**Secrets to Tabbing**
Compiled By Gary and Greg
Written by Greg
Since the beginning of "Gary and Greg's Sweet Tabs" people have been
requesting songs for us to tab. Now, with the addition of the message
board, it is easier and quicker to request songs. As a result, we get
many requests each week and sometimes, it gets to be a bit too much.
However, our purpose here at "Gary and Greg's Sweet Tabs" is to keep you,
the guitar-playing net surfer content with all the best tabs from all the
best bands. But, one must also know that musical tastes often differ from
person to person. People request songs that we don't really like, and it's
really difficult to sit through and tab an entire song that we think sucks.
I don't mean offense to anyone, because everyone is entitled to his or her
own opinion, but I have to say right off, that Gary and I cannot stand
The Starting Line. I know this may come as a shock to some of you and I
apologize for any hurt feelings this may have caused, but I'm sure all of
you do not like all of the same bands we like. Anyway, that being said, and
keeping our objective in mind, Gary and I decided to compile a list of our
secrets to tabbing so you are able to make your own tabs when we don't feel
up to the task. Now I know at first your tabs may not be the same caliber
as ours**, because we never make mistakes...ever. (One time, I thought I
made a mistake, but I was wrong). But as time goes by, and as you tab more
and more songs, you will see that your tabs will greatly improve. I mean,
look at some of the first tabs that Gary and I made....they absolutely suck.
So here it is: Gary and Greg's Tabbing Secrets.
**that was a joke
1 - Winamp is the bomb
I don't know about Gary, but I have never used anything but winamp to tab
songs. In this age of computers, it it easy to find almost any mp3 of any
band ever. Here's a list of sites and file sharing programs where you can get mp3s...
Audio Galaxy
Kazaa
WinMX
that's basically all you need. If you can't find it in one of these
programs, it doesn't exist. So anyway, once you have your mp3, play it in
winamp and tab away. Easy rewind, easy fast forward, easy search, easy to
go to one spot in the song without fast forwarding through the entire
beginning, and no cd's to scratch. Also, it has controls to listen to only
the right or left channel at one time. Usually, if bands have more than one
guitar, they put one guitar in each channel. When tabbing a song, Gary and I
put it all the way to one side first, tab one guitar, then put it all the
way to the other side and tab the second guitar. Its that simple!
2 - Pacemaker
Winamp also has a whole slew of plugins available on www.winamp.com, but none
more useful for tabbing than "pacemaker" This plugin allows the user to slow
down the tempo of the song without changing the pitch. It also has controls
for changing the pitch, which is very fun to play with, but serves no purpose
for tabbing. So if there's a super fast solo that you can't figure out, turn
on the pacemaker and slow it down!
3 - Finding weird chords
For the majority, this site focuses on punk, or punk-related bands. Which
means that a large majority of chords used are barre chords. But what
happens when they don't play these types of chords? That's when you call it
a "weird chord" Here's the step-by-step to figuring out weird chords..
-Listen to the chord more than once. Are there any
single notes you can pick out of the chord?
-Listen to the chord some more. Can you pick
out a different single note?
-Listen to the chord once again. Are you able
to hear a different single note?
-you get the point
try to pick out single notes. When you get one, remember it, then put it
away somewhere and forget about it for a while. Find another one and do the
same thing. After 3 or 4 notes usually, try them all together and see what
you get. If this don't work, try it again, and if you still can't get it
after that, give up.
4 - Play along with the song for a while
The first thing you want to do is try and find the key of the song and the
way to do that is to find all the chords they use first. Then you'll be able
to tell if it's in major or minor so you'll kind of be able to predict where
their going to go with the notes in a riff. And don't just go with the first
thing you come up with. Maybe not even the second thing you come up with.
Play along with it for a while.
5 - Benefits of tabbing
Tabbing helps you learn where all the different notes and sounds are on a
guitar. After you do a lot of tabbing, you can listen to songs and be able
to point out where they're playing it at or if it's a chord and stuff like
that. Tabbing also helps you to write your own music. I'd say 7/8 or maybe
even more of writing music is ripping off other people. When I (try to)
write a song, I take pieces of all kinds of different songs from other bands
and put them together. I mean, i dont copy them completely, but just the
general idea. Recently, I've been listening to and tabbing a lot of Thrice.
As a result, little parts in some of our new songs sound a little like
Thrice. Now, I'm not telling you to go and copy people's songs. I'm just
saying, tab songs, and you will get ideas from other songs that will help
you to write music more easily.
6 - I hate dumb people
So now that you know all our secrets to tabbing, you can go and make sweet
tabs for the world to enjoy. But whatever you do, do not write "I know for
a fact that this tab is 100% correct" No You don't! You don't know for a
fact that your tab is 100% correct. In fact, I know for a fact that none of
your tabs are 100% correct. I know for a fact that none of our tabs are 100%
correct. It pisses me off when people say that their tab is "100% correct"
The funny thing is that these tabs are usually the ones that are the farthest
from correct, but thats a whole different subject. I think one said something
like. "I am sure that this tab is 100% correct. All of the others are wrong.
Anyone who says otherwise is also wrong." The only thing I'm sure about is
that this guy is an ass.
So thats it. Use your knowledge wisely.