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    The opening section of the opening track on Message for You, the new album from NYCGS student Ed Ciocys, sets up the album’s following thirty minutes perfectly. The track is titled “The Sun Will Rise Tomorrow”, and its instrumental opening is led by an authoritative acoustic lead guitar playing a bittersweet melody that instantly invokes the dusty, pensive aesthetics of modern americ

Why Are Inversions So Important? After getting past the beginning stages of guitar (open and barre chords, strumming patterns, learning songs) playing rhythm starts taking a back seat. For many, lead guitar becomes too appealing to ignore. Improvising and learning solos is a no-brainer when compared to repeatedly strumming the same chords over and over. Did You Know That You Can Improvise with Cho

  We spend a lot of time and attention on learning how to play improvised solos. When we think of improvisation in music, the first image that likely comes into our heads is of a soloist tearing through scales and arpeggios. It makes sense that the focus is on improvising solos; not only are improvised solos integrated into otherwise pre-composed to a degree that other would-be improvised elements

  When we first learn how to play guitar solos, we’re generally taught to stick to the confines of a specific scale shape. As we progress, we learn how to break out of that initial scale shape and into other shapes all across the fretboard. Yet, no matter how many different places across the guitar we learn to play in the key of A-minor, there is still this somewhat unquestioned conviction th

With its evil atmospheres, buzzy lo-fi recordings, striking costumes, and lurid history filled with arson, Satanism, and murder, black metal has long been one of the most polarizing of metal’s many genres. The genre has its roots in a loose collection of widely spread European bands, which were retrospectively named first wave black metal and included such bands as Switzerland’s Celtic Frost, Denm

Maybe I’m being overly optimistic, but it really seems like we might be gearing up to return to normalcy. I’m counting down the days until my second shot will have been in my arm long enough that I’ll be as immunized to coronavirus as currently possible, and I know that many people around me are doing the same. It’s been a rough year, I’m hoping that normal life might return with just enough of a

When people talk about pop rock as a genre, they generally think of bands like The Cardigans and early Maroon 5 who bring gentle, radio-friendly hooks and slick production to music whose foundation is otherwise that of a somewhat subdued rock band. However, on their debut EP The Power, NYC-based duo Villins invert that conception entirely. Though rooted in the big beat, sheen production, and simpl

Logic Pro X (recently sometimes referred to simply as Logic Pro) is cheaper and easier to use than many other music recording softwares, but is still a very capable program in its own right. This fact on its own has made it a popular program for home recording since its release in 2013 (following the somewhat less popular Logic Pro 9). However, Logic Pro X is much more focussed on the recording an

  Rockabilly may be one of the earliest forms of rock n’ roll, but it’s also one of its most deceptively complex. Rockabilly blends elements of county, R&B, bluegrass, and into music that has a simple skeleton but is fleshed with some pretty crafty musicianship. In this article, I’m going to give you a guide to start writing authentic sounding rockabilly riffs today. Although the scope of the

Sixth chords are often overlooked. They sound great and can add some wonderful color to a chord progression, but, like many other chords that break-away from tonal music’s standard pattern of nothing but stacked thirds, they don’t get much attention. Guitar methods and class curriculums often exclude them, teachers seem to sometimes forget about them, and many guitarists just never get around to r