Pink Floyd's The Wall

[theinevitable]

So, Pink Floyd's The Wall. Has it stood up to the test of time? are Pink Floyd just a bunch of stoned and pretentious assholes? do you do drugs and watch it?

did you do what I did, and assume that no one knew what it was about? I definitely came up to my friend who watched it with me a week later and said "ok, here's my theory--" only to be informed that no, apparently we know what it's about.

So. Does anyone else aspire to be able to play the guitar solo on Comfortably Numb? it is one of few pieces of music which has made me gasp with emotion.

also, I do not mean to have been a crap dude with the title. if it annoys or confuses anyone, I suppose I can change it.

[pmcd9]

This board is decidedly split on Pink Floyd.  I'm in the love 'em camp, but The Wall isn't my favorite of their albums.  It's hard for me to get too into them these days because i've heard them so much over the years.  If they were to dig a live recording out of the vaults like Zep did a couple of years it might rekindle my interest, but until then i'll let them continue to moulder.  I've listened to Floyd under the influence, but I enjoy them sober as well.  Fun fact, the female voice in the hotel suite when Pink throws a tantrum "wanna take a bath?" is Toni Tenille.

~Paul

[Asherdan]

That is a cool fact and Paul also summed up my position perfectly.

ahem

[robot_god]

So, Pink Floyd's The Wall. Has it stood up to the test of time? are Pink Floyd just a bunch of stoned and pretentious assholes? do you do drugs and watch it?

did you do what I did, and assume that no one knew what it was about? I definitely came up to my friend who watched it with me a week later and said "ok, here's my theory--" only to be informed that no, apparently we know what it's about.

So. Does anyone else aspire to be able to play the guitar solo on Comfortably Numb? it is one of few pieces of music which has made me gasp with emotion.

also, I do not mean to have been a crap dude with the title. if it annoys or confuses anyone, I suppose I can change it.

If it wasn't for Pink Floyd, I wouldn't be alive today.  Well, that's not true, but if it wasn't for them, my perspective on music and many other things wouldn't be nearly the same.

Yes, I have watched the movie on all kinds of drugs.  Just try to understand something about it, it doesn't really matter what.  Then, go back a few months later and watch it again, and you will get different things out of it.  And then again.  This basically happens with any good movie.  And any good drugs.  But don't do drugs.

To tell you the truth, the solo is not really that difficult to play.  Once you start playing lead guitar and learn the pentatonic scale, you are probably ready to learn to play the solo.  But learning someone else's solo only provides so much satisfaction.  Gotta play your own.  That being said, the first solo I learned note for note was Money.  Also, I have the tab book for The Wall somewhere.  Additionally, Comfortably Numb is probably transcribed in guitar mags like, at least once a month.



While I was typing, new replies were posted:  Yeah, while The Wall is excellent, it is overshadowed by the brilliance of their other albums.  I reccomend Wish You Were Here at max volume while chugging cough syrup.

[AugustWest]

I've been listening to Piper a lot lately.

[miles]

Most mind-numbingly boring solo to ever be called the greatest solo of all time.  I mean, fuck, it's in the song's title.

Meddle, though, that's a fanstastic record.

[pmcd9]

Most mind-numbingly boring solo to ever be called the greatest solo of all time.

Now now Miles.

~Paul

[Hobot]

This is going to turn into a general Pink Floyd thread, and I am okay with that.  "Money" is one of those songs with a bass line that I can feel in the pit of my stomach, and I love it; I turn the subwoofer up on my speakers and probably annoy the hell out of my housemates, but I don't care (for those of you who are curious, the others that do this for me are Radiohead's "The National Anthem" and Portishead's "Wandering Star."  Oh God yes).

[theinevitable]

wow. definitely did not mean to put this in History. Sorry paul.

hm. I own Meddle on vinyl. it was my dad's in college. I've never really listened to it.

yeah, I am a really really shitty guitar player. I know the pentatonic scale. I play for long periods every day. but I have no discipline, and no accuracy. my speed is for crap because of this.

the thing which is upsetting me right now: I just got my new guitar. I love it. it sounds like a dream. it felt better than any of the other guitars I tried out.

but my P.O.S. 130$ Ibanez still feels much better. It's light, it's tiny, the neck is thin, and it can have really thin strings because it doesn't have a tremolo. it sounds horrible. but I can play so much better on that guitar. what is the deal. I am wishing it wasn't an Act Worthy of Capital Punishment to try to get the ibanez neck put on the fender.

old guitar
new guitar (forgive me, but I like this picture, even if I am trying way too hard to be cool)

so, yes. What am I missing about playing guitar? the answer is probably "discipline". I'm working on that.  I think another part of the problem, is that most of the bands I enjoy have very simplistic guitar parts. The ones which have more complicated guitar are difficult to find tablature for. It is difficult to learn a song by ear if I can't physically play it in the first place..

[robot_god]

Well, if you play for long periods each day and know the pentatonic scale, you're definitly on the right track.

Important question is, is do you know how to apply the scale?  The only way to learn this is to play over music and the easiest way to go about that is to just play some music in the background and fuck around on the instrument.  Listen carefully to the music and search for notes on the instrument that sound good and try to figure out which notes are good and which sound shitty, then play the good ones.  This does not seem like very thorough advice, but it is really the best I can give.  Hmmm, maybe try playing only one string, that is kind of how I started improvising.  Like, for example, lets say you play along to Comfortably Numb, the song is in B minor.  Try just playing the B string and use frets 0, 3, 5, 7, 10, 12, and just fuck around and try to play melodies or whatnot.  This should work pretty well, because the open string will be the root note.

When that gets boring, make it the minor scale and on the B use 0, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 10, 12.  It doesn't matter how fast or accurate you play at this point, you just need to try play things that complement the music, and you only need one note for that.

Improvising on one string should be pretty helpful with or without music in the background.  Perhaps you would enjoy the spanish-gypsy scale (a mode of harmonic minor) which would look like 0, 1, 4, 5, 7, 8, 10, 12.

Just don't be afraid to play things that don't sound and eventually you will start finding things that sound good.

Speed and accuracy will come with time, there really is no fun way to go about it besides playing excercises.  Playing chromatically up and down the strings like 12, 11, 10, 9, 12, 11, 10, 9, 12, 11, 10, 9 (using a different finger for each fret) and challenging yourself to just play as fast as possible, and then faster, will probably be the best way to improve on that.

So... good luck.  Let me know if this works out at all.  Also, I owe you a picture of my guitar.

And learning by ear, that takes a lot of experience.

[theinevitable]

wow.
so, I definitely learned the spanish gypsy scale at some point. all I remember of it is this one cool sounding riff I wrote.

amazingly: the thing you said to do, with trying to improvise along with songs? i just started doing that a few days ago. Well, no, I had actually tried doing it along to Velvet Underground songs before, but at that time I was mostly being wierd. Now that I know that this isn't a totally rediculous way to learn guitar, I will continue.

I was, actually, finding that this was a good way to learn the scales all over the neck. I used a program to make a (crappy, skipping) loop of a I-IV-V in A, and just messed around until I'd figured out the scale in other positions. obviously I could have figured this out by knowing the notes of the scale. But no matter how many times I do something like chart out a scale on graph paper in math class (I mean... I would never do that!), the scales don't stick well in my head unless I figure them out in a more fluid way.

anyway. thank you.

edit: I'd like to say, in my defense, I am not that kid who has a nice guitar and can't play it. at least, I don't think so.my level of playing ability is most likely reasonable for my years of playing, age, etc. It's more an issue of frustration with being unable to play the things I want to play. we're not talking "theinevitable has a new fender guitar that his parents bought him, and he can't play "stairway to heaven" or "heartbreaker"".

[AugustWest]

hm. I own Meddle on vinyl. it was my dad's in college. I've never really listened to it.

A.  Go fuck*ng listen to Meddle now.  Right now. I mean it godammit!  Then rent Pink Floyd Live at Pompeii.  Oh yeah, and you must listen to it LOUD.

B.  Heh.  I own Meddle on vinyl. That was my upgrade copy.  My original was on 8-track.

Hobot, if you like the Money bass line, you must listen to Meddle too.  At least "One of These Days."

I know that it's long been fashionable in certain quarters to sneer at Pink Floyd.  I don't care.  They're my favorite band and have been for almost 30 years now.

[miles]

I know that it's long been fashionable in certain quarters to sneer at Pink Floyd.

What possible reason could one have to sneer at Mr. Floyd?

[Hobot]

Hobot, if you like the Money bass line, you must listen to Meddle too.  At least "One of These Days."

Will do!

[AugustWest]

Will do!

Please promise me that you'll turn it up to 11.