I was off and on for a few years until I bought my first electric guitar. It was a series 10 p.o.s and the amp I bought had a six inch speaker and was a bigger p.o.s than the guitar. I still didn’t know how to play it but by this time I had discovered tablature. I started buying all the Guitar For Practicing Musician and Guitar World magazines I could get my hands on. (Pink Floyds Wish You Were Here was the first “real” song I learned.)
I learned a few songs but I was still off and on for quite a few years…until…My brother finally gave me a 1972 Gibson S.G guitar that he had hanging on his wall. It was all beat up, and it was missing the bridge and the tail piece. I fixed it up the best I could with my limited knowledge of fixing up guitars, but I did alright making it playable.
By this time (which was the late 80’s - early 90’s) I had upgraded my amp to a pawn shop 8” speaker Charvel. With the S.G and Guitar Magazine…(which I was going through like they were Playboys…meaning I only bought them for the tabs.)…I was a guitar playing fool. I learned a bunch of my favorite songs that I had always wanted to learn.
I’ve always thought I did a pretty good job with the songs I knew. I would go to friends / families houses and play along with all the songs I knew. (mostly AC /DC some Zeppelin and of course Iron Man.) The more beer they drank the better I sounded. The more beer I drank the better I “thought” I sounded…(good times.)
During the late 90’s my pawn shop amp had died and I ran out of duct tape, so I had to put the Gibson in the corner. I went to the local music store and bought a Fender Champion 110 and my first intermediate guitar. Which was and still is an Ibanez RG 250 DX. I discovered that one of my co-workers played drums, so we started hooking up. We talked about starting a band so when I got a fat income tax return I went out and bought me a Marshall AVT50 half stack. Things were going pretty good for a while and then life got in the way for both of us.
Moving forward to 2014...while playing Iron Man for the 4 millionth time. I started thinking about “What do I really know about the guitar.” I know a handful of chords and a bunch of two finger bar chord songs. I don’t even know what key half of those song are in. I know hindsight is 20/20 but looking back I realize that maybe I could have benefited if I actually read some of the articles in the guitar magazines…That’s why I’m here now.
I figure the best place to start is at the beginning. I’m about halfway through guitar fundamentals 1 and am really enjoying the lessons. I haven’t learned anything new yet, but I’m sure that will change as I move along.
I did however take a look at a couple of songs I thought I knew and learned a few things there. For instance: Boston’s Somkin’ actually has a guitar part during the keyboard solo. I’ve always faked it by thumping on the open A.
To help motivate myself in the learning process I decided it was time for a new guitar. I ended up getting an Epiphone Les Paul Standard Plus Top Pro a couple of weeks ago. (awesome guitar BTW) One day I plan on buying a new roll of duct tape and see if I can get the Gibson going again. Hopefully in a few months I can get some of the rust of my fingers and start living up to my user name. :)
Peace!
