Things I learned From Playing Guitar Live in Los Angeles

 

So what is it like, playing shows live onstage at small bars and clubs in Los Angeles, from the guitarists' perspective? 

First, you have to realize, that playing guitar live onstage in Los Angeles is very common. There are a million guitar players in Los Angeles. Why? Because its a warm climate and guitars do much better in warm climates than in cold climates. Therefore, there are a million guitar players in Los Angeles. So, you must realize that if you want to play guitar in Los Angeles, you are competing with a million other players, many of which, may be good, very good, so-so, and/or amazing. 

So you've decided to play a guitarist in Los Angeles? Okay, so here are the next steps in your sound once you get on stage in whatever capacity: in a band, in a cover band, or in an original band, or just playing a jam session. 

Second, the type of guitar you use is important. So when you get onstage, the type of guitar you bring to the performance matters most more than anything. You need a cheap but comfortable guitar that you can play at any moment's notice. Cheap, because most bars aren't the most safest for your good gear. And comfortable because you need to be able to play very well in any moment's notice. 

Third, the type of amp matters a lot too. Let's say you're playing in a metal band. I would recommend some cheap solid state amp [digital] that you could haul easily. If you're playing country and western then you want something older like an old small tiny Fender tube amp that you can really crank up. Classic rock? Well, you could do a solid state amp [digital], or a tube amp. 

Or, there's another option. You could run the guitar through the PA, and have the sound technician turn up the guitar loudly. But this is a last resort option, only if somehow you have no amp and you must perform. 

Fourth, you as the player matter. What kind of styles of music are you more inclined to? If you're a metal player, you might play fast three-notes-per-string scales like Malmsteen or Steve Vai. If you're more blues, you might be sounding like Jimi Hendrix or Jimmy Page. If you're more country you're going to sound more like Joni Mitchell backing up Emoulou Harris. So, you, as a player matter a lot. 

Moving forward, you must ask yourself, why am I playing guitar in bars in Los Angeles? Do you need money, do you play for fun, are you trying to be famous, or are you just trying to chill and have a good time? You must have a purpose to what you're trying to do. 

However, because there are a million other guys playing guitar in bars in Los Angeles, you'll find that its difficult to make it in the business. Especially because the music industry and music business has changed so much from when I was a kid [2011] to now [2025], so you'll find its tough no matter how good at guitar you are. 

So, you'll learn that guitar in Los Angeles isn't the most necessary or important, or required instrument in bars. Because the music scene here is so oversaturated with guitar players, you'll find out that its better to be a multi-instrumentalist instead. 

Next, you'll find that you'll have to wear many hats and know how to play musical chairs. 

In conclusion, what do you have to do in order to be a musician [guitar player] in Los Angeles? This will take all of your musical abilities start from whatever age you first became attracted to music. Most musicians get interested in music around the age of 9 or 10 years old. 

So you'll find that you'll have to be a multi-instrumentalist. Most bands won't need a guitarist, so you'll have to be able to be a singer [while also strumming piano or guitar or bass or drums at the same times], or a bass player [non-singing], or a drummer [non-singing], or piano [non-singing] and you must also have the ability to be able lift heavy sound equipment for your band. 

Lastly, you'll also want good old fashioned sound engineer ability as well. For, as you see, its very complicated playing guitar at bars in Los Angeles. 

Rent-Due, Still Playing Clubs

Things I learned From Shows in Los Angeles

Letter from the composer: [sends me chords to play on piano]

Me: Thanks, I'll check them out. 

Happy New Year. Kind of bummed out with a work situation at the moment. But the music is keeping me going. The last couple nights I've been going to shows at the bar and figuring out how the sound technician gets all the sounds. I figured it out. 

There are monitors, subwoofers inside the bar on the top of corners on the ceiling. 

The owner only wants the sound tech to only use the brand new [digital equipment]. But he doesn't want to because he likes a more traditional system. 

The owners says the traditional system is too loud. So he can't use it every night. So he's been loading different equipment [a more fancier analog system] all by himself for different nights in a large SUV style van. Not good because the guy is 64 years old. 

The answer to this dilemma is that he must use a smaller sound system for each and every night. But he doesn't want to because he wants to do what he wants, and is reluctant to do anything the owner says because they've been working together for a long time and they have some sort of dispute about it. 

However, the sound technician showed me the older more basic [analog log system that's very small] and I saw that everything that it had was acceptable and could work within the small confines of a small local Encino bar. 

So, you find that the sound systems used to record music are not important at all to the sound of the recording. 

Rather, it is the direction of sound that is placed or pointed at the audience that determines the sound more than anything else. 

In conclusion, theoretically speaking, you could record a classical music album on an iphone 12. 

Keep in mind, this guy used to run sound for Black Flag.

Happy New Year! 

das Erntedankfest 2022

Hello loyal blogspot readers, 

How are you? It's been a minute. Things have been up, down, topsy, turvy. Here I'd like to jot down some notes on what life has been like this Thanksgiving week. 

First, I've been working nonstop since the summer. I've requested a week off for a vacation week every month since September and I've been denied every time. C'est la vie. On top of that, I only had Tuesday off this week so I'm working hardcore. 

Here's an empathetic experience for you. I was listening to classical music on my last ten minute break tonight and this cute girl I work with came in and talked on her phone for like two minutes, probably with her boyfriend. Then she just sat there and cried. It was super awkward. I didn't know what to say so I didn't say anything. But I was listening to a great classical piece without headphones so she heard it, and it seemed to soothe her, especially the last major chord ending the piece. Quite an experience. Did I mention she's cute?

Second, although my job is grueling, it is pretty easy. So although I get mad when I'm there sometimes, in reality, I can't complain too much. Pushing carts in the cold is harder work and I've done that too. I stand there and take cash and throw things in the bag. It helps to have a personality but the job doesn't require you to have any kind of personality whatsoever, so if you don't really want to talk, you can just say the bare minimum. 

Third, this holiday season has been especially rough on the low level employees and the customers. The only way you can really enjoy this holiday season and have a lot of fun is if you're some kind of superman or superwoman. Most people that come to my line have nothing but complaints about this, that, the other, or prices of most things. I could care less. Nobody seems to be happy and you know what, that's not going to change. You know why? Because they simply lack the capacity for happiness. 

Fourth, what is the capacity for happiness? The capacity for happiness is the ability to find happiness within yourself, in and outside of your own makeup and psyche, and being able to see it and fulfill it within others. When you are happy, you are smiling, even if not physically, your spirit will be shining bright, and when others see that, theirs will be too, ad infinitum. 

But again, not to be rude, but most people can never be completely happy because most people simply lack the capacity for happiness. Nobody in the universe, not even God, or Christ Himself, can make you happy. You have to make the leap on your own for your own good. Everybody wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to die. It easier to smoke pot or get drunk or do hard drugs. 

Lastly, I've been talking about this idea for years on this blog. Here's a blog from 2020 even entitled Capacity for Happiness, you can read it here. When everything is going well, it doesn't really matter if your happy or sad or in the middle or whatever. But it's times like these, where the world seems to be falling off the hidden cliffs of the abyss, staring back at you, that's when you need to have practiced and gained the capacity for happiness, training within it and without it, your entire life, ad infinitum.

image ai generated 

Anger Management in Video Games

 Everybody's been there. You're in the middle of a competitive match in a video game and then one of your teammates berates you and the rest of the team, hurling insults and cuss words, sometimes even slurs. 


It's not a good look on the individual that performs this action, but nonetheless, it is forever constant no matter what rank you are and no matter what competitive game you play. Here are some tips and tricks on how to control your anger in competitive video games. 

1) Don't react 

No matter what you do don't give that person who is toxic and angry the power of a reaction. It's always better to ignore that person and move on. If you're the angry person, realize that you overreacted and stepped out of bounds, and come to the conclusion that you have to control your emotions and the way you react to the game. 

2) Keep calm

Always keep calm. When you're winning, keep calm, when you're losing, keep calm. Don't raise your voice if you use voice communication in the game, rather, always speak with a cool and even level and tone. The calmer you are the more effective you can be in the game and improve. This is the most effective way to use voice coms in competitive games too. 

3) Get used to losing

Get used to losing. No matter how good you are at a game, all these team-based games that I play have many variables based on what my teammates and enemy team players are doing. So technically speaking, no matter how good I am as an individual player, I can still lose if my teammates are just a little derpy. Get used to it. It will happen and you will lose as a result of it. It's a part of life. 

4) Get mad, then get over it

Sometimes you have to just lay someone out on the pavement, and watch the gore from behind the scenes afterward. You will get angry at people and will inevitably tell them off. That's normal. What you must accept is that it was wrong to do so, apologize if you like or have the willpower to do so, and then simply move on. 

5) Keep playing

When most 'nerd rage' gamers get mad in a game they get so worked up emotionally that they stop playing the game. While this might be a good way to take a time out like a toddler, I actually think that if you're angry at the game, you should continue to play, and learn to calm down while continuing to play. Instead of smashing the TV screen, just keep playing and learn to enjoy the solace of gaming again. After all, the reason why we play video games is so that we can have fun. The longer you keep playing, the higher your chances are of having fun while doing so. So remember, have fun. 

Good luck and have fun!     

How To Be A Great Healer In Competitive Games, Synergy

In my last post, I went into detail about what it takes to be a great healer in competitive games. Here, I'm going to expand upon the ideas from that, and go into more specific detail about synergy with the characters I play. To keep things short I'll go into the synergy between the healer and only one other character in each game. 

What is synergy? 

Creation of a whole that is greater than the simple sum of its parts. 

In short, this means you, as a healer, can combo with other characters [tanks/assassins/other healers] in such a way, that both you and the other character are that much more powerful [assassins], tanky [can take up more damage without dying, tanks], or durable [ other healers]. Your powers combined with others is so powerful that it is actually one of the most important deciding factors in if your team wins or loses the game. Other than actual skill. 

Now, I'm going to go into quite a bit of detail about synergy with the healers that I play in Overwatch, Heroes of the Storm, and Team Fortress 2. Yall ready for this? 

First, Overwatch. I have 340 hours as a Mercy player and she's the reason why I play the game, because I really enjoy her playstyle, which is sort of campy, sort of like a ninja, and her synergy with other characters is astounding. When Mercy follows a character, healing and damage boosting them throughout the round, this is called pocketing, essentially Mercy is a great character to pocket with because she can use her cadeous staff not only to heal and keep the character she's pocketing alive, but she can also damage boost them as well, increasing their damage by 30% while doing so. Essentially, every time someone doesn't need healing, as a Mercy player, you always want to be damage boosting, in that circumstance. 

So, in Overwatch one of the strongest combos to synergize with is the Mercy/Pharah pocket. Pharah is a girl who shoots rockets and can fly in the air. Mercy can use her L-shift to fly with her in the air as well, creating a space force style combination, that, in the right hands, can be downright unstoppable. As Mercy, I want to make sure that Pharah can survive long enough to do as much splash damage with her rockets as possible, so I want to heal her in certain key firefights, and I want to damage boost her accordingly, like when she's hitting three or more enemy players with rockets, raining hell from above, with me beside her, flying around. I've found that every time Pharah uses her ultimate ability, Rocket Barrage, I always want to make sure in that moment that I'm healing her instead of damage boosting, because it takes a second before the rockets start shooting, and in that split second the enemy team can insta-kill her easily.

This is one of the strongest combos in Overwatch but it is beatable. If the enemy team plays a hit scan [like Soldier 76, Ash, McCree, Orisa], or two, sometimes, if need be, they can easily either kill Pharah as she's being pocketed by Mercy, or kill Mercy first, and then Pharah once she doesn't have that Mercy support. However, there are some Pharah players who are so good that they simply won't die to any hit scans, as long as they have the healing/damage boost support, they will always kill enemies. Combine that with a Mercy player who is superb, and you have a combination that is simply unstoppable. The strongest combo in the game. And for me the most fun. Add to that the fact that the combo has a funny name; Pharmacy.

Second, Heroes of the Storm. Varian is the King of Stormwind, from World of Warcraft, the leader of the Alliance. When he goes full tank mode, he uses a sword/shield, can parry attacks, charge to enemies/allies, and he's also super strong, probably the best tank in the game, IMO. My main character is Morales, she's a medic from Starcraft Broodwar. She's basically Mercy/Medic [from Team Fortress 2] but in MOBA form [massive online battle arena, like Dota, like League, what Heroes of the Storm is]. She uses a ranged single target heal that can be empowered with level ups and different talent choices. She has a Safeguard that can throw some shields on allies, an ultimate ability called Stim, where she can power up an ally to give them more attack power, and a Displacement Grenade which she can throw to enemies, displacing their attacking/defensive positions. 

Varian is a high tier hero and Morales is mid-tier because she doesn't have many escape routes and she's easy to kill. However, when you combine Morales with Varian, it is almost unstoppable. She can pocket Varian, making sure he doesn't get low on health. She can grenade any enemies that try to flank Varian or herself. She can stim Varian in a pivotal fight to turn the tide of battle. She can safeguard Varian to increase his defenses in fights. If you're a good Morales and watch your positioning so well that you hardly ever die, Morales will be able to keep Varian alive most of the time. And Varian will be able to tank through most of the enemy team damage, leading to easy, flawless victory. Basically, the strategy is foolproof. I can't even count how many games I've won with this combination with my friend Ip. The classic tank/healer dynamo of Heroes of the Storm, for me.  

Third, Team Fortress 2. If you made it this far, obviously my main character is the Medic ["Ocktober Fest!"]. I have 100 hours on medic and counting. My favorite character to pocket in TF2 is actually the Soldier, which is basically the same as the Mercy/Pharah combo except no flying, no damage boosting, all healing, all ground foot moving, and positioning. 

But actually it might not be the best nor the strongest. If you have a Heavy on your team in TF2, that is the character you want to pocket. The heavy is a tall, fat, gent with a mini-chain gun. He sometimes eats sandwiches to gain health, which he can also throw out to you when you're low on health. The Medic is a German doktor. He's the OG Mercy, meaning he heals with a ranged single target heal. However, he can't damage boost. But, he has the choice of being able to have different weapons in hand 1, hand 2, and a melee weapon. This is where TF2 gets its strategic qualities because the way you customize your weapons options heavily modifies your gameplay and game experience. For simplicity's sake, we're going to say the Heavy and the Medic are both using stock equipment that comes with the game. 

Okay, so the Heavy has the mini-chain gun as his primary weapon and the medic uses the medgun as his primary weapon. Here's where TF2 gets more interesting than Overwatch. The medic's medgun, when fully charged, at 100% makes any character he uses it on invulnerable for 8 seconds. Yes, you read that right. The medic's medgun makes any player he uses it on invulnerable for 8 seconds. This is so strong that it's primarily the reason why I enjoy playing TF2, and it changes the tide of most firefights if used on the right ally player at the right time. 

So, going back to our Heavy/Medic combo, the Medic can pocket the Heavy when securing points or pushing the payload. And when the Heavy is surrounded by tons of enemy players, you can pop Uber on the Heavy [it's called uber because the Medic is German], and he can literally mow down the entire enemy team in one fell swoop because his mini-gun has a far range, rapid fast fire, and it's super strong. For me the Heavy/Medic combo is the best combo in pc gaming history. A real bromance to Overwatch's sisterhood of the traveling pants.

That's all for now. There are plenty of other combos in these games, but for me these are by far the strongest that I utilize on a regular basis. Practice finding different combos as healers and you will find that there's almost nothing that can't synergy at least a little bit. You want to find what combos well and what doesn't and be able to see it on the enemy team as well, as this is a very strategic element of playing healers and winning games. 

"Have you tried not dying?"