Spotlight Guitarcade: Gone Wailin' and day 46

Gone Wailin'

The first and most simple game in the Guitarcade is Gone Wailin'.  The game's premise is simple: the background is going to scroll, a wail is going to shoot you into the air as you make noise on the guitar.  Use this to collect bananas, avoid birds and islands.  The level is randomized and gets faster as you go.

Let it be known that I tried for all of 5 minutes(almost no time when it comes to me) to find what this game is based on.  I figured it was based on an old game like all the other games, but now I am convinced that this is just a take on the tablet/phone game Jetpack Joyride.  In Jetpack Joyride you touch the screen to fly up, and let go of it to fly down(the satanic Flappy Bird was not in existence when this game was made).



When I first played Gone Wailin' I thought it was fun but I also thought that there was no way this game would help me.  I thought to myself "I know how to make noise on my damn guitar".  I was stubborn in the early days and determined to take everything serious about Rocksmith 2014, and I am glad I did.  Eventually I realized that I had stopped banging on the strings trying to make as much noise as I could in a punk style, and ralized that its much easier to slowly strum and just maximize the amount of string vibrations.  That helped me when it came to chord work.  For beginners, this game is essential and I would not advise them to stop using it even past the 60 days.  Why?  Its a muscle builder.  My hands do not fatigue easily because of my prior bass playing experiences, but I remember when they did.  This game will help build stamina.

Also it really is fun.

Day 46

I've got a huge, nerdy post about bass amps coming up, but I feel like I've had too much bass coverage recently, and seeing as this blog is based on me learning guitar it feels a little out of place.  Bass has been a big part of my life, so its only natural some of that bleeds in.

Sore throat still going on.

I am now officially recognizing that I am getting better at guitar.  It is 46 days in, and I know I am much much better than I was when I first began.  Rocksmith has definitely helped me, not only with learning the basics, but also with keeping my interest in playing every day.  Too many times I used to think "well I have a lot to do, I can put that off till tomorrow" and just like the Credence Clearwater song says, someday never comes.  The chords I know are making their way into practice.  My power chords are sounding much less punk and much more 70's rock these days.  My busy blues style is learning to fill space with more than just notes.  I am not a guitarist yet, and I would not say I'm good at guitar, but I have improved from Day 1, you would not even recognize what I was doing on Day 1 as anything but "screwing around with a guitar".

I need to update my technique book.  I'm not doing a lot of song learning, just as I planned, so I only have one notebook to update.  I still have not committed as scholarly as I should, but I know myself and I know I can not resist making an "essay" out of learning guitar lol.  One of the first things I am going to do after Day 60 is get a "song writing" book.  Some of you may laugh at learning song structure and maybe even think "isn't that something you should just... you know... do?" and to that I laugh.  If you spit in the face of people that learned song structure through reading, then you should probably never listen to Led Zeppelin again.  I do not have a support network of musicians to just "tell" me how to do all things.  What's with this attitude of glorifying ignorance and putting down learning these days?