Is that a cat in agony?

Bob-Dubery · 2009-11-30T18:37:02+00:00

No, it's just Bob practicing. Had my first slide lesson today. This is a lot of fun. What I've started with is a bit different from what Fritz showed on the forum recently. The teacher (Richard Bruyns) and I are working in open D (D A D G F# A D low to high) where as Fritz's demo was in open G. I quite enjoyed this. If you know a bit of Travis picking you can have quite a lot of fun with a slide and open tuning. Homework is major scale, pentatonic and the first few bars of a Muddy Waters tune. I took Fritz's advice and started with a ceramic slide. A different brand from the one he uses - this is a Joe Perry signature model. Initially I'm working with the Smoothtalker - and it sounds pretty cool.

Jack-Flash-Jr

X-rated Bob wrote OK. Just had lesson number two. Now we're looking at a Reverend Gary Davis/Mississippi Fred McDowell number - "You Gotta Move". Great fun. I like this piece because you can play it quite briskly, or play it real slow and turn it into a lament. (well... you can, I need some practice).

Stones did a good cover on Sticky Fingers and very slide heavy when they played it live in the seventies...

singemonkey

Jack Flash Jr wrote
X-rated Bob wrote OK. Just had lesson number two. Now we're looking at a Reverend Gary Davis/Mississippi Fred McDowell number - "You Gotta Move". Great fun. I like this piece because you can play it quite briskly, or play it real slow and turn it into a lament. (well... you can, I need some practice).
Stones did a good cover on Sticky Fingers and very slide heavy when they played it live in the seventies...

Yes, and very much in the style of Mississippi Fred McDowell.

Bob-Dubery

OK... another thing I just got a handle on. Looking back in this thread you will see that I currently have THREE different slides.

The Bluesbottle

A glass Steve Clayton and a brass Jim Dunlop

The Bluesbottle has a 30mm diameter, that gives a circumference of 94.25mm

The other two have a 28mm diameter, thus a a circumference of 87.97 mm.

The greater circumference and the of the Bluebottle does, I think, make for better control in terms of downward pressure, but it also means a flatter radius on the outside of the slide and I am finding that makes it harder to get into position accurately. You have to have the slide RIGHT OVER the fret to get an accurate note (at least down the low end of the note) and this precise positioning is made a little more difficult with the larger diameter slide.

Trade offs and more trade offs....

Bob-Dubery

X-rated Bob wrote
The greater circumference and the of the Bluebottle does, I think, make for better control in terms of downward pressure, but it also means a flatter radius on the outside of the slide and I am finding that makes it harder to get into position accurately. You have to have the slide RIGHT OVER the fret to get an accurate note (at least down the low end of the note) and this precise positioning is made a little more difficult with the larger diameter slide.

So the tapered slide is starting to look like it has some things going for it as you can get a lesser circumference/more pronounced radius onto the high strings.

singemonkey

X-rated Bob wrote
Jack Flash Jr wrote I feel lap steel GAS coming on... Would love to catch some of our local players - I'll keep an eye open.
Loot.co.za seems to be more expensive than Take2 for example? WantItAll I avoid at all costs.
You can go the whole hog and buy a National with a square neck etc etc, or you can get a guitar modified for lap steel. A higher nut and saddle, and cut to take some of the radius away.

Lapsteel guitars come up on gumtree from time to time and are not expensive. My buddy bought a 60's (I think) Gibson for about a grand.

Jack-Flash-Jr

singemonkey wrote
X-rated Bob wrote
Jack Flash Jr wrote I feel lap steel GAS coming on... Would love to catch some of our local players - I'll keep an eye open.
Loot.co.za seems to be more expensive than Take2 for example? WantItAll I avoid at all costs.
You can go the whole hog and buy a National with a square neck etc etc, or you can get a guitar modified for lap steel. A higher nut and saddle, and cut to take some of the radius away.
Lapsteel guitars come up on gumtree from time to time and are not expensive. My buddy bought a 60's (I think) Gibson for about a grand.

I would kill for an original Weissenborn... only a few thousand made in the 30's...

singemonkey

There you're unlikely to be very lucky ? I think early Rickenbackers are also super expensive.

Jack-Flash-Jr

singemonkey wrote There you're unlikely to be very lucky ? I think early Rickenbackers are also super expensive.

Know Uncut magazine when they ask interviewees if they would take a suitcase filled with a million pounds if, in doing so, someone in China would fall their bike and be killed? Only an original Weissenborn could tempt me {devil smiley}

Bob-Dubery

OK... here's some footage.

Some explanatory notes.

1) The guitar is my Smoothtalker. This is recorded via the pickup, not a microphone. I'm using a Line 6 MM-4 to add a tremolo effect.

2) The tuning.... OPEN D. So from 6th to 1st that's D A D F# A D. Note that you have an entire D major chord on the open strings. The 3rd of the major chord is on the 3rd string. By fretting at the 5th we have a G. By fretting straight across the 7th we have an A. Also we have easy access to the notes of the D pentatonic. 3rd fret on any of the Ds gives us the flat 3rd - F. 3rd fret on any of the As gives us the flat 7th - C.

3) Actually I have a little device designed to make it easier to play slide on this guitar. This is installed at the 2nd fret for these examples, so effectively this is like a capo and I'm playing in OPEN E. So open strings give me an E major etc etc.

4) This tuning is great for combining simple travis picking with slide.

5) The slide is brass. Quite heavy. And if it looks tapered in the videos that's because it is.

The first video shows the right hand at work

The second one shows me playing a short extract from a Muddy Waters song. Same tuning. Here you can see the left hand and the neck better.

Ray

Thanks Bob. Is this the device you mentioned that Andy McG was putting together for you?

Bob-Dubery

It is. Promising but not perfected yet.

Squonk

Good stuff Bob, the slide man ?

What is the reason for that device connected on the 2nd fret. Is the tension of the strings that make it easier to play.
Or does tuning to open E instead of open D not have the same effect?

Bob-Dubery

Squonk wrote Good stuff Bob, the slide man ?

What is the reason for that device connected on the 2nd fret. Is the tension of the strings that make it easier to play.
Or does tuning to open E instead of open D not have the same effect?

All my guitars have a low-ish action. Too low for slide really. So the MacSlidulator (as I am calling it) simply raises the action. Effectively it is acting as another nut. I tune the guitar to open D, then fit the MacSlidulator at the 2nd fret. I could fit it at the first fret, but then the dot markers get too confusing.

Tension is not the problem. Action is.

Bob-Dubery

In the first clip, before you see me grab the slide, I am just playing the open strings. Because of the open tuning I have a root major chord on the open strings, the 4 chord simply by placing a barre or the slide at the 5th fret, and the 5 chord at the 7th fret.

So in open D with no capo or MacSlidulator you would have D major on the open strings, G major at the 5th fret and A major at the 7th.

At the third fret you have would have an F major. The notes in that chord are F, A and C, so that can fit in well as a passing chord for bluesy things. I have been messing around with a version of "Little Red Rooster" and I think that Brian Jones was doing just that on the Stones' recording of that song.

In my second clip I actually get to that third fret position at one point to get the C, A and F in that order, then I lift off and we have resolved back down to the root D. So that little run goes minor 7th, 5th, minor 3rd and then root.

I have also been playing some finger style in that tuning. I'm trying to work out The Incredible String Band's "The Hedgehog's Song". I found a tab for this on-line, but it is not accurate. As I learn more about the tuning I get to the point where I conclude that Mike Heron didn't play all of that tune with the slide but mixed up slide and fingered chords.

singemonkey

So funny. When you said you were going to play a Muddy Waters tune, I knew it would be that one. It's the only thing I can kind of play with the slide besides noodling around with Travis picked riffs. But you've converted it into a solo guitar piece - combined with the travis picking. It sounds very nice, and very melancholy.

Bob-Dubery

singemonkey wrote So funny. When you said you were going to play a Muddy Waters tune, I knew it would be that one. It's the only thing I can kind of play with the slide besides noodling around with Travis picked riffs. But you've converted it into a solo guitar piece - combined with the travis picking. It sounds very nice, and very melancholy.

I was taught the melody first. Just that as an exercise. Hit the notes one at a time with the slide. The travis picking is just what seemed natural to me playing in that tuning. I don't think it's far from the arrangement that my teacher Richard Bruyns uses when he plays it on lap steel.

Any idea what it's called?

Another note about the tuning. It's very easy to play in several other keys - though you may have to sacrifice the open strings as a chord. EG with the guitar tuned to open D, if I needed to play the piece on the 2nd clip in F then I just move everything up 3 frets and remember that when I would usually "go open" I just put the slide over the 3rd fret.

If you need open strings (and if your action is high enough) you can use one of those capos designed for lap steel.

Ray

Went looking for a brass slide and cant find one. Cant even find a glass one. See, I've been using bottlenecks and I want to get fancy now, y'know. All I can find is the ceramic ones and quite honestly just looks like a fancy shalompie to me. So I'll stick with the bottles I guess.

Bob-Dubery

Ray wrote Went looking for a brass slide and cant find one. Cant even find a glass one. See, I've been using bottlenecks and I want to get fancy now, y'know. All I can find is the ceramic ones and quite honestly just looks like a fancy shalompie to me. So I'll stick with the bottles I guess.

I got another one for Xmas. It was bought at McGibbons who, I'm told, recently got a whole lot of slides in and in all sorts of shapes, sizes and materials.

No kidding... you could try a socket or sparkplug wrench. Lowell George famously used a Sears sparkplug socket for playing slide. If it works for you then it works.

Ray

Tried that as he is really one of my favorites. Too heavy for me. But glass is my favorite sofar but I keep on letting them roll off things. But I am interested in your tuning because I have been playing open G because I want to tune down. Now with this gizmo which you will no doubt announce when it becomes available, I can tune down and play in open E, ne?

Bob-Dubery

I tune to open D. So low to high that is
D (down 1 tone)
A
D
F# (down 1/2 tone)
A (down 1 tone)
D (down 1 tone)

So I tune to this and THEN fit the MacSlidulator at the 2nd fret which effectively puts me in open E.

You could tune to open E. Some folks do.
E
B (up 1 tone)
E (up 1 tone)
G# (up 1/2 tone)
B
E

But I'd rather tune down than up.

Fingering is the same for both.

When I get time I'll knock up some chord charts for open D and a chart of the pentatonic scale and post it.

I can't say if it's better or worse than open G or what the pros and cons are. All the slide I know is in open D. It does work well for a Travis picking right hand technique, but then open G might as well.

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