Psychobilly Guitar Tips For Beginners

by Kevin Nightingale

So now you know what gear's gonna set you off on the right foot, but that won't make you the next Reverend Horton Heat just yet baby. If you wanna play like the masters of Psychobilly it takes more than just the right tone, you need to learn the playing style to match. Luckily I've got a few tips to pass on that'll help get the old school purists on your side. Old hands will see these as no brainers, but if you're a young punk, metalhead or even an emo kid, who has just discovered this quirky underground genre and want to get involved then those two finger power chords, two handed fret-tapping solos and drop c-tunings aren't gonna cut it by themselves so this could make the difference between sounding like a psychobilly band or just Green Day with an upright bass.

Tip #1: You remember those weird chord shapes your guitar teacher kept trying to drill into your head when you first started playing but quickly forgot about because you never heard Linkin Park or My Chemical Retards using them? Turns out they aren't just for old fogeys to play Bob Dylan tunes on their acoustic guitars so get used to making those tricky D's, G's, majors, minors and 7ths.

Tip #2: Start at the beginning and take it slow. The rockabilly and rock and roll of the 50's holds more influence over psychobilly than any genre it's inspired, so learning a few simple oldies and practicing them regularly on your own and kicking up the tempo as you get confident playing them at your own pace. here's 3 obvious easy choices that will help you master a few key techniques.

    •    "Brand New Cadillac" - There isn't a single psychobilly band on the planet that doesn't have at least one song that uses this Vince Taylor masterpiece as a template, it uses a classic 12 bar blues structure and a riff that captures the essence of rockabilly perfectly.

    •    "Mystery Train" - I've heard so many versions of this song I couldn't tell you who done the original without checking Wikipedia first to make sure, but I do know when it comes to learning how to do the Travis Picking technique (not to be confused with folk style picking), accept no substitutes. This style takes some getting used to so don't give in, if you don't master it straight away, just keep it simple and play slowly till you get used to alternating your picking fingers.

    •    "Peter Gunn Theme" - Not strictly a rockabilly or psychobilly song, it's closer to early 60's big band swing jazz, but it has Duane Eddy playing one of the most instantly recognisable and badass Gretsch twang single note melodies with expert use of the Bigsby vibrato and if you've been following our advice so far and got yourself a Gretsch 5120 or a Pro Jet then that's what you got the dang thing for, right?

Tip #3: So now you've either got the hang of those or you're a cocky git and you think you're ready to start peeling off some greasy, hot rodding guitar solos. Well for starters you need to be at the very least practicing those old pentatonic blues scales regularly until you know what notes work with which chords in your sleep, then you can at least bluff your way through a solo if you get lost (old stage guitarists trick, that way if you mess up, the audience just thinks you're showboating with some improvisations).Obviously there's more to a good Rock/Psychobilly guitar solo than scales, they're just the base for any good lead guitar work, wether you're a Setzer or Satriani. And that's where Tip #4 comes in...

Tip #4: Learning the licks that make a solo go psycho. As I've already stated back in Tip #2, the best way to learn is from the oldies, wether it's Mad Sin or Meteors, Cramps or Demented, any time you hear those guys take a solo i guarantee there'll be an element of one of these 3 classic leads in there somewhere.

    •    "Johnny B. Goode" - If you don't know this already then I'm amazed how you ever learned to play a guitar, but study that solo Chucks knocking out from his Hollowbody Gibson religiously. Those  bends and double-stops (2-note chords) have been the blueprint for Rock 'n' Roll since Marty Mcfly Rocked the Enchantment Under The Sea Dance way back in 1955. Now, you can too!

    •    "Rock Around The Clock" - As solos go this one is pretty short but don't let that fool you, the guy who came up with this could probably run circles around any of todays virtuoso players. Seriously, playing this might not wow the pants off someone who knows nothing about guitars but anyone who has played it will tell you the run down the scale at the end of this makes Van Halens "Hot For Teacher" feel like "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star", once you can play this note for note you can handle any garden variety guitar solo.

    •    "Stray Cat Strut" - OK, not technically an oldie but gimme a break, it's about 30 years since The Stray Cats hit big with this, and it's one of the first rockabilly songs i taught myself to play since I fell in love with this type of music and not only is it really fun to play but shows just how it's possible to make something as simple and generic as rockabilly music sound unique and original yet still faithful to it's roots. Brian breaks things up with jazzy chords and whole tone scales mixed perfectly with the traditional rockabilly bag of tricks shown in the examples above.

Tip #5: This is not so much of a tip as it is a friendly advice, and that is, once you've got down the basics and you're ready to start writing your own stuff, remember that this is just groundwork and not a "how to do psychobilly properly" article. Start from here and take it in any direction you want, throw in elements from different genres. That's how psychobilly started, by taking rockabilly and fusing it with punk. Take a leaf out of Link Wray's book, experiment, find your own sound, if you like it chances are someone else will too.

Good sound on budget vol.1

Behringer GDI-21 review

So how to get a good psychobilly guitar sound on a budget ?
Behringer GDI-21 is your answer.

Its an analog modelling preamp with all sorts of goodies built into it.
You'll get 3 amp styles to choose from, 3 gain modes and 3 mic placements, which gives you total of 27 combinations.
And you've got drive and level controls with 2-band eq
DI and 1/4" jack outputs.

Sounds from this blue box are very flexible.
Ranging from fenderish punchy clean tones to Mesa boogie style rough distorted sounds.
If you like the Brian Setzer's aggressive, yet cleanish tone, then this pedal will work for you like a dream.
For me, one serious tone will do. But time after time you might be in need for some more distortion or more punch. And with this pedal its just a matter of flicking switches and turning knobs. Its very easy to get a good tone out of this pedal.

Construction of this pedal might seem a bit flimsy, as its made of plastic. But so far it has resisted all my abusive behavior towards it.

A bit about how to use it.

First of all, this pedal is great substitution for amp-less stage.
We all have had the odd situations of arriving to the small venue to discover that there's no guitar amp. 
Because you've got an XLR output, you can plug it straight into to PA and you're ready to go.

Another cool thing about it is that you can get your own sound out of almost any amp regardless of its make.
To do this, the amp needs to have an effects loop.
Simply plug yourself into the effects return and your pedal acts as a pre-amp.

Its very useful if you're using an amp that you've never used before. You'll save lots of time and braincells fiddling with amps eq and gain settings in order to get a good sound.

This is one of the finest piece of equipment that i've ever used. If something should happen to it, i wouldn't hesitate to get another one.

Budget psychobilly guitar vol.2

Gretsch Pro Jet 

Coolest guitar in the history must be the Gretsch Duo Jet.
Played by great guys like Cliff Gallup ,Roy Orbison ,Neil Young to Joe Perry and Billy Zoom.
But there's a catch.
Not all of us can afford a real Duo Jet, even the newer re-issues cost you an arm and a leg.

Fortunately for us - psychobillies with low budget, Gretsch has released in their electromatic series an affordable workhorse called Pro jet.

It comes in many different configurations. With or without bigsby vibrato, single and double cut away and 3 different finishes: gold and silver sparkle and black gloss.

Im referring to my G5235 which is black with a single cutaway and bigsby .

Gretsch has done its very best in carefully choosing the electromatic Pro Jet’s features. There is very little to be wished for.  
It has chambered mahogany body with set-in mahogany neck, dual Gretsch mini-humbuckers, and Bigsby® B50 vibrato
I got it second hand, but i assume its set-up and ready to play out of the box if you get it brand new.
Its built like a tank and is very tolerant to abuse and stays tune well.

Sound of this guitar is pretty unique, thanks to the chambered body and special designed mini-humbuckers which are not featured in any other guitars. Between the two pickups you can get a huge range of tones. Varying from soft n' warm neck pickup to cold n' crunchy bridge pickup tones.
Its not hard to get a decent distortion sound out of this guitar. I've done some really heavy grunge stuff on this guitar and it still sounds good.

Its my favorite guitar and
Its been serving me well on stage and in studio. It's definitely built to last.

Little bit about cons and mods.

As im a rhythm player, I prefer a bit higher action. That makes the string angle on the bridge a bit smaller. And using bigsby frantically might result in string breakage, usually when you least expect it.
Changing the bridge will cure that. It's an easy job because the original bridge is a standard tune-o-matic which means you'll have many options.

For example you can replace it with a roller bridge, although many people don't like roller bridges as they supposedly eat up the sustain. I've put a roller bridge on my guitar and haven't notice any loss of sustain.
Also you've got an option of numerous bar bridges like Compton and Tru-arc or even gretsch space control.

There are other mods that you can do to make it look and sound more like a real thing.

Common mod that people like to do is changing the pickups in order to improve the sound.
There's quite a selection out there but most respected name amongst rockabilly and psychobilly guitarist is Tv Jones.
To change the mini-humbuckers to Tv Jones pickups 
requires a bit of woodworking and wits, but its not that hard.
They've got instructions on Tv Jones website on how to do it.

Another easy mod to commence is to change the bigsby (or add one if you got the stop tail version).
Most people don't like the B50 (also known as horseshoe) bigsby system . As it gets squeaky rather fast and don't look right.
This mod is not hard to do either. Only thing you have to note is to get a bigsby system with a string tension bar - B7 or B12 style.
B3 style bigsby will work, but might result strings poppin out of their place on the bridge and loss of sustain.

Other mods include adding the extra volume knobs and a "mud" switch, but these require a bit more serious skills so i wont go into that.

Hope that you found something useful from above
And don't forget to stay psycho !

Budget psychobilly guitar vol.1

Gretsch electromatic G5120 review

If you're looking for a great psychobilly guitar and you're on a budget, Gretsch G5120 is for you.
It has that classic Gretsch look and more important - tone, without the price tag.

Everything that needs to be there is there:
Full hollow body, two gretsch styled humbuckers, bigsby, thumbnail inlays on rosewood fingerboard and G-arrow volume/tone knobs.

Build quality of this guitar is amazing. Especially to consider the price.
The neck is set in perfectly, and the fret work is some of the best I've felt.
Tuners might look flimsy but they are doing their job great and the guitar stays in tune very well.
To play this guitar is absolute joy. Neck feels really nice and slick, also its not too thick or too thin. Just right.
Its a reliable instrument. I've been gigging with it numerous times and it never let me down.

Another thing which was a really nice surprise, as i got it brand new, was that it was set up perfectly when it arrived.
Intonation and action was absolutely flawless.
It was wound with D'addario 11's and all i had to do is tune it up and start playing.

Soundwise its very versatile. You can get a nice smooth, jazzy clean sound with a neck pickup. Or a sparkly twang from bridge pickup.
Add a bit of overdrive or distortion and it turns to a true rocker.
Tones you can get from this guitar can range from Jazz, country and rockabilly to full on hard-rock and psychobilly.
Obviously You can't go too far with distortion as it's a hollow body, but im sure that no one wants to play Slipknot on this guitar.
However, if you do want to crank up the drive button all the way to 11 , but some tape over the f-holes and you should be sorted.

I can't recommend this guitar enough.

Another Fender Frontman 25r mod

Another modification that you can do is a bit trickier and its meant for someone who has a bit more experience in soldering and who has more requirements in terms of sound.

That mod will clean up the sound of this amp and makes it less noisy.
It makes the clean channel really crisp and sparkly.
The drive channel will be much more clear and less muddy.

In theory its simple: Change the 5 pre-amp chips on the circuit board to a low-noise, hi-fidelity OPA2134 chips.

In reality its a bit trickier.

So if you're brave enough lets start.

I assume you've already acquired 5 of the aforementioned chips.

Now its time to separate the chassis from the rest of the amp.
Undo the speaker connection and remove 4 black screws on the top of the amp that are holding the chassis.
Gently take the chassis out from the cabinet.
Now you've got the chassis out and can see all the guts inside.
You need to get underneath the circuit board. But theres some wires from the circuit board to the power socket, switch and transformer.
You've got two options really:
1) Undo all the connections to get the circuit board out.
2) Commence the modification with all the connections intact.

I went with the option nr.2 because first of all the wires can't be easily unplugged and second, you need to put them back as they were and theres quite a lot of them.
When the wires are intact you can still access the necessary parts. It just requires a bit of acrobatic soldering :)

Lets carry on, shall we ?

Pull out all the control knobs on the front panel, remove the nuts and washers holding them in place. Remove that little screw holding the aux input in place.       
Underneath the chassis remove the two screws that are holding the heat sink in in place.
Now you can start working on the circuit board. Undo the 2 wires coming from reverb tank (remember which way they were)
Remove the screws holding the circuit board in place and very gently pull the circuit board so all the pot shafts are coming out from their mounting holes.
You might have to fiddle around with it for a while, but be patient and extremely careful.
Eventually you should be able to lift the circuit board up and see the other side of it.

If you've managed to come this far, then congratulations ! Hardest part is actually over.

Now you can de-solder the old chips and solder in the new ones.
Make sure you solder them in right way around. Theres a little mark on the chips and a little marking on the circuit board. If you pay attention you cant go wrong.

After you've done your soldering, assemble it all back together.

Plug it in and prepare to be amazed !
 
 Thanks to David Moore from www.wholenote.com

Fender Frontman 25r amp modding

This amp is the bullocks !
And perfect if you wanna play psychobilly.

It's pretty basic. You'll get 2 footswitchable channels, 3 band eq, headphone jack, aux in and spring reverb.

It has a very nice crisp clean sound.
Drive channel might be a bit on a heavy side for some but not bad if you like a classic hard-rock distortion.
If you'll plug in your favorite overdrive or distortion pedal into the clean channel, it'll be guaranteed not to offend your ears.
This amp doesn't mind pedals.

I really like the reverb in this little baby.
Under the hood there's a real spring reverb tank and it's quite sensitive which means you can get that really spooky 50's horror movie graveyard sound.

Description says that its for home practicing but
with minor modding you'll get a small but vicious amp that doesn't let you down at the band practice and/or when gigging.

So lets get down to it.

Essential thing that you want to do, is change the speaker.
I chose Eminence Ragin' Cajun' (10" 75w)

First of all it'll really brings out that nice Fender clean sound
And second, it'll let you crank up the amp without any speaker distortion or farting.

To remove the old speaker, first undo the speaker connectors at the back of the amp. Then undo two black screws on the sides of the amp. These are holding the grill so be careful not to let the grill fall out when you do that.
When removing the old speaker from the grill, first caution you must take is to remove as much of the green sticky stuff around the bolts.
That's there to prevent the nuts from unscrewing themselves due to vibration. If you don't do that you'll risk to destroy the counter thread which holds the bolt in place
and the result is loosely turning bolt with stuck nut on it i.e. very bad and nearly hopeless. (If that happens, you'll need a junior hack saw)

After you've removed the old speaker, its time to drop in the new one. Note the speaker connector position, anywhere between 9 and 12 o'clock is fine.
Attach the grill back to amp and connect the cables (black is - and white is +)

And you're ready to rock !

Quick indroduction of Psychobilly

Psychobilly is genre of music, usually described as mixture of fast, vicious rockabilly and punk.
It's often characterized by lyrical references to science fiction, horror and exploitation films, violence, lurid sexuality, and other topics generally considered taboo, though often presented in a comedic or tongue-in-cheek fashion. Psychobilly is generally played with an upright double bass instead of the electric bass more common in modern rock music.

The term "psychobilly" was first used by Wayne Kemp when he penned the Johnny Cash song "One Piece at a Time," a Top 10 hit in 1976, where he makes reference to a "psychobilly Cadillac", although this song has nothing musically to do with Psychobilly. It came into use as a genre a few years later, when the Cramps described their music as "psychobilly" and "rockabilly voodoo" on flyers advertising their upcoming shows. Although the Cramps rejected the idea of being a part of the psychobilly scene, they, along with artists such as Screamin' Jay Hawkins and the Stray Cats, are considered important precursors to psychobilly. Musically speaking, there are also antecedents in the garage rock scene of the 1960s and the pub rock scene of the 1970s.

The very first verifiable psychobilly band is considered to be The Meteors in south London in 1980. With one member being part of the rockabilly subculture, another being part of the punk subculture, and the last being a horror movie fan, their musical ideas overlapped to begin psychobilly as it exists today. The Meteors also invented the concept of psychobilly being a-political, by encouraging their shows to be a "politics-free" zone in order to avoid disputes among fans, as was becoming common in the punk rock scene of the time. The Meteors' second LP, Wrecking Crew. It is considered a classic and influential psychobilly album.

While the psychobilly of the early 1980s (the Meteors, the Sharks, Batmobile) was similar to punk or 1960s garage rock, with obvious rockabilly influences, the psychobilly of the later 1980s and 1990s (the Nekromantix, Demented Are Go, the Klingonz, Mad Sin, Asmodeus, Milwaukee Wildmen) had a different sound which was a bit harder.

The current psychobilly is closer to the American psychobilly sound (Tiger Army, The Spectres, The Knuckle Draggers, the Koffin Kats, Los Gatos Locos, the Barnyard Ballers, The Young Werewolves, The Beards and The Matadors).

Source: Wikipedia

Welcome !

Welcome to the psychobillyguitar.com
Blog for a psycho guitarist

Within upcoming weeks you can expect gear reviews, lessons, interviews with players, various articles and news regarding psychobilly scene.

So, keep checking back !