2016 !!
Thats when I started trying to juggle a full time job, a full home life and trying to learn the guitar.
Alot has happened and many things have changed. One thing hasn't - I still cant really play the guitar.
2025 is the year that changes. For the last couple of years whilst the guitar has always been around and I have picked it up and tinkered I have had no real plan which means I have made no real progress.
Where I'm at -
Tone chasing - I found the Katana to be a distraction and actually got in the way of practice. If I wasn't tinkering tweeking my pedal to do more, I was playing with preset options. Finally the faff of getting the amp out and setting it up actually made me think twice about playing.
Clearly that's not helpful so I bought a small Scarlett Solo interface and now use a simple amp sim plugin. The PC I use to stream YT lessons is also my amp ! It doesn't get much easier than that. I can still use the footpedal both to switch tones but also pause/play songs so it really is a win / win.
With my new setup I also got a copy of Ableton 12 DAW. This runs the amp sim plugins but can also function as a Tuner , Metronome and even a looper though thats a step too far for my just now I have everything I can possibly need right there on the desktop. A final investment in a pair of Studio headphones and I'm good to go.
A week into my practice regime and so far I'm really happy. My finger tip calluses have returned and I'm enjoying the process again. Over the last year I focussed on leaning the fretboard (Don't need the guitar for alot of this) and the 5 pentatonic positions. Whilst all this "theory" will undoubtedly be useful I cant for the life of me make it musical! Something had to change. Taking a little inspiration from JustinGuitars beginner course - he always puts songs into the sections I have decided to focus on songs for now. My first goal is to have 5 - 10 songs I can play along to a record with decent quality. They dont have to be perfect and I'm not looking to play any "solo" sections.
Back in September '24 I found a really nice Bon Jovi- Its My Life tutorial on YT. Its a simple song but sounds great. I can play along to that at full speed and to my ears it doesn't sound too bad !! Buoyed by this I went looking for more and my repertoire is now -
- Its My Life - Full speed playthrough for th e Rhythm Guitar part.
- Next Step look at the Solo (Not imminent yet)
- Rolling in the Deep - Another "Simple song" chord wise but this has taught me the need for counting to get the changes correct. Again I can play along to the song at full speed (Except the "solo").
- 7 Nation Army - A fun simple song to play along to.
All the above I have found are good to build Fretting hand strength and muscle memory for quickly shifting up and down the fretboard.
I'm now working on 3 more songs -
- Powerslave by Maiden - I can play along to the whole first section (Intro , Verse , Bridge etc) at 65%
- Since You've Been Gone - Another great tune with simple chords - the challenge here is the speed changes in the bridges
- Whiskey in the Jar - Metallica's rocked up version
I'm focussing 2 days on these songs and 1 day on new stuff and I'm enjoying (even looking forwards to ) playing. My goal is 30 minutes at least 5 days every week - lets see how I get on.
