Advanced rock songs for rhythm guitar

[waxlyrical]

Hey all,

Been focusing too much on developing lead guitar chops that i've neglected practicing rhythm. Any suggestions on rock songs that will help me tighten groove and timing? Hard rock/alt rock/classic rock songs.

Thanks!

 

[wck]

try playing stuff by the mars volta. their songs make use of all kinds of weird time signatures. Cotopaxi is an interesting one to start with, not that easy to get the timing right at first tho.

 

[waxlyrical]

Mars volta is dope man. wicked drummer! Will check out Cotopaxi. thanks!

 

[wck]

Np bro.

Haha yeah, they're a really crazy band. btw the verse is in 11/4, the chorus is in 4/4 and the bridge is in 9/4..it may seem hard but the stuff he plays is quite simple so u can concentrate on getting the groove and timing right.

 

[CrazyCactusJack]

Np bro.

Haha yeah, they're a really crazy band. btw the verse is in 11/4, the chorus is in 4/4 and the bridge is in 9/4.

Dude..sorry to hijack. hee

what's 11/4 and 9/4 -> 11/4 = 11 quarter notes in a bar, 9 = 9 quarter notes? How to count?

Don't mind sharing/"teaching"?

 

[wck]

im not sure about the technical or theoretical explanation and the proper terms leh, so someone correct me if im explaining wrongly.

take 11/4 as an example eh. the 4 is quarter notes and the 11 stands for 11 beats. so i believe 11/4 means 11 beats in 4 quarter notes. i guess in one bar consisting of 4 quarter notes u will have 11 beats.
So if the quarter notes are 1sec apart each, 11/4 means that there is 11 beats in 4sec.


hope this helps and is correct cos thats what i think it is, not too sure..i figured out by counting the beats only haha. took me some time to figure out what the timing was in that song.

 

[monkengreg]

Okay okay in simple theoretical terms..
4/4 is a time signature in a bar.
4/4 is 4 beats in a bar.
If its 11/4 its 11 beats over 4 quarters in a bar.

Also to Waxlyrical..
You should try going to Youtube, and find for Master Of Puppets Backing Tracks.
Megadeth, Metallica are all filled with crazy riffs. - My opinion.
Cheers!

 

[bf0502tr]

hmmm seems to be different from what i studied. 11/4 means 11 quarter notes in a bar. it works similar to fractions that we learn in school. or at least that's how it works in guitar pro...any pro wanna clarify??

 

[xfigox]

like what bf0502tr has said,
11/4 = 11 quarter notes in a bar

common odd time signatures are

5/4 = 5 quarter notes in a bar
7/8 = 7 eighth notes in a bar
15/16 = 15 sixteenth notes in a bar

there are many ways of breaking up these odd time signatures and counting them, like for 7/8 you can think of it as:
3/4 (3 quarter notes) + 1/8 note, couting it would be:

ONE n TWO n THREE n ONE ONE(new bar)

try youtubing "odd time signatures", you get lots of information there.

Some songs like Between the Buried and Me's Selkies: the Endless Obsession uses the 7/8 alot.
Dream Theater's Beyond this Life uses 5/4 at the start.
Marco Sfogli's Andromeda is kinda like 13/8 if I'm not wrong.

EDIT:

Contrary to what wck has said, 11/4 isnt 11 quarter notes in 4 sec. The denominator determines the note value (whole note, half note, quarter note, eighth note, sixteenth note, 32th note etc...) and the numerator (top number) determines how many counts of the denomintator.

So 11/4 can be broken down into 4/4 + 4/4 + 3/4, but of course it is written in 11/4 for a reason.

 

[wck]

like what bf0502tr has said,
Contrary to what wck has said, 11/4 isnt 11 quarter notes in 4 sec. The denominator determines the note value (whole note, half note, quarter note, eighth note, sixteenth note, 32th note etc...) and the numerator (top number) determines how many counts of the denomintator.

So 11/4 can be broken down into 4/4 + 4/4 + 3/4, but of course it is written in 11/4 for a reason.

Sorry if i got it wrong, thats what my disclaimer at the top is for heh.

Btw, i didnt mean that the 4 is 4 sec, i meant that the 4 is a quarter note but whatever..u all provided better explanations than me haha

 

[wck]

Oops, double post.

 

[bf0502tr]

ok now that we got that settled i dun think having songs with odd time signatures will help if you cant get those with the common 4/4 signature right. like TS i started off learning all the fanciful stuff at the start then one day my teacher realised i can't even play a simple rhythm on time. so i started with songs like sweet child of mine, don't cry, use somebody. these might be easy songs but their rhythm timing isn't so easy to follow