First Acoustic Guitar! Need Suggestions and Tips

Hey guys I just got a guitar for christmas, and have always wanted to play. The guitar is your average Fender Acoustic. Lately I have been practicing with chords and trying to play songs. I'm just curious if anyone else here is learning or has learned how to play and could possibly give me any tips or advice. I'm also looking for beginner/intermediate songs to learn how to play. I want to learn an entire song. I can play the opening riffs to Enter Sandman, Boulevard of Broken Dreams, Nothing Else Matters, (Don't Fear) The Reaper, and a few other songs. Any help and suggestions are appreciated

Man... Where to start. I played for many years, and in a couple of bands. When I left the band that I was in, in 2001 or 2002, I pretty much hung up the guitars. Haven't done much since.

I was entirely self-taught. no lessons, no YouTube, no forums. I picked up a few books, including how to read tablature. Tablature is a form of sheet music designed specifically for guitar, where the musician cannot read conventional sheet music. Simple, and handy.

I'd suggest you learn how to read tab (again, very easy) and go from there. Start by learning all the basic major and minor chords, and work up from there.

Keep in mind when trying to play along to recorded music, that it is VERY common for bands to record while being down-tuned a half step or even a full step. So if you normally tune to a reference A, you'd actually end up tuning to G or G#.

Yeah you guys remember Doc's old band...



I'm pretty useless for musical advise, but good luck with it anyway.

Thanks for the advice! I've just started learning tabalature and I feel like I know a good amount of the basic chords. I'm trying to teach myself how to play, with the help of youtube and books of course. I want to get to the point where I can hear a song and just know the chords and strum patterns that go with it. I still need to pick up a capo, seeing that ALOT of songs use them. Alot of songs play in drop D, which is what I'm finding. This is pretty easy to tune. An electric tuner helps too

I'm finding guitar to be a really cool challenge. It is not something anyone can do. I know it will take me a while to learn everything. As of now, barre chords are the biggest PITA. but practice, practice, practice.

I'm trying to find a cool song to play that would be a good song to learn for someone just starting. What song do you recommend Doc?

@mr.modified wrote:

Yeah you guys remember Doc's old band...

Weird. I don't remember playing with Black Sabbath... I DID play some Sabbath SONGS, though... LOL

Oh, well maybe I got the wrong picture or something. I always thought it would be neat to play, but never had enough intrest in it to learn how.