The REAL Reason It's Harder to SHRED High Up On the Neck!
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ก.ย. 2024
- Snag your official SHRED TILL YOU'RE UNDEAD merch here!!!! vonkowen.threa...
Downloadable practice tracks, bonus guitar lessons, and MORE here: / benellerguitars
Grab last week's practice tracks at a variety of tempos, plus the midi tracks so you can build your OWN workout, PLUS the downloadable TABs here! / 50395556
How about a treasure trove of drone tracks that i made!? 12 root notes, 12 major chords, and 12 minor chords, for a total of 36 super long drone tracks! Its everything you need to learn all your scales in every key! Here's the direct link you need: / 49828461
Snag your official Shred Till You're Undead merch here!!!! I'm so excited about getting some sweet merch made, i hope you all love it!!! vonkowen.threa...
Wanna learn ALL the notes and master the board? Here's the lesson you need: / 45181774
The BEST Half Hour of Alternate Picking Practice EVER: / 33563344
The secrets of note targeting revealed: / 38535524
My followup to my Ditch the CAGED System video: / 40492155
Get sweet deals on all the nice things i use here as part of @Sweetwater Guitar Month!!! Sick deals on all kinds of good stuff: imp.i114863.ne...
Hey everyone! One of my beloved Patreon supporters recently asked me a great question: Why is it harder to play high up on the neck of the guitar? This seems like a simple question, but there's an answer NOBODY has ever talked about here, and its called RADIAL DISTORTION! And on today's episode of FAQ You, you're gonna find out all about it!
In this video, we are gonna conquer the 3 things holding you back from shredding up high: Tighter string spacing, higher action, and the aforementioned radial distortion. These 3 things are holding you back, but not for long!
Using my Les Paul Custom and Axe FX 3 for this video. What question for you have for the next FAQ? Let me know in the comments!
Radial distortion ruins lives!!! Hope y’all picked up some good tips and learned how to fight it!
A solution is to angle your pick to pick more into the string / into the guitar, that way even if the string is 'ducking down' you should still hit it, since you are also playing more up and down rather than sideways.
Also about the compound radii, does floyd roses actually come in different radii there, since you cannot raise or lower each saddle???
Guess I'm not that good of a player or have strong enough fingers, but bending a whole step at low frets is much harder
@@VArsovski10 nah that’s very normal, it’s definitely harder to bend down low on the neck. The tension is increased down there since you’re at the end of the string. Think about it like jumping on the edge of a trampoline, there’s not a lot of bounce there.
Great video Ben !
Another thing that happens when playing higher in the neck is that due to the shorter length of the string that can swing is that it doesn't swing as widely as on a lower fret. Therefore the string is a lot stiffer to play. When having a too strong picking style you will get exhausted a lot faster and if you are holding your pick too softly, then you are more likely to drop tje pick. Also it increases the chance of becoming only a stepdad once
I’ve noticed about the steep hill as I moved closer to the bridge when I play higher notes. Definitely a really cool video and I like the way that you broke it down. I’ve been watching your channel for quite a few years and you are one of the channel create my own channel and add videos that have to do with information guitar players. Especially beginners.
This is great! But you missed one other crucial reason: your thumb can't be placed in its normal spot in relation to your other fingers because of the body of the guitar getting in the way. This is especially a problem with the Les Paul's block joint where the neck meets the body.
RT on this, I have a semihollow that doesn't have a cutaway or anything and I gotta do it like flamenco players if i wanna play up there lmao
This is one of the reasons I've switched to sculpted heel, or neck through guitars.
I've seen a lot of players lately who pull their thumb completely to the front of the neck beside their index finger when they get up above the 15th or so. I don't know how they do it but it works for them!
@@garypatrick7426 That's normal for acoustic and classical guitars that don't have a cutaway. I used to do this too on my Les Paul at the very highest frets, since the blocky heel joint can only get you so far, but nowadays I exclusively play on guitars without a massive joint, so I can keep a consistent form and have one less thing to worry about.
My favorite phrase "...re-finger stuff..."... Guitar players need capable and flexible fingers... 😉😉😅🤣😂🤘😁
Thanks for doing this for me Ben, this is super helpful and hopefully helps others as well! Also, given you are talking physics, I just put it together that not only is the string dipping lower the higher up on the frets as mentioned, but the string *tension* is increased as well, so each pick stroke requires ever so slightly more pressure to ring the string! I just spent a few minutes between the 2nd and 22nd frets and the difference in both string height and tension is definitely noticeable and does appear that is a big part of my issue! The pinky suggestion is definitely helpful as well and does go against what I've been practicing so much high up the scales and exercises so going to adjust a bit in that area as well as my stupid fat fingers definitely crowd up after fret 15! And anyone still reading this, definitely go support Ben at his Patreon site, you too may get your questions answered and help him afford that protein powder he's cramming in to get ripped :)
This is why I sub to this channel. Your insight and awareness on the instrument is unmatched. I'd genuinely never considered that, but it actually makes so much sense!
Thanks Ben!!! My girlfriend always complains that I watch too many guitar videos on TH-cam, but when she noticed that I was watching a video that demonstrates how to get better at fingering she told me to watch to my heart's content. Thanks!!
Many guitar greats use the pinky only if absolutely necessary.... In every section of the fretboard. You kick some butt with the information about radius distortion.
Great discussion Uncle Ben. Thanks for the tips!
This is very high on the nerd list and I fucking love it! When I try to tell stuff like this to my girlfriend she tries to act like she cares… awesome.
Such an obvious concept that I never considered. Great call out.
Good point Ben! Gus G acknowledged this in one of his videos while talking about this when teaching us one of his solos. Tried it and behold it works better for me now.
Finally! You might remember I asked you on Patreon because I've been having issues with pull offs and hammer ons on the higher frets. It's gotten better but it's definitely something that I have on every guitar no matter how well it's set up.
So glad to help, buddy!!!
Great and informative video uncle Ben! I'd like to add another reason that makes it harder to shred high up. The reason is that the length of the string that gets stroked by the picking hand is shorter. It's easier to strike an open string, compared to striking it when playing a high note, let's say, in the 15th fret or higher. This becomes more prominent the more we move higher. It needs more strength to make the string vibrate (hence produce the sound). This is also the reason that it's easier to bend the string when we're in the middle of the fretboard, compared with bending high up or low down the neck
That "radial distortion" is something I've felt for years but never really could put into words! It's such a slight factor but can be insanity-inducing, especially since sometimes my picking hand drifts towards the neck pickup
You're the best, Uncle Ben.
And that's why shredders loved those Wizard necks and that humongous fretboard radius 😁
where neck joins body area is tricky. you right i never thought fretboard not flat.
Excellent point about setting the action on your guitar as flat and consistent up and down the neck as possible. Archtops like LesPauls are notorious for having high action near the neck pickup. I've definitely noticed that it's taken more time for me to get my LesPauls dialed in to my liking than some other models.
Still amazed on your new Gibson! Great vid! Gotta go pinky police are after me.
That transition in pattern at the 12th was slick! I see ya homie!
I can't wait to get the new Holdsworth album "Radial Distortion". 😎🎸
Allan Holdsworth - RIP to the king who lived on an island of one. Our Mozart.
Thanks for that fine forensic analysis Mr Eller! I concur with your radial distortion hypothesis and that practice in unfamiliar areas on the neck is the only solution
I'm glad this has a term now!
Hey uncle Ben good stuff bro. Cheers. Thanks for all your content.
I wanted to add to the reasons it can be harder to shred high up on the neck unless I missed it in this video. The strings have more and more tension when we are fretting higher and higher. Even when we are "tickling" the strings up higher while keeping Ben's awesome phrase "Radial Distortion" in mind, requires a little more picking pressure to get the the same volume as picking on the lower frets. Something that crosses my mind if I'm not syncing up, etc.
Thank Mr Ellen, though I heard your talking at the start of the video, I couldn’t stop looking at the the amp candy in the back ground 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 Great video as always 👍🏻🤘🏻🎸😎
never thought about the radial distortion issue. cool video.
Uncle Ben is a genius that was very eye opening thanks 🤟🏻
As always, great breakdown video!
Ive noticed a couple of things, one is that the tension for picking increases, two that you have to be more precise with timing because the increased tension causes the string to pluck faster than before. I guess that's all I could notice, it also kind of requires better fret placement
I thought I was crazy thinking about this.
I built a parts caster with 12-16" compound radius, a Gotoh Floyd, and an OFR nut. The OFR nut is 10" and the bridge is 350mm (about 13.75"). I see now that I should have gotten a 10-14" radius on the neck to make it match up with little effort. Now it looks like I'll have to get a Special/1000 series nut (12") and shim the saddles on the bridge to really get my string radius perfect. Thanks for the video, Uncle Ben! 😁
a huge problem for me is also the angle that I have to keep my hand at. Sometimes my torso gets in the way, and sometimes its because the body of the guitar and the neck joint get in the way.
On a compound go a couple of degrees flatter than the flattest point of the board. The reason being is that the nut should be cut at the roundest part of the board. For example a 10-16 compound. The nut should be set at 10. If the bridge is set at 16 by the time the strings get to the board (there’s some distance to cover over the pups) you’ll be lucky to be achieving a 14.5 radius as you meet the fret board resulting in needing higher action to clear the frets. You will split the difference between the radius of strings between the nut and bridge at the mid point 12th fret, in this example you’d be at 13 radius at the 12. Not terribly offset till you think about what fret the board becomes the flattest. I believe on fender this happens at the 14th fret. So if you’re at 13 r on the 12th your string radius is going to be significantly off over the 14th fret again requiring higher action. So to counter this effect you may need to set the bridge radius close to 19 degrees putting the midpoint 12th fret at 14.5 degrees you’ll reach the 16 radius before the 20th fret or so (split the distance from 12th fret to bridge to figure this out) and that should give you the ability to get the lowest possible action. It will never be as efficient of a radius match as a non-compound board but it’ll be as good as possible and likely low enough for anyones needs.
Thank you Uncle Ben. Especially loved this one as I could learn something really important guitar-less; while detangling my curls 😜
Anyway, time to get off the internet and practice 🙂
Lots of love from a very grateful student. Cheers!
Gosh darn it! now in a alternate universe my G string👙 that I am wearing has radial distortion.
Awesome information Ben! I had just come to the realization you made in your first point yesterday. It was the first time that I thought it's stupid for me to force myself to keep the same finger spacing as down low.
Outstanding, Uncle Ben! You're a thinking man's guitarist!
Finaly a great teaching on high notes guitar🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉
Radial Distortion is an awesome term. It could also be a great band name for your Prog-Metal project. Love it.
awesome video! Also beautiful LP You rock uncle ben
2:39 damn I thought he was gonna flip us off 🤣
I keep my action low, but thinking about it, I realize that I compensate for "radius distortion" with left hand muting with a barred index finger to hold the string down and fret mostly with the middle ring and pinky up high.
But I am also a bassist of 20 years, so I am used to digging into the strings with the pick.
great tips for people to practice and try. also for speed playing, economy of motion is huge. faster you go , the less you want extraneous movement be it the pick or finger distance from the strings.
Since we're splitting hairs here I wonder if it is worth considering that the shorter the length of the string the more energy it takes to get it ringing so the notes high on the neck will feel "harder" on your right hand. Also maybe that a lot of cool things to play build up to higher notes (like the Vinnie Moore pepsi lick) by the time you getting there you will need solid endurance to stay fluent.
Always the coolest videos man, thank you so much for years of awesomeness, insight and inspiration!
Now you have to get a matching white LP custom.
I don’t make the rules…
This is another reason why having a guitar setup properly is critical, uber critical when playing up high. Think of the number of guitars you have picked up where even if the relief was setup correctly perhaps the pickups were WAY too high, almost touching the string when playing up high. I love the radial distortion name and explanation! Kudo on the new term!
Great job Ben, love your channel. I figured out the ditching the pinky after 12th fret or so after 20+ years of playing 😂 but makes a big difference. Great content as always.
That was Brilliant
Guitar physics and dynamics should be like music theory. Everyone says you should eventually learn music theory. And I totally agree that the physics of the guitar should be implemented in the teachings. And if it already is, then that's because I am still ignorant about everything music and guitars lol.
Legato is also more difficult high up the neck, the smaller string is left the more resistance for hammer on/off. And if you are into dynamics using less gain then it becomes way more difficult to control :(
Good stuff
Combine moving your pick towards the bridge and change the pick-up selection towards the neck! You see this often with the legends :-)
One way to help deal with this issue: point the neck upwards when playing on higher frets. Players from Les Paul, the man himself, to jazzer Ted Greene, to Zak Wylde, to Slash and many others, use this approach. Even strat-style players like Iron Maiden's Dave Murray and Joe Satriani do so.
Yingyang Milkshake. I can't watch your videos at work anymore! 🤣🤣😂😂
Uh, #4.... that giant hunk of wood called the heel (where neck joins body), and is 380lb lineman blocking you from getting to the Quarterback. That LP has a GIANT one. Other guitar designs have worked to help get this out of the way and make higher fret playing way more comfortable. I was pretty impressed with the Fender Ultra "contoured" heel. Suhr does something cool with a few of their models. And, any of the PRS doublecut style guitars are way easier to access those shred frets.
Thanks for the video and creative content.
Just another thought to add to your observations; the fretboard generally gets wider as you go towrds the bridge. Not sure if that helps or hinders playing up higher.
The “radial distortion” also makes it harder for your pick to escape the strings, adding tons of movement to your picking hand.
Very useful, thanks!
Radial Fusion on Tour Now!
Ying Yang Milkshake is my fervrite gortarist!
Great video, I was beginning to think I was just never going to be able to shred but I've found a few things to try here! My picking hand tends to move closer to the neck when I'm higher up the fretboard so the radial distortion will definitely be an issue for me 😅 plus my ancient squier strat is probably crying out for a setup lol
Ying Yang Milkshake!!😆😆🎸
its the "Eller Effect" !!!!!
for the 2nd reason i have a job! ask your local tech to give your instrument an extra fallaway when they do fretwork on your instrument. take off extra fret material from about the 13th fret and you can get away with MUCH lower action on the higher frets
Point n.2 is usually accentuated by the habit a lot of luthiers (included guitar companies) have to use very little, almost none, neck relief in their setups.
If you compare two guitars with the same action at the 12th fret but different neck reliefs, you’ll notice a higher action at the last frets for the guitar with a straighter neck. I know, a lot of people believes it works the other way round, but it doesn’t, trust me!
I’m not saying you have to bow your neck: I set my relief at 0.4-0.5 mm at the 8th-9th fret on my guitars. PRS, for example, suggests 0.1-0.3, which is way too straight in my opinion. One test I always do and which actually brought me to my favorite truss rod adjustments written above, is to pick very hard each string comparing for example the 3rd and the 15th fret: the amount of buzz I want to hear (yes, even a 5000€ perfectly setup guitar will buzz if picked hard) is exactly the same. When you set those straight neck values and do my test, you’ll hear a lot more buzz at the 3rd compared to the 15th fret, meaning you have to add some more relief. Try it!
Glad to see that old Ying Yang Milkshake made an appearance in the video.
Also when you get way high up on the fretboard your thumb is behind the body of the guitar and your fingers are shoved up into the cutaway so there's that.
I'll file this under really dull sounding things that are fascinating
dip the tip deeper as you go, got it.
I dug this video a lot of stuff about radius and string height that I normally don't think about... Troy Grady would be proud lol
Great video🤘🔥🔥🤘
"Yeah! Science bitch!"
You mentionned wanting to do a AF3 VS Kemper when you get your AF3 back from repairing, is it on Patreon only or did you change your mind ? :) TY for great videos as always
Haven’t made it yet!!
That little EJ lick. Noice. Also Yngwie's official nickname is "sausage fingers"
I was thinking it's more about the finger position itself but I'm surprised about the radius thing
Yin Yang Milkshake is now officially Yngwie’s name to me. Forever.
I notice that usually my left hand just puts way too much tension in playing up high on the neck. There are spells when it relaxes and I can actually keep up with Michael Angelo Batio, but I'm still working on making that a permanent thing 😅 (BTW I was so happy the first time I matched his speed in a solo). My neck and bridge are both 16", and my technique, or more like, the way I generate my tone is picking more towards the neck pickup a lot of the time(especially when playing on that pickup!), this radial distortion is something I've gotten used to, with string skipping too. Another odd thing is I use my pinky up to the 19th fret on the top 2 strings. On the lower strings that stops being a thing at like 13 or 14.
I find that higher up on the neck, my fretting arm gets closer to my body and then is harder to move freely. My guitar and I end up leaning at a weird angle when I'm playing up there.
Radial Distortion, the newest solo single from John Petrucci
Was that the Trogdor meedely-meee lick for the opening?
Could the fretboard slope out the closer to the body of the guitar to make the action even the whole way up the neck? Have the fretboard chase the strings so to speak
Hey sir, on your patreon page, do you do lessons like developing a practice routine and actually WHAT to practice and how? lol As i got older i turned into a scatterbrain and need all the help i can get haha
Sure I do! There’s also a bunch here on TH-cam too!
Lol my work around has always been legato. I'm very lazy with my picking.
I have a 20" radius with my bridge dead flat. I am pretty sure I have almost not radial distortion.
The thumbnail made me realize how thick a custom is. It’s like Corpsgrinder, but guitar 👁👄👁
Uncle Ben, I’ve noticed recently that a lot of guitar player don’t sit square in their chair, and sit at an angle. Do you think this helps the picking hands elbow to rest on the guitar without falling behind the Body or is it just a camera trick and I’m clutching at straws? I can figure out how to keep my picking arm resting on the body without flying up or turning my self into a contortionist.
I know a lot of telecaster player shim thier necks. Would that make a difference?
Do you ever get wrist pain from playing guitar?
Thankfully no!!
hey ben how do u play the lick you played at the. start of the vid
The only issue I have with pinky elimination is the inability to properly perform the sensual shocker technique.
Another reason. I suck at guitar. You actually made a bunch of videos about it. 😳🤣
honorable mention : the neck joint
Is it because a naughty little pictsie says "no, you may not do that here" and pushes away your fingers?
Paul Gilbert has no problem playing the high frets without changing the fingering despite his large hands.
it gets soooo tight up ther none of the finger patterns you normally use will work and you have to switch to 3 finger mode?
That's all good 'n' well uncle Ben. But, if I'm honest, the real reason I find shredding up high rather difficult, is cos I'm not very good. There. I said it. I feel better now.
Yeah man, there is a certain NY subway stair that is 2mm higher than the rest and people are tripping on it all day...and other stuff but that's a different thing altogether...Wyngtip Milksop looks like an extra from The Hobbit or Wizard Of Oz \m/
What is that notepad thing he's using?
Hey Ben
If u have a curved neck(depends on the amount of relief the truss rod has) then the action starts to get lower as from 17h fret to 24. The more straight the neck then the action is actually higher when u get past 15 and it’s noticeable.
Anybody here experienced this?
One uniform solution is flatten the neck with as little relief as possible
Lower your action dangerously this gives u better play but tone wise it sucks-intonation also appears weird. Plus your strings feels tighter. Bending is hard. Can u accept so many cons for a low action neck?