#which pains me cause the bass is the coolest instrument there is

[spaceytrash]

I love how I'm so on brand for myself that the first song I can kind of completely play (although play very badly) on bass is Vivosunamela by Bluvertigo

[monochromatictoad]

For the ask: Trevorcard, Hector and Isaac :P

Trevorcard!

1. favorite thing about them: Trevorcard's devotion to his family, but also to his own humanity. He worked his ass off to get his father to see he's worthy of redemption, while also never succumbing to the vampire curse.

2. least favorite thing about them: The fact he never told Simon who he really was. I get why he didn't, but it doesn't make me happy about it.

3. favorite line: "You'll pay for what you did to me and my mother!" Specifically as young Trevor in the Castle portions of LoS2. It seems like a strange quote, but this is the first thing Trevor said to Dracul before their first battle, so it's how Trevorcard gets Gabriel to see the young boy is him.

4. brOTP: Trevorcard and Victor. Honestly, not much is known of their relationship, but I'd like to think they were pretty close.

5. OTP: Trethias (Trevorcard x Mathias) and Trevorcard x Sypha. (Gavor)

6. nOTP: Satan x Trevorcard. Listen Satan. Possessing the body of your crush's son, is not how you get your crush to like you back.

7. random headcanon: Trevorcard watches over the Belnades after he became a vampire. It's one thing he could do as atonement for causing his wife's death, but also because of the changing political stance on them. After the Belmonts split from the original Brotherhood of Light (another headcanon), he begins to watch over them too.

8. unpopular opinion: I think he's the coolest looking Alucard, and I like how they show that he refuses to give into the curse by perpetually starving himself of blood, which shows on his actual character model.

9. song i associate with them: uhhh....

Animal by Disturbed.

10. favorite picture of them: have some baby Trevorcard, ft. Dracul's hand.

Hector!

1. Favorite thing about them: The fact he broke away from Dracula and Isaac, finding his own place in the world, free from their toxicity.

2. Least favorite thing about them: Hector, honey, maybe don't try to the woman helping you. (I hope I'm remembering that panel of the manga correctly)

3. Favorite line: "Damn him! So be it. I must descend into darkness and reclaim that accursed power once more... Heed my words. I will hunt you down like the beast you are. I will have my revenge!" Like? My guy? That goes so fucking hard.

4. brOTP: Alucard and Hector. Weird adopted brothers, who are each other's only sanctuary.

5. OTP: Hectaly, Isaactor, and Mactor

6. nOTP: can I put N!Isaactor? I'm putting that.

7. Random headcanon: I really like the ones that portray Hector treating his Innocent Devils as like little pets/children.

8. Unpopular opinion: honestly? I don't think I have one.

9. Song I associate with them: Uhhh... Maybe..

The Death of Peace of Mind by Bad Omen

10. Favorite picture of them: I know he's barely visible, but like, the size difference between him and Dracula? *Chef's kiss*

Isaac!

1. Favorite thing about them: unhinged bastard man, causing death and destruction in his wake. What's not to love about that?

2. Least favorite thing about them: Maybe don't burn your adopted brother/ex lover's wife at the stake? And expect him to like you still?

3. Favorite line: "I've been waiting quite a long time to plot my revenge. Not only did my Lord die because of you -- you stripped me of my pride, my home. Now I shall make you suffer as I suffered. You shall die a most painful, gruesome death." Isaac, honey. Like, this line is painful, but it shows so much about Isaac and his mentality around Dracula and the Castle.

4. brOTP: Joachim and Isaac. I just can't visualize them being in a relationship.

5. OTP: Isaactor, Isaastle, and Gabsaac/Isabriel? Basically Isaac x Gabriel.

6. nOTP: same as Hector. N!Isaactor

7. Random headcanon: I think Isaac could play a few instruments. I don't know... He seems like the type to have, like, a bass or, like, a steel guitar.

8. Unpopular opinion: Isaac is perfect as he is. He is chaos and depravity, and I love him for that. He's so unapologetically awful in every way, and I love that in a character.

9. Song I associate with them: Sick Like Me by In This Moment

10. Favorite picture of them: This is just a fantastic image of Isaac.

[goodwriterwithbadhabits]

March 27th

Master List

~~

“And the sky, it's this amazing shade of blue, and all the clouds change color during sunrise and sunset.” Jae gushed, waving his hands in the air as he spoke. “I can’t wait for you to meet him, Brian, Younghyun, he’s literally the coolest dude ever.” You laughed along with your best friend, truly happy for him, but your heart still clenched at his words. You weren’t even sure what the color blue looked like. 

In your world, everything was shades of black and white, no other colors. This was a common occurrence, everyone was born seeing the world in black and white, only gaining the ability to see in a full spectrum once you encounter your soulmate. For most people your age, their soulmates had been found ages ago. Jae was an exception, at 27 he should have met his soulmate ages ago, but that had only happened over the weekend when he encountered Brian, Kang Younghyun, at a bar and upon bumping into him, found out beer was yellow. You wanted to be happy for your friend, and you were, but part of you still aches when he talked about his boyfriend. 

“He’s a songwriter, you know Park Sungjin? The cool guitarist a year above me?” You nodded blankly at Jae’s words, staring out the café window as you sip your drink. “He’s in a band with him and a couple other kids from here.” Jae gestures to the campus around you. “A keyboardist and a drummer. They’re playing at Club Xion next Saturday, you should come with me.”

“Are you playing?” You ask, opting not to answer his question. 

“Yeah,” His face erupts into a grin. “I’m heading over to Brian’s tomorrow for some practice, you should roll up, meet everyone, bring me lunch.” Your friend’s words bring you back into the present and you can only shake your head at them, not the least bit shocked at his audacity.

“So that’s the real reason huh? To bring you food?” You laugh, rolling your eyes slightly. 

“And because I think you should meet my new friends.” He reasoned, sighing at your grimace. “Come on, you and I have been besties since we were in diapers, it’s only right that you met my soulmate and judge them to the best of your abilities.” You chuckle at his remark, sipping your drink again. “Please?” He whines and you finally cave, sighing and looking away from him. 

“You owe me.” You huff, slumping slightly in your seat, and as you expected Jae is leaning over the table to shake you vigorously in excitement.

“Oh my god I love you, I’ll buy you dinner for a week, or that giant shark plushie we saw at the store the other day. Whatever you want, I’ll get it for you, promise.” He cheers. 

“This better be worth it Jaehyung Park, or I’m going to tie weights to your ankles and throw you in the Han.”

“It will be I swear, Brian tells me they’re awesome. You’re the best, I love you so much.” 

“I know, calm down.” You finally push him away, picking up your drink once more and gazing back out the window. “This had better be worth it.” 

~~

“So, he’s really your soulmate.” Wonpil sighed dreamily, elbow resting on his keyboard. “That’s so cool. Was it romantic?” Younghyun chuckles, shaking his head as he tunes his bass. 

“Oh not remotely. We bumped into each other at Xion, he dropped his beer on me and we both started seeing colors instantly.” 

“What color did you see first?” Seungjin asked, eyes still trained on his guitar.

“Yellow.” Younghyun grins and Dowoon has to physically stop himself from gagging. Colors, of course, they were talking about colors. Dowoon was sick of hearing about colors, it’s all any of the boys wanted to talk about, Sungjin had found his soulmate back in middle school, Wonpil found his during the gap year he took in college, and now Younghyun had found his. 

This was bullshit in Dowoon’s opinion.

“What’s with the sour face kid?” Jae’s voice filled the room, jolting Dowoon from his thoughts. 

“We’ve got a sour little brother, cause he’s the only one who hasn’t found his soulmate.” Wonpil teased, earning a drumstick thrown at him. “Ha, now I have your drumstick, what are you gonna do about it?” Wonpil jokes, and in retaliation, Dowoon picks up another drumstick. 

“Alright that’s enough,” Younghyun interjects, “Hi babe,” He greets his partner with a kiss that has Dowoon rolling his eyes. “Everyone, this is Jae, Jae you already know Sungjin, and this is Kim Wonpil, a genius with the keyboard and synth,” Wonpil flashes the older man one of his charming smiles and a peace sign. “And this is our baby brother, Dowoon, an excellent drummer and the best boy.” Dowoon only offers the older man a wave of a drumstick. “He’ll warm up to you.”

“It’s nice to meet you two, I hope you guys don’t mind, but my friend is bringing food later, for everyone.” 

“You conned someone into buying food for a bunch of strangers?” Sungjin asked. 

“Why are you complaining?” Wonpil inquired, glancing over at Dowoon to find him trying to balance a drumstick on his upper lip.

“I didn’t con her, she’s my best friend, she’d do anything for me.” Jae defended, setting down his guitar bag. The sound of a drumstick clattering to the floor alerted everyone that he had failed in his balancing attempts. “So, did we want to start practice?” 

It’s almost two hours before the group breaks for a breather. Dowoon has almost successfully gotten his frustrations out via his drums, and now that he’s worked up a sweat, he’s hungry as fuck. 

“Hey, Jae hyung, when is your friend going to be here?” Sungjin whines, flicking his pic at the oldest man. 

“Soon, she said she was just down the street a few minutes ago,” Jae tells the group, just as a knock echoes on the door. “And there she is, the love of my life.” Jae cries, throwing open the door. Dowoon wasn’t paying attention at first but the moment the door was opened his eyes landed on the person standing there. You were rolling your eyes at your tall friend, holding bags of food in each hand. 

“I’m only your bestie cause I bring you food.” You scoff, to which Jae feigns hurt. 

“Not true, you’re my bestie cause I’m the only one who puts up with your crap.” He jokes and you gasp in shock. 

“Someone come take this food, I gotta beat this punk’s ass.” You hold up both bags and Sungjin and Wonpil immediately surge towards you to take them. Dowoon remains hidden behind the drums, not wanting to get too close to you, meeting Jae was enough for one day. Once the food was out of your hands, you kicked your leg up and would have nailed Jae in the face if he hadn’t blocked it. It was actually really cool watching you fight Jae, and while neither of you actually managed to hit each other, the two-minute brawl was flashy, to say the least. That was until Jae knocked you over and you almost toppled onto Dowoon’s drums. 

The man had never moved so fast in his life when he saw your figure stagger towards his instrument. One moment he was sitting playing with his sticks, the next the clattering of wood resounded on the floor and he was grabbing you by the shoulders to keep you upright. His fingers barely brushed the skin under your sleeve, but it was enough to send sparks across his whole body. In the instant your skin touched, the crimson of his drums lit up his vision, a similar red to the stripes on your bag. 

You all played it off pretty well for the time you were with them, sitting as far away from Dowoon as possible as you ate with the boys. Neither of you spoke about the colors and didn’t speak at all about your soulmates. It isn’t until you’re leaving that someone finally asks.

“Hey, Y/n, have you met your soulmate?” Brian finally blurts. You paused at the doorway, and it became obvious that Jae was growing uncomfortable. At that moment, you decided that yes, it was time to be a pain in the ass.

“Hey maybe we shouldn’t-” Jae started, trying to play it off. 

“I’m not sure.” You began, shouldering your bag, and turning back to the group slightly. Your gaze raked over the boys before landing on the youngest. Your smile broadened before you shifted your gaze to his drum set. “Maybe.” You mused, chuckling as Jae practically began to vibrate. “Either way, I like your drums.” All the eyes landed on the drums, except for Dowoon, who continued to stare at you. With a wink and another small laugh you properly left the room, calling out: “Red suits you.” 

[vapormaison]

Best of 2019 Vaporwave Release 3/4: Sensual Loops SPECIAL EDITION by Cyber Club

As vaporwave matures and enters the mainstream, I often find myself having discussions with vapor heads on reddit about the iconography of the genre. I realize that this is a bad idea, but cannot help myself. More often than not, they are pointlessly terse, and tend to be tediously teleological — the type of argumentation featuring enough loops of logic to cause a medieval Byzantine monk’s head to spin.

A recurring topic that baits me every single time is when a poster attempts to criticize the album art of a record, dismissing the entire work on the based on “anime” aesthetics. While this might seem like an argument so off-center and reductive that it’s parody— I’d encourage you to go on r/VaporVinyl and take a look at some of the posts replying to threads about Cyber Club’s Sensual Loops LP series. It’s not pretty, and representative where some of the fanbase is at the moment. Adding to my shock was when one of the self-appointed critics outed themselves as twenty three years old. At that moment, I was forced to confront my own bias. I had mistakenly assumed that the puritan was an out-of-touch Gen Xer or a Baby Boomer. Aesthetic intolerance is not exclusive — and plenty of Zoomers are members of this trash clique as well.

What really boggled my mind, however, was that the user had picked vaporwave out of all the other possible genres to go on their Nipponophobic soapbox against. A quick look at the aesthetic movement as a whole (sonically, artistically, etc.) establishes it as what I would assert as a primarily millennial genre — less of a statement about its creators and consumers, and more about the broader, overarching cultural milieu in which in developed. It was birthed in the decade that heralded the mass-consumption of Japanese media in the Western marketplace. Many of its early practitioners got their start chopping and screwing anime OSTs and hip hop. Future Funk effectively appeared on the sonic map by the sampling of Japanese city pop. What is even worth arguing here?

But that which bothered me even more was the user’s stubborn refusal to even listen to the album. You can not buy a vinyl because you just have a particular aversion to cover art — that’s fine! Better yet, you can not buy a vinyl just because you’re not a fan of the sound. Those are two perfectly fine reasons not to partake in a release. But then to go on reddit and complain about an album aesthetic for something you haven’t even listened to? Come on, fam. Level up your praxis. It is the whitewashing and the boorishness that is most infuriating. I’ve legitimately never heard of anyone who dismissed an entire album’s music purely on the basis of its vinyl cover art before.

And shame on them, because they are sleeping on one of the best works of 2019.

The limited edition of Sensual Loops 1 & 2 is another LP that I had the luxury of listening to while on my East Asia tour. I brought the album (among others) with me to visit a very good pal of mine, Han, who’s retired to Hong Kong. Much to my relief, he’s in a comparatively spacious apartment over in the Tai Wo area — by no means the stereotypical postage stamp — and has set up a little audiophile pad that I’m most envious of. His setup is devoted to all things B&W, and I got a beautiful listen of the album on a pair of impressive and almost imposing 700-series floor standers. Powered by the Cambridge Audio Edge series Amp/Pre combo, this was far above even my paygrade. But after working as a salaryman for two decades, he was finally able to invest in his endgame system. And what an endgame it is!

Getting the chance to listen Sensual Loops on this system cemented my opinion when I had first heard it’s release digitally: I was listening to an instant contender for the best vaporwave release of 2019.

Sensual Loops 1

Introduction immediately fills your speakers with a wide, warm guitar and horn loops that feature just enough static noise to distinguish itself as a vaporwave track. I always like it when a little minute-thirty track gives the amp a little exercise. It also proves to be a perfect sonic setup for the next track, which is ostensibly what every “intro” track should do, right?

Night carries that guitar riff from Introduction but adds a playful variance with a synth loop, and vocals that I believe are sampled from that Philly Soul classic “Children of the Night” done by the Stylistics and the Jones Girls’, among others. All of the moving parts here do wonders, syncing together in a perfect arrangement. Both Han and I commented on just how bright this played on his JBLs, which is a testament to the mix and mastering work here.

Love & Affection definitely feels the most retro-vapor of all the tracks on Sensual Loops 1, beginning with a series of loops, riffs, and synth chimes that feel as if they were picked from a certain collection of sitcoms of an early nineties vintage. The heavily distorted vocals and hypnotic drum kits pop in after about a minute to give the track an almost deep house feel as it progresses. The “all mine” hook then crescendos into a symphony of drum hits that conclude the track with a real sonic flutter in the air when played with high-end speakers.

Pain accelerates the rather slow pace of the album up to this point. I’m a big fan of the synth arrangement that opens the track, and I schmood even more with the powerfully funky vocal set that carries the track throughout. But with its short length, it does feel more like an interlude or setup for what I consider to be the highlight of the LP.

Memories is our certified slapper. It starts off immediately with an incredibly catchy synth chord arrangement supplemented by a fantastically tweaked vocal sample from the fantastically, alliteratively-named Melba Moore, another funky soul queen who needs a revival in the contemporary lexicography.

Sensual definitely swings the record a bit further away from the future funk and back towards the vapor-funk side of things. Back are cyber club’s usual array of jumpy, tinny synth chords and manipulated vocal micro-samples that still provide a really robust sonic experience on the hi-fi system of your choice. When the vocals make their appearance about ninety seconds in, I was expecting them to sound much less rich in the middle than they did, which was definitely a present surprise on the mastering side!

Alone is a beautiful cacophony of micro-samples with a vocal track manipulated to sound like an 80s ideal of a future robot gf. I’m not sure how else to describe this track except as pure atmosphere. The fluttering synths, muted percussion, electric highs that send tweeters bouncing — it’s difficult to precisely describe how a track like this comes over a hi-fi system like the Edge. It just pulls out every detail from an immensely dense track like this and does it every bit the justice it deserves.

Paradise ends up taking a traditional funk and re-engineering it into a sort of quasi-tropical sound similar to some of the early Aloe Island Posse bangers. It’s got a much more lo-fi edge to the track then most future funk takes on a track like this, and creates a really unique and playful experience.

Bliss is almost raw synth pop with a hardened vapor edge to it. Although the original sample is from a very soulful electro R&B outfit — the Loose Ends — we get aggressive drums and synth loops that bring this closer to Paula Abdul than anything that could be traditionally considered rhythm and blues. Just enough manipulation of the vocal sample and some well-timed percussion hits make this more fit for a night out than a baby-making session in, which is both remarkable and a testament to cyber club’s skill.

Sensual Loops 2

Intro captures a little more of than urban-turned-Island soundscape that we caught a glimpse of in Paradise. I’m eternally impressed by this, as it seems like Cyber Club never gets too caught up in the production to bring this too far from its vapor essence while still making this a great lede in its own right.

Sensual was a track I was initially expecting to be a remix or redux of the first Sensual from Sensual Loops 1, but I’m glad to see this piece of bass-heavy vapor exists as its own full-bodied track in its own right. It grabs you immediately with its “I’ll never give up on you” vocal loop spliced in among its synth array, and carries you through with an intriguing arrangement of instrumental loops and micro-samples throughout. The low end can really shine here with the right system.

Hold Her Now is a piece of nostalgic, vintage vaporwave straight out of the Saint Pepsi era. Ostensibly a creative cut-up some New Jack Swing that absolutely slaps with the right electric guitar riff and synthetic percussion hit, it harkens back to when vaporwave was in its “peak aesthetics” phase of production and plunder-phonic glory. Perhaps this reminder of what vaporwave used to be unfairly biases me, but it’s definitely a listen for the nostalgia driven old-heads.

Affair is the type of track that sounds completely different on certain types of stereos. While Han’s stereo brought out the crisp, wide vocal mix — perhaps a testament to Cambridge’s design history, my Harman Kardon/KEF pairing brought the synth flares here to the fore. The testament to this track is that I really enjoyed both profiles, and Affair sounded robust and detailed throughout.

Kiss is one of the tracks that I felt coolest on upon an initial listen, which is perhaps a statement to just how much I enjoyed this album. When presented with the innovative arrangements of tracks like Hold Her Now or Memories, I was left feeling that Kiss doesn’t do enough in its minute thirty second runtime. That being said, it’s fun. And that’s what music can and should be at the end of the day, isn’t it?

Touch heaps on that vapor memory with some creative vocal layering, tinny and distorted high-end flutters, and an electric horn that came out swinging in the Cambridge system, much to my surprise. It’s clear at this point that Cyber Club has created a very particular listening experience here, and I’m oh so fond of it.

Special makes a funky classic fresh and electric again, which is what I’m really starting to vibe with in terms of the Cyber Club oeuvre. It serves as a sort of confirmation, a celebration and an altogether fantastic close to the LP.

Vinyl Physicality & Listening Experience

I like black vinyl. This milquetoast statement has earned for me the ire of some enthusiasts on r/VaporVinyl when I post on my alt-account there. Because vaporwave attracts curators with “experience” in the music industry, I’ve been told by “serious LP collectors [who know] label managers” — the type of folks who spin on $100 Crosley turntables bought at a Kohl’s Black Friday sale — that new black vinyls just doesn’t sell anymore. Not for vaporwave, at least. A release should have a colored vinyl or not release at all!

This was a take from the same twenty-three year old who wouldn’t purchase Sensual Loops because of the hentai on the cover — so take that for what you will.

I’ve always liked the supplier that Sic Records uses — whoever they are. The vinyls always have a bit of mass and heft to them, leading me to guess that they’re probably in the 180g range. But that’s just my finger test. My Jungle2000 vinyl feels just as weighty. I’ve always believed there’s a definite spectrum with black vinyls — from the frail Qrate cheap options to the high end audiophile oriented waxes like the beautifully crafted Victor Japan and Columbia waxes from the late 80s and early 90s that you see most city pop and anime OSTs pressed on.

The masters on these records are definitely intriguing for the format. My biggest critique of vaporwave vinyl at this point is that some labels don’t take the requisite care to put out a good vinyl master, and often just end up going all-in with poorly optimized digital release ones. The folks at Sic definitely know what they’re doing — because this ended up playing great on a number of systems and speakers, from my KEFs and H/K setup, to a friends Technics mid-fi rig, to Han’s Cambridge endgame. Each time, we got a wide-but-not-too-wide play without the sound edging towards the bright end of the spectrum too intensely. I think this is important because it respects a lot of the samples used. The mixing work done on a lot of the Philly soul here definitely had a certain muted approach that really brought out the most from the vocals and left instrumental arrangements to a moderately more ambient role. I get that impression of continuity here and love it for that.

In short, you should snap up this release while you can. It’s a great release, and fuck the vaporwave nannies who’d shut down Cyber Club’s best two albums without even a listen. May that /u/ go down with u/hoesmad_ on r/Vaporwave’s wall of shame.

[blogofken]

Left-handed Guitars - A Solution in Search of a Problem

by Ken Hiebert

Ah, the age-old question:

If you're left-handed, is it better to learn on a left-handed guitar?

I'd like to posit this question in a slightly different way:

Why on earth would you want to?

Being left-handed myself, and someone who plays guitar "right-handed", as well as being a guitar instructor for the last dozen years or more, I have developed some fairly strong opinions on this.  If you happen to be a left-hander who plays a left-handed guitar, please don't take offense at this because it really only applies to those who are just beginning their journey.  If you already know how to play then please keep on rockin'!

For everyone else, let me first attempt to answer the second question. If you are left handed (like me), you've probably noticed that pretty much everything in the world is against you because it's been designed with the right-handed person in mind. Whether it's using an old-school can opener or those little school desks with the left side wide open, or even trying to write with a pen and smearing ink all across the page, it's pretty obvious that the world has it in for lefties - and don't even get me started about writing in a three ring binder. Oh yeah, and right-handed scissors. Whoa. Well, thankfully someone did come up with a left-handed version of those that works, but with most of these other things, we're basically screwed. It's sink or swim, buddy. Get with the program or get out and walk.

It's pretty severe and the struggle is real, but if there was something a left-hander could just do naturally and not worry about having to adjust his or her whole life to do it, wouldn't that be preferable?

I remember my Mom telling me about my aunt (who's a lefty) when she was in school. The teacher had been trying to force her to write with her right hand (there it is again - wRITE with the right hand, the proper hand). Anyway, she was having a tough time until my Grandpa went down there and tore a strip off that teacher and told her she better let his damn kid write with whichever hand she damn well wants (or something like that). So, it fixed the problem, but not without a lot of pain and a huge amount of expended energy.

Now, back to the answer to the second question which I'll repeat because by now you've likely forgotten what it was:

"Why on earth would anyone want to play a left-handed guitar?"

So, you're a lefty who really wants to play guitar and you just came home with your first left-handed guitar.  You've taken lessons for a month or so and you've just spent the whole weekend working on the coolest riff you've ever heard.   Let's say it was the riff from "Smoke on the Water", because if you've just started learning guitar, then that probably *is* the coolest riff you've ever heard. Now, say you're at your friend's place and he's also learning how to play guitar and you're really pumped to show him this awesome riff.  Then you realize that you don't know how to play *his* guitar.  You only know how to play *your* guitar.  Then repeat that scenario for every one of your other friends as well.

Now fast forward about a year and you're in a small music store, and there's this dude playing a really nasty version of "Stairway to Heaven" and you know you can play it WAY better than him. You look around on the rack for a lefty guitar but sadly, they don't have any in stock.  Foiled again!

Now, I totally skipped over the part where you went to your local, small-town music store and played a dozen different guitars because you wanted to find the perfect one to make all your dreams come true - one you could buy with the money you saved pumping gas all summer.  The reason I skipped that part is because it likely never happened.  You'd be lucky to find even one guitar you could play at most small music stores and guaranteed, it's going to be more money than its right-handed equivalent.

Ok, so after all of that, I still don't know why anyone would ever really *want* to play a left handed guitar, unless someone simply convinces you that you should.

My first band consisted of myself on guitar, my friend Ian on bass guitar, and my other friend James on drums.  James also played guitar and Ian played everything, but the one thing we had in common is that we were all left-handed. What are the chances!?

*Interesting side note:

Like most lefties, we enjoyed talking about how the entire world is against us, and when another friend noticed this, he remarked that we "sounded like a bunch of bitter southpaws." Our band name was born!

Now, the interesting thing about these three Bitter Southpaws is that we all played guitar right-handed.  Another interesting tidbit is that in the arts, the incidence of left-handedness seems to be relatively high, and among left-handed guitarists, the majority of them don't play a left-handed guitar.

Here's another question that you probably have never asked:

"Why does everyone in North America operate a standard transmission with their right hand, while in the UK they use the left hand?"  

Here's a hint - it's not because everyone in North America is right handed or that everyone is left handed in the UK. It's because that's the way they are built.  To build them the other way around would be ridiculous and would cause more problems than the imaginary one it would solve.  Just because you are offered a choice doesn't mean that it's legitimate or beneficial.  As a left-hander myself who plays "right" I'm convinced that the opportunity someone saw for a niche market in left handed guitars was a solution in search of a problem.  Could you learn to play a left handed guitar?  Of course, but why would you want to unless some salesperson convinced you that you should?  

I'm also convinced that left-handed guitars have caused more problems than they've solved.  Learning a musical instrument is challenging enough as it is, so why in the world would anyone want to make it more complicated than it needs to be?  

There have also been some great players of upside-down guitars (Jimi Hendrix, Alber King, Elizabeth Cotton), as well as great guitarists who played with the guitar laying flat on their laps (Jeff Healey comes to mind.)   Could you do that? Probably.  That doesn't mean that it's the easy way or the best way to do it, it just means that humans are capable of almost anything they put their minds to.  I've even seen someone play guitar with his feet.  You gotta do what you gotta do, I guess.

So, to answer the first question:

Should a lefty start learning on a left-handed guitar?

If you've never played a guitar before, then I would say a resounding NO!  I don't think personal preference has anything to do with it.  In order to play guitar well, both hands need to function well above what would be considered "normal function" for non-musicians and if you're starting from zero anyway, you might as well just do it the normal way.  Learn to play the instrument the way it was designed.  It will make your life easier.  There's a reason you don't see right-handed pianos, or right-handed saxophones.  Now, I've taught a few lefties in my day, but they had already been playing that way for over a year before they came to me, so changing it up at that point would not only have been insensitive, it would’ve been completely ridiculous.

When I walked into my first guitar lesson over 35 years ago and picked up my first guitar in a left handed fashion, Chet Breau (son of the late, great Lenny Breau) told me something like, "Kid, if you don't already know how to play that thing, I'm gonna teach you the RIGHT way!"  I'm so glad he did, and this is exactly how I approach the subject with my own students today.