Members Kramerguy Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 My rant of the day... How can I describe how much I hate internet guitar tab? Let's see... 99.999999% of it is dead wrong, even simple 3-note songs these losers get wrong. I don't use it since I've realize how horribly inaccurate it is. I think part of the problem is that most seasoned musicians can learn by ear (hell, 5-10 years and longer ago, there was no tab.. you had to go buy a published, LICENSED, book), so who's making tab? Yep, the one and two year captain fantastic's out there who just don't have a developed enough ear to learn a song the right way to begin with. Now you can argue "don't like it? don't use it.." but (and I should have remembered this in my audition thread) so many people use it, and then show up playing songs wrong, that it just spikes my annoyance into the stratosphere.. and because they use it, they don't have a developed ear to know the difference. So I guess that along with this rant, is some more friendly advice. TAB: Just say "no". Learn by ear. You will develop a better ear in the process and become a better player for it. You will only get laughed out of an audition when you can even hear that you ain't playing the song correctly. ok, I'm done. / rant off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BlueHeaven Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 They are good to use as a starting point, at least most times. But that's about it. Only way to truely learn the song is to listen to it, and pick out the parts you want to play. A lot of times evern when the tab is correct I'll prefer to play the part in a different position. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GCDEF Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 Half the time they don't even get the key right. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ski219 Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 I find tabs to sometimes be useful, but you are right, most are wrong. You have to listen to the recording. My band mates and I have been using youtube videos sometimes. I always look there to see what the original band does with the song live and it's easy to send a link and say what do you think of this version. Regarding auditions, I suggest sending MP3's or links to the player. If you want to be really helpful tell them which parts they should learn. Awkward moment: when I auditioned I got an email from our singer with the 5 songs to learn. He asked me to learn the Joe Walsh solo in Hotel California. So we're playing the song and when the first lead, Don Felder's solo comes up, everybody's playing rhythm no solo. I'm thinking - oh {censored} - I didn't learn this part... I'm just gonna wait until it comes around and play what I actually know. So that's what I did and it all worked out in the end. (Learned Felder's part for the next week) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members fastplant Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 It's right up there with youtube "instructional" videos. It seems like 99.9% of them on there are done by people who should still be TAKING lessons, not giving them. I think it gives people some sense that they are better than others that they can impart their "wisdom." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wades_keys Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 The better quality tabs are in GuitarPro format - it's easy to separate wheat from chaff with those because they can be played back in the guitarPro software. some powertabs are pretty good too. The only tabs I would ever consider and the ones that tend to be high quality are the ones for more complex tunes. Even then, you've got to beware of jive-ass fingering notation, even if the notes are correct. There's a YYZ guitarpro tab out there that is dead-on, as far as notes but the fingering positions are bull{censored}. A good player can easily work around this though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members undercool Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 I always look there to see what the original band does with the song live and it's easy to send a link and say what do you think of this version. Yep. That is what I do for most of the songs we're doing. Good resource for good- and bad- ideas. Esp for songs that have been done to death- like to check out covers of the songs too. Especially songs that have a ton of synths and crap. If my brain isn't coming up with solutions it's nice to see how other 3 or 4 person bands are handling it. youtube... Because where else can you see a poorly executed inappropriate 2 minute Malmsteen solo dropped into the middle of Brown Eyed Girl? ( I actually did this once- I was pissed we were playing it. Or drunk. Or both. Either way, it still gets talked about in certain circles...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Austincowbell Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 So you're saying they are worth the money ;-) -I like it when I look up the chords to a song and two people have them literally a step-and-a-half apart. I wonder if any of these people actually listen to the song while tabbing or just do it from memory. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Kramerguy Posted March 13, 2009 Author Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 It's right up there with youtube "instructional" videos. It seems like 99.9% of them on there are done by people who should still be TAKING lessons, not giving them. I think it gives people some sense that they are better than others that they can impart their "wisdom." ^^ that too. Well put. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members scolfax Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 Check sites like guitarinstructor.com first. They have official tabs for .99 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Lopp Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 They are good to use as a starting point, at least most times. But that's about it. Only way to truely learn the song is to listen to it, and pick out the parts you want to play. A lot of times evern when the tab is correct I'll prefer to play the part in a different position. +1 "Back in the day..." we couldn't get tabs off the Internet, so we either learned it by ear or bought a magazine or book with the tab in it. The free tabs do give a good starting point (and yes, it is amazing how inaccurate some of them are). Also, as mentioned, YouTube vids of both the original band and cover bands playing a song give a good reference point for learning songs. Not only that, but software that slows down MP3's for picking apart intricate parts and practicing challenging sections slow also helps. This is great stuff when combined with the ability to learn by ear to learn songs quicker. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members iTor Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 I can't see the point in being such a hater about it. Nobody forces you to use it, not even paying for using it. If you think you can do better, then do, and if not, I can't see the point in the ways you use to show your dislike. There are much healthier and polite ways to do it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members PigWings_v2.0 Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 Use tabs only as a reference. Sure, none are really %100 accurate but most are good enough to get you on the right track. After that follow your ear. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Kramerguy Posted March 13, 2009 Author Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 so many people use it, and then show up playing songs wrong, that it just spikes my annoyance into the stratosphere.. and because they use it, they don't have a developed ear to know the difference. Guess you read only the first line of the OP? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Janx Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 So how come you don't post your own correct tab? One thing I hate about tab (and I like tab), is that when I google, I get 100 sites, and they all have the same copied tab file from the same guy. Meaning I can't really get a second opinion on a song, because they're all just copying each other. Ultimately, tab is sheet music for guitars. dissing tab itself is like dissing musicians who use sheet music. What you're really mad about is how much incorrect free sheet music is out there. When you consider how people don't want to pay for sheet music, the level of quality is equal to the work put into it which is measured by the price charged. Free sheet music means minimal work was put into it. As for learn by ear, some people's brains don't work that way. Some of us learn visually, and hearing music ain't visual. It's not wrong if the result is the same, which is correct playing of the song. I would suggest the following, if you have a song figured out, tab it out. It'll be useful later if you haven't played the song in a while, or need to teach it to a new guy (ex. hey you, take this file, this is exactly how we play it, skip the internet). It'll also reinforce your memory of the song (writing things down does that). Once you have that file, post it online. Diseminate CORRECT information, rather than complaining about incorrect information. That's the whole point of open source, you fix the bugs as you find and use the product, and you have a responsibility to the community to return your fixes to the pool. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members iTor Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 Hey, no But then again, complaining here, where pretty much all of us will agree with you about people not being talented enough to learn tunes by ear trying the easy way (aka internet tab) being annoying, I found your rant gratuitious. I mean, if you find its service that crappy, you could have used the time you have spent writing your rant post in a much proactiver task as writing the correct tab of a song you specially want people to play correctly is. But hey, none of this chat is going to make that site better or the people that use it to stop doing so, so... Peace... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Janx Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 One other thing to add here, is how many conversations have you seen here or in real life of "that's not the way we play it, can't you hear how it's played on the album". My point is, learn by ear isn't all that accurate either. If you were to tab out what you think the song is, I bet you'll find others who disagree with your version. And it won't just be the typos, it'll be actually disagreement with what you think you heard (and thus tabbed). Ironically, you won't really prove who got it right, only that people interpret songs differently, and not all notice nuances (or add nuances sub-conciously). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wades_keys Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 That's the whole point of open source, you fix the bugs as you find and use the product, and you have a responsibility to the community to return your fixes to the pool. But in reality the real work tends to fall to a small group of dedicated idealists, and once they move on to other work, the project dies on the vine. Plus, the community could do a better job IMO of inviting others to share their work without having to jump through a ton of hoops in terms of using funky version control systems and such. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Janx Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 But in reality the real work tends to fall to a small group of dedicated idealists, and once they move on to other work, the project dies on the vine.Plus, the community could do a better job IMO of inviting others to share their work without having to jump through a ton of hoops in terms of using funky version control systems and such. I don't disagree with that. Once you've met my challeng of "tab your {censored} out", I have no doubt that it's a pain in the butt to get your version posted next to the wrong version, even as a comment. Most of those sites are too cumbersome for that kind of management. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wades_keys Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 My point is, learn by ear isn't all that accurate either. If you were to tab out what you think the song is, I bet you'll find others who disagree with your version. And it won't just be the typos, it'll be actually disagreement with what you think you heard (and thus tabbed). That's something that was addressed when the powertabs sites were online - there was a voting system that allowed the better efforts to "rise to the top". This is why I use GuitarPro and Powertab exclusively (on the exceedingly rare occasion that I use tabs at all) - some of those tabs are extremely accurate and well done. I don't like being "told" where to put my fingers - it's hard for me to connect a fret number with a note name or scale degree - so I tend to avoid tabs for that reason if no other. Plus, I personally think it's limiting to think in terms of positions that may or not be well suited to your playing style. Again, that's why I like powertab/Guitarpro - the standard notation is right there too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Janx Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 I like using PowerTab as well. Even though play-back is low quality, it lets me test it out, to get a sense of how it plays. And the standard notation is nice. I've been learning standard for the last 6 months. Can't quite sight read, but it's getting better. I'll have to start using the PowerTab site's tab. I used the online guitar archive for a long time. It was better than what we got now at least. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wades_keys Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 I'll have to start using the PowerTab site's tab. I used the online guitar archive for a long time. It was better than what we got now at least. Are they back online? For a long while there were no tabs there due to legal issues.... I remember when they were an active community though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members strathound Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 The better quality tabs are in GuitarPro format - it's easy to separate wheat from chaff with those because they can be played back in the guitarPro software.some powertabs are pretty good too.The only tabs I would ever consider and the ones that tend to be high quality are the ones for more complex tunes.Even then, you've got to beware of jive-ass fingering notation, even if the notes are correct.There's a YYZ guitarpro tab out there that is dead-on, as far as notes but the fingering positions are bull{censored}. A good player can easily work around this though. Exactly. The benefit of GuitarPro is that you can load the tab into it and in 5 minutes of listening to GP play it back for you, you know if it's accurate or not. I also think learning by ear is the best way to go. But there are times when you need to learn something really fast, and GP is a good tool for doing that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rorylawford Posted March 13, 2009 Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 I also think learning by ear is the best way to go. But there are times when you need to learn something really fast, and GP is a good tool for doing that. My feeling exactly - always best to figure it yourself, but when you have to learn 4 metal songs with solos for tomorrow night's practise - sometimes you have to cheat and use TAB as quick jump-in to get you going Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Kramerguy Posted March 13, 2009 Author Members Share Posted March 13, 2009 I swear I typed out a nice and decent response an hour ago, where did it go? ..sigh... Anyways.. didn't mean to start a pissing match. I don't use tab, I use my ears. For those who use tab, it frustrates me because it's usually wrong, like someone else said, half the time not even in the right key, so when people use it (and believe in it..) they bring that into the mix and it's painful to work through progressions when someone learned them all wrong. I would love to write my own, but being in two bands and constantly in learning mode doesn't allow me the luxury, and I refuse to do it from memory here at work, not to mention that 80% of the people who use/view it would probably complain that it's wrong because it doesn't match the 9 other floaters in the toilet we call the internet. Again, was just bitchin, not looking to start a pissing match... agree or disagree I guess, but I'm done with it for today. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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