1, 2, 3, 4. I declare a shredding war!

Well this weekend, I was going to put some more work than I usually do, on 5 and 6 string sweep picking patterns. At current I'm working on Lucretia-Megadeth, specifically the Marty Friedman solo, mostly because it has great feeling, and gets you to work more on bending and vibrato (I'm one of those guys that loves his wide vibrato and Friedman is a master at it IMO), plus his licks in that solo just seem to go all over the fretboard (it's a really cool solo to watch it be done properly), so bending, vibrato, phrasing and there is a sweep picked lick in there as well.

HughesJB4 wrote: Just wondering, what picks will people you guys be using? Last Sunday I got a 12 pack of Dunlop Tortex 1.14mm, hardly any flex and pretty good grip and so far, the best picks I've ever used. Prior to that I was using Fender Heavys, which were a little more flexible, so I guess they were about 0.95mm or something. The Fender Heavys were $4.95 Aus for 12, while the Dunlop Tortex 1.14mm cost $7.95 Aus, but IMHO, it was well worth the extra cost.

I'm afraid I've lost all my VoodooLab plectrums, which were the ones I ordered from abroad and constantly used. However, I found a replacement which is almost as good, and yellow. That is Ernie Ball (heavy). Strong but slim, just the way I like it.

Also, the start will be painful. I cut my finger while chopping onions yesterday Well, I'll just take the pain or use a plaster, which makes playing a lot harder. I was thinking I'd learn some of these songs that i've forgotten, like Moonlight Shadow of Mike Oldfield, Carry on Wayward Son by Kansas, YYZ by Rush, nothing too difficult for starters Kind of like, 2 hours in the morning, then 4 hours studying, then 2 hours playing and then fingerpractise before bedtime!

Damn it, my right arm is seriously too sore to play at all for now. Perhaps I wait either a few more hours, or perhaps until tommorow.

Well it seemed my arm got a bit better now, so I've been playing for the past hour. A little breakdown of what I've down so far: alternate picking in 16th note triplets (from 80bpm to 110bpm), in 16th notes (from 150bpm to 180bpm), playing the guitar solos from Ozzy Osbournes (or should I say Randy Rhoad's') Mr Crowley, and now about embark on some sweep picking.

Edited by HughesJB4 - February 29 2008 at 22:28

You guys have inspired me to practice more.  Only about half an hour a night, but it's certainly better than nothing.  Maybe I'll actually improve now!  

Barla wrote: You people have seen these ones?:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uea8k5sJ5qg   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evTTHS9hwvU&feature=related   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pJ1ccnC1GI&feature=related   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hywld4xFHiM&feature=related       Amazing!!

As it is, last night was the last party I'm going to for a while (I went because I organised to go before the shred challenge had even seen light anyway). I had 4 hours sleep since then and well, I had a fair amount to drink as well, but again, last night was the last time I drink for a while, as I've decided I'm not drinking for the rest of the month. But enough rant.....

I finally looked into Shawn Lane maybe about a week ago after seeing his name pop up a lot lately. I thought Rusty Cooley was the top guy whenit came to speed, but Shawn is just so much more innovative with it all. Truely amazing. I'm still trying track down as much info as I can from Mr. Lane. I plan on buying his cd's soon also.

The time isn't off by too much. You're down in Aust and I'm up here in Okinawa. So the time stamp for your last post is 12:40 PM, sweet, only a two hour difference between us. I'll only be here for another 4 months until I get stationed in San Diego, California.

Yesterday's 6 hours went fine..but 3 of them were at a band practice...I started working on "Satch Boogie"...pretty fun song, we'll see how the rest of the month goes