"Shredding"

[daveq]

This was something that came up in the thread that snork started where he claims to be an excellent "shredder". link

I'm in my 30's and I think I have a different idea of what shredding is than what the younger guys do.

To me, it means someone can play fast/accurate. It also means that during the fast runs, the shredder MUST do something interesting and unique - not just run up and down a scale or arpeggio. There were lots of great shredders back in the 80's in my opinion but since music has changed so much, I'm wondering if the idea of shredding has changed also?

What is shredding in your opinion?

[MikeB]

hey dude, ive noticed this also, i sometimes say shred, and people think slipknot heavy distorted pap sounding tremolo picked palm muted power chords! to which i say hahaha, you are wrong, i mean... blah blah blah.. but yes, i think the name shred has been sullied by some pap nu metal and death metal etc.... shred is about solo man!

[jbkim]

I thought it was about making cole slaw.

[BLS]

To me Shredding is exactly how you described it dave. Im pretty sure thats what most people think it is. I dont know how someone can associate slipknot with shredding, or any tlaent for that matter.

[El Dangerouso]

I found this in the dictionary...

Shred - a style of guitar playing made popular by several players in the '80s, emphasizing a variety of techiques (tapping, fast scalar runs, tremolo picking, whammy bar tricks, sweep picking arpeggios, right hand above left, etc) played extremely fast and accurately. Waning popularity in recent years due to a growing resistence in technical competence in musical movements such as grunge (i.e. Kurt Cobain - look where it got him) and nu metal.

WOW....I can't believe they had this in there...especially that bit about Cobain.

Long live Joe Stump!

BTW I'm 30, so maybe I was brainwashed by the late '80s early '90s.

[westhemann]

i always thought it was metal.....but i noticed most think it is vai style stuff

and bls...learn to play some slipknot before you dog it.just because you don't understand it doesn't mean it is talentless.there is more talent in the metal genre than most people are aware of or capable of grasping

i find that style of music more challenging(when played correctly) than almost anything aside from flamenco

[Bounty Hunter]

I think you are dead on. Shred is all about technique, speed and style.

My personal thoughts: a solo/lead without a memorable melody is like a story without a plot.

If you can't hum it, it wasn't worth playing .

[Saber]

If you can't hum it, it wasn't worth playing .

And what if I can hum something that you can't play? What are your rules for that. Set us straight here. We need you to tell us what is musically valid and what isn't.

Bobby McFerrin can hum just about anything so I guess anything goes.

[Snork]

I can play fast but by no means am i vai material. I can do the fast pentatonic jive plus a bit of fast lydian, sweep picking and have my own bag of tricks. I never said i was like UBER shredder yngwie styled sweep picker. im pretty damn good though for my time playing. ill show you guys a clip of my band playing when we record tommorow.

[Little Bit]

Post pulled by author.

[Bounty Hunter]

If you can't hum it, it wasn't worth playing .

And what if I can hum something that you can't play? What are your rules for that. Set us straight here. We need you to tell us what is musically valid and what isn't.

Bobby McFerrin can hum just about anything so I guess anything goes.

Melody. 'Music' without melody is just noise. Satch is a shredder who never sacrifices melody for speed.

Don't take it personally dude, it's my opinion.

[daveq]

Maybe we should just stop here - I didn't think this question would create hostility. I was just curious how people were going to judge how snorks playing ranked as a shredder. Thanks anyway.

[westhemann]

the way i have always understood it is that music is an expression of yourself.melody or no melody,music is music...even rap

[Drak]

the way i have always understood it is that music is an expression of yourself.melody or no melody,music is music...even rap

Does that include Yoko Ono-ing?

[daveq]

So, let me try asking this then:

If snork records himself playing quickly around a pentatonic (or any other scale), is that enough the be considered a good shredder?

I think what Bounty Hunter was saying (maybe) was that it's not enough to just rip of a quick scale/riff - you need to do something that will catch the listeners attention. To try to clarify this - I mean that most (not all) guitar players after a period of time can play quickly and accurately. Would that be enough to be a shredder in your view?

BTW, I'm fine with it if the answer is Yes - I just want to know what you guys consider a shredder to be so I can understand what most people mean when they say they can shred.

[wylde1919]

I think shred is about style and technique, its not always about melody for me at least. I think of Randy Rhoads solo on Over the Mountain. Lots of bar tricks and dissonance. And by the way snork I think you are using the term lydian wrong. Thats not a crack, i just thought I'd point it out.

EDIT: let me rephrase that, explain to me what you mean by lydian

[Bounty Hunter]

I think what Bounty Hunter was saying (maybe) was that it's not enough to just rip of a quick scale/riff - you need to do something that will catch the listeners attention. To try to clarify this -

Yep. I am impressed by speed to an extent, but if it is just mechanical I don't see a point in it (other than for a picking exercise).

I mean that most (not all) guitar players after a period of time can play quickly and accurately. Would that be enough to be a shredder in your view?

I personally wouldn't consider that shredding anymore than I would consider a 10 year-old-kid stealing passwords a hacker.

Anyway- it is all opinion.

[daveq]

I think I can tell now that everyone will have their own view of it. It should be interesting to see if snork is considered to be a shredder or not since there are going to be so many different definitions of it.

So when snork or anyone else claims to be an excellent shredder, provides a sample, everyone will judge it by their own view of what he meant by the term shredder? Or are you going to judge it based on you own view?

... Or are you just going to ignore it and forget it now that the issue has been beaten into the ground?

[El Dangerouso]

Ahhhhh.....music, since we're talking about art, it's tough to draw clear lines between where one thing stops and another begins.

Is shred metal only? Then what about Allan Holdsworth and Frank Gambale? Mike Stern? Albert Lee? Johnny Hiland? Dan Crary? What about Van Halen? Is shred only, or at least primarily instrumental? I don't know where the line is and I'm not going to say there is only one answer. I put these guys in the same category with Satch, Stump, Vai, Firkins, Morse, Malmsteen et. al. You could seperate them as "fusion" or "hot country" or "bluegrass" and it would be hard to argue that that wasn't right too. Maybe they're all cousins in the "shred" family.

Shred, I feel, is certainly the technique part of the equation. Clean, clear control of the instrument. Ability to play technically challeging parts at will. Can you sweep cleanly, as well as up to tempo? If I only hear the first and last note distinctly, then you need more practice in my book. Can you tap? Good legato? Alternate picking up to tempo? Hybrid picking? Are all of these played cleanly? Can you alter your emphasis on licks at will? Can you combine these in interesting ways? What if you can't do one of these, are you still a shredder? I say yes, Paul Gilbert nor Satch can sweep an arpeggio to save their life, they're still, to at least the vast majority of the population, shredders.

What might take a shredder to the next level? Songwriting ability. Check out Francesco Ferreri (I might be a little off on the spelling), he's on the net. I checked out his lessons. Jaw dropping. Then I checked out some clips from his album. It didn't do it for me. My ears just get tired of listening to notes played a million miles an hour with no change. I think it would be better if there were a mix of tempos, etc. Good knowledge of theory wouldn't hurt a shredder, either. Not that you can't get by without it, but I think it's a tool that can help take you to the next level, especially compositionally. My favorite players combine the shred ability with songwriting. My personal favorite? Satch.

Just my opinion, totally biased by my life experiences and tastes. I have heard other opinions and arguements from other players that I considered equally valid.

To answer Daveq's question, from what Snork says, there are clear gaps in his theory/composion knowledge. That takes him out of the running for a level two shredder. He's only been playing a year or so, so that's not not really a knock. It takes time to learn. We'll see in the post his command of the instrument and techniques. If he plays fast pentatonics, then he's a one trick pony, not a shredder. If he has learned a Lydian "box" position and plays it over a A chord, then he's a two trick pony. If the plays it over an A D E progression, I'll ask why he chose to do that, and depending on his answer, I might offer him lessons.

[Snork]

im more about expression and no im not a one trick pony. i practice for 6-8 hours a day and study my theory. i made a casual comment and ill live up to it. im not at all like rusty cooley. but im comparable to slash.

[daveq]

if you had aim i could show you how bad i can WHIP half the people on this forum at shredding

Snork - I think I understand what's going on now. I re-read that thread and I think you made this comment to counter someone else's comments about you.

I wouldn't call it a casual comment by any stretch but I think I understand how this got started now.

Having said that, I still think you'll need to prove that you can "WHIP" to those who feel like that comment was directed at them (half of us).

[wylde1919]

I think dangerouso understand my lydian question! Your not really playing a Lydian scale unless you have the right chords moving under you. otherwise your just playing a diatonic scale with a different fingering in a different position. Modal theory is easy to fake on the guitar but often hard to truly grasp. and as as gamable and holdsworth go, that is shred. So is albert lee. I think shred is about showing your chops off. And you have to have hella chops to do it!

[El Dangerouso]

This will be my last post in this thread, no matter how bad future posts may make me want to reply.

To Snork - Brother, I have no reason to doubt you practice 6-8 a day. (I wish I had that kind of time to practice, frankly, I'm jealous; I haven't been able to do that since high school) To get to Slash-level playing in a year or so is great, especially if you've done it through self study. To help you understand the view of at least some of the 30+ crowd, Slash would NOT be "shred". In my opinion, and from what others have said, we would consider him to be a good rock player, but undoubtedly not "shred". So if that's the level you're at, very cool. We (some of the 30+) just don't consider it "shred".

As far as your theory goes, please take me at face value, no harm intended. You have a long way to go. Which is fine, you've got plenty of time to learn. Your statements in the renabilistec "blues scale to play blues thread", you said (paraphrased) Clapton is major pentatonic, (can't remember the name here) is minor pentatonic, and Steve Ray is Dorian. I can prove to you in an instant that these statements are not, at least exclusively, conclusively, true. You submitted them as if they were. The "I can play pentatonic and Lydian" comment shows the same gap. Again, I don't doubt your work ethic. I don't doubt that you study theory. To illustrate, I was in the army for six years. When I was a platoon leader I had a private whose boots always looked bad. I told him needed to shine them, several times. Finally, in frustration, he said "Sir, I shine my boots for two hours every night. What are you talking about?" He put in the effort, did the best he could based on his knowledge, he just didn't achieve the correct, expected end result. There were gaps in his boot shining knowledge. I have some gaps in my theory knowledge, I'm sure. I'm certainly no Walter Piston or Arnold Schoenberg. My modal theory is solid, however, and I'd love to help you with yours. I'll be glad to do it via e-mail for free.

[Snork]

i would love to learn some theory. the more the better. im very interested in understanding the modes. honestly i have little to no understanding of modes. and also some chromaticism. if you could give me a lecture i would love it. i know the order and all of that jive but i dont understand what that means.

[jbkim]

i would love to learn some theory.

How do you not learn theory with 10 years of playing piano?!?!