Guitar Lessons

You won’t get better if you surround yourself with mediocrity. Sure, if you’re any good, you’ll stand out in a mediocre crowd, but you’ll stagnate. And where does stagnation and mediocrity get you? Nowhere.

The key is to continue learning in whatever you do. And you need to learn from the best. The guy down the hall in your college dorm may have put together this really catchy tune using garage band, but you’ll be hard-pressed to learn much from him. Using garage band is great, but to be a recording engineer, you need a lot more. Likewise, his one song won’t help to teach you how to compose. The I, IV, V and gritty vocals won’t quite get you to the top.

Now I’m not saying you need to necessarily take music theory classes or even lessons, but you do need to be immersed in exceptional talent in some way.

In my time at Messiah, I listened to tons of mediocre singer/songwriters who played all the same songs, all the same way. Of those, there were a few gems who were inspiring; who could teach you something. And you could learn something from them. Those were the people I tried to surround myself with, musically. The few collaborations I did in my time there, especially, were huge growth experiences.

Since then? I’ve got a single room in a city that tries, but doesn’t do anything great. I’ve met a ton of great people at open mics, but I can’t walk down the hall at 2 am to find someone to give me a hand with a new composition. I’ve played guitar more than I got to at school, but there’s been something missing.

Within the percussive fingerstyle genre, who do I really have to look to? Trace Bundy, Andy McKee, Antoine DuFour? Since I can obviously just stroll over to their respective houses and soak up their imparted knowledge and skill… Right. It’s not that easy. It never is.

Then one day I get this email. Along with hundreds, if not thousands, of others… I mean, it’s mass fan-mail. This guy I had a gig with a couple years back had some slots open for lessons.

Now those that know me …like really know me – know that that would never entice me. I’ve recently talked about taking cello lessons or jazz lessons, but regular guitar lessons? I took lessons eons ago and quitting them was one of the best things for my progress. They were great to start, but I was just sitting there learning other people’s songs that I didn’t want to learn. That’s not me. So why would I want to take lessons ever again?

Well, see a few years ago I played a gig with a guy by the name of Trevor Gordon Hall. A percussive fingerstyle guitarist who loops, uses distortion, and does everything with tonal perfection. I’ve never known anyone to have better tone. Ever. Hands down. Ever. I have never met a single guitarist with better tone than this guy. EVER. If you follow my blogging at all, you’ll see his name pop up every once in a while with regard to innovation and tone.

So lessons with Trevor? He’s right outside of Philly; actually only 5 minutes from Kelly’s parents place… So I gave it a try. I’ve had two lessons and feel I’ve made years worth of progress. I’m doing things I didn’t know I didn’t know. And I’m practicing?!?! For the past 8 years, my practice has consisted of me writing new material. Practice wasn’t working out kinks or getting better, but writing new, exciting things. That’s how I practiced. Over the past two weeks, I’ve practiced only finger exercises, fingerpicking technique, arpeggios, sweeps, and scales.

It’s enlightening. It really is. This guy makes me feel like I know nothing about playing guitar. Every time I sit down to practice I can see and hear where I am getting better. Whatever is going to transpire of this will blow minds. In the meantime, I’ll be locked in my room.

Customer Service (8thstreet.com)

I recently got a new job. I’m still working for Alcon, but am on direct, no longer a contract. People celebrate things like this in different ways. Obviously one of my ways of celebration relates to guitars. And no, I did not get another.

My current tone enhancement efforts are to upgrade my cables. People will contest the notion that there is any difference between types of cables, but I can hear the difference. It’s subtle, but it’s there. I’ve been using Monster Standard cables for ages now. They work really well and are reliable, but a few months ago I picked up a Monster Acoustic cable… and wow. The difference is subtle, but the difference between good and great is achieved subtly.

So I wanted to pick up another. I’ve got an input and an output to my board, so it would make sense that I would want two.

I turned to amazon. As it turns out, they’ve got the best prices on most guitar equipment. I won’t buy a guitar off amazon …ever, but strings, cables, etc.; yeah that makes sense. My preference is for 10-15 ft cables, so of the 12 or 21 ft options, I chose the 12.

A day later, I get an email from 8thstreet.com. They’re the company that I bought the cable from, through amazon. Turns out the 12 ft isn’t in stock and will take a few extra days.

Thanks for telling me. Seriously, it’s nice to know when a delay is expected. I don’t want to wait day after day for something that won’t come for another two weeks.

But they take it a step further. Because they know that the customer is more valuable than the product. It doesn’t matter what you’re selling if you don’t have customers. They take it a step further by offering me a second option. I can either wait for the 12 footer or they can send me the 21 ft cable at no extra cost. The 21 ft cable retails for twice what I paid for the 12 ft cable.

I opted for it because I want the cable sooner rather than later. And I always like to have extra cables. And because I like having extra cables, I will likely pick up a 12 ft cable later. And it will be from 8thstreet.com.

And here’s a quick review of the cables on amazon!

Video - Debris of a Brainstorm

To continue with the song explanations, here's Debris of a Brainstorm. This is off of my debut album, Deconstructing the Temporal Lobe, along with one of the earlier videos, Ice Mountain.

The idea behind Debris is that it's sort of how most of my compositions have been written; that is, phrase by phrase, pieced together. So often in the process there are tons of little experimental licks that don't make the cut. Most of the time those are lost. And I don't care. I believe that the best licks, the best songs, the best albums are those that you remember. Those you forget? You lose them. So what?

This song is a culmination of parts and ideas that weren't quite lost. It's in a different tuning from anything else I've written (C-G-C-G-B-E), but really builds off of ideas from previous brainstorming sessions, primarily those from Horse in the Clouds. If you're familiar with that one, it was my first lap-tapping song and is the first track on the debut, largely inspired by the movie, August Rush.

While writing Horse in the Clouds, I had lots of ideas and just no great way to cram them into one song. So I went back and forth between the two different tunings and worked on them simultaneously, really only intending on finishing one piece. After Horse in the Clouds came, when a second tune came, it was obviously the "debris" of the "brainstorm."

Because nothing else I've written is in this tuning, it doesn't get much play time these days... But I do really enjoy playing it and usually, I like to think, other people like it too.

Enjoy!

Video - Muscle Memory

So this one has actually been up for a while... But I want to give stories behind all of my work, ya know, make them a little more real. What better way than to explain the song and give you a point of view of me playing it? I'm convinced that it would be easier to learn to play guitar this way, but that's not what this is about.

This is actually one of the songs that will be on album 2, but one that's familiar enough to throw up here for everyone. As a matter of fact, this almost made it onto Deconstructing the Temporal Lobe, my first album, but it wasn't in a polished form at that point. And actually, this had a different name at that time as well.

So how did it make it to the second album and get a new name? It started roughly a year after the first album, when I went back for another recording session with Jeremy Bentley at MR.STUDIO. I recorded the song in that session and ...that was it. Fast forward a year and I'm thinking about the next session and a full album. So I go back to listen to what I already have ...and have no recollection of this song?

It was bizarre. I had a general idea of what tuning it was in, but that's it. So I had to basically deconstruct the whole song and reteach myself. It was difficult, but eventually I remembered the shapes I was using, how I was plucking the strings, etc. Hence, Muscle Memory.

It's nothing technically dazzling, super complex, or obtuse like much of my work. Instead, it's just a well rounded, very agreeable composition. Easy listening without needing to think to appreciate it. Hope you enjoy!

Buying Fans??

Everyone wants to sell you something. Whether it's a used car or a record deal; don't trust them. There's truth down there somewhere, but you've got to dig to get to it. You want to know exactly what you're getting, what it can do for you, and why you need it.

Sometimes, the digging is all done for you. Take this example. Below is an email I got from some promotion company (If your music is out there, you probably see these as well - one every few months or so at least). Basically, for a fee, they will sell you facebook fans, youtube plays, and website hits. They sell numbers. And I'm not okay with that. So, I sent them a reply:

From: Label - DianaHolland

Subject: Hi, Alex Brubaker you will love this Reverbnation Music Promotion

Date: 02/15/2012 6:22 AM

Hi Alex Brubaker my name is Mike with http://TalentHouseLIVE.com, the #1 site for Artist Development and Promotion. I've listened to the majority of your music and I think we can help you convey your talents to a much bigger audience.

Talent House Live will help you promote your music and grow your fan-base with our innovative marketing and brand management services. We specialize in a number of services like ReverbNation Promotion, Artist Development, FaceBook promotion, Twitter fans, YouTube promotion, DatPiff promotion, album cover designs and much more.

I am truly passionate about our dedication to help "Indie Artists and Indie Record Lables" with new and creative ways of marketing that traditional record labels can't match. If you are looking to launch your music career to new heights using internet marketing then check out Talent House LIVE. Get Revernation Promotion athttp://talenthouselive.com/portfolios/reverbnation

http://talenthouselive.com/portfolios/reverbnation 
Get 10 percent Discount on all other Promo when you use the code mikepromo 
Call Talent House Live directly @ 800 871-2314 and tell them Mike Referred you.

and my response:

To: Label - DianaHolland  

Subject: reverbnation promotion

Date: 02/15/2012 1:12 PM

Mike,

Thank you for the email and reaching out to help. However, I do not prescribe to the idea of "selling plays." It's a great business model, to find young, naive artists and to show them big numbers; who wouldn't jump at that? But it's never about the numbers. It's about the music and the fans. When you turn your fans into numbers, they remain numbers. And numbers are not sustainable. Hype is not sustainable. This creates anomalies in statistics and makes overnight success look like a great thing. It's not. You need fans, not numbers, to sustain that. And if you don't know your fans, they might as well be numbers.

Music is something I see as a career. For me, it’s a career on the side, but still a career. A career in music is built on relationships with fans, friends, and other artists. One builds a career one gig at a time, during one song at a time, by one fan at a time. It’s not some one night stand with 100,000 faceless names.

Sorry, but my music is about the music and the fans. I won't cheapen that by buying fans and plays like some sort of commodity.

Alex Brubaker 
www.alexbrubakerguitar.com

Matt Walsh at the Collaboratory

Yesterday I had the pleasure of getting to hear Matt Walsh speak at the Collaboratory at Messiah College. I know, I graduated last year, but I still help out with Collab and really wanted to hear Matt. He and his family are missionaries at the center that I was at in Burkina Faso two summers ago. That, and he’s got good things to say.

Through his talk, he had a lot of great things to say with regards to work in Burkina, as well as work in other non-westernized cultures. Though one thing struck me… and I think it has to do with actually having gone over there and being a bit older and, perhaps, a bit wiser.

His point, the shot no one saw coming, was that sometimes we need to impede our successes. We need solutions that are both “good” and also sustainable. An overnight boom in anything is seldom sustainable and, often times, it’s “goodness” is measured strictly in quantity. In the case of Matt’s work, he provided many examples of foreign aid on things like crop yield that, overnight, would double or triple yields, but in the process would cripple communities and actually increase poverty in the area.

In the case of this blog, with the main focus on music, the same can be applied.

One of your worst fears as an artist is to explode overnight. So many strive for it and anxiously await the day, but it seldom does any good. You’ve seen it so often (i.e. top 40), where all of the sudden everyone is singing the same song and everyone likes the same band and it seems like everything is going well for said artist.

Fast-forward a week or two from that instance. Has the song been forgotten? Overplayed ad nauseam? Has the artist been forgotten? At that point, maybe not. But then fast-forward a few years. In almost all cases, you’ve got a burned out act playing dumpy bars and clubs, riding the coat-tails of the good ‘ole days.

Instead, you want something sustainable. You don’t want a fling with success, you want a career in it. And a career is sustainable. A career isn’t made with a hit. A career isn’t made by hype. Those are quantitative results, recklessly obtained with no regard for quality. People see that and that’s why they forget about you.

You need to build slowly. The fans you get shouldn’t be the drifters, following whatever the tastemakers are saying is hot. The fans you get you want to be life fans. Those are fans that know when you’re in their city and know when your next big project is coming out. Those are the people who you talk to after the show and have meaningful conversations with. Those are the people that you smile to and thank for coming to the show. They will build your career and sustain it for you.

It’s always about the fans; always about the people. If it starts to be about the money, the hype, and the fame, you’ll all but be forgotten tomorrow.

Birthday Post

So yesterday was my birthday. Since I haven't blogged in a while, I will post regarding births.

Stop having children. If you can't put the effort forth, don't bother; you'll spawn children that also don't put any effort towards anything. They will make poor music and poor life decisions. Fact.