Superstar in your own rock movie, I wanted just a minor part

I go through phases in my guitar playing development, and my idea of what I want to sound like changes as my skills improve and my musical interests change. If you asked me five years ago who I wanted to play like, I'd say Jimmy Page, if you asked me two years ago I'd say Kirk Hammett. So I put in a lot of focused practice time working on skills such as blues based penatonic soloing, palm mutes, rudimentary sweep picking and tapping, to varying degrees of success. Usually I wind up buying a bunch of related gear as well - thus, I'm currently the owner of a sunburst Gibson Les Paul and an Ibanez s470 with EMG pickups, and a Mesa high gain amp.

Not that I regret the time spent on this type of practice since it's made me a better guitarist, but I find my tastes changing again. Ever since my baby was born, it just felt silly walking around with a big honking electric guitar strapped to my chest, blasting these metal solos. I started learning quiet fingerpicking versions of nursery rhymes to entertain my wife and baby. If you ask me now who I want to sound like I'd say Ben Gibbard or Elliott Smith, probably a combination of both. I want to be equally adept at intricate fingerpicking, fast acoustic strumming parts with or without a pick, basically the 'indie sound'. Not that this is the most difficult thing to do in the world, metal playing requires much more skill, I just like to play the acoustic more and more these days.


I was thinking - I'm already a pretty good player, I can play 'These Days' by Nico, which to me means that I already have a good grasp on acoustic fingerpicking - it will just take me a couple of months to get totally used to fast strumming with the light nylon pick. I know I talk about this a lot - but I'd really like to record more, possibly record some youtube videos instead of just mp3s. After I get around 20 songs recorded, I'd like to look into either playing out at open mics or something, or maybe I'll take an ad out in craigslist about starting a band.

If I could play like either of these dudes, I'd be happy. I don't need to play like Eddie Van Halen or anything.

Ben Gibbard Live at Theatre of the Living Arts on 2007-05-09


Elliott Smith Live at Black Cat on 1998-04-17 (April 17, 1998)