Guitar Faces: A Step-by-Step Guide

Some claim the most important skill for a guitar player to possess is a sense of melody. Others may argue finger tone is paramount. Still others think high-quality gear is what allows a guitarist to reach his or her full potential.

While these things are all significant, none are more important than a masterful command of guitar faces.

The first face to become proficient with is the timeless Soft Serve face, popularized by guitar lords like Steve Vai and Joe Satriani. Essentially, you’ll want to hold your head up to the sky, as if you’re eating soft-serve ice cream right out of the machine. This guitar face is best utilized on screaming bends at the end of a phrase.

Another crucial guitar face to utilize is the Mean Mug. This guitar face has been harnessed by the likes of Stevie Ray Vaughan, Joe Bonamassa and countless other greats, past and present. The unique thing about the Mean Mug is that others often reciprocate the face as they see you use it. The Mean Mug is meant for only the dirtiest, raunchiest guitar riffs.

Watch the video below to with the goal to commit all of these guitar faces to memory, because these faces are the most important elements of any guitar player’s skillset.

Tyler Larson is the founder of the guitar-centric brand Music is Win. His insightful, uncomplicated guitar lessons and gear demonstrations along with entertaining, satirical content about life as a musician receive tens of millions of video views per month across social media. Tyler is also the creator of the extremely popular online guitar learning platform, Guitar Super System. A graduate of Berklee College of Music, Tyler has been teaching guitar for over a decade and operates a production studio in Nashville, TN.