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...