Sweep Picking...

  • Thread starter Thread starter Tawlks
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prsdiezel":2vbrqivw said:
I don't think the problem is the sweep picking. If you have a lead and you put one or two sweeping arpeggios in there at the right place and they are clean you can hear all the notes killer :rock:

If you do a whole 5 minute lead with nothing but sweeping like all the vids above that sucks. Don't get wrong the guitarist are amazing but 100 sweeps in a row Come on....Come on

Moderation and good taste is the key to a good lead with sweeps.
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i wanna hear more tasteless overusage of sweeps.i like it...check out my former student on youtube type Viraemia... cool and tasteless i love it
 
While so many of you find it tasteless, I would love to be able to play like that.
 
I like the food/cooking analogy. Its like eating "smart"...just about anything can be ok if done in moderation.

Greg Howe once said sweeping is simply another way to get from point A to point B on the neck so you can make your next statement. I don't see anything wrong with that approach - whether you sweep, pick, tap, string skip, etc, they're all just tools for your ideas. Its when one does the repetative (and predictable) barrage of successive sweeps for several measures with no real point made before or after where I roll my eyes and yawn. That does not impress in the slightest, any tom dick or harry can do it fairly well with just a little practice, and they do...and of course once mastered, they make that same lame statement over and over again, too enamored to bother incorporating some taste with the chops.
 
It's like any technique: In the right hands, it's musical. In the wrong hands, it's wankery.

In my hands, EVERY technique is wankery, but I'm ok with that. :D
 
Sweeping is awesome if used in the right context. I'm getting closer to being able to do it smoothly, but I still need a lot of work.
But it's not like I sit and practice it for hours every day either. I usually write songs and practice more practical things, but I'm slowly working on the sweeps! :rock:

FWIW, Devin Townsend is a perfect example of sweeping used in a musical context. He builds entire songs around arpeggios and they actually serve the music and it's not for showing off. He rules.
 
Doubleneck":2ifwvwdk said:
While so many of you find it tasteless, I would love to be able to play like that.
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i love the tasteless stuff,its now a goodword to me,cause i usually like things called that
 
I don't see how a technique can be "bad". It can definitely be used poorly, or overused. Some people tap too much. Some people tremolo pick too much. Some people use too much legato. If you treat it like a different color crayon, and not overuse it, I don't see the problem.

Now if your crayon box only has 2 colors, and you ham-hand it onto the paper, of course it's shit. :D
 
Seems to me as with any technique, it can be done tastefully or wankingly. I wouldn't mind be ably to do either.
 
it can be total wank if you dont apply in the appropriate musical sense. Listen to Classical Violin pieces and concertos, thats certainly not wankery, its beautiful. I think they are a lot of metal guitarists do it just as a gimmick though, like tapping. So it all depends on how advanced you are in your listening spectrum...I heard etudes from all sorts of classical composers that have been transcribed for electric guitar and make logical music sense and sound cool.
 
I think it's just like any other way of playing, it's art, if it sounds good it's good. I'm not the type of person that think one technique or another is bad no matter what. It all depends on what you play. There's many great sweep-pickers out there who can use it properly and make great compositions and improvisations using it. Like, Yngwie Malmsteen, Jason Becker, Vinnie Moore, George Bellas, Frank Gambale and more. But I can understand that people get sick of it, it's for sure overused, I agree on that.
 
I practice the technique to help get both hands in sync but I don't use it in a musical situation. It is a good thing to practice even if you don't ever plan on using it.
 
I think alternate picking is wank.
I think bends are wank.
I think sustain is wank.
...feedback is wank.
...amplifiers are wank.
...
...
...

See how easy that is?

Any technique can be used, over-used, or abused.
It's all about making music, and if a sweep is what fits the song best at the moment, then do a sweep.
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWrtV1iTY70

"Whats up, im jess ive been playing guitar for a yr and a half now (two this jan.) "

She's sixteen, shreds, covers one of my favorite guitarists (Kiko Loureiro), and she's apparently from my hometown.

I'm not sure whether to cry or find and marry her. :cry: :doh:
 
It's no different than tapping.. overuse it, and it becomes silly.

Where the fine line of overuse actually exists, though, is up for debate :)
 
i don't play arpeggios but i sweep that little section of the pentatonic scale that sounds like an arpeggio. the 3 string climb- you all know what i'm talkin about eh?
 
People should of course, be aware that you can play arpeggios very effectively using alternate picking- you don't have to use "sweep picking" . Some people whom you THINK are sweeping are NOT.

People that use it and like it- fine.

Those who find it unnatural or complex to use alternate picking then go downpick- downpick-downpick-downpick then uppick-uppick-uppick-uppick THEN back to alternate picking while improvising a solo, should be aware that good old alternate picking can get you there as well. Definitely. And probably further in the long run*

Meaning you alternate pick across the strings, never changing your picking technique.

Musically or artistically is a whole other thing, virtuosity has been a tradition for many instruments for hundreds of years or more, and technique and art have to be balanced for each person, each style and even each song, where some songs are technical displays and others are atmospheric, moody , whatever and obviously longer pieces go through different moods, colors. etc.

Obviously your audience may get tired of too much of one thing and so might the artist ( that's you ).

*Alternate picking across the strings enables rhythmic triplets for example (and many other things) across three strings slow or fast and very rhythmic AND can be done without distortion OR even on Acoustic or Nylon String guitar - which are difficult to do with the "Sweeping Technique ".
 
Too bad 99.99999 % of metal guitarists, after ascending a sweep pattern, use the exact same notes while descending the sweep. That's one problem which gets old real fast.

I think sweeping, by virtue of the technique itself, has a kind of 'generic' sound. Largely because there's not much difference in pick attack and left hand pressure (finger feel) from note to note as there is in other playing techniques. There's really not much 'shaping' the note via player idiosyncrasies involved IMO. E.g. two guitarists, with similar yet not identical styles, will probably sound more similar to each other when they are sweeping, vs. when they are alternate picking, doing legato runs, etc.

I also have a pet peeve with some of the ultra-tech death metal bands whose riffs are little more that sweep patterns. Its so fast and over the top that the music loses much of its heaviness. Which pretty much defeats the purpose of being a death metal band !
 
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