Mick Taylor (TPS) on You Tube guitar gear demo's

PudWud

JezWynd said:

PudWud said:

LPManic said:

Not to go all Joe Bonamassa but people do need to just go home and learn to play the guitar - in other words learn to use the tone and volume knobs and picking dynamics and just play. Rather than wasting x number of hours per week watching someone playing gear. The only person worth watching is Greg Koch to steal all his best riffs.

Agreed with this, especially for myself. Over the last 3/4 years I’ve wasted so much time watching YouTube gear demos and looking into gear rather than playing the guitar. I think I’ve actually regressed as a player. 

I’ve also learnt not to take any gear demo videos as gospel, for the reasons Mick says. But I also don’t trust most of these demo guys as there is always a flavour of the week drive pedal that seems to disappear after 6 months or so to be replaced by the next TS or bluesbreaker pedal.

Only in the last few months have I broken this cycle of gear watching and buying and started to just sit and practice the instrument again. I’m trying to only watch YouTube videos with some sort of value to them (like a lesson). 

Having tried dozens of modulation and delay effects over the years, I finally realised that the effects that I really like and use - reverb and tremolo - are thoughtfully built in to the amplifier by some clever designers. Life suddenly became so much simpler and my playing has improved.

Yep, I really do like my pedalboard and the sounds I can get from it, but when I've only got an hour or 30 minutes to play, I find myself tweaking the knobs of the different drive pedals and getting some nice sounds. Only to realise I spent the whole time enjoying getting different tones rather than learning a new song, or getting better at the instrument. 

So now I try to plug straight into the amp, or only have one drive/boost pedal in front, and sit down to play and learn some new songs. I spent some time learning the opening riff of Tom Misch - Lost in Paris, and I felt much better about my playing after that session rather than just tweaking some knobs on different pedals. 

Its basically the same reason I got rid of my Kemper, as I spent all my time checking out new profiles and tweaking rather than playing.

grappagreen

PudWud said:

Yep, I really do like my pedalboard and the sounds I can get from it, but when I've only got an hour or 30 minutes to play, I find myself tweaking the knobs of the different drive pedals and getting some nice sounds. Only to realise I spent the whole time enjoying getting different tones rather than learning a new song, or getting better at the instrument. 

So now I try to plug straight into the amp, or only have one drive/boost pedal in front, and sit down to play and learn some new songs. I spent some time learning the opening riff of Tom Misch - Lost in Paris, and I felt much better about my playing after that session rather than just tweaking some knobs on different pedals. 

Its basically the same reason I got rid of my Kemper, as I spent all my time checking out new profiles and tweaking rather than playing.

Agree with this completely. I sold my Kemper for the same reason and it's the reason I just don't mess with all the gear I have - I just don't have enough time to practice and mess with gear so practice takes precedence for me. 

As an aside I was with Tom a couple of weeks ago when he popped round to buy an old synth. very nice chap..

Si