Rocksmith

[Sky]

One more thing, just to see how CAGED works without going whole hog (there's a lot to absorb at first). The two main barre chords you'll learn are most people's only knowledge of CAGED theory.

An F has no archetype, it's always played as another archetype. The cowboy chord basic F major is played 133211 (and tough as balls for beginners pushing that 1st finger barre down right next to the nut!). Anyway, that basic F chord I showed you just now is using the E chord shape, it's just that when played as an open chord, the nut of the guitar replaces your first finger barre. The root note determines the chord (again, not getting into complex stuff like inversions). So the note on the lowest string (open is E, first fret F, etc) determines the chord for the E chord shape archetype.

The B chord also has no archetype. The cowboy chord B is played x24442. This is the A chord archetype played on the second fret. For the A chord archetype, the second lowest string determined the chord (open is A, second fret is B, etc). I personally hate the A chord archetype by itself.

So learning the basic chord positions will start you on CAGED theory if you know what to look for. Then you'll start to notice when they have you play an A in second position, with the root on the 5th fret 577655...hey, there's that E chord shape archetype! You'll be using that a LOT and now you know what it is :) Because the lowest string is on the 5th fret (A) it's an A Major chord...now you can play any chord by memorizing the notes on one string instead of all six!

The last bit I'll leave you with - the nice thing about using the archetype thought process is that any tricks you learn on one chord will translate to anywhere else you play a chord using that archetype. So instead of learning 12 ways to play a riff to play it in 12 keys, you can learn it in one position and then use the method to reposition the archetype template and play it in a different key. Trust me, this is powerful stuff and cuts down majorly on rote memorization after the initial learning curve.

Hope your eyes aren't too glazed :p Come back and reference this once you get those cowboy chords down. And feel free to ask questions, I love this stuff!

[Merusk]

Bought a $99 Matte-Black Laguna at Guitar Center's big sale and the Rocksmith cord arrives from Amazon today. Odd that no music stores carry it and none of the big-boxes like Target, Best Buy or Walmart had anything but 360 bundles.   

The daughter is thrilled and I'm considering doing the 60-day challenge myself.

[Sky]

Nice! I hope you enjoy learning the guitar, it's really a great part of my life to be able to sit down and play for a while. I'll try to answer any questions you have!

One game-related comment. I was playing the other night and I'm really missing the venues, setlists and encores. Though I didn't like the score requirements for qualification, having the game shoot me a set list and then 'performing' it after a rehearsal and then getting random encores was a really strong part of the first game. The new murky crowd appearing from some hallucination through the wall isn't the same.

[Cyrrex]

Sky, question for you.  Is there any particular reason you have bought this for the PC?  I am thinking you don't own/play any of the consoles, but I can't remember.

Reason I ask is because I have the original for Xbox, but am considering buying the new game for PC instead.  In part because it is quite a bit cheaper.  Can you get this as a digital download somewhere?  I don't really want to buy the cable again if I can avoid it, and all the boxes I've seen so far are bundled with the cable.  So are there any significant drawbacks to the PC version?  How does the guitar even interface with the PC?  I'm a bit confused.

[Merusk]

I'm not Sky but  you can get it on steam, that's  where I picked it up.  I went PC because I can put it on a laptop and go elsewhere in the house to not bother people.  Not so much with a console, you're relegated to sitting in front of the tv.  I think the cord is the same as the console versions as it's just a USB and 1/4" jack for the guitar.

Nice! I hope you enjoy learning the guitar, it's really a great part of my life to be able to sit down and play for a while. I'll try to answer any questions you have!

Thanks! Played for 2 hours last night, enough to know for a true novice there's still some benefit to real lessons.  I had the damnest time dong the slide lesson, and still don't think I'm doing it right.  It also seemed odd that the program suggested that lesson before basic chord structure.  I know I'm holding my hands completely wrong just based on my inability to pick the second string at the 5 fret after doing a  slide on the g from 3 to 5.  I just can't do it at all, my fingers won't flex or bend that way, so I'm clearly dong something wrong, but I'm left to figure it out myself.

Eventually I just gave up on the lesson and went to learn a song to relax. I got paint it black and knights of cydonia to 6.5%.  Pretty damn good for my first two hours ever, even if paint was only g string notes.  Funny to note that knights was all over the board and strings in even the "I know fuckall" mode. Progression of rock music!

[Dren]

Yeah, I use Steam also.  I originally bought the PS2 version but quickly got frustrated with having to take up the living room to play.  Also, trying to position the gamepad near me to interact in anyway with the game was very awkward compared to just having a keyboard laying flat in front of me.  I haven't gotten as technical as Sky, but I'd imagine you have more options available to you if you want to tweak out for the best performance.

I haven't got the new version yet due to time, but I'm liking the reviews!

As to the guitar for a beginning discussion: I got a Squire for $150.  I do notice the issues with that, but for where I'm at with my learning and desire of playing guitar it is just fine.  I know I'll eventually get more serious and start spending more money.  My theory is that if I do get crazy like Sky with it, the original $150 I spent that might have to be completely thrown out would be well worth it and nothing compared to the thousands the experts and fanatics spend.  No knock on Sky at all.  I'm jealous and wish I were as passionate about all this.

[Sky]

Cyrrex, mainly as I don't own consoles. But also, the majority of what I have bought for Rocksmith (the original and all the original DLC) was during Steam sales. I have a....lot of DLC... But I did hold out for the original until it hit the xmas sale, and the new one was too much of an improvement for me to wait (and I don't regret that a bit). The main downside is latency, depending on your setup. In my normal setup, I use an X-Fi sound card which has an analog out to a breakout ADC, which feeds an optical out to my receiver. Too much latency for Rocksmith. Running through my motherboard's optical out direct to the receiver removes this latency. The cable works on all platforms, I just bought one on amazon for the original.

Merusk, fingering is often situational. Classical notation is nice because it tells you which fingers to use. For the slide in question you could do it like this:

1. Using your index finger, slide from 3 to 5 and then use your middle finger to fret the 5 on the next string. This is a bit awkward for my hand, you'll learn what works best for you and then have to practice to teach your hands to do the things that aren't natural (I still struggle with an open A chord after almost 30 years).
2. Similar to 1, but use your middle finger for the slide and ring finger for the next string. I use this a lot if there's not a lot of movement after, because those two fingers are close in size and length and work well together.
3. Use the tip of your ring finger for the slide and then fret the next string. If it's a sustain, where both notes keep ringing, keep the tip on the initial string and push down with the first knuckle to fret the next string. If no sustain, then hop the finger over from one string to the other rapidly. These two methods are more like how I'd do it, I think. Wish you were local, it's much easier to show than tell!

But you have the gist of the approach, work at a lesson for a while and then take a break. It's a lot of work, but it should be fun, too. Professional guitarists usually structure their practice to keep motivation and interest as high as possible, ten minutes on scales, ten minutes on chords, fifteen on a new riff, then some fun time for practicing whatever comes to mind.

On cheap guitars. I had several cheap guitars when I started out in the 80s, and cheap guitars were pretty low quality compared to today. I finally got a decent BC Rich Warlock and it fell over while we were lifting weights and the headstock snapped in half on a barbell. I think my no-name strat was $250 or so. Then I got a deal on a Peavey bass that was pretty awesome and when that got stolen I bought my second decent instrument, an ESP custom bass from their Japanese brand Edwards...but the electronics in it suck and I never got around to upgrading them with better pickups.

After a couple years of not playing in the late 90s (a bleak time for me), I started again on my ex-girlfriend's Cort strat-alike. It was awful. I still have it, it's so incredibly and insanely bad. But I told myself, if I dedicated myself to practice and hit certain milestones, I'd splurge and buy myself the best guitar in the local shop (which has great stock). My 61 SG was that guitar.

You want to get a guitar that feels good in your hand and doesn't have too many flaws, so it's not working against you. But the important thing is realizing that it's a lot of work but also one of the coolest things you will ever do in your life, and bring joy to you and those around you for the rest of your life.

/ramble

[Trippy]

I'm not Sky but  you can get it on steam, that's  where I picked it up.

You can also get it from Amazon as a digital download if for some reason you don't want to buy it through Steam. You will still need to play it through Steam (and UPlay which is a new requirement for this version), however.

[Cyrrex]

Thanks all.  Purchased for PC.  If nothing else, it was cheaper that way for sure.  More flexible, too, thanks to steam.  Won't be able to import songs from the old version obviously, but I can live with that.

[Quinton]

I broke down and got the full (including cable and guitar) version for PS3... then frustrated with dealing with latency tuning in the living room picked up the PC version from Steam.  Massively better on my PC, latency-wise (just simple powered speakers hanging off of the onboard analog audio).  Going to need to find some additional resources on guitar to learn how to correctly hold things, etc -- I can only assume I'll teach myself all kinds of terrible habits regarding finger position, etc, if I just blunder through things on my own.

I'm quite impressed with playing a real instrument instead of a controller shaped like an instrument.  Feels like I may actually learn something.

[Sky]

I'm so excited for you guys! This is the kind of thing I hoped for when it first came out, after seeing so many people enjoy fake guitar playing with Guitar Hero.

Q, there are tons of resources for the basics online. Your company is your friend 

[Sky]

Note to self: don't start the bass track by playing The Trooper three times in a row. Oh teh blisters on mah right hand...

[Merusk]

Those arcade games are pretty great for techniques.  Learning the string & fret locations and building up calluses doing slide ninja.  Felt like my fingers were about to bleed on Sunday.

However, I'm encountering the problem I've always figured I would with guitar.  My fingers are stubby and short, so trying to play chords is a problem because I can't arch my fingers enough to hit only the right strings is damn near impossible.  It also make long jumps on the fret board pretty problematic. ugh.

[Sky]

Welcome to my world. Try playing bass with stubfingers 

It becomes more of an issue with something like this game, because when I play guitar, I can invert chords, play fragments, etc; to fit my hand better.

Practice helps but there will always be chords that will be brutal to play. As I've said, the simple A chord x02220 is difficult for me. I don't like to omit the 5th on top (x0222x), sometimes I'll fake in the upper octave if it sounds ok (x2225, where the second fret is a partial barre with my index finger, 5th fret is pinky).

[Sky]

Using Tom Sawyer as a song to rest from The Trooper makes me chuckle. But it's actually a really easy song, with only a little bit of a left hand riff under the solo, so it dovetails in very nicely when the right forearm locks up from all those Harris triplets.

I cannot overstate how much better the latency is with this version. I don't think I'd be able to play these songs to this level without the changes they made in the engine.

[Sky]

IRON MAIDEN SONG PACK OOOOOOH YEEEEAH BOOOOOOOEEEEYYY!!!!

Ahem.

I'm excited.

1st report. Bass solo in Number of the Beast, not easy to play cold first time through! But that's just a matter of getting it down a couple times. The goddamned power chords in Fear of the Dark? Thou hast broken me. Remember what I said about wee nubbly fingers? Yeah, I might be able to practice this every day for a month or two and get the right hand strength to make those chords, but it will be a contest of wills (me vs Harris...Harris wins). I mean...a Bb power chord?

I think this game is good about playing in different positions, so I might move that on up to 5th position, now that I think about it. Still pretty brutal, but not x133 brutal.

I got about 100k better score with the Trooper, still not enough to take 5th yet (master). No masters for Tom Sawyer, but it's funny how quickly I remember all the little quirks of the riffs when the tabs go away. I can play it, just not the way it's recorded...I did move up a spot on Tom Sawyer hard, though (they don't like the way I play one riff). With, ahem, noted exceptions, the new Maiden lineup is a really nice set to play. I might have gone for a few less 'big hits' and more fan songs like Rime or Revelation, or back to Phantom. Still, a good workout on some good songs.

At this rate, the old metal dudes will be banging my door down to bring me out of retirement...

[Merusk]

1 week today. Ow, my damn fingers.

It's been amazing how quickly I'm learning string locations and fret positions.  No muscle memory yet but a week ago I was thinking "fuck, I'll never remember this. Where the hell is the 5 fret?"  Today I only have problems finding things after 9 and though I'm frequently misplacing my hand between 7 and 9, I know when I'm wrong.

Maybe someday I'll actually be able to play all the notes to a song.

[Sky]

That is so incredibly cool. And if it helps, my fingers have been sore and blistered as well. Classical guitar is much easier on the hands.

[Velorath]

Apparently the Tomoyasu Hotei 3 pack released in addition to the Iron Maiden pack. You may recognize one of the songs from Kill Bill.

[Sky]

This week it's Alice in Chains pack. Some decent tunes, I can see going for the hits, but I would've picked a very different list (I was a big AiC fan back then).


    Alice in Chains “Man in The Box”
    Alice in Chains “Would?”
    Alice in Chains “Hollow”
    Alice in Chains “Them Bones”
    Alice in Chains “Check My Brain”

Sky's choices if he was the man in charge:

Love, Hate, Love
Brother
Rotten Apple
I Stay Away
Got Me Wrong

[Merusk]

What I really want is some way to buy some of the original Rocksmith songs.  Steam won't let you do it without owning it and there's a few I'd love to learn in time, like Addicted to Love, that I'm going to bet won't be re released in 2014.

[Sky]

Good point. I was playing a few tunes on bass for the old lady (Chic ftw), and she said 'you're building quite the set list there'. I haven't counted yet, but the original + 2014 + buckets of DLC...

Still building up my calluses, need to switch back to guitar and start alternating. Got a blister underneath my right index callus (which is a pretty solid callus), started chuckling. Still trying to master The Trooper, it's so tough because you need to be album perfect and that's unrealistic for most songs, the artist generally isn't when they play it live. Ah, well. The old lady told me not to worry about the leaderboard nerds :) I'm at a million and a half but now there's a guy up over 2 mil. Ye gods.

[Ghambit]

Have they added any more classical, jazz, blues, etc. to the repertoire?  I gave up the game because I was tired of playing shitty rock I had no intention of performing at family gatherings.  (I recall a lot of rocksmith forum whining about this same issue; not enough alternatives to rock)

[Sky]

Yeah, I don't see why ROCKsmith has so many rock tracks. 

[Merusk]

Agreed.  No interest in blues, classical, country etc. here. I bought it because it's called ROCKsmith, not Guitarsmith.   Sounds like something for the fan mod community.

Although the parent company could use the tech to expand their market with different packaging for the same product.  If there's demand for it they're leaving money on the table. (Though Country guys are bigger pain in the ass about licensing I've heard)

[Sky]

Both jazz and blues are not very well suited to this kind of mechanic, because when I say I struggle to play rock songs as recorded (required by the game); jazz and blues it's almost heresy to play them at all like the recorded version. They're improvisational forms for the most part, at least out of every musician I've ever met or played with.

Classical would fit the format, but might sell a hundred copies. I'd love to see it but I'm not mainstream by a long shot.

[Merusk]

Good point on the Blues/ Jazz method and very correct.  I hadn't considered the heresy behind it.  I understand Miles Davis wasn't a fan of recordings because people always expected to hear the album version vs. what the band was coming up with that night.

Classica/ Country would probably work.. though is there such a thing as classical guitar played on an electric? The sound is so totally different there since it's all acoustics.

[Sky]

Oh, hadn't even thought of that. Yngwie, but meh. I guess you could get a hybrid classical, but ewww.

So Countrysmith is left. Which is really rock/pop these days anyway.

[Trippy]

I would love Fingerstylesmith but I know that won't happen.

[Ozzu]

I got this a few days ago and I'm plugging away at it. The slide lesson and the bend lesson just tear my fingers up. It seems fairly often at this point, my biggest question is what fingers to use to most efficiently play what I'm trying to play. I mean, I can make it work, but I get the impression I'm not doing it right or something. That could be just because it's all so new though.

I ended up grabbing this guitar as a starter and I'm digging it:

http://www.guitarcenter.com/Epiphone-Les-Paul-Special-I-P90-Electric-Guitar-107274870-i2101227.gc

[Gets]

Takes time to develop calluses that protect your fingers for longer periods of play. Try your best to bend the strings with your wrist and using more than one finger.

This game is simply amazing. Everyone should get it. And before you complain about not having this song go check out smithyanvi forumsl for customs because people have made literally hundreds of custom songs for you to freely choose (including fingerstyle and bass) and customs for the 2014 version are just around the corner.

[Sky]

The game will also show fingerings for chords (on the fretboard, not on the incoming notes, so I almost never see them as I look ahead), but not single notes. They do give you the hand position, a darkened column the incoming notes appear on. This can be your guide for when to shift, but fingering is a pretty big topic (har har).

And slides and bends are brutal, even for me after a while. Because I play classical on a nylon string guitar, when I play electric it tears up my left hand fierce. And the bass tears up my right hand.

Still can't pop 1.6M on The Trooper (master), they just really don't like the way I hit some of the notes, I guess. I did find that the Judas Priest tunes are a great warmup set, nice pumping 8ths to get the forearm warmed up without popping it to a freeze like Maiden does.

This version does suffer a bit from note detection like the original did. Playing some of the new Green Day, it's mostly power chords which I've been playing for 30 years, 6 of those professionally :) And I get about a 40%? Yeah, no. It's humorous (but a bit frustrating) to watch the little *miss* messages popping up when I'm playing the song correctly.

Another love letter to the new riff repeater, it's gotten really nice. I've been learning some of the Maiden stuff on guitar and I want to tackle some of the Megadeth leads, but at that speed and complexity (I heart Friedman) the lack of real tabs is very frustrating, even the lack of the fret number under each note really hampers things as I'm so used to sight reading to learn. Ah, well. Maybe next year.

[Merusk]

And before you complain about not having this song go check out smithyanvi forumsl for customs because people have made literally hundreds of custom songs for you to freely choose (including fingerstyle and bass) and customs for the 2014 version are just around the corner.

Eeeeexcellent. I was hoping there'd be something like a mod community. Woo-hoo.

Nailed my first phrase at 100% difficulty the other day.  (R U Mine) I was so damn happy.  Still can't hit 5 & 7 fret without stretching which puts the hammer-offs from 10 to 7 in "Knights of Cydonia" wayyy out of my league.   Making progress, though, and am starting to mess with Scale Ninja and Bends a lot more in the guitarcade to get those down.  

I still fuck up 3rd (blue) and 4th (orange) string in the middle of songs and get flustered with fast transitions between chords but I've come along, long way in the last 24 days, which is fantastic.  I'm going to be upset if I lose a lot of it when I go to Vegas next week and can't practice.

This version does suffer a bit from note detection like the original did. Playing some of the new Green Day, it's mostly power chords which I've been playing for 30 years, 6 of those professionally :) And I get about a 40%? Yeah, no. It's humorous (but a bit frustrating) to watch the little *miss* messages popping up when I'm playing the song correctly.

Another love letter to the new riff repeater, it's gotten really nice. I've been learning some of the Maiden stuff on guitar and I want to tackle some of the Megadeth leads, but at that speed and complexity (I heart Friedman) the lack of real tabs is very frustrating, even the lack of the fret number under each note really hampers things as I'm so used to sight reading to learn. Ah, well. Maybe next year.

Yeah, playing String Skip Saloon I often find it misses notes I KNOW I hit and I lose.  Quite frustrating.

What Megadeth songs? I haven't seen any, or are these imports from RS1 I can't have?

[Sky]

Yeah, sorry. Pretty glad I went hog wild on DLC for the first one now. http://store.steampowered.com/app/206102/

Which part of fretting the 5&7 is giving you difficulty? I've developed a lot of bad habits over the years, especially on bass where I can't stretch as well, so maybe I can help out (to avoid the bad habits I mean!).

If you guys want I can also give you some finger development exercises that you will utterly hate me for.

One thing this game really punishes me for hard is my style is to generally play the upper voicings of a chord (so instead of 577655 for an A, I'd play xx7655), my thumb is pretty weak for doing bar or even some power chords because with distortion, a power chord is just two fingers no pinky and the game wants it fretted hard. My thumb ends up killing me, but it is good at exposing weak spots in technique for sure!

[Merusk]

Like I've said before, I've got short ass fingers.  The 7&10 hammer offs in KOC's lead solo highlight this the most.   My 2 finger is on the 7 then my 3 will barely be touching the 10 fret.  Doing that and then hammering off? Forgetaboutit.

Also, if I have to hit 5& 7 as part of a chord (no idea on names yet, still working) I really need to contort my hand so the 2nd pad of my ring finger isn't hitting any other strings.  Sliding up and down on the fret bar, going from 5&7 to 4&6 then to 2&4? Kills me because I can't hold them apart consistently moving them like that.

Finger exercises would probably assist the most, tbh. What isn't about finger length is all about hand flexibility at the moment.  Years of keyboarding have given me decent nimbleness, but damned if I have any flexibility left.

Still, it's great fun though. I just lost an hour and a half and didn't even realize it.  I don't mind though as I realize I used to lose that much time and more in MMOs that have given me zero real life skills.  Really best if I don't think about the time wasted there.