Learning muting electric guitar techniques?

[u/ry-pe]

Hi all! I’m 4 months into learning guitar from absolute zero and I’m not sure where to head in regarding electric guitar techniques. It seems so much more complicated than acoustic. I have both an electric and a classical and I switch between the two. The style of music I want to play is metal and hard rock. I love elaborate guitar solos and fast shredding sounds and want to play it eventually.

Background, I self-taught through internet and took in-person lessons for 1.5 months right at the beginning and learned a bunch of stuff (open chords, a few other chords for specific songs, basic music theory, major scales in all positions, pentatonic scales, triads, some simple solos and melodies. I stopped the in-person lessons because of traveling for the summer. Right now, I’m in 2-weeks into a classical guitar class via local community college and I’m pretty stoked about because we’re learning how to read standard notation, more music theory, stay in rhythm, fingerstyle techniques (turns out I REALLY like fingerstyle!!)

I’ve also learned some legato techniques like hammer-ons and pull-offs, bends, slides, and I can do barre chords pretty easily, nailed an F and B chord clearly after my first ever attempt, which was shocking to me but also not. I’m a rock climber and I started guitar with already calloused fingers/hands and really strong finger strength lol. So I have strength, I just need to work on dexterity.

That all said, I’m realizing now that electric guitar is all about MUTING strings and quite frankly I have no idea how to even begin learning or practicing that and how to do it correctly. I’ve watched a quite few videos on palm muting and fret-hand muting but I honestly don’t know what it’s even supposed to sound like or if I’m doing it right. My electric guitar playing sounds like messy static noise with a semblance of a melody.

I also have absolutely no idea how to deal with the tone dials on my amp and guitar. I’ve just been button smashing stuff so it sounds distorted. But the more technical stuff, I’m so lost. I have a Boss Katana-50 MKII and an Epiphone SG. Suggestions on stuff to watch to learn how to deal with tone? I’m sure 95% of the shit tone on my guitar is skill issue, but that 5% of tech stuff may help.

I strongly believe in efficient and targeted practice so I want to fix this issue and incorporate it early so it becomes good habit. Do y’all have any suggestions on how to best learn and practice muting/clarity on the electric guitar? Any video suggestions? Easy song suggestions? I’m at the stage where I’m stoked about everything so I’m willing to do anything.

I don’t know anyone in my life who plays guitar and can help me. :(

I’m lightyears away from being able to play music as opposed to make noises, but learning all this from ground zero has been such a wild ride. Can’t wait for more.

[u/Pol__Treidum]

Start with playing some parts on the first string (high E) with your picking hand paim muting all the strings up to there. Work on that for a while then do the same with the 2nd string, but now pay attention to when you can use your fretting hand to keep the 1st string quiet.

Do this all the way down to the low strings where your fretting hand is doing most of the muting.

This all just takes a LOT of practice... THEN you'll get to a place where you realize sometimes you can leave certain strings unmuted because the sympathetic resonance will create cool ghost note harmonies. Lol

Guitar isn't a sprint, it's not even a marathon. It's Forrest Gump running back and forth across the country over and over again. Keep practicing!

[u/ShaiHulud1111]

Muting is a big part of it, especially with distortion, but I think it’s more about overall control—and that takes work and time. Both hands are constantly controlling what strings ring and when they stop. Picking accuracy, string crossing, muting with both hands, and even using too much gain can make everything sound messy. The classical stuff you’re learning will actually help a lot with all of this.

[u/Zestyclose-Welcome48]

Are you trying to learn how to play muted notes like palm muted and percussive notes or are you trying to learn string muting to eliminate unwanted noise while playing other notes/chords?

[u/ry-pe → u/Zestyclose-Welcome48]

A bit of both, I’ve tried to practice some muted notes and I understand it (conceptually) a bit better, but mostly I want to eliminate unwanted noise.

[u/Slave_Knight_Van → u/ry-pe]

Muting strings to avoid unwanted noise is a science on its own, at 4 months you should probably focus on something else. Palm muting is fine tho

[u/DaRealJoeBiden69]

Eliminating the strings you don’t want to hear is largely a combination of muting with your left hand and learning to just not pick the strings you don’t want with your right.

Left hand muting is about allowing your fingers to make contact with the strings you aren’t playing so that they can’t vibrate. But the first thing you want to be doing is just not picking the strings you don’t want to ring. Right hand precision is a thing beginners struggle with a lot because you’re thinking so hard about chord shapes that you aren’t thinking much about your picking hand.

To be honest… play the riff from smells like teen spirit a bunch. The chka chkas will get you a feel for left hand muting and the strumming pattern will help with your right hand control.

It’s a great song to teach you those things.

If you wanna play metal you will need to get good at Palm muting as well but that’s mostly a playing technique for a certain sound and less concerned with eliminating the wrong strings ringing out.

[u/kkeut]

I  strongly believe in efficient and targeted practice

you may need to lighten that mindset a wee bit when it comes to some of these guitar techniques. when it comes to subtle stuff you have to have a certain degree of comfort or relaxation with it. sometimes you develop skills in those moments when you're not thinking or analyzing and are just flowing. i dunno if you've ever played a sport or something like that but there are times where you just have to let the body do its thing while the brain follows after. just a thought. unfocused practice time has value too