Innehållsförteckning för Summer 2022 från Guitarist

This month’s exclusive cover story with one of the most artistically fearless guitarists of our time, Robert Fripp (see interview, page 60), is a reminder of what can sometimes be lost in the world of guitar. There are so many great musical traditions, from blues to metal, to learn from. And each of them has its standard licks, hallmark techniques and heroes to emulate. In that sense, we all stand on the shoulders of giants when we play guitar in those styles, and their legacy vastly enriches us. But there’s a reverse to that coin, too. In learning the classic foundations of modern rock and pop guitar, it can be easy to settle into a standard way of doing things or fall prey to the creatively damaging illusion that those…

FIRST PLAY BLACKSTAR ST JAMES 50 EL34 COMBO BLACKSTAR ST JAMES 50 EL34 COMBO £1,099 WHAT IS IT? Significant new release from Blackstar combining innovative features and modern cabinet emulation Blackstar’s history goes back to 2004, when a gang of four guitar-playing mates left secure employment with a major amplification manufacturer to spend the next two and a half years developing their own range of amps, from the somewhat more dubious security of a shed in Northampton. Blackstar Amplification made its debut in 2007 at Frankfurt’s Musikmesse trade show – and the rest we know. Today, it’s one of the top amplification brands in every niche, from hand-wired pure valve designs to cost-effective digital modelling, all presented with the typically down-to-earth pragmatic attitude that’s a reflection of the company founders…

NEVILLE’S ADVOCATE... You may recall that earlier this year a mate of mine and I did a gig to ‘launch’ our respective albums. It was great fun, hugely rewarding but as stressful as anything I’d ever done – my hands were literally shaking with nerves. So guess what? We’re only doing it again, this time in Essex, nearer to where most of the band members live. “I used the amp’s onboard reverb, which is valve-driven and very juicy, and I can honestly say it was one of the best guitar tones I’d ever heard” But I’m not using my column as a cheap ad. I’m genuinely in a turmoil over what guitars to use. Last time it was my red Strat, Les Paul Goldtop and Martin OM. Of course, I’ve…

SUBSTITUTE... AUDIO http://bit.ly/guitaristextra An augmented chord is what we call a major chord with a raised (or sharp) 5th. You’ll hear it whenever the composer wants to set up a state of suspense, whether at the beginning of a song, as part of a chord progression, or in film scores to add a sense of foreboding at key moments. As with many other aspects of music theory, there are actually a couple of different names that can be correctly used. I’ve already mentioned ‘sharp 5’, often notated as +5 in jazz chord charts, in the same school of shorthand as a minus sign being used for minor and a small circle for diminished. Check out a copy of the jazz ‘bible’ The Real Book to see these symbols in…

Since arriving in Nashville in the early 90s, guitarist Tom Bukovac has performed on more than 700 albums by a veritable who’s who of the music industry’s upper elite. Just a cursory glance at his credits reveals names such as Taylor Swift, Stevie Nicks, Vince Gill, Sheryl Crow, Don Henley, Carrie Underwood, Keith Urban, Faith Hill, Reba McEntire and Blake Shelton. And that doesn’t even take into account the numerous jingles, TV and film projects and various other projects he’s performed on. “It kind of boggles my mind,” Bukovac admits. “The sessions I get called for are so wide-ranging. In a two-day period, I could go from playing heavy rock to 70s LA studio jazz. I love the variety of the music that’s coming out of this town. One minute…

TAYLOR 724CE KOA £3,799 CONTACT Taylor Guitars PHONE 0800 23750011 WEB www.taylorguitars.com What You Need To Know 1 Grand Concert, Grand Auditorium. What’s the difference? Taylor says the Grand Auditorium bears refined proportions that fall between a dreadnought and a Grand Concert. While the bigger dreadnought was considered a flatpicker’s guitar, and the smaller Grand Concert catered to fingerstylists, the GA was designed to deliver on both fronts. 2 What type of wood is koa? Acacia koa is a timber found in Hawaii. Taylor has always used koa for certain guitars but usually the highly figured variety. The koa used on the new 700 Series is not highly flamed yet is no less striking in its appearance. Ethically sourced, it’s also said to have the punch of mahogany and a…

“We discussed many options for the name,” laughs Tim Stark. “First, we looked at bird names, specifically owls, but we couldn’t settle on one. As the guitar progressed and we got into the intricate details of the design, the horns kept coming into our thoughts. We went through blade names, birds, Egyptian gods and, one day, Nolly said they reminded him of the horns of an Oryx, a type of antelope. We both loved that name, and it stuck. Nolly was keen to have a link to an animal of some kind, I think. We actually called it Project X when we first started, so it had that X sound, which we all really liked, too.”…

FENDER HAMMERTONE PEDALS £69 TO £84 CONTACT Fender Musical Instruments EMEA PHONE 0333 200 8765 WEB www.fender.com What You Need To Know 1 Hammertone? What’s that? It’s a new range of pedals from Fender. The name probably comes from the textural paint finish, but the idea is for pedals that are affordable and easy to use. 2 Nothing too complex, then? No. Fender’s rule for these was a WYSIWYG interface with a maximum of four knobs and two toggle switches, no hidden functions and no displays. 3 Is it a complete range? We don’t know if there are more in the pipeline, but there’s already plenty here to create a variety of complete pedalboards: four dirt pedals, two modulation pedals, two delays and a reverb. Fender got itself back into…

Guitars, like cars, need regular maintenance otherwise they simply wouldn’t be fit for work. Exactly how we guitar players let our instruments get in such a state always surprises me, but I’ll put my hands up and say, ‘Guilty as charged!’ We don’t have well-paid techs to look after our guitars so it’s something that can be easily forgotten. I pulled out my main guitar when I was setting up for a gig recently, only to realise I’d not wiped it down after the previous gig; the strings felt horrible and the action eemed to be considerably higher than before. Had I given the guitar a simple maintenance check before the gig I’d have spotted the problems. Instead, the two-hour show was less fun than it should have been. I…

TALKING LOUD Doing the job I do means I have a great excuse to play different amps and, if I’m lucky, get them for the studio. I feel it’s important to understand how different amps work with different speakers and cabs, if for nothing else, to understand how various sounds are created. It probably doesn’t surprise you that as a cab builder I gravitate towards heads rather than combo amps. Though adding an extension cabinet to a combo can sound fantastic, be quite practical and offer oodles of versatility, it probably accounts for no more than five per cent of what I do, so it makes sense for me to focus on heads. After all, every head needs a cab. That said, I do absolutely love a combo. With all…

Traditional Electric Blues Tutor Richard Barrett | Gear used Knaggs SSC & Vox AC15 C1 Difficulty | 10 mins per example WHEN THE GUITAR ‘WENT ELECTRIC’, its potential as a solo or featured instrument – especially in a band context – blew wide open. A new breed of players, including John Lee Hooker, Hubert Sumlin and Sister Rosetta Tharpe, began to exploit these different possibilities and sounds, which were later built upon further by Chuck Berry, Buddy Guy and Jimi Hendrix. What I’m hoping to capture in these examples is a snapshot in time, when people first began to turn up their amps and discover just how raucous things could get! As you’ll see, I’m relying more on strident ringing open strings rather than single-note ‘solos’ per se, but the…

FIRST PLAY GUILD SURFLINER GUILD SURFLINER £395 WHAT IS IT? Original-design retro-style solidbody bolt-on Presumably named after the Pacific Surfliner train service that runs down the California coast from San Luis Obispo to San Diego, this new electric is quite a departure for Guild. First off, it undercuts the previous Newark St start-up model, the Jetstar, and is nearly half the price of the long-running S-100 Polara. It shares the Jetstar’s longer 648mm (25.5-inch) scale length but is the only bolt-on in the current range. Guild did produce various bolt-ons to try to stay current in the 80s, but those were more ‘SuperStrat’-like; the style here seems more retro. And while technically an offset, as in its waist and curved bass-side base, the Surfliner doesn’t look – or feel –…

HARLEY BENTON MR‑MODERN £295 WHAT IS IT? Budget Mostrite-style offset double-cut from Thomann’s in-house brand Fast becoming the place to find a bargain, Harley Benton – a house brand of online giant Thomann – seems to release new models on a monthly basis. The latest is a dual-level MR (as in Mosrite) range with hardtail ‘Classic’ models at £209 and this rather more pimped ‘Modern’ version at a lofty £295. And when we say pimped, we get jumbo stainless-steel frets on a Macassar ebony fingerboard, a Wilkinson VS-50 II vibrato, Graph Tech nut, rear locking tuners, and a pair of coil-splittable Artec humbucking soapbars. We’re probably not alone in saying we’ve only played an original Mosrite for moments. To be honest, it’s likely the same for Harley Benton’s designers. Yes,…

Summer NAMM Round-Up The NAMM Show was back as an in-person event this year for the first time since 2020, making summer the new winter for many brands’ big-release schedules. Here, we’re rounding up a cross section of some of the best and most interesting new gear from those who were there – and even those who weren’t! Here are the guitars, pedals and amps you can expect to see hitting the shelves in the months ahead. [SW] EVH STRIPED SERIES ’78 ERUPTION £1,269 In contrast to the super-limited version that was released a few years ago, EVH has unveiled a production version of the ’78 Eruption in its Striped Series. This guitar features many of the same appointments we’ve come to love about EVH guitars – such as a…

Artist: Al Di Meola, Paco de Lucía, John McLaughlin Album: Saturday Night In San Francisco (earMUSIC) The coming together of three giants of flamenco and jazz-fusion guitar on the 1981 live album Friday Night In San Francisco was an era-defining moment. Al Di Meola was one of the hottest players in the world of jazz fusion, while John McLaughlin was already an established master. With flamenco firebrand Paco de Lucía to complete the triangle, it was no wonder the trio’s acoustic odyssey became a hit record. Few knew, however, that a second recording was made the following night, capturing yet more of the intensity and fire of their extraordinary meeting. Now, those recordings finally have been released, so we joined Al Di Meola to learn how it all went down……

CONFESSIONS OF A LUTHIER There is an atmosphere of nervous anticipation at the Alex Bishop Guitars workshop this week, as a handful of my guitar-making students edge into the final phase of their instrument builds. From an assortment of rough wooden billets have emerged elegant guitar-shaped creations, the timber now tamed into unmistakable objects of beauty and sonic potential. I do my best to remind my students that there is still a long road ahead if they wish to master the art of French polishing these fine acoustic creations (although an easy oil finish “will do”). However, there is one last woodworking challenge to overcome, and that is designing and carving the bridge. “Before making a bridge, any fledgling luthier needs to understand its role in transforming the energy of…

STAR LETTER HOLIDAY HOARD I couldn’t help but relate to the story of Royal Albert in the Iconic Guitars special edition. Joe Bonamassa’s remarks about “buying stories” really resonated with me as I realised a few of my own guitars have a story. Take ‘Cornish’, for example. I’d been after a clean example of a 90s Les Paul Standard for some time, having played one some years back to see what the fuss was all about. Fast-forward to the summer of 2020, when we were all wondering if we would ever leave lockdown. I’d taken a punt on our regular family Cornish holiday destination opening in St Ives, and a truly memorable week ensued with the usual mixture of Atlantic weather giving birth to some showery afternoons. On one such…

Interviews with ‘That Awful Man’, as Robert Fripp refers to himself these days, are rare, and until now he hasn’t allowed his collection of guitars to be photographed, including the one pictured opposite that was used on so many classic Crimson albums. “I don’t collect guitars,” he tells us as we settle down to talk, “they are merely tools that I use in my work.” However, we note that the famous ’59 Les Paul Custom appears to be in almost pristine condition – in fact, it’s still shiny even after years on the road. “One careful owner,” he quips with a wry grin. Anyone who wants to assess Fripp’s skills as a guitarist need only check out Fracture from the King Crimson album Starless And Bible Black. The Moto Perpetuo…

BLUEPRINT: Laney The Difference Engine Laney may be best known as a Brum-based amp maker with a rich backstory in British rock and metal, but its deftly designed and styled effects pedals are growing in number every year. Now, with the launch of a sophisticated delay pedal called The Difference Engine, the company has got a rack-quality echo machine that conjures up some of the most famous tones in rock – and Laney says it’ll please everyone from plug-and-play newcomers to the most pedantic MIDI-obsessives out there. Intrigued, we join Simon Fraser-Clark of Laney – whose keen ears shaped the pedal’s wide palette of classic sounds – to learn why top-flight guitarists ranging from Brian May and Billy Duffy to Tom Quayle are getting involved with curating and creating the…

Gretsch 6128 Duo Jet Back in the early 1950s, the concept of a solidbody electric guitar was beginning to catch on. Throughout the 30s and 40s, it was the finely crafted hollowbody archtops from the likes of Gibson and Epiphone that ruled the electric roost, but that began to change when Californian upstart Fender started making waves in the guitar world. In 1950, Fender unveiled its revolutionary Esquire and Broadcaster models, attracting reactions from sceptics who criticised the now-iconic Telecaster blueprint for its utilitarian design. To some degree, there was a reluctance to accept the new kid on the block during this watershed period in guitar history. Indeed, Fred Gretsch Jr expressed surprise at his friend Ted McCarty’s decision to hit back with a Gibson solidbody electric in the form…

All three pickups are made by BHK (Booheung Precision Co Ltd, Korea). The LB-1 at the bridge, which uses an Alnico V magnet, will be pretty familiar to any Guild Newark St fans, while the flush pole (Alnico V) single coils look fairly regular, except for their partial covers, which will help to reduce hum pick-up. Aside from selecting the solo bridge humbucker, the neck and middle combined, and all-three-on are hum-cancelling. Underneath the scratchplate there’s an open ‘swimming pool’ rout. This means if you wanted to go HH, HSH or SSS, so long as you could fabricate a scratchplate, no additional routing of the body would be necessary. Maybe Guild has some different pickup configurations in mind for the future? The volume and tone controls are 500k Alpha ‘Made…

VOX VH-Q1 HEADPHONES £249 WHAT IS IT? High-quality noise-cancelling headphones with a unique ‘Silent Session’ feature Headphones really have to earn their crust these days. Not only is great audio quality expected but wireless connectivity with your devices is pretty much standard today. Vox’s VH-Q1 headphones are all of the above but also feature noise-cancelling technology that suppresses intrusive sounds from outside, such as engine noise on a long haul flight. Pairing the VH-Q1s with a device is pretty simple; you just hold down the power button for five seconds, after which they should be discoverable on Bluetooth-enabled phones or tablets. Once paired, the sound quality is impressive, balancing warmth and detail very pleasantly via the high-grade film diaphragms. The pillowy earpads are very comfortable and, at a little over…

Artist: Jon Wilks Album: Up The Cut (independent) Jon Wilks is a folk singer from the Black Country, whose most recent album, Up The Cut, takes traditional songs from his native land and arranges them for acoustic guitar. Minimalist maybe, but Jon’s playing can be complex, fleshing out the song’s melody with technical flourishes, as he demonstrated on his most recent tour. “The live arrangements haven’t changed much from the album,” he tells us, “but the more you play songs, the more confidence you have to mess around with them. You get used to where your fingers are going and you’re more comfortable finding something different.” Keeping With Tradition The songs on Up The Cut were arranged and recorded quickly, a method Jon is changing for his next release. “Some…

SESSION DIARY When I was first asked to write this column several years ago, my inspiration was Tommy Tedesco’s ‘Studio Log’ column in Guitar Player magazine. Here he would describe a day’s work recording a movie, TV show or album, the special challenges each job posed and how he solved them, what instruments he used, and how much money he made on the job. I think it’s fitting, therefore, for my last effort for a while in this magazine, to speak to someone who many would regard as the UK’s answer to Tommy, and someone who was very much an inspiration to me in my formative years – Mitch Dalton. It’s a well-worn cliché to say: “While you may not have heard of ‘X’, you’ve certainly heard their playing!”, but…

RAISING THE TONE... Opinion Last issue, I travelled down to specialist trader Glenn’s Guitars in London to try a varied selection of acoustic guitars, both new and vintage, in search of the perfect instrument for an album of acoustic instrumentals I’d like to record this year. As previously mentioned, I traded in a very good Martin DR Centennial dreadnought, which was a bit too much of a cannon for fingerstyle, to find something more subtle and mellow. So, what did I buy in the end? Well, before we get to that part, I’d like to pass on one or two (hopefully useful) personal observations from my year-long quest to find a ‘keeper’ acoustic guitar. The first tip, which I also mentioned last month, is to always try before…

HISTORIC HARDWARE Pre-CBS Strats are commonly divided into 50s and 60s types, or maple-’board and rosewood-’board models, but there were plenty of variations within those categories. Vintage Strats can have a mix of features and parts, which don’t always coincide with the ‘official’ specs for any given year. Even so, for this overview of the pre-CBS years, we’re focusing on four years that mark key stages in the evolution of the Stratocaster: 1954, 1956, 1959 and 1962. 1954: The Story Begins Like the earliest Broadcasters and Esquires, the very first Strats, made between March and May 1954, are often described as ‘prototypes’ – but, in comparison, they were fully formed. Fender sold a significant number before the ‘official’ launch in October, with a few minor changes having been made over…

Manson Guitar Works evolved as an offshoot of the repair and custom work that had been a big part of the legendary Mansons Guitar Shop, founded by the equally legendary guitar maker, Hugh Manson. Some 20 years on the company is now based in Ashburton – after moving in August 2016 – where in-house finish spraying, pickup manufacturing and CNC processes all take place under the same roof. “We can now make between 100 and 150 guitars a year depending on the build specs,” says head luthier, Tim Stark, “but we’d like to double or triple that over the next six to 12 months.” Back when the company started it was just Adrian Ashton (now Manson Guitar Works’ MD) and Tim building a small number of instruments in a very…

BOUGHT & SOLD What was the first serious guitar you bought with your own money? “I bought an Aria Pro II guitar that had a whammy bar on it. It wasn’t a Floyd Rose… it was a Kahler. It had visible wood grain and was red. I would say it was a rock guitar, for sure. I was a teenager at that point. I mean, I started when I was 12, it was probably a couple of years later when I was 14 or so. It’s funny, I was playing with John Myung back then and we still play together in Dream Theater – he’s the bass player – and we met each other when we were 12. “I would just go jam with everybody in those days. There was…

Acoustic Guitar Shapes & Sizes There is arguably more enthusiasm for innovation and experimentation in the acoustic guitar world than for electric guitars. Even so, most acoustics conform to a handful of shapes and sizes that have been around for a century or more. Many of these body styles were introduced by Martin Guitars, and its model designations are still widely used – irrespective of the manufacturer. As with solidbody electrics, when one or two brands dominate the market, smaller companies tend to copy their successful designs. American-made guitars really began to diverge from the European tradition during the 1850s. Most ‘classical’ guitars began following the dimensions and fan-bracing pattern employed by the legendary Spanish luthier Antonio De Torres. Meanwhile, over in Pennsylvania, Christian Frederick Martin developed an X-shaped bracing…

1963 Gibson Firebird I “At the moment, we have custom-colour Firebird I, III, V and VII guitars, along with Thunderbird basses. This is a reverse 1963 Firebird I in Kerry Green. The earliest Firebirds from 1963 do not have a Firebird insignia on the pickguard; that starts a little later. Believe it or not, the Firebird I is one of the rarest models. Because there was a small price difference, the Firebird Is kind of got overlooked. But I happen to think they are the best out of all of them. I mean Clapton played a Firebird I. It’s simplistic: a single pickup, no fretboard binding and dot inlays. Some have a stud tailpiece and some have a shorty Maestro Vibrola. “[Gibson president] Ted McCarty hired a guy called Ray…