Some technique advice for a few songs

[Deneb]

I was never big into this kind of music, but a recent band offer has me learning a few songs, and I seem to be stumbling through them in my spare time, which is obviously not good for live play.

Ants Marching by Dave Matthews
Black Water by Doobie Bros
Burning Ring of Fire (J.C.)
Cannonball by Damien Rice
Hook-blues traveler

Songs along those lines, I need some advice for getting through them. I "thought" I could play anything I wanted to play. What do I mean by this? I've been playing along to all sorts of heavy metal shit, and some pretty hard music. Then these simple songs are giving me a little grief. I can stumble through them, but that's not good enough. The music isn't really my thing, but I don't want to blow this band offer over.

I'd like to think some of my problems right now can be blamed on my right shoulder. I just had that surgery, and I don't have like any control of my right hand, and I know I'm missing strings picking. I know this will come back to me in the very near future (I hadn't used my arm in the better part of a month).

It's humbling, going from playing all of the serious shit that I play, to this and stumbling through it.

Any advice?

[thetroy]

Listen to the songs a lot to really get them in your head, that might help

[Ace]

If you've been playing a lot you've probably developed the ability to play what you hear in your head. Maybe you need to smoke a joint and sit down and really hear the songs. Basically it sounds like you've got to pick up the vibe of the songs so that you're flowing with them instead of fighting with them. When I am learning a new song there seems to be a point where I go from trying to play it to actually making it flow and adding my own flair to it.

[skorb]

hmm, I am going through this same thing a bit, but not as bad as you I guess, cause I'm not recovering from surgery.

I am auditioning for a band tomorrow night and last Thurs nite they gave me 11 songs to learn, most of which I'd never even played, and like 3 of which I'd never even heard before (pretty mellow songs in varying styles). these are pop and classic rock covers, not metal.

well in the few days I had, I have learned them all, but the hardest two have taken more time and I had to really listen to those ones often and isolate what the guitar is doing. I also got the TABs and chords for all the songs off the internet so I'd have a solid base.

I would suggest you listen to the challenging songs at odd hours, when you normally would not be listening to music. sometimes that can help me hear something in the songs I would not otherwise hear, due to a different part of your brain listening. I also put the songs on disc and on my iPod so I could hear them over and over to get really familiar with them and how they flow.

I thought I could easily learn any song also, but the last two were really hard and gave me a new challenge. one of them is a Norah Jones "Don't Know Why" (that jazz bossa nova style of guitar is fucking hard for a rock guy like me, and almost every chord in the song is an odd jazz chord I never tried before, and the chords change very quickly, talk about fucking difficult) and the other is Prince "I wanna be your Lover" (I think the song blow ass, that's probably my obstacle)

I still don't have the Prince song down very well, it's just SO not my style of playing. my only saving grace there is that the guitar is not the primary instrument in the song.

but I figure when I lay down all the other songs to a T, hopefully that will be sufficient for these guys.

[Soap]

Mayer and Matthews and artists of that type of acoustical music aren't necessairly easier as some think. Matthews has very wide extended chord vocabulary. He's a very good acoustical writer. Have you every listen to his live stuff where he does his chord voicings/chordal soloing? Its incredible to the say the least. Very talented.

You already been given good advice.
Just keep listening to it over and over, get it in your head.
Google a tab or tabs to possibly assist you in getting the specfic chord/s right. If the ear is use to metal, then it may take some time to adjust to the acoustical different nonmetal sounding stuff.