Help Improving Originality for Solos

[Twitch]

Heres the solos snippets from one of our new tunes called Let Go. Its the 80s ish song mentioned in another thread in MP3 submissions.

Ive got these here just to practice them and tighten them up a bit, but Ill see if I cant get the correlating rhythms that go along with them this weekend so you can here them in the proper context.

http://www.soundclick.com/player/single_player.cfm?q=hi&songID=11172977

[Cliff]

Hey Twitch - sweet! Looking forward to hearing them in the proper context, as you say. I particularly like the first 21 seconds or so - that sounds pretty damned original to me.

[tanpsi]

Try this:

Put on a radio station with music that you don't normally play, but with songs that you know, I do this with classic rock, oldies.

What ever song comes on try to play the vocal melody, you'll get a couple chances of course because repeating choruses verses etc

Next song comes on same thing.

This will break you out of boxes and guitar patterns,

Also try hooks, horn parts, anything that's NOT guitar soloing!

[horns666]

Jeff Loomis told me his secret to song writing and solos. He stated, and I quote verbatim.."I just go for it"..

Don't think too much. Stop analyzing it to death, and just play like you mean business. This is the only thing that works for me. I never practice anymore. I pick up my geetar when inspired, or try an idea. Ohh, playing with another good player and bounce shit back and forth. My son and I write totally different when we're together. We get Ideas and playing styles we normaly wouldn't do on our own.

I play for the fun of it and whatever comes of that is cool with me.

Lots of great tactics, ideas here..

[Twitch]

Jeff Loomis told me his secret to song writing and solos. He stated, and I quote verbatim.."I just go for it"..

Don't think too much. Stop analyzing it to death, and just play like you mean business. This is the only thing that works for me. I never practice anymore. I pick up my geetar when inspired, or try an idea. Ohh, playing with another good player and bounce shit back and forth. My son and I write totally different when we're together. We get Ideas and playing styles we normaly wouldn't do on our own.

I play for the fun of it and whatever comes of that is cool with me.

Lots of great tactics, ideas here..

Oh yeah, I can pull a solo out of my ass, and it may sound awesome, but, chances are I wont remember it. I gotta be able to duplicate, were not The Grateful Dead. I do agree with the getting together with others to get ideas flowing. Works great with rhythms and song structures. Not so much with solos though if the guys you play music with arent up the level you are. Not saying, my other guitarist sucks, just, he doesnt solo like I do.

[Endrik]

Bird wasn't much of a player at the beginning but what helped him a lot was playing tunes in all 12 keys and soloing over them. Helps to connect the dots and to expand melodic and harmonic ideas. Can't think anyone else who had that much impact in soloing and improvisation than Mr. Parker in modern music. So do what Bird did... and I don't mean shooting smack.

It's good to focus on what "colours" the notes have in each context. Each interval jump creates a different colour and tension. It's a lot more useful than to be ascending/descending scale oriented. For example during the chord change jumping from root to next chord's 6th and and during next change from 9th to next chord's root or from b7th to next chord's 3rd. Endless options. There's not even much theory behind it, just messing around and finding what sounds cool. And the music doesn't even have to have chord changes, you can image those chords, chords which would work over that static groove. Chordal orientation creates more interesting sounds than scalar orientation.

A simple way to make cool fast licks is to come up with a cool melody which uses all kinds of colourful interval options and then playing it fast.

One way of making set melodies more interesting is breaking them up, like pianists do, playing some notes octave higher some lower etc.

[Endrik]

Funny thing is that Billy Sheehan is a very overrated and underrated bass player at the same time if you can say that. Great groove and pocket, great songwriter and does much more than just rock... Niacin with Dennis Chambers is a great example. But most don't talk about these things, generally people talk about his fast stuff. Although he has incredibly fast right hand then his fretting hand does very simple things. Most of his live solos were usually very flashy yet simple and often not very musical.

But what surprised me is that a few years ago he said that he now practices more than ever just to prove himself. Every time he picks up an instrument the first thing he does is to try to play the most awkward and uncomfortable thing he can come spontaneously. Breaking out of comfort zones and old habits. He even plays concert violin solos note for note on the bass to expand his vocabulary. Pretty awesome approach.

[horns666]

Funny thing is that Billy Sheehan is a very overrated and underrated bass player at the same time if you can say that. Great groove and pocket, great songwriter and does much more than just rock... Niacin with Dennis Chambers is a great example. But most don't talk about these things, generally people talk about his fast stuff. Although he has incredibly fast right hand then his fretting hand does very simple things. Most of his live solos were usually very flashy yet simple and often not very musical.

But what surprised me is that a few years ago he said that he now practices more than ever just to prove himself. Every time he picks up an instrument the first thing he does is to try to play the most awkward and uncomfortable thing he can come spontaneously. Breaking out of comfort zones and old habits. He even plays concert violin solos note for note on the bass to expand his vocabulary. Pretty awesome approach.

YES,

BTW: I get my best ideas while takin' a dump or eatin' poon. But poop and poon is just a letter off..see.

[xenophobe]

When trying to lay down a solo over something, record yourself humming/singing a melody "solo" line, then figure out how to play it after the fact on your guitar.

I was actually going to suggest something similar.

Instead of ripping your rinse and repeat scale... try noodling with a very slow tempo melody where your normal lead would be. After you've figured out what you like there, add some skills and some shred if you want.

[jgcable]

Alright, Im officially over it. Ive spent the last 4 years pretending Im a lead guitarist, and Im sick of it. My solos suck and are boring. Its always the same, start with the root note of the key, usually on the A string, proceed to run through a butchered harmonic minor scale, in the box and end on the root note of the key. Furthermore, I do a lot of fast alternate picking of 3 or 4 notes and maybe the occasional bend up a whole step.

I cant stand it anymore. My solos are rudimentary, and boring. Nothing original, all stock scale runs that all sound pretty much the same. A monkey could easily learn my solos.

Is there anything you guys can do to help my think outside the box and be a little more original? Any help would be appreciated. I just spent 30 minutes beating my head against the wall trying to solo over stuff, I sounded like a 14 year old in GC, if I went outside of my "box". The notes fit, but made no sense, no emotion, no soul. HELP!!!!!

I can help you bro. I have been giving lessons for years. Mainly lead guitar.
Here are some questions...
#1. Obviously, you know many melodies to songs. You know.. the vocal track. You can sing them in your head or out loud. Can you play them?
#2. If you can, can you match the vibrato and every nuance of the singer with your guitar?

This is what you need to be practicing to help with your solo's. I usually practice to the soundtrack to Riverdance. That Celtic stuff is melodic and usually off fret and forces you to think out of the box. Also.... mimic'ing the vocal track on your favorite songs (as opposed to the guitar track) is a great way to get out of the box and to begin thinking for yourself and taking musical chances which is what lead guitar playing is all about. PM me and we can get into detail. John G

[Twitch]

Damn JG. Thats a fucking brilliant idea. Make up my own vocal melody to the song then figure it out on the fretboard. A lot of our stuff is barked like Slayer, so theres no real vocal melody there, which would make a vocal melody from the guitar full of contrast. Especially on or more melodic tunes, the thrashy ones might be a bit of a stretch to have a melodic solo in, would have to add some shreddedge.

Ive thought about the vocal melody thing before but always kind of considered it lame, ala Nirvana. Redundant and thoughtless, but in a song without a vocal melody, that still leaves it up to me to create it all from scratch, not just parroting the vocal melody thats already there, if there is one.

Thanks JG. Ill have to try that next time I hit the studio or write some new stuff. Ive still got to come up with a set in stone solo for our version of Wish You Were Here, Ill try this approach with that.

[jgcable]

Damn JG. Thats a fucking brilliant idea. Make up my own vocal melody to the song then figure it out on the fretboard. A lot of our stuff is barked like Slayer, so theres no real vocal melody there, which would make a vocal melody from the guitar full of contrast. Especially on or more melodic tunes, the thrashy ones might be a bit of a stretch to have a melodic solo in, would have to add some shreddedge.

Ive thought about the vocal melody thing before but always kind of considered it lame, ala Nirvana. Redundant and thoughtless, but in a song without a vocal melody, that still leaves it up to me to create it all from scratch, not just parroting the vocal melody thats already there, if there is one.

Thanks JG. Ill have to try that next time I hit the studio or write some new stuff. Ive still got to come up with a set in stone solo for our version of Wish You Were Here, Ill try this approach with that.

Basically, what jamming to vocal tracks and trying to mimic every nuance of the vocal track does is open your mind up to alternate melodies. The best guitar solo's always have one thing in common. Melody. The 2 types of music that I jam to the most to work on my soloing skills are Celtic music, Pagannini and believe it or not... Yanni. For Yanni, I mimic the violin parts. All of them, the solo's, the fills and if they aren't playing I switch to the basic melody of the piece and jam along. I end up all over the place on the guitar and when it comes to writing guitar solo's I frequently pull a snippit of melody from something I jammed to and incorporate it in my solos.