Hello everyone!

I think this would fit in the 'Accessories' category...

I am interested in getting cool guitar effects (like the eBow gives you) that go beyond using a pick or finger-style. Does anyone have any interesting accessories they use and can recommend?

Thanks!

I'm a big experimental gearhead (sorry to use the name haha), but I love trying to use things like that in ways other than their intent.

Example: Have you ever tried playing upright bass with a pick?
Taken an eBow to the strings of piano? <--- THAT one's fun.

Just some ideas. My favorites are eBow, TalkBox, and Acoustic Bow, among others. Oh and you can get crazy cool sounds depending on what you use as a "pick." Anything from a quarter to a business card. You can even wrap your fingers in different material and check out what happens to the sound. This works especially well on an acoustic or classical guitar. Fun times.

Just to toss a few ideas around on ways to find inspiration in new sounds.

Peace,
ShackMan

An eBow to piano strings sounds like something I want to try...

Wrapping your hands in different materials before playing is a good idea too.

I don't own a talk box but they seem more versatile than Peter Frampton would have us believe..

My neighbors will hate me after these experiments...

So will piano technicians. I'm kind of notorious down at WVU with the tech there for experimental piano pieces. Have fun dude and let me know what you come up with! There are millions of crazy cool combos out there that you can find, I'm sure!

LOL @ Shackman! You have to be his very favorite person! Try using the goose end of a goose feather for a pick. It gives a diferent sound too. When the feather is plucked from the goose, the keratin in the goose end is sort of like organic plastic. But with the quill attached it gives it a softer sound. Try it. It's what they used to play mountain dulcimers with way back when.

Really now, Eddie? This needs exploration, right away!

Well, at least once I find a goose...and catch him. HA!

I do have a friend with a dulcimer, though, so I might even get to try it out on that.

A goose feather pick! That just made my day.

This is not guitar, I know, but if you have a piano laying around and some dimes, I once tried to insert the dimes between the higher strings of the piano. Doing this gives the piano a cool sound, like high-pitched wood blocks...

Gearhed, that's a big thing with John Cage and subsequent composers. That's called prepared piano. Objects ranged from dimes, quarters, screws, rubberbands, woodblocks, all the way up to a brass plate over the entire bottom two octaves. Take a listen to some of that. I highly recommend his 1st Sonata for Prepared Piano and Joelle Leandre's Hommage a John Cage for starters.

If you're looking for other cool sounds from a piano, Henry Cowell's "The Banshee" is an AWESOME creepy little piece. It's played entirely with your hands on the strings. The performer never actually touches the keys. You scrape and pluck and hit the strings on the action of the piano. Good times. The best recording is one from 1934 if you can find it. It's performed by the composer himself!

Recent experimentation: Wrapped my first two fingers in springs. Used an envelope filter and a rotary speaker emulator.

Funky stuff.

That sounds funky shackman. So you tell me how that works? you wrapped your first two fingers with springs going horizontal? Then you synthisize the sound but what is a rotary speaker emulator? What kind of sounds are you getting? It sounds cool.

I might have to raid the dark side of the couch because that does sound funky! Don't your guitar strings get caught in the springs, leading to sticking and frustration?

I actually wound the springs around my first two fingers while playing bass. I didn't have rubber bands immediately accessible, and I had heard that Bootsy Collins (at one point) use to actually play with rubber bands on his fingers, so I tried springs. Really you just have put your finger in the center of the spring.

The envelope filter is a stompbox effect, specifically an Electro Harmonix Q-tron. The rotary speaker emulator is modeled after a Leslie rotary speaker (used on Hammond organs primarily). It comes from my Line6 ModPro (the rackmount version). I got lucky picking one of those up. A store near me had one used in near mint condition for $125. I couldn't pass THAT up.

Essentially the springs add a very metallic sound, and wrapping them around your fingers deadens your attack, since you're mostly sliding across the string rather than plucking it. It almost feels delayed when you're playing. It isn't useful for playing anything straight ahead, whether it's funky or rock, but it is useful as an effect. Still not sure how you'd get the springs on mid-performance, though, hahaha.

I must say this is the most amazing thread in this forum. You guys have got my imagination fired. I never thought that there were so many innovative ways of playing the guitar. Do you use these methods on stage too? Or just when you are bored at home? I especially loved the goose feather idea. Would a bunch of chicken feathers do as well?

Wow! I love this post. You guys have given me some great ideas on how to change things up a little. I'm going to try the eBow. Also I've never thought about wrapping my fingers before playing the piano. How does it sound different than just playing?

Ahhh, Rocker14, you've stumbled upon another little trick. When wrapping your fingers to play the piano it's generally done so that when your fingers strikes the key some sort of sound happens. For example, a man might tie wood blocks to each of his fingers so that it would make a cracking sound when he struck the ivories.

Unless it's audible there really isn't much value in wrapping your fingers at the piano. Unless your playing on the strings INSIDE the piano...in which case, by all means have a ball and experiment with materials at will. =)

Drumstick, of course I use some of these things on stage! That's a secondary goal of it. First is experimentation and finding alternative ways not only to play or to gain inspiration but to understand HOW we play and by differentiating from "normal" playing solidify our technique. It's all the better if you find that you are actually using some of these sounds on gigs. I think it's one of the most fun things to play a rock show with an uprite, pick it up, turn it sideways like a bass guitar, and play it with a pick. Just watch the crowd's reaction!

yeah i agree with you ..its interesting! i mean i like to try that one too.. and Ive tried wrapping my hands and its a nice kind of fashion i think..

Awesome Teeter! Welcome to the Forums, by the way. The tough part about wrapping your hands, I think, is that the tip of your finger isn't the main attack anymore. It's the edge of whatever you've wrapped them in (say, one of the spirals on the spring). It makes it feel very different to play, but you can get crazy sounds out of it.

Medeski Martin and Wood are pretty famous for doing some of these things too. Any other suggestions for who to listen to for experimental ideas?

Okay, the ebow was used on Bowie's Changes, wasn't it? I think I saw it being used during the Freddie Mercury Memorial concert.

And speaking of Queen, didn't Brian May file down an English coin to use as a pick?

And as for pianos, I've also heard of putting a speaker near the strings, lifting the sustain pedal and allowing the strings to vibrate in sympathy to whatever's coming out of the speaker. I bet that would be interesting.

I'm not sure about the Bowie tunes, but, although I'm somewhat doubtful that he would file it down, I do know that Brian May has been known to use coins as picks in the past, and he isn't in any way alone.

If you listen to TOOL, Adam Jones uses quarters several times throughout the album Lateralus and scrapes them across the strings and across his pickup. He does it on almost every TOOL album, in fact, but not to the greater extent that it is used on Lateralus.

Other groups that have used that include:
YES (Chris Squire)
Zeppelin (Jimmy Page)
Korn (Head & Munky)
Judas Priest (Glenn Tipton and KK Downing)
Joe Satriani (listen especially to various versions of "Hordes of Locusts")
Dredg
The Mars Volta (Jon Theodore even used them on his drumkit occasionally, in some cases on the snare springs)

That's what comes to mind presently, and I'm sure you can find a thousand more instances, Ricardo. I'm curious about Bowie now,
so I'm going to try and do a little research on that. Maybe I'll even stumble upon a video of that specific concert! Do you have a youtube or Google Video link for it?