Caffeine Carl & The Buzz Live At The Green Parrot

Blues band from Key West Florida. The tracks are: 1. Intro by Pat "The Hammer" Lanergan Rock with Me, 2. Why Get Up, 3. Shakey Ground, 4. Tell Me, 5. The Sky Is Cryin", 6. Treat Her Right, 7. Midnight Special, 8. Mar had A Little lamb, 9. Mama Don't Like Me, 10. On Your Way Down, 11. Voodoo Chile.

Buying your first guitar is a big step for anybody, but even more for you if you intend to play seriously. Most youngsters get a guitar in their teens, and play around with it for while until the novelty wears off, and then get involved in something else such as the opposite sex, or sports or whatever.

However, a few, and perhaps you are among them, decide to take playing seriously, and for them their first guitar has more meaning. If you are simply purchasing any old guitar so that you have one, then you don't have to spend a lot of money to get a playable instrument. Most people will likely buy a cheap acoustic guitar unless they have enough money to buy an electric guitar and amplifier. However, the point is that if you are not intending to use your guitar as a serious musical instrument, then you need not pay too much for.

If you do, however, then you should pay as much as you can afford because you tend to get what you pay for with guitars. The better makes definitely sound better, so try to save up as much as possible before parting with your cash. You must also decide what kind of guitar you want to play. Is it going to be electric? If so will it be a bass, or specially strung and designed for rhythm or for lead? What kind of tone do you want: the classic electric guitar sound of a Stratocaster or a loosely stringed Gibson to provide a Jimi Hendrix type of sound?

Most people want to play lead, but you won't know if you are cut out for that until you start playing. Even if you are playing lead or rhythm, what kind of music are you involved in? A blues guitar is strung totally different to a rock guitar, and the pick-ups are also different. It can save you money if you know what type of music you want to play, but if not, then that is probably a refinement you won't have to worry about until you are an accomplished player.

If you prefer an acoustic guitar then there are several types available. There is the traditional Spanish guitar than can be used for Flamenco or classical guitar styles, which is stringed in nylon. You should never use steel strings on a classical guitar because you will damage the bridge and the soundboard. There are other acoustic styles suitable for steel strings. Acoustic guitars are suitable fro classical, folk and country music, and are also good for learning before going for an electric guitar. The problem with electric is that you also need an amplifier, so are limited in where you can practice.

In fact, the answer to most of these questions will be that you don't know! You just want a guitar to learn to play on, and in this case a relatively inexpensive acoustic guitar will do fine. You can get a playable instrument for under $100 that is good enough to learn on. You will mostly be working on chords and fingering at the start until you are reasonably competent at strumming along to a tune, and then you can start thinking about more advanced work such as riffs and picking out tunes.

Before buying your first guitar you might also want to check up on the top guitars within your price range. Many budget makes produce low cost copies of some of the great guitars such as the Squire Stratocaster or one on the many Les Paul clones. However, they will not sound like the originals so make sure that you play whatever you intend to buy before parting with your cash.

Nor should you be a shrinking violet when testing the instrument. It matters less if people laugh at your standard of play than if you buy a lemon totally unsuited to your needs simply because you played so quiet that not only could other customers not hear you but you couldn't hear yourself. Play your guitar at the proper volume so that you can hear its tone, and if you don't like it don't buy it. There is no point in buying a guitar you don't like and is going to put you off playing: you might as well buy nothing at all!

These are the main things to consider before buying your first guitar, and if you take all of that into account you should end up with instrument that can do the job you want it to do, while also being suitable for you to learn on. Keep in mind that there will be plenty of time to seek the perfect guitar once you are able to play it properly, and that for now a functional instrument that sounds OK will do you just fine.

Now that you have one, it's time to learn how to play the guitar! You should consider an online video lessons site, and the best one out there is http://www.jamplaynow.com Check out some of their free lessons and you'll see I'm serious!

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Starlicks Sessions With Les Paul: Instructional Guitar Video

This Les Paul instructional video represents a rare and historical in-depth view of the living legend that inspired the revolutionary development of the recording industry. Les not only invented the electric guitar, he also perfected the technique of multi-track recording and experimented with the use of "echo", what we now refer to as "reverb"

Everybody grows up dreaming about being a rock star, about being able to shred on an electric guitar and impress the masses. Even one of the most popular video games of today, Guitar Hero, is based around people's primal urge to play the guitar. The electric guitar has been the single most defining element of music for the 20th century and it's evolvement from the big band orchestra to the bands we know today.

Who Invented the Electric Guitar?

During the 1920's and 1930's many individuals and companies were experimenting with designs that would enable them to make guitars louder. With bands getting larger, and audiences getting louder, it was important to be able to hear the actual, individual instruments.

In 1924, Lloyd Loar of the Gibson Guitar Company was developing a means (an electric pickup) to pass the vibrations of the strings through a bridge to a magnet and coil, whereupon they were passed as electrical signals to an amplification device. By 1928 "electric guitars" were officially being marketed and sold to the public.

However, the problem with this was that in transferring the vibrations to a medium before being sent to an amplifier, the signal was too weak. So a more direct method had to be developed. The first to do this, and get the patent for it, was George Beauchamp, along with Adolph Rickenbacker and his company.

The guitar was known both as "The Pancake Guitar" and as "The Frying Pan" because of its appearance and because it was played flat in the musician's lap. Available from 1931 on, the guitar was made out of cast aluminum and steel.

Notable Early Achievements Following the Invention of the Electric Guitar

Before this, there were other models being experimented with by many other people. Les Paul, for instance, was working with attaching microphones to guitars. By the 1940s Les Paul would invent something much more successful, which was the solid wood body guitar.

It was designated as "The Log", because it was essentially just one piece of wood attached to a neck with pickups and hardware attached. Gibson later sold a solid body electric guitar endorsed by Les Paul starting in 1950 which could be mass produced.

It was Leo Fender in the late 1940s that developed the first commercially successful, solid body electric guitar. With a single magnetic pickup, it was known as the "Esquire", while the model with a double magnetic pickup was known as the "Telecaster".

In 1953 Fender introduced the mass-producible and world famous Stratocaster guitar. This guitar had several many unique elements, creative design features and improvements over the previous Telecaster model.

These mass-produced Gibson and Fender models are what took hold of a generation and caught on in popularity with many influential musicians of the time. These guitars changed the outlook, style and sound of music forever.

From humble beginnings, the electric guitar transformed an entire genre of art and was able to capture the emotions and feelings of entire generations of people. From guitar legend Jimi Hendrix to the Guitar Hero next door, electric guitars are now entirely synonymous with popular music.

Jay Villaverde is the owner of Vintage Guitar Center. A site dedicated to preserving the beauty and sound of vintage electric guitars You can find great deals on guitars from Gibson, Fender and many more manufacturers. If you love music and vintage guitars, this is a must see site.

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