Article: http://bit.ly/NewbieSlideGuide
If you don’t play slide guitar, start now. It’s easier than you might think. Just follow the Funkadelic principle: “Free your mind and your ass”—or in this case, your fingers—“will follow.”
There are no limitations of genre or technique with slide. The slide empire extends from the stab ’n’ slice of Delta blues granddaddy Son House to the whinnying cries of Muddy Waters, the bare-knuckled rumblings of J.B. Hutto to the righteous roots of Ry Cooder, the infinite sonic universe of India’s Debashish Bhattacharya to the modernistic wail of the Edge, and the free-flying jazz of Sonny Sharrock to the omnivorous odyssey of Derek Trucks, with all kinds of artistic stops between. And it doesn’t matter if you’re a shred master or just learning basic chords. Everybody can do it—trust me. You only need two things to play slide: a guitar and, of course, a slide!
Let’s assume you’ve already got the guitar—and in this case, we’re talking conventional roundneck guitars, verses lap or pedal steels, or squareneck resonators. (For a jump start on playing lap steel, read Senior Editor Andy Ellis’ “Hand Jive! Master the Fundamentals of Lap Steel” on premierguitar.com.) Some say you need to raise a guitar’s action for slide, and while that’s an option, it’s typically unnecessary—especially if you’ll be playing electric guitar with at least a tad of distortion. That’ll cover up any minimal fret or neck noise. And honestly, when I hear the occasional “clunk” of a slide on the neck of an acoustic guitar, I just consider it part of the approach’s charm, reminiscent of cool field recordings of Fred McDowell, R.L. Burnside, and other great rural American sliders who I admire. When you’re in the early stages of slide discovery, let nothing discourage or distract you from the quest.
With a trusty guitar at the ready, the next tool you need is a slide. Here’s where things can seem complicated. The market is flooded with slides made from a wide variety of materials and with differing dimensions. But the only thing that’s important is finding the slide that works and feels best for you. There are three factors to consider in choosing the right slide: size, weight, and material. Let’s tackle size—both length and girth—first.
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