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If you play "I Don't Want To Know" by Fleetwood Mac loud enough -- you can hear Lindsey Buckingham's fingers sliding down the strings of his acoustic guitar. ...And we were convinced that this was the definitive illustration of what we both loved about music; we loved hearing the INSIDE of a song.
Sep 17, 2025
Like, when I write a song, the song comes first before production. Everything is written on an acoustic guitar so you can strip away everything from it and have it be equally as entertaining and good without the bells and whistles.
I've always been obsessed with drums. They fascinate me. Any other instrument - nothing. I play acoustic guitar a bit. But it's always been drums first and foremost. I don't reckon on this Jack-of-all-trades thing. I thing that felling is a lot more important than technique. It's all very well doing a triple paradiddle - but who's going to know you've done it? If you play technically you sound like everybody else. It's being original that counts.
There' something about universal truths with the simplicity of the acoustic guitar. You can take it anywhere and it helps me reach listeners of all ages and walks of life.
Playing acoustic guitar is like having sex with your clothes on. I mean you know how to do it, but it’s more difficult.
I went to the zoo one day and saw a chimp playing with a beat-up acoustic guitar in a way I had never seen before. Instead of using the pick the chimp was banging the neck and tapping it with its fingers. I knew the chimp was on to something so I practiced this new technique in my room for hours until I'd perfected it.
... I like the clubs because ... we have two or three acoustic guitars up there and we're not hard-core slamming or stomping through the music. We're singing it with intricate harmonies and really showing the craftsmanship.
When I write a song, I always start on acoustic guitar, because that's a good test of a song, when it's really open and bare. You can often mislead yourself if you start with computers and samples and programming because you can disguise a bad song.
I'd say it's harder to play with an acoustic guitar strapped over your shoulder for a few hundred people than it is to play in front of thousands with an entire bombastic band behind you. After all these years, I still get nervous in front of people. I can't help it.
Inspiration and stealing are two completely different things. If somebody wants to make a song like "Stairway to Heaven" and writes a song on acoustic guitar, Led Zeppelin does not own every song that's on acoustic guitar for the rest of time.
Each acoustic guitar has its own character and personality. On a particular day, I might pick one up and start noodling around, looking for some emotional content in the chords.
I was in Australia in about 1996 when I played some acoustic guitar for some guys at a studio down there. They were pretty happy with it, and mentioned doing an album, so about a year later I met some people who were interested in recording.
For an electric guitarist to solo effectively on an acoustic guitar you need to develop tricks to avoid the expectation of sustain that comes from playing electrics. Try cascades, for example. Drop arpeggios over open strings, and let the open strings sing as you pick with your fingers. It's kind of a country style of playing, but it works very well in-between heavily strummed parts and fingered lead lines.
I try not to punish the audience by making them listen to too much acoustic guitar.
I write almost all my songs on an acoustic guitar, even if they turn into rock songs, hard rock songs, metal songs, heavy metal songs, really heavy songs I love writing on an acoustic because I can hear what every string is doing; the vibrations haven't been combined in a collision of distortion or effects yet.
I practice on the acoustic guitar a little bit, but I think I have reached the peak of my talent.
There is far more sensitivity in acoustic guitar players than could ever be compared to any synthesizer. That's a personal point of view but that's the way I see it. I think that's what it's all about. The drive, the fire, the passion - it all comes out on the guitar.
I'm just as comfortable performing solo with just my acoustic guitar and vocal as I am with a band. The main thing for me is that the performance remain rooted in the words and voice, that there be no place to hide.
It's important to keep your creative muscle strong and working. My most inspiring method though is just sitting down with an acoustic guitar and coming up with melodies. It's what I've been doing nice I was nine years old.
When I'm writing with just an acoustic guitar, it can be for anyone.
I tried when I was 13, when my grandparents gave me an acoustic guitar, and I tried for a year. It hurt so much to play. I mean, the fingertips hurt so much, I gave up.
The classical guitar has a dynamic to it unlike a regular acoustic guitar or an electric guitar. You know, there's times when you should play and there's times when you gotta hold back. It's an extremely dynamic instrument.
It was endlessly amusing to me to try to imitate John Lennon and Paul McCartney's harmonies using the guitar.
For me it always comes down to what is a good song and I'm very old fashioned in the way that I like to make songs that have something classic about them whether you can play them with an orchestra or an electro synthesizer or an acoustic guitar.
The best way to do that is to pick up a new instrument or an instrument that you don't typically write on and see where it takes you. Whether it's using an acoustic guitar, or piano, or electronics as tools, all of these lead to creating different types of songs and I used all of these methods for this record.
After months of playing air guitar to 'Free Bird', what really got me into guitar was watching a documentary about Jimi Hendrix and picking up the Woodstock soundtrack. Listening to his version of 'Star Spangled Banner' and 'Purple Haze.' My brother played acoustic guitar and, idolising him, I thought, 'I'm going to get a guitar.'
Going to high school in rural Florida, we always partied down in the woods. Somebody - one of the rednecks - would leave class and mow a path out to a field, and we'd drive out there. Dude, every party I went to was lit by a bonfire. Acoustic guitar.
I have pictures of me sitting in the racquetball court in my pajamas with an acoustic guitar, and Wolfgang is probably just two-and-a-half-feet tall. I'll never forget the day I saw his foot tapping along in beat! I knew then, I couldn't wait for the day I'd be able to make music with my son. I don't know what more I could ask for.
This band - because this is myself on electric and acoustic guitars - we've done three tours together now and I really, really like it which is why I did the DVD as well.
I even played bass for a while. Besides playing electric guitar, I'd also get asked to play some acoustic stuff. But, since I didn't have an acoustic guitar at the time, I used to borrow one from a friend so I could play folk joints.
So I played the acoustic guitar and harmonica and stomped my foot and I think I was right in assuming that Greenwich Village would be the best place to perform my own material and possibly get some attention, move on to making records and all.
At the Muddy Waters thing, I played the first song by myself on an acoustic guitar. I thought that was great that y'all did that tribute to Muddy Waters. I had a real good time
I suppose my little Martin acoustic guitar is quickly becoming a prize possession. It's a lovely guitar. I bought it at the Cambridge Folk Festival in 2001 before I had cleaned up.
There was nobody at the time who was playing slide guitar like Johnny, and nobody, or no white guys at least, that was playing country blues like that on the acoustic guitar. And it was at that point that I realized what Johnny had to offer.
Up till now I wrote the songs on my acoustic guitar alone with the Lord. Then I would take the song and share it with my family and then we all would figure out instrumentation together.
Every one of the songs was based around picking an acoustic guitar. That was part of the concept from the beginning, that the tempos were going to go from slow to almost mid-tempo.
On acoustic guitar I tend to stay in the key of D for some reason. On electric guitar I keep basic: C, G, D, and A. The key of D minor is also real good for me.
I approach playing acoustic guitar more of as a percussive instrument. It's fragile. I don't have a lot of finesse when it comes to my guitar playing.
I play piano and guitar. Acoustic guitar. I tried studying classical guitar when I was 16 but it got really hard. I could never play a lead to save my life.
Artie travels all the time. The rehearsals were just miserable. Artie and I fought all the time. He didn't want to do the show with my band; he just wanted me on acoustic guitar.
In certain ways I still feel like I'm finding my way. I feel pretty comfortable playing acoustic guitar and singing, but then I feel pretty good sitting on a reggae groove as well.
Most of our songs were written on acoustic guitar before they made it to the practice stage.
You know, there's times when you should play and there's times when you gotta hold back.
If you play acoustic guitar you're the depressed, sensitive guy.
What resonates with me now is the acoustic guitar and piano.
If you can't play it on an acoustic guitar or a grand piano then it's not a song.
I love the subtlety and tonal range of the acoustic guitar.
I'm not good enough to be playin' much acoustic guitar onstage. Man, you gotta get so right; I mean, the tones, the feel, the sound. Plus, acoustic blues guitar is just that much harder on the fingers.
To stand up on a stage alone with an acoustic guitar requires bravery bordering on heroism. Bordering on insanity.
But the reality is when you write a song, you should be able to strip away all the instruments and just have a song right there with an acoustic guitar and a voice, and the song should be good.