Am I the only one that can't play any full songs and basically only plays leads over backing tracks or in a band situation?

RaceU4her said:
im not sure theres a song not my own that i know start to finish anymore, once i got decent enough on guitar i just always liked writing my own stuff more. ill learn parts of songs to practice recording if i find a decent backing track, never a whole song though
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I bet when you are home alone you put a ball cap on backwards, wear an Ecko unlimited jacket, and play LImp Bizkit covers.
 
I rarely play songs these days as I have no need since I'm not gigging anymore. I forgot so many, especially complete songs.

I usually play to free backing tracks I find or random drum tracks I create or download using Sonic Charge's microtonic.

https://soniccharge.com/microtonic

I've probably had this drum plugin for nearly 20 years, and they've been upgrading it ever since. The have auto generated drum sets and tracks you can play a sample, vote on and download at https://soniccharge.com/patternarium that you can edit...

I have a flagship arranger and a flagship workstation that I can create complete songs on, or just drums, bass and keys to play guitar or keys over

Once I retire I plan to have more time to learn more about Ableton Live, and other software / gear I have.
 
I can play a shit ton of full songs. Ironically, most of the ones I played thousands of times in a working band I would have to go back and relearn.

These days I have no band. I tend to learn songs, play the fuck out of them for a bit, then move on to other songs promptly forgetting the previous ones.
 
I could probably play 50-60 songs start to finish right now, and there's probably 150 or so more that I could re-learn in a minute or two. It's just what I've always done.

Noodling along to a backing track sounds mind-numbingly boring to me.

EDIT: After pondering this for a while, I'm sure the second number is a fair bit higher. I bet there's 200-250 songs that I could play all the way through after a minor refresher.
 
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VonBonfire said:
More gigs for me n you bro!!!
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Yeah, for sure - it just seems like there are two different hobbies at play here sometimes, yano?

ZEEGLER said:
I could probably play 50-60 songs start to finish right now, and there's probably 150 or so more that I could re-learn in a minute or two. It's just what I've always done.

Noodling along to a backing track sounds mind-numbingly boring to me.
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I practice improvisation noodling a little bit, but its always goal oriented. Like I want to practice x technique in y style in this key, etc etc
 
Roll with whatever gets you to what you want to accomplish as a player.

The last year or two, I’ve done a fair amount of cover band jams or playing as an acoustic duo. To do that successfully, I have to learn songs. When I’m not doing that, sometimes I’ll just focus specifically on lead playing.

As long as your current method is enjoyable & not holding you back, there’s nothing inherently wrong with it.
 
Matt300ZXT said:
Dude, I play your songs all the time.
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Awesome. Can you shoot me the tabs to 2A? I gotta give it to the guest vocalist so he can play it with his band, but I only remember the bassline.


...and the reggae part. I can't wait to get my kazoo back out.
 
cobrahead1030 said:
Roll with whatever gets you to what you want to accomplish as a player.

The last year or two, I’ve done a fair amount of cover band jams or playing as an acoustic duo. To do that successfully, I have to learn songs. When I’m not doing that, sometimes I’ll just focus specifically on lead playing.

As long as your current method is enjoyable & not holding you back, there’s nothing inherently wrong with it.
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Exactly, supposed to be fun. I have too much other shit to worry about
 
So many responses....
I can't possibly respind to all of them.

Today I actually busted out my old Lynrrd Skynyrd songbook and went to town playing a buch of full tunes.

Then I grabbed some other books I had laying around, mostly just basic chords and stuff, but it was fun.

After that I started playing Jailbreak by Thin Lizzy by ear, maybe I can play some rhythm?
 
I don't know that I can play any full cover tunes anymore. For that matter, I'm not sure I ever could, depending on how close to the original recording you expect me to be! Even when I played cover bands, we mostly just went for the riffs and general structure, but made it our own from there - never did try the note-for-note thing. When I jam along with recordings, I'll lock in on the rhythm parts and riffs, but then go do my own thing on the solos. I still spend more effort thinking how I'd arrange if it I played/recorded it, than worrying about the exact details of how someone else recorded it.

When we were gigging constantly, I had all of our tunes down, of course, but at this point I'd need to go back and relisten to them to really get them back down. I could pull that together fairly quickly, but couldn't do it off the cuff.
 
yngHL said:
Posting on TGP must be a communist
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I know you are joking, but I am a Patriotic, Grunt Style Wearing, don't "F" with my country type of guy.
I always say, you have a 1st amendment right to say stuff, but i have a 2nd amendment right.......
Like the Creed Fisher song says - "If you have a right to burn my flag I have a right to kick your a--"
 
rstites said:
I don't know that I can play any full cover tunes anymore. For that matter, I'm not sure I ever could, depending on how close to the original recording you expect me to be! Even when I played cover bands, we mostly just went for the riffs and general structure, but made it our own from there - never did try the note-for-note thing. When I jam along with recordings, I'll lock in on the rhythm parts and riffs, but then go do my own thing on the solos. I still spend more effort thinking how I'd arrange if it I played/recorded it, than worrying about the exact details of how someone else recorded it.

When we were gigging constantly, I had all of our tunes down, of course, but at this point I'd need to go back and relisten to them to really get them back down. I could pull that together fairly quickly, but couldn't do it off the cuff.
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I just get the basic chord structures down, but I don't have the patience to learn a solo.
I did 6 years of College and Grad school, my brain has had enough.
 
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