Sonic Savagery
withย Greg Koch
Greg Koch
Sonic Savagery
Over eight hours of chicken pickin', unreasonable bends, pinch harmonics, jazz, rhythm and general plectrum-wielding skullduggery. For the first time, all of it in one corral.
- 8+ Hours of Content
- 25 Performances
- TABS Included
- Lifetime Access
Everything In One Corral
Greg Koch has made a lot of lessons over the years. A little bit of this over here. A little bit of that over there. Some chicken pickin' in one spot, some blues in another, a bit of jazz tucked away somewhere else. Useful, sure. But scattered.
Sonic Savagery is the one where it all comes together.
If you are getting a Greg Koch course, you probably want the greatest hits. The chicken pickin'. The crazy bends. The minor pentatonic getting worked over until it confesses. Pedal steel bends, pinch harmonics, shrieks, and the general wise-acery that comes standard.
You get all of that. But Greg also went in and built things he has never put in a lesson before. New compositions. New approaches. Angles he has simply never taught. Over eight hours of it, recorded with his own band behind him, tabbed out and broken down piece by piece.
I cherry-picked all the stuff that I thought was cool and put it in one big course.Greg Koch
What You Get In Sonic Savagery
25 Performances
Full pieces played straight through, over backing tracks Greg cut with his own band. Organ, drums, the works. Real music, not isolated exercises.
Fully Tabbed Out
Every performance comes with tab, so you can read along, work through it slowly, and see exactly what is happening rather than guessing at it.
A Breakdown For Every One
Greg goes back through each performance and explains what he did and why. Not just the notes, but the thinking, the touch, and the moments he shrugs and admits it just works.
New Compositions
Material written specifically for this course. New approaches and new pieces that have not appeared in any lesson Greg has done before.
Extended Interviews
Sit-down segments where Greg digs into the material that does not fit neatly into a lesson. Where the ideas came from, how they connect, what he was chasing.
Gear Tips and Tricks
Amps, guitars and tones. How to get them, how to avoid the ones you do not want, and how to have some fun with the whole business along the way.
Release Your Inner Savagery
The techniques Greg is known for, taught properly and put to work inside real pieces of music.
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Chicken Pickin' The hybrid picking attack that put Greg on the map. The snap, the cluck, the pop, and how to fold it into playing that is not strictly country.
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Bends That Should Not Be Legal Pedal steel bends and the kind of string abuse that makes people rewind. Where to put them, how to control them, and how to land them in tune.
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Pinch Harmonics and Shrieks Getting the guitar to squeal on command instead of by accident, and knowing when the moment actually calls for it.
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The Minor Pentatonic, Reconsidered Five notes everybody already owns. Greg shows you what he has been doing with them for forty years that keeps them from sounding like everybody else's.
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Rhythm Guitar That Earns Its Keep Greg has always been fiercely respectful of rhythm playing. This is the groove side of the equation, treated as the main event rather than the thing you do between solos.
Where This Style Comes From
Greg did not arrive at his sound by picking a lane. He cherry-picked everything he thought was cool and threw it all in one big vat. In this course, he shows you where each piece came from.
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The Country Detour Greg was deep in Clapton and blues rock when he heard Albert Lee on a live Clapton record and had no idea what he was hearing. That question sent him down a rabbit hole that added an entire country dimension to his playing.
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The Jazz Door, Opened By Hendrix Hendrix was the lifelong obsession, but tracks like "Rainy Day, Dream Away" and "Still Raining, Still Dreaming" were the gateway. Hendrix name-checked Kenny Burrell and Grant Green, so Greg followed the trail. George Benson did the rest.
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Blues, Backwards Into Slide The Allman Brothers led him back to Elmore James and Robert Nighthawk, and the slide vocabulary that runs underneath so much of what he plays.
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Respect For The Groove Pete Townshend. Keith Richards. Leo Nocentelli of the Meters. The rhythm players Greg studied as seriously as any lead guitarist.
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Theory Only When It Helps Greg went to school for music, which he says gave him just enough knowledge to get himself into trouble. He leans on it when it explains something. The rest of the time the honest answer is that it works, and he will tell you so.
Meet Greg Koch
Koch. Rhymes with chalk.
Greg Koch is a guitar player's guitar player. A Milwaukee native who got hooked on Hendrix as a kid, studied jazz performance in college, and then spent a career refusing to stay in any one lane. Blues, country, rock and roll, jazz and slide, all mashed into a single unmistakable voice.
His father was a lawyer with seven kids, and his advice to his musician son was blunt: this path will not be easy, so you had better be as good as you can possibly be. Greg took that as a mandate to be as versatile as humanly possible. That versatility is exactly what this course is built on.
- First place, 1989 Bluesbreaker Guitar Showdown, judged by Buddy Guy
- Signed to Steve Vai's Favored Nations label
- Named by Fender as one of the top 10 unsung guitarists
- Clinician for Fender, Fishman and Martin
- Tens of millions of views on his guitar demo videos
- Author of some of the best selling guitar instructional books in the world
- Signature Reverend Gristlemaster guitar and Gristletone pickups
- Wisconsin Area Music Industry Hall of Fame inductee
What Lands In Your Account
- ✓ Over 8 hours of video content
- ✓ 25 full performances with band backing tracks
- ✓ TABS for every performance
- ✓ Detailed breakdowns of all 25 performances
- ✓ Extended interview segments
- ✓ Gear, tone and amp discussions
- ✓ Full lifetime access, desktop or mobile
Is This For You?
This Is For You If
- You have wanted the Koch bag of tricks in one place instead of scattered across a dozen lessons
- You already play, and you want vocabulary rather than beginner fundamentals
- You want to sound like more than one thing on demand
- You learn best from real performances, not isolated licks in a vacuum
- You want the tab in front of you and the reasoning behind it
Before You Dig In
How is this different from Greg's other courses?
The earlier courses each took one slice. This one brings the whole thing together in one place, and adds new compositions and approaches Greg has never taught in any lesson context before.
What level do I need to be?
This is not a first-guitar course. If you can get around the neck and hold down a groove, you will be able to work with this material. The breakdowns and tabs mean you can take any performance as slowly as you need to.
Do I get the notation?
Yes. All 25 performances are tabbed out, so you can read along, work through sections and take anything at your own pace.
Is this only for country players?
Not remotely. Chicken pickin' is part of it, but so are blues, rock and roll, jazz and rhythm playing. The entire point of the course is how those pieces connect.
How long do I have access?
Forever. Buy once and it is yours, on any device, at whatever pace suits you.
All the different stuff Greg thought was cool, cherry-picked and thrown into one big vat. Forty years of connecting the dots between blues, country, rock and roll and jazz, finally rounded up and put in a single corral.
Gristle Buffet
Maximum Larry Course Outline
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Introduction
2 lessons- Course Introduction
- Start Improving Immediately
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Sad Man
9 lessons- Sad Man Introduction
- Sad Man Lesson
- Sad Man Song 1 Performance 1
- Sad Man Song 1 Performance 2 - Claw & 6ths
- Sad Man Song 1 Performance 3 - Hi Lonsome Lo Notes
- Sad Man Song 1 Performance 4 - Trippy Bends
- Sad Man Song 2 Performance 1 - Slidy Chords
- Sad Man Song 2 Performance 2 - Milky Tone
- Sad Man Song 2 Performance 3 - Harmonic Man
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Keg Party
12 lessons- Keg Party Boogie Rhythm Lesson
- Keg Party Guitar Performance 1 Main Rhythm Guitar
- Keg Party Performance 2
- Keg Party Performance 3
- Keg Party Performance 4
- Keg Party Performance 5 Bang Your Gong
- Keg Party Performance 6 The Bends
- Keg Party Performance 7 Chuck Berry
- Keg Party Performance 8 Big Al Bounce
- Keg Party Performance 9 Sevenths Hell
- Keg Party Performance 10 Four Over One
- Keg Party Performance 11 Fogerty
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Smear
6 lessons- Smear Lesson
- Smear Interview
- Smear Performance 1 Main Rhythm Guitar
- Smear Performance 2 Guitar 2 Performance 1
- Smear Performance 3 Guitar 2 Performance 2
- Smear Performance 4 Guitar 2 Performance 3
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Blues Rhythm
10 lessons- Blues Rhythm Lesson
- Blues Rhythm Performance 1 Blues Jam 1
- Blues Rhythm Performance 2 Blues Jam 2
- Blues Rhythm Performance 3 Fast Blues
- Blues Rhythm Performance 4 Slow Blues
- Blues Rhythm Performance 5 Hideaway Blues 1
- Blues Rhythm Performance 6 Hideaway Blues 2
- Blues Rhythm Performance 7 Train Blues
- Blues Rhythm Performance 8 Van Morrison Rhythm
- Blues Rhythm Performance 8 Van Morrison Rhythm Lead
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Motif and Solo
1 lesson- Motif and Solo Playing Lesson
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Closing
1 lesson- Course Closing
