Student Spotlight: Jeramie McCloud

This months student spotlight is on a 25 year old self professed "army brat" Jeramie McCloud. Jeramie has been playing guitar seriously for 11 years now. He has been taking lessons from me since February 2010. He is an accomplished metal player. He is part of a band from Texas called "Shadow Kill Clan." The band has released a full length cd and it is brutally terrific! I will send you links at the end to check it out. Some of his influences are Slayer, Korn, Slipknot, Pink Floyd, Micheal Jackson and Sade. Being a military brat he has lived all over the country. His dream guitar would be a custom 7 string Gibson Les Paul with Seymour Duncan Blackout pick ups. I asked Jeramie with all the places you have played what places would you like to play? He told me he would love to play in Antarctica because its a cold desolate place, Japan because that's a stop for every one that's a metal great or even space!!!! If he could play guitar for anyone that's ever been around in history it would be Micheal Jackson. He is a self professed Micheal Jackson freak! If he could tour the world with any band it would be Prodigy. Jeramie got into playing guitar because his grand dad played. He wanted to play metal because there are not too many black people represented in metal. Another thing that got him into playing was seeing Hall and Oats on a TV Christmas special playing Jingle Bells and the white stratocaster being played mesmerized him. The Van Halen video "Hot For Teacher" was also a turning point. Seeing the close up of guitar god Eddie Van Halen got him the guitar bug. Why did Jeramie want to come get lessons? He wanted to unlearn bad habits and be more than just a "metal" guy. He just wanted to get better and be able to convey more emotion in his music.The things Jeramie have gotten the most out of lessons? He has had alot of his questions answered and it is just plain exciting to come. The most embarrassing thing on his ipod? Britney Spears and other bubble gum pop!! Jeramie is an accomplished metal player with the desire to expand his musical horizons. I am pleased to be his teacher. Shadow Kill Clan is a great band. I enjoy it .If you like metal you will too. He is an easy going guy with awesome musical aspirations and hopes to be part of our countries armed forces. So here is to you Jeramie....Keep Rockin.....Keep Playing.......and Keep Having Fun!!!!!!!

to check out Shadow Kill Clan go to

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdC6isMCKuA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4R749RMwdzQ&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58qUXwvmqv4

http://www.youtube.com/shadowkillclan.com


http://www.myspace.com/shadowkillclan

Learn From.....

This is called "Learn From." Basically its just about something that you can use to become a better musician. It can be anything....from a person, to a band, to an experience. The first one I am gonna do is musician magazines. There are alot of ones to choose from, Modern Drummer\Guitar World. They are great to learn from for a lot of reasons. The first one, and my personal fave, is the lessons. There are some real crappy ones, like the flavor of the week ones. Korn guitar players did one in guitar world years back and it was no good, but majority of them are informative. You also got product reviews. They are pretty honest too. You can also look at the little ads in the back classifieds and find a bunch of info on anything from new practice books to new start up company amps. If you need it they also have decent tabs in them for the most part too. If you have to use tabs, guitar magazine tabs are alot better than online tabs. There use to be a ton of guitar mags Guitar World, Guitar For The Practicing Musician, Guitar Player and way too many to list. Over the years some have went under and some new ones have emerged. The best thing to do is get a subscription, a year can cost you as low as $12, and learn all you can from guitar magazines, bass magazines and drum magazines.