Okay, what's THE excercise for building ridiculous shredder-style picking speed?

[Knottyhed]

Now you've subsequently posted a different claim about how the analysis was done. This may or may not shed light on why we should be sure this guy is a fake, but if you post a claim backed by a fundamentally flawed argument, people aren't going to just "question the validity", they are going to point out exactly where you are wrong GaJ

Yup. In a nut-shell.

[Knottyhed]

 

 

Dude, I don't know your friend Willie Jordan or what makes him an expert on video analysis so I'll take that with a pinch of salt. To me you're just some guy on a forum to me who has a bee in his bonnet about some guy that claims to have a record, and I'd need a labotomy before I start swallowing everything people tell me on internet forums.

 

THat's the point, as you mentioned above - it all looks pretty official, maybe Della Vega is a total douche bag and faked the whole thing, but if you want to go around convincing people you might want to start with posting the bootleg video rather than expecting people to believe totally unverifiable claims.

 

As I said before - I also cannot understand for the life of me why anyone would analyse video to verify his claims (a) it wouldn't prove much conclusive, it'd be the audio that mattered (b) he claims to have set an official Guiness World Record in 2008 at 320bpm, this would be pitifully easy to verify for anyone who was bothered, (which I assume anyone analysing a video would be), by looking it up in a book!! If he had the record you could be damn sure he played the peice at the stated speed, didn't miss out any notes or make a mistake because Guiness adjudicators would have recorded it and analysed it. It's a no-brainer, he is either in the book or he isn't, it's easy to check out, there's no need for anyone to analyse anything.

 

Having seen the bootleg, I'd say - yeh he's probably a lying arse-hat, but then again it might just be the poor quality audio on the bootleg, so if it's all the same, I'll keep an open mind until I get a chance to check it out.

[Li Shenron]

Personally, I couldn't care less whether the guy is true or fake.

[Yngtchie Blacksteen]

Dude, I don't know your friend Willie Jordan or what makes him an expert on video analysis so I'll take that with a pinch of salt.

They wrote about him in Guitar World, and both Michael Angelo Batio and Rusty Cooley are very positive about his work. He owns perhaps the biggest collection of Shawn Lane's music that I know of, and has posted huge amounts of vids under the MyShawnLaneVideos moniker on YouTube. That's just to show that you may at least be familiar with the vids he's posted.

 

The reason I'd call him an "expert" is because while most people don't have the patience to sit down and actually study the picking styles of all the famous(and infamous) shredders out there, he's done just that. He's tracked down all the fastest solos by the fastest guitarists, and have measured their playing very thoroughly. He eventually posted a list of the fastest alternate pickers in the world, and also produced audio clips that serves as proof that his measuring is correct.

 

Nerd? Of course. Pointless? To many it certainly is, but how many speed-related discussions are there on Internet forums? How many times have you seen various guitarists being called the fastest? I've seen a lot of these discussions, and it's obvious that people think it's worth discussing. Willie wanted to put and end to most of these discussions by figuring out just how fast the various players are, and then post a list with the player's name and what his top picking speed is. He only measured alternate picking, because it's the most demanding one to do cleanly, and because sticking to just one playing approach would eliminate the idea of comparing different playing styles that have different speeds. Like, tapping would normally produce more notes over a certain amount of time than alternate picking would, in the same amount of time.

 

I know him, and I know how serious he is about this stuff. He posted video examples of Della Vega, which not only shows that he picks less notes than you can hear, but also that he frets more notes than he picks. His hands are simply not synchronized.

 

I'm sorry for being so passionate about this, without backing up my claims with sufficient evidence. I'm just tired of seeing Della Vega's name being mentioned, knowing that he's replaced the original audio with a different one. I hope that I can get these slowed-down videos up on a web site so that people can see(and hear) for themselves. It may seem like a silly and long-winded process, but it is proof that Della Vega isn't as impressive as he's made out to be.

 

Willie's a family man, so he rarely has time to get online and talk about these things, but I showed him this thread and asked him if he could try and clear things up.

 

Btw, I sent GreenAsJade a video of someone picking 22 notes in one second, where the slowed-down footage clearly shows 22 pick strokes. Willie sent me this video earlier today to show that GreenAsJade's claim that a video camera can't capture more than 15 pick strokes in one second. If the links are still up, you can download them and see for yourself:

 

Spasmic Arm Picking demo - 22 pickstrokes per second (fast) : http://www.speedyshare.com/649907774.html

 

Spasmic Arm Picking demo - 22 pickstrokes per second (slow) : http://www.speedyshare.com/871779818.html

[Yngtchie Blacksteen]

Having seen the bootleg, I'd say - yeh he's probably a lying arse-hat, but then again it might just be the poor quality audio on the bootleg, so if it's all the same, I'll keep an open mind until I get a chance to check it out.

I just wanna add that poor quality audio doesn't alter someone's playing like that. I've seen vids of Michael Angelo Batio that had terrible audio, but his playing was just as clean and impressive as that you hear on his official videos. Ditto with Shawn Lane, many bootleg vids of him feature really bad sound, but it doesn't affect the performance in any way, just the overall sound.

 

But yeah, I'll leave it up to you to decide. Just wanted to point this out.

[1001gear]

The one I watched, he falls into triplets at 260 and then progressively deteriorates as Ritgwie Malmmore pointed out.

[The Burninator]

The reason I'd call him an "expert" is because while most people don't have the patience to sit down and actually study the picking styles of all the famous(and infamous) shredders out there, he's done just that. He's tracked down all the fastest solos by the fastest guitarists, and have measured their playing very thoroughly. He eventually posted a list of the fastest alternate pickers in the world, and also produced audio clips that serves as proof that his measuring is correct.

 

 

 

Is your friend the one who's mentioned here?

http://acapella.harmony-central.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1454581

 

Edit - after readin that post again a little, it's the same guy.

[lollygag]

speed is all about coordination between the hands. you can practice whatever the hell you want, but if yours hands aren't in synch then it will sound like flatulence (with either more or less humor, depending on the circumstances).

practice slowly, avoid winging it on issues like pick direction when crossing strings, or choice of finger when moving to a new position- plan it out!

also, this sounds weird, but after I started exercising my body my speed and playing in general got much better. if you can't get into a gym 3 times a week, then try to get into the habit of doing 10 or 20 pushups 3 times during the day. cardiovascular stuff (running, biking) is good for you anyway, do it and your body and brain will thank you!