Guitar Hacks for your playing, not your gear
Search for guitar hacks and you’ll find a hundred ways to clean your fretboard or wind your strings faster. None of them make you a better player. These are playing hacks: 150 short, practical shortcuts for chords, scales, soloing, technique and practice, across three books.
A shortcut in how you think, not a trick with a capo
A playing hack is a better way to learn or practice something you’re already working on. You get more out of the chords you know, you find your way around the neck faster, or you practice the thing that actually makes the difference.
Most of them take five minutes to read and a week to sink in. None of them need new gear.
12 guitar playing hacks you can try today
A sample from across the series. Each one is covered properly in the book it comes from, with diagrams and an exercise.
Learn more chords without learning more shapes
Take a shape you already know and move one note. Drop the root of a C chord a half step and it’s Cmaj7. Drop it a whole step and it’s C7. One shape, three chords.
Book 1 · Hack 3Get the modes into your ears before the patterns
Let the open low E ring as a drone and play each mode against it. You’ll hear what makes Dorian different from Aeolian long before any fretboard pattern would show you.
Book 1 · Hack 4Aim for the chord, not the scale
When the chord changes, land on its 3rd. It’s the note that says major or minor, and one well-placed 3rd does more for a solo than a fast run.
Book 1 · Hack 22Use your volume knob
Set the amp for your heaviest sound and roll the guitar’s volume back for everything else. It cleans up as you turn down, and you’ve got a boost for solos without touching a pedal.
Book 1 · Hack 42Mute what you’re not playing
Most sloppy playing isn’t wrong notes. It’s the strings you’re not playing ringing in the background. Both hands can mute, and sorting it out cleans up everything.
Book 2 · Hack 6Sing along with your solos
Sing what you play, even quietly. You can only sing what you can hear, so your solos slow down into phrases instead of runs.
Book 2 · Hack 7Record yourself every week
You don’t hear yourself accurately while you’re playing, because you hear what you meant to play. A phone recording played back tells you the truth about your timing, your phrasing and the licks you play every time.
Book 2 · Hack 9Rotate in 15-minute blocks
Five songs to learn? Spend fifteen minutes on each and keep cycling round, instead of an hour on one. It feels less productive, but spaced, mixed practice sticks better.
Book 3 · Hack 23Split the fretboard
Solo using only the bottom three strings, then only the top three. Your usual licks break apart, and you have to find new ones.
Book 3 · Hack 19Move the phrase, not the notes
Play the same three notes starting on beat 1, then half a beat later, then on beat 2. Nothing changes but the timing, and each version sounds new. It’s called rhythmic displacement.
Book 3 · Hack 13Minor pentatonic over a major chord
Over Cmaj7, play B minor pentatonic. It gives you the 7, 9, 3, #4 and 6: a sophisticated Lydian sound from a box you already know.
Book 3 · Hack 30Superimpose a triad
Over a C7 chord, play a D major triad. Its three notes become the 9, #11 and 13 of C7, an instant jazz-fusion sound without learning a new scale.
Book 3 · Hack 37
Three books, 150 hacks
Each book stands on its own, with no set order inside it: start wherever looks useful. If you’re not sure where to begin, start with the first.
50 Guitar Hacks for the Thinking Man’s Guitarist
For players past the beginner stage who want to think more clearly about the guitar.
Most guitar books give you more to learn. This one gives you better ways to learn it: chords, scales, modes, improvising, technique, tone and practice.
- Learn more chords without learning more shapes
- Get the sound of the modes into your ears first
- Make your solos sound better overnight
- Design a practice routine that actually works
- Hack the CAGED system, or avoid it altogether
50 More Guitar Hacks for the Thinking Man’s Guitarist
For players who’ve got the basics and keep running into the same problems.
Fifty more ways past the things that hold players back: solos that don’t land, noise between notes, barre chords that won’t ring, and nerves on stage.
- Always land on the right notes in a blues
- Mute what you’re not playing
- Master barre chords four different ways
- Play over dominant chords from the pentatonic box
- Deal with mistakes on stage
50 Guitar Hacks for the Advancing Guitarist
For players stuck on the intermediate plateau.
You can get through a song and take a solo, but the same licks keep coming out. This one is aimed higher: fifty hacks for getting into advanced territory.
- Move beyond the pentatonic scale
- Superimpose triads for jazz and fusion sounds
- Learn sweep picking one hand at a time
- Solo with chord tones and play over changes
- Find out what to learn next
The Guitar Hacks Trilogy
All three books as PDFs: 150 hacks, every diagram in print quality, and an exercise at the end of every hack. This is the first time the series has been available as PDFs.
Rewritten, redrawn and expanded
The originals came out in 2016. Ten years on, some of it held up and some of it didn’t, so this is a proper revision, not a new cover on an old book.
Guitar hacks FAQ
What are guitar hacks?
Most of what you’ll find under that name is about gear: changing strings, cleaning the fretboard, cheap fixes with a capo. The hacks in these books are about playing: shortcuts for learning chords and scales, finding notes on the neck, soloing, technique and practice. They make you a better player, not a tidier one.
Which book should I start with?
If you’re not sure, start with the first book. The second covers different ground at a similar level. The third is aimed at players who’ve hit the intermediate plateau. Each one stands on its own.
Are these books for beginners?
They’re for anyone past the first few months: you should know some chords and at least one scale. The first two books suit most self-taught players. The third assumes more.
Do I need to read music?
No. Everything is shown with chord boxes and fretboard diagrams, labelled with intervals. There’s no notation to read.
What’s the difference between the PDF, Kindle and paperback?
The content is the same. The PDF has print-quality diagrams and downloads instantly from this site. The Kindle and paperback editions are sold through Amazon.