The Watering Hole

been after me to participate in their GT Tea.  It basically requires me to perform some sort of guitar peice for them.  I've dodged it for years because like an ass I didn't want to drive all the way from my county to the other and of another county to play a 3-5 minute piece.
So what I am thinking about doing so far is:

1.  "316" by Van Halen
2.  Straight into "Cathedral"....by Van Halen
3.  Into "Big Sur Moon" by Buckethead
4.  Into "Star Wars" by Buckethead.

I'd like to make this a bit longer.  I have to work this up by Dec 2.....So I can't get too crazy.

IF you can think of solo style stuff that would sound cool without any other intrumentation.....through those ideas up.

I've thought about MAYBE adding "Dee" by Randy Rhaods but I can't think of a good spot to put it....or I might boot 316 and replace it with Dee.  Not sure.  Any ideas would be helpful.

ERUPTION!  

Midsummer's Daydream by Triumph,
the acoustic gtr part in "when the children cry" by White Lion

both might work well.

Why don't you write something yourself, why do what has already been done by someone else.

DreamTheaterRules — Nov 25, 2008ERUPTION!  

I need DRUMS for THAT one....well I guess I could play part of it.....Will think about it.  The little whiddley thing at the end I did think about incorperating.

Ligerborn — Nov 25, 2008Midsummer's Daydream by Triumph,
the acoustic gtr part in "when the children cry" by White Lion

both might work well.

I'll listen to the Triumph thing tonight I haven't heard that.

Good call on the White Lion....I actually knew that at one point....shouldn't be to hard to pick out.  

Many thanks.

desertbluesman — Nov 25, 2008Why don't you write something yourself, why do what has already been done by someone else.

There is a good chance I 'll will bullshit through a part of this and just improvise a bit.  I'm just tryign to establish a frame work to fiddle aroudn in.  

The other bummer is that after tonight.....I'm going to be traveling for hte next week and won't have time to myself to really write.  Given that I take the stage for rehersal Dec 2....and the show is Dec 4.....and I have such a shitty attention span....I don't see me writing something.  

If I had a bit more time I have a perosn I write with that can easily inspire me and get good ideas out of my head.  But I'm going north and he's going south for hte holidays.  Maybe next year I'll write a performance piece....that would be cool.

"Midnight" by Satch is not as hard to play as it sounds, and it's a pretty effective solo piece.

Of course, if it was me, I would just fire up the Sovtek high gain channel with the master volume dimed and the gain barely up, throw out a sweet chord progression with some pretty ninths, and then start working in lines on top of it.  And after a minute or two, when eyes started to glaze over, kick in a delay pedal set to a dotted eighth...

Maybe you could make a solo out of the Chicken Dance...  ;)

charger — Nov 25, 2008"Midnight" by Satch is not as hard to play as it sounds, and it's a pretty effective solo piece.

Of course, if it was me, I would just fire up the Sovtek high gain channel with the master volume dimed and the gain barely up, throw out a sweet chord progression with some pretty ninths, and then start working in lines on top of it.  And after a minute or two, when eyes started to glaze over, kick in a delay pedal set to a dotted eighth...

This is why we have that whole Brotherhood of Mutual Love Society thing.  Because PART of what I added tonight.....was exactly what you are talking about.  

I needed something to bridge a gap and be a bit more interesting between "CAthedral" and "Big Sur Moon".......and I have this thing I do with delay.....since I have to have it for both of the other songs.....It's real similiar to the progression at the end of "Floods" by Pantera....but I take it someplace else.  It worked out really cool.  The 3 of them together is a pretty gross Delay etude.

I was thinking at one point....and still might fart with this if I can arrange it and make it make sense....but use the beginning part of Midnight.  I can play that one already....though I do tend to forget some of the shapes at the end.  But I could yank that first section.....and it would just LOOK fucking cool.....which is part of what I'm going for also......it's all about the performance! HAHAHAHAHA  It's not a guitar crowd so I can't beat them over the head with just guitar shit.

CraigBert — Nov 25, 2008Maybe you could make a solo out of the Chicken Dance...  ;)

Funny enough I do have some little musical jokes I've worked in.  OR little passing ideas that people will go...."Oh that's......" and then move on.

I've got a little "SOmewhere over the Rainbow" in there.....and have mixed in and out "Rondo al Turka"  which is a real fun thing to play.  

OF course the Star Wars medley will get a lot of the kids that are into all that Star Wars shit....like it was just invented last year or something.

Midsummer's Daydream by Triumph

Great call, Richard.  I took Amy to see Triumph one of the 19 times I saw them (just kidding, more like 10) and she LOVED this song.  When Rik played it, she said "If you promise to learn that song, I'll buy you a guitar like that to play it on."  I never did... so she didn't either.  

Really I think the best idea would be to come up with a simple theme and do some variations. Theme and variation as a form allows for so much diversity while not getting overly complicated. You could shift throughvarious moods/textures/playing styles all the while the basic thematic material would keep the listeners engaged.

As for coming up with the initial theme you could:

A)Borrow from a standard, be it a jazz tune or Beattles melody or whatever
B)Throw together a quick chord progression and just pull a melody out of the lines makung up the progression
C)Compose it from scratch
D)Use a simple serial trick like finding a phone number or whayever and assigining tones to the digits
E)Take a small phrase, write it out in Morse Code, use the rhythms of that as your themes rhythm
F)Related to E, convert a word in binary (by first going to ASCII, then binary) and make a pitch pattern from that

In these methods, except for C, the thing basically writes itself.

Just some thoughs.

If nothing else you can just play a chord progression and improvise/decorate it as you go.

Play Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star OR the Alphabet Song, but not both.  ;) ::)

How about the solo from Comfortably Numb? :)

If you are going to play solo without a band I would keep it clean and simple.  If not acoustic, then electric with a clean sound and a touch (just a hint) or chorus and play with fingers (no pick) and play something that is recognizable to the audience.   Don't crank up the distortion and go for glory as most likely it will sound like one huge noise to the audience if they don't know what it is you are trying to do.  Put yourself in the audience's position. What would you like to hear?  A cranked solo guitar attempting flamboyant shredding with no band, or a well-played simple finger-style piece that is immediately recognizable?   Keep it simple so you can play it without fucking up and something they know with strong themes and they will love you for it!

Jon — Nov 26, 2008If you are going to play solo without a band I would keep it clean and simple.  If not acoustic, then electric with a clean sound and a touch (just a hint) or chorus and play with fingers (no pick) and play something that is recognizable to the audience.   Don't crank up the distortion and go for glory as most likely it will sound like one huge noise to the audience if they don't know what it is you are trying to do.  Put yourself in the audience's position. What would you like to hear?  A cranked solo guitar attempting flamboyant shredding with no band, or a well-played simple finger-style piece that is immediately recognizable?   Keep it simple so you can play it without fucking up and something they know with strong themes and they will love you for it!

Actually, about 95% of it's totally clean.....the only effects I am using really is Chorus and Delay.  I'm using a clean boost to get a touch of edge in sections.

So basically taking every ones ideas thus far this is how it goes.

1.  Swamp Thing----I didn't have time to write something so I took something I already wrote.  Wrote it way back in college and it's combines Travis picking, Faux Slide via whammy bar, and chicken picken.....covers nasty blues and goes into a bluegrass thing.

2.  316

3.  Cathedral--Dealy trickery part I

4.  Floods Rip Off---Delay trickery part II

5.  Big Sur Moon---Delay trickery part III (up to this point NO DIRT)

6.  AT this point....for the moment I'm thing of clicking on the dirt....not a lot...but just to nasty things up a bit and do a few little blues licks and some wah wah crap.  Pretty much improvise just a bit.

7.  Star Wars Theme a la Buckethead (because the kids in my class think it's soooo cool....gotta play to the audience you know?!)

8.  Thinking about going back to the clean shit and ending with Midnight.  

So start soft.....build up.....bring it back down.

That's the rough Idea.....I need to sit down with a clock and see how long this takes.  But I won't get to touch a guitar for the next 5 days!!  Poo!

Listened to the Triumph thing.  Sounds cool but I don't think I'd be able to do it justice in the amount of actual play time I have left....everything on my list is something I either already know well....or once knew but have to dust the cob webs off.

Still cool to ideas as I want to make smooth transitions and have it all make some kind of sense.

ok, here's an idea.  End it with a Jimi like version of the Star Spangled Banner.  That is, unless you think that down there in redneckville, there might be someone who's never heard Jimi and might get offended at you defiling the national anthem and pop a cap in you or something.   :o

you can always resort to this

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJagb7hL0E

fingers — Nov 26, 2008you can always resort to this

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJagb7hL0E

Absolutely riveting!  I've got it looped as I type!  :o ::) ;D

fingers — Nov 26, 2008you can always resort to this

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJagb7hL0E

Never ceases to amaze me what you can get away with if you call it art.

This borrows a bit from Spaivxx's option A.  My basic thing when I just sit down at the guitar and do some simple wanking is to start off of a simple tune/chord progression.  One of my favorites is "You never give me your money" by the Beatles.  In pretty much any key you want, it's super fun to play, and as you chord it out, you can start throwing in licks and melodies on top of it.  Then, because of the season, I always find myself putting in a little "Silent Night"... just chords with trailing notes to round it out.  I always find myself doing this around this time of year.

Your "menu" looks pretty good, but overly ambitious.  The problem with something like that is that you make one big fuckup, and that's all people remember.  You just have to sometimes trust your skills and instincts as a player, and let go of the trappings, and just go play for three or five minutes.

Charger, you know as well as I do, that it will probably take armed security guards to get him off stage once he starts playing.   ;)