Seems from Twitter that Jem has a Skeletone - http://twitter.com/#!/PlanetFrost/statu ... 6198005760 (http://twitter.com/#!/PlanetFrost/status/183936366198005760)
This is a variant of the Tapladder which is a tapping instrument - think Chapman Stick and various variants. Mobius make a version called the Zentapper too. The interesting thing about the Tapladder type instruments is that they have no fretboards - you just tap into the space between the rods that act as frets! It'll be interesting to see what Jem comes up with on the Skeletone. I like its mix of steel rods with brass for the octaves.
Is anyone else a tapper out there? I fumble along on my Mobius Megatar from time to time but it's quite a task; Trey Gunn I am not!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQ1bijmQN9I (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQ1bijmQN9I)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAEAkcYKPCw (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAEAkcYKPCw)
I am trying to get all my Megatar ideas together for a project called "Deep Grass" - I played live late last year...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycl8v7QwYrI (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycl8v7QwYrI)
...but various variables have been stalling that one.
On top of all that there's a video I've been trying to make for ages which may have some appeal to Frost* fans. More...when I get it done! :)
Quote from: "JimD"Is anyone else a tapper out there?
My chum Brodie (//http://www.frost-music.co.uk/frosties/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=416) is a player of the aforementioned Stick of Chappy-men.
He says he's not very good at it, but I've heard him and would say otherwise. So much so that I once commissioned him on behalf of a client to do a piece for the website of a certain fashion house that has nothing to do with crisps-in-a-tube.
I've always fancied a Chapman Stick.
Not that I'd be able to play it being a keys man who struggles with anything guitar related. But it's just too damn cool.
Mind you I don't know what Mrs One would say if DHL turned up one, but I fear it might not be pleasant.
I've not played a Stick, due to their general rarity in these parts. I can say however that the two handed style is really really not what I expected. I have been tapping on normal electric guitars since I first picked one up as a teenager, "Eruption" being the reason I HAD to try playing guitar in the first place.
But to start tapping on a purpose built instrument, where strumming and picking is possible, but not the point, is a really strange experience. My whole sense of timing just disappeared for starters - it was like driving a car with two steering wheels and sets of pedals, one for each side of the vehicle for example. You think "let's go!" and then...you crash! Then the actual physical experience of strapping on and effectively hugging this surfboard of strings was quite different to playing a guitar. My whole ability to find notes went out of the window - whereas normally my motor skills were expecting a guitar neck held horizontally, now I had to slooooow my brain's desire to find a note down until I could locate it on the instrument. I imagine this is what a piano accordian might feel like to a hardened keyboard player. Sort of like "I know that, I know how that works...so why can't I do what I want on it?!". Tapping itself is quite easy, but so is making a mistake, and a fluffed tap is really nasty sounding!
There aren't many videos showing you how to start tapping but this is an interesting one...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaKDlvVIZcI (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaKDlvVIZcI)
...which I wish had been available when I started out. I genuinely thought I'd be able to pick up the Megatar and run with it, and instead I was stopped in my tracks. But...in a good way. It made me think about music and how it's made with a particular instrument and what you can or can't do. One odd thing was, because it works like an electric guitar with strings and pickups, that I thought I'd get some real crazy sounds with distortion and loads of effects. It turned out to be quite the opposite really, in that I really like the natural sound of the instrument just plugged into an amp. Of course a bit of "squidge" is nice (some sort of modulation) and distortion has its place, but I find I do not want to emulate a distorted guitar and play a bassline at the same time (although you could if you wanted to).
One big difference between the Megatar that I play and the Stick is the tuning. The Stick normally comes with inverted 5ths bass, where the bass section starts in the middle of the fretboard and ascends in fifths out towards the neck, whilst the melody side is in fourths. My Megatar is in what Mobius call "Bass Bottom" where the bass strings are in ascending fourths like a bass guitar. You can have the Megatar set up in inverted 5ths (and you can have the Stick any way you want I believe too) and one day I'd like to try it, but if you are not able to easily theorise chords and structures (which is how I am - I just really struggle with it) then the bass bottom concept is easier to understand. This video from Greg Howard explains inverted 5ths in great detail
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TZi0qKzKCM (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TZi0qKzKCM)
Here's a banjo tapper
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31cqDcwk3mL.jpg (http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31cqDcwk3mL.jpg)
B :D
Quote from: "BrizzleRocker"Here's a banjo tapper
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31cqDcwk3mL.jpg (http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31cqDcwk3mL.jpg)
B :D
LOL!
Also, I believe one of these is essential for the accordian:
(//http://pineriverrustics.com/images/chainsaw.jpg)
Quote from: "MarkOneMusic"Mind you I don't know what Mrs One would say if DHL turned up one, but I fear it might not be pleasant.
Are you saying DHL are in league with UPS on the trashing stakes
Quote from: "Mikey"Quote from: "MarkOneMusic"Mind you I don't know what Mrs One would say if DHL turned up one, but I fear it might not be pleasant.
Are you saying DHL are in league with UPS on the trashing stakes
They might well be, but if two and a half grand's worth of unsanctioned spend* got delivered here by any courier, I'm pretty sure I know what would get trashed... and I'm quite attached to that part of me! :lol:
*particularly something that expensive I couldn't even PLAY! :roll:
Quoteparticularly something that expensive I couldn't even PLAY! :roll:
There's always that risk when investing in a new bit of gear - are you outpricing your ability? Even more so when there are folks out there who raise the bar so high you might as well just go home, like this chap - http://youtu.be/ikzY3J2aov8 (http://youtu.be/ikzY3J2aov8)
He has a lot of instruments and is pretty ace with most of them!
I liked the banjo tapper :D
Quote from: "BrizzleRocker"Here's a banjo tapper
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31cqDcwk3mL.jpg (http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31cqDcwk3mL.jpg)
B :D
:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
I have a stick, myself. I am quite crap at playing it, but it is, let's face it, an awesome thing to have. I was working in a music shop and a guy came in with the stick to have our repair guy restring and set up in perpetration for selling it. "Oooohhhh...." says I. "Holy crap, a Chapman stick!"
"You know what this is. You want to buy it?"
"Well that would be awesome, but I am really broke right now, I just bought a really expensive synth"
"Well... Why don't you take it home and play with it or a month?"
Who was I to say no to that? Come the end of the month I admit that I still am broke, but this nice chap has decided that he is going to have a hard time finding someone who even knows what it is, and the fact that I play both guitar and keys might give me a head start in playing it, and he basically wants me to have it. He comes over to my place and has a poke around my studio for things I might be willing to trade, and we make a pile of a bunch of old stuff that I was willing to part with. I think there was an old les Paul copy, a twelve strIng with action an inch high, a midi controller, some mics and a copy of cubase le. Maybe some guitar pedals and cables too. Basically a bunch of my old crap I didn't need for something awesome.... I didn't need. I kinda felt a bit bad, like I was ripping him off, but he seemed happy with the deal.
The Skeletone is the first tapping instrument that has made sense to me. I had a Stick for a while, but I couldn't get my head around it. With the Skeletone (or Tap Ladder as the other version is called) however, it makes total sense.
For a start I've devised a custom tuning that works for my strange little mind, the first 3 strings form the root, 5th and octave, then the others go up as on a guitar. Then I have the entire lead half tuned a major 3rd up from the bass strings, but with the same tuning. Bizarrely, this makes total sense to me. I have no idea why... :shock:
The other plus is that I can play it with my thumbs as well so it feels more like a piano. This gives me 10 fingers to go at it at.
I'm having some modifications done to this first one by the excellent Craig Price who hand makes the Skeletones. He's been brilliant with interpreting my slightly (to him I'm sure) bizarre requests and comments. I love the thing, it's a definite keeper and you'll be hearing it a fair amount on F***. It has great riff potential. :D
Oh wow, keep us posted on the modifications - it would be very interesting to know what yr thinking of.
Sounds like a sort of dropped-D type tuning. I think whatever works for you...works. I have an unfinished 6-string tapper that I am building that I have in a dropped-D type tuning (root-5th-octave) and I like to blast away on that every now and then. I believe "Tone Eleven" retunes his stick for Elephant Talk too (watch towards the end for an explanation - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvpia_zUwXQ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvpia_zUwXQ))
On my megatar I have "E-dots" to find my way around. This is a variant of C-dots http://www.clicmusic.be/C_dots.php (http://www.clicmusic.be/C_dots.php) but transposed down to E as I never really got C (being primarily a guitarist and really only knowing that note anyway).
Very much looking forward to hearing some skilled Skeletoning!
Quote from: "JimD"Skeletoning!
Does that mean you can use it to slide down a bob track?
How on earth do you discover a custom tuning that works for you? :shock:
That must take ages, twiddling little knobs... Ooer!
Quote from: "Drarok"How on earth do you discover a custom tuning that works for you? :shock:
Just a guess....tap, tap, tap....oh, I expected
that note to be
there....*tunes string....that's better. :)
Quote from: "Pedro"Quote from: "Drarok"How on earth do you discover a custom tuning that works for you? :shock:
Just a guess....tap, tap, tap....oh, I expected that note to be there....*tunes string....that's better. :)
:lol: :lol: That was basically it.
Huh. Beyond dropped D (or dropped G in the case of my 7-string - brütal!), I've never really considered messing with the tuning on my guitars. I don't really expect any notes to be anywhere though - I guess I'm not an intuitive player.
I've got one side tuned to B 1 octave below middle C and Eb below middle C on the other side.
Bizzare, but it seems to work.
QuoteI don't really expect any notes to be anywhere though - I guess I'm not an intuitive player
I know that scenario well! I guess I have been lucky with bandmates who've been very patient with my non-note ability. I learned the whole Small Machine songbook by being shown where to put my finger on the neck; attempts to interpret "It's G, then F, then C" just fly over my head!
I guess this could be one of those areas where people who can play guitar properly wouldn't understand why anyone would want to significantly change the tuning? Like how people who have learned to touch-type see no need to change Qwerty.
I wish I could master both! :)