Evil Spud Boy

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There is an interesting gallery at ABC News featuring guns that have been made into guitars by Columbian luthier, Luis Alberto Paredes. The guns are AK-47s and shotguns that were used by fighters in Columbia’s continuing conflict.

The gallery contains photographs of the creator as well as some of musicians performing with the guitars. There is even a photo of Bob Geldof holding one of the guitars.

Via Guitar MX Blog

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Tags: Guitar

That is, if you’re in the UK on Feb 18th; because, that is when Harrods will attempt to set a record for the largest guitar jam ever as part of the Harrods Rocks exhibition. They hope to enter the Guinness Book of Records by assembling 2000 guitarists to play Deep Purple’s “Smoke on The Water.”

read more | digg story

From Wired News:

A new online service is about to launch that will allow bedroom musicians worldwide to play together in real-time — without leaving their own bedrooms. In March, eJamming will introduce eJamming Audio, an online music studio that uses peer-to-peer connections to eliminate lag times between live performers.

read more | digg story

I ran across this post on Digg, and found that, in a addition to this video, this user has posted a ton of free guitar lesson videos to YouTube. He has a lot of songs in a range of styles. The quality of the video is pretty good for YouTube and the quality of the instruction is better than a lot of commercial DVD’s I’ve seen. Check it out.

read more | digg story

I recieved a letter from Marshall Johns at Peterson regarding my previous review of StroboSoft. Marshall sent me a link to the most recent version of StroboSoft that I had requested but hadn’t received. It seems he had sent it previously from his home address rather than from a Peterson address so it may have been filtered by my spam filter.

Also, In the letter, Marshall addresses some of the comments I made in my review, so I am posting that portion of the letter here:

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I’m hoping some readers of this site might be in a position to help out here.

From Harmony Central:

The Derek Trucks Band had their equipment trailer stolen in Atlanta the night of March 10, 2006. Harmony-Central is asking our community, particularly those in the greater Atlanta area, to be on the lookout for any of the following gear.

Here is a list of the key items that were in the DTB trailer. This is not a complete list but these are the items we’re most likely to spot and hopefully recover. Please contact (303)778-1156 immediately if you have any information.

I’ve reprinted the equipment list below. I’m posting it here in order to try to reach as wide an audience as possible. There is also information about the theft Derek Trucks Band site.

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If you are an adult just beginning to learn guitar, you may have difficulty finding time to practice. Putting in enough time is a big challenge for anyone taking up guitar at any age, but as you get older I think it becomes even more of a challenge. I didn’t start learning guitar until I was 39 and I had to find ways to fit learning to play in with all of the other things I have going on in my life. I think that most people who take up guitar as an adult find that there are many things that demand their attention; thinks like a career, a marriage, home ownership and children all make demands on your time and make it hard to find time to for practicing.

If you don’t practice regularly and consistently, it is very difficult to make any forward progress. When you aren’t making progress it is very easy to become frustrated which may cause you to spend even less time or give up playing guitar altogether. In order to prevent that from happening to you, here are some tips and advice to help you make the most of your practice time.

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An interesting piece of news if you own any Behringer equipment:

Radio World Posted an article saying that the FCC is proposing a $1,000,000 fine for marketing products in the United States without certification that they meet FCC standards for radio interference. There is a list of the specific models that were imported in the FCC’s notice.

I only own one Behringer product, a BCF-2000 control surface, which is one of the products named. I was going to write a review of it for the site, but maybe I’ll hold off on that and see how this turns out. I am wondering if this will have any effect on future availability or support of these products in the United States.

It’s always impressive when you see someone on stage quickly retune their guitar between songs; whenever I see that, I always think, “there is an experienced musician.” It is especially impressive if you, like most people who are new to the guitar, have to perform several iterations of plucking and tuning before even getting one string in tune.

You can get by without this skill, since tuners are cheap and plentiful. But, besides the advantage of not always being dependent on a tuner and being able to quickly re-tune if you go out of tune while playing live, is not having to deal with the nagging feeling, in the back of your mind, that you can’t tune well. It’s just another thing to make you feel like a beginner and diminish your confidence. As guitarists, the fewer things we have eating away at our confidence the better.

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