A Different Kind of Truth Tab Book

[jhale667]

Yeah, you haven't lived until you've had to check tab...and you're going off something where an instructor has actually taken the time to learn a lick correctly - at least it sounds that way in the video you're watching of them playing it - and the tab is something completely different - different position, string, etc.! I had to re-write a few sections entirely on occasion...wondered if the original transcriber even bothered to watch the video, or did their portion separately...


Correcting tab really expanded my horizons though, as I was asked to work on transcriptions for artists/styles I'd probably never bother to learn on my own, in some cases I didn't even listen to their music previously...

What's with the "recording sounds a half step flat" bit...(?) they're tuned that way, hello!

[chefcraig]

Tab books always flummoxed me. OK, Paul McCartney is a wonderful writer, but there is no way in hell that he could have come up with some of the finger-breaking chords transcribed for ""Blackbird" in one of those Beatles books I bought a few decades ago. And for crying out loud, if the creators of these things can't even get things correct for a three chord Neil Diamond or Jimmy Buffet tune, I'm somewhat doubtful about their transcriptions for "Spanish Fly", let alone anything performed by Yes or even Bachman Turner Overdrive.

The fact is, the last time I bought one of these books was sometime in the late seventies, and only then because it was full of really cool photos.

[Jagermeister]

The best one I have is Ozzy RR tribute. Very well done. I can't remember who did it. Prolly Wolfe Marshall?

[jhale667]

Tab books always flummoxed me. OK, Paul McCartney is a wonderful writer, but there is no way in hell that he could have come up with some of the finger-breaking chords transcribed for ""Blackbird" in one of those Beatles books I bought a few decades ago. And for crying out loud, if the creators of these things can't even get things correct for a three chord Neil Diamond or Jimmy Buffet tune, I'm somewhat doubtful about their transcriptions for "Spanish Fly", let alone anything performed by Yes or even Bachman Turner Overdrive.

The fact is, the last time I bought one of these books was sometime in the late seventies, and only then because it was full of really cool photos.

I had that book as a kid too...and it was before the dawn of tabulature, that sucker was written as a piano score!!!

[ThrillsNSpills]

Chef I had the Beatles Complete as a kid.
Simple tunes in the key of C got changed to E flat.

Years earlier I was taking keyboard lessons and had this crazy book with Maggie May as a lesson.
The chords (in reality) of the verse are A G D. The book just had A and G and stayed on G where the 3rd chord should have been D.
We're not dealing with jazz chords here, just A G D, and they couldn't get that right.

Everyone is correct to be leary of sheet music.
http://www.download32.com/guitar-and...r-2-i1682.html with guitar and drum trainer you can get to half speed staying in pitch and set the parameters to any section of the song where you can set it on repeat. The boss eband device looks like it does the job as well.
I still have the Ibanez rock and play which took tapes down to half speed.

At least this way you have a point of reference when judging the sheet music, as previously mentioned.
You can get the positions straight from the artist if there's a live video, like with Blood and Fire for example.
That's a good thing about Youtube, it demystifies the process a bit.

[chefcraig]

Simple tunes in the key of C got changed to E flat.

Years earlier I was taking keyboard lessons and had this crazy book with Maggie May as a lesson.
The chords (in reality) of the verse are A G D. The book just had A and G and stayed on G where the 3rd chord should have been D.
We're not dealing with jazz chords here, just A G D, and they couldn't get that right.

Everyone is correct to be leary of sheet music.

Exactly! Even if you consider that a guitar may have been altered in the studio, either by tuning down or by tape speed, how is it possible that a simple C chord becomes some oddly augmented flat that requires both hands to form when written down and committed to paper? Yet the practice persists to this day, including the concept of simply leaving out entire passages of a song by remaining static on a single chord, rather than performing the entire movement.

I was reminded of this as recently as two days ago, while attempting to find the music and words for Tom Wait's "I Hope That I Don't Fall In Love With You." This is unarguably the best of a batch of barroom life songs ever written (The Replacements' "Here Comes A Regular" ranks right up there), and having only heard the charming version done by Hootie & The Blowfish, I wanted to learn more about it. In my search I discovered that for one thing, the Blowfish version omits an entire verse, yet when it came down to finding the correct chords for what is essentially a song about as complex as "Louie, Louie", I could not find any two in the same key, let alone possessing the proper arrangement. So what did I end up doing? Yup...I printed out the lyrics while at work and found a clip on Youtube, transcribing (IE, watching the screen and matching the chords on my acoustic) myself.

[Terry]

Yeah, you haven't lived until you've had to check tab...and you're going off something where an instructor has actually taken the time to learn a lick correctly - at least it sounds that way in the video you're watching of them playing it - and the tab is something completely different - different position, string, etc.! I had to re-write a few sections entirely on occasion...wondered if the original transcriber even bothered to watch the video, or did their portion separately...


Correcting tab really expanded my horizons though, as I was asked to work on transcriptions for artists/styles I'd probably never bother to learn on my own, in some cases I didn't even listen to their music previously...

What's with the "recording sounds a half step flat" bit...(?) they're tuned that way, hello!

I find that a lot with user submitted tabs on a lot of these online tab sites, particularly with sections notated on the correct fret but the wrong strings...or any one given song tabbed by multiple users will have the same sections played on different positions on the neck with each user submission.

Still, tab is a useful guide...a heck of a lot easier than trying to figure something out by ear on your own...kind of like Cliff Notes for lazy guitarists who can't read sheet music.

[jhale667]

I find that a lot with user submitted tabs on a lot of these online tab sites, particularly with sections notated on the correct fret but the wrong strings...or any one given song tabbed by multiple users will have the same sections played on different positions on the neck with each user submission.

Still, tab is a useful guide...a heck of a lot easier than trying to figure something out by ear on your own...kind of like Cliff Notes for lazy guitarists who can't read sheet music.

Oh sure, if it's right from a notation standpoint it's helpful, but I tried to imagine a kid or a beginner who wasn't familiar with the fretboard watching what the video instructor was doing, looking at the tab and going "Huh??" I wanted to make sure the tab matched the footage, and eliminate that possible confusion...

[Coyote]

Still, tab is a useful guide...a heck of a lot easier than trying to figure something out by ear on your own...kind of like Cliff Notes for lazy guitarists who can't read sheet music.

Or, who can, but very slowly...

It's not a bad skill to possess, one just has to be careful not to run headlong into jazz theory while learning it. That shit can and will get weirder than a Hunter S. Thompson rant in a nanosecond.
Overtone-systems, tetrachords, etc... (read: shit that might not be necessary in real world situations. None of which can be easily applied to songwriting.)

[evil_lil]

Does anybody know who worked on this?

[Matt White]

Matt Schnarfglass is the name that jumps out.....he works for GUITAR WORLD....& their tabs are usually damn good....they get the artist involved which cuts out the mystery!

[VAiN]

Got mine a few days ago and just learned Stay Frosty! What a fun song to play!