Innehållsförteckning för September 2018 från Total Guitar

A lot has changed in the world of guitar, and the whole music industry, in the 60 years the Les Paul Standard has been around. Genres have collided, recording technology has become accessible to anyone with a computer, and you can access any song you can think of from your phone. But a reassuring amount hasn’t; vinyl is so good it came back, live music is still drawing crowds, and guitar heroes still matter. The classic players who inspire us and we aspire to learn from have stood the test of time. And a lot of them chose the Les Paul as their muse. The die was cast over half a century ago when Eric Clapton changed the perception of how an electric guitar could sound when he channeled his…

Jimmy plays this riff on a Danelectro 3021 (or sometimes a Gibson Les Paul) set to its middle selector position, so both pickups are engaged. We used our Danelectro 59X’s neck pickup in the video – its humbucker tone was a little closer to Jimmy’s single coil sound. Opt for a Marshall Plexi style amp (any digital modeller should have a suitable preset) and dial in a moderate amount of gain – the tone on the studio recording isn’t very distorted at all. A slow phaser effect gives the final touch. EFFECTS Phaser Rate: 2 Depth: 3…

1 TONE  The tone stack on the DS-1, interestingly enough, is quite similar to that found on the Electro-Harmonix Big Muff. It is essentially a tilt around a low-mid scoop. Unlike pedals, such as the Tube Screamer that boost the mids, the DS-1 cuts at around 500Hz, leaving the treble and bass substantially louder at the mid-point of the control’s rotation. Arguably, this EQ curve is more suited to hard rock, especially if you roll off excess bass at the amplifier end. 2 LEVEL  The level control passively attenuates the output of the pedal. 3 DISTORTION  The Tube Screamer can offer about 40dB of gain, while the ProCo Rat has nearly 70 on offer. The distortion control on the DS1 controls the gain from the second op-amp amplifier stage, which…

GET THE TONE #1 JOE SATRIANI LEAD It’s easy to get huge, searing sustain out of the DS-1, but make sure you’ve got a noise gate handy if you plan on running it into a larger amplifier, as you’re likely to get a lot of feedback. Try these settings into a hairy Marshall and get your shred on. GET THE TONE Tone: 1 o’clock Level: max Dist: 1 o’clock GET THE TONE #2 ENTOMBED CHAINSAW The guitar sound on Entombed’s Left Hand Path album was largely the DS-1’s successor, the HM-2, with one guitar panned left and right. Uffe Cederlund recently revealed there was also a DS-1 panned dead centre. As the counterpoint to much more saturated tones, the DS-1 can help fill out a mix, even when placed lower.…

1966 FENDER STRATOCASTER “I have a 1966 Strat with all the original pickups and parts and my love of these guitars goes back to the age of 13, when I received a Strat from my father for my bar mitzvah. I fell in love with it, although I didn’t know how to get a great tone out of it then and I eventually traded it, much to my horror years later. Once I figured out how to adapt it a bit – for instance, with the five position switch customisation, where you could get these ‘between pickup’ sounds, that beautiful, kind of hollow Stratocaster tone – I really grew to love it.” GIBSON 1942 J-45 “As I grew up, over the years, any time that I got to play somebody’s…

Thin Lizzy, Iron Maiden, Wishbone Ash – all influential with their harmony guitar licks. The key to mastering their styles is understanding the 3rd interval… 1. This is the scale our licks are based on. Known as the E natural minor scale, it’s used in all styles of music in every minor key. 2. The first phrase of our lower harmony line uses the three notes shown here. Nothing too difficult about that. Next! 3. The top line uses these notes, crucially, three notes higher up the scale. When the two harmonies are played together, the intervals are known as 3rds.…

With roots in the Motown and Stax recordings of the 50s and 60s, the soul ballad is a well-trodden musical path, evolving over the years into the emotive pop ballads of artists such as Amy Winehouse, Adele and even Ed Sheeran. For this month’s jam track we’re taking a step back from the present day with a track that’s a little more traditional. Our rhythm guitar stylings are a tip of the hat to guitar greats like Steve Cropper, Jimi Hendrix and perhaps even Prince – all highly influential soul players. Listen out for the accented chords on beats 2 and 4 in each bar of the verses in our track. It’s a staple soul vamp best played with three- or four-string ‘partial’ chords. Finally, we’ve given you all the…

The earworm riff in this AC/DC classic kicks off with a handful of bombastic powerchords before breaking into a bluesy pentatonic lick and a funky syncopated line. The syncopation continues in the chorus where several of the chords are played off the beat. It’s probably already familiar to your ear but listen carefully so your timing stays tight. For the solo it’s best to use the E minor pentatonic and blues scales – Angus’ solo is heavily based on these. Rockschool’s arrangement omits a full tab of the guitar solo, the idea being to improvise or prepare a solo, rather than slavishly replicate the original track. Essential skills for any guitarist whether or not you plan to take Rockschool’s exam. Try to play bite-sized musical shapes and phrases within these…

“I’M ALWAYS TRYING TO BREAK MY HABITS BUT I DON’T DO A VERY GOOD JOB AT IT...” The biggest challenge when growing the Haas avocado on the West Coast of America is trying to stay ahead of the rising water prices. At least, that’s what Jason Mraz has learned since he and his wife, Cristina, moved to Oceanside, San Diego, in 2004, and then, quite by accident, became farmers. As Mraz tells it, he was pulled towards a country life after his debut album, Waiting For My Rocket To Come, went platinum. “I wanted to be able to make noise and not have neighbours,” he says, “and then I realised that I was responsible for these 50-year-old avocado trees.” That responsibility wasn’t taken lightly. He switched to organic, leveraged his…

1 KORG PITCHCLIP 2 Just when you thought Korg had run out of ideas for headstock tuners, it goes and releases a sequel to its best-selling Pitchclip. Changes this time around include a thinner, larger display; improved low-frequency detection accuracy; a 140% improvement in clip holding power; reverse-display function for lefties; and 24-hour battery life. The tuner’s detection accuracy is +/- 1 cent, as before, and it works with electric and acoustic guitars, basses and ukuleles.. (from £13, korg.co.uk ) 2 NEKTAR PACER MIDI controller specialist Nektar has dipped its toe in the guitar pedalboard waters with the Pacer, an 80s-vibed unit that’s preconfigured to work with Line 6 gear, the Kemper Profiler, and even switch your amp, MIDI or not. There are 10 programmable footswitch controls,…

1 CONSTRUCTION  Don’t bother asking about tone wood: Dano lists the 59X’s body build as ‘composite/ plywood construction’. Thankfully, it doesn’t dampen the superb plugged-in sounds 2 PICKUPS  There’s a certain top-end magic that only Lipstick pickups can tap into, and the 59X has some of the best yet, courtesy of that humbucker 3 CUTAWAYS  If you can call them that, that is. Come on, Dano, deepen those grooves – what’s the point in having 21 frets if you can’t actually reach them all? Of all the companies that benefitted from the Black Keys/White Stripes-fuelled pawnshop guitar surge, we’d wager Danelectro was near the top. Its electric range has always been off-the-wall, but its low prices and unique build and sound have seen a raft of new models surface in…

For most people, ‘rotary speaker’ probably instantly conjures up two key sounds: Hendrix’s clean tone in Little Wing, and his guitar histrionics in cuts like Machine Gun later in his career. What’s interesting is that even in the 60s, the Uni-Vibe phase effect, which aimed to emulate the sound of a rotating speaker, was what he was using to achieve those tones live. The rotating speaker, most famously the Leslie, generates a fluctuation in volume and in pitch, which is why it bears more than a passing similarity to the sound generated by a phaser pedal. From subtle vibrato sounds to wild tremolo, pedal-based emulations can exceed what the original physical machines could do, and take the player into wholly new sonic territory. We check out the best modern offerings...…

CHRIS BIRD All the Gibson goodness in this month’s mag has got TG’s tuition editor musing on his own favourite Les Paul players. “I’ve probably spent more time listening to Jimmy Page and Slash”, he explains, “but the guitarist I most want to be able play like is Gary Moore. No doubt!” We hear you, Mr B. We hear you! MICHAEL ASTLEY-BROWN Jimmy Page may have been most famous for wielding a Les Paul, but he also turned to a Danelectro DC59 for anything tuned to DADGAD – Mike struck a pose with Dano’s latest incarnation of its most iconic outline, the 59X, this issue. Oh, and he caught up with his pals in Thrice, too. CHARLIE GRIFFITHS This month Charlie has been mostly in the studio recording the new…

SNAP DRAGON GUITARS Get packing with Snap Dragon Guitars’ folding guitars in both electric and acoustic formats. With their light, polycarbonate body and 24” scale length, you can trot the globe and still sound good. FLATTLEY GUITAR PEDALS Based in the south west, Flattley Guitar Pedals produces a wide range of good-looking, handmade stompboxes that promise top-notch tones. We particularly like The Boss Overdrive and superbly monikered Darth Fazer. DREWMAN GUITARS A few heads will certainly be turned by the Drewman stand, where all electrics are built using aluminium, with anodised finishes and mirror-polished necks. Current models include single-cut and T-type shapes, with an offset model on the way.…

1 “This is a Maton guitar, made in Australia and this is my guitar of choice for live and also all studio stuff. If you look through my albums I always put what guitar I used for which track and you’ll find Maton is featured everywhere. I got my first Maton guitar in 1960 so it was a long time ago, and they just keep getting better and better. It now has a custom shop at the factory in Melbourne and it’s run by a young man called Andy Allen, who hand builds my guitars.” 2 “This model here is based on the [EBG808] model that Maton has been making for a long time. This one is called the TE Personal; in other words it was personally made for me.…

First introduced in 1978, the Boss DS-1 was initially based around a Toshiba preamp, rather than the op-amp that would be used for later iterations of the circuit. BOSS’S DS-1 HAS GONE ON TO DEFINE SUBSEQUENT COMPACT PEDALS This circuit resulted in a warm distortion tone, which was made gritty by the hard-clipping diodes placed after the amplifier stage. Although its tone is more angular, the ProCo Rat employs a similar hard-clipping action, and this is what tends to characterise a distortion versus an overdrive. The Tube Screamer, by comparison, has a soft clip, with diodes placed in the feedback loop of its op-amp. As the first distortion that Boss released, it has gone on to define the compact pedals that have come after. Probably the only pedals as recognisable…

“Istill find them tremendously sexy. For me, being in a room full of Les Pauls is akin to being in a room full of naked girls… it never gets old, ha ha! I don’t know what else to compare it to. These guitars are a major turn-on for me. I still look at the Les Paul as a particular model or style that’s the most awesome. I really don’t think there’s a better-looking or more understated looking guitar out there. Plus, you never run out of sustain. Funnily enough, I was watching a thing on Mark Knopfler recently – who is an awesome player who I never really talk about – and he was in the studio having a discussion about his fingerstyle, talking about the differences between a Strat…

EPIPHONE LES PAUL ULTRA III THE LES PAUL THAT REALLY DOES HAVE IT ALL On the face of it, there’s nothing too out-of-the-ordinary with the Ultra III – catch a glimpse of its purdy AAA flame maple veneer on a guitar shop wall, and you’d never suspect the amount of additional tech Epiphone managed to cram into this weight-relieved yet souped-up single-cut. Its biggest selling point is the inclusion of two pickup systems: first up is Epiphone’s top-notch ProBucker humbuckers, which aim to nail Gibson’s PAF-style BurstBucker tone. But the other is a Shadow NanoMag pickup, which you can just about make out at the end of the fingerboard, if you look closely. This captures the LP’s body acoustics and string harmonics for an acoustic-like tone, channelled via a separate…

Learn To Fly was the first single from the Foos’ Grammy-winning third album There Is Nothing Left To Lose. Recorded in the frontman’s home studio following the departure of guitarist Franz Stahl, the entire album’s guitars were played by Nirvana drummer and eventual megastar Dave Grohl. The song is primarily rhythm guitar-based, centred around a fair number of open position chords, and really brought to life with dynamics – how loud or soft you play. The verses benefit from gentle picking and you can drop your guitar’s volume down to clean up the tone. This section is arpeggiated; skipping over the strings to hit the right notes may take a little practice. The choruses are louder and bombastic so turn your guitar up to 10 and strum the strings confidently…

Inspired to take up the guitar by Stevie Ray Vaughan, Kenny Wayne Shepherd’s determined note-for-note study of his hero’s solos has paid off. As a gifted young player Kenny scored his first record deal aged 13 and he has released eight studio albums to date. SRV’s influence permeates the Louisiana guitarist’s style; his playing is both fiery and intricate, with lots of bluesy grace notes and slides. The minor pentatonic and blues scales feature heavily in his solos, mixed in with Hendrix-like chord-based lines too. Keep this in mind as you tackle this month’s licks. Kenny rarely plays anything other than Fender Strats. He’s owned an SRV Signature Series, a ’54 Custom Shop model and his favourite, an original ’61 Strat. He’ll often dial in dollops of overdrive for solos,…

1 CONTROLS  Straightforward controls make the AC30S1 easy to use. All of the great classic and modern Vox sounds are right here – just a few twists is all it takes 2 SPEAKER  Behind the diamond grill cloth is a custom Celestion VX12 loudspeaker. Lots of volume and bass makes the AC30S1 sound bigger than many 2x12s 3 DIGITAL SPRING  The AC30S1’s reverb is a superb digital spring that’s up there with many studio effects for quality and versatility, from subtle ambience to full-on cavern The word ‘icon’ is frequently over-used in the guitar industry, but few would disagree that Vox’s AC30 is the quintessential British guitar amp, used by a diverse list of equally iconic musicians including Hank Marvin, Rory Gallagher, Brian May and, of course, The Beatles. This…

1 WOODS  Art & Lutherie is using 95% homegrown Canadian woods for this model 2 CONTRAST  The binding, rosewood bridge, ’board and maple neck create an effective dark vintage-flavoured contrast to the lighter finish here 3 TUNERS  The 18:1 ratio open gear-tuners balance vintage style with smooth accuracy Denim is a wondrous thing, forever soaring above the fickle world of fashion with an appeal that transcends age and class. But its relationship with our instrument has usually been restricted to a player’s jeans or jacket accompaniment, rather than a whole denim guitar finish. Could this be the moment where the two worlds finally align? Last issue we took a look at the Maritime: a solid wood cutaway electro from Seagull, one of Canadian maker Godin’s acoustic brands. Art & Lutherie…

Electro-Harmonix is well-known for its longstanding Holy Grail, which boasts killer sounds but not a whole lot of flexibility; enter the Oceans 11, a compact pedal that boasts a whopping 11 different types of reverb. Aiming to do for reverb what the Canyon did for delay, the Oceans 11’s ’verbs span “essential to exotic”, says EHX, from classics such as hall, spring and plate to shimmer, polyphonic and auto-infinite settings. Tantalisingly, EHX says the pedal is also capable of producing infinite reverb to be played over with other reverb effects – we look forward to testing that boast next issue. With a price tag of £145 (including a 9V power supply), the Oceans 11 is keenly priced – here’s why it’s worth diving in……

STEP 1 Hold your pick comfortably and rest the side of your palm on the strings where they meet the bridge. Fret a note and pick the string to see how it sounds. STEP 2 Gradually move your hand farther onto the strings for a stronger dampening effect or onto the bridge to allow the strings to ring out more clearly. STEP 3 You’ve tried a single note, now try fretting this G5 powerchord. Position your pick hand so that you mute out all three of the guitar’s bass strings.…

BOSS DS-2 TURBO DISTORTION £55 Used by DS-1 aficionados like Kurt Cobain, the DS-2 was Roland’s first attempt to evolve the circuit. Tonally similar to the DS-1 in mode 1, it could be switched into a second mode that brought the mids more forward, lessening the effect of the tone stack’s scoop. Apart from that, its controls of level, tone and distortion were identical to those found on the DS-1. BOSS HM-2 HEAVY METAL £150-250 (USED) A development of the core idea of the DS-1, the HM-2 goes overboard, with soft clipping diodes, hard-clipping and crossover distortion all combining to make the ‘chainsaw’ sound so beloved of death metal guitarists. Although the circuit was more complex, with two controls for EQ in addition to the changes already mentioned, this cult…

ERNIE BALL MUSIC MAN INSPIRED BY STINGRAY GUITAR Dustin: “The coolest thing about it is a mode where if you press a button, it makes the pickups run to separate outputs. For me, I do two separate inputs into the Line 6 Helix, and that allows me to control what pickup is used or a blend of the pickups with the settings on my Helix. “On tour, I have one that’s set in D standard, and one that’s in baritone, in B standard. And there’s a backup of each, because they have different string gauges. These are the only electric guitars I own now. I try not to be sentimental about guitars, because otherwise I’d have too many!” GIBSON ’76 LES PAUL DELUXE Teppei: “I’ve had that guitar forever, actually.…

SEYMOUR DUNCAN PEARLY GATES £102 One of Seymour Duncan’s most popular models, for a reason: it emulates the original bridge pickup sound from Billy Gibbons’ 1959 Les Paul. Slightly hotter than a traditional PAF humbucker, the Pearly Gates emphasises the midrange, and is great for overdriven tones. BARE KNUCKLE THE MULE £129 The Mule is a super-accurate take on Gibson’s prized PAF humbucker by one of the world’s leading proponents of high-quality pickups, Bare Knuckle. By comparing the best-sounding late-’59 PAFs, it’s nailed the elusive combo of clarity and dynamic range. DIMARZIO SUPER DISTORTION £77 The Super Distortion is known as the replacement pickup, and for some, it was the first high-output humbucker they encountered. Designed to push a valve amp into highly overdriven territory, it’s behind some of rock’s…

BIRD OF PLAY John Smith pays tribute to his influences on new album As John Smith revisits some of his favourite traditional folk songs alongside new compositions on his next album, Hummingbird, he’s told TG about fulfilling a long-held ambition to record them. “Honestly, it was a real joy,” he explains. “But also quite challenging. Lord Franklin, for instance, is a deceptively complicated 4/4 thumb and fingerstyle piece that I had to practise loads to get right, after leaving it alone for a year or two.” That traditional folk ballad nods to one of Smith’s heroes, John Renbourn, who also interpreted the song in Pentangle. But the musician is also showcasing his own compositions with the title track, historical tale Boudica and a reworking of Axe Mountain from his 2009…

Getting barre chords together can be tough. Wrestling with finger-crunching shapes is hard work and progress can be slow at first. The way to get them sorted is to find a song based mainly on open chords, but which also has a few barre chords thrown in for good measure. This way you get to practise those tricky barres and your fret hand will still have some life left come the end of the song. This classic track from The Kinks is the perfect example. The verses are built around four simple open chords: E, A, D and C. In the bridge and middle sections there are four barre chords, B, F#, G#m and C#m, but you’ll be back on open chords after just a few moments playing all those…

Welcome to the GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome*) Station! Every issue, TG scours the market for the hottest new gear and brings you transparent reviews that you can trust. From the smallest of accessories that make your life easier, to big investments such as brand new guitars, amps and effects pedals – if it’s worth your attention, you’ll find it here! HOW WE TEST CURATION Our product selection is driven by our love of gear. We select the most exciting products on the market every month to bring you opinions you can trust. FACE-VALUE REVIEWS We’re not gear snobs here at Total Guitar. We judge it on whether it looks good, sounds good and plays well – not by the name on the headstock. NO SNAKE OIL You won’t find us…

The EL84 valve was originally made for small radios and portable record players, and was also the heart of Mullard’s legendary 5-10 hi-fi amplifier. A true pentode, the EL84 was designed with high internal gain so it could be used without a driver valve in low-cost circuits. Together with its small size, this made the EL84 very popular, and hundreds of European audio products used it. Introduced in 1953, it was still quite new when Vox chose it for its AC15, and quickly became a key part of the classic Vox sound, powering many British pop and blues bands from that era. Vintage EL84s weren’t so good at withstanding the torture of guitar amp use; thankfully modern versions are much more rugged. Today, the EL84 is still a very popular…

There is a common misconception that all guitars equipped with active pickups sound alike. But is it not more the case that guitarists using said guitars are chasing the most brutal metal tone possible, and that this engenders conformity at sonic extremes? These four electrics seem to bear that theory out. Of course, all are capable of articulating a riff in super-high-gain scenarios, but there’s a world of difference between the Fret-King – or even the Schecter – and Mick Thomson’s Jackson. If you’re after the ultimate metal guitar, then it’s the Mick Thomson Soloist. Its harmonic response and note separation when playing through filthy levels of gain is unbeatable. But the Jazzmaster is no slouch: we love its super-cool Surf Pearl finish, and it’s a fun guitar – a…