Ace's Masterclasses Recording Guitar Melodies
We’ve covered a variety of tracking tips in our tutorials so far with Skunk Anansie guitarist Ace, but here, the ACM tutor has delved into the world of tactics for making your guitar melody stand out.
Here, Ace tells you his tactics for recording guitar tracks, and how harmonising can develop the melodic nature of a lead line.
Here, Ace tells you his tactics for recording guitar tracks, and how harmonising can develop the melodic nature of a lead line.
Transcript
00:00Hi, it's Ace here, we're back in Metropolis Studios and today I want to talk about melodies
00:11and simple motifs really.
00:14Let's try to do something very, very simple just to listen to the ear and the way that
00:18it just fits into the track.
00:21So start simple, we can get more complicated as we go along.
00:24First of all, I'm going to lay down a few tracks.
00:27So I'm going to do the technique I was talking about before, which is one single coil chord
00:31track and then maybe some root and fifths underneath to give us a bit of a rhythm bass.
00:36Then I'm going to play some melodies on the top, really, really simple, maybe harmonize
00:40with them and use maybe some effect sounds as well.
00:44So here we go.
00:45First of all, we're going to lay down the tracks.
00:47So let's go for the single coil open chord track.
01:17And here it is with a humbucker.
01:42Okay, so we've flashed a few rhythms down there, we'll just quickly balance them up
01:46left and right and let's try some really, really simple melodies.
01:50I'll put a little bit of sound on this, it's got a bit of chorus on it and it's got a bit
01:55of delay.
01:56And then just do something really, really simple and then maybe harmonize with it.
02:00Let's see how we go from here.
02:16Okay, so we put down a really simple melody, something that just rolls all the way through
02:27the chord sequence and a little motif in there as well with a bit of a sound.
02:32So now, why not harmonize it?
02:34Most simplest thing to do is to say, for me, is to play the same thing but the other way
02:38around, okay?
02:39So let's see if this works.
02:40It might make a simple, nice harmony for us, okay?
02:44Keep it simple and always trust your ear.
03:11So there you go.
03:12Simple melodies, keeping it simple, listen to ear, always work on good sounds and solid
03:17rhythms and try to find something that kind of flows through the whole piece.
03:22Hooky is the key and melodic and tuneful is always a winner.