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Guitar Practice.

In my time I've lived next to my fair share of aspiring musicians, from drummers to guitar players and even singers. As I write this my neighbour is practicing his guitar.

What all these wanna be rock stars have in common is that they all set their volume to a level that is suitable for performing, when you actually have an audience, but totally unsuitable for practice in the back streets of the suburbs. Volumes so loud that the neighbours (namely me) have nowhere within our own home we can retreat to in order to not listen to their music.

Why would I want to retreat from these free concerts playing right over my fence? It's not because I don't like the sound of the music - indeed my neighbour does quite a good version of David Bowie's 'Ziggy Stardust'. What really is annoying is that the other thing all these musicians/singers have in common is that they never practice full versions of songs.

How can you even like their sound when all they do is play a riff here, a beat there and perhaps sing a verse if you're lucky? It's the equivalent of someone channel flipping the TV to see what's on - all the time - without ever really stopping on any one program long enough to see what it's about.

So here's my message to all you backyard musicians - practicing in your sheds. Either have the decency to play/sing full songs or turn the f**king volume down!

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