Indholdsfortegnelse for September 2018 i Guitarist

With blazing August melting everyone’s minds like a lollypop, it’s hard to think forward to the cooler climes of autumn but everyone at Guitarist and our sister mags Guitar Techniques and Total Guitar are doing just that as we gear up for hosting the UK Guitar Show in London on 29-30 September (see page 28). There’s some top-drawer attractions planned for the show, including an exhibition of Rory Gallagher’s guitars, a pantheon of big-name guitar makers from Fender to PRS all showing off their latest goodies, plus live performances from stellar players including Martin Simpson, Misha Mansoor, Simon McBride and many more besides. For us mere mortals here at the mags, it means a return to the rehearsal rooms as Nev Martin, editor of Guitar Techniques, Mick Taylor of That…

The first wave of all-mahogany Indonesian-made SE Standards launched back in late 2014 and included a Standard 24 and 22, Singlecut Standard and Tremonti Standard, with the Santana Standard and P-90 equipped Santana Standard Special appearing slightly later into 2015. “They were originally developed for the third world markets,” explains PRS Europe’s MD, Gavin Mortimer, but a range that kicked off, back then, at £399 (including a gigbag) soon found its way into the USA and European markets. Instead of using their long-time partner for the SE line, World Music in Korea, the Standards came from Indonesia’s PT Wildwood facility that, certainly around the time of their launch, was also building for Yamaha, Schecter, Fender and ESP among others. As of 2018, however, SEs heading to the USA are now…

PRICE: £999 ORIGIN: China TYPE: Grand OM 14-fret cutaway electro acoustic TOP: Solid koa BACK/SIDES: Solid koa MAX RIM DEPTH: 113mm MAX BODY WIDTH: 401mm NECK: Mahogany SCALE LENGTH: 645mm (25.4”) TUNERS: Nickel with ebony buttons NUT/WIDTH: Bone/44.5mm FINGERBOARD: Micarta FRETS: 20 BRIDGE/SPACING: Bone, 56mm ELECTRICS: Fishman Flex Plus (Volume, Treble, Bass) WEIGHT (KG/LB): 1.9/4.1 RANGE OPTIONS: The only other Modern Series model currently available with solid back and sides is the limited edition (only 48 are available from this month) SGBCE-5+ with blackwood and a deluxe case LEFT-HANDERS: No PROS A solid and well-finished Taylor-inspired koa build for less than the bigger competition CONS No gigbag for a £1,000 acoustic seems a little mean…

PRICE: £349 ORIGIN: Vietnam TYPE: Valve preamp, digital reverb and solid-state power amp. OUTPUT: 25 watts rms into 8 ohms, max 50 watts rms into 4 ohms VALVES: 1x Nutube 6P1 DIMENSIONS: 323 (w) x 596 (h) x 180mm (h) WEIGHT (KG/LB): 9/20 CABINET: Ply/mdf CHANNELS: One CONTROLS: Gain, Volume, Bass, Treble, Tremolo, Reverb level, EQ Fat/ Deep, Eco on/off, switchable output impedance FOOTSWITCH: None ADDITIONAL FEATURES: Two speaker outlet, speaker-emulated headphones/recording out OPTIONS: None RANGE OPTIONS: None PROS Compact, good-looking and great tone you’d expect from this British institution CONS Over-bright mains LED, and no strain relief for power cable…

After last issue I felt a bit mean criticising guitar mods I’d either seen or been told about. I was only a repairer for 10 years but saw enough disasters in that time to give me the occasional willies. A guitar is a strange beast: it can sit there benignly on the bench and, with no word of warning, jump up and bite even the most experienced and conscientious luthier. So I started to think and came to the conclusion that if someone wants to mod their guitar how they see fit, then good luck to them. It just happened that the ones I mentioned were hallowed vintage models and the work done would have made them less desirable (and valuable) today. But isn’t that a pretty cynical way to…

EarthQuaker Devices Erupter £155 It was the long-held dream of designer Jamie Stillman to create a Fuzz Face-inspired pedal that sounded brilliantly expressive with just one control and which was tolerant of being placed elsewhere in the signal chain than at the very front.We think he succeeded with the Erupter, which could well be the fuzz for guitarists who don’t do fuzz normally. Brantone Woodstock £115 Dunlop make very fine official Fuzz Faces in both silicon and germanium versions, but if you’re after something in the same Hendrix-esque tradition that’s a little bit different, give one of these hand-built beauties a try.With retro styling, great pricing and classic tones this silicon fuzz pedal delivers handsomely on the promise of its name. ThorpyFX Fallout Cloud £184 Okay, so we’re venturing into…

PICTURE PERFECT Thanks for the latest issue [Modify Your Guitar, issue 436]. Here’s my eye-catching, one-of-a-kind Gibson Melody Maker, which has been modded with a steel top plate, engraved and painted by the Swedish artist Jesper Eriksson. I have also added a Bigsby and Tonerider P-90s. This is a real loud rock ’n’ roll machine. Jesper Eriksson is a very cool artist who started to engrave and paint guitars some years ago and has made guitars for guitar aces like Dregen from Backyard Babies and The Hellacopters. For more pictures and info on the artist, visit http://jespereriksson.nu. Hope you like it – I do. Niclas Ekstedt, via email Thanks Niclas – it’s an absolute beauty and we’re most envious. We’ve had quite a few letters showing off readers’ modded and…

“This was the first guitar of my own. I’ve never found another guitar – ever – that feels as good as this one. I feel like it’s part of me, but, at the same time, I’m a bit rough with it, as you can see. It’s been battered around a lot. Sometimes, I worry I’m going to hit it so hard it’ll break, and that’ll be it, I’ll have to give up guitar [laughs]. It’s good that I picked a Tele to play. I saw Jeff Buckley playing [a Tele] and just thought, ‘I guess that’s the guitar I’m going to have to get then.’ “I got it brand new, in 1997, from a guitar shop that doesn’t exist anymore called Way Out West in Twickenham, when I was about…

“The incredibly elegant headstock was emblazoned with a torch-motif inlay” Like many Martin guitars, the development of the Orchestra Model-shape acoustic was influenced by the curiously long shadow cast by the banjo. Though it is quaint to think of today, the banjo once outshone the guitar in both popularity and acoustic projection. Though the banjo’s time in the sun was coming to a close by the 1930s, many players still liked certain aspects of the banjo’s playability and found the flat fingerboards and short necks of the era’s existing guitar designs alien to their hands. As described earlier, the OM’s hourglass outline was conceived as a way to give Martin endorsee Perry Bechtel a guitar that offered some of the slim-necked, fast-picking qualities of the banjo (see box, page 67),…

From the original designs of the Thunderbird, Polara and Jetstar in the 60s, the turnaround to the 70s solidbodies, like our S-100 here, was an obvious attempt to capture some of Gibson’s SG market. Gretsch had already been inspired by the bevel-edged SG with its 1963 Corvette, taken to out-there extremes with the 1966 Astro-Jet. But although these second-wave Guild ‘copy’ models debuted in 1970, by 1977 a new original design in the form of the 24-fret S-300 and S-60 had replaced them. Gibson did take action against Hoshino in the late 70s and the US was awash with import lookalikes, but there’s no documented evidence of any litigation between Gibson and Guild so, perhaps, as The Guild Guitar Book author Hans Moust suggests, the new late-70s shape was simply…

“Whether it’s the wood or age, this S-90 has a resonance that is pretty rare to find on a c£500 new-build” We feature a lot of vintage beauties throughout our pages but most are them are certainly out of my budget. Like every other guitar player, I hanker after that glorious old Gibson, or fabulous Fender from the ‘golden age’ of the electric guitar but, yes, I might have to dream on. Yet step away from the classics and you might find other vintage slices of history at sub-£1,000 prices. Researching this review, I did just that. A casual search for “Guild electrics for sale” brought up lots of current Newark St. models and the occasional semi from yesteryear. And then I found the model down from the S-100, the…

Gibson Les Paul Standard £1,999 The G6228FM BT’s greatest rival has Heritage Cherry Sunburst lacquer, contoured Maple and well-liked Burstbucker pickups, making it as much of a contender as it’s ever been. Supro Martinique Deluxe £1,199 The Supro features a semi-hollow body topped with an Acoustic-Glass shell. It might look like the love child of a Wurlitzer jukebox and an Art Deco lamp but the playability is surprisingly modern. Guild Bluesbird £899 Maple-topped with a chambered Mahogany body, this underrated classic is still available in a Far East-built edition. Retro looks and some twin humbucker firepower from makes this a versatile little rock machine.…

MANUFACTURER LUNASTONE MODEL BOOST 18/ BLUE DRIVE 1/ SMOOTH DRIVE 1 PRICE £89/£169/ £169 CONTACT WWW.LUNASTONEPEDALS.COM The Pusher had been LunaStone’s sole clean boost pedal for some time and demand for a refresh became strong. After responding to requests from various users, the company upped the amount of boost from 15dB to 18dB, as hinted at in the name of this new replacement. Same as The Pusher, the Boost 18 is a 9V-adapter-powered mini-sized booster with offset connections and a single chicken-head knob to dial in the amount of boost. The JFET circuitry here is designed to add tonal enrichment as well as boost, so even with no boost added, we found a welcome lift in clarity. The extra 3dB of boost might not seem much but it provides more…

1 What was the first pedal you built and how did the design come about? “The Tremolo was the first Empress pedal. It started when a friend asked if I could make him a tremolo pedal – like a Boss Tremolo – and I kept on adding features to it. A year later I said, “I’ve done the pedal!” and he said, “I’ve kind of forgotten about that, I bought a Boss pedal a while ago.” [laughs] 2 What do you think makes Empress Effects unique? “We have two separate categories of effects. One of them is the more analogue pedals; the ones that stand out are the Compressor, the ParaEq and the Heavy. But, I guess we’re probably better known for our Echosystem and Reverb, which have as many…

The Jazz Bass inspired a certain ease of play that encouraged bass guitarists to perform with greater speed and dexterity Soon after Leo Fender put the first mass-produced solidbody electric guitar, the Esquire, into production in the Spring of 1950, he turned his attention to its low-end equivalent, the Precision Bass. Appearing the following year in 1951 and often referred to as the P-Bass for short, it was the first bass instrument of its type and offered players a unique way of navigating a horizontal neck using frets – as opposed to an upright/fretless model – with comfort, ease and accuracy of pitch (hence the ‘Precision’ moniker). Musical styles were rapidly changing, and the creative abandon encouraged by jazz music had installed a sense of freedom with regards to technique.…

Flying Saucer It’s about time the psychedelic guitar sounds of early Floyd got a live outing once again – and who better to lead the band than drummer Nick Mason? p74 Anna Calvi Crackling with creative energy, you really should check out Anna’s Tele-toned music if you haven’t already. She tells Rod Brakes all about it on p50 Plain Lazy Highly rated amp-maker Jesse Hoff is celebrating 10 years of Tweed-inspired Lazy J amps this year. David Mead takes a look round his workshop on p120…

PRICE: £545 ORIGIN: Indonesia TYPE: Double-cutaway solidbody electric BODY: Mahogany NECK: Mahogany, wide fat profile, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 622mm (24.5”) NUT/WIDTH: Friction reducing/42.43mm FINGERBOARD: Bound rosewood, pearloid bird inlays, 254mm (10”) radius FRETS: 22, medium HARDWARE: PRS patented vibrato (cast), PRS designed tuners–nickel-plated STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 52.5mm ELECTRICS: PRS Santana ‘S’Treble and Bass humbuckers, three-way toggle pickup selector switch, master volume and tone WEIGHT (KG/LB): 3.5/7.7 OPTIONS: None. PRS SE gigbag adds £69 RANGE OPTIONS: The 24-fret SE Santana costs £849, including gigbag LEFT-HANDERS: No FINISHES: Vintage Cherry only (as reviewed) PRS Europe 01223 874301 www.prsguitars.com PROS: Price, build quality, girthsome sounds, excellent playability and modding potential CONS: Aside from colour choice and you’ll need a gigbag, nothing…

Along with the different woods used by Sigma, the fingerboard (and we suspect bridge) material is a synthetic composite material called Micarta. It’s been used as a nut material on thousands of instruments and is one of a few synthetics, like Richlite and Blackwood Tec, that are now in reasonably common use for fingerboards and bridges. Various different materials are used in creating the synthetic, which are mixed with resins then compressed under heat to create a thermosetting plastic. Micarta is also used for numerous diverse applications, from tabletops to propeller blades. Another example of how the materials and wood types used in our guitars are rapidly changing.…

The UK Guitar Show 29 and 30 September Olympia, London Our show might be fast approaching but there’s still time to be part of the great weekend of guitar we have planned with our partners at Total Guitar, Guitar Techniques and MusicRadar.com. Whether it’s the latest gear, vintage classics, learning from experts or seeing great players in action, the UK Guitar Show has more than enough to inspire you. To prove it, here are some of the highlights you can expect to see and take part in over the weekend… Main Stage British folk luminary Martin Simpson will perform on Saturday, followed by Periphery’s progressive mastermind and Jackson, Peavey endorsee Misha Mansoor. The Sunday lineup will also include Irish blues-rock powerhouse Simon McBride with his band and Alice Cooper shredder…

Who was the first person to coil-split a humbucker? That would make a great pub quiz question. Maybe some readers might know the answer, but certainly by the 1970s this kind of technical wizardry was the thing to do. The first time I came across it was, probably, a DiMarzio Dual Sound, a four-conductor version of the Super Distortion. It came with a mini toggle switch and instructions on how to either run the two coils in parallel to create a lighter, brighter but still humbucking voice; or voice either of the two coils individually for true non-humbucking single-coil sound. This ceramic-loaded humbucker was a clever piece because not only did it have plenty of clout to warm up the front end of your amp, voicing one coil creates quite…

What? Gibson Custom Shop ’58 Les Paul Where seen? Coda Music, Stevenage Price? £3,399 Description? I happened to be in Coda last week helping a friend decide which Tele to buy, when I spotted this beautiful ’58 Reissue.There’s a few ’58s out there with fabulous tops, non-baseball-bat necks and lovely dark boards.They’re thousands less than equivalent ’59s so represent almost unheard-of value in the current market. I particularly loved this Dark Burst one (there’s a Vintage Cherry Burst too) and if you did want to mod it with a set of Bare Knuckle or ThroBak pickups, fit TonePros bridge and tailpiece and a set of aged Gotoh tuners, you won’t knock that much off its value and would have a phenomenal axe for your cash. If you don’t buy it,…

POWERING UP! I started to read your magazine in January 2018 as I am a new guitarist, playing for seven months. I read a while back about guitarists with disabilities, which really caught my attention. I say this because I too am disabled and have cerebral palsy – all four limbs are affected, especially my right hand and arm. I found my teacher here in Malta and he said to me, “There are famous guitarists out there, like Django Reinhardt and others, and if they can play guitar so can you.” So for these past seven months he has worked hard with me and I can play a few songs; I am not fast and I struggle with some of the strumming patterns, but my right hand and arm have…

Nick Costley-White Detour Ahead Ubuntu Music Debut solo release from rising jazz star A former winner of the Yamaha Scholarship For Outstanding Musicians and a graduate of Guildhall School Of Music & Drama, Detour Ahead isjazz guitarist Nick Costley-White’s first solo release. He’s toured extensively in Europe, Australia and South America, bringing his blend of classic be-bop era and modern jazz to enthused audiences and critics alike. Presented in a quartet setting with the traditional piano, bass and drums as soloing sparring partners, Nick works his way through eight tracks comprising two American Songbook classics,Detour Aheadby Herb Ellis and Cole Porter’sJustOneOfThose Thingsand six originals, proving himself to be a deft and imaginative soloist throughout. [DM] Standout track: SwingState For fans of: Herb Ellis, early Martin Taylor…

Steve Miller Band Fly Like An Eagle Capitol 1976 Steve Miller received guitar lessons from both Les Paul and T Bone Walker when he was growing up. They were all visitors to his parents’Texas abode where their love of music dominated his formative years. This fuelled Steve’s musicality and eventually led to his tenure as the driving force of the band, formed in 1966 (and including Boz Scaggs), and a relentless work schedule that nearly killed him. Being driven to the airport in 1972 for yet another tour he had a bad car crash and was forced to take time to recuperate. He installed a small studio at home and finally had the time to please himself. He worked on demos that would become The Joker,which was a huge worldwide…

The ‘D’ stands for Dreadnought, after the huge British battleship of the same name. The ‘28’ stands for $28, the sum this wide-waisted guitar cost to buy, withitsoversize bodyof Brazilian rosewood and a spruce top edged with German herringbone purfling. Strange to say, this most famous of Martins had its origins in an order placed by another firm. Just over 100 years ago, in 1916, Martin began building a range of ‘contract’ guitars for music publisher Oliver Ditson & Co of Boston. The largest of these featured 15 5/ 8-inch-wide bodies and produced a loud, bass-rich voice that was unusually strident for the time. After Ditson went out of business in 1930, Martin took a fresh look at these large-bodied guitars and built two versions under their own name in…

Martin model names are typically composed of a letter prefix and a numerical suffix separated by a dash. The letters come first and indicate the body size and shape. The numbers after the dash designate the ‘Style’– the features and appointments of the guitar. Starting with the letter prefix,most people know that ‘D’ stands for dreadnought, whose distinguishing characteristics are described at the start of this feature. Another well-known shape is the ‘OM’, which stands for ‘Orchestral Model’. Launched in 1930, its iconic hourglass shape was devised by squaring off the shoulders of earlier Martin ‘OOO’size guitars and redesigning the neck so it joined the body at the 14th,not the 12th fret. The aim was to offer one of Martin’s star endorsees, Perry Bechtel, a more banjo-like feel. Martin only…

Many of Martin’s classic designs were created at the behest of artists rather than dreamed up by a marketing department. And such was the case with the D-45. The first example of this model was made in 1933 for the celebrated actor and singer Gene Autry, also known as ‘The Singing Cowboy’. Autry already owned a D-18 when he placed an order via the Chicago Musical Instrument Co – and while he didn’t opt for the very highest Deluxe spec Style 45, he did have his name inlaid into the fingerboard. As the first of the breed, Autry’s D-45 had a 12-frets-to-the-body design but only one more D-45 order was completed before Martin switched to the 14-fret neck that we associate with the model today. As with many of the…

1 What’s the story here? Guild’s latest solidbody release, the Jetstar, hones in on a simple solidbody design that first appeared in the 60s. It was the only single pickup model in a trio that included the Polara and more famous Thunderbird. 2 But this Jetstar has two pickups… Ha, Guild aren’t calling this a reissue – it’s based on the body design of the Jetstar and Polara that appeared in 1963 before Guild redesigned them to the more well-known style – clearly based on Gibson’s SG – that appeared in the 70s as illustrated by the S-100 we have on review too. 3 Where are these Newark St. models made? Up to now all the Newark Sts have come from South Korea but the Jetstar is their first electric…

PRICE: £539 ORIGIN: China TYPE: Offset double-cutaway solidbody electric BODY: Mahogany NECK: Mahogany,‘C’ profile, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 648mm (25.5”) NUT/WIDTH: Bone/43.4mm FINGERBOARD: Pau ferro, 5mm mother of pearl dot inlays, 254mm (10”) radius FRETS: 22, narrow jumbo HARDWARE: Nickel-plated tune-omatic-style with stud tailpiece, vintage-style tuners STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 51.5mm ELECTRICS: 2x Guild LB-1 mini humbuckers, three-way toggle pickup selector, master volume and tone WEIGHT (KG/LB): 3.52/7.74 OPTIONS: None LEFT-HANDERS: No FINISHES: Black (as reviewed), Seafoam Green and Vintage white – all gloss polyurethane Selectron UK Ltd 01795 419460 www.guildguitars.com PROS Original body and headstock style, great width of sounds, weight and playability CONS For the money, not a lot, plus there’s plenty of modding scope too…

PRICE: £2,099 (inc case) ORIGIN: Japan TYPE: Single-cutaway electric guitar BODY: Chambered mahogany back with laminated tiger flame maple top NECK: Mahogany, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 625mm (24.6”) NUT/WIDTH: Graph Tech Tusq XL/43mm FINGERBOARD: Ebony, 305mm (12”) radius FRETS: 22, medium jumbo HARDWARE: Chrome-anchored Adjusto-Matic bridge, V stop tailpiece, Gotoh locking tuners STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 51mm ELECTRICS: 2x Gretsch Broad’Tron BT65 humbuckers, 2x volumes, master tone and volume, three-way pickup selector toggle switch WEIGHT (KG/LB): 3.2/7.4 OPTIONS: No RANGE OPTIONS: G6228 Players Edition Jet BT with V stop tailpiece in Black, Cadillac Green and Deep Cherry Metallic (£1,979 ) LEFT HANDERS: G6228LH Players Edition Jet BT with V stop tailpiece and Rosewood fingerboard in Cadillac Green (£2,179) FINISHES: Dark Cherry Stain (as reviewed), Bourbon Stain PROS Like a retro-mod car: underneath…

The Blue Drive 1 explores that area where boost turns to overdrive, starting off as a fine clean boost with the drive down, moving on to add grit to a medium-level drive, along with a wide-ranging Tone control, which can get strident in the top end if ice-pick tone is called for. Nicely responsive, this is a pedal that reacts whether you are gently caressing the strings or digging in with aggression. LunaStone states the inspiration for the pedal comes from the blues genre and the marketing of the name reflects that. However, we believe that an overdrive is an overdrive and shouldn’t be limited to a particular musical ghetto. This is a particularly good one and while it – justifiably – might be right up a blues player’s street,…

THE BACKGROUND ARTHUR HASKINS, GUITARIST READER: I play in a covers band covering everything from 90s indie tunes through to classic rock. However, lately we’ve been asked to play more heavy tunes from bands such as Rage Against the Machine, Pantera and Mötley Crüe. They all seem to use metal-specific amps and yet I only have a Fender Hotrod Deluxe III (HRD) and a small pedalboard with a Vox Wah, a Boss Bluesdriver and a Boss DD7 Delay. Do I need to upgrade my amp to a full 100-watt stack or can I do anything to get convincing heavy metal tones out of the HRD? THE QUESTIONS 1 DO I NEED TO BUY A HEAVY METAL-VOICED AMP TO CONVINCINGLY NAIL RATM, PANTERA AND MöTLEY CRüE SONGS?…

The story of Lazy J amplification would put Cinderella’s adventures to shame. With a 10th anniversary looming in December, the remarkable success story began with an advert in Loot magazine and a few ideas about how to upgrade a Fender amp. “I still can’t figure it out,” laughs Jesse Hoff as we sit in his garden to talk about its history. “I wish I could explain it because I always wondered what it would be like if you’re in a band and suddenly your star just rises, and next to you there are all these other cool bands, and nothing happens for them. Why that one? I don’t know. Maybe it’s just your time. Maybe you’ve had to put up with enough shit, and fate says, ‘Okay, go’,” he shrugs.…

1. SERIAL NUMBER Stamped onto neck plate; L-prefixed five-digit serial number, usually in the range of L60000s-L99000s; later models from 1965 with six-digit serial numbers, usually in the range of 100000-110000s 2. HEADSTOCK Matching Sonic Blue custom colour nitrocellulose finish; original gold and black ‘transition’logo (designed by Bob Perine and debuting upon the Jazz Bass’ release in 1960); ‘Jazz Bass Trade Mark Electric Bass’ and ‘Offset Contour Body’ decals 3. BODY Jazzmaster-style offset double-cutaway alder body in rare Sonic Blue custom colour nitrocellulose finish (faded to green) 4. HARDWARE Chrome control plate (with front-loading jack input), neck plate, front pickup cover, F-logo embossed back pickup/bridge cover and oval ‘no-name’ Kluson tuners; round metal D/G string guide; metal strap buttons (central bottom edge and bass horn); top-loading metal bridge with 4x…

Previous installments in this series that focus on Fender guitars have demonstrated that the appearance of a rare finish can significantly amplify the resale value of any individual vintage instrument. In the 1960s, most Fender finishes were available only via special order – few were built and even fewer survive to the present. A rare finish like Lake Placid Blue on a pre-CBS Strat, for example, might multiply the value by two or three times over an equivalent Sunburst model. When it comes to basses, the numbers can be even more extreme. Fender produced fewer basses overall in the 60s, and of those there remain only a small number with bold finishes like Candy Apple Red or Shell Pink. Sonic Blue ranks up near the top of the Fender collectability…

Difficulty 10 mins per example Tutor: Richard Barrett | Gear used: Atkin J45-T Open G Stomp MANY OF THE BLUES masters use open tunings as part of their sound. In this case I’m tuned to an open G chord, which runs from low to high D, G, D, G, B, D, and often featured in the acoustic stylings of Jimmy Page, particularly on Led Zeppelin’s so-called ‘acoustic’ third album. In fact I’ve borrowed the general feel of Zep’s bluegrass-hued track Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp for this month’s transcription. Mr Page aside, open G has been used by many legendary players, including Robert Johnson and Son House. The beauty of an open tuning like this is that it allows whole chords to be fretted with one finger or slid around using a bottleneck.…

PRICE: £545 ORIGIN: Indonesia TYPE: Single-cutaway solidbody electric BODY: Mahogany NECK: Mahogany, wide thin profile, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 635mm (25”) NUT/WIDTH: Friction reducing/42.7mm FINGERBOARD: Bound rosewood, pearloid bird inlays, 254mm (10”) radius FRETS: 22, medium HARDWARE: PRS patented vibrato (cast) with up-route, PRS designed tuners– nickel-plated STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 52.5mm ELECTRICS: PRS Tremonti ‘S’Treble and Bass humbuckers, three-way toggle pickup selector switch, individual pickup volume and tone controls WEIGHT (KG/LB): 4.41/9.7 OPTIONS: None. PRS SE gigbag adds £69 RANGE OPTIONS: The SE Tremonti Custom costs £849, including gigbag LEFT-HANDERS: No FINISHES: Black only (as reviewed) PROS: Ditto the Santana Standard CONS: The weight of our sample is excessive, again there’s only one colour and you’ll pay more for a gigbag…

PRICE: £569 ORIGIN: China TYPE: Grand OM-14 fret cutaway electro acoustic TOP: Solid Alpine spruce BACK/SIDES: Laminated Macassar ebony MAX RIM DEPTH: 112mm MAX BODY WIDTH: 400mm NECK: Mahogany, low profile SCALE LENGTH: 645mm (25.4”) TUNERS: Nickel with ebony buttons NUT/WIDTH: Bone/44.5mm FINGERBOARD: Micarta FRETS: 20 BRIDGE/SPACING: Bone/56mm ELECTRICS: Fishman Flex Plus (Volume, Treble, Bass) WEIGHT (KG/LB): 1.6/3.5 RANGE OPTIONS: The modern series also features the GWCE-3+ with laminated walnut back and sides (£559), GACE-3-SB+ with laminated flamed maple back and sides (£649), the GBCE-3-SB+ with laminated blackwood back and sides (£599) and the GZCE-3+ with laminated ziricote (£625) LEFT-HANDERS: No FINISHES: Natural ultra thin UV WESTSIDE DISTRIBUTION 0844 326 2000 WESTSIDEDISTRIBUTION.COM PROS A well-finished, highly playable and very likeable modern electro that makes use of ebony for…

PRICE: £735 ORIGIN: Vietnam TYPE: Valve preamp, digital reverb and valve power amp OUTPUT: 30 watts rms. VALVES: 2x 12AX7, 4x EL84 DIMENSIONS: 658 (h) x 550 (w) x 265mm (d) WEIGHT (KG/LB): 24.5/54 CABINET: Ply LOUDSPEAKERS: One Celestion Custom VX12 CHANNELS: One CONTROLS: Gain, Volume, Bass, Treble, Reverb level FOOTSWITCH: None ADDITIONAL FEATURES: Series effects loop, extension speaker outlet OPTIONS: None RANGE OPTIONS: None Vox Amplification 01908 304600 www.voxamps.com PROS More portable than a 2x12 AC30, without sacrificing too much volume or tone CONS It would be nice if the loop was footswitchable…

Two-Rock, Dumble, PRS… John Mayer is a connoisseur of valve amps, but he recently revealed he’s stopped using them for his session work for other artists. “When I’m playing on people’s sessions these days, I don’t usually bring an amp; I record all my guitars through my Akai MPC [X],” Mayer told our US sister mag Guitar World. “Why? Well, because that’s what the rest of the music is suggesting. When everyone is using virtual instruments and virtual effects, there’s no oxygen. Those frequencies are so well cordoned off, a Bassman amp with three mics put on it literally will not fit inside the song. There’s a lot of resistance to that from producers.” And it seems as though this change of direction is popular. “My guitar parts are getting…

Sessions in the last couple of decades have changed a lot, and this is mostly due to the advent of technology. This past week, however, I’ve had the pleasure of recording an album in a decidedly old-school fashion. All the band have been in one room, and, for the first time ever, I’ve been allowed to do it with a Marshall head on 10 without an attenuator, a Les Paul and not a lot else. Those of you lucky enough to have been in the same room as this phenomenon – and still have your head attached to your shoulders – will know it’s quite something. The album was a solo affair for great keyboard player and all-round lovely chap Phil Lanzon of Uriah Heep. It was recorded at Master…

“Fuzz can transform a song into a volcano of viscerally exciting tones” Most of us have been there at one point or another, staring at a fuzz pedal that seems reluctant to make a useful noise and thinking, ‘Is it just me, or does fuzz sound a bit… rubbish?’ A brief period of reflection on Hendrix’s mind-blowingly cool use of fuzz, or tracks such as the Stones’ Satisfaction, is usually enough to banish any doubt that fuzz can sound stunningly good. But there’s no question that fuzz can be a tricky customer to work with. Partly it’s a question of expectations – due to current trends, we’re used to overdrive pedals that sound ‘organic’ and ‘amp-like’, so something so brash and synthetic as fuzz can feel artificial by comparison, like…

1 What was your first guitar? “It was a no-name acoustic that my father bought for me at a place called Wallich’s Music City in California. It was horrible and I think it cost $10. It was virtually unplayable! I was about 10 and I thought that the idea was to cover up the strings that you didn’t want to resonate with your left hand. I didn’t understand the concept of fretting and chording, I’d just seen pictures of people playing so I was just trying to figure out what they were doing. The first six months I struggled with that.” 2 What one guitar would you save if the building was burning? “Probably my tiger, because it has the most longevity and history. It was the original. I slapped…

Martin’s 00-17S is steeped in mojo from tip to toe. With its satin ‘Black Smoke’ finish, 12 frets to the body and ivoroid binding, this small-bodied tone machine wouldn’t look out of place on the porch of a Mississippi shack – or, if you’re the lucky winner, leaning up against a favourite armchair in your living room! The 00-17S specs out with a solid Sitka spruce top, mahogany back and sides, a rosewood fingerboard and retro 1955 Style 18 mother of pearl inlays. The nut width is a fingerstyle-friendly 1.75 inches, ensuring that those dancing digits keep out of each other’s way. The guitar also benefits from Martin’s Modified Low Oval neck shape and High Performance Taper to aid all your acoustic playing dreams become reality. In order to win…

What was your first gig and how did it go? “It wouldn’t have been a professional gig. It might have been at a cricket ground in front of people who wandered in and then wandered out again. I was just sitting in with a band – we’d never played together before – there were a few old R&B standards, blues things; I’d had a few beers and I was quite relaxed and I actually really enjoyed myself. You can’t count the years when I was five or six playing harmonica in front of people, collecting money in my little cup. That’s what I used to do – fleece people for their money! I used to do tricks with the harmonica likeplaying God Save The Queen throughmy nose. I had an…

Anna Calvi earned immediate acclaim from critics, music fans and guitar players alike with the release of her eponymous debut album in 2011. It was a powerful introduction to a remarkable guitarist and, like her follow-up album One Breath released in 2013, was deservedly nominated for the Mercury Prize. Seven years on, with stacks of fevered and unforgettable performances chalked up, Anna is preparing for the release of her third studio long player: the visceral and wildly sensual Hunter. Taking advantage of a short pause in an impressive tour schedule that runs well into next year, Guitarist travelled over to Fender’s Artist Centre near Kings Cross to meet up with Anna and discover more about how she approaches her hard-hitting music, her unique and eloquently wild brand of guitar playing…

Even now, documents found in the North Street factory and elsewhere shed fresh light on how Martin did things back in the early 20th century. “Jeff Allen did some archival work and discovered that there was a recipe written down in the early 1930s,” says Instrument Design Manager Tim Teel. “It described how they would go about applying lacquer and finishing it to the point where it became what we term ‘vintage gloss’ today. We use it on our Authentic [reissue guitars]. That was an old process that he rediscovered and developed from the archives. He also found out that back then, anything from an 18 Style to a 40 Style would have this vintage gloss method. And anything above that would be full gloss with it polished out.”…

Nick Mason's new project has certainly sent ripples of excitement through the Floyd fanbase. Whereas the band itself might now have run its course, its illustrious guitar and bass alumni are keeping the music alive in the world's stadiums. So the thought of a third outfit addressing material from the Syd Barrett era and beyond – some of which has never been performed live in the past – is a tantalising one, to say the least. The guitarists involved in the new band come from very different disciplines; Lee Harris, formerly of The Blockheads and Spandau Ballet's Gary Kemp have formed a unique musical alliance to recreate the hallowed guitar parts from pieces ranging from the band's recording debut, 1968's The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn, through to 1972's…

All roads point to Gibson’s SG – the 2018 SG Standard is streeting around £1,000 and comes in Autumn Shade, Ebony and Heritage Cherry and includes Gibson USA fitted hardcase. Epiphone’s G-400 Pro SG (approximate street price, £380) loads in Alnico Classic Pro humbuckers and coil splits – a great way to experience the SG flavour and a favorite for budding Derek Trucks slide wannabes. The Viper is ESP’s offset SG-alike, the LTD Viper 256 (approximate street price, £330) in See Thru Black Cherry chases a classic SG vibe but with master volume and tone. ESP has just changed distributor so stocks and prices will currently vary, while Vintage has the more Guild-alike VS6 available in various formats and colours from approximately £309 and with vibrato, as the VS6V, for…

PRICE: £629 (inc gigbag) ORIGIN: Korea TYPE: Offset double-cutaway solidbody electric BODY: Mahogany NECK: Mahogany, vintage soft ‘U’ profile, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 629mm (24.75”) NUT/WIDTH: Bone/43.1mm FINGERBOARD: Bound pau ferro, pearloid block inlays, 305mm (12”) radius FRETS: 22, narrow jumbo HARDWARE: Nickel-plated Guild tune-o-matic-style with stud tailpiece, Grover Sta-Tite 18:1 ratio open-backed tuners STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 51.5mm ELECTRICS: 2x Guild HB-1 humbuckers, three-way toggle pickup selector, individual pickup volume and tone controls WEIGHT (KG/LB): 3.20/7 OPTIONS: None RANGE OPTIONS: The other Guild NS solidbodies are the vibrato-equipped S-200 T-Bird (£809) and the same model with simplified electronics and hard-tail, the T-Bird ST (£759) LEFT-HANDERS: No FINISHES: White (as reviewed), Black and translucent Cherry Red – all gloss polyurethane PROS Price, ‘deluxe’ style, nice repros of original HB-1 humbuckers, weight and…

1 Nice looking guitars. Shame I don’t play rockabilly... Dismiss these new Players Edition Jets at your peril. They might look like 50s throwbacks but Gretsch has tweaked these Jets to provide more contemporary playability and tone. 2 So, Gretsch are going after the Gibson punters with these things? Well, sometimes actions speak louder than words. The G6228FM BT model in particular has more of a rock feel and voice than you expect from a 50s spec Jet. Let’s just say that the Les Paul Standard has some fresh competition. 3 Jets are basically Les Paul rip-offs anyway, right? The original ’53 Duo Jet was released as a direct challenge to the Les Paul model unveiled the previous year. Under the skin however, the Gretsch’s chambered body makes it a…

PRICE: £2,049 (inc case) ORIGIN: Japan TYPE: Single-cutaway electric guitar BODY: Chambered mahogany back with laminated maple top NECK: Mahogany, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 625mm (24.6”) NUT/WIDTH: TUSQ XL/43mm FINGERBOARD: Rosewood 305mm (12”) radius FRETS: 22 medium jumbo HARDWARE: Chrome-anchored Adjusto-Matic bridge, Bigsby B7CP String-Thru True Vibrato, Gotoh locking tuners STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 51mm ELECTRICS: 2 x Gretsch Filter’Tron humbuckers, 2 x volumes, master tone, master volume and three-way pickup selector toggle switch WEIGHT (KG/LB): 3.7/8.3 OPTIONS: None RANGE OPTIONS: G6128T Players Edition Jet FT with Bigsby in Black (£2,049), G6129T Players Edition Jet FT with Bigsby in Silver Sparkle (£2,049) LEFT HANDERS: G6128TLH Players Edition Jet FT with. Bigsby in Black (£2,259) FINISHES: Firebird Red (as reviewed) and translucent Cherry Red – all gloss polyurethane PROS A cool concept fully…

LunaStone’s vision for the Smooth Drive 1 encompasses the silkier side of the blues and a little jazz – name-checking BB King, Larry Carlton and 335s in their marketing. And certainly the tonal character is more subdued. Or, in other words, it’s smoother than the Blues 1 – not so strident and a little fuller in the midrange, although it can still get a bit snarky at high Tone and Gain knob levels. The pedal is designed as a response to players who wanted a gentler version of the TOD 1 and, as such, it has less gain and compression than that pedal, allowing more leeway in knob juxtaposition for just breaking up and low level drive tones. There is also a nice line in enhanced clean boost, all delivered…

REVEREND REEVES GABRELS DIRTBIKE £799 CONTACT Andertons Music PHONE 01483 456777 WEB www.reverendguitars.com “Reeves Gabrels approached us at a NAMM show several years before he was in The Cure,” remembers Reverend head honcho, Joe Naylor, on the origins of this new Dirtbike model. “He loved our guitars. We are fans of his work. It was a no-brainer.” Aside from his aforementioned work with The Cure, Reeves Gabrels worked with David Bowie from 1987 to 1999 and was a member of The Thin White Duke’s Tin Machine project. You don’t shut the door on an artist of that calibre but, according to Naylor, it doesn’t matter how big you are, if you want a Reverend signature, rules are rules: “It has to look like a Reverend. It has to be saleable.…

Back in last month’s issue I discussed my desire to get my old ‘bitster’ CE 24 up to current PRS spec and how, without the help of the US-only PRS Tech Centre (PTC), I was going to have to do that myself. A key part of any such upgrade are the pickups but PRS only sells ones they no longer, or rarely, use. So while I wait on my leads to source ‘unobtainable’ PRS 53/10 or 58/15 humbuckers, it’s time to consider the guitar itself and – hopefully – improve its voice. Back in the early 00s, Paul Reed Smith drew up a document – the 21 Rules of Tone – based on his considerable guitar-making experience. Intended as a never-to-be-publicised document, by 2012 Paul was willing to discuss, at…

1960 First released; 2x ‘stacked’ volume/ tone knobs; felt string mutes; slab rosewood fretboard 1962 Veneer rosewood fretboard; custom colour finishes available 1963 Felt string mutes discontinued 1964 Pearloid dot fretboard inlays begin to replace ‘clay’ dots 1965 Fingerboard binding introduced 1966 Pearloid block inlays replace dots 1968 Original gold and black headstock Fender logo replaced by black logo; Kluson tuners replaced with ‘F’ logo type; nitrocellulose finish replaced by polyester 1969 Maple fingerboard, black binding and black block fretboard inlays optional. This was standard in 1971 Mid-70s Original four-bolt neck plate replaced by three-bolt ‘micro-tilt’ design; bullet truss rod; maple fingerboard with pearloid block fretboard inlays and white fretboard binding optional…

• FINISH CONDITION Buyers for rare finish Fenders will be attentive to the quality of the finish itself, and if there are any major blemishes, discolourations or other conditional issues. That said, there is a certain appeal to finishes that age and patina in the right way, so even some more roadworn specimens can still command top pricing. • MATCHING HEADSTOCK If you were to find an original Sonic Blue Jazz Bass, chances are that the headstock would be painted in the same colour. The appearance of a matching headstock on any rare finish Fender will make it more appealing to vintage collectors. • L- VS F-SERIES SERIAL NUMBER As 1965 was the transitional year, most collectors prefer guitars and basses that came from the earlier months. This can be…

LED ZEPPELIN III Though the first two albums had both included some acoustic moments, such as Babe I’m Gonna Leave You and Ramble On, this third album has become particularly renowned for demonstrating Jimmy Page’s acoustic prowess. Tracks such as Hangman and Friends feature the acoustic front and centre, but That’s The Way and Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp are played in our featured open G tuning. As I’ve said, the latter served as the primary inspiration for this month’s piece! ROLLING STONES EXILE ON MAIN ST. Having discovered the open G tuning toward the late 1960s, Keith Richards has used it in preference to any other since then. A notable difference, however, is that he usually omits the sixth string completely – so many of his main guitars have just five strings,…