[Question] I want to become a folk legend, where do I start?

I've been playing guitar since I was around 15 until I was 19. I was more into guitar to play my favourite songs, so while I have good dexterity in my hands and a decent set of songs I know, I pretty much have never written a song and I've never played in a band as a guitarist (I did play as a drummer for 3 years).

About 4 months ago I decided I wanted to pick up the guitar again and i dusted off my cheap $150 fender acoustic and started strumming. Since then I've gained a decent knowledge of basic music theory and written a couple of mediocre songs (I also bought a beautiful Seagull guitar).

I've had a lot of growing pains, however. My technique is pretty terrible (or so I think) because I'm incredibly inconsistent when it comes to every facet of guitar and while I can play quite fast and technical songs I can't quite get through them without 4 or 5 screw ups (I screw up californication at least once per performance, an extremely easy song). The only songs I can really nail are chord strumming songs with similar shapes or small movements between (c to g, etc). I also seem quite heavy handed, I will strum relentlessly hard with no accent or subtlety and I have trouble playing any palm muted strums without letting a wrong string play.

My ultimate goal with my playing is to become a decent guitar player and singer, and I want to focus on folk music (primarily acoustic singer/songwriter). I discovered In The Aeroplane Over The Sea last year and I fell in love with the performances and writing and decided I wanted to do something in the same vein. I know it's pretty much impossible to become well known so I'm not counting on that, I just want to street perform and maybe play a few gigs from time to time.

I have very little money so formal training is out of the question for at least a year. What are your opinions on what the most efficient route is for me to improve my playing, writing, and singing to where I can call myself semidecent performer. I'm looking to create a roadmap and have a daily practice/play schedule so any suggestions in that format would be extremely helpful. Thanks for reading!

Also if anyone could suggest some music in the same vein as Neutral Milk Hotel that would be much appreciated, I'm a big fan of art rock and cryptic, metaphorical lyrics. I'm mainly looking for things I will be able to play solo and sing on guitar.

TLDR: I'm a semi-beginner and want to become Jeff Magnum. What should my roadmap and daily schedule look like? Also song suggestions?

Submitted March 24, 2019 at 11:51AM by InsideDepth https://ift.tt/2HOuItv