Yvette Young is so much appealing for new guitar techniques!
I learned guitar seriously when I was about 16, with Police, James Brown’s guitarist stuff, which I most appreciated technically (control of ghost notes).
Wasn’t fan of Satriani’s examples tapping lessons I tried, Yvette Young may me want to work on new techniques again! Thanks!
Btw I really don’t care about the green color of its guitar.
Yep I hear you. Sounds like my SB basses. The BB is no lightweight either. I’m a knee player so the weight thing isn’t as big an issue for me. I’ve got a Wal Custom that I used to play out. I swear I’ll end up with a shoulder complaint in old age! It weighs an absolute ton!
Ah and playing the video again I noticed she use really particular tunings too!
It’s one of the solutions to the problem of two-handed tapping. When your picking hand is being used to tap, it is harder to use that same hand to mute unwanted open-strings. So if the guitar is tuned to a particular tuning and the piece is also written to focus on the notes of that tuning, it doesn’t sound so bad if you can’t mute an open string while you are tapping.
I learned to play guitar when my roommate in college volunteered to teach me some Beatles songs on a guitar he just bought from a flea market. I didn’t think I would get all that serious about playing guitar, but somehow I got more interested over time.
I had a Chapman Stick for a bit. I learned the basics of tapping on that one. It comes with a dampener so that the player does not have to worry about open strings ringing. I eventually sold the Stick because I realized I do like to strum, which the guitar is designed for and the Stick is not.
I stopped playing guitar for several years. Then I joined a band that was formed by a guitarist who wanted to play music like Mogwai, Mono, and Explosions in the Sky - so-called “post rock” music. I was the bass player, then he asked me to switch to 2nd guitar so that somebody else could join as the new bassist. Post-rock music doesn’t require a lot of solo practice so I started learning Preston Reed’s song “Tribes” on my acoustic guitar. It is in the CGDGGD tuning and requires both fingerstyle technique and tapping - like Yvette Young’s music. Eventually I got frustrated with the unstable tuners. My cheap steel-string guitar does not handle that tuning well, especially the low string being turned down to C.
So was my experience with open tunings, I even used different strings to correct that, keeping the open tuning for a guitar. (DADAAD, then BF#BF#BF# with a custom gaunge on a strat like).
For my relatively new 8 strings, I just drop the F# to E if needed / wanted, both being interesting. I chose a 80-10 set for that. Changing all strings tuning would be a nightmare!
Anyway, I think Yvette Young tricks can be transposed / used on different scales /tunings.
Easier to learn with same settings, for sure…
The frontman for Eastern Youth, one of my favorite Japanese bands, plays an old Yamaha SG-1000 from that period. I’ve never owned one but have been tempted many times.
Had a go at Section A of “Nero”. I had to slow down Youtube playback and repeat the last section many times. One advantage of the tuning for this song, is the major 3rd is easier to play on the 2nd and 3rd strings with right-hand tapping.
One advantage of an open-string tuning is you can get some nice sympathetic string resonance. It’s more noticeable on acoustic guitar but I heard a bit with the Strat plugged in. It’s like getting a pad sound for free.
I noticed that the Ibanez YY10 comes with .011 strings, which is unusual for a production Strat-like guitar, but the heavier gauge is probably well-suited to her music, with all the tunings that she uses. My Thinline Strat came with .010s. It’ll be interesting to see how this music plays out on the Tele with the .009s.
A few G&L mentions here lately. I’m looking into the L-1000 and Fallout Bass Launch Edition. I wonder how much custom shop options are and if they are worth it.
I like anime and I like guitars but I haven’t watched any Evangelion other than the first TV series. So I was surprised to see Asuka get her own signature Tele model
I don’t know much about those, but I have one of the Japanese G&L L-2000 basses and it’s great. So many tone options it’s insane. If you can find a used one they are really good value IMO.
Needs to be paired with the Korg Miku Stomp…
As an aside, it turns out Fender did make not one, but TWO guitar models for the other major girl in that anime - Rei. But they’re in a whole different price bracket as they were masterbuilt guitars, not mere “special edition” factory guitars.
https://www.musictrades.co.jp/english/webnews/archive/2010/01/evangelion-fender-strato-and-telecaster-fetched-16-mil-yen.html
Funny you mention Hatsune Miku. My avatar is Mahiru Inami
Her voice actress is Saki Fujita, whose voice was sampled to create Hatsune Miku’s voice
I had a Heartfield bass for a while in the late 90’s, used from late 80’s?, Japanese made. It was pretty good, but I had a dozen basses back then. They made 6’s too. I only remember them because there was a mid 00’s dream pop band by the same name, also MIJ.
My latest guitar-shaped object arrived:
The color is closer to regular white than “vintage cream” as depicted on the site. My Eric Johnson Thinline Strat is “vintage white” and that guitar has a more pronounced yellow tinge.
It arrived tuned pretty much like a regular guitar, instead of the CGDAE tuning that the website said it would be tuned to. That’s ok - I tuned it to CGDAE, which is the same tuning as a cello with an extra E string on top.
There is occasional noise, depending on how the cable is inserted into the jack. Maybe that can be fixed by having pots and/or wiring replaced? Other than that, the pickups sound fine, with the neck being surprisingly louder, as reported by other customers.
Neck feels pretty good to play. Having gotten used to the EJ Strat’s baseball bat neck, the D’Angelico Deluxe SS’s relatively thinner neck, and my Tele’s compound radius neck, I’m pretty flexible with necks anyway. I’ve never been good at evaluating fret quality - they seem ok.
The low C string has some flop to it. I might look into having a tech adjust the truss rod for a bit more neck relief and maybe raise the action a hair to improve the low string tuning stability. I do like the current low action though. I’ll give the Warren Ellis 5 some time to settle into the CGDAE tuning.
I started learning the bluegrass standard “Red Hair Boy” from Andy Wood’s bluegrass mandolin course. I quickly found that the notes are quite a bit further apart than on a real mandolin - more like a cello than a violin as expected. I have to shift my hand around a lot more than I would on a fiddle or mandolin-scale instrument.
I barely remember some chords I used to play on cello but have already discovered some other cool chord voicings made available by this tuning. Bending notes is fun because the short scale makes bending up a minor 3rd so easy. Overall, I think it’s a good buy for the money. I might look into upgrading the pots, wiring, and shielding but that’s about it
Thanks for posting your thoughts. I’ve been curious about the Eastwood stuff. The Eastwood McGeoch looks cool, kind of wish Yamaha had done it though, or at least a Revstar with a non-flame sunburst finish like that.
Andy has a great right hand technique, without pick.
I’m sure this has come up before so apologies if so…
I just put my electric guitar direct into my novation circuit mono station and no sound even with the gate open so I guess I need to preamp it… Any suggestions for the cheapest, smallest but effective way? Thanks
The TC Spark boost pedal is small and will add up to 20db for not much money (around £40 here in the UK).
Thanks, I’ll take a look.
I use this for cheap battery powered pedal okayness.