Ibanez RG 770 DX
Parker Nitefly SA
Line6 POD 2.0

(Clean sound: Fender amp simulations with short stereo delay / Lead sound: Soldano amp simulations with delay & reverb)

I first picked up the guitar in 1992. I was ten years old.

I didn't have any greater ambitions, other than to play some of the cool music I had discovered in my friends cd collection (mainly Metallica, Nirvana and Megadeth).

When I was sixteen something happened in my tiny puberty brain - and I suddenly had a vision: I should practice scales all day long and become the greatest guitarist on earth - and I started practicing.

A few years later I had become a speed moster, with no sense of rhythm, melody or originality.

Playing Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan songs (and many others), got my scratching and strumming technique together. Now, I am not talking about being able to strum a four chord song to impress your party friends.

No, by exploring the realms of rhythm guitar, I all of a sudden got a sense of musical periodicity, which boosted my solo phrasing to new heights. Suddenly I could, in my head, hear how the "C - Am - F - G" vamp would go round, long before it actually did. Thanks to this "sight hearing" ability I could predict which would be the coolest notes/lick to play as the chords progression goes around.

Obviously, playing scales up and down to a metronome all day long, will not give you this kind of knowledge.

I also find that some of the coolest solo techniques, are in fact rhythm guitar applied to the higher notes of the guitar, an example of this is Stevie Ray Vaughan's "Voodoo chile" solo.

So how to get started with rhythm playing? If you go through the songs covered at freelicks you will have touched upon fingerstyle, metal, scratching, strumming and standard rock riffs.

Important note: You must understand that you do not "know how to play" a song/riff until you can play it with the original song as backing . If you have this as your goal, it will ensure that you learn things correctly and get the "sense of musical periodicity" which I was talking about.

Now go ahead and be the best,