Bad Blood: Led Zepplin Vs Taylor Swift - The Volume Wars

The volume wars, it looked like they might be subsiding, seem to be back with a vengeance. Maybe the pop music producers were just reloading their overzealous compressors, or maybe they were busy acquiring extras so they could can stack them up thus multiplying the un-dynamic over decibeled sound that has become the trademark of such acts as Katy Perry, Imagine Dragons, and too many others to list.

Take Taylor Swift's new hit Bad Blood. Even if you have earplugs in and the volume on "1" the song is still so shockingly loud that it sounds like just a bunch of people screaming and yelling so that they can try to be heard above the drums that are all one completely compressed, no dynamic volume, Obscenely Loud!

To get exactly what I mean you can compare Bad Blood with Led Zeppelin's Good Times Bad Times. No one is ever going to call Good Times Bad Times a ballad or wimpy tune. But you can hear dynamics, you can hear feeling, the outro has Robert Plant singing, even screaming, some great rockin' high notes. In short that song is full-out scorching played by some guys who play loud, but with a sonic fullness that does not sound like an assault on the ears or freight train trying to run you over.

The Swift song has none of that nuance - what's more is that Swift's song does not contain any musical intensity at the level of Led Zeppelin's, an interesting phenomenon that shows loudness does not equal intensity. Don't get me wrong - I am a fan of Swift's and enjoy her sound immensely. In fact Swift's voice is so wonderfully full of expression that it is astonishing that her producers seem to have been able somehow surgically remove all emotion from her performance on Bad Blood. Swift's producers have done this to her, and what else is her producers are not the worst offenders. I love Imagine Dragons, but good god someone needs to produce their songs in such a way as to let the band's personality come through. That band has some genuine warmth that is buried under a mountain of tricky producer studio effects.

All in all we need a return to producers who can let the singers, the rockers, the alternative musicians, and the singer songwriters breath a little bit. I've heard some new music lately that sounds pretty good and pretty un-produced in a nice sort of way.

Improve Your Guitar Playing By Using The Most Effective Guitar Practice Exercises

Are you 100% sure the guitar practice exercises you use are actually improving your guitar playing? Hint: Most guitarists aren't and they constantly struggle to get better at guitar as a result. Learn how to avoid this in your own guitar playing by taking these 5 steps:

STEP 1: Determine Your Long-Term Musical Goals

If you are truly serious about becoming a great guitarist, you need to have very clear and defined musical goals for yourself before you even play a note on guitar. While this seems obvious, most guitar players DON'T do this (and constantly struggle to improve their guitar playing as a result).

Imagine the captain of a ship sailing at sea. If this captain sets sail without a destination he will have NO idea where he is supposed to go or how he is supposed to get there. This exact same concept applies to your guitar playing. Setting clear goals is one of the best ways to ensure every action you take brings you closer to success. The more defined your musical goals are, the stronger your desire to reach them will be.

Furthermore, effectively setting your musical goals will allow you to develop a deeper understanding as to which aspects of your guitar playing require more focus from you. This enables you to choose only the most relevant guitar practice exercises and reach your goals much faster.

STEP 2: Determine How Far You Are From Reaching Your Goals

After setting clear goals for yourself, you need to determine where you are now and exactly how far away you are from reaching your goals. Don't do what most guitarists do and simply use a metronome to find your maximum guitar speed. This is a vastly incomplete method due to the fact that your maximum guitar speed is only ONE of the many elements you must track in this area.

Think about how the ship captain needs the exact coordinates of his destination. He doesn't simply "sail East" and HOPE he stumbles upon his destination. So why would you do the equivalent of this to your guitar playing progress? Tracking only your maximum speed on guitar is the same thing as the ship captain "sailing East".

The "exact coordinates" you must track in your guitar playing are elements such as your:

*Creativity in your guitar playing (yes, this can be tracked!)

*Music theory knowledge

*Your ability to visualize scales, arpeggios and chords on the fretboard without hesitation

*Overall lead guitar skills. Hint: this involves so much more than your maximum speed on guitar

*Ability to play rhythm guitar

*Ability to integrate all of your guitar techniques together fluently

*Ability to develop your "musical ear"

STEP 3: Progress In The Fastest Way Possible

After you figure out how far you are from reaching your musical goals, you need to find the exercises that enable you to make tons of progress fast. Most guitar teachers struggle to do this for their students because they have no idea how this is done. Instead, they simply give each student the same set of exercises.

By working with a GREAT guitar teacher, you will receive only the best guitar exercises that have been designed and customized around your every musical goal.

STEP 4: Create A Customized "Road Map"

After finding the practice exercises that are guaranteed to improve your guitar playing, you need to organize them by using a highly effective guitar practice schedule that ensures you reach your goals. Think of this practice schedule as a "road map" that leads you to your goals. Without it, you are just as lost as the ship captain without coordinates.

While using the best guitar practice exercises will certainly help you improve your guitar playing, it's only ONE of the steps you need to take to truly become a great guitar player. Developing an effective guitar practice schedule is crucial to you actually benefitting from these exercises and reaching your goals.

STEP 5: Always Track The Progress You Make

Tracking your guitar playing progress in the most effective way possible is crucial if you want to experience huge improvements in your guitar playing. Think back to the ship captain. Even though he has precise coordinates, if he doesn't get constant updates on his current location in relation to his long-term destination, his "coordinates" are useless. Understanding which of your guitar practice exercises are improving your playing the fastest is essential to you finally reaching your goals.

Once you take each of the 5 steps outlined in this article and unleash the power of the Guitar Playing Accelerator, you will begin to see BIG results in your guitar playing.

Adele and Whitney Houston - Best Female Performers

Adele's new hit album "25" along with the hit single "Hello" have had crazy good sales. She stands atop the current pantheon of female singers and for good reason. But how does Adele stand up next to Whitney Houston, another great performer with a great voice.

If you look at Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You" against Adele's "25" you can see some real similarities - especially when viewing the videos. I love both of these performers so much that I am pleased to see that they have some similar ideas. It is the same as Michael Jackson and James Brown; both are great performers with one graciously standing on the shoulders of another to push the quality of musical performance to greater and greater heights.

Both 25 and I Will Always Love You have terrific arrangements and the story lines on the videos are excellent. The cinematography on both are fantastic. The musical performances on both songs are excellent and the musical production on both songs cannot be criticized. I like the contrast in tones between the two songs with Adele opting for a traditional grand piano sound and Houston going for a mellow electric Rhodes piano sound. The music in both cases is very gentle on the ears.

The production of the voices is where the two singers depart. When you listen to Houston you get every nuance. Her voice is so gentle and wonderful, but powerful and bold when she needs it to be. The amount of subtle soft emotion practically wants to make you cry while her loud authoritative moments in the song gets your emotions super energized. Overall Houston gets such a light floating effect you feel that you are listening to the most powerful whisper mankind has had the pleasure to hear.

Adele has every bit of Houston's vocal ability, but her producers have let her down. Adele's producers applied too much compression to her vocals, and to the entire arrangement in general, and sucked the gentle feeling out of the melody, which would have been so nice to hear. I would have loved to hear Adele's performance before all the goo/gawps were added that producers insist on putting onto songs nowadays. You know, massive compression and limiting so that volume levels can be pushed through the roof.

So in conclusion; Adele and Whitney Houston end in a tie, both are great performers and both have wonderful voices. We do have to imagine a bit how much better Adele would have sounded had she had Houston's more subtle producer's.