I have never played with a slide. Today I bought two to use with my first CBG: one glass, one brass. They are both medium, so I assume they do come in different sizes. Trying to use either on my ring finger, they both fit very loose. Is this normal, or should they fit a bit snug?
I can see it is going to take a fare bit of practice to use the slide without all sorts of buzzes and squawks. I see in some online lessons that you use your other fingers to mute the strings to prevent this from happening. Practice, I imagine... :-)
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Muting with the down hill fingers is to prevent harmonics. It will not stop the buzzes and squawks. You need to press firmly enough that when you puck the string, said string does not pull away from the slide. But dont press so firmly the string hits the fret. A high action helps.
Mine do fit very loosely, I hold them in place by bending my finger ala Mr. Johnson. I find if they are too tight I cant bend my finger enough to get them into place. Do what ever works for you.
As for the home made slides, I gave up on the string and fire techniques after a couple of failures. I found a dremel with a cutting wheel and a lot of patience works very well. Once you have it cut a few twists with a piece of steel wool works very well to take off the sharp edges.
Yep there`s all kinds of slides, but you can only but this type from me.
I was having a similar problem. I'm a cheapskate, so I bought a 3/4" diameter copper pipe coupling at Home Depot for 98¢ to use as a slide. It was a little wide on my skinny fingers, so I put it on my middle finger. It works ok. When I've made guitars as gifts, I've given the recipient a copper coupling to start out with.
I ended up making a slide from a wine bottle neck that fits on my ring finger really well. That's pretty much all I use now. I'm still a cheapskate.
Take an empty wine bottle and score it around the neck with a glass cutter (however long or stubby you want it). Then grab the bottom of the bottle and submerge the neck into a pot of boiling water. Take it right from the hot water and stick it into ice water (it may take a couple of times) and the bottle should break along the score line you made. Then sand down the sharp edges..........and viola, you have a glass slide.
(my first attempt didn't break off right, so I had to drink another bottle of wine and try again)
I can't get the hang of wine bottle slides so I go for straight neck bottles. My favorites are:
(my first attempt didn't break off right, so I had to drink another bottle of wine and try again)
Oh darn! I hate it when that happens! :-) Looks like a nice slide.
I visited Guitar Center and bought a couple that fit much better. Now I just need to practice so that the slide engages cleanly without making terrible noises.
Start by watching this.....https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HhMWkoKodc&feature=share&li...
then get randy to make ya one ;-)
That's really cool! Are they "affordable?" :-)
They are artwork! I just bought my first half and half. For what they are, the price is excellent. However, I played for a few years with just a $1.75 steel bushing that is about like a 3/4" socket. I'm not going to tell you what to do, but my approach was to learn and become happy with my results using less expensive slides first. Once I was happy I could actually play something descent I began to consider better looking and better performing slides like Randy's. That was just my approach to it and your experience may be different.
BTW, I have only played my steel bushing once to compare to the tone of the Mojobone slide. Haven't picked the steel up since then.
yup as the others have said , ya kinda gotta find what works for you . i myself don't trail the fingers .. but i get away with not clanging that much ,, just through doing it for awhile .
also ,, if your slide is too loose , you can always put a strip or 3 or one sided sticky felt in there to make it comphy .
my old stand-by slide is a light mini medicine bottle ;-)
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