My timing is precise but ... inaccurate.

[Big Tick]

Metronome is good for timing. The problem is that people are using it wrong most of the time.
Here is Victor Wooten, a guy who knows a thing or two about groove and timing, explaining it all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9X1fhVLVF_4

[mjudge55]

Metronome is good for timing. The problem is that people are using it wrong most of the time.
Here is Victor Wooten, a guy who knows a thing or two about groove and timing, explaining

Great video, thanks for sharing.

[Hermetech Mastering]

I enjoyed it too, great stuff.

[The Noodlist]

Metronome is good for timing. The problem is that people are using it wrong most of the time.
Here is Victor Wooten, a guy who knows a thing or two about groove and timing, explaining it all.

Take note of his left foot, in time with the metronome. This has to be developed before moving on to grooving. Different stages, I suppose.

[vurt]

no problem tapping my foot in time.
it's my hands i use on guitar though

[Hermetech Mastering]

Metronome is good for timing. The problem is that people are using it wrong most of the time.
Here is Victor Wooten, a guy who knows a thing or two about groove and timing, explaining it all.

Take note of his left foot, in time with the metronome. This has to be developed before moving on to grooving. Different stages, I suppose.

For sure, he says so in the beginning of the vid, the reason he uses the metronome is so that eventually he doesn't need to rely on the metronome, and the groove comes from within. He keeps on repeating it throughout, slow the metronome down, so you rely on it less. I am 3 1/2 years into practising acoustic guitar five days a week, four hours a day, with a metronome or drums for about 90% of my practise. I still haven't even considered breaking away from it, despite knowing from the beginning that this is the goal. You can't break the rules until you have fully assimilated them. This vid is a good stepping stone into that.

Tapping my foot on the beat is something I have been doing since the beginning, it's hard at first, but makes strumming things like 16th note patterns, triplets, or mixed meters, much easier in the long run. Now it's just automatic. Same goes for Victor's final exercise, that one is just INSANE!!! (But so, so good...)

[The Noodlist]

I am 3 1/2 years into practising acoustic guitar five days a week, four hours a day, with a metronome or drums for about 90% of my practise.

Tapping my foot on the beat is something I have been doing since the beginning, it's hard at first, but makes strumming things like 16th note patterns, triplets, or mixed meters, much easier in the long run. Now it's just automatic.

[Chris Walton]

So, I posted this thread, then kinda dipped. Sorry about that. However, thank you all so much for the amount of input; I really didn't expect that this thread would explode as much as it did (in the best way).

I should note that I've had some (minor) success with the following: While playing, I concentrate on getting the "one" right every measure or every second measure (depending on the song, if it's half-time, etc.); with that, I found I'm much better at keeping it "right". I'm still far from perfect and this is still way too much "conscious" effort at the moment, but it's a technique that's helping me get there a part of the way, at least. This was inspired in part by Bootsy Collins "Keep it on the one" and by Ben Eller's video on chunking.

practise to a groove rather than a click, if you want to develop a groove style of playing.

Funnily enough, even there I have the same problem. I can groove just fine even with something that's not quantized, it's just that every note is a bit early.

Start with the rhythm already well and truly going and if you make a mistake, fine, but keep that rhythm going and come back playing in time and in sync with the song position. Never start and stop that internal rhythm while you are playing or recording.
I heard that tip from a flamenco guitarist who was an absolute master of rhythm. Improved my playing no end

Oh yes! This is fascinating to hear, because this is a technique I've kinda developed for myself to be better at recording tricky parts (particularly ones with excessive time signature wankery). Just keep the foot tapping after I hit stop, and then hit start again on time with my foot, etc.; I never considered that this same technique could help me get my timing itself better as well. Thank you!

Are you over-thinking things? It reads as though this is something that troubles you enough to throw your timing - maybe unconsciously. Meditation might help. Finding a way not to care or think about it. What you play should be pure muscle memory anyway. So you should be at live performance level before thinking to record - perform the song at least 200 or so times before tracking.

Don't worry about nailing any take. Just set up your session to loop record and keep playing. Forget you are recording and enjoy playing.

This may very well be a factor. I'm a notorious overthinker, and my mate has told me several times before that I'm way better at the instrument when I turn off my brain.

Dealing with overthinking is something I've worked on for years. I have a small toolbox of tricks I use, though most of them involve sounds in some fashion, which would obviously not be helpful in a situation when I'm trying to knock out a song. I'll try to do some autogenic stuff in conjunction with the music the next time I open up my DAW and see if that helps me a bit.

Also rethink and apply your picking technique.

Just two years ago I actually "relearned" picking (though based on a Rob Chapman video) because I had been doing it wrong for 20 years but that didn't make a difference in timing.

Also, Adam Neely is awesome.

If so, this is just latency.

I can rule out latency. Happens even when no DAW is involved at all.

3. Establish picking speed during count in by picking muted notes at the pulse of the tune.

This absolutely does help (though more for precision than accuracy, in my case at least)