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The Classic Angry Face

Guitar Soloing is fine and all.  There’s lots of skills involved – finger tapping, scales and arppegios.  But whatever.  If you’re great at wailing on guitar, but your face looks like a pile of yuck (I’m going to cite John Mayer as an example) then it’s going to be hard to take you seriously.

Yes John Mayer is a talented player. And yes, I struggle to take him seriously.  It’s not because he makes little pop nuggets about chicks or being vaguely liberal.  That kind of thing doesn’t bug me very much because honestly, I rarely bother listening to lyrics anymore.  Music is more about production and fitting sounds together for me than background noise for lyrics.

Nauseating Multi-Chin Face.

But I can’t take this man seriously because he makes the worst faces when he solos.  He scrunches his body up until he has 15 chins, and then rolls his eyes back into his head like he’s having the most nauseating experience he’s ever had. It totally breaks the mystery and glamor of being a rock star.

Now you might be worried that if John Mayer fails so horribly at making solo-faces, how can you ever hope to compete?  But I’m here to tell you it’s easier than you think. I’ve even provided pictures of myself mid-fake-solo for your amusement and education.

First is the Classic Angry Face pictured above. Think of KISS, AC/DC and a bunch of other bands from the 60’s on.  They just make awesome angry faces and BAM – guitar awesomeness.  Not really hard, just squint and make your forehead wrinkled.  Make a face like you’re yelling.  And then stare hard into the face of someone in the front row (or camera if there is one).

Too Cool For School Face.

Second is the modern, hipster Too Cool For School face.  Make some bug-eyes and cock your eyebrow.  Maybe suck your cheeks in a bit.  Just make sure you look like you’re judging whoever you’re looking at.  Judging them hard. I don’t love this look, but if it works for you, then more power to you.

Last is a series of faces. Basically it’s the I’m Getting Scared of My Guitar face.

Start lower building your way up slowly to some more intense/higher notes.

Not So Scared of my Guitar.

Now that you’re getting really into it – start getting a little weirded out by your guitar.  Like Uh-oh what is going on?   You should be a little highger up your neck and making louder crazier notes.

This is starting to freak me out.

Last you end up in the craziest parts of your neck.  You know those little frets where you don’t even know what notes you’re playing.  You should look like you’re screaming because your guitar is now all of a sudden the scariest S**T you have ever seen.

OMG!

So now you have some options at least. There’s lots of other faces you can make, but you gotta figure those out on your own.  Just try to avoid the Nauseating face.

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