Sommaire pour April 2021 de Guitarist

This month’s grand round-up of gear to try in 2021 (see cover feature, page 52) got me thinking about something that can be a tricky dilemma for any guitarist lucky enough to be in a position to invest money in equipping themselves for music making. Playing the Patrick James Eggle Macon Single Cut (reviewed on page 82) was a genuinely inspiring experience. Simply put, it was among the best – if not the best – twin-humbucker electric guitars I’ve ever played. Every detail of the instrument, from the elegant headstock to the finely crafted heel, added its measure of virtue to make playing the guitar not merely a pleasure but a revelation. Well, you might say, it should be good: it costs the better part of five grand. In these…

PRICE: £899 (inc gigbag) ORIGIN: Indonesia TYPE: Double-cutaway solidbody electric BODY: Mahogany back with maple top (w/figured veneer facing) and shallow violin carve NECK: Maple, Wide Thin profile, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 635mm (25”) NUT/WIDTH: Friction reducing/ 42.8mm FINGERBOARD: Rosewood, ‘old-school’ bird inlays, 254mm (10”) radius FRETS: 24, medium HARDWARE: PRS patented vibrato (cast), PRS designed non-locking tuners – nickel-plated STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 52.5mm ELECTRICS: PRS TCI ‘S’ Treble and Bass humbuckers (open coiled zebra bobbins); 3-way toggle pickup selector switch, master volume and tone, 2x mini-toggle coil-split switches WEIGHT (kg/lb): 8/3.6 OPTIONS: Colour only RANGE OPTIONS: See Custom 24. The SE Paul’s Guitar uses the same mini-toggle switches and TCI ‘S’ pickups as the 24-08 and costs £899. The USA Core 24-08 starts at £3,799 LEFT-HANDERS: See SE Custom FINISHES:…

S-Types Throw a pick in a custom build workshop and chances are you’ll hit an S-type derivative. So, how is this different to the iconic guitar? Leigh Dovey highlights a few key points. “It’s a lot narrower as a whole but particularly across the top horns. I prefer a smaller-bodied guitar. If you flip it over then you’ll notice that the heel block is a lot different. It’s styled to be a lot more comfortable with a cutaway, rather than a block like you’d find on more traditional double-cuts. So it’s more ergonomic and it’s also got a string-through hardtail bridge as opposed to a vibrato. We may offer a vibrato in future, but my favourite guitars have always been fixed bridge and, of course, it helps meet that price…

HILTON VALENTINE: 1943-2021 Guitarist was saddened to hear of the passing of The Animals’ founding guitarist Hilton Valentine on 29 January, aged 77. He played the immortal arpeggiated chords to the band’s 1964 version of House Of The Rising Sun and on key singles such as Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood and We Gotta Get Out Of This Place.While the Newcastle band first split in the late 60s, Valentine would reunite with singer Eric Burdon frequently over the years. “The opening opus of Rising Sun will never sound the same!” wrote Burdon in tribute on Instagram. “You didn’t just play it, you lived it! Heartbroken by the sudden news of Hilton’s passing. We had great times together, Geordie lad. From the North Shields to the entire world… Rock In Peace.”…

“I’m good at holding my nerve and playing accurately with attitude and vibe in high-pressure and, in this case, unusual situations” Over the course of the pandemic, almost everyone has had their work environment change to some degree. While professional musicians are among those to have been dramatically affected, personally I’ve been fairly lucky, as sessions have continued in one form or another – be it online or in a socially distant fashion in a commercial studio. The larger studios, such as Abbey Road and AIR Lyndhurst, have worked extremely hard to make their facilities Covid-secure. A couple of days before you attend a session you’ll receive a health questionnaire, you then have to arrive early to sign in and get your gear in. The breaks are extended and the…

Even with spring on the horizon, the gloomy grip of a long winter has stayed with me throughout this year. Dark nights, damp mornings and ongoing lockdowns (at the time of writing) continue to threaten that kernel of hopeful optimism driving me forward. But when one also decides to move house with two small children during a global pandemic, stress levels can reach previously unknown heights. A return to the workbench with the same energy and focus that I’m sure I had before the move is not exactly easy, if indeed – amid the cascade of cardboard boxes and bubble wrap – I can make it there at all. Fortunately, despite all the domestic turmoil I am not moving workshop. Entering through the front door and switching on the lights…

Reading about ‘The Rivals’ in issue 469 reminded me of a parallel within artist oil paint manufacturing. For umpteen years two firms dominated this product, especially in Britain. Over time the quality in the paint seemed to decline but the prices remained high, until 20-plus years ago a smaller manufacturer started to make paint of extremely high quality at a good price. Their popularity was so great that the rivals had to rethink and reprice their product to save face. I’ve come late to guitaring again, after failing miserably in my teens trying to be a blueser, listening to my ‘Beano’ vinyl and seeing Taste, Zep, Savoy Brown all play in their day. I was given a Squier Strat on my 60th from my daughter, but later fancied another guitar.…

Rule Britannia “My parents got me a guitar and some lessons, and I ignored the lessons and just started picking stuff out. George Harrison’s solos in The Beatles, every guitar player learnt those literally – I mean, it was sacrilege to improvise them. But the second wave of British Invasion acts – The Who, The Yardbirds, John Mayall – that’s when I really got into the guitar. It was all about improvisation and the songs sometimes became secondary. It’d just be some old blues song that you rearranged just for the purposes of playing really long solos. “When Eric Clapton made his debut with the Bluesbreakers, that was an atom bomb in the middle of the guitar world. Everyone was hanging off every note he played. I drove up to…

PATRICK JAMES EGGLE MACON SINGLE CUT £4,500 CONTACT Patrick James Eggle PHONE 01691 661777 WEB www.eggle.co.uk The Gibson Les Paul is a cornerstone of the modern electric guitar. Obviously, Gibson offers many flavours in its production and Custom Shop ranges and there’s no shortage of small ’shop boutique makers who have their own particular takes and flavour combinations to tempt us with. To illustrate such diversity, we’re taking a look at British guitar-making royalty, Patrick James Eggle, with this latest version of his Macon Single Cut. The last time we looked at one of these models we awarded it a straight 10 and Guitarist Gold award. How will this one fair – and what’s changed? Well, one thing that hasn’t changed is the case-opening wow factor. This Macon is simply…

Unscrewing that lovely backplate, we’re thrown back in time with a pair of large and very old-looking Luxe Grey Tiger paper-in-oil caps that dominate the circuit. Unlike other recent PJE guitars we’ve looked at, there are no treble bleeds here on the Emerson 500k pots. But there’s also a pull-switch on the bridge pickup tone control, a ‘blower’ switch that routes the bridge pickup directly to the output bypassing all the controls. “On one hand, we do want to offer different wirings where we can and let people know that it’s available,” says Patrick when we quiz him on this vintage-wired circuit. “But it was also born out of a conversation with Thomas [Nilsen, Cream T Pickups founder]. I asked him what he’d want with these pickups – as in…

PRICE: £3,335 (inc Aero case) ORIGIN: USA TYPE: Grand Theater electro-acoustic TOP: Sitka spruce w/ C-class bracing BACK/SIDES: Indian rosewood MAX RIM DEPTH: 114mm MAX BODY WIDTH: 375mm NECK: Mahogany SCALE LENGTH: 612.7mm (24.12”) TUNERS: Taylor nickel mini NUT/WIDTH: Graph Tech Tusq/43.6mm FINGERBOARD: West African ebony, Element inlays FRETS: 20, small BRIDGE/SPACING: Ebony with compensated Micarta saddle/56mm ELECTRICS: Taylor Expression System 2 WEIGHT (kg/lb): 2/4.4 OPTIONS: The 811 is available without the Expression System 2 pickup at £3,155 RANGE OPTIONS: Taylor’s 800 series currently features 10 models; the GT body size within that range extends to the GT urban ash/spruce (£1,619), GTe Urban ash/spruce (£1,835) and, also new, all-koa GT K21e (£5,159). See website for details. LEFT-HANDERS: Yes FINISH: Natural Gloss with satin neck back PROS Great instrument with a…

BOSS GT-1000CORE GUITAR EFFECTS PROCESSOR £599 CONTACT Roland UK WEB www.boss.info/uk When Boss introduced the flagship GT-1000 amp modelling and effects floorboard a couple of years back it signified a major refresh for the long-running GT series, ushering in a number of features: an ultra-fast DSP engine, 32-bit operation and 96kHz sampling rate as well as AIRD (Augmented Impulse Response Dynamics) technology, designed for more realistic amp simulations and optimised integration with whatever’s next in the chain. Although more streamlined than the previous GT models, the original GT-1000 still has the form factor typical of a large floorboard unit, which will not appeal to every potential user, despite its tempting sound and facilities. Fortunately, now there’s a way for some of those users to buy into the sounds and facilities…

We’ve probably all got one or more pedals that have an input for expression pedal control… and we’ve probably all got one or more reasons why we don’t always use them. Maybe we don’t own an expression pedal or we think it’s too much of a faff to set up. Or maybe it’s simply that an expression pedal (or indeed multiple expression pedals) can take up valuable real estate on our pedalboards. Now, there are instances when an expression pedal’s treadle action is essential: you’d definitely need one if you wanted to have real physical control over the wahs found in the Boss GT-1000Core reviewed in this issue, for example, or maybe to get some Whammy-style action from a pitch shifter such as the recently reviewed Electro-Harmonix Pitch Fork+. However,…

Sustainer The Sustainer is a reverb type that I like to put in front of modulation devices such as phasers, flangers and tremolos in order to make those effects sustain and shimmer for longer. It’s kind of inspired by the routing of old Fender amps, where the reverb tank would sit before the tremolo circuit – but with modern-day reverb technology you can really push that concept to new intergalactic heights. For this job you’ll need a reverb pedal that’s able to produce a really long, clear and consistent reverb decay. If you feed that into a fast, choppy tremolo and slow phaser, for instance, you can create some really cool percussive synth-like pads that keep going, even when you’re not playing. My most used pedal for this particular job…

“If you asked someone, ‘Do you know what a Bigsby is?’ they’ll probably tell you it’s a vibrato,” says Andy. “But they might not be able to tell you it was invented by someone called Paul Bigsby, and that he was the same guy who made the first solidbody electric guitar [for Merle Travis in 1948]. The very first Bigsby vibrato was also made for Merle [in 1951]. The guitar came first and he was experimenting with pedal steels, so the idea of pulling the strings in and out of tune was kind of natural. When Paul first met Merle, they got to talking about guitars and he told him, ‘I can build anything – I’m a patternmaker.’ “Prior to making instruments, Paul built motorcycles, so for him to tackle…

I discussed levelling your frets, reprofiling and then polishing them to reduce the worn fret tops and give them a custom shop-like mirror sheen. For many, that’s simply a job for the pro repairer, and rightly so. The professionals can advise on how to remove (or lessen) fretwear, why your guitar is buzzing in random places and, above all, speak from experience. There are plenty of ways to skin this particular cat and in today’s virtual world you have the huge resources of ‘how-to’ videos. If you want to learn what’s involved it’s the obvious place to start. I’d recommend a visit to the StewMac site as it’s full of not only tools, parts and jigs but plenty of tutorials by Dan Erlewine and his team, who probably know more…

1962 Maestro FZ-1 Fuzz-Tone released (first fuzz pedal); 3 transistors Late 1965/early 1966 Sola Sound Tone Bender ‘MK 1.5’ (similar to Fuzz Face circuit); 2 transistors Late 1966 Fuzz Face released; ‘Arbiter England’ logo; NKT275 germanium transistors; grey finish 1968 ‘Dallas-Arbiter England’ logo; BC183L silicon transistors; red finish available Late 60s onwards Various silicon transistors including BC108C, BC109C and BC209C Early 70s ‘Dallas Music Industries Ltd’ logo 1974 ‘CBS/Arbiter Ltd’ logo Mid-70s Discontinued; reissued briefly in 1976 with silicon transistors (‘Dallas Music Industries’ logo) 1987 Crest Audio reissue; BC109C silicon transistors; grey, blue or red finish 1993 Dunlop reissue; ‘Dallas-Arbiter England’ logo; germanium transistors…

What if Enzo Ferrari had not only created some of the greatest sports cars in history but also built some of the best motorcycles and bicycles? As improbable as that sounds, Leo Fender achieved something of the same order with Fender’s musical instruments. From the Telecaster to the Twin, from the Precision to the Princeton, it’s astonishing how much Fender got right so early in the electric era and how enduring his designs have become, be they amps or guitars. Leo may not always have been first, but he was uncommonly good at being best and he always had his eye to the future, not the past. For example, it’s arguable that his most influential invention was the electric bass: the transition away from upright basses to electric solidbodies changed…

Before the Precision Bass landed in 1951, fretless upright basses were the industry standard, and with this groundbreaking design Leo Fender set a precedent that changed the course of popular music. Not only did the P-Bass alleviate many of the practical problems associated with transporting a large double bass, but with the benefit of powerful amplification bassists were now able to be clearly heard during any performance. Along with greater volume, the instrument’s ‘precision’ frets and relative ease of playability encouraged musicians to develop new bass playing methods, altering the soundscape of modern music forever. From 1951, the Precision Bass was styled in a similar vein to the Telecaster and Esquire, featuring a ‘slab’ body finished in blonde with a black pickguard (hence these are often referred to as ‘Telecaster…

During 1954, a series of spec changes took place that signalled the end of the Telecaster and Esquire’s Blackguard era – notably when single-layer white pickguards replaced the original black type. At the same time, Fender’s classic butterscotch blonde finish was replaced by a whiter shade, giving these later guitars a much brighter appearance. Also, in ’54, the guitars’ slotted bridge saddles switched from brass to steel, changing again in ’58 when a fully threaded type was introduced. Further changes occurred in 1955 when the bridge pickup’s flat polepieces were superseded by Stratocaster-style staggered polepieces. While these two Telecasters appear similar, notice that the headstock decal/ logo of the 1956 model on the left is lower down the headstock. That year, the original round string tree was replaced by a…

Following the introduction of the Jazzmaster in 1958, rosewood fretboards became standard across Fender’s entire guitar range in ’59. Aside from appealing to those who preferred the more traditional, upmarket appearance of rosewood, this move also helped solve the increasing problem of Fender’s lacquered maple fingerboards appearing worn out after a certain amount of playing time. The earliest Fender rosewood fretboards feature a flat/‘slab’ base. This changed to a curved veneer in ’62 and became thinner the following year. The alder-bodied Telecaster and Esquire Custom were introduced with rosewood fretboards in 1959 as a fancier alternative to the standard blonde/ash body models, although they are identical in terms of their pickups and electronics. Attempting to give the plain old Tele a classier appearance, the Custom was gussied up with a…

Since 1950, Fender had led the charge in establishing the solidbody electric as a commonly accepted form of musical instrument, and with the guitar boom well underway in the mid-60s following The Beatles’ ‘British invasion’, its guitars were never more popular. In 1965, the company was sold to the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) conglomerate, and in order to meet this unprecedented demand Fender’s new management set about streamlining production. As the 70s progressed, however, guitarists increasingly sought out used instruments from Fender’s earlier periods of production. Thus, in 1981, Fender returned to its roots with the Vintage reissue series ’57 and ’62 Stratocasters and ’52 Telecaster. Although the ’52 Telecaster was available in the Blackguard-style blonde finish only, the two-tone sunburst fretted-maple-neck ’57 Stratocaster and three-tone sunburst rosewood’board ’62 Stratocaster…

Fender introduced its American Professional series in 2017, building upon the success of the long-running American Standard range that helped relaunch the Fender brand in the mid-80s (and provided the guitar world with some of the best axes money could buy!). This was, in turn, superseded by the American Professional II series late last year, which currently features a choice selection of some of Fender’s most popular models, including the Stratocaster, Stratocaster HSS, Telecaster, Telecaster Deluxe and Jazzmaster. The range embeds a very modern feature-set within classic Fender lines, including Tim Shaw-designed V-Mod II pickups that employ a blend of Alnico magnet types for balanced tone, and boutique-vibed touches such as roasted pine bodies as an option on the Strats. Priced at £1,779, the American Professional II Stratocaster HSS pictured…

If we were grading on looks alone, the new Guild Starfire I Jet90 would bag a 10 without breaking a sweat. The Jet90 plays fast and loose with Guild’s heritage, probably best described as a bit of a mash-up. Back in issue 465 we looked at the new Starfire I DC and SC models, and here Guild has taken the single-cut SC body with its sharp Florentine and melded the Firebird-esque headstock from its Jetstar solidbodies. Six-in-line headstocks on semis just look cool, don’t they? Anyone remember the Hagström Viking II Elvis played on his ’68 Comeback Special TV show? Then there’s the cult classic Gibson Trini Lopez, a guitar that’s probably better known these days by its association with Foo Fighter Dave Grohl. While the Indonesian-built Jet90 boasts that…

Both the vibrato and rear control cavity covers sit on top of the surface and aren’t recessed flush like the USA Core models. Don’t feel too short changed, though; it’s the same with our CE 24 and the S2 models.The Custom’s cavity is shielded with conductive paint, the underside of the cover with conductive foil. It certainly looks ship-shape (we’ve seen far less tidy soldering on Core models). The Custom’s circuit uses a 180 picofarad treble bleed and a 223J code (0.022 microfarads) tone capacitor on 500kohm pots, with the volume stamped RF.The tone pot has a pull switch that simultaneously dumps the screw coils to ground. On most PRSes that use this switching there are two small resistors that allow some of the dumped coil to remain in circuit,…

“I pushed every DC plug in to the hilt, in every pedal… Every light was lit and yet the parrot remained stubbornly extinct” As the late British comedian and singer Max Bygraves used to say,“I’m gonna tell you a story...” Actually, it’s not that exciting, so don’t get your hopes up too high. Mind you, it is quite funny, given that I’m supposed to be an experienced gear person, a reviewer of many years’ experience, and a player of rather more. It started when I decided to make up a small pedalboard to go with my Fender Blues Junior ‘Woody’ amp that I keep at home. It sounds great on its own and I use it as my review test rig, but for single-coil guitars it could sometimes do with…

ALLEN KEYS: A selection is helpful for adjusting the various types of truss rod out there. NUT FILES: The most costly set of tools when getting started, but nut files are worth the investment. Lowering nut slots is one of the most effective ways to improve the playability of a lot of guitars. SOLDERING IRON: Crackly jack sockets are a common problem and a low-risk place to start practising your rewiring skills. FRET END FILE: Dressing fret ends will instantly improve the feel of many factory-made guitars. MICROMESH: Bring your frets up to a mirror polish for a velvety-smooth feel.…

Open G, one of the most popular and widely used open tunings, is particularly associated with Keith Richards who used it on a number of tracks, including Honky Tonk Women and Start Me Up. It retains the core of standard tuning on the second, third and fourth strings (D, G and B) but both high and low E strings are dropped a tone to D. The fifth/A string is also lowered to G, making it the root note of most shapes – so much so that Keith Richards stopped bothering at all with the sixth string on the guitars he keeps in this tuning! However, there are some fantastic chords available using the sixth string for more fingerstyle/folky areas, and these take into consideration such players as Robert Johnson, Gram…

Unsung Heroes? The Westone guitar brand is 40 years old this year, made between 1981 and 1987 by the Matsumoku company in Japan. The Japanese Westone guitars and basses are renowned to this day for their quality: they range from the more economical Spectrums and Concordes to the Gibson-beating Prestiges and Rainbows. The basses were as good as the Ibanez and Aria basses produced in Japan at the same time. Not many famous endorsees, but I am sure that many of your readers will have played or owned one of these fine instruments at some stage in their playing career. Could there be a tribute at some time this year in the magazine to celebrate this milestone of Japanese guitar craftsmanship? I have a number of models and could send…

1 CHARVEL PRO-MOD DK24 HSH 2PT CM MAHOGANY An option for those who appreciate progressive performance but in a more classic style is Charvel’s Pro-Mod range. There are three additions to the Pro-Mod DK24 2PT (the model name denoting a 24-fret model with two-point vibrato). Up first is the tongue-twistingly titled Pro-Mod DK24 HSH 2PT CM Mahogany (£1,059, pictured), which features a natural mahogany body, gold hardware, and Seymour Duncan Full Shred at the bridge, Flat Strat SSL-6 single coil in the middle position and Alnico II Pro pickups at the neck. The Pro-Mod DK24 HSS 2PT CM (also £1,059) swaps the mahogany body for Snow White-finished alder. Finally, the Pro-Mod DK24 HH 2PT CM LH (£1,159) comes in Gloss Black or Satin Shell Pink (with chrome hardware), alder…

In a six-decade career that has seen him stretch the concept of live performance, this year’s Clearly Human Virtual Tour might be Todd Rundgren’s most ambitious project yet. Joining a 10-piece band for a run of 25 livestreamed shows performed at a single venue in Chicago, Rundgren intends to create the illusion of a full US tour, with each concert tailored to a specific city and local fanbase… “The first phase of Utopia was probably when I was playing the best guitar of my career… [My level of technique has] not gone beyond that” What can we expect from the Clearly Human Virtual Tour? “With a one-off special livestream broadcast, you can reach your entire audience at once, but you give up a lot of what they’ve come to expect,…

1 That’s an expensive Les Paul copy… That’s one opinion. It does follow the classic recipe, but it’s blindingly obvious from its headstock, not to mention the top carve, the sculptured heel and rib-cage cutaway, that this is a Patrick James Eggle instrument. It’s made in the UK, too. 2 Haven’t we seen these models before, though? We last looked at the single-cutaway Macon model back in issue 421 (July 2017) and this latest version includes numerous differences, notably Cream T’s WhiskerBuckers directly cloned from Billy F Gibbons’ fabled Pearly Gates ’Burst. 3 Who’s gonna play one of these? If you’re into Les Pauls, not to mention ones that summon up the mighty originals, you’ll be at home here. It’s one of the oldest, most worn-in feeling (but not reliced)…

PRICE: £4,500 (inc case) ORIGIN: UK TYPE: Single-cutaway, set-neck lightly chambered electric BODY: Genuine mahogany with flamed Eastern Red maple carved top NECK: 1-piece mahogany with extended ‘foot’, ‘Fat C’ profile, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 625.5mm (24.625”) NUT/WIDTH: Bone/42.8mm FINGERBOARD: Figured maple bound rosewood with ‘frame’ inlays; 305mm (12”) radius FRETS: 22, medium/tall Jescar 55090 HARDWARE: Aged nickel, Milled aluminium ABM tune-o-matic-style bridge with steel saddles, ABM milled aluminium stud tailpiece, Hipshot Classic Open tuners with ivoroid buttons STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 51.5mm ELECTRICS: Cream T BFG WhiskerBucker set, 3-way toggle pickup selector switch, individual pickup volume and tone control,‘blower’ switch on treble pickup tone control WEIGHT (kg/lb): 3.73/8.2 OPTIONS: The base price here is £4,200. The ’board binding (£100) and Cream T pickups (£200) account for the upcharges. As with most…

1Haven’t we met Taylor’s GT before? Taylor’s new GT body size was introduced in October 2020 with the GTe Urban Ash and we looked at it back in issue 467. We were charmed by its demure playability and sofa-buddy cuddliness, not to mention its ecological credentials. The 811e shares its body dimensions, scale length, and so on, but this time we have more ‘old-school’ body woods – rosewood, spruce and mahogany – and more upmarket body furnishings. 2 Small is still beautiful, then? Indeed. We’re certainly seeing a rise in smaller-bodied acoustics these days as the mystic art of lutherie has evolved to the extent that less is more in this respect. We’ve heard instruments that can dish out surprising levels of volume and rich tone from a comparatively minute…

1 I thought the GT-1000 was a massive floorboard? It is, but Boss identified a need for a version that could fit comfortably into a compact pedalboard or sit unobtrusively on a desktop. 2 Is it just as powerful as the big guy? Absolutely. It has all the processing clout, models and patches of the flagship model – it just loses a couple of connections, seven footswitches and the treadle. 3 Are three footswitches going to be enough, though? We don’t see why not. Okay, you might not get instant individual switching for 10 effects, but there are many ways to assign the footswitches to provide for your onstage needs.…

MOOER Expline £74.99 If you need an expression pedal but don’t have the space for a full-size one, this one is micro-sized at 128mm deep by 55mm wide and 48mm high. OLD BLOOD NOISE ENDEAVORS Expression Slider £49 How about using a fader to change expression values? This will easily slot into your ’board or could perhaps be strapped to your mic stand. MISSION ENGINEERING Expressionator £199 A programmable multi-expression controller that lets one expression pedal control up to three expression-enabled effects.…

What was the first serious guitar you bought with your own money? “Okay, this is going to come as a surprise to many… it was a BC Rich Warlock! I literally rolled coins and used a piggy bank of sorts to pay for it. I loved hair metal at the time, but once I heard SRV and Hendrix, a Strat would replace the Warlock.” What was the last guitar you bought and why? “I ordered a Novo Miris and should have it by the time your readers see this. I love to support small builders. I especially like to support those that are pushing the envelope of design but keeping elements of tradition in their products. I’m really on a quest like never before to find ‘my sound’, so I’m…

JOHN LEE HOOKER THE COMPLETE ’50S CHESS RECORDINGS Everything on here is a valuable listen, but particularly relevant are the tracks where John Lee Hooker accompanies himself on solo guitar (and foot tap) because you can really hear how he manages to provide a complete sounding accompaniment. Leave My Wife Alone shows what an inventive player he was, with rhythmic chords, lead fills and bass solos! Please Don’t Go and Worried Life Blues are also great examples. HOWLIN’ WOLF THE DEFINITIVE COLLECTION The most obvious track to highlight here is Smokestack Lightnin’, which makes such a feature of the repeated rhythmic guitar fill. But be sure to check out Moanin’ At Midnight, which applies a slightly different rhythmic feel and could also work on a lone guitar without the band.…

Undoubtedly Fender’s most popular and influential guitar design, the Stratocaster appeared in the spring of 1954 and was originally intended to replace the Telecaster. Sporting three pickups along with a “synchronized tremolo” and “original contour body”, the Strat certainly was an upgrade in terms of features and within a few years it was being endorsed by some of America’s hottest guitar talent, including Buddy Guy, Buddy Holly and Mary Kaye. When designing the Stratocaster, Fender collaborated closely with professional guitarists such as Rex Gallion and Bill Carson (Bill had previously taken a saw to the body of his Telecaster to add some ‘contours’ of his own), while studio star and Fender employee Freddie Tavares later assisted Leo in nailing down the guitar’s timeless form. Blending space-age aesthetics with curvaceous appeal,…

The 60s were a particularly colourful time in Fender’s history. Although custom colour instruments were occasionally made to order throughout the previous decade and were offered in catalogues at a five per cent additional cost during the late 50s, custom colour guitars from that period are especially few and far between. It wasn’t until Fender brought out its first custom colour chart in 1961 that the choice of colours became standardised and the idea really took off. The more numerous custom colour finishes include Candy Apple Red Metallic, Olympic White and Lake Placid Blue Metallic, while Shell Pink, Surf Green and Burgundy Mist Metallic are among the rarest. Fiesta Red Stratocasters such as this fine example from 1963 were especially popular in the UK during the early 60s, thanks to…

PRICE: £599 ORIGIN: Indonesia TYPE: Single-cutaway semi-acoustic thinline electric guitar BODY: Laminated maple with chambered mahogany centre block, ABS binding, satin polyurethane finish NECK: Mahogany with satin polyurethane finish, set-in SCALE LENGTH: 629mm (24.75”) NUT/WIDTH: Composite/43mm FINGERBOARD: Indian rosewood with ABS binding and 5mm pearloid dot inlays, 320mm (12.5”) radius FRETS: 20, narrow tall HARDWARE: Nickel tune-o-matic anchored 6-saddle bridge and aluminium Guild Bigsby style vibrato, vintage-style inline tuners STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 52mm ELECTRICS: 3x Guild Franz P90 Soapbar single coils, master volume, master tone, 6-way pickup selector rotary switch WEIGHT (kg/lb): 3.3/7.5 OPTIONS: None RANGE OPTIONS: The Starfire I SC and DC models come with or without Bigsby at £459 and £549 respectively. The more historically correct Starfires include the single-cut III at £1,090 LEFT-HANDERS: No, but the Starfire…

PRICE: £825 (inc gigbag) ORIGIN: Indonesia TYPE: Double-cutaway solidbody electric BODY: Mahogany back with maple top (w/figured veneer facing) and shallow violin carve NECK: Maple, Wide Thin profile, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 635mm (25”) NUT/WIDTH: Friction reducing/ 43.2mm FINGERBOARD: Rosewood, ‘old-school’ bird inlays, 254mm (10”) radius FRETS: 24, medium HARDWARE: PRS patented vibrato (cast), PRS designed non-locking tuners – nickel-plated STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 52.5mm ELECTRICS: PRS 85/15 ‘S’Treble and Bass humbuckers (open coil, double black bobbins); 3-way lever pickup selector switch, master volume and tone (w/ pull switch to simultaneously coil-split both humbuckers) WEIGHT (kg/lb): 7.6/3.45 OPTIONS: Colour only RANGE OPTIONS: Other SE include the Custom 22 and the Custom 22 Semi-Hollow (both £825), and the Custom 24 Floyd (£899). The USA Core Custom 24 starts at £3,599 and the S2…

Artist: Ariel Posen Album: Headway (Soundly Music) “All my plans got rearranged, but I’m just making it work and I’m grateful that I can still be quite busy with music without playing gigs, and still keep productive and creative,” says Ariel Posen, speaking to us down the line from Montreal. Quite naturally, our opening conversation with Ariel concerned the pandemic and the drought of touring and live gigs. But, like so many artists, the enforced lockdown hibernation and its associated restrictions have proved to be an inspiration for Ariel, in that it produced a new album, Headway, which appeared in stores and online during the first week of March. As anyone will tell you, Ariel is not only a connoisseur of fine guitar tone, he’s also a canny songwriter –…

Despite being one of the most effective ways to improve how your pedalboard works with your amp, the ‘4-cable method’ is still not that widely used by guitar players at large. But what is the 4-cable method? Well, we’ll come to that shortly. First, we’ll join tone expert Daniel Steinhardt of TheGigRig and That Pedal Show for a little refresher on what effects loops are usually used for: helping you get the most from your delay and reverb effects. “If I plug my delay pedal into the front-end of my overdriving amplifier, when those repeats hit that preamp, they’re going to distort” “Let’s start by dividing the amp into two sections – the preamp and the power amp,” Dan explains. “The preamp is where the signal enters the amplifier and…

ALL AMP’D UP Following the continuing restrictions and all the money I’ve saved from not having band rehearsals I thought I’d treat myself to a decent amp. After quite a bit of online research and flicking through old Guitarist magazines I’ve decided on what I want and have ordered my new amp. However, it wasn’t an easy or pleasant experience with all the online video reviewers constantly showing off their speed guitar skills with nothing but scale ‘widdling’, which makes it much more difficult to hear what the amps actually sound like. I wouldn’t mind so much if they could string a tune together, but no – it’s just scales up and down and usually with as much distortion as possible and plenty of string bending. No chance of hearing…

1 FENDER ’68 CUSTOM VIBRO CHAMP REVERB Fender’s new ’68 Custom amps are a cool blend of late 60s silver-panel cosmetics, with tweaked designs to give them a more contemporary edge. The 40-watt ’68 Custom Pro Reverb (£1,349), for example, features a smaller cabinet with a single 12-inch weight-saving Celestion Neo Creamback loudspeaker, while the modified all-valve circuit has a single channel with a Mid control, as well as a proper valve-powered vibrato and spring reverb. Visual treats include authentic aluminium-trimmed silver/blue grille cloth and blue control panel logo, accented by a blue jewel power indicator. The original Pro Reverb’s fabled clarity and three-dimensional chiming cleans are enhanced with reduced negative feedback, increasing the dynamic response and making the Custom much more of a modern player’s amp. Meanwhile, the…

While you can expect to pay around £2.2k for a current production Gibson Les Paul Standard ’50s, moving up into the Custom division you’re looking at double that. UK dealers such as Guitarguitar have a huge selection to feast your eyes on. Meanwhile, PRS’s reworking, the Singlecut 594, starts at around £3.8k. Here in the UK, Patrick James Eggle certainly isn’t the only maker offering this style. Seth Baccus’s Nautilus is a beautiful interpretation and starts at £4,899, and there are plenty more makers who will use their considerable experience to build a single-cut to your specification, for example, Feline Guitars with its Lion, which starts around £3.6 to £4k. You then have a host of top boutique makers such as Nik Huber in Germany and Joe Knaggs in the…

The epitome of the high-level craftsperson, Patrick James Eggle is a regular in these pages, more likely to strike up a conversion about different hardware ageing processes than regale you with tales of the latest ‘rock star’ to pick up one of his guitars. An interview request doesn’t involve lengthy email exchanges, nor PR scheduling. No, the only hold-up could be, “I might be in the spray shop… but someone will answer the phone.” Like many in the musical instrument manufacturing world, the past long months have been very busy at PJE HQ in Oswestry where Pat’s four-strong team crafts around 12 to 15 guitars a month, such as our reviewed Macon, typically already sold. “I basically feel very lucky that I get out every day and can come down…

If you’re going shopping with a four-figure acoustic guitar budget in mind, it’s pretty much an open playing field. We would suggest browsing a few bespoke makers’ price lists as there are some remarkable instruments available in the UK. Roger Bucknall’s Fylde range includes the smaller-bodied Goodfellow (£2,300) and Ariel (£2,500) and custom variations in terms of body woods, etc, are available on both. Alister Atkin is another maker to check out with the 037s (around £2,799) and Essential 0 (£2,699) both meeting smaller-body requirements. Off the peg, so to speak, it would be foolish to ignore Martin’s 00-18 (£2,375) or 0-18 (£2,299), and Lowden’s S range is worth a look with the S-32 coming in around £3,179.…

V-CLASS BRACING Taylor’s V-Class bracing is a revolutionary new pattern that marks a major shift away from traditional steel-string bracing patterns. By allowing the soundboard to flex naturally while maintaining rigidity along the centre (in the direction of the strings), it enhances both volume and sustain. Up and down the fretboard, notes are full, true and consistent, with more harmonic agreement. It represents an entirely new design platform that can be adapted to different body styles in different ways to infuse each with a unique sonic personality. C-CLASS BRACING Developed for the smaller Taylor GT body shape, Taylor’s proprietary C-Class bracing leverages some of the tone-enhancing ideas behind the V-Class design to boost the volume and sustain. Featuring an asymmetrical, cantilevered design (thus the ‘C’ in C-Class), this unique architecture…

The most obvious rival to Boss’s GT-1000Core comes from the most obvious name in the amp sim and effects business, Line 6. The similarly sized HX Stomp (£399 street price), packed with Helix sounds, will just as easily slot into your pedalboard or sit on your tabletop for USB-connected recording. There are larger alternatives available such as the four-footswitch HeadRush Gigboard (£519) featuring a seven-inch touch display, and if you want to go further upmarket there’s the threefootswitch Fractal Audio FM3 (€1,266), which is based on the company’s flagship Axe-Fx III and features the same range of modelled amps.…

Hey everybody! My name is Stefan Fast and I’m a total pedalholic. Over the past 15 years, there hasn’t been a single day where I haven’t messed around with pedals or thought about interesting pedal combinations. My addiction actually runs so deep that I’ve been displaying it to the world for almost five years on my YouTube channel, ThePedalZone. There are infinite magical possibilities present when you start to combine pedals and it’s those creative doorways that I want to help open for you guys through this new Tonal Teamwork series. I’m dedicating the first instalment of this column to reverb – my favourite effect of all time – and the cool tones you can conjure when you begin to acknowledge the existence of two different, broad types of reverb:…

“I play Two-Rock amps and go between the Bloomfield Drive and Studio Signature. I play a handful of PRSes, but I’m often seen lately with my ’61 Epiphone Casino or ’64 Gibson ‘Conversion’ SG. My pedalboard almost always has a Greer Lightspeed on it and other drives – Nobels ODR-1, Vemuram Shanks, J Rockett The Dude or Karma MTN-10. In my home studio I’ve become attached to my Ebo E-verb, but live I use Source Audio’s [Ventris and Nemesis] for reverb and delay. One of my fave sleeper pedals for modulation is the Boss MD-500. I do a mix of sideman work, so having a variety of things is always useful and fun to me.”…

There are a considerable number of ways to wire your Strat-style guitar and while many of us like the classic drive – master volume, individual neck and middle pickup tone controls – others might prefer to have something a little different. There’s plenty you can do with the existing three pots. Many mods require either a pull-switch on a tone control or a separate mini-switch, such as the ‘seven sound’ mod, which gives you the two extra ‘missing’ sounds of bridge-plus-neck and all three pickups together. So, how can the ‘Full-Blend circuit’ help? With the blender pot on 10 (fully clockwise) you get your standard Strat positions. With the blender turned anti-clockwise you get position 1 – bridge with neck pickup blended in; position 2 – bridge and middle with…

Transistors are the heart of the Fuzz Face circuit. And though the inventors of the transistor probably didn’t have guitar effects in mind at any point, fans of the Fuzz Face may be pleased to discover they did receive a Nobel Prize in the mid-1950s for their efforts. Transistors enabled the consumer electronics industry to flourish in the post-war years, and with electric guitars becoming ever more popular in the 50s and 60s it was only a matter of time before devices like fuzz pedals made their way into music shops. Be it the original germanium NKT275 or one of the silicon variety used from 1968 onwards, it’s the transistors that determine a Fuzz Face’s fundamental sonic character. While silicon generally produces a brighter, more cutting sound and germanium is…

“This is a very early production Gibson SG-style Les Paul Custom from ’61. It’s one of the first of its type and the only black one I’ve seen from the era. The original owner custom-ordered it in a black finish. He wasn’t a famous guitar player and he didn’t have any special connections to the factory, but in those days you just wrote Gibson a letter. And that’s what he did – he just asked them if they could make it in black. It also has white plastic parts, which offset the custom black finish beautifully. It’s got that tuxedo look. When he first went to the music store to get it – the Ossining Music Center in upstate New York – he was not expecting it to have white…

THE LYDIAN MODE IS THE FOURTH MODE of the major scale and can literally be seen as a major scale that starts and ends on the fourth note of the scale. The A major scale contains these seven notes: A B C# D E F# G# A D Lydian contains the same seven tones as the A major scale but starts and resolves to the fourth degree, D: D E F# G# A B C# D Playing the A major scale from the fourth degree produces the D Lydian mode, which is a major scale with an augmented 4th (#4th) degree instead of a perfect 4th. It’s this raised 4th that gives the Lydian mode its unique flavour. Harmonising The Scale When we harmonise the major scale (build chords from…

Fender’s 1950 debut electric solidbodies came in the form of the single (bridge) pickup Esquire and dual-pickup Broadcaster (renamed the Telecaster in ’51). Prior to the arrival of these radical designs, solidbody electrics were virtually unheard of, although Leo Fender’s friend Paul Bigsby had previously explored the concept with a custom-built instrument that was made for country and western star Merle Travis, who wanted a guitar that would sustain like an electric lap steel. Having studied Paul’s efforts up close, Leo then took the logical approach of evolving his Fender steel designs into an “electric Spanish”-style instrument. The rapid, continued success of Fender guitars was partly due to their modular layout and automated ‘cookie cutter’ style of mass production. With maintenance in mind, their streamlined construction included one-piece maple bolt-on…

Although the essential blueprint of the Stratocaster has not changed since its introduction in 1954, Leo Fender was constantly striving to improve his products. Testament to its timeless form, most of the changes that occurred over the years were due to cosmetic enhancements and/or the implementation of harder wearing materials. Be it a ’54, ’57 or ’62, all Strat aficionados have their favourites. But as far as Leo was concerned it was all about continuous improvement. While the earliest Stratocasters can be identified by their two-tone sunburst and heavily grained ash bodies, in 1956 Fender switched to using alder (aside from those instruments featuring a transparent blonde finish) and introduced a less rounded ‘V’-profile neck. In ’57 the Strat was refined even further when its fragile polystyrene parts – including…

By the late 1950s, Fender had grown from an obscure localised start-up brand into a well-renowned national competitor in the electric guitar market. It was during this time, too, that solidbody instruments had gained mass appeal and were proving to be far more than simply a passing fad. One important area of guitar playing that Fender was keen to tap into was jazz – a genre dominated by Gibson’s long-established archtops. Thus, in 1958, the Jazzmaster was launched. Sporting a rosewood fretboard and ‘clay’ dot markers (with binding and block inlays from ’65 and ’66 respectively), its patented offset contoured body was intended to enhance playing comfort when seated. Mellower-sounding pickups with wide, flat coils similar to Gibson P-90s and a bespoke vibrato system further set the Jazzmaster apart from…

Introduced in 1962, the Jaguar reigned supreme as Fender’s top-of-the-line solidbody guitar. Originally retailing at $379.50, it was priced significantly higher than the $259.50 Strat and $209.50 Tele, although it hasn’t yet achieved anything near same level of popularity (or value on the vintage market!). Recent years have seen a surge of interest in the Jaguar, however, bolstering its position as one of Fender’s ‘big four’ classic solidbody designs. In addition to an offset contoured body, the Jaguar features the same vibrato system as the preceding Jazzmaster, though Jags have a short 24-inch scale length. The Jag’s dual single-coil pickups produce a distinctive focused sound that can be further thinned out using the ‘strangle’ or ‘choke’ control located next to the pickups’ individual on/off selectors on the lower switch panel.…

In 1985, the Fender baton was handed from CBS to the newly formed Fender Musical Instruments Corporation (FMIC) and the California-based factory moved from its founding home of Fullerton to nearby Corona where production recommenced, beginning with the Vintage series reissue guitars. In 1986, the American Standard Stratocaster was launched, followed by the American Standard Telecaster in 1988. Drawing inspiration from Leo Fender’s pre-CBS models these modernised designs set new benchmarks in the industry and immediately proved a hit with guitar players the world over. In 1987, Fender launched its Custom Shop with the intention of fulfilling requests for special-order instruments, much like Fender did for musicians back in the ‘golden era’ of the 50s and 60s. While supplying bespoke guitars to some of the world’s leading artists, the Custom…