Obligatory Guitar Solo :: Mike Neir's Page

Nothing really noteworty to report on the events of today except that Matt proved to Steven and I that it is possible to sniff packets over a switched network even if the traffic isn't directed towards you... Guess that shows our naievity. I guess Steven and I were living in the land of THEORY where sniffing anything but your own traffic isn't possible, but in practice it is due the lovely layers of the TCP stack. You can't sniff switched layer 2 traffic unless it's directed to you, but you can fool layer 3 into directing traffic to you, which makes it real easy to sniff. Oh well... Matt wins, this time.

On a completely different subject, I've been noticing a different trend as of late when it comes to the guitar and what I've been playing on it. Ever since I started playing the guitar, I've always been quite content just playing rhythm stuff, laying down the foundation that the song is based on, not really choosing to be flashy in what I play. I've pretty much pulled a 180 in the last few months though. Every time I pick up the guitar and plug in, I'm not really interested in playing the same old power chords over the same old songs anymore. I've been playing completely random stuff off the top of my head, and it's mostly lead-type stuff. I wouldn't believe for a second that I'm actually good at playing in that style or that I have 1% of the musical knowledge and passion that I would need to actually sound good, but I'm doing it anyways. Perhaps it's just because I'm so incredibly bored with playing the same old Metallica and Megadeth songs that I've played hundreds of times... bored with the small palette of sounds that I've made on an instrument that's capable of so much more. Who knows. I'd like to get back into a more regular habit of playing since I've kinda become lazy with it. It's hard to believe that I couldn't be more creative with the music that I play if I worked at gaining some more knowledge and skills. I had a glimmer of originality when I was playing today... a lead lick that sounded very cool to my ears and wasn't something that I just mindlessly replicated from some other song. It would be sweet to be able to do that with regularity.

Ross S. :: 02/12/2004, 3:46 am :: Reply

When you get in a band come play in Austin, biatch! (Local places in Lansing area BLOW)

>:-)

Alex :: 02/12/2004, 7:18 pm :: Reply

I consider my dorm room a local venue. if your interested.

Phil :: 02/13/2004, 2:16 am :: Reply

That's always a great feeling. It always comes out of nowhere when your not really thinking about anything and just playing, then you go "damn, what the hell was that?". I usually forget what it was the next day, but not always... ;^)

Jonny K :: 02/18/2004, 1:17 pm :: Reply

Good stuff. The best way to expand your playing possibilities is to expand on what you listen to. I know you really dig the heavy stuff a lot, but you might be pleasantly surprised by some of the other stuff out there. I would recommend checking out some older stuff from U2, The Cure, or anything from The Smiths. The Smiths in particular have some incredible guitar work in them (Johnny Marr, their guitarist is a genius). Also, Radiohead and Coldplay have some really neat stuff going on. You may not dig all of it, but it'll at least give you a completely different perspective on guitar sounds than what you're used to hearing.