First time picking after a break

Over the past week I have barely touched the guitar, mainly due to having unplugged and taken the system to St Cuthberts for the Young Rewired State sessions.

I finally got around to reconnecting it, and have spent around two hours playing. Instead of listing each song separatly with a commentry I've put them into a table with worst to best score.
I should point out that some of the higher scores are due to the songs having a significant number of notes played and are nothing to do with my playing skills!

I intend to get back to a more normal discussion of how I feel about the songs

Song	Artist(s)	Score
“Jules”	Seth Chapla	4148
"Number Thirteen"	Red Fang	5161
"California Brain"	RapScallions	9196
"Use Somebody"	Kings of Leon	12805
"Outshined"	Soundgarden	19011
"Where is My Mind?"	Pixies	19795
"Unnatural Selection"	Muse	21307
"Boys Don't Cry"	The Cure	22133
"Surf Hell"	Little Barrie	29916
"I Can't Hear You"	The Dead Weather	30821
"In Bloom"	Nirvana	32585
"Slow Hands"	Interpol	35815
"Higher Ground"	Red Hot Chili Peppers	52573
"Vasoline"	Stone Temple Pilots	61032
"(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction"	The Rolling Stones	74097
"Angela"	Jarvis Cocker	74691
"Go With the Flow"	Queens of the Stone Age	77300
"Next Girl"	The Black Keys	79046

The Low Down performance

Today I had another look at a couple of the techniques, and a play through of the newer songs on my playlists.

Techniques

I had another attempt at the Bends technique, getting 25538 points but still a very long way from getting comfortable with the technique. It is easier to use more than one finger to hold the string down, and I suspect my main issue at the moment is getting the speed of doing the bend matching how long the bend appears on screen.

The  technique was unlocked last time, I had three attempts at this getting between 354 and 991 points. I kept getting difficulty level up, then almost immediately down again so I suspect it will be quite a while before I get to the Bronze award for this.

Rehearsal

I had two goes at California Brain with a slight improvement from 6317 points to 8039 after two attempts. 

I can't hear you I earned 28292 points, a nice increase from the 8562 I earned on the first try through.

I quite like Slow Hands as a song, and moved up to 21984 points, coming close to doubling the original score I got.

Surf Hell I didn't really improve with, getting slightly lower than the original 21371 points  but 20444 isn't that far away.

Nirvana's In Bloom is one I keep trying to get the chords right and moved up to 35351 points. Not much else I want to say about this one.

The last one I played was Vasoline and made a good improvement to 61902 points from the previous 30878. This is another song with lots of fast notes in the tab to play. Not one I suspect I am going to really enjoy playing, but will be good for getting my speed up when playing.

The Low Down performance

Four songs in this 'performance', as I hadn't practiced the songs much I was curious how I would score. From the crowd reactions, it confirms what every musician will say: rehearse, rehearse, rehearse.

Vasoline was first, I got 62956 with a slight reaction from the crowd. Slow Hands got 33961 and a moderate reaction, I can't Hear You bombed with hardly any reaction from the crowd. Surf Hell got a slight reaction too with 27704 points.

Oddly this gained an encore, with (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction and I got 71411 points. This also unlocked a new trophy and a second encore! 

Sadly this was another new song Boys Don't Cry by The Cure and I struggled a bit with this, but did earn 22133 points and the performance overall got 238330RSP.

This unlocked a Vintage Epiphone 1964 Casino and a Tape Delay as well as a double encore reward of a rare song Jules. I didn't have time to hunt through the listings to see what this was about.

The Velvet Club 

This is going to be a five song set with Unnatural by Muse, Outshined by Soundgarden, Number Thirteen by Red Fang, Use Somebody by the Kings of Leon, and Where Is My Mind? (something I often ask myself) by the Pixies.

I didn't have a run through these, the set list runs for around 25 minutes, and I do recall that Muse songs tend to be just a little challenging. 

Local Support Act

Due to the Sunderland International Airshow last weekend, and the shifts I was on last week I didn't have a lot of time for practicing.

I suspect that I may have my son hooked on Rocksmith though, I got him to bring his guitar last weekend and I was playing along while he was hooked up to the PS3 actually playing the game.

I do need to spend some time and look into connecting the audio from the PS3 and the guitar inputs via the mixing desk, I think it is about time I started annoying the world with my attempts at learning to play the guitar as well as the neighbours!

In this session I had another attempt at the Bends technique, and played through all of the songs on my current playlist.

Bends Technique

This is one that I'm struggling to come to grips with, I suspect that I'm either pushing the bend too quickly or not far enough. I did manage to slightly improve my score from 15404 to 19486 after four attempts (the first one I only got 4446!).

The Songs

I was happy with my first attempt at In Bloom by Nirvana, with 34352 and opened up several more of the chords within the song, and I do think that the chord does sound far better than the single note previously being shown to play. I am trying to think of some way of getting a screen grab from the PS to show what I'm talking about, I did consider taking a photo but find holding the guitar is a big enough challenge without trying to grab a camera at the same time. Another pair of arms would come in useful - that would be a good super power though.

Higher Ground by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers was another practice I was happy with, improving my score to 58928. I will admit to restarting as I was daydreaming and totally missed the opening half dozen notes!

I don't think that Go With The Flow will be one of my favourite songs as the beat is manic,  I didn't quite reach my previous high score but did get 67516 - of course if you're playing eighth notes for extended periods then that does help boost the score.

Jarvis Cocker's Angela is a song I could very much enjoy playing, it has a nice rhythm and lyrics. I improved my score to 66412.

I so enjoy Rolling Stones songs, and (I can't get no) Satisfaction is a good one. I did improve my score to 72095 so another happy face from me. I don't want to talk about the singing that I added along to the playing though. I am getting very close to the next line on the bar chart, and am getting a little nervous of what happens when I reach that point.

At the moment I am just playing the single note version, I should probably think about switching to the chord version at some time.

I didn't beat my score for Next Girl, but I did enjoy playing it - currently it is the highest scoring song on the songs I have been playing, so it hasn't had as much practice as the other songs.

I unlocked the Authentic Tone Vintage Fuzz with 773556RSP. 

As I had enjoyed this rehearsal I thought I'd have a go at the next performance, there isn't much time between the songs to make notes, so all I made a note of was the scores for the songs.

Higher Ground Red Hot Chilli Peppers with 58720 points
Go With The Flow Queens of the Stone Age with 83262 points
In Bloom Nirvana with 30091 points
and an encore
California Brain Rapscallions with 6317 points

I do like the way that the encore seems to be a song you've never played before...

As a result of this I unlocked the 1958 Korina Flying V and a Rota Vibe Phase effect with 951 946.

The Next Set

I thought I'd have a run through the next set to see how I managed.

Vasoline by the Stone Temple Pilots with a qualifier of 35000 (scored 40878)

Slow Hands by Interpol to qualify with 10000 (got 12688)

I Can't Hear You by The Dead Weather with a qualifier of 18700 (only achieved 8562)

Surf Hell by Little Barry - 1670 to qualify and I got 21371.

I was pleased with this, and if I hadn't been heading out for a meeting this morning, I would have had another go at I Can't Hear You.

Playing this got me to Local Support Act with a total of 1,005,512RSP, but somehow I doubt anybody would want to pay to hear what I can play at the moment (apart from anything else I'd have to drag the PS3 and TV around with me at the moment, I haven't got the songs memorised yet, and most of the songs would sound a little better with a signer or two, a drummer, a bass and possibly a second guitar in the mix).

I've also unlocked the Velvet club and the power chords technique. Now to head out for the meeting...