haloguy's advice column

This is a question for you drummers out there!

I just purchased a double bass pedal. Well not only can I get the timing right but I also get exhausted from using it!

Any tips are welcome.

Like doing certain exercises at the gym?

The best thing you can do is to practice with a metronome. Start slowly too. Find a speed where you can do it flawlessly, then increase the speed only slightly and practice there. Keep doing that until you're a god.

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What does "gain" mean in terms of music, like when it says gain on a preamp or an amplifier. On my acoustic amp it pretty much is tho only other thing that changes volume besides the master, is this correct? At first I just thought it meant distortion but maybe not?

You're right, gain is basically the distortion. However, distortion means you're distorting the sound and making it sound heavier. Gain is actually increasing the input volume into the speaker, which is basically TRUE distortion. Gain is better than distortion, but if you're into metal or hardcore it's good to have a fair amount of both. Keep in mind though, with a lot of gain comes a lot of feedback and unwanted buzzing noise, but you can buy an MXR noisegate to fix that.

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okay im 14/f and my bf spent the night at my house, we made out big time. i sat on his lap facing him, and he went hard, i think he might have spermed but he doesn't know, i was wearing sweat pants and so was he so is their a posibility that im pregnat?

there is no chance in hell you're pregnant. even if you had unprotected sex, it wouldn't be a 100% chance that you would be.

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I think I might be Schizophrenic.And Im not lying when I say this either. I feel really weird saying this I've only told three people. Well,Sometimes I hallucinate demon and demonic and scary weird stuff. Like when I blink... and it happens so fast that by the time my eyes are opened its already gone. But ill remember it. They're really super graphic and realistic and sometimes I will see like... almost shadows with no face or shape. not normal shadows and they like move either fast or slow and theyre scary.
I see those in my room at night all the time. and I see those with my eyes open.This has happened to me my whole life and it seems to get worse as i get older.I will also seem to feel something brush by my shoulder or tug at my clothes and pull at my hair and when I turn around, nothing is thier. I looked schizophrenia up and it says depression and anxiety are common to have along with it. and I have Severe depression and anxiety so that really got me thinking..So yeah can you tell me whats wrong with me and if I should see a doctor. I dont really wanna tell my mom is their a way I can get around telling her and still get help? I told her once when I was little and she didnt belive me.and she always thinks I lie for attention

whether its schizophrenia or not, you should still see a doctor. telling your mom that you feel awful and you think you need to see a doctor could do it, you don't have to specifically say you see things or any of that.

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hey i got help from you like over a year ago and i have the same question and i went over your steps from forever ago, yet it doesnt work with windows vista it seems. when i go to my computer there is no choice for show hidden files under views. can you help please?

are there any other programs that i can just dump my music into itunes?

honestly i have no idea. i have vista, but i havent tried doing that. what you can do is just use a computer with windows xp to drag the individual song files to the desktop, then put them all in a folder and drag it onto the ipod. then they'll all be in a non-hidden folder and put them on vista. i've never tried this so it might not work, but might as well give it a try.

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is this for real: http://www.biggest-cat.com/

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what are some of the best songs from this band? like those songs that will get me into the band. where the songs better before or after iggy went single?

Search and Destroy is their best song in my opinion. I love the guitar, especially all the mini solos throughout.

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I'm suppost to be learning the intro to fade to black and I don't understand how to read this

http://www.fretplay.com/tabs/m/metallica/fade_to_black-crd.shtml

I'm just starting to learn guitar, and i'm not sure how to read that at all... like what notes do I play? Thanks.

Think of that graph of lines as the neck of your guitar. So the bottom line represents the thickest string, and the top line represents the thinnest. So when there's a number on the line thats 2 from the bottom, the note is on that string. As for the number, just count the frets to get to that note. So if it says 12 on the bottom line, you'd go to the thickest string and play the fret with 2 dots, because that's number 12. It takes some getting used to, but tabs are invaluable when learning guitar. And bravo for learning such a good song too lol

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I'm about to start learning how to play the drums. Next weekend I'm going for my first lesson.

I've always wanted to play and I know it obviously requires alot of hand control and doing two different things with your hands and once and what not and I don't know if I'm good at this or not, it's just something I've never thought of so my question is if it turns out my hand control isn't all that hot is it something you can learn and practice or is it something that you're naturally born with?

Also, if anyone plays the drums, any tips?

You can learn to play the drums very well if you just practice A LOT. And what I would recommend (for any instrument in the rock genre) is learn the fastest, hardest, and most complicated metal songs you can play at your level. Obviously at the start you'll be playing basic practicing things but once you get the feel, playing harder faster songs can increase your rate of improvement. Not even necesarily faster, just more complicated. If you focus on one easy song all the time you'll end up mediocre. But as long as you dedicate yourself to the instrument, you'll be rockin out in no time.

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How realistic is it to want to self-teach yourself to play the piano?

As in, learning how to read music as well not just actually play?

realistic, but challenging. I learned guitar (which is fairly similar to piano in terms of musical theory) and I had problems with teaching myself reading and things like that. A teacher may give you an example that brings it all into focus, whereas if you're alone you have to just figure it out. It's possible, but I would recommend learning to play fairly well, then finding a teacher for theory.

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... yeah so I need new music. You can give me indiviual songs or bands. Preferably not your typical pop punk band/alternative band that sounds just like everythint else.

My favorite bands are: My Chemical Romance, The Academy Is..., Fall Out Boy, Pencey Prep, Jack's Mannequin, Something Corporate, The Rocket Summer, All Time Low, The Beatles, Cartel, The Hush Sound, Paramore, Rise Against, Taking Back Sunday, +44, Blink 182.

[This part is not necessary to know to give me some songs, I just feel like explaining.]
I love MCR, and I just can't find another band I love as much as them. So I'm desperately searching to find another band that I love like I love them.

I pretty much hate those bands except for blink, and that one song "dead" by mcr, but if you like them you'll probably like jimmy eat world.

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http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html
On that website it has many downloads and I'm not sure which ones I'm supposed to download! Can anyone tell me which ones I'm supposed to download and why? (I have Windows XP

download.com

just go there to download gimp, it's much simpler and guaranteed virus free.

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14/f

i'm not really religious at all. my family doesn't go to church or anything and one day my parents found out i don't really believe in god. and they kinda like freaked and said we're going to start going to church and stuff [we never did]/ k so i have some questions about all this religion stuff.

-who wrote the bible?

-i mean really how is it possible that theres some great god up in the sky?

-who all thought of this? like there had to be someone who came up with this?

-who created these so called sins?

-if being gay is a "sin", why did this god create them?

-how do people know anything of what they looked like or did?

thanks =]

many religious folks would tell you it was holy men who witnessed history and put it into words on a page. even if this was the case, the bible has been re-translated, and edited SO many times throughout history it's surprising anyone believes the things in it are true. For example, people talk about the virgin mary. In the old aromaic (the langauage spoken when jesus was alive) virgin literally means young girl, not someone who has never had sex. The church uses things like this to its advantage, and therefore the bible should not be taken nearly as seriously as it is.

I don't belive there's some grat god up in the sky, but anything's possible. One thing to think about is the fact that miracles seemed to stop right around the time when people could record history in detail. This indicates that there were no miracles, and people told stories about god intervening when he didn't.

I believe that in order to prevent chaos and create a system other than government for controlling people, religion was created. People aren't able to focus exclusively on knowledge and real life because a lot of people are idiots and need something to believe that doesn't require questioning or thought of any kind, and that in my opinion is why religion was created.

Being gay isn't wrong, it is a sin (but what does that count for anyway?), and it isn't normal. Then again having piercings isn't normal, but a lot of people have them and there's nothing necessarily wrong with them.

I know i'm a pessimist and kind of a non-believer, but please take into account at least some of what I said.

By the way, my family never goes to church either. I used to be a devout Lutheran, and I went to a Lutheran elementary school for 5 years until I finally questioned the things I was being told and realized how ridiculous a lot of it was.

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what exactly is it?
and what does it do to you if you take it like as a drug.

it's a painkiller, and an extremely powerful one at that. it sedates you, and has a very high rate of addiction so it's only good to take when absolutely necessary.

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is masterbating a sin?

yes, according to the catholic church. however the church also says all sins are forgiven if you repent. so essentially, do whatever the hell you want as long as you atone for your sins. isn't religion dandy?

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Ok well my race, Vietnamese (I don't know if any other Asian race does this) does this thing when we're sick and I'm not sure if it’s supposed to be safe or not.

When we're really sick, we lay on our back and get someone else to put like lotion or something on our back and get this special spoon (Asians use to drink soup with) and scratch our backs really hard and stop when it's so red with like dots that looks like it's going to bleed.

I frankly don't think it works nor is it safe. Wouldn't scratching your back mean damaging your skin? But we're potion lotion on it so...

But it's red as if it's going to bleed. Doesn't sound good to me.

And if Caucasians see it, they'd think our husbands whipped us or something!

I asked my mom how in the world is it safe. Did the doctor suggest it to her? She says no but everyone of our race does it as a custom.

Now, just because everyone else does it doesn’t mean you have to do it, right?

I remember the one time I was sick and my dad did it for me cuz he said I had to and it hurt like HELL!

My mom says that if it hurts then it's working and makes you feel not tired anymore.. That doesn't even make sense. Of course it doesn't make you feel tired anymore, you're in pain!

What do you think of this? If you're a nurse and telling me this or you're advice is partially from a professional, please add that in.

Thank you.

this sounds similar to the Korean practice of chi'ro . the basic idea is to create better blood circulation. I don't think this works. The person only feels better because the pain from the procedure is gone. I don't think this will harm you, but it won't feel good and it won't help either.

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ive been taking guitar lessons for like a half a year to a year. im thinking about quitting for a little while due to money issues. what are some good books that i can continue my teaching with by myself? ive been playing for about a year, so im not completely dumb to guitar playing. i havent gotten into theory yet, like sharps and flats and keys and things like that. but i know the basics. i can play pretty well and i know barre cords, slides, and all those types of things. i use tabs. so, what are some books that i can continue my level of playing from? i guess you could say im a step above begginer, but not much. websites and specific books names would be very helpful.

thanks so much!

theory is important, but it really won't take very long to learn. you should wait to take on that kind of learning until you can pay for lessons, because some things are difficult to understand unless someone explains it to you. i would recommend tab books from a music store that have the music and tabs, anything that you like to listen to that you can't quite play, some songs you can work toward being able to play.

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I just got off of school. Are there any songs that talk about summer and summer vacation?

school's out - alice cooper

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Hi i'm a teenage girl who has given up on relationships and everything else in life.

Before i commit suicide i want to have a hookup with someone.

How do I go about getting a hookup with a guy who won't hurt me or abuse me?

thx

This is obviously bogus. However, if you are sincere you should watch Fight Club. In one scene of that movie, a dying girl (dying from terminal cancer) makes a similar plea. She does so by advertising the fact that she has a number of sexual products in her apartment. Good night and good luck. You have everything to live for

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