Winter can be a time for woodshedding, but summer heat and humidity can make a person want to hibernate, too, and if you’re gonna hide from the heat, you’re gonna need DVDs. Here are a couple new summer releases that are sure to teach, inspire, and make you want to pick up that guitar and do a little pickin’.
A Lesson with Steve Earle: Guitars, Songs and Picking Techniques
There’s no songwriter cooler than Steve Earle—gritty, honest, angry, snarky, and smart; he’s also prolific, gifted, and troubled, but mostly he’s a hell of a writer, and a darn fine picker, too. In a conversation format, Happy Traum does a great job asking questions and prompting Earle to teach picking techniques and talk about songwriting in this two-hour DVD lesson.
Earle states that he’s played “way more solo than with a band,” and so his style is very self-contained. He’s very concerned with what he calls “keeping the heartbeat going,” which is the thumb-pickin’ part—the alternating bass line. His style revolves around simple guitar riffs that more imply than convey melody, which is tougher to do than it looks.
Earle demonstrates eight of his best-loved songs, with a split screen showing left and right hand up close and personal at the same time. He takes us through “Tennessee Blues,” “Sparkle and Shine,” “Ft. Worth Blues,” “Hometown Blues,” “South Nashville Blues,” “This City,” “Satellite Radio,” and the iconic “Copperhead Road,” starting on mandolin, and finishing on his trusty signature Martin M-21.
He also talks about his collection of vintage acoustic guitars, which is somewhat of an obsession for Earle. We see a few different vintage Martins from his collection as he talks very lovingly and excitedly about them—an unexpected treat.
$29.95
homespuntapes.com
Fingerpicking Hank Williams: Guitar Arrangements for Western Swing and Honky Tonk Classics (taught by Toby Walker)
Toby Walker is a veteran fingerpicker who’s put together a series of lessons that will make you the most popular gittar picker around any campfire. Walker teaches the classic Hank Williams tunes: “Your Cheatin’ Heart,” “Move it on Over,” “My Bucket’s Got a Hole In It,” “Hey Good Lookin’,” and “Honky Tonkin’,” on this 100-minute DVD.
In addition to teaching these particular songs, Walker talks quite a bit about the process he went through to arrange these tunes, which are some universal ideas that will serve you well when you find tunes you might want to arrange yourself. These songs all require the player to keep a muted alternating bass line going while playing a melody, and what Walker calls “tinsel:” the little extra flourishes and ornaments that bring a piece to life. I happen to be of the opinion that anything that teaches us to be more self-contained and complete guitar players is good, and I’m very impressed with the way this DVD goes about doing just that.
The instruction is remarkably detailed and clear, with a split screen showing close-ups of both right and left hands. Walker literally takes us note-by-note through each song, slowing everything down and talking through every riff. This is fantastic, because there are all kinds of licks and ideas that can apply to other songs, like walking bass, double-hammer-ons, slides, and little licks that imply chords without actually playing them. Even if you go through only one song, you’ll learn tons of techniques. Each song is arranged with multiple sections, so there are several styles being taught, from blues to boogie-woogie to honky tonk and Western swing, sometimes within one single tune.
$29.95
homespuntapes.com
The Power of Claw: A Complete Course in Clawhammer Guitar (taught by Steve Baughman)
Clawhammer banjo is one of the sweetest, happiest sounds out there. Steve Baughman brings that warm joy to fingerstyle guitar in a power-packed set of lessons that truly does go from the most elementary techniques to mind-blowingly complex and very advanced things like percussive slapping, tapping, “clawmonics” (harmonics done with claw techniques), and funk grooves, all in 70 tightly packed minutes.
Baughman is a wonderfully encouraging presence through this, despite having ferociously intimidating chops himself. He seems utterly relaxed, calm, and patient (of course, he really doesn’t have to show you that same lick 100 times with the miracle of the DVD lesson). The lessons are organized quite sensibly and progressively, starting with what he calls the “bum-ditty,” which is the nitty-gritty of the whole thing. Once you master the bouncing little groove with your right hand, everything follows on from that, from playing simple tunes to adding in the super fancy stuff. The “Bells and Whistles” section isn’t something you want to jump straight to, trust me! But once you get there, there probably won’t be much of anything you can’t do.
This DVD will probably take some time to get through, and the technique is something that I am confident I will use on a very regular basis. Clawhammer is, at its foundation, a gentle technique—a stress-free and soothing way to spend many a summer evening on the front porch.
Huge shocker incoming: Zach Broyles made a Tube Screamer. The Mythos Envy Pro Overdrive is Zach’s take on the green apple of his eye, with some special tweaks including increased output, more drive sounds, and a low-end boost option. Does this mean he can clear out his collection of TS-9s? Of course not.
This time on Dipped in Tone, Rhett and Zach welcome Tyler Bryant, the Texas-bred and Nashville-based rocker who has made waves with his band the Shakedown, who Rhett credits as one of his favorite groups. Bryant, it turns out, is a TS-head himself, having learned to love the pedal thanks to its being found everywhere in Texas guitar circles.Bryant shares how he scraped together a band after dropping out of high school and moving to Nashville, including the rigors of 15-hour drives for 30-minute sets in a trusty Ford Expedition. He’s lived the dream (or nightmare, depending on the day) and has the wisdom to show it.
Throughout the chat, the gang covers modeling amps and why modern rock bands still need amps on stage; the ins and outs of recording-gear rabbit holes and getting great sounds; and the differences between American and European audiences. Tune in to hear it all.
Get 10% off your order at stewmac.com/dippedintone
Hats off to Carmen Vandenberg of Bones UK, our celebrity Question of the Month respondent.
Guest Picker - Carmen Vandenberg, Bones UK
The cover of Soft, Bones UK’s new album, due in mid-September.
A: My favorite method these days (and to be honest, from when I started playing) is to put on my favorite blues records, listen with my eyes closed, and, at the end, see what my brain compartmentalizes and keeps stored away. Then, I try and play back what I heard and what my fingers or brain decided they liked!
Bone UK’s labelmade, Des Rocks.
Obsession: Right now, I am into anyone trying to create sounds that haven’t been made before—bands like Queens of the Stone Age, Jack White, and our labelmate, Des Rocs! There’s a Colombian band called Diamanté Electrico who I’ve been really into recently. Really anyone who’s trying to create innovative and inspiring sounds.
Reader of the Month - Sam C. Schiff.
Sam spent endless hours trying to learn the solo Leslie West played on “Long Red,” off of The Road Goes Ever On.
A: The best way to learn guitar is to listen to some good guitar playing! Put on a record, hear something tasty, and play on repeat until it comes out of your fingers. For me, it was Leslie West playing “Long Red” on the Mountain album, The Road Goes Ever On. I stayed up all night listening to that track until I could match Leslie’s phrasing. I still can’t, no one can, but I learned a lot!
Smith’s own low-wattage amp build.
Obsession: My latest musical obsession is low-wattage tube amps like the 5-watt Fender Champ heard on the Laylaalbum. Crank it up all the way for great tube distortion and sustain, and it’s still not loud enough to wake up the neighbors!
Gear Editor - Charles Saufley
Charles Saufley takes to gear like a duck to water!
A: Learning by ear and feel is most fun for me. I write and free-form jam more than I learn other people’s licks. When I do want to learn something specific, I’ll poke around on YouTube for a demo or a lesson or watch films of a player I like, and then typically mangle that in my own “special” way that yields something else. But I rarely have patience for tabs or notation.
The Grateful Dead’s 1967 debut album.
Obsession: Distorted and overdriven sounds with very little sustain—Keith Richards’ Between the Buttons tones, for example. Jerry Garcia’s plonky tones on the first Grateful Dead LP are another cool, less-fuzzy version of that texture.
Publisher - Jon Levy
A: I’m a primitive beast: The only way I can learn new music is by ear, so it’s a good thing I find that method enjoyable. I’m entirely illiterate with staff notation. Put sheet music in front of me and I’ll stare at it with twitchy, fearful incomprehension like an ape gaping at the monolith in 2001: A Space Odyssey. I’m almost as clueless with tab, but I can follow along with chord charts if I’m under duress.
The two-hit wonders behind the early ’70s soft-rock hits, “Fallin’ in Love” and “Don't Pull Your Love.”
Obsession: Revisiting and learning AM-radio pop hits circa 1966–1972. The Grass Roots, Edison Lighthouse, the Association, the Archies, and Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds—nothing is too cheesy for me to dissect and savor. Yes, I admit I have a serious problem.
