Today’s guitarplayers have a wide range of choices to increase the volume of their guitars. Some of us will use overdrive, whilst others prefer using distortion or fuzz or whatever name is there to label the overdriven sound.
If you were a guitarplayer in the 1950s you did not have any pedals available to boost your signal. If you wanted your guitar to sound a bit louder you simply had to turn the volume of the amp up. Turning your amp up to create a bit of distortion is unpredicatable and it can also cause unrepairable damage to the speakers of your amp. Guitaramps in the 1950s were mainly designed to produce a clean sound, turning up the volume would increase the clean sound up till the point where the amp would break up and produce a distorted sound. Overal not an ideal habit to create overdriven sounds. But heh, who wanted distortion in the 1950s? During the mid 1960s the musical landscape started to change, not only the music was changing, the guitarsounds were changing as well [as discussed in an earlier article on this blog]
Eventually manufactorers of musical equipment realised that by overdriving a small preamp you could create a lot of distortion. This signal would then be fed into a guitaramplifier set for listeninglevels whilst still giving you a nice, distorted sound. The guitaramplifier was no longer needed to create the distortion, as the distortion came mainly from the preamp.
For today’s article I want to introduce you the many flavours of distortion and one in particular: The sound of Fuzz. But before I will dig into fuzzbox teritory let me first remind you why preamps were designed:

                                The Birth of the Preamp:

The electric guitar is a low-level output musical instrument. Its signal needs to be boosted to make it audiable. A simple test you can do for yourself to check the validity of this statement: Plug your guitar straight into a speakercabinet, play your electric guitar and see how exhited you will get about its sound.
The answer to this problem is: Put an amplifier in between your guitar and the speaker. The amplifier will have its own preamp build into it, and it is this preamp which is so important to boost your guitarsignal up to audiable levels.
Most typical guitaramps will have a control which says PRE, apart from this control there will also be something like POST, or MASTER or simply VOLUME. Very small guitaramps may only carry one control for volume. If this is the case you cannot manipulate the preamp, as your preamp is set to work at optimum levels to create a clean sound.
Over the years guitarplayers have discovered that overloading the preamp will create a desirable distorted guitarsound: Simply turn the level of the preamp up whilst keeping the mastervolume at listening levels.

                               Using Overdrive/Distortion and Fuzz pedals as a Preamp:

Most distortion/overdrive pedals work as a preamp: You can overload them to create distortion. Most typical controls on distortion and overdrive pedals are labelled as: LEVEL, TONE and GAIN. The gain control will act as a preamp, while the level control acts as a mastercontrol for your volumelevel. In most cases you want to keep the level similar to the volumelevel of your guitaramp.
Fuzzes are no different from distortion/overdrive pedals: They are specialised preamps designed to maximise distortion.
Distortion comes in many flavours and colours but they are all based on two types of Clipping that creates the distorted sound of an amp. 

                               Hard Clipping:

This is the type of distortion you get when you play through a clean amp whilst putting up the volume. At some piont the amp will start to distort, break up the sound, as it is no longer able to produce a clean sound. The distortion will usually be heard when you hit the strings harder. This type of distortion in often unwanted and it is not a pleasant kind of distortion.
Most guitarplayers prefer a distorted sound which appears while the amp is still at a fairly low volume level. This type of distortion is called Soft Clipping.

                              Soft Clipping:

Soft clipping simply means the output level becomes progressively more distorted as the input signal increases [by turning the Preamp up!]. This type of distortion is more “natural” and it will preserve the dynamics of the sound: Hit a string harder and you will get more distortion, and the distortion will change as the sound of the string decays. With hard clipping there is not that much variation in the sound until the output signal passes below the clipping point.

                            The Sound of Fuzz:

Fuzz boxes were one of the first type of effects created to overload a small preamp to create a lot of distortion. They became popular during the 1960s. Using a Fuzz meant you could get a distorted guitartone regardless of the level of your guitaramp since the preamp in the Fuzz would distort at any given level!
Fuzzes became the flavour of the day after the release of  the song “Satisfaction” by the Rolling Stones. The popularity of the sound of that particular song meant that any garageband in Britain and the United States wanted to use that guitarsound.
For those of you who are want to know what all this fuss was about listen to this here:

Some of the first commercially available fuzzboxes in Britain where the Vox Distortion Booster and the Arbiter Fuzz Face. In the United States there was the Maestro Fuzz Tone.

                               Applying Fuzz:

Since Fuzz boxes produce a very high output signal the settings fo your guitar will make a big difference to the overal sound.
You can get a smooth sound from your Fuzz by using the neck [bass] pick-up whilst keeping the tone control set for minimum treble.
For a more ranchier sound use your treble [bridge] pick-up.

                             Pick-Up Adjustments:

Pick-up height adjustments are crucial to getting a happening tone from your Fuzz: Angle your pick-ups slightly so that the bottom three [bass] strings are further away from the pick-up compared to the top three[treble] strings. It will create a brighter and less boomy sound. These pick-up adjustments are not only useful for when you play using a Fuzz, they will make your guitar sound better in any kind of playing situation!

For next blog I will talk you throuhg how you can use the Boss FZ2 and the BD2 to get you close to that sound which satisfied the world of the 1960s so much.
See you soon.
Eddie 

Today I want to continue with the discussion of last article about the subject of Trebleboosters. In this short article I will highlight how you can use the Boss BD2, FZ2 and the Pro Co Rat as a treblebooster.  

                                Boss BD-2:

This pedal is an overdrive but can be used effectively as a treblebooster as well. The pedal does have three controls: Level, Tone and Gain. To boost the treble of your guitar simply keep the Gain control low down and boost the tone to where you like the sound of your guitar. Set the Level to similar level as your guitar amplifier. The BD-2 works best for this application with single coil guitars such as Stratocasters. They will also work with humbuck equipped guitars, but a bit of care is needed with regards to the level as you may  get unrequired distortion!

                                Boss FZ-2:

This pedal is a Fuzz pedal, it has the capability of producing two different Fuzz sounds, apart from that there is a booster mode. In the booster mode you can boost the volume, treble and bass. Simply put pedal in boost mode and adjust the bass/treble control to your likings. The FZ-2 does also compress your guitarsound a little, but this can be a good thing from time to time.  The FZ-2 will work well with both sinlge coil- and humbuck equipped guitars. A novel function of the booster mode is to put the gain to max, put a pre-amp after the FZ-2 which you use as master volume control [set it to unity level with your guitaramp].  Using the pedal as described before will give you a natural, open-sounding Fuzz sound, not as compressed as mode 1 and 2 of the pedal. If you do not use a pre-amp you will end up with a massive volume-boost which makes it hard to control for regular playing, however some of you folks may like this mayhem noise.

                               Pro Co Rat:

As all the pedals mentioned before, this one is a distortion pedal, but can be used to boost your treble signal as well. Pedal contains Distortion, Filter and Volume controls. To boost the treble without distortion simply put the Filter control at 12. 0’clock [ or 10. o’clock, or anything near, just dial in how you much treble you want!] whilst keeping the Distortion control all the way down. Set the Volume to similar level as your guitaramp’s level. The Pro Co Rat will work well with single coil and humbuck equipped guitars.

                              For the Ones Who like Experimenting:

The novel sound I described before with regards to the FZ-2 [boosting the gain all the way to the max!] can also be obtained by combining the FZ-2 and the Rat together: Simply use the FZ-2 to boost your treble signal while dialing in a distorted sound with the Rat, go for a moderate distorted sound. In this application you will not need a Pre-amp, as you can control the overal volume with the volumecontrol on the Rat and your amp.

Happy Playing and hope to see you soon again!
Eddie

In the early days of the electric guitar, tone was a simple and straightforward issue: Plug in your guitar and play. Most of the music of those days [I am talking mid 1950s/early 60s] was simple as well: Minimal production with emphasis on the song. Recording engineers were mainly concerned with recording a true documentation of what was being played and sang.
Rock ‘n’ Roll may have toyed about with reverbsounds but as far as exhiting guitarsounds we have to fast forward to the mid-up to late 1960s with guitarplayers such as Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page and a host of others who started to experiment with their guitarsounds in the studio and on stage.
The development of guitartones is related to the improvements made in recording technology, soundreproduction equipment such as personal stereos and public amplifiers. Not only technological improvements had an impact on music and guitartones, society on the whole, and lifestyle in particular, had an impact on populair music: The mid 1960s were the start of the beginning of a more individual and liberal society for the Western World. As an artist and musician it was now possible to sing about your own personal problems [Think of “Manic Depression” by Hendrix]] instead of glorifying the ideals of the state or the company you worked for. It is during these times that we see the birth of heavy Rock and the thought that any guitar player should have his/her own sound, and this sound was to become more and more reliant on the use of guitar effects.
Instead of giving you a historical overview of the development of the sound of Rock guitar from the 1960s up to where we are today, I would like you to introduce to the one steady ingredient of most rock guitar players throughout the years: The use of Boosterpedals.

                       Booster, Why and What?……….:

One of the obvious reasons to use a booster is to increase your overal volume. Increasing your volume will not necessarily result in a better quality in the tone of your guitar. To alter the quality of your tone you may want to use a treble booster. Put them infront of any overdrive/distortion pedal  and you will get a more exhiting and expansive sound without adding more decibels.

                      Treble Boost:

Your guitar tone is made up of different frequencies, by boosting some of the treble frequencies you can add more drama to your overal guitartone. There are a number of ways to achieve this goal. One of them is by using a compressor. Use the compressor as first pedal in your sigal chain, it will create a treble boost to your overal signal, but it will also add compression, and some guitarplayers may not like the idea of this.
Another way to add treble is by using a graphic EQ, as menitioned in an earlier article on this blog, you can use them to boost the treble of your overdrive/dist. pedals by simply putting them infront of your favourite dirtpedal and boosting the treble.
A cleaner way to increase your treble is by using another overdrive pedal: Boost the tone and volume on this pedal before putting it infront of your other overdrive/distortion pedals.  Be careful with the various volume-controls, try to keep the overal volume not much higher than the level of volume coming out of your amp.

                     Bass Boost:

 Adding more treble to your sound may make you feel you have lost some of the body of your guitarsound, to overcome this problem you can a bit a bassboost: Add a bit of bass boost to enhance more fulness to the body of  your guitar sound. You can do so by using a graphic EQ where you simply boost the bass. Another way to boost more body is by using another overdrive pedal, placing it staight after your main overdrive/distortion, use it for a clean boost by keeping the gain all the way down. Some overdrive pedals add a powerful bassboost, but not all of them do! Check out the ones which do and start experimenting to discover what you like.
Using a treble and bass boost will give you the feeling you are playing guitar with a more expansive and exhited tone. 

                    Test For Beginners:

Check out any multi-effector you can get your hands on. Find your favourite effect patch and check out which individual effects are being used to create this sound. Changes are there will be more than just one single effect at work! By doing this test I hope it will become aware of the fact that to get great guitartones you may need to mix several individual effects to get the happening tones you like. There are no right and wrongs to mix whatever you want, your ears are the final master: If you like what you hear than you are doing it right.  Guitartone is not only created by pedals and your amp, your speaker and the preamp of your amp do play an important role as well, but that is the subject matter for future blogs……………

                    Go Vintage or…..??…??

In today’s world it is possible to get your hands on the tools of the past to recreate some of those magic guitartones of the 60s, 70s, and 1980s. If you do have patience and do like exploring and experimenting you may like the idea of checking out a lot of pedals to see if you can find some of them which actually do have the sound of some of those magical 60s pedals. You will need to check out a lot of pedals, but it is worth doing so as there are quite a few relatively unknown pedals out there which are able to give you some of those classic 60s and 70s sounds. It is a journey of fun and exhitement to discover how you can apply some of those gems to get the tones you enjoy for your own guitar playing.
Happy Travelling!!
Eddie

There are some bands which are simply forgotten because they never had that much of an impact or they only had minor hits in small countries. Today a selection of some songs I do remember, and I listened to them today and some of them I still enjoy.
The first song is from the Mo, when I looked for them on Youtube it first told me: “no files found under the Mo” just a sign of how well-known this band was. Anyway, the opening of the song is great, then it seem to carry on, in the tradition of songs of the 1970, without adding to much new information to the listener. If you type in the title of the video you can see that this song does get quite a lot of comments, mostly from folks who grew up when this song was hit. Heh we all have our own nostalgia-trip.

Next song, the Shirts with “Tell me your Plans”. Don’t they have that Stranglers sound? Okay, this is the odd one out here because they are not a Dutch band [just testing, now sit still on that chair!!] Still sounds fresh in some way, but then it also may carry on too long. Heh, how times and music has changed, or is it just me and wanting a lot more from music and songs in general. There must be a reason why we do not hear any of these songs being played often on the radio. It could also be something to do with the Anglo-American domination of the world. Heh, are we getting all political today then? Hmmmmmm, what do you mean? Let me fast forward quickly to the next song…………………………….

Oh la la, for this one we go all sunny and bright. It is Earth and Fire with “Weekend”.  Reminds me of the summers of the late 1970s and early 1980s. The production on this song is great, but who cares about that when you are reading this for guitars and other related issues. Heh did someone say a while ago: “It is the Singer not the Song”. What about the singer in this band? Do people still dance like that? I wish they did!!!

Next song to show that I do have good bad taste. Hmmm I seem to remember far better songs of this trio, but I think this one will do for today, the video is great, funny to see how innocent things were in the late 1970s. Don’t they sound a lot like Abba? Great!!

Heh how bad can things get? Have a look overhere, great intro, reminds me what I once did with the intro for “Vivious” by Lou Reed. I think I still have that mentality, make is silly and go all the way. Heard some My Chemical Romance today and they had that vibe as well, heh make it go silly and have fun, afterwards you can still show the world that you know how to shred!!

Okay before you all start to believe I have fallen of the planet today I want to share this song with you, one I still like, like the whole thing, the attitude, the sounds of the Guitar and the Singing. Okay here we go, all clap your hands for Herman Brood, His Band, Bertus Borgers on Sax [Heh were is he Man???] and his Bombitas!!

Okay, now for all the Dutch speakers among you, here is Normaal [Heh Eddie, they are not forgotten what the heck are you on about??] What about the intro? Great sound!!

Here a song to boost up your knowledge of the Dutch language, yes you can even sing along. Oh before we go all insane, just listen to the guitarsolo, heh isn’t that a delay? Yep it is, well spotted!

Okay for next song we all go serious [yes that happens from time to time………..] Berlin in the early 1980s, what else can I say? Maybe I should leave this to our German Friends who will have, no doubt, a lot more to say about this subject than me. Ain’t is strange, that just a little while after this song came out things would change and they would change forever!

Last song for today as Forgotten Dutch bands are thin on the ground. Anyway, I will leave you with Annabel.
Enjoy and hope to see you soon for my next update, Eddie

Learning to play the guitar is a mixture of getting used to particular motorskills and using your brain: Your fingers need to get used to making particular movements and your mind needs to become aware of what you are doing musicwise, the kind of rhythms you are playing, what kind of notes you are playing, you need to memorize particular parts, you need to become aware of the fretboard ect.
All in all most of these skills can be learned fairly quickly, however I meet a lot of people who struggle, and some of them keep on struggling because they do not ask the right questions to themselves, and also they may not practise as efficiently as they could. Today a short overview for all of you who feel they can do with a bit of improvement in this department. 

                                                   Time:
No matter on what level you are, you do need to practise, to improve your playing, to get it smoother, to deepen your horizon and to grow musically. Spending time with your guitar helps you to get engaged with music. A lot of people do find it hard to find time to practise, most people want to play, but still it seems to be hard for them to find the time to play. Why is it so hard? Because of the distractions around us, and how we get conditioned from a young age onwards. I was brought up with the attitude that hard work rewards, and you will need to make choises about what it is you want to do and stick to the choises you have made.
Childeren do not have a mindset of their own yet, often they go with what their parents tell them what to do, or their teachers or their peers. Of course every child does have his/her own character and talents but usually childeren will copy and just go along with whatever they are told to do. This is fine as long as they are shown the right example. Parents can tell their childeren they need to practise their guitar at particular times of the day. Follow a particular habit with regards to practise and you will see the results.
For adults things are pretty similar: Try to set yourself a particular time of day when you practise your guitar, try sticking to this as much as you can, of course there will be moments when your habit will be broken up by your environment, be flexible  at those times but also stick to your regular habit of playing the guitar. What time is good for you is different from what is good for me, I can only give guidelines here, but I can guarrantee that a good habit of practising your guitar regularly will pay off.
Okay so you play your guitar regularly but you are still not improving, what is up then? Well there is another matter: What do you actually do during the time when you are playing your guitar? Do you play what you already know or…………………….. Let us have a look at this now in greater detail.

                                                  Activity:
Again, a habit may be good, but these habits may need to change from time to time, all depending on the goals you have set for yourself. A good habit is to start with some warm-up playing, this could be particular fingerexersises [see one of my early blogs from late Oct. 2010 for more details] or some scales, or even chordsequences, or rhythmic exercises. How long should I do this for? Depending on your time. [in an ideal world I,myself, will play about 2 hours of warm-ups, I will develop songideas from this and then go into other activities, but this is ideal, often I get less time or more……………]
After warm-up time you should go into what is new for you, what is hard to play, what it is you need but is not yet smooth. Whatever this is I do not know, it could be a new song, a new song you create yourself, it could be material from a book, something of the internet, something from a CD or ….. but it should be something new and something you can not do yet. It is a good habit to learn new things all the time. In my own case I do spend an awful long time on technique, one of my early goals was to be able to play whatever it is I wanted to, or what I could hear, or what people wanted me to play. This goal is wide and never-ending, however it does pay-off to practise all kind of techniques and to stick to this routine.
Do not only play techniqual exercises, it is a good  habit to turn these ideas into songs or songideas you can later use for compositions or whatever.
Finally you should reward yourself with playing whatever it is you like playing, and play this really well. Tell yourself there is an audience watching you so you really have to play well. Get up and play, dance around and make it fun! Do not be like “Oh I play this little part of this song and then go to another part which I know well” No, play the whole song, get it down as well as you can, if you are struggling you know what it is you need to do!

                                             Know Yourself:
This is the hardest for most people, and most of us do not like to admit this. Do I know myself? Well I do know what I want to achieve in the short term, and the long-term ideas change from time to time, has been like this for quite some time. Once you feel you know what it is you like to do, be proud of it, do not be shy, do not think it is silly you want to play, for example Metal, no if this is what you want to do, fine, let the rest of the world think whatever they want to. At least you know what to do, stick to it and grow and make it loud and play it proud.
Once you know what you like doing stylewise, find out what kind of techinique you need to play this style of music. There is a core set of techinques any player of any level needs, but from there on it gets quite specific. Find out what it is you need, and what you like and work on this, as much as you can, as your playing will start to sound like the style you want to emulate.

Enjoy your Journey!
Eddie                                                  

Delay is a universal name being used for Time-Shifting effects. Tims-Shifting effects add a touch of ambience to the sound of your guitar. Subtle use of delay will hardly be noticeable for your audience, but you, the guitar player, will notice what the effect does to the sound of your guitar.
Well-known examples of time-shifting effects are: Flange, Chorus, Reverb, Echo and Delay.
The main difference in all these effects is their different delay times and their different applications. 

                             Different Delay Times Explained
          
                                            0-15 mS

The shortest specific delay is a Flanger. Typical delaytimes for Flangers are from 0 to 15 milliseconds. Flangers can be used to add extra dimension to your original guitarsound. More dramatic settings can create a “jet airplane” sound. In the 1970s it was common to take the whole mix of a song through a Flanger to add a more dramatic effect.
Listen to this Queen song here from 1978, from 3.09 they open up the flanger to add more drama to Brian’s guitarsolo. Queen was very good at their special effects and their fantastic light-show to add extra drama to their live-shows.

                                           10 to 25 mS
Chorus effects have a typical delay time in this range. Chorus pedals are great to give you the idea of playing two guitars at the same time. They are popular to thicken up the sound of an electric guitar.

                                          25 to 50 mS
A delay time from 25 to 50 milliseconds gets you into echo. With delaytimes as short as these you can create “Slapback” echo, which is a very tight echo sound often heard on older Rock “n” Roll recordings of the 1950s and early 1960s.
                                
                                         50 to 200 mS
Delays covering this range are able to give you a more spacey and ambient sound.

                                        200 to 800 mS
Most delayeffects which cover this range will have a “hold” feature which makes it possible to harmonise your guitarlines: Play a short idea, press hold, and the orginal sound is played back as long as you keep the hold function engaged. It is now possible to play other ideas over your original idea, you can create a short solo or harmonise your orginal idea with another guitaridea.

                                       800 to 5200 mS
From 800 to 5200 mS we get into some “serious” delay times. Most delay effects within this range make it possible to create short loops of your guitarplaying. As mentioned above, within this range you will be able to create guitarideas which will be played back to you, but now they can even be longer, much longer really!! These loops can be used to solo back over, or to create miniture compositions. Most of these loops can be overdubbed with Sound on Sound which means you can now create layers of sound.
If you like your delaytimes to be long you may also be interested in looping pedals, which can be seen as “super” delays pedals with an extreme long time-delay range.

                                 

                                  Delay and How to Use Them:

At thi moment in time I will not go into detail in all the various applications of the different delaytimes. I will create more blogs in future which will deal with this. Today is just a short overview of various delaytimes and their various units. A taster if you like, but not to worry, there is much more to come, as this man is experimenting daily with all the possiblities of all effects under the sun.
I will tell you how NOT to use your delay: Put you delay-time on maximum, and strum as quick as you can through the chords of your favourite song, or play your sinlgle-note solos at light-breaking speed. The delay may add a touch of extra thickness to your sound, but only you wil notice that. If you really want to hear your delay at work why not play a chord, and mute the sound while you listen back to the sound of your guitar coming back to you from the delay pedal. It is just one way to make a delay stand out and make it noticeable to the music you are playing.

Here are some songs which use the delay in the way I mentioned before:

First of all “Let’s Dance” by David Bowie, listen to the chords on the guitar and how they hold them, then the chord is repeated back for a couple of times. The delaytime is just long enough to notice the echo on the guitar. Yes you could play all those chords, but the delay will help you to keep things tight. 

Here is another one, a more modern example, and the delay is there on the first chords of the intro, nice!!

Here is an example where the delay is used on the vocals,  listen at around 1.99/ 2.00 it is very subtle but the vocals are coming back on the shout. This idea is used throughout the song. It is one idea which is used often over time by various artists.

Last example, this is a more subtle example of a delay, it is used in the intro chords of this song. Typical example for using a delay to thicken up the sound, and to give you the idea there are more guitars at work.
Enjoy and hope to see you soon!!
Eddie

Playing an electric guitar is playing with sound and musical notes. One way to experience a difference in the sound from your guitar it to change the pick-up you are using while you are playing: Switch the pick-up selectorswitch to another setting and hey presto, you will hear another sound coming from your guitar.
Most guitars will have two or three pick-ups. Depending on the type of guitar you are using [Les Paul-or Stratocaster type] you will have three or five sounds available from your pick-ups. Most of these sounds are usuable, all depending on the musical situation: Play chords on a Strat with the pick-up selector being engaged in the middle position for a bright and open sound, switch to the bridge pick-up for a solo to get a more distorted and trebly sound. Start using your volume-and tone controls, start playing with the tone-controls of your amp and hey, the sound possibilities you have are infinite. But some of us want more, a lot more. For those of us there is the Equalizer pedal.
For today’s blog I will explain how an Equalizer pedal works, which types are available, how you can use an EQ to change the sound of your guitar, amp and the sound of your pedals. If you have never felt the need to use and EQ pedal, keep on reading as you may be surprised to what you will discover.
Equalizers are part of the frequency-response altering effects. The basic operation of these effects is based on filters which change the timbre [tone quality] of an instrument. A well-known example of a frequency-resonse altering effect is the Wah Wah pedal. A less dramatic example of a frequency-response altering effect is the Equalizer. There are two type of equalizers used today: The Graphic equalizer and the Parametric equalizer. Let us now have a look at a Graphic EQ

                  —Graphic EQ—

A Graphic EQ can be seen as a “super” tonecontrol compared to the simple treble and bass tonecontrols which can be found on most guitaramps. Graphic EQ’s started their life in recording studios, as most guitar effects did in the early days of recorded music. They were used initially as problem solvers: For example to “tune” a room, by cutting the high frequencies to create a flatter response to the sound being played back in the control room. Another example could be to add a bit of low end to a speaker with a poor low-frequency response. A typical Graphic EQ will come with a number of bands [filters] which devide the frequency spectrum up into sections. Most guitar EQ pedals do come with six, seven or ten bands. Each of these bands are designed to fine tune the bass, midrange and treble response of the pick-ups from your guitar. The different bands will allow you to cut or boost a particular frequency, which will create a change in the sound of your guitartone. Some pedals will also come with a master volume which controls the overal volume of your sound.
Adding a bit of boost to a particular frequency can often add unwanted distortion. Adding a little bit of boost is often enough to create the desired sound you want.
I myself am fond of playing electric guitar at low volumes, whether I play on my own or with others I do not want to sound to be too loud. Of course, playing an electric guitar at low volumes cuts down the bass and treble of your amp. Add a bit of boost with an EQ pedal and the amp will sound a lot fuller, similar as when you would be playing at higher volumes.

                 —Parametric EQ—

They are less common and more subtle in their effect to your sound. A typical parametric EQ for guitar usage will include one- or two different filter stages, as opposed to the six, seven or ten filters available on a Graphic EQ. The frequency response of a Parametric EQ is often handled by just one controlknob, as opposed to the various controlsliders found on a Graphic EQ. This frequency controlknob can be used to emphasize or de-emphasize the low end, mid-or treble range of your guitar. The overal feel, of the changes you make to your tone with a Parametric EQ,  is very smooth and subtle: They help to stand out a particular frequency of your guitar as opposed to  the cutting-or boosting  of a particular frequency with a Graphic EQ.
A typical use for a Parametric could be to fine-tune an older guitaramp which lacks any additinal tone controls. Find the frequency you like, and play, it could not be any simpler. Parametrics are easy, effective and quick to use since there is only one control to change the frequency as opposed the numerous sliders on a Graphic EQ.
The Boss SP-1 is an example of a simple one-stage Parametric EQ. Unfortunately the pedal is no longer produced today and can only be found on the second-hand market for vintage prices. I myself am very fond of the Yamaha NE-1 which is a two-stage Parametric EQ. Very flexible and works great for bass and guitar. The pedal was orginally designed by Nathan East, as studio musician who plays mainly bass guitar. However the pedal works well for guitar as well since it handles all the typical bass and guitar frequecies: Stage one: 200Hz- 10kHz and Stage two: 150Hz – 6kHz.

                  —EQ pedals for Tuning Your Distortion/Overdrive and Pre-amp Pedals—

Yes it is fine to control the overal tone of your guitar and amp with an EQ pedal, however you can also use them to change the tone of your distortion or overdrive.
I orginally started using EQ pedals because I was unhappy with the distortion coming from my amp. I was looing for a distortion sound with more treble but the distortion channel on my amp lacked any controls to add more bass or treble. The EQ gave me more control over the treble frequencies, and it did give me the distortion sound I was looking for at the time. Once I started using the EQ I noticed I could not only alter the sound of my distortion, now I was able to change the whole sound of my guitar as well. I started using the EQ to thin out the dark sound of a Les Paul, to create a more treble Strat-like  kind of sound.
There have even been times when I tuned a Boss HM-2 pedal to a Boss MT-2 distortion pedal with the help of a Graphic EQ. With a lot of tweaking of the EQ both pedals can sound very similar. I will not go any deeper into the subject of distortion and particular type of dist./overdrive pedals as I will create more specific blogs which will deal with this subject alone in great detail.

                   —Finally–

Most bass players will have some kind of Parametric EQ build in into their amp, as Parametrics are quite common on bass amps. Maybe some of you may not use the effect that much. Start playing around with it to notice what it does to your sound. 
When you will go out shopping for an EQ pedal you will come across a lot of Graphics as they are very common. Once you start using a Graphic and become more familiar with their sound you may also want to invest in a Parametric. They are particularly useful for musicians and guitar players who are interested in homerecording. It is just one of those electronic tools which is useful to have around you.

For next blog: Delay effects and the latest Foofighter song: “Rope”

Smile and enjoy your time while playing the guitar,
Eddie 

Most of the music you listen to today was recorded by using effects. Some of the effects being used may have been applied to the music during the recording process in the studio. Another way to get effects onto the recording is by gettting the guitar player to use effects while he is playing his parts in the studio.
It is hard to imagine in today’s world of digital recordingtechnology and musical equipment that there was once a time when hardly any effects were being used on recorded music. In the early days of recorded music recording engineers tried to duplicate the natural sound of the music being recorded. It was during the late 1950s that recording engineers and musicians started to discover effects through experimenting with recording techniques. Echochambers were build in recordingstudios to create more ambience for the music. It was felt that a little bit of echo helped to brighten up the sound of recorded music. As musicians and recording engineers kept experimenting, new sounds and effects were discovered. Most of these effects were purely discovered out of practical purposes, think of echo and reverb, but soon more exhiting effects would emerge: Effects like Flange, Phase and Envelope Filters. Manifactures and designers of musical equipment followed these developments in newly discovered sounds with interested eyes. Soon these newly discovered effects became available in “compact” boxes  which meant, for example, that echo was not only available in the recording studio, no, you could also have it now coming from your guitaramp and from small metal boxes called guitar effect pedals. A new world opnened up for recorded music and for the ambitious guitar player who was interested in the use of sounds.
For today’s blog I do not want to give an overview of the guitar effects available today. I also do not want to explain the mechanics of the range of effects out there today. I will create special blogs about these subjects in future. For today I want to focus on the question: “Why should I try using effects?” “Is there a need for me to use effects as I only play guitar as a hobby?” The truth to some of these questions is that guitar effects will open your eyes [and ears] to the kind of sounds you can create with your amp and guitar. It will also change the way you play guitar, as you will start playing with sound and notes and not merely notes alone.

                   —Play with the Tone Controls  of Your Amp—

Whenever you play your electric guitar make it a habbit to change the settings of your amp from time to time, add a bit of bass or treble to the sound and see how the change effects your sound. Play chords at first, as they are great to hear any changes you have made to your sound: By playing chords you play more than one string, any changes to your sound will be more noticeable as opposed to when you play only one string at a time. Keep experimenting with your settings and tone. At some point you may feel your amp is lacking something: It may not have enough bass or treble or whatever. This is the moment for you to start thinking about effects. Think first what it is your are missing, then start researching what kind of effects are out there to help you getting that sound. Try various type of similar effects to find the one which is right for you.
It is hard to give someone a guideline about how to get yourself into effects. It is a process which emerges over time. Most of it is personal and will depend on what you know, your taste, what kind of music you listen to and your personality.
When I started out playing electric guitar I was curious about effects, I heard them in the music I listened to, and it was one of the things I wanted to try. I had friends who did have some effects, but most of them did not use many of them. They were often bored with their sound [overused their effects in the beginning!] or they felt that the effect took away too much of the orginal guitar tone. I discovered that the use of effects all depended on what you played, on the settings of the effect, how well you knew your equipment and what you wanted to do in the first place. it is true, there are some effects you can use daily, noone will notice anything unusual about your guitarsound apart from you yourself. These kind of effects are my favourites. Then there are the more radical effects. The ones where you step on and anyone will notice the change in your guitar sound. These kind of effects you may only use on certain occasions, maybe for just one solo in a whole set of 45 minutes of music. But that sound may just make that guitar solo sound great, so worth knowing what effect makes that sound.

                        —Home Recording—

As mentioned before, most forms of recorded music do contain effects. If you like making recordings of your own guitar playing, why not start experimenting with adding effects to your guitar?  By doing so you will create some variety to your sound. At first you may want to add a little delay or chorus to a clean guitarsound, then you may want to add a wah to a funky guitar part in a song. Maybe you want to get an extra distortion pedal, one which does have a different sound compared to the distortion build-in into your amp. Before you know it you may get hooked and become really curious in how all these little effects work. Once you become interested your view on recorded music and guitarplaying in general will change. You may also become a collector of particular guitareffects. Anyway, however you will go about it, it will all keep you busy and keep you thinking about making music and playing the guitar.

For next blog: How EQ pedals can improve the sound of your guitar amp.

Keep experimenting and have fun,
Eddie

Most students who contact me, with the request for taking up lessons with me, have all one thing in common: They want to get better at playing the guitar. Most of them do not know how to achieve that goal. There are too many small steps to be taken and they simply cannot see the choises they need to make.
When it comes to playing the guitar, and making music in general, there are a lot of choises you need to consider: Do I play guitar just to entertain myself or should I play guitar infront of an audience? Am I going to join a band or do I want to be a soloartist?
The questions above are just a sample of the choises people need to look at, but most people who start out with playing the guitar will simply not have a clear idea of what it is they want to do. As you travel along the path of making music it will become clearer what you like and it is you need to do to achieve these desires. Setting yourself clear short-time goals will speed up the process of improvement in your guitar playing. Any good guitar teacher can help you with this process. For today’s blog I will guide you through the process of settting yourself goals, explain what kind of goals there are, give you some typical examples of short-and long term goals and will give you advise on how to monitor your own progress.
As with anything in life, when it comes to setting goals for yourself, it helps if you are a Go-Get-It-Now kind of person. Students with a quick mind and a positive response to actions/ideas will achieve results quicker compared to people with a laid-back mentality. However people change over time, the once laid-back student may become all of a sudden very motivated because he enjoys the kind of riffs he is introduced to.

                          —Short Term Goals—

Short term goals are achievements which can be reached within in short space of time, it could be a matter of two weeks, a month, two months or half a year. A typical example for a short term goal for intermediate students of the guitar could be: Learn to play barrechords of the A-shape chord.

                                 A                     C

           E    ————————————————

           B    ————2——————5—————-

           G    ————2——————5—————-

           D    ————2——————5—————-

           A    ————0——————3—————-

           E    ————————————————-

                    Open A chord                 C chord based on fingering of the open A chord

     How to achieve this goal? Play songs you already play, but change the fingering of the chords based on the fingering of the A-shape barre chord. Use songs which only use major chords. Take as many songs as you like, stick to them and try to get the barrechords to sound as smooth as you can. Take a handful of songs you really like and say to yourself: “I should be able to play these songs very well within four weeks from now. After four weeks you will see how well you have done. Can you play those songs smoothly without struggling too much with the new fingerings? If you cannot, do not worry, maybe you did not get enough time to practise, maybe you got distracted by other, new ideas to play or…………………
Whatever the reason is for not achieving your goal, at least you know where you stand. No need to feel bad about yourself as you will have plenty of time to get those chordshapes under your fingertips. At least now you know how to go about it.

                        
                          —Long Term Goals—

A long term goals is a skill which should take you a little longer to achieve, maybe within the space of seven or eight months or one year or maybe even longer. An example of a long term goal could be: Take the songs you have played from the previous example of a short-term goal and say to yourself: “I want to play three of these songs in front of an audience for the next open mike night six months from today”
After you have played your songs during the open mike night you know now where you are: Were you nerveous? How could it be that you messed up that second song? That song was the one you liked most of all, but still………………..
Performing songs is about a lot more than just knowing how to play a handful of songs very well. Yes it does help if you know your songs, but that is only one part of the game.
Anyway, the open mike event taught you a lot of lessons, lessons which will probably open up doors for your next new set of short-and long term goals.

                           —Guitar Player—

No matter how long you have been playing the guitar, there is always scope for setting yourself some goals to achieve new skills. Typical examples of short term goals could be:
                       
                           @ I am going to learn to play ten new cover songs
                           @ I am going to play guitar in a band
                           @ I am going to experiment more with distortion and my guitartone for the band
                           @ I am going to learn how to use time-based guitar effects such as delay and flange
                                for my band.

Stick to your short term goals, monitor your progress, and observe from time to time how well you are doing with your new skills. Some short-term goals are more concrete than others, the example of the ten cover songs is much easier to monitor than for example the time-based effect goal. Keep your goals as concrete as possible. The clearer they are the easier they will be to achieve.

                            —Song Writer—

Within your songwriting you could set yourself short-term targets such as:

                         @ I am going to write songs based on what I hear, not using my knowledge too much with
                             what I know about harmony and melody ect.
                         @ I am going to learn to arrange my songs for a band/orchestra.
                         @ I am going to write songs which are based on a groove.
                         @ I am going to start the songwriting process thinking from a melodic idea rather
                             than a chordsequence.

Goals can be cruel towards yourself, especially when you are not achieving them. Maybe you have set your goals too high? Break them down into small steps, be realistic towards yourself, but at the same time stick to your goals. If you are driven enough and you enjoy making music, you will achieve whatever you set out for yourself to do. It may take time but be patient and enjoy the process in the meantime.

Catch you soon,
Eddie

Now that you have decided to create your own songs you may wonder where you get that moment of inspiration from? You may want to write instrumental songs which do not contain any vocals and lyrics. Logical isn’t it? Because you play guitar and making music is all you do. On the other hand you may want to write songs which do contain lyrics and vocals. If you have never written any lyrics before it may be a less obvious choise for you to take. Similar story for the vocals: If you have not sang before you may not feel comfortable about singing. Today’s blog will deal with the inspirationprocess, where to get it from, how to nurture it and how to develop it. What kind of songs you will write is up to you, you need to make up  your own mind about this matter. Your choises may change over time as you get more experienced.

                               —-Own More Than One Guitar?—

Neil Young once said that every guitar contains at least one song. This is very true, as each guitar is unique in sound and feel. One guitar may inspire you to create a very delicate piece of music, whereas another one may inspire you to bring out the Rockmonster in you. When writing songs bear this in mind: Play different guitars for a while, keep them around you, put them on a stand in the room where you usually play, make it as easy as possible for yourself to play your guitars. If you own a few of them, make a habit of playing them regularly, do not get into the habit of: “Oh this is my all-time favourite guitar” If you have guitars you do not like for whatever reason, do not keep them, sell them, as someone else may enjoy playing them. Make sure your guitars all work well as they should, no obvious problems with pick-ups, volume-and tonecontrols ect. as your guitars should serve you as a moment of inspiration and joy and not a headache.
Try to admire the differences in guitars, their different feel and sound. Try avoiding an attitude like: “I really love this guitar as it is so EASY to play, the neck is so smooth etc. Guitar players who have this approach to their guitars often overlook the unique quality guitars have: Each of them sound- and feel different. It is an art to find out what your taste is, and to find guitars which match that taste. I will create more blogs on this particular subject but for today, I only want to make you aware of the different feel and sound of your guitars, and to use this for your creative powers. Why are all guitars different? A few reasons, again too many to discuss in one article. One reason is the different factories around the world, and the tools which are being used for building the guitar, these change from time to time. It is true that all guitars of a particular period in time will feel and look somewhat similar. Sunburst colours do look different throughout the times. There are the particular 1970s colours, and you will see this amoung all brands. It is due to the kind of paints and finish which were being used etc. Quite and interesting subject in itself but too deep a subject for today’s article.

                          — Pick-Ups:Single Coil Electric and Humbuck Guitars—

If you have one of the above, educate yourself how your pick-ups work what they stand for and find out about the other pick-ups: What makes them sound and feel different? Next thing is to play some of those guitars equipped with pick-ups you do not own yourself. Maybe borrow one of a friend before you buy one yourself. However you go about it, once you own one of each, listen carefully to their sounds, play the same thing on one guitar, use the other one and listen to how different is feels and sounds. You may want to write a song just using that one guitar, because it sounds so thick and dark. The guitar may inspire you to write a really mean riff. Let your electrics inspire you in sound, and use that sound as a starting block for your writingprocess, more about this later on.

                         —Play Electric Guitar without Using the Amp—

You must be joking Eddie! Do you do this yourself? All the time!! and I will tell you why: An electric guitar without the amp will speak through its strings and woods. Tune up a few electrics, play the same musical idea on each guitar. What do you hear? Changes are it will sound different with each guitar you play. Now use your amp, and those differences will be exaggerated through the pick-ups and tonecontrols of the amp. Playing an electric without an amp will also improve your tone as you need to work on it, you actually make the sound, not the pick-ups and amp. Once you amplify the guitar, the pick-ups and the amp will interact with your tone. Only inexperienced guitarplayers tend to think their amp is responsible for their tone and volume. Do not be fooled: You create your own tone, it starts with you, your mental state of being and your fingers, from there the amp and the pick-ups of your guitar become an extension of you, not the other way around!

                       —Acoustic-or Electric Guitar—

Try using both guitars as they are both different animals. If you have never played an electric guitar changes are you will miss the bigger bodyshape of your acoustic, you may even treat the electric just as another acoustic. A lot of beginners fall into this category, because they do not experiment with the amp, pedals and tone in general. Why not? Partly personality, partly not knowing what to look for in sound and electric guitar in general. There must be a reason why we eneded up with an electric guitar on this planet. The answer is volume, once people knew this they started looking for more, and tone was the next thing people started manipulating. Jimi Hendrix pushed the envelope in the 1960s, he was not the first one to use effects, but he was the first guitarplayer who openly admitted to the world how fond he was about using his effect pedals. 
An easy way to manipulate the tone on the electric guitar is to use your tonecontrol. In itself the tonecontrol is a mini-wah. I am really fond of using it, as you have your own build-in wah. Play around with it, if you like it become curious in a wah pedal, which really is a tonecontrol you can manipulate with you feet to change the tone of your guitar instead of using your fingers to work the tone control.

                      —Let Your Sound Tell You What to Play—

Once you have a particular sound with your amp, guitar and effects, use this sound as a springboard for creating riffs or a chordsequence. Do not think too much about what you are doing as the sound may be just right for what you are playing now, play same idea on an acoustic and it may not make any sense at all. You may only play a few notes, but so what?, it sounds wonderful so use it for writing a new song with. Document how you create that sound so you can recall the sound a few days later.

                       —Night Time Playing—

Night time is the time when all around is becomes quite and dark, a perfect moment as the human brain tends to relax and work in a different way: It is less critical and just want to create not matter how it comes out. During the busy hours of daylight there are all kind of critical voices in our head at work, voices which tell you how to play, how not to play, how to behave ect. All pretty normal stuff really, as we operate in a world around us, a world which puts rules on us on how to behave and act as we are with other people, but a nighttime this critical voice inside us is less active, use this to get to your fun moments of joy and playing. Record what you come up with, some of it may be pure nonesense, but there may also be some great moments. Use these ideas as a starting point for a new song.

                         —Finally—

These are just a sample of some of the things I use, there is a lot more, but again, I will create specific articles in future which will deal with this subject. There will be blogs on how to use your capo creatively, how the use of open tunings can open up a new world, the wonderful world of distortion, what Equalizer pedals can do for your amp. All of these topics can stand on their own, but really they are all about the inspiration and the joys of sound coming from your guitar.
For now, have fun, do not be to critical as you are only human, but at the same time stay focused on what it is you want to do.  

Hope to see you soon to read the next article which will be about setting goals for yourself and how it can improve your guitarplaying.
Enjoy,
Eddie