I need some help

[CTN]

I need to improve my rhythm skills.

Specifically my blues/rock rhythm skills. I'm talking strange complex bluesy shapes, quirky off-beat picking/strumming accents, and making chordal melodies and such.

I don't really know how to approach this or where to start. Coming from the world of metal, my right hand is good with timing, precise picking, chugging, palm mutes and playing fast. And my left hand is great at playing fast single-note runs percussive riffs and really simple chords that are easy to finger.

What I'm not good at is switching between picking/strumming and finger picking, jumping to odd chord shapes (that's just a matter of learning new chords and repeating them until my fingers have the muscle memory), and switching back and forth often between rhythm and melody, or in the case of more jazzy kinda stuff, playing rhythm and melody at the same time.

What do?

[CTN]

so basically, trying to get better at blues, old school 70's R&B and soul.

[GoldenVulture]

You'd probably find a lot of what your looking for in the stones catalogue.

[CTN]

:/ man, I HATE the stones.

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I think I should maybe just start jamming along to old r&b and soul stuff and just pick things up as I try ever so hard to NOT play any solos.

[GoldenVulture]

Sorry but they do encompass a lot of R&B as it used to be and have a lot going on in the rythm work that people don't notice.
I picked up a lot of my rythm work/chord work from the players behind people like Dianna Ross and other artists that were middle of the road Jazz Rock.
More precisely Jazz Guitarists.

[CTN]

that may be, but I really can't bring myself to suffer through Jagger's horrendous mouth noises.

I'm just gonna start listening to a fuckton of 60's and 70's R&B and Soul and just get that sound firmly entrenched in my head so my fingers can figure out what to do.

[LesStrat]

Larry Carlton.

[Securb]

Niles Rodgers

[Big Flannel]

I'd say...*gasp* REM.

they implement a lot of "walking" chord melodies in their music.

[GoldenVulture]

Rapidly Escrusciating Monotone...

One step; two step; three step; back.