barely get 50 views.. Some random hot sloot that just started playing last month posts a video of her struggling to play Sweet child of mine and gets more views in that video than all of mine combined... Can't blame them though, i'm one of those viewers for them lol.. I remember when I first started posting guitar videos on instagram some girl followed me and I followed her back, we both barely had any audience.. She had just started playing though and it was obvious but she was really pretty.. Fast forward to today and she has 10x the amount of followers I have even though she only plays covers.. To give her credit though, she really did improve a lot and it's better to look at her than my ugly face but still...

Fk don't get me started on the female guitar simping. I will recognize and appreciate anyone if they are exceptional. Then I see a female doing a Jason Becker cover, yeah it's ok but kind of sloppy with quite a few mistakes and I read the comments: "Wow how come you're not more famous?" "Gorgeous and a guitar god!" I see 5 million views. Then I watch a 50k view cover of the same song, 100x times more precise and cleaner but it's a male for 450k less views all because of a thumbnail.

But I try not to get agitated over that, we all know beauty sells for casual listeners. Skill musicians and musicians who have mastered multiple instruments AND can sing are all still struggling if they choose a non-mainstream route.

Speaking of mainstream music, you realize it's been the same autotune half EDM/hip hop genre for over a decade? What happened to changes in music fads? At least before you had rock, hip hop, grunge, metal all sharing the charts.

Shawn Lane couldn't even afford medical insurance, he had to build/fix his own amps and rent out equipment.

Anyway we're at a point now where fast arpeggios, fast 3 note per string licks, 1-2 finger tapping and all of that has been mastered and displayed since the fking 70s. You have thousands of people who can play all around the same level, but it's then left up to what songs can they create? I hate it when people in 2020 play something that was down like 50 years ago and they all act astounded.

There seems to be "YOUTUBE GUITARISTS" which is like the equivalent of a sh*t game player who streams for the culture and then actual musicians creating music and using social media as a supplement. It's easy to spot the difference.

Look how many subs Frank Gambale has... a fuking crime and I see female and male guitarists who play at a 2-3 year level with 500k, 1m+. Image comes first for youtube guitarists and an old guy who is easily one of the greatest guitarists currently living is doing his thing not caring about clout.

That's what I loved about EVH, he legitimately loved music and would have kept doing it regardless of the success, you can tell that about his character in his interviews.

100% bro, but that's life... I wish I had the love EVH and those guys have for playing, I get easily discouraged when I post something and it gets no views.. Get pissed and stop playing a few months and then come back and repeat lol..

I'm happy at least some guys that deserve it are getting a lot of recognition like Mateus Asato and those ****gy looking kids from Polyphia (they're great though lol)

Yeah those dudes might have figured chit out.. But you never know their situation beforehand, maybe Misha has really rich parents or something? I really enjoy Ola's videos and interviews but I've never heard him playing anything good, he just seems to do those generic metal riffs all the time. Having said that I'd like to try Solar and Abasi guitars.. Especially Abasi because people are saying they're something else.. I find them extremely ugly but I don't give a fuk about guitarsthetics any more..

Misha deserves to be a millionaire honestly.. Periphery were always one of the GOAT prog boys along with Btbam, PtH, and the Human Abstract.. His solo work is also insane, dude is a genius composer..

Damn really? Could never tell.. I don't even think any of the Periphery guitarists are into solos though, their riffs though hnnnng..

Yeah, I picked that up right away. An awesome intro riff.

[QUOTE=rollerball post_id=1620309351]Another favorite. They're definitely into solos, I tend to think that Misha has the better solos even though he's not quite as technically sound as the other players in the band.
Guthrie Govan's solo on this Periphery song is probably the best of the lot though lol. Start listening at 3:50 to get a sense of the chords before the solo starts.

[youtube]L6c8Cl3Hka0[/youtbe][/QUOTE]They also had Petrucci in one of the songs right? I only know their really old material honestly.. But it's cheating to have Guthrie do a guest solo, how the fuk do they even play that chit live?

Yeah, I've heard Misha and other members of Periphery say that they don't really make any money from the band. Pretty much all their income comes from their businesses outside of Periphery. Although being in a band as big as Periphery obviously helps, since many of their fans are also the target audience for their businesses like Horizon Devices and GetGoodDrums. Not to mention endorsements and royalties from signature pickups, guitars, etc.

I've been a fan of Bulb and early Periphery for a while as well. 2 of my favorite songs are All New Materials and Unleash the Pwnies. Although to be honest, I'm not used to hearing All New Materials with vocals since I got so used to hearing the instrumental version. It's hard for me to appreciate the version with vocals.
Unleash the Pwnies is pretty heavy and kinda reminds me of The Faceless.



Any of you guys fans of Haunted Shores? Misha's other side project with Mark Holcomb. This is probably my favorite song by them, it features Chris Barretto, one of the previous Periphery vocalists.

Not sure what else you can try mang. Time for a SwimToTheMoon OnlyFans?

That's just the nature of a superficial platform with little substance. Nobody is there to read anything or absorb more than a few seconds of content. If someone looks good they'll get a follow before they play a single note. It's all about instant gratification. I was looking at Plini's instagram and no surprise a female guitarist with a blue tick who commented on one of his photos has more followers than he does.

Forget social media, I still believe in the album concept. It serves as a time capsule. Musicians who are chasing a quick buck with clickbait, gear reviews, teaching a few licks, etc. might be financially better off these days but they won't leave behind a legacy like the artists who put the time into recording their music even if there's no money in it.

Two of my favorite guitarists sadly passed away but I can still enjoy the albums they made. Now what if all they put out were gear reviews and a bunch of 30 second instagram videos showing off their chops? That stuff is forgettable. So the message is keep making music with no fuks given about followers. Document it. Record it. Learn to mix it as well as you can or get some outside help. Collaborate with other musicians. That's my goal anyway. I've pissed away many years with a lot of musical ideas but I haven't properly finished anything in a long time. I struggle with the idea something has to be perfect and that quest for perfectionism can paralyze you.

On another note, back in the mid 90s a friend was visiting from Japan and we were talking about the demise of guitar music which was lost in the tidal wave of grunge and nu-metal. He said "all that guitar stuff is huge over there. They idolize those guys." Fast forward a few years and eventually the likes of Paul Gilbert were appreciated again, maybe not quite on the same level as the 80s, but thankfully he kept doing what he was doing. So it's important not to get caught up in chasing trends and just focus on making the music you have a passion for. Just my 2 cents.

Yeah I know what you mean about female guitarists getting a ton of views, especially if they're pretty. But I think another reason why she's getting more views, is because she's playing covers. I think in general it's hard to get people to listen to new original music, especially if you're not an established artist. My most viewed video is a Megadeth cover I played, which has 15,000 views, while my original songs only get about 500 views on my channel lol.
Nowadays, I usually post most of my original songs through Youtube promotion channels, which are genre-specific Youtube channels that post new releases from underground and independent artists. It's definitely helped me, because their subscribers are looking to find new artists in a specific genre, like me. When I release song through these promotion channels I usually get around 2,000-4,000 views, which I know isn't a lot in the grand scheme of things, but it's still a lot better than I could do myself.

Not to mention I also release my music on Spotify, Apple Music, Google Play, Amazon Music, etc, which helps me gain more listeners as well. The platform in which I've gained more followers and performed the best is actually Bandcamp. It's kinda convenient that a lot of my listeners are finding me on Bandcamp, because they can stream/download and buy my music as well as merch like CD's and T-shirts that I'll be coming out with soon. I definitely recommend Bandcamp because you can release your music on there for free, unlike Spotify and Apple Music.

I remember you mentioning you play metal and that you listen to BTBAM. If your music is in that same style, I can probably recommend some Youtube promotion channels that you can contact. I think right off the bat, that's something you can do to increase your plays and gain some new listeners. If you ever need any advice just let me know.I agree. Even though the music industry in general is moving away from full length albums, I think fans of certain genres like rock/metal still very much appreciate full length albums. Pretty much every person that I talk to that listens to rock/metal say that they prefer full length albums to singles. I've released singles in the past and thought I was doing fairly decent as far as plays/downloads. But when I released my first full length album, the response that I got was exponentially better and I was reaching a lot more people. I even had people from other countries messaging me about buying a CD. I didn't even plan on selling physical CD's but ended up ordering some, because a few people had asked for them. I agree though that releasing albums or even EP's are the way to go.

Yeah, it takes some getting used to. I definitely wasn't a fan of growls either when I first heard them. I think the key to appreciating them is that you have to enjoy the music first. My gateway was listening to melodic death metal. I was already a big fan of power metal, so when I first heard melodic death metal, it didn't seem that much different, apart from the vocals. I mainly just listen to death metal and other heavier styles like this for the music anyway. I see growls as more of a rhythmic instrument that helps to emphasize certain melodies and rhythms in the music, it's not really the focal point for me. I'm a big fan of instrumental stuff too tho. I'm currently writing an instrumental death metal album. It definitely has a different feel without vocals tho, I'm having to write busier guitar riffs and drums.

Lolled at swim onlyfans..
I'm also being a little dramatic honestly.. At the end of the day I'm a lazy kunt that has only recorded like 5 full songs in all my years of playing.. I have a lot more music recorded but it's mostly 1 min chit for instagram.. I have enough material written for like 3 or 4 full albums but actually having the will power and motivation to learn and record them is different.. Guys like Plini or Nick Johnston probably have an insane work ethic and play at least a few hours a day, whereas I barely play that amount in an average week.. Like this month, I haven't even touched a guitar and my last upload was in the summer...

You hit the nail on the head with social media though.. I'm just chasing trends and expecting to be a legendary instagram guitarist when I'm not even focused on this chit.. Need to record at least 1 proper album, not for clout but for my love of guitar..
Would love some advice man, I can pm you my youtube and insta.. I also want like honest critique of my work, I sometimes upload my songs on forums and it's either ignored or like a simple "it's great man".. It's really hard to be objective about your own work, when you play and relisten to your own music hundreds of times your brain legit can't tell you if it's good or not. Also send me your music please, curious to listen to it

Thanks for the good advice, my son definitely will benefit from having something he wants over something that's "better".

He had his first lesson with a new instructor last week and he learned some new chord exercises. Nothing crazy, just something new that sounds different than when he's been doing. The next day was the first time in probably a year that he picked up his guitar to really work on something other than just practice a few songs and mess around.

Yeah man, send me a pm I'll definitely give it a listen and give you my honest feedback. It is always good to get another person's opinion since sometimes they're able to hear things that you wouldn't have been able to catch. And yeah music forums are pretty much like any other forum, where you have to be a regular poster to get a good response rate usually. I used to post my music on forums too, but after a while I just realized I was getting a better response elsewhere.

Brah didn't want to spam this forum again with my chit.. But did I not improve my drum programming in this song?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOIZsZmZPOU

I completely redid my workflow.. Split the drum tracks and mixed each part separately and spent more time working on velocities.. I know it's still not great yet but is it at least better? Before I only had one track for everything and mixed all the whole drum track as one unit.. Also didn't fuk with velocities that much..PM Sent

You say you only practice a few hours a week, which is impressive. Most of the technical things you want, within reason, you can have within 3-5 years if you get off of your ass. I can see and hear that in your playing. You have finesse, but you need to put in the time to get the rest - finesse is usually the last thing that comes in shred, so being that you've got some now means you won't become a sterile shredder later, but your vibrato is killing you. You need to fix that chit asap. It's weak af. Thin and shrilly. Slow it down, more forearm, and widen it. It won't take long to develop, so long as you stay mindful of it.

Good advice of course but it can be hard to develop in isolation. That's why I'd suggest playing more blues since you can't play convincingly in that style with a bad* vibrato (*this is subjective of course since I could rattle off a list of players whose vibrato triggers me but many people like it).

Agree.

Damn, guitar misc going in dry on Swim's vibrato. Q for Swim:whose vibrato do you like?That gives you something to aim for.

IMO there is no one size fits all vibrato that works for everything however I stand by blues being the ideal proving ground for developing expressive bending and vibrato which you can then fine tune for other styles so you can do subtle and slow to wide and fast and everything in between.

How you grip the neck makes a huge difference in my experience especially with bending and again that's why I like the blues angle for developing both. Happy to post my own examples to back it up and help you work on yours if you want. I have a few different approaches depending on the music and the situation. Sometimes I approach it more like Holdsworth which is what Tom Quayle is doing at times here. To my ear it's perfect for this style.



Speaking of which he did a series of videos on vibrato.

Spoiler!

Worked a LOT on my vibrato and I've only started to see some improvements.
It's hard as fukk if you can't do it naturally.
Also working out affects my vibrato and my tremolo picking.
Now that gyms have been closed for a while I've noticed that, while it's not what I'd call pro vibrato, it's much easier to perform it.