Things Guitarists Should Never Do 

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Played with a bassist who removed the ground pin from his amp. If he made contact with anyone else at any point while playing, we'd both get shocked. We banned that amp from rehearsal REAL quick.

100% Samurai is right on ear plugs for soundchecks, especially when you start playing mid-tier and up venues. I had perfect hearing before I got big with my blues trio, and one show we did a soundcheck and my right ear was right next to a PA stack that was "muted" according to the soundguy. Next thing I know a sharp feedback hit me and I instantly lost some hearing, ear bled, and started me down the painful road of tinnitus. I was 23, and now at 31 I'm partially deaf in that ear and literally can't use ear plugs live cos I won't be able to make out definition in the music

One I would add: Never bring a piece of gear to a gig that you didn't use in practice. I had a bandmate bring a delay pedal to the biggest gig we'd ever played. As we were setting up, we got a microburst of rain and didn't get to sound check. In about the third song of our performance, he hit the pedal for a solo and it sent a burst of feedback that echoed throughout the gorgeous mountain setting that we were playing. We weren't invited back.

Been shocked more than once with an amp that had it's ground prong broken off.

Dude, I had this tech who screwed up my board when I had him re-wire it. And he was SO adamant about me removing the ground cause it'll be better. Thanks for confirming he was full of it haha

This is the single best "beginner" guitar video I have ever seen. I'm a long-time player, so I personally didn't see/hear about anything unknown to me, BUT I would vouch for EVERY concept and every word presented here. This advice is golden. Much of it are ideas that I've offered to my guitar students for decades. Also, there are no wasted words in this presentation. Excellent job.

I love that you mention using jealousy to create something positive, rather than making it toxic, or negative. An awesome outlook, takes practice, but it is such good advice! Thank you

'Never tell yourself you'll be happy if..' That's not only a guitar tip, but a life one lmao

Don't only practice sitting down, unless you never plan on playing with a band, or doing a gig.

I was jamming with friends, in HS. None of us had cut off our ground pin. But... apparently, we were on two separate circuits of the electrical system. I was playing bass, and I swung around, at the same moment our guitar player was swinging in the opposite direction. Our strings connected, and with a flash, spot welded together. We were both forced to change 4 strings.

You raise a lot of important points in this video. The ones that resonated the most with me were the fingernail thing and the amp ground pin. I always keep my fingernails trimmed so short that there's no visible white end, but I clip them first, then file the rest of the way. It's a lot quicker and easier than just filing them all the way down. Back when I was a busker, often playing as much as 8-10 hours a day (not including practicing and teaching) I always kept a tube of cyanoacrylate glue in my guitar case, but it wasn't necessarily just for the occasional fingernail peel situation. I would often get little rips or tears where the fingertip callous gave way to normal skin, and I'd use the superglue to create a seal over the little rip. It also acted as a sort of "instant callous," as I had a bad habit of gnawing on rough bits of skin on my fingertips. As for the grounding pin, I once knew an idiot who cut off his amp's grounding pin. He thought it improved his tone, until he got a bad shock and ended up in hospital from stepping on a wet spot on the stage at an outdoor concert. He got the power plug replaced after he got out of the hospital, some three days later and a whole lot wiser.🤣

My Dad was a Factory Inspector (Now referred to as an HSE Inspector). Most of the fatalities he was called to investigate were where people had bypassed the things that were there to keep them safe. Deaths from removing the Earth from an electric socket were quite common. Some other common causes of fatalities or severe injuries were: Using Duck Tape to cover bare wires; Jamming a spanner to disable the protective shield on cutting machinery, Scaffolding, being a farmer.......

Just in case someone was wondering about it, yes the tuning machine tip also applies to steel and nylon acoustic guitars.

That little tip about tuning. I feel like I've always done that, instinctively. Because when you tune down, you usually overshoot it and have to come back up anyway.

Definitely wear ear plugs, for the snare and cymbals alone. bass tone hurts too if it's too loud.

As a bassist especially practicing with an amp it's very different as there's some SERIOUS air movement! Makes playing extremely different with all the air around you moving.

I put airtags inside my guitars control cavity using a strong 3M double sided tape to stick it to the plastic cover. I also make sure the speaker is disconnected so that other people can't ping it. That way if the guitar gets removed from it's case or a thief thinks the airtag that's following them is in the case they have to work a little harder to find it. Also very much yes on the ear protection! It's not uncool or expensive to protect your ears!

thank you for mentioning the grounding pin, it's disturbing to know how much this gets recommended. especially cause most people will never know how dangerous it actually is.

The thing about selling to the store is valid, but at least they won't agree on $500 via email/dm/whatever, then show up at your house with $100 in nickels and dimes and whine at you when you tell them to fuck off. And then 6 months later, because you've gone through several variations of that, you still haven't moved the thing on.

Great advice (as ever) and great Open-chord course! 🙂 Thanks Sammy-G

Re: selling to the guitar store, Any guitar store I ever knew/or worked for offered no more than 50% of what they could sell it for. Your old place at 60% sounds great! 😄

The only time I feared losing my hearing completely was during a soundcheck when I was in the audience. An electric auto harp made the most howling feedback and I spent the night thinking the PA sucked. It was my favorite gig as a spectator besides that. The ringing in my ears cleared up after two and a half weeks.

This is great stuff. Great insight into the guitar stuff and the life stuff! Thanks for sharing this!

On the "don't remove the ground" topic, I believe that's how Keith Relf died. He had been both the lead singer of the Yardbirds and a founder of Renaissance, whose original lineup was reuniting (under the name Illusion, since a different lineup of Renaissance was still active), and had to restructure after his death.

I remember i went to a party. I played the guitar all the time, another dude smoked too much weed and barfed all over the floor and refused to clean after himself. Guess who wasnt invited to the party the 2nd time?

A ground isolator in the signal path is the fundamentally correct way to eliminate system ground loop problems. A transformer does this by magnetically coupling the signal across an electrically insulated barrier. Ground loop problems are caused by small voltage differences that normally exist between the ‘grounds’ at the send and receive ends of a signal cable. In an unbalanced interface, this ground voltage difference directly adds to the signal. This generally produces hum or buzz in audio. In a balanced interface, the ground voltage difference may reveal inadequate common-mode rejection at the input stage of the equipment or other design defects.

One I learned recently, if you played a gig or rehearsel where you sweat. Make sure to not put the guitar straight back into the case/bag. Let the sweat evaporate for a bit. Same with tube amps and quick changeovers, give tubes as much time to cool down before moving them after a gig.

Great video. Lots of subtle, well thought-out tips even for experienced players. Thanks!

A great mix of tips, thank you!

Excellent advice - all around! Thank you so much for this video!

i absolutely agree with the tuning up one. i have a guitar with not so good tuners and whenever i tune down, pitch goes down even more but when i do it like he said, tuning is stronger and more stable.

Been playing for ages….still learned a bunch of good “don’ts”. Thanks Sammy!

As sound engineer: use earplugs during the sound check. Feedback is the #1 worry, we are often looking for the edges deliberately to know where it is so occasional whistle is possible. Be prepared for it. We are also often troubleshooting behind the desk and since time is of the essence, that troubleshooting is quick and dirty, wires may be connected while hot. Nothing that breaks the gear but can make your ears ring if you aren't wearing protection. Everything that was said in that bit happens about every single soundcheck as a guarantee. And the millisecond drumset is set, you know what will happen next. The animal stays happy in its cage if it can do that one drum fill, so, wear earplugs.

Nailed it. I especially like the life lesson there at the end about the hedonic treadmill. Lots of wisdom from such a young feller.

By your comments, you seem to be attuned into harmony of life this will serve you well in life. 😊 The session is brilliant for everyone involved in getting into guitars . Best video I’ve seen on it all so far. Technical advice to, some people skills but when put together it’s golden advice that really needs to be followed if you want to get ahead with out hassles or death in case of tampering with power cords ( that’s just plain wrong). All very sound presentation about guitars I’d highly recommend. Cheers Colin.

This was quite refreshing. Thanks a lot for the good advice!

Thank you for posting this video! A lot of very sound (hehe) and useful tips. All the best!

I played my first chord yesterday and now I want a dumble. That’s a natural progression, right?

Good video! And I certainly agree on the ground pin thing.

Always tune up when the string is out of tune! Thank you! Finally someone said it

Great Video, thank you for the advice!

I didnt know about the ground buzz trick, thanks for the tip SG!

This was a very useful and informative vid. Thanks!

Also make sure any gig space has ground on the microphones. Keith Richards was almost killed by a shock from an ungrounded microphone several decades ago. (This may be why he now cannot be killed by conventional means.)

Love It ! Great advice !

Awesome episode, love the good advice 👏🏼

So motivational. Thank you❤

This was good advice! Thanks dude!

Check the links in the video. They are off quite a bit. For instance Tense Up starts at 3:52 but you have got it at 2 minutes 53 seconds. This throws everything else off.

Excellent advice!

Great vid, thank you!

Yes! That last one (and the ‘don’t electrocute yourself’) is really important. I so bad with that last one, always needing just one more thing. Always. It never stops.

Great advice sir!

Well said my sage. Thank you for your wisdom ❤

When you clip a fingernail it's like breaking a 2x4 piece of wood in half and it leaves small jagged edges along the cut. Make sure to file down your nails after cutting them creating a smooth surface preventing the cut nails tiny jaggies from catching and splitting the nail.

Great clever video!!! Thanks

The helpful guy who "Here let me plug that in for ya" and doesn't know you have an adaptor for the two prong socket helps out by breaking off the ground pin of the new cable which your Amp Tech installed on your vintage Fender last week.

Great video as always SammyG and also that Jazzmaster looks gorgeous.

Drummers don't have that house party issue. People are always thrilled if you arrive at a chill gathering and start blasting solo's on your 22-piece DW kit.

Bruv you're doing an awesome job! Been you're learner now for quite a few years Keep up, and thanks a bunch 🙂👍

My grandma is usually imposing sonics wherever she goes if it is at the house she asks for a acoustic guitar, if we’re in a music store she has to show the clerks she can play violin it bugs everyone except me

@8:44 I felt like I needed to hear that. Most importantly because that can be applicable to other aspects of your life. Such as exercising, studying, getting through the shift of the day etc.

These were really good. Thank you

Hey SG, I do not play guitar and do not even care about playing guitars. I do care about you and you frequently give great general advice. Like this video. Thanks.

Wow! Some great advice!!

I'm guilty of not wearing ear protection, even though while working at a music studio I've been blessed with drummers testing out their kits while I'm mic-ing the kick drum!!!

Love the combination of physical and mental pro tips 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼

thank you, glad to have stumbled upon this video

Growing up in Venezuela, outlets didn’t have the ground pin hole. And we didn’t have that much access to the adapter, so most amps were missing the ground pin haha

As a recovering acoustic-guitar-at-the-function guy, I’ve had the fortune of being around people who were very chill with it, so it can depend on who you’re with. Main thing I’d say is Know The Vibe. If everyone’s just chilling and hanging out, it might be fine to bring your guitar and just provide a little background ambience. Maybe don’t tear into a complex and really flashy finger style piece if the vibe isn’t concert hall performance. Also understand what hangouts the guitar may be welcome at, vs. the times where it comes off kinda presumptuous to have brought your guitar with you in the first place. Social dynamics are hard, at the end of the day just don’t take it too personally. If you’re like me, over time you’ll just kinda laugh at yourself for having done it in the first place and move on.

Thanks for some great advice. However, your first piece (tuning up) needs a bit more. As a professional guitarist, teacher, and guitar maker, I always: first, as you said, tune UP. But THEN, I give it a bit of a pull around the octave area, THEN re-tune. THEN give it ANOTHER pull and again re-tune. REPEAT this until the string keeps it's pitch after pulling it! Also, although a guitar should NEVER be left in the trunk (I used to wrap my guitars in kid's sleeping bags, which insulates them and keeps them out of view thru windows). However, my wife and I are professional musicians, and on the road permanently, so I built an insulated vault in the back of our tow vehicle, so the guitars still get some extremes. It's more important to let them acclimate BEFORE opening the cases! As for humidity, well, I've had many very expensive vintage archtops that were well over 50 years old and never had humidification in their lives and survived just fine, but yes, it's still better to keep humidity stable IF POSSIBLE.

Straight to the point. Love it

Bro dropping the knowledge like me as a baby

60% for a used instrument from a guitar store is actually a deal. I sold a P-Bass once to a guitar store that had some major issues. Weeks later I found it listed by them as is for over 3 times the price they paid me. This was also the same place that offered me $300 for a Les Paul. The followig year I found some at a musicians flea market marked at over ten times the price.

very good video samurai sama. As a guitarrist, personally a don't like play guitar at parties or social gatherings, I don't wanna force myself to learn "popular" songs or play that song everyone plays at these kind of situations. 🤷

The explanation for the ground pin in the video isn't quite right. The ground pin is tied to the amp chassis, which should be electrically connected to anything else metal on the amp. When you plug your instrument in, your strings, tuners, etc are also connected to ground. If something goes wrong with your amp and a live wire comes into contact with the chassis, it will trip the breaker and prevent you from being shocked. Without a ground pin, the metal in your amp as well as your instrument are now hot. If you're touching your strings and touch anything else properly grounded, like a mic or another musician with a functional amp, you (or both of you) will be shocked.

I learned about grounding amps the fun way after picking up a second hand one where the plug was bad and wasn't grounding properly. Puts a new meaning to electric guitar .....

The ground pin isn’t a issue in the uk because u can’t plug anything in without one

Thank you for this

I keep a few circuit testers in my gear bag and guitar and amp cases. Not expensive and it's hard to believe how many places are wired wrong.

Great video my guy!

in the UK if you remove the ground pin, you cant use the plug. That pin pushes a switch (of sorts) that opens the slots for the other two pins.

All old and very important information! 👍👍 Michael Bloomfield always used to say: keep those fingers loose;)

The earplugs is definitly the best advice you could give to young musicians!!! I ruined my ears in the 90 because of the lack of earplugs (it wasn't easily available at that time...)...

Great tips, thanks! I'm guilty of your last tip. I see so many guitarists on RU-vid that are way better than me. I usually think, "I'll be happy when I can play as well as that guy."

I sell gear at guitar stores a lot of the time, take the 50-60% of what they think they can sell it for, and I'm content with it. You get the money now, nobody wastes your time with lowball offers or failing to show up, no opportunity for scammers to try their crap on you. For a lot of items, paying half of its value to not have to deal with the hassles of finding a legit buyer is totally worth it.

Please please keep up these videos!

Very inspirational.

I’ve been playing guitar since 1974. And I have always heard it sad never tune down always tune up not down. Yeah and I’ve also heard of people cutting the ground cord off of a plug. That is very deadly dangerous. Great advice. Thanks for the video.👍🏼👍🏼😁😎

wise wise words great vid bud!

I miss playing live and last summer my sister moved and her new neighbors had a teenage son that could play and sing. So we played and entertained the campfire or just group of drunk people that wanted to sing something. The teenager moved away for college but I still wanted to jam around the campfire. Most the time it was on request, but I can admit sometimes I just wanted to play. Didn't force anyone to listen to me. Would even wander off and play away from the group. But I still totally felt like "that guy". I hate that feeling.

If your getting noise through the ground it's because the building has a wiring problem. carry a power conditioner with you. Sure it's more gear but it is worth it to save your amp.

Yep! I agree with all of this

Awesome vid Sammi G!!!!!!

Pretty well spot on all round 😊

The house I lived in before the one I own now was built in the 1800's and was renovated around WW2 (this was 16 years ago) none of the electrical outlets in the old house had outlets that had a third hole for a ground pin so for the entire time I lived there I had to either use adapters or yank the ground pins. Usually I just yanked the pins

Always tune UP. THANK YOU. I always tell people this, they never get it. It eliminates mechanical slop. Same for tightening wheels on a car or motorcycle, or anything. If you build an engine and the spec says 80 ft/lbs for a particular bolt, and you take it to 85 by mistake, you have to go below it first, then tighten.

Oh man, it's been so many years since I've had that fingernail separation thing that I almost forgot how it feels like. It's even worse than the skin pain you get when starting out on a guitar.

8:50 I may be weird because I have the opposite experience, I'm only happy if I'm learning something new, even though I know I'm not necessarily going to get great pleasure from completing the learning process on that particular piece. It's OK playing and practicing the stuff I know, but I find it hard to get motivation to play at all if I'm not constantly learning a new tune.