Tag: nextlevelguitar.com

Categories
Metal

Power Chord Rhythms AC/DC Style

With an electric guitar, it often sounds best to play 2-3 note chords. This is where power chords prove useful. Power chords are usually found in metal, rock, and blues. Since they’re rather tiny chords, they’re not widely used in traditional acoustic strumming scenarios.

The video lesson will show you several power chord rock rhythm patterns you can play using only power chords. This lesson is important for anyone learning rock or metal, since power chords are used a lot by super bands such as AC/DC, Led Zepelin, and basically all bands that have an electric guitarist.

The power chords we’re going to study are movable chords, which means that we are able to move the actual power chord shape up or down the neck of the guitar, to create different power chords. Many guitarists prefer to use all downstrokes when strumming power chords. This results in a more “chunky” sound. Muting the open strings is a very important part of playing power chords as well.

Categories
Electric Guitar Reviews

Epiphone Les Paul vs. Gibson Les Paul

Gibson Les Pauls have become pricier every year-way out of reach for many players, which paved the way for the cheaper Epiphone version of the Les Paul. Watch the video to find out the differences and similarities of the Gibson and Epiphone Les Paul guitars.

Epiphone Les Paul Standard Specs:

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  • Mahogany body
  • Maple veneer over carved top
  • Chrome hardware
  • Grover tuners
  • Rosewood fretboard with trapezoid inlays
  • 24-3/4″ scale
  • 1-11/16″ nut width
  • Set mahogany neck
  • Slim-tapered neck profile
  • Alnico Classic humbuckers

The Epiphone version of the Les Paul standard is a great buy. It’s tone is not quite that of the Gibson, but almost as nice.

Gibson Les Paul Studio Specs:

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  • Carved maple top and mahogany back
  • Rosewood fingerboard
  • 2 volume and 2 tone knobs, 3-way switch
  • Tune-O-Matic bridge with stopbar
  • Chrome or gold hardware
  • 490R (neck) and 498T (bridge) Alnico 2 magnet humbucker pickups, 2 of Gibsons most popular pickups

The most noticeable difference between an Epiphone and a Gibson Les Paul is the price tag. Believe it or not, the Epiphone is a real Les Paul, not a bad Les Paul shaped imitation

Categories
Guitar Notes

Learn Notes on the Fretboard

There’s no reason to study the fretboard until after you’ve learned the very basics, like chords, a few barre chords, picking, strumming and easy songs. But once you do, your level of playing will start advancing in giant leaps.

Understanding the notes around the fretboard and their relation to 1 another is your initial step in studying guitar theory. Once you are familiar with the notes, studying to form chords, playing scale shapes, and even writing music will seem easy and effortless. Of course it takes time, patience, and lots of studying, so lets just stick to the notes around the fretboard for now.

The initial step in learning the fretboard is to remember the notes along strings five and six. Focus on the natural notes, so leave out the flats and sharps for now. The natural notes are the letters A thru G and usually occur in alphabetical order. The second step would be to fill the gaps with sharps and flats. Sharp (#) indicates 1 fret higher while flat (b) indicates 1 fret lower.

Watch the video, and download this free fretboard training software if you want an interactive studying experience as well.

Notes on the fretboard.
Notes on the fretboard (Click to view larger image).