How to Be a Good Rhythm Guitarist

[Music] hey I'm Eric hin check the description box below for tabs and backing tracks on my website information about exactly what sound tools I'm using today how to schedule lessons with me live streams and more on patreon and my deep dive courses it's all on my website [Music] rhythm guitar before we even start today I just want us to take a minute to just say this out loud if I can play my open position chords and my bar chords reasonably well I'm good enough to play with other people 100% of the folks who take lessons with me that's the top of their list of things to be able to do and I think the internet is making us think that unless we have mastered all of our Triad inversions and cage shapes and pent tonics and double stops we're not good enough yet but the reality is if we can if we can chill and just play clean rhythm guitar we're good to go okay so what is good rhythm guitar let's talk about it clean chords that's the first thing second thing deep feel that's important we'll talk more about all these things picking accuracy being a good hang and having good tone those are the things I think those are the things so let's talk about the first thing knowing chords you don't need to know all of them obviously your bar chords your open position chords you know you're just e a d g a minor D Minor you know all those standard ones and of [Music] course you know your bar [Music] chords those that's key knowing those dead to wrs being able to change between them no problem now the slightly more advanced chords that I think are helpful to know would be dominant 7 major 7 Minor 7 sus chords and slash chords now of course I always think just dry memorizing chords yeah not going to work super good so we want songs that we can use as examples of these things to kind of have a repertoire that we keep revisiting and improving on oh what's a good song has a handful of medium interesting chords Marvin Gay what's going [Music] on [Music] really good song to work on we're going to talk more about right-hand stuff and um plucking in a little bit but yeah that's a great one I always talk about this with my students have a repertoire keep a list keep coming back to it now in real life if I was practicing that by the way I'd probably be like I always say to play so [Music] slow so you know that everything is exactly where you meant it to [Music] be even slower so that you know that you are in the right spot cuz man playing slow doesn't have to mean [Music] no feeling in fact I tend to think it makes it more deliberate and intense okay that was talking about yeah that's Point number one now yeah having a deliberate and deep feel it is our job to know basic grooves I did do a video about this called I play these three grooves every day let's review those midtempo Rock I used to call this one the ubiquitous pattern because yeah you know mid Tempo and uptempo rock songs the old down down up up down I think we can see on hand cam here I'm going to just point out something here a lot of times well you probably saw I won't cross like that I'll cross with the pick like that everybody's hand is different but something to think about let's look at make sure I'm in shot here let's look at the verse of heart crazy on you that's a good example of mid-tempo [Music] Rockfield oh it's so fun [Music] uhoh that's a slash [Music] chord I love 70s heart That's a classic to know for sure so that's a good example of a mid-tempo strum pattern yeah as a rhythm guitar player yeah knowing those things kind of our job uh what's another one oh halftime I always reference Pixies I love Pixies I referenced I believe in that video I made Where Is My Mind [Music] and a lot of songs have that feel that kind of plotting very much a walking kind of feel now the other one that actually shows up everywhere and I talked about this in that video too oh I need to do something about that stay on there stay the bow didly or bow didly variants this shows up throughout Funk it's just it's actually yeah it comes from Latin stuff though let's do D's Peace [Music] [Applause] Frog what a great riff but yeah that is that thing let's slow that down let's look at right hand cam so B didly that's moving no matter what again I got that thing going on where the pick is not I'm not like this I'm like that Focus [Music] so I'm not like this and I'm not from the elbow it's from the wristy wrist that is a cool riff okay so we're grabbing a g yep we in shot we in shot [Music] yeah so simple so great [Music] so fun so fun guitar is so fun to play isn't it I think so now we're going to switch to talk about picking accuracy um [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] um all [Music] right so fun the Daniel yeah this is the Daniel Fields Dogwood I love this guitar with he made these gold [Music] foils but yeah big deal as a rhythm guitar player is the picking accuracy that that we don't always swing wild we don't hit all six strings all the time that we're actually quite accurate with what's going on here that we really are like we're not doing a lot with this which camera am I looking at we're doing a lot with this okay let's take a look at Ohio even that [Music] it's just an F chord it's kind of neat he releases that and then gets to the [Music] [Applause] C yeah that's the thing with Neil you know everybody thinks that he's really sloppy but he's actually pretty pretty accurate with his his picking uhoh oh wait let's go back revisit midtempo and play cinemon [Music] girl Bridge [Music] pickup [Applause] [Music] greatest solo ever I love Neil Young I love Neil Young so much okay let's visit another Neil Young but in standard tuning [Music] here it's that thing of look how interesting the open position can be and all that style uh comes back to like Carter style Carter family style picking [Music] like that's Wildwood Flower that's one I always recommend working on I love stuff like that that it's not this it's this yeah maybe that that could be the whole it's not this it's this is really a big part of rhythm guitar playing now another thing to discuss have good tone like yeah that's always obviously a big priority for me um you want it so that you know you're showing up to the jam or the rehearsal or the audition and you want it so that even if all you do is go your tone is good now for me what that means is that perfect edge of breakup tone where Brian May talks about this the chord is clear but if you dig [Music] in you get just a little bit of sustain and a little bit attack gosh there's so many ways to get there at this point uh Str and Deco GRE light speed I mean my setup today is I have this lovely car b r in the highwat setting the h74 um I do have my Deco on not to provide crunch but actually to tame the fun thing about the in Deco is if you have it the saturation side just straight set straight up it actually acts kind of like a compressor it here off Watch what it does to the high end now it's on off so it acts to just ever so slow slightly grab those harsh harsh spiky spikes and just get them get them down just a little bit I could use of course the stman to to do a lot more than that but it with this amp that's all I do is just to kind of calm down the pickups just a little [Music] bit and of course I put a little bit of Reverb on imp post my Valhalla ventage verb I love the way that sounds because yeah I always want it so that even if I do the simplest thing everybody in the room is like oo we sound good today because remember music is a collaborative event it's about everything that's happening not just you um and that's a big deal in this modern era of whatever we're in there's it's a lot of self it's a lot of me me me me me and we forget that like yeah when you're jamming when you're playing with other people it's about what's happening in the room not all the cool pentatonic double stops I can fit in all the cool slick things that I can do it's about like what's the song going on right now cool I mean like many like just so you know like yeah I you know if I made videos that were what I actually play they would be like this nobody's going to click on [Music] this that's a guitar part from one of my band songs uh here's another [Music] one like those are the kind of guitar parts I actually play I don't spend you know it would be annoying if I was [Music] always people be like what are you doing you're just noodling over the whole song it's just an interesting thing that I notice and then the last thing let's talk about be a good hang and that's kind of you know a little bit of rule for life isn't it but by that it means like you know no one wants to play with an egomaniac you know no one wants someone who's just there to show off all the things they can do but flip side you don't want to make people uncomfortable with your nerves um so you have to learn how to even if you're really nervous even if you're a little bit panicked you pretend you're not you're just yeah no it's cool what's going on I don't really know this song but okay I'll pretend I know what's going on I pretend I know what to do and to that end you know remember if you don't know what to do in the jam situation you can just shut up it's okay you don't have to play you can you can just not play until you know what's going on um and I definitely made it through high school jazz band like that I was talking about that with my friends yeah I knew I knew that chord I knew that chord I knew that chord I didn't know the next chord so I would just go like that I don't that's probably bad advice but I know I did that so it really is it really is that and I think that I'll just want to reiterate the point at the top that it seems like a lot of people think that they're not good enough to get out there and play with other people until they've mastered the cage system or until they've done this or until they've done that but like I said if you can play your chords if you could keep them even and smooth if you're not freaked out by a sus chord or a slash cord and you can keep that pocket just really deep and really smooth get out there be don't be afraid to embarrass yourself this is music you're allowed to make an ass of yourself it's okay nothing bad's going to happen you're going to hurt your ego a little bit but like what what what are the Alternatives the alternatives are staying inside and you know I don't know wood shedding more and remember always all these things you're working on you go slow and then slower and then slower still why because that helps again with that adrenaline control that Tempo control to be able to not only speed up which we are always going to do but to be able to be like this is getting ahead of me right now how about narrow how about I don't let it get ahead of me uh what's a riff that I haven't [Music] played I know that Stones enthusiasts will be like that's not the right way to play it but watch footage of the last 20 years of Keith playing gimme gimme shelter he does it in standard tuning like that which is weird kind of I wish she would pick up the open E guitar but yeah even if I was working on [Music] that I can't abide by that though hold [Music] on but even that one like I said i' drag it [Music] around okay that's all we got to talk about for today if you enjoy my work please like subscribe share that costs you nothing and helps people like me who work this gig out immensely one more time how my business works you can book lessons with me live streams charts backing tracks that's on patreon my deep dive courses it's all on my website as Bill and Ted would say be excellent to each other that includes yourself station happy Friday eat [Music] pizza [Music] oh

Channel: Eric Haugen Guitar

Views: 1,332,774

Keywords: Premiere_Elements_2023

Id: Uo70TeO6B9E

Length: 19min 40sec (1180 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 19 2024