How long have you played guitar , and how long did it take til you considered yourself good, you know fast palm muting, fast alt picking and shit? If you consider yourself good that is...

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Long enough, why does it matter?

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6 years but the first couple I was too young to be that interested in it, only an hour or 2 a week. About 2 years ago i started getting really interested, then a year ago I was in saskatchewan and i met this guy a year older than me and he was awesome, and he played shred and basically got me interested in it. After that i was obsessed with it, and it only grew from there.

i've been playing for 9 years, and i still suck. i just bought a metronome 6 months ago. before that, i was fine just playing regular rhythm stuff, gnr, acdc, etc.. nothing that required you to be awesome at guitar, just comfortable with it. stuff you can play on an acoustic. the more i practice nowadays, the more i think i suck. at least that drives me to keep at it!

It's not all about playing fast... When can all those gay metallica kids learnd that?

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I know its not all about being fast damnit, i just consider myself slow.

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I've been playing guitar for about a year and a half now. An could easily do all those things u said after about a year. I feel i m fairly good as i've learnt a hell of a lot of theory and can both create good shit and play good shit. But i aint gonna class myself good until ive learnt the whole of the symbolic album by Death.

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It's not all about playing fast...but a whole hell of a lot of it is.

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I agree. Besides, have you ever heard someone that can rip across the fretboard say "dude, speed sucks man"

People who cant play fast say that speed sucks because theyre just jelous. Fast all the time is boring but no speed at all is even more boring.

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if you pick the right notes to shred on for the particular chords, It can sound beautiful. Jason Becker has odd finger positionings that arent regular triads but when he goes fast on it... its great

Anyone can play an awesome solo slow. Speed matters A LOT!

no, what mattesr a lot is fun and personal satisfaction. that being said, i am still pretty slow but practice and play as much as i can stand it

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no it doesnt a solo doesnt have to be shredding for it to be awsome or cool its all about how it moves you and how it fits to the song for example the solos in november rain by GnR there slow but fit perfectly with the song and sound amazing if there had been a ripping fast solo it would have totally ruined the whole feeling of the song

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Just because you can play fast dosent mean your good, or that its gonna sound good

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Playing fast means you can play whatever you're playing at a slow speed also...or pretty much any speed lower than your fastest. So it does mean you are good but that doesn't mean it sounds good all the time to hear fast shit.

Playing fast and not knowing what the fuck you're doing sounds shitty

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yes, and ive heard that all to many times.

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i feel that being able to play quickly means that you have more control over your hands. if you stick to very simple stuff, anybody can play a cool sounding solo slowly with very basic techniques, like the blues scale. but that doesn't require much command over your hands and technique. you can't shred out a super fast solo and have no control over yourself. and to play something from the heart, you have to have control over your hands. anybody can randomly noodle around on a pentatonic minor scale and come up with something that sounds cool, but when you have control over yourself, you can play what you meant to play, not just play stuff and see how it turns out. to me, that's what being good is about. and working on speed and being able to play quickly definitely helps you on your way to doing that.

I think I can play at an intermediate level. I didn't think this until I met my competition in my area. I had been playing for 5 1/2 years and met my fellow guitarists at school and saw the high-school bands. THEY SUCKED! I found one person who was actually better than me, though. Me and him started a band: Black Sunshine. So, when I met other guitarists that blew!

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I dont know why you quoted me on that one...I never said that. I said if you pick the right notes, for the particular chord structure and do it fast it CAN sound good.

I have been playing for 14 years.

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I've played for about 3 years but I still suck, lack of dedictation, that and I don't practice as much as I could, I usually end up writing or playing games instead.

I've been playing for 11 months, and I started to think I was decent about 4 months into playing. I started with an acoustic, and some stat from somewhere said that if 4 out of 7 people who start playing on an acoustic are likely to quit in there first four months of playing. I don't believe heavily on stats, but it does make me feel tonnes better about myself and raises my confidence which I feel is more important then most guitarists think.

yah i started playing acoustic too and i played maybe for a year or something before i went over to electric, but the problem is i find it hard to know what to play to get better. i know its just practice practice practice....

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Exactly.

I have been playing for 4 years now. I don't consider myself "great" or anything, but I consider myself pretty decent (I get stares for saying that I don't r00l. Also take into consideration that my friends are idiots). Unfortunatly I don't know anything I probably should. Scales are about where I'm up to in knowledge

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yeah, thats how I am. The only reason I am as good as I am (not saying too awfully much...) is because last summer I had 5 hour practice sessions that I came up with. I did them about 3 or 4 times a week. Then I stopped when school started, so I went back downhill.

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my guitar hours are going way up now that im DONE SCHOOL


IM DONE SCHOOOOOOOL

I've been playing for about 3-4 years, I can't remember anymore. Do I consider myself good? Given my time, I think I've done impressively good compared to my peers but I'm nowhere near great. As for the speed arguement, speed is good but if your just shredding like crazy an entire song I get very bored. I think sweeps and trem. picking scales as fast as you can is overrated (though very impressive). I find people like Satriani to be gods because he's found a way that is unique. I play with my fingers a lot since I can get lead and rhythm together and it gives me a better connection to my guitar and a jazzier tone. I like a lot of legato stuff and given that I'm still young, I want to try and get used to it so I'll have my own thing when I'm older as well. There are still things I have trouble with (accenting notes, sweeps, scales) but I am trying to get those to be alright. I would really suggest taking lessons especially if you are having trouble with phrasing. My phrasing has improved so much in the past 6 months that it's crazy. Also, time away from playing really helps your phrasing. I haven't practiced much due to my main guitar being down since I have to order a new nut for it but once I get that in (or I buy a Charvel Journeyman that I was looking at) then I'll practice much more. Umm... what else... oh ya, someone said something about playing games which is probably my mine obstacle since I'm a nerd and spend my summers inside playing first person shooters and strategy games against my "l33t" online buddies. All in all, if you are having trouble, take guitar lessons or order the Guitar Grimoire series of books *drools* . I learned most of my knowledge from those (teacher for theory, phrasing, and reading music; books for reference.)

Edit: Oh ya, I remember what I was gonna say now. It takes more skill to do things at different timings and notes (not what i mean to say but going from eigth notes to triplets and back with in one measure, etc.... get what I mean but cant put in words?) than it does to use speed. So basically, phrasing over speed.

EHEHEHE its the guy with the fat kid eating!!! What made you come back??

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I wanted a tab but couldn't find it on yahoo which left me dazed and confused.... until I remembered about this site so I came here... unfortunately, these guys don't have it either so I have to tab it out on my own... I hate tabbing, but so far so good. I hope they accept my tab.

what is it with FPS games that hinders your progress? tthat you dont have time to practice?

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I'm an addict man, I wake up at one and I can play till 4:30 in the morning. It's freaky. It'll be worse when the Diablo II ladder resets. It's mostly the fact that my main guitar is missing a piece and needs a full tune up that hinders my progress.

BTW, on my other post, I forgot to say how long for fast palm mute, etc, etc. I play with my palm almost always on the bridge or right above it so I can palm mute real fast which really is a part of my playing. I do alot of "stuttering" as I like to call it (see example). Fast alt. picking is something I feel that came really early. I do a lot of single string stuff since it was how I learned my major scale (all on low E; whole-whole-half-whole-whole-whole-half) which is how alt picking became vital to my playing. I then got into tapping which gave my left hand quite a work out (I play right-hand picks). This allowed me to do a lot of legato style stuff like --0h5h7h8-- which then became --0h5h7h8t12p8p7p5p0-- which is pretty fun to do and easy if you take it step by step. I'm drifting from the point so basically, all that stuff came early for me because of how I started and how I hold my hand. All in all, you just add on and take things step by step I guess. I am having trouble with scaling for a long time so I'm taking scale fragments and practicing them(allusion to John Petrucci's Rock Discipline which is AWESOME.)

Example (PM everything on E)

A |----5--3--6-5---01~|
E |--33-33-33-3-333---|


It's not exactly metal, but I don't just like metal and it can me modified. Very "At The Gates"-y or "The Haunted"-y since the had the same guitarist.

ive been playing almost five years. when i compare myself to kids at my school, im pretty awesome, i can shread a little, i can solo pretty fast if i put my mind to it. when i compare myself to fuckin randy, alexi, dimebag and all of them, i suck big fat ass rhinosaurus dick when i play.

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I have been playing for 5 years, 2 months, and 3 days. Yes, I CAN be that specific, I remember the exact day I got my first guitar, it was a highly memorable day. I've been playing since that first day. Whether or not I'm good is really subjective. I consider myself good, but not great. I'm far from even being in the same league as some of the people you hear, like Muhammed Suicmez, Terrence Hobbs, Doug Cerrito, Trey Azagthoth, etc. On the other hand, I am leaps and bounds above what you could expect from the average player. My writing abilities exceed that of my playing abilities as well, you have to factor in little things like that.

Something I think many people neglect to mention is songwriting ability. IMO a musician has to be able to write AND play well. I know people who play A LOT and are really good other people's stuff, but they barely write and anything they do play doesn't come off sounding good at all.

Yeah, I agree with most of what has been said here.
Different types of playing; fast, slow, palm muted, etc. just creates more variation in a song..
When you can play real fast solo s, that does say something about your handcontrol and technique.. and you can probably play things as chords and riffs fast, more controled, easier.. (especially easier)..

I don't exactly know when it was that I started to play guitar, but I was about 8/9 years old, and then had guitar lessons for about 2 years..
Stupid enough, I have quit lessons, and stopped playing.. maybe too young to be really interested and stimulated, I don't know...
But, when I was ehrm.. 12/13 years old, I met some dude - on the internet, who lives in the same city etc. He playes guitar, and I said I have done that too .. and he was like: 'Come over, and we'll play some guitar!'
..I did that.., and he rocked/kicked my unskilled ass! Haha, there I found my discipline to start playing again, and become better.. I am now 14, almost 15 years old.
I certainly have improved some skills, but am still far away from good..
When I try to create a good solo, I just can't find the exact right notes, and play them as fast as I want to.. I really hope to improve that!
I think I could improve soloskills by studying a solo, and play it again and again.. though it's gonna be hard..
But well, I still got my whole life ahead to practice..! It would be great to play/create kickass riffs, and speed solo s , and solo s with the right notes, with just thát feeling.. Hm.. I had a lot more to say, .. but I forgot. :s
By the way, there might be some dumbass senteces in this story, > my English isn't that advanced..

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It's a hell of a lot more advanced than my Dutch!

I've been playing guitar for 9 years and am completely self-taught.

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shit if i can ever get money to pay for lessons id love it, then id actually be able to write full songs on my own. all i usually need is a solo but i dont know theory or scales or anything that could help.

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I still need to practice my palm-muting its kinda sloppy. I wanna learn som cool and slow ballad shit too, its just hard to find the right songs that are not too difficult.

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Speed? First you have to play fast things slow before you build up to fast, its not a "build up" at all really, if the fingering is implanted in your brain, its so easier to play things at faster paces. Technique is much more important than speed, like that 13 year-old guitarist wasnt impressive at all because he had absolutetly no technique, but he just shredded out and allowed himself to miss notes and play all, well, dead.......if you play something fast but it sucks it makes absolutely no difference, it means it sucks.

Ive been playing guitar for about 2 years. I still ain't that good, but im working on guitar alot these days and im improving as much as I can.