Guitar Noob Help?

[Lance813]

You can slow them down to make excellent practice songs... -.- Triplets most guitarists wont get for a while anyways.

Songs like 'Welcome Home' and 'Phantom of the Opera' are a great way to exercise your fingers. Most Coheed songs are fairly easy to learn. Actually, most Rush songs are fairly simple also.

[Nitro Vordex]

Learn to play Rock the Dragon.

It's good for alternate picking.

I'm serious.

[Syl]

You can slow them down to make excellent practice songs... -.- Triplets most guitarists wont get for a while anyways.

Songs like 'Welcome Home' and 'Phantom of the Opera' are a great way to exercise your fingers. Most Coheed songs are fairly easy to learn. Actually, most Rush songs are fairly simple also.

Gallops and triplets are a great exercise early on IMO for building up strength and rhythm, but not super easy to grasp right away. Once you get it though it's like stupid easy.

Unless of course it's in polyrhythm or confusing syncopation (Meshuggah *cough cough*), then you're fucked ;o

[Midicronica]

Awesome thread is awesome. Just bought a guitar on Thursday and I'm pretty excited to get it. I haven't played much because my hand has been bothering me pretty seriously for the past few days. I'm thinking it might be carpal tunnel since my hand gets numb and I feel serious pain in the joints at the end of the fingers.

So far all I've been doing lately is an exercise to strengthen the fingers and build dexterity. I'm getting a little better since I can play it a little faster. But I'm not sure what I should be trying to focus on besides learning chords and trying out a few songs that I know are easy.

Oh, here's the guitar I got. It's an Ibanez GSA60.
minus tremolo bar.

I'm loving this thing so far and I'm sure I'll like it even more when I buy my amp two weeks from now. It's killing me not having one. I've got my eye on the Line 6 Spider III 75w amp.

[Split]

I would get rid of the Floyd Rose if I were you...

[Lance813]

Unless of course it's in polyrhythm or confusing syncopation (Meshuggah *cough cough*), then you're fucked ;o

There are no other triplets as far as I'm concerned. The rest is just 'fast picking', haha.

Midicronica, That's a pretty good choice for a starter guitar. I'm not a big fan of Line 6(sounds too artificial for me). If you want a good distortion amp for cheap, then there really isn't anything better for the price.

[3---Hit---U]

Hey, thanks for all the tips!!

My brother apparently likes Greenday, so he'll be ok with learning for a while.

Woah, isn't that a pretty hefty jump there? :P. I mean, especially maiden...well ok, I learned the trooper and Hallowed be Thy Name early on guitar..but I wouldn't really expect him to be able to do the triplets/gallop picking really well in the early stages nor the sick trillwork of Dave's solo's XD.

I love triplets. I don't know why, but they just seemed "easy" to me. As for gallop picking (sweep picking?) I suck. Bad. But I'm a rhythm guitarist, so it doesn't really matter.

A few more questions:
1) What are some good songs to work on technique? (mostly scaling and some other "lead" things, because I'm pretty good at rhythm) Currently I'm trying to learn a few Lamb of God songs (Ashes to the Wake album) and I really don't care what I learn, I play alot of metal and hard rock, so I prefer that, but I would like to experiment with some other stuff (To be honest, I'll even play some classical or country music if you give me a few songs ) Oh, and if possible, keep the list to E standard or Drop D. Or anything on acoustic.

2) Give me some "mainstream" music. Being able to play guitar pretty good and having no one respect you because you play metal (//.-) is sorta annoying.

3) I found an acoustic guitar in our storage room, (yeah, it's like old) so what are some cool unplugged songs I can play.

4) Finally, what are some easy songs to sing (and I mean freaking easy, I can barely sing on rock band on easy :s) and play, like "romantic" I guess. Because I plan on asking out this girl and I thought a nice song would be... nice?

Thanks everyone!

[Midicronica]

Man, not having an amp is killing me. I was trying to play Blitzkrieg Bop and it just wasn't working for me. Besides that, I've been doing finger exercises and trying to memorize chords. Right about now I can hardly remember any of them aside from the A and G chords. I can't play A properly because of my sausage fingers and G makes my hand hurt. From what I've read that won't be a problem later on but I dunno...

[Split]

Man, not having an amp is killing me. I was trying to play Blitzkrieg Bop and it just wasn't working for me. Besides that, I've been doing finger exercises and trying to memorize chords. Right about now I can hardly remember any of them aside from the A and G chords. I can't play A properly because of my sausage fingers and G makes my hand hurt. From what I've read that won't be a problem later on but I dunno...

Trust me, it won't matter! I have the worst sausage fingers but I've been playing for five years and loving every second of it. I actually think it helps to have thicker fingers - it's it easier to form any chord that requires barring (regular barres, 9ths, 7ths, etc.) when your finger fills the entire fret.

Speaking of which, A is easier to make if you just bar the second fret and strum strings A through B (and it's not really a cheap shortcut since it sounds exactly the same). Also, remember that E and A minor are the same shapes, but with A- every finger is up one string (so the middle finger is on the D, second fret, the ring finger is on the G, second fret, and the index finger is on the B, first fret). So basically, that's two chords and only one shape to memorize. Then for the E- all you have to do is remove your index finger. F is a little tougher since it requires a two string bar with your index finger, but you'll be ready to learn it in no time, I'm sure.

Also, you would do well to memorize the note every string makes in standard tuning:

EADGBE, respectively, starting from the lowest string to the highest.

All this sounds complicated now, but if you just stick with it, it'll be cake in no time. That's the main problem many people have with starting an instrument though: lack of commitment. If you can start out practicing the basics for about an hour or so per day, eventually it'll become really fun to play. There was nothing like the first time I could recognizably play a song (Scar Tissue by RHCP - still remember it). I would play it nonstop - of course after everyone else heard it the first time they would start getting really annoyed - and started to realize that it is much more fun to play music than to listen. Really, it's true. You don't have to make it your life, but just keep at it! I can't emphasize that enough. Best of luck to you, man.

EDIT: Almost forgot, It's best to start with an acoustic guitar because it builds up finger strength and calluses. Just my opinion.

EDIT2: At OP: House of the Rising Sun is a really basic progression, but once you improve a bit you can move onto doing the picking pattern that goes with each chord instead of just strumming. It's a really versatile beginner tune (for your brother, of course, like you were asking for. Also, don't worry about sweeping, that's not what's important. Bluesy Zeppelin/Traffic/Hendrix style classic rock lead is where you'll find the truly musical sounding stuff. There are plenty of insanely coordinated and mathematically minded Asian kids on youtube (not that there's anything wrong with Asians...or math...or youtube) that can sweep through five different scales up the entire neck in time with a metronome that sounds like a frigging automatic rifle, but most of them don't have an ounce of creativity in their body. It's good to throw in like a four or five string sweep every once in a while if it leads into a lick with a few hammer-ons and things like that, but even for metal too much sweeping just sounds impressive, not good.

[DreXxiN]

Hmm...mainstream....


Well an easy one that I guess is "leadish" is Mr. Brightside by the Killers...not sure why but that song is just fun to play to me. XD. (it's actually still a challenge for me because of my finger size..)

Another easy one? Kryptonite by Three Doors Down is easy as well.

You might also want to try some popular hair/80's metal riffs.

EDIT: Oh, and what the post above me said. House of the Rising Sun. Except you're going to fucking hate that F chord as a beginner.