Here’s a link to my boy Hunter Johnson playing without a pick. He rarely does when playing his acoustic.
That’s cool, but no comment on my clip? Over the sound of crickets chirping? 
Awe man, sorry. I didn’t mean to imply your playing was subpar. I enjoyed it.
That’s cool - it’s just a new approach I am trying to wrap my brain around.
I liked it too. That heavy popping attack has a primitive sound to it that I find very authentic, and well suited to old blues/country stuff.
Kinda like a young George Foreman saying, “Allow me to demonstrate how gently I can punch this guitar.” 
Your approach is interesting – kind of a clawhammer stance in your right hand position. It’s basically two fingers doing the work (if I didn’t miss something in the video), your thumb and index fingers, except when doing a down stroke across multiple strings. It’s very thumb-centered, and I agree a thumb pick should be considered for more speed. You should work on getting your middle finger to have a contribution. Overall very nice, well done! 
scabpickerI’m sorry I don’t have any helpful advice. I’ve never sold my music, and my experience is basically noodling on a guitar by myself. It sounds like you have a good plan in place; perhaps one of our regular posters with experience in marketing might have suggestions.
I’m still on the fence about pushing the thumb pick on him, to be honest. I started using the thumb pick because my arthritic hands were dropping picks in the final songs of shows while playing bass. When I play bass, I often dig into the strings hard, and make them pop on the fretboard on downstrokes. It has an effect between an upright player’s pop, and a pick attack. After I got over the feel of the thumb pick, I started using it on guitar, playing a bass part with my thumb, and fanning chords with my fingers, picking intervals in unison, and eventually finger picking sloppy rolls. I still drop into using it like a flat pick a lot, and while WordMan does a little picking that way in the clip, he’s not doing much of it. I thought about ditching the pick entirely, and just upping the treble on the EQ (not really an option on an acoustic), but I’m not fastidious about cutting my nails, so my thumbnail would get caught, which hurts quite a bit.
It took a couple of months to get any sensitivity using the thumb pick as a substitute for a thumb. but now I can go from delicate to full cro-magnon. If he’s just using the side of his thumb, and gets the attack and feel he likes, then it’s one less thing to collect when it’s time to play.
Ehh, I’m far from a record magnate, and predicting whether your art will sell is always a crapshoot. Any advice with a minute of thought behind it would be worth reading. If we break even on the release and get a modicum of press, I’ll consider it a success.
However, I am considering a marbled blue/white colored vinyl pressing, at least for this first 250. Having colored vinyl sitting around collecting dust would make me slightly happier than black ones :).
scabpicker - I don’t have any advice on the vinyl, other than if you guys can afford to upfront costs, it sounds pretty cool overall. And yeah, if you can make colored/marbled vinyl work, that would look great. Wish I had a turntable!
And thanks for the comments on this weird new approach. squeegee, I use my index and middle fingers a lot depending on the groove I’m doing. While I am mostly doing “pickless flatpicking,” I also am working on using my thumb to set up a bass drone - e.g., thunking the low E - while doing bluesy partial chords and leads with my fingers. I am sure if I stick with this and get more thumb independence, I will end up moving past drone bass to basslines. That should be fun.
EtFlagon - yeah, primitive is about right. I’ve only been doing this for a couple of weeks, so I anticipate that my technique will clean up a bit over time. So it should get a bit more smooth, but I want the sound of my fingers popping and plucking left in the mix - I like playing aggressively and like that to be heard in the playing, as long as it isn’t forced - just louder and a bit more…muscular (??) sounding.
Thanks for listening you guys…
I don’t know about the coloured vinyl. I’d say the only reason to do that is the ‘cool’ factor. From a purely Ferengian merchandise point of view, it will cut into your profits without making the recording any more valuable. The artist in me says ‘Yeah, fuck, the only point of this is to sell a cool souvenir that promotes the band. Hang the expense.’
I’m glad the recording reveals that you guys sound better than you thought you did!
I’ve been ultra-legal in preparing for my own recording, but our situations are a little different. I may have lucked into a distribution deal because of the number of Canadian composers, and the amount of time devoted to Canadian composers; the last bloody thing I need now is a Cease and Desist order.
I have to say, I’m getting right tired of dealing with anything associated with an acronym, whether that’s ISRC, AVLA, CMC, CDDB, CMRRA, GAH!! I just want to go back to practicing and performing!
However, I should have the master sometime this week, the new title is working out (the title I’ve been planning on for a couple of years was also the title of the concerts - I found out that it’s the title of a book and a double CD set by Andy White. While you can’t copyright a title, there didn’t seem to be much point in fighting the fact that his work occupies the first 4 or 5 pages of a google search before you come across the first reference to a concert I did in 2011…) the booklet is on the graphic designer’s desktop, the manufacturer is ready to roll, and I’m booking the venue for the release party.
That’s good work, and it suits the material really well. You’re doing a good job coming back to the ‘home’ position; that’s one of the biggest challenges for people used to using a pick. You’re on a good road, especially for some of your influences like Jeff Beck and Mark Knopfler.
That full strum you do - just to add one more colour to your palette, try doing over the fretboard with just one finger, but drive the strings down into the fret board rather than across. It gives a nice, low sustain, trebley tone to that kind of strum (not unlike a flamenco rasgueado).
For some of it, you may want to explore holding the wrist still and just using finger strength - it’s a different technique, but it gives you more choices to explore for your tone colour. There’s lots to play with - weight of attack, angle of attack, point of attack, direction of attack, free vs. rest.
I’m with you on the thumb pick - I’ve tried shaping them, different thicknesses, taping them. There’s nothing like being able to just use the thumb with or without the nail, and when you nail (Nail! Ha!) that side of the thumb rest stroke and start to sound like Bo Carter or Wes Montgomery, that’s when you know you’re getting it.
Very, very helpful. Thanks Le Ministre.
Great commentary on “mobile wrist” vs. “stationary wrist” - for the pickless flatpicking, its definitely mobile. Playing up and down the neck is something I do a lot of when I flatpick, and will begin doing more of it here after I get the muscle memory a bit more down. And trying that strum sounds great - will do.
Stationary wrist - that’s when I move to more of a fingerpicky approach - when I am playing bass with my thumb and chords/melody/fills with my fingers. I find I am trying to mimic the positioning and heavy thumb attack of Big Bill Broonzy - mobile link:
And finally, your comments about all of the variables one can mix up with fingerstyle - that’s it, exactly. It goes back to what Enter the Flagon commented on - I love having that organic sound in there - makes the music sound/feel a bit more…present and fresh. It’s hard because it very easy to sound like a two-year-old - but getting a solid groove down is a very cool thing.
Here’s a one-minute lesson from Bruce Cockburn, where he mostly talks about his RH and LH thumb techniques. I just want to point out, though - look and listen for the different accents he gets by moving or not moving his wrist. Stillness or movement are always a deliberate choice with him.
Or here he’s playing ‘Foxglove’, but check out how a little up with the wrist along with the finger brings out the ascending melodic figure at around 0:45.
Missed the edit window - a shiny object went past.
There’s actually a whole series of ‘Canada’s Guitar Gurus’ featuring Jesse Cook, Madagascar Slim, Colin Linden and others doing one minute lessons that can be seen on YouTube.
Oh, boy, did I ever just get an early birthday present.
You may recall that SWMBO and I hosted a house concert for Dave Nachmanoff last month. While he was here, I joking said that I wanted him to send me everything he’s ever written because I want to learn to play it.
Guess what I got a Dropbox link to? Damn near his entire catalog, words and chords.
Squeee!! I’ma put some new strings on and start pickin’!
I can’t seem to view the one minute lesson, but the other is good. I will check out the others, too - thanks.
I bought a '78 Les Paul Custom about 20 years ago and it came with a case of this type. Anyone know anything about these? Were they common at the time (late 70s)?
I don’t know if they’re common, but I used to own one, too. Mine came with a Marauder inside of it. Now that you mention it, I haven’t seen another one.
Yeah - I think they were standard issue at the time. I remember a friend getting a Bar Mitzvah Les Paul in that kind of case. I think Lester Polfuss would’ve approved 
Just for fun, here’s the final guitar solo(s) for Free Bird, all backing music removed. I didn’t realize how much guitar doubling there was; some sounds like delay, some like two different guitar performances. Was all that from the live performance, or was some added afterwards?