Indholdsfortegnelse for October 2021 i Guitarist

The artist Pablo Picasso once said, “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” He might have been writing about Les Paul (see cover feature, page 56) who never stopped working, hardly even to sleep. These days, people tend to think of Les Paul as an inventor who was also a talented musician. But as his son, producer Gene Paul, told us, this is absolutely the wrong way round. He was an inventor because he was driven, as few people are, to unlock the full potential of the guitar as a music-making device. Making better music was a goal he pursued relentlessly – and so when inspiration visited Les (which happened often) it would inevitably find him working. His diligence in making the best music he could, by any…

You don’t need us to tell you that there’s a rich seam of very high-quality guitar makers throughout Europe that, if we’re honest, we often overlook. Framus, owned by Warwick, certainly falls into that category – and visiting its factory a few years ago was like dropping into an otherworldly futuristic dream. Nobody that we’re aware of makes guitars (or world-class basses) quite like Warwick. That said, the modern Framus instruments that we’ve played over the past few years have an almost organic quality – obviously imbued by the spirit of Warwick – and from the moment we pull it out of its sturdy Rockbag gigbag, our Idolmaker sample feels very luthier-made. Exactly the origin of the Idomaker design we’re not sure, but we’d wager the good old reverse Firebird…

Amp legend Orange takes another step into the acoustic field with its Acoustic Pedal, which is essentially a DI box with frills… and what frills they are. As you can imagine, anything coming from such a renowned stable is not only going to follow through on its promises but do so with great user-friendly functionality and transparency in use. That is, if the traditionally reserved acoustic crowd can get past the somewhat psychedelic artwork on the pedal itself! So, what exactly is on offer? For starters, there is basic volume, plus treble and bass EQ, which, we’re told, benefits from a single-ended design for an ultra-low noise floor. Then there’s a notch filter that operates over the 68Hz to 1.2kHz range and works hand-in-hand with the midrange rotary to offer…

Artist: Joe Robinson Album: Borders (Joe’s Garage) Can you tell us how the album sessions for Borders unfolded ? “I recorded the album during lockdown, which was quite a fun experience, honestly. And I recorded it, start to finish, in 30 days. I knew I wanted to make an album of songs about missing my fiancée, who was in Canada [while I was in Nashville]. So, you know, the border has been closed for most of the year from Canada to the US. I was recently able to go and visit. But, before then, I couldn’t see my fiancée for seven months or so. “So I had a collection of songs about that experience saved up and I went into a studio with a great session drummer in Nashville, Nir…

HERE I GO AGAIN Here is a ‘lost and found’ tale inspired by Neville’s recent column. A few years ago I was enjoying the annual Guitar Show in Birmingham with friends. I had a small fund allocated to buying a guitar in memory of my father, and was probably trying too hard to find a suitable purchase. So when I found a guitar I liked towards the end of the day, I wasn’t thinking clearly. The guitar was a PRS Bernie Marsden signature model, actually signed by the man himself. It looked lovely and I was beguiled by its feel and tone. However, for whatever reason, I walked away and didn’t buy it. Regret kicked in almost immediately, but when I contacted the vendor to buy the guitar, it had…

“The first time I saw that guitar, he wasn’t playing it,” Gene Paul recalls of his father Les Paul’s most cherished possession. “He asked me to go downstairs and get a specific guitar. And when I brought it back upstairs, it was in its case. And he said, ‘Put it right on the table there.’ And he said, ‘Open it up.’ And I opened it up – and it was this gold magnificent guitar, simple… elegant. “I don’t think people understand what the hell this guy went through from getting that note at the barbecue stand till the time he finally got Gibson lit…” “I was just so struck by it,” Gene continues, “because I was used to the black Les Paul [Custom] guitar and the white one – the…

“There are guitar owners, there are guitar players, and then there are guitarists. Les was a guitarist. The man was the personification of excellence,” Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter says, with some authority. Jeff is one of the most respected players in the world, who was a founding member of Steely Dan and a session ace with a list of credits any player would envy. Indeed, his solos on tracks such as Steely Dan’s Bodhisattva and My Old School gave the band a reputation for hot playing. But just as thousands of aspiring guitarists have looked up to Jeff’s guitar work, so Jeff has always held special regard for a master of an earlier generation: Les Paul. “There was a lot of stuff for a human brain to decode [in Les’s music],…

1 What’s special about the pickups? These are brand-new designs specially conceived for the 2021 Streamliner models. They’re called FideliSonic 90s and are loosely based on the P-90 ‘staple’ neck pickup of the original Gibson Les Paul Custom. 2 But aren’t these just cheaper versions of the Electromatics? Yes, they’re the entry-point into the world of Gretsch, but they also aim to broaden the appeal of these classic designs beyond the be-quiffed rockabilly rebels. For the money they’re well conceived and built, too. 3 Do all these Streamliners have centre blocks? The new pickups are only available on these centre-blocked models (also without Bigsbys). Streamliners without centre blocks include the full-depth G2420T Hollow Body with Bigsby and the G2420 Hollow Body with Chromatic II tailpiece – both with Broad’Tron humbuckers.…

MANUFACTURER 633 ENGINEERING MODEL X2 CLASSIC OVERDRIVE & X3 MULTISTAGE OVERDRIVE PRICE £285 EACH CONTACT 633 ENGINEERING WWW.633AMP.COM 633 ENGINEERING X2 Classic Overdrive £285 The X2 is a soft-clipping overdrive that offers different clipping options from a three-way toggle switch and has two tone knobs (Lows and Highs) to tailor your sound. Lows comes before the clipping and is useful for keeping your bottom-end under control – tighter and leaner – but it’s also good for adding a bit of girth to bolster single-coil pickups. Highs comes after the clipping and covers a useful range for brightening the sound or toning it down. This is a great pedal for low-gain break-up, the centre setting of the Clip switch offering the cleanest option, with the Gain knob running from clean…

What was the first guitar you bought with your own money? “I bought a Les Paul imitation called a Tara and it cost me 10 bucks. I had a buddy in sixth or seventh grade who had the guitar and he was going to upgrade and so he said, ‘I will sell you this guitar for 10 bucks if you join my band and I’ll teach you to play.’ We started a band called Wit’s End. We did punk rock and heavy metal and Cheap Trick… lots of different things, whatever we could actually play. It wasn’t very complicated stuff. I got into the more Mötley Crüe kinda stuff later on and I wanted to play Metallica and Slayer, of course, but the band couldn’t handle that at the time.”…

1957 Model 4000 launched; single horseshoe pickup; dot inlays 1960 Changes from mahogany or walnut to maple neck-through-body July 1961 Larger body horns November 1961 First ‘deluxe’ model 4001: dual pickups; triangular inlays; plain or chequerboard top binding 1962 Cast aluminium tailpiece; thinner body (1¼”); longer bass horn January 1964 First Rose Morris model 1999 basses (UK export 4001-style) 1968 Hi-gain replaces horseshoe pickup; Ric-O-Sound stereo jack 1970 Shorter headstock 1972 Walnut neck-through-body centre strip 1973 Hi-gain replaces toaster pickup; plain binding; cast zinc tailpiece 1986 Discontinued…

Rhythm… and Blues Tutor Richard Barrett | Gear used Knaggs Choptank & Vox AC15 C1 Difficulty | 15 mins per example THE DISTINCTION between ‘lead’ and ‘rhythm’ guitar has long been a very blurred line. In fact, guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and SRV have managed to pretty much obliterate that line on many occasions. Having the ability to bridge the gap between those two ostensibly different worlds can really open up the fretboard in a way that remains useful even when staying within strict rhythm or lead boundaries. For this piece, I’ve used a harmonically sparse but relatively busy bass and drums backing. This allows me to sit back on a more chordal approach or venture into single-note territory with relative freedom, including whether I want to emphasise a…

JIMI HENDRIX AXIS: BOLD AS LOVE Any of the tracks here are recommended – not just for the specific licks and chords but also for Jimi’s overall approach as the main harmonic instrument in this three-piece format with a minimum of overdubs. The title track, while featuring a few overdubs later on, is a particularly great demonstration of this. Little Wing is worth revisiting, while Wait Until Tomorrow is a masterclass in creating harmonic and rhythmic interest. STEVIE RAY VAUGHAN LIVE AT MONTREUX (1982 & 1985) The first eight tracks, recorded in 1982, capture SRV at the moment he came to the attention of David Bowie and Jackson Browne. All the tracks give useful ideas, but going chronologically, starting with Hide Away and Texas Flood then skipping to 1985 with…

DUSTY HILL 1949–2021 Guitarist was saddened to hear of the passing of ZZ Top bassist Dusty Hill on 28 July, aged 72. The Texan played with the legendary blues-rock trio for more than 50 years after joining in 1969. He previously played alongside his brother Rocky and future ZZ Top bandmate Frank Beard in the Warlocks, the Cellar Dwellers and American Blues. Hill became an integral part of ZZ Top’s sound, with both his bass playing and backing vocals. His keen sense of economy in the band’s brand of boogie blues was very much by design after being influenced early on by the busier playing of Jack Bruce and Stanley Clark. “When I started playing in a three-piece, I realised that you have to do the song, not your personal…

Sometimes it’s fun to be forced into a situation where you can only have minimal gear and potentially have to play any style known to man. If I have a big-budget studio session then it’s an easy call to ask my roadie to simply bring everything, but sometimes it’s fun – and necessary – to do everything on a minimal space and price basis. I’ve experienced such a situation over the past few months with a regular Saturday brunch cabaret at Ronnie Scott’s in London. We’ve been extremely lucky to have been performing fairly regularly throughout lockdown to various-sized audiences, and currently we’re at full capacity with no Covid restrictions. The premise of the gig is that Olivier Award-winning actress and singer Cassidy Janson presents the show each week with…

Lately I’ve been delivering quite a bit of lutherie tuition and I’m often asked what, above all else, makes guitars sound different, and why do some guitars appear to sound better than others? Is it some special, expensive tonewood? The type of strings? Perhaps the instrument was built in a ritualistic fashion according to the waxing and waning of the moon? I’ve heard every ‘secret’ of the sound of the guitar, no matter how bizarre. It’s a timeless debate and a question for which every guitar maker ought to be armed and ready. Naturally, I’m always willing to launch myself into the fray, so here we go. I’ve always broken down my response to the question of ‘tone’ into three categories. Let’s address these in ascending order of importance. So…

Like all systems, chord theory occasionally struggles to itemise every single possibility in harmony. Just as mathematicians have no universally accepted way to write repeating decimals such as 0.333333, musicians often have various ways to describe a chord in our own language – all of which may be different but no less correct than each other. In situations like this, it’s useful to employ a bit of logical thinking. For example, in what context does the chord appear? An A/G chord (an A major triad over a G bass note) could be referred to was an A7 3rd inversion (7th on the bottom), but if this then resolves to a D/F# (D 1st inversion/3rd on the bottom), it seems logical to go with A/G and acknowledge the descending bass. Listen…

In Roxy Music, Phil Manzanera was the guitarist who put the addictive hooks into hits such as Love Is The Drug and Angel Eyes. A lifelong sonic innovator, Phil worked closely with Brian Eno to create Roxy Music’s experimental pop classics of the 70s – but Roxy’s albums also showed him to be a player of rare taste and poise. Phil’s also produced albums as diverse as David Gilmour’s On An Island and John Cale’s Fear – but he’s far from done making his own music. In fact, he’s just completed a new album entitled Caught By The Heart with Tim Finn, formerly of Crowded House and Split Enz. A multi-layered melange of sound with a Latin heartbeat, it brims with soulful sounds from all corners of the world. Despite…

EMERALD VIRTUO £2,625 CONTACT Emerald Guitars PHONE 00353 7491 48183 WEB www.emeraldguitars.com What You Need To Know 1 Who is this guitar aimed at? That was the first question we asked ourselves upon opening the case. It’s a brand-new model with a surprising array of features, and has the structural stability and light weight that carbon fibre has to offer. In those respects, it’s kind of an open book. 2 Is this an acoustic guitar with a foot in the electric camp or is it just a full-blown electric? And that was the second question we asked ourselves! We think the giveaway is that it arrived loaded with electric guitar strings and the unplugged acoustic voice is in the vicinity of an archtop. So we’ve marked it down as an…

The joy of manipulating your tone hands-free in real-time was once reserved for treadle-based effects such as the wah and Whammy, or expensive rack-based effects. The world of pedals has come such a long way over the recent years, however, that it’s more or less become the norm – rather than the rare unicorn-like exception it once was – for a pedal to have some sort of expressive capabilities either via ‘expression control’ or ‘control voltage’. So, let’s take a look at some of the different expression devices out there and how I like to use them. But first, I’ll quickly break down the differences between Expression and Control Voltage… 1. EXPRESSION VS CONTROL VOLTAGE You’ve probably encountered expression control before, but maybe the world of control voltage (aka…

The Telecaster has appeared in many different guises since the basic design went to market in 1950. Fender’s first solidbody electric guitar, the single (bridge) pickup Esquire, was introduced during spring 1950, while the odd dual-pickup Esquire was made that summer. Fender decided to launch these dual-pickup instruments separately as the Broadcaster in autumn 1950, though following a trademark disagreement with Gretsch they were rebranded Telecaster in early 1951. This landmark electric guitar is now celebrating its 70th anniversary. The Telecaster continued to evolve throughout the 50s, transitioning away from the original Blackguard livery in 1954 with a lighter blonde finish and white pickguard. The model’s greatest change would come in 1959 when rosewood fingerboards became standard across the Fender line. In June that year, the Esquire and Telecaster Custom…

1. SERIAL NUMBER Stamped onto jack plate; two letters: ‘Q’ (1977) and ‘I’ (September); four-digit number 2. HEADSTOCK Maple wings; ‘cresting wave’ profile; dual truss-rod nuts (under cover) 3. BODY Neck-through-body (maple with walnut centre strip); contoured maple wings; ‘cresting wave’ horns; 1¼-inch depth; plain single-layer top binding; Jetglo (black) finish 4. PICKUPS Dual Hi-gain pickups with individual tone and volume controls; three-way selector switch; Ric-O-Sound stereo jack; mono jack 5. HARDWARE Chrome-plated cast zinc tailpiece; metal pickup surrounds (chrome-plated plastic cover removed from bridge pickup); four individual nickel-plated tuners (two-a-side) 6. PLASTICS Single-layer, eight-hole white pickguard; single-layer white truss-rod cover embossed with Rickenbacker logo; reads ‘Made in USA Model 4001’ 7. NECK Neck-through-body (maple with walnut centre strip); dual truss rod; single-bound 20-fret lacquered rosewood fingerboard with triangular resin…

PRICE: £999 ORIGIN: UK TYPE: Valve preamp and valve power amp OUTPUT: 30W VALVES: 4x 12AX7, 4x EL84 DIMENSIONS: 80 (h) x 400 (w) x 220mm (d) WEIGHT (kg/lb): 12/26 CABINET: Steel CHANNELS: 1, with footswitchable boost CONTROLS: Boost, gain, bass, mid, treble, presence, volume, boost volume. Boost on/off switch, clip switch FOOTSWITCH: Single-button latching footswitch toggles boost function, not supplied ADDITIONAL FEATURES: Series effects loop, footswitchable boost OPTIONS: None RANGE OPTIONS: Ashdown’s Guitar Magnifier collection includes: AGM-5C combo (£749), AGM-30 Offset head (£1,099), 45W AGM-684C combo (£1,599) and 15W AGM-284C combo (£999). Matching speaker cabinets include the AGM-112 featured here (£349), AGM-210 and AGM-212 (both £599) Ashdown Music 01621 857853 www.ashdownmusic.com PROS A great-sounding, compact and portable all-valve head with plenty of punch; ideal with effects pedals; built to…

PRICE: £2,519 (inc gigbag) ORIGIN: Germany TYPE: Original offset shape, solidbody electric BODY: Mahogany with inset AAA figured maple NECK: Mahogany, glued-in SCALE LENGTH: 628mm (24.75”) NUT/WIDTH: Graph Tech Black Tusq/43.3mm FINGERBOARD: Tiger-stripe ebony, small oval abalone inlays, illuminated side-dots, 305mm (12”) radius FRETS: 22, jumbo HARDWARE: TonePros locking ‘Nashville’-style bridge and stud tailpiece, Graph Tech Ratio real-lock tuners – chrome plated STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 51mm ELECTRICS: Chrome covered Seymour Duncan ’59 at neck, JB at bridge, 3-way toggle pickup selector switch, master volume and tone control (with pull switch coil-split) WEIGHT (kg/lb): 3.67/8.1 OPTIONS: No, but check out the Framus Custom Shop (£POA) RANGE OPTIONS: The Idolmaker also appears in the Chinese-made D-Series at £782 LEFT-HANDERS: Yes, £POA FINISHES: Nirvana Black transparent high polish (as reviewed), Solid Black high…

Fairly recently I met with my old friend Robbie Gladwell (ex-Dr Robert of this parish) to do a charity gig in Suffolk. This is something he does annually to raise money, and because last year’s was cancelled, this one felt extra-special for all concerned. Robbie was also putting together his and Martyn Booth’s old band, Swift, to do a couple of numbers. So, with Robbie, Martyn and me, it was a minor reunion of Gibson’s UK repair squad, circa ’76 to ’82. “I dredged up anything acoustic and practised like mad. Banter would help, and I pictured myself in front of an enraptured crowd…” Training it up from Devon was our mutual friend, Mary Ann, who was in a band with another Gibson alumnus, Mark Willmott. She also ran Sudbury…

Anyone who spends enough time around guitars will run into the term ‘scale length’ eventually. But what does it mean and how does it influence a guitar’s performance? To deal with the first question, scale length describes the theoretical length of the ‘speaking’ part of the string – the bit that vibrates when struck by a plectrum: in other words, the section that is stretched at high tension between the guitar’s top nut and the saddle. We say theoretical because the scale length is simply used to calculate the position of the frets. The actual string length between the nut and saddle is longer and requires local adjustment for intonation otherwise the guitar wouldn’t play in tune. Scale length often varies between guitar models: most Fender electrics have a scale…

Nobody alive knows more about Les Paul’s ‘Number One’ 1952 Goldtop than Tom Doyle. After watching Tom, an accomplished guitarist and luthier, perform live in the mid-60s, Les invited him to become his personal tech. The term ‘tech’, however, falls somewhat short of describing what Les, with his tireless urge for tinkering, had Tom do for him. “First of all, Les didn’t like to sleep,” Tom says. “I would be there until six o’clock in the morning working on guitars and I’d say, ‘Les, I got to go home’. And he’d say, ‘Okay, we’ll work on this tomorrow.’ I mean, it just never stopped. He just had so many ideas: he would think of them, dream of them constantly. And many, many times, he would tell me: ‘Tom, this is…

There’s not too much on the current market that would be an exact rival for the Virtuo, especially in terms of pickup variety. If it’s a twin humbucker semi you’re after, then Eastman’s T386 is around £1,000, Gibson’s ES-335 around £2,500. A full Gibson archtop will cost considerably more, with even second-hand ES-175s coming in around the £2,000 mark. If it’s the humbucker/piezo combination that appeals, then you could look in the PRS catalogue and go for the SE Hollowbody II Piezo for around £1,349. If a MIDI output is an essential, then take a peek over Godin’s back fence and consider their Multivac range that will set you back around £1,500.…

“I’ve got to know PJD well and admire their work – Leigh is a real rising star”Tim Lobley When we first heard rumblings of this project – the birth of a new guitar company – our interest was piqued, not least because of the names involved: Relish, PJD Guitars, Cream T pickups and the legendary Billy F Gibbons. This could be interesting! The seed of the idea had actually started with the innovative and very different designs of the Swiss-based guitar company Relish. Tim Lobley, owner of Sound Affects in Ormskirk, takes us back: “I’m quite a fan of Relish’s pickup-swapping system, but, as a retailer, had some reservations about the guitar they were using as a ‘host’ for this new technology. On a personal level, I like the design,…

Following the release of Fender’s game-changing Precision Bass in 1951, most American manufacturers had introduced an electric bass guitar to the market by the mid-50s, but it wasn’t until 1957 that Rickenbacker introduced its own. Although it was slow to arrive, the model 4000 ultimately became one of the most influential bass designs ever. It was the first of its kind to feature a neck-through-body construction and dual truss-rod system. This, along with its “extreme cut-away” body design and ‘cresting wave’ three-piece headstock profile, made the company’s fledgling bass appear altogether different. Upon its launch in 1957, the Rickenbacker 4000 cost $279.50, which was $60 more than the Precision Bass. Evidently, Rickenbacker’s owner (and former business partner of Leo Fender) FC Hall was confident in the company’s new arrival. Production…

“I’ve been fortunate enough to have handled and possessed several prototype Stratocasters that were made very early on. It’s assumed the first 200 Stratocasters had [serial] numbers that appeared on the tremolo cover, starting with 0100. However, there are definitely prototype Stratocasters with earlier appointments made prior to this that were not serial numbered, some of which left the factory later. The first Strats that went out were sent to sales reps as demo guitars. They went all around the country and even up into Western Canada – one of the Strats I’ve had was a guitar that belonged to a dealer rep in Calgary. “One of the earliest Stratocasters I’ve seen was at the Songbirds museum [in Chattanooga, Tennessee] and it had a January 1954 neck. The nut step…