I’m going to discuss some dos and don’ts of using these pedals and give some input on my experiences using both simultaneously.

Firstly, when using these two, it’s important to understand in a practical sense what each pedal is doing to your signal. That doesn’t mean you need to be a physicist or audio engineer to understand what’s going on with your sound, but use your ears and experiment entirely with your pedal to see what it’s doing. The two biggest things to consider when using overdrive and distortion pedals are compression and gain.

It’s important to understand how compressed your signal is getting from your pedal because we have all been in a situation wherein we get on stage after spending months perfecting our tone, only to result in a vast difference between stage volume/tone and practice-room/bedroom volume/tone. Or, have you ever been at an open mic and heard someone performing, and even though their amp is seemingly loud and heavily distorted, you can’t make out a single note they are playing? Compression is almost always the culprit with an overly distorted tone.

Gain consideration is important because you need to make sure your pedals are all sending a balanced (equal-volumed) signal, OR at the signal balance that you want them at.

For example, I have a JHS Lowdrive (overdrive pedal), and a Wampler Plextortion (distortion pedal) that are my two main “gain/distortion” sounds I use on my pedal board. Without complicating my example, let’s just say for this conversation that my signal is: Guitar > JHS > Wampler > Amp (Figure A)

I have my JHS set so with my volume cranked on my guitar and playing full pick-strength, my clean volume and JHS-on volume are balanced with the stage volume I use my amp at. My Wampler-on is also balanced with my clean channel, but what is important about my signal chain is how much the Wampler compresses my channel compared to my JHS. Because of the compression, I can turn on my JHS and Wampler at the same time to increase the distortion, but with an insignificant change in gain (volume, decibels, however you would like to refer to it).

IF I had set up my JHS and Wampler in the following order: Guitar > Wampler > JHS > Amp (Figure B), it would be a lot more difficult for me to run both pedals at the same time without increasing my overall volume significantly. The reason is because now the JHS is increasing the gain of Wampler without the same compression the Wampler provides for the JHS.

This may seem a little wordy and complicated, but try it for yourself and make these mistakes at home! Even if you’re not interested in using both pedals at the same time, knowing this and setting your pedals up accordingly can help avoid embarrassing feedback squeals, or destroying a sound-guy’s ears/equipment by accidentally mis-pressing a pedal.

First, set up your pedals so when they are turned on, the volume is balanced with the clean channel. I would recommend that you do this with the amp set to a medium volume (if the amp is too quiet, it is essentially compressing the signal so you could have the pedal cranked and you wouldn’t even know the difference until you had to bring everything up to stage volume).

Try plugging in both pedals and turning everything on with one configuration, then the other. You’ll immediately notice that by putting the distortion pedal as the second pedal in the chain (or simply AFTER the overdrive pedal) that the tone created is much more manageable and without a significant volume boost. And trust me, if your volume is all over the place in an unmusical fashion, sound-guys don’t consider that to be “dynamic”. It’s just annoying.

Jordan Welbourne

www.jordanwelbourne.com

facebook.com/JordanWelbourne\

The Stomping Ground – Cascading Overdrive/Distortion from MyRareGuitars.com

• Some very cool products come out.
• Some slimy companies try to sell their (generally) useless products with scantily clad women (and, hey, I’m all for scantily clad women, but it seems out of place, silly and kind of skanky in a bad way at a trade show).
• There are rooms and rooms of guitars and amps and pedals to check out.
• And there is what seems like a whole floor of drummers and drum products to avoid. (Only the most aurally masochistic of us should ever have to endure the “World’s Fastest Drummer” competition.)
• A surprisingly large amount of guys (most in their 40’s, but some younger, however this is an offense that even youth offers no excuse for) walk around with sunglasses inside and look pretty much like their trying to win a “look like a pathetic moron” contest.
• And so on.

But, it’s still a blast and a half to go—largely because the Eastwood crew (Mike Robinson, et al) are some of the greatest people to hang with. So, what happened this year at NAMM? What follows are some random notes and observations, things I saw and heard, from the NAMM show, this year’s model.

• One of the things about booth placement at NAMM, is that you’re pretty much at the mercy of the gods…or, at the very least, whomever it is who decides what booths go where. The Eastwood booth was in the company of several very cool booths. It was, however, maddeningly placed kitty-corner to some “carry it in a bag” acoustic amplifier. The theory behind this gizmo seemed to be that any singer-songwriter could carry this tall thin speaker and amp and play a gig anywhere without back strain. Unfortunately, the makers didn’t seem to consider ear strain when making this. The sound quality was not helped by the fact that everyone who demo’d the thing seemed to be the first handful of people they could find off the street who knew a G C and D chord and who promised to howl out of tune at any public opportunity. But the amplification system itself sounded so bad that I don’t think Bob Dylan himself could have sounded good through it. As the great and funny Peter Robinson said at one point, “That thing sounds like someone strumming a screen door.”
• The booth directly behind us seemed to be for some brand of bass. However this wasn’t some company trying to take business from, say, people who play Fender Precisions. People who play, you know, actual bass. No, this bass was for guys who thought holding down the bottom and playing tastefully and melodically were archaic notions and quaint ideas of the past. Not for them subtlety or musicality…bass is made for playing as fast as possible. And it gets even better if you can tap and snap as often as possible. Spend four eight hour days with this tuneless rumble directly behind your booth, and you will go insane. You’ve been warned.
• Relic guitars are, inexplicably, as popular as ever. I may get some flak for this but, damn it people, if you want a beat-up looking guitar, beat up your own damn guitar. For one thing, there’s something truly disingenuous about having a fake cluster of wear on your guitar. Do it yourself! Play the hell out of it. It’s not hard to beat a guitar up—I’ve done it to several. However, the worst thing about these “relics” is that they LOOK fake as all hell (including the ones that cost about as much as a car coming out of various custom shops in, not to name names or anything, places like Corona, CA). I have a 1969 Telecaster I’ve had since 1982. It was beat up when I got it. In the twenty-eight years I’ve had it, I’ve played it more than any other of my guitars. It’s been on several tours. It’s been through THREE sets of frets. It has acquired beer and sweat and blood (all, literally) in its electronics. It’s been banged around by luggage carriers, band-mates, tour vans with crappy suspension and questionable brakes and played night after night for years by yours truly. It’s full of dings, scratches, wear marks and a couple of cigarette burns. Why do I tell you all this? Because, as beat up as my Tele is (and I’ve hardly taken great care of it, physically) is has NOWHERE near the “wear” of the average “relic” guitar. I checked out several “relics” (from several well known brands—all the big players) and they, without exception, looked extreme, ridiculous and phony. I can see the logic of wanting to feel a worn-in neck, but these relic bodies are goofy. Most look like a stoned teenager took a belt sander and mallet to them in shop class.
• Boy, are there a LOT of pedals for guitar players available. Many of them seem to have so much gain, it has NO importance what amp you put behind it. It kind of cracks me up that people will buy a three thousand dollar amp and then put a pedal in front of it that so blocks the tone and personality, they might as well be playing guitar through a Radio Shack PA.
• There are, and this is an estimate, about five thousand guitar players at NAMM better than me (I say this estimating the number of guitar plays at NAMM at about five thousand). Somewhat reassuring in this estimate, however, is that fewer than a hundred of them play anything I’d want to play. There’s an astounding amount of truly stunning, and truly awful, noodling out there.
• Based on the purely anecdotal evidence of walking around the NAMM show, I would say that there are a LOT of bass players who don’t know what a bass player’s job is. Yes, Jaco Pastorious and Stanley Clark may have been geniuses, but I think they may have ruined a generation or two of bass players. I’m not saying you have to play Nashville bass and just sit on the root, or that you can’t play it as a lead instrument at time—hell, I love Mingus, for instance, or Entwistle, and they didn’t play “traditional” bass. But, damn, I heard so many profoundly AWFUL bass players just cramming a bunch of notes and slapping and pulling and not seeming to know a thing about the bottom or the melody. It’s an epidemic, people. If you have a bass player like this in your family or band, it might be time for a thud staff intervention. This “style” of playing needs a drastic reaction. Say, public shunning, or something.
• I had to listen to a guy, some “artist” at a pedal booth demo (wearing a purple suit and purple fedora and more makeup than Tammy Faye Baker) play “Pride and Joy” and (yes, really) “Mustang Sally” several times in four days. He was, sadly, on the way to the bathroom, the food and the beer. He was also, sadly, on the way BACK from the bathroom, food and the beer. He played a Strat through a Tubescreamer and a Wah and he sounded exactly like Stevie Ray Vaughan, except for those ever so subtle little things we like to call originality and genius.
• A lot of guys (the ones not shredding like someone named Blackie, or Sinister, or Diabolical Jones or Really Scary Larry or whatever their mascara-stained faces are) play “Pride and Joy” when they sit to test a guitar.
• An otherwise stunningly attractive woman in her mid 40’s with a “SCORPIONS” tattoo tramp stamped at the small of her back. Just sad.
• Along with the bozos who wear sunglasses indoors (and NO, I will never let up on you clowns until you’re swept from the Earth), there were plenty of guys trying to dress like rock stars—long coats, silly boots, one Goth guy trying to look all scary with those weird “look! My eyes are red! Ooooh, scary,” contact lenses, and so on. Really, NAMM is an interesting place to go to see how pathetically some men handle middle age. Guys, the pencil-thin mustaches, the pancake makeup, the black wigs…it would be funny if it weren’t so obvious and so naked in its Peter Pan desperation.
• I checked out the Peavey booth, thinking I’d been unfair a couple years back saying everything they made was ugly. But, no, I was right. They make fine, dependable, at times first-rate products. But they slap that hideous early 80’s ‘lightening bolt’ Peavey logo on everything and they seem to have the worst aesthetic sense in the business. Obviously they’re doing something right, having been in the biz since 1965, but boy, their stuff is tough on the eyes.
• What else? Well, lots of cool guitars. Some fine looking amps (it’s hard as all hell to tell if they’re good sounding at NAMM, since you can’t turn the volume up, which is good, in the long run). More Ukuleles than I’ve ever seen in one place. A Paul McCartney impersonator at the Hofner booth who didn’t look much like Paul McCartney. And, perhaps much sadder, a Catwoman impersonator at the Hallmark booth who didn’t look nearly enough like Julie Newmar. But, then, not enough people in this world look enough like Julie Newmar, so what’s one to do?
• I’d be remiss not to mention National Treasure Deke Dickerson and his annual Guitar Geek Festival. The man knows how to put on a show and this year was no exception.

So, that’s something of a wrap on this year’s NAMM show. In between all the guitars, the amps, the goofy guys with sunglasses indoors were many hours spent laughing and hanging out with the guys from Eastwood (and I would quote some of the jokes and conversations, but none of them approached anything like a G-rating, so you’ll have to be out of that vulgar loop, my friends)—truly some of the greatest guys I know and people who make even a casual gathering in a hotel room better than most parties. Even though I’m still hearing really bad folksingers and slappy bass bozos as I try to sleep at night, I can’t wait until next year.

Report from NAMM 2010 from MyRareGuitars.com

Small Is Beautiful: Under 10 Watt Guitar Amps Grow Up
Last year I discussed what I believed to be the growing fascination with power reduction. At that time I reviewed the ways in which an amp’s power can be reduced: attenuators, variable power reduction, switchable power reduction, pentode/triode operation and single tube, low watt amps.

One year later it turns out that the industry seems to have focused on single tube amps and either variable or switchable power reduction.

In 2009 the already crowded ranks of the ‘under-10-watt’ category grew significantly. Three aspects of that growth are, I believe, interesting and give us an indication of what’s coming.

1. VERY low power. Not only did many manufacturers introduce under-10-watt amps, a number of them provided the ability to reduce power to under 1 watt – sometimes well under 1 watt. I believe this acknowledges the fact that the vast majority of electric guitar players – if not all – spend a significant portion of their time playing at home. Therefore, it makes sense to provide amps optimized for home playing and less than a 1 watt output is necessary to obtain the best tone at bedroom volume.
2. The economy made me do it. The impact of the economy has helped fuel the industry’s interest in low power amps – 2009’s Mesa’s Mark V and the PRS amp line being notable exceptions. In the worst economy since The Great Depression it makes sense that manufacturers introduced lower priced products. Relatively few guitarists were willing and able to spend over $1,000 on a guitar amp this past year – and likely won’t for some time to come.
3. The economy made me do it, part II. Boutique builders embraced low power for the same reason the rest of the industry did: to have something to sell! Good news for tone hounds! Prior to the world’s economic bubble bursting, boutique amps were overwhelmingly focused on 15-18 watts and above – (2+ power tubes).

Where are we headed?
I believe that the low power amp trend will have legs at least as long as the ’18 watt’ trend – that is 5+ years. For the next few years expect to see more under-10-watters hit the market. This trend will be long lived for two reasons:

1. First, with the global economy expected to experience only limited growth over the next two years (and perhaps longer) and unemployment expected to decline at a very slow rate, high ticket guitar amps will not be selling like hot cakes. As I mentioned above, amp companies have to have something to sell at a price people are able to pay. Hello under-10-watters!
2. Second, I predict the electric guitar world will discover that under-10-watt amps can provide GREAT tone and surprising flexibility – they can be legitimate tone machines suitable for more than just bedroom strumming.

The positive result for all electric guitarists is that as more and more builders pursue low power amps of their own, the quality and variety of under-10-watt amps will increase – just like 15-18 watters did a few years ago, which were considered low power amps before the under-10-watt trend took hold!

Guitar Amp Industry Reacts to Change – Extension, Contraction and Caution
It’s no surprise that this year the Crystal Ball is clouded by the effects of the economy. Most industries (all?) have been forced to change tactics. Here’s how I think the guitar amp industry will cope.

Up until the fall of 2008 the overall guitar market was as overheated as the rest of economy. Vintage guitar prices were sky high, manufacturers were introducing new products at a rapid rate, a boutique builder baby boom was in full swing with new arrivals being born almost every week. Music Industry revenue statistics confirmed double digit annual growth: guitarists were buying gear like there was no tomorrow.

Sound familiar? Substitute guitars and amps with almost any product you can think of and the scenario was the same.

And then we hit the wall.

How have manufacturers reacted and how will they struggle through until sales start to grow?

Product Line Extension – Want More Pedals?
As mentioned above regarding low power amps, many guitar amp companies that previously relied on $1,000+ products to sustain business are searching for lower priced offerings that appeal to income battered guitar players.

This is confirmed by an interesting fact about how this recession differs from those of the past: the sale of ‘luxury’ products have dropped right along with everything else. In every recession since the Depression, luxury goods manufacturers (in our case think boutique builders) enjoyed relatively robust sales: those with money kept buying high-end items. Not this time.

So, I believe that in addition to under-10-watt amps many amp builders will extend their product lines by creating their own line of effects pedals. After all, compared to a guitar amplifier an effects pedal requires less labor, fewer components (usually), no power supply (or an off the shelf, cheap wall wart), a dramatically smaller and less costly cabinet and, as is the case with combo amps, they don’t require a large and expensive speaker.

To an amp company, that looks like a promising path to a relatively inexpensive product line add-on. I’m certain that I am not the only amp builder who has thought of that!

However, will extending a previously amp-only product line by adding pedals be the ‘answer’ to increased sales? Maybe.

We all know the pedal market is as crowded as the amp market if not more so. Will amp company offerings cause guitarists to buy a pedal when they otherwise wouldn’t or cause them to choose the amp company’s product vs. a pedal company’s?

Time will tell, but those amp companies that successfully launch a line of pedals will do so solely on the merit of their product (and their marketing budget!): amp builder pedals will have to be sufficiently different from the crowd to garner attention and sales.

Can that happen? Who knows for sure, but I believe you will see an increasing number of pedals offered by amp companies that are, of course, designed using their knowledge of tube amp design and tone – not from a pedal manufacturer’s ‘pedal-centric’ perspective.

So, expect to see pedals that are designed to form a ‘system’ with an amp rather than being simply an add on. How a pedal compliments, enhances and changes the amp’s tone (and vice versa) and how the pedal interacts with the amp’s first preamp stage will, I think, be areas of interest for amp-centric pedal designers.

Pedals designed to, in effect (bad pun), add another channel or multiple channels to an amp… pedals designed with a frequency response perfectly matched to an amp’s voicing… overdrive and distortion based on the detailed knowledge of how tubes produce their particular mojo and long experience ‘voicing’ amps. I think that amp builder’s will have their own take on pedal design, particularly in conjunction with their own amps.

Guitar Amp Product Line Contraction – Less Choice
I think we will see some amp companies narrowing their product lines. Following the unfortunate theme of this article, higher priced and/or lower volume models may see the end of their life cycle in the coming 12 months.

Too bad for guitarists, but inevitable at least to some extent I think.

Guitar Amp Product Line Caution – Fewer New Products
This is another prediction that isn’t a surprise. When sales are down there is less money available for research, product development and product launches. Plus, these days the risk inherent in any product launch is much greater than in the past.

So, as was evident in 2009 – aside from low power amps – I believe that the number of new amp product introductions will significantly lag that of past years.

Again, too bad for guitarists, but inevitable.

2009 Tube Tone Crystal Ball Revisited.
Last year I made three predictions. As it turns out, it looks like I called two of them correctly!

1. End of the 18 Watt Guitar Amp Trend: In my opinion 2009 proved what I believed was already happening in 2008: the fascination with dual EL84 amps has ended. Although I don’t have precise statistics, I think there were dramatically fewer amps of this type launched in 2009 – yes, launches were down overall, but other than perhaps a small hand full none were twin 84s. As I pointed out last year, this is not to say that EL84 based, 18 watters aren’t good amps! In fact, the trend was legitimate – these things can sound fantastic!!
2. Guitar Amp Power Reduction – enough said above.
3. PCB Amps On The Rise: My prediction that more ‘high-end’ amps will feature printed circuit boards (PCBs) instead of hand made, stuffed and soldered circuit board has not been realized. Nonetheless, I believe that this change will occur, but when it will start given the current industry situation, who knows.

I’d like to know what you think is happening in the world of tube amps. Send me an email at: Don@MackAmps.com.

Mack Amps: Skyraider SR-15 Amp (front)

Don Mackrill
www.MackAmps.com

Tube Tone Crystal Ball 2010: Amp Trends & Future Predictions! from MyRareGuitars.com

A legacy of my idiocy.

What’s strange is that it’s probably the column I have received the most mail on. People from all over the world wrote me about equipment they’d lost and the interesting ways they lost their stuff. They were all GREAT letters. Sad yet entertaining. We all had a story or two or twenty. It was like a gear geek AA meeting. ‘My name is so and so and I lost a FILL IN THE BLANK.’

If you put us in a room, I’m sure we’d wince at the equipment and the amazingly low price our brothers and sisters lost it for. We’d hug each other and pat backs and shake heads and bond over how dumb we could be. (Maybe we SHOULD start a ‘lost gear’ support group.)

The funny thing is, while I can go on and on about great gear I’ve lost, I rarely tell the stories of how lucky I am to have the gear I do have (especially now that I don’t sell AC30’s for a zip lock bag with what are SUPPOSED TO BE 20 Percocets!!! It’s bad enough to be dumb…but to be dumb and ripped off…wow.) But people who trade AC 30’s for disguised stool softener pills get what they deserve, I suppose. But back to the topic at hand: Lost cool gear.

Until VERY recently, I had a fond memory for this very cool multi-effects unit I bought at a yard sale back in the early 80’s in Connecticut. For those of you unfamiliar with the term ‘yard sale,’ it’s the same as a ‘tag sale’ or a ‘garage sale’ depending on where you live. It is a low rent estate sale. Without the dead people and with crappier stuff, mostly.

The thing I bought (and I had NO idea or memory what it was called) was about the size of a small suitcase. It had a handle on top and the case was a sort of brushed aluminum. When you set it down and touched a button on the top, one side of it opened to a floorboard with what looked like a wah-wah or volume pedal in the middle and three or four mushroom cloud-looking foot buttons that would turn various effects on and off. When plugged in, it had SEVERAL cool clear switches that looked like clear light switches with a wild array of colors shining through the control panel.

It looked like something out of the original Star Trek series and it was 10 bucks and I bought it.

And for the next 7-8 years, whenever another guitar player came to my house or apartment, I would show him or her this ridiculous box (Named ‘the box’ by me) I had that made a series of astounding (and yet pretty unusable) noises all while shining various great colors in the dark.

One of my friends and mine’s favorite applications for this thing was to take a hit of acid, turn the lights out and play this thing as loud as possible through my mid 70’s Twin Reverb (sold, as I recall, for 100 bucks in gas money in the late 80’s…’arrrrghhhh!’ as Charlie Brown would say). We’d rotate…the unlucky people would play bass or drums…the lucky one in the rotation got to play the light-up suitcase with all the lights and weird noises. Ah, ‘the box.’

Then, I feel deep under the influence of Glen Branca and a guitar player named Glenn Phillips, best known as the guitar player for the obscure Hampton Grease Band. By the 80’s, however, he was deep into his solo career (he still plays…catch him if you can) as one of the oddest, most wonderful and interesting instrumental rock musicians. His album Razor Pocket is one of the truly great instrumental rock guitar albums. FIND IT, if you care about great guitar players. Someone at ‘Guitar Player’ in those days dubbed him ‘Mahavishnu Johnny Ramone’ which is actually kind of accurate. His has the chops and improvisational skills of a Jazz horn player, with the energy and velocity of a raging punk guitar player. A proto Nels Cline. He’s astounding. Find Razor Pocket or any of his other solo outings. He has the rare gift of writing catchy, melodic guitar instrumentals with monster chops and cool noises.

Anyway, I had fallen deeply under the spell of great guitar noisemakers. So, I started using ‘the box’ in a new band, at gigs, not just at acid parties at the apartment. During free form noise shows with my ‘art’ punk band of the time, I would use ‘the box’ and I now realized it had SEVERAL usable noises and settings. It had a VERY weird and thin sounding fuzz-type effect that would cause huge, annoying overtones and octaves and harmonic swirls when turned up (and we were nothing, if not VERY turned up, volume wise). We had another ‘guitar’ player who would tune all his strings to one note and repeatedly drop his guitar for his ‘solo’. It was a happening, man. ‘The box’ also had a sort of tremolo effect. A pulsing noise to add to the Fizzle effect. And then there was this odd filter/compression sound. When they were all on together, along with a Big Muff and the amps on 10…well, it sort of didn’t matter what you played note-wise, as the whole guitar was swallowed by these effects that would create this Niagara Falls of noise that just took your body over—it wasn’t really music, but it was astoundingly inside you when ‘the box’ really got going.

After that band was banned from most clubs in Boston, I moved, and ‘the box’ was retired as I played in more conventional bands. And all I know is, years later, I don’t have it. I may have given it away. I may have left it in an apartment when I moved. I may have sold it for a few bucks. But, by the time I was sober and had moved west, ‘the box’ was a thing of my past.

I really had nothing but fond memories for this weird effect until very recently, when I was reading Analog Man’s Guide to Vintage Effects. It’s a great book—one, along with Dave Hunter’s Guitar Effects Pedals: The Practical Handbook that any fan of effects should check out.

However there is one terrible thing about Analog Man’s book. One horrifying, crappy, sad, awful thing about the book.

What is this terrible thing about the Analog Man book?

It identified ‘the box’ for me. There were two pictures, so that I could point to it and tell my wife, ‘That’s IT. That’s THE BOX!’ While she nodded patiently at my insanity with what seemed to me to be not nearly enough interest.

1970 Ludwig Phase II Guitar Synthesizer

It turns out ‘the box’ was a Ludwig Phase II Synthesizer. The tremolo effect was called ‘Animation.’ The weird filter thing was called ‘Formant Trajectories.’ The fuzz was, well, fuzz. There are 4 sliders on the top, four mushroom cloud foot switches. A pedal for wah-esque effects. And seven light up switches on the top.

So, what’s so terrible about this news? Knowledge is good, no? Well, no, it turns out. Not this time, anyway.

I learned they go for 3-4 THOUSAND dollars on eBay. Not a misprint. Three to four thousand dollars. The box was cool. VERY cool. But it was not a 4 thousand dollar effect (I don’t know if I think there is such a thing…well, I believe there is such a thing when I’m selling, but not when I’m buying).

But, I keep trying to remind myself, if I hadn’t lost it in whatever forgettable way it was that I lost it, I would probably have lost it in such a really stupid way that I would have regretted it every day of my life and all I would have to show for it would be a column about how dumb I was that I lost ‘the box.’

Lost Gear Therapy from MyRareGuitars.com

First some quickie suggestions right off the bat for you guys and gals.

Phase 1

1. When using a wah wah and a distortion always have the wah wah before the fuzz box (how’s that for old school?) in your chain. You want to effect your guitar signal before you distort it. When using a clean boost that should be last in your chain right after your distortion units.
2. Use as few pedals as you can. The more effects you use the more your sound suffers. If you are using more than 5 or 6 pedals try using an A/B switch and set up two loops to keep the chain as short as possible.
3. If you like a tight sound, ceramic speakers are a good way to go. In general AlNiCo speakers tend to be a bit more saggy. But there are some Alnico speakers that are clean too, these tend to be the higher quality ones. And as they break in the ceramics tend to be tighter and cleaner.
4. Lower output pickups tend to be thinner eq wise, and subsequently a hotter pickup tends to be darker sounding. If you want to use a lower output pickup for the reason that they reproduce your playing dynamics better, you must use a higher output amp. Again, if your guitar is a high output axe you can use a smaller amp, and still achieve a nice fat sound.
5. Shorter scale guitars make light gauge strings feel extra light, and consequently longer scale guitars make light gauge strings feel a bit heavier. This is why back in the day when light gauge strings were not readily available, guitar players preferred Gibson guitars over Fender.

1962 Fender Telecaster Electric Guitar (Vintage)

Phase 2
Next on the cavalcade of hits, I will give you some examples of typical setups for certain types of music. Remember you can mix and match these suggestions for your signature sound.

Clean Country Sound:
This is a sound made popular by country pickers since the 1960’s. It’s a clean sound, very little if no distortion at all.

• Guitars: Fender Stratocaster, the bridge pickup for a bright twang with a bit less output and fatness then the Tele bridge p/u. You can also get a great albeit a more modern country sound using the between the pickups sounds (2nd and 4th) on the Strat. For all you Eastwood fans check out the Wandre and the Joey Leone Signature Models for a great bunch of aforementioned country sounds.
• Gretsch models w/ DeArmond Dynasonic pickups give you a great country sound with alot of dynamic range for subtle to ear splitting tones. For those of you who want to dabble in some cool country tones try the Eastwood Classic 6 for a very reasonable starter country axe.
• A Gibson thin line arch top like a Byrdland is also a great clean country axe, don’t believe me? Ask Roy Clark and Hank Garland (Mr. Sugarfoot Rag). One of my idols Scotty Moore (of Elvis fame) played an L5 and an ES-295 during his years with the King.
• Amps: The cleaner the amp the better, period. A Twin Reverb comes to mind immediately as well the solid state high wattage steel guitar offerings from Peavey like the Nashville and Session 400. Amps with at least a 12-inch speaker will help you get that twang. If you are the only guitar player in the band consider using an amp with a 15-inch speaker. You can also use a smaller amp at a lower volume with a mike on it.

Gritty Country Sound:
Same guitars choice as above, just crank your amp up. 10 inch speakers are okay for this application. The Marshall TSL Series, Fender Deluxe. Vibrolux, and Super Reverb will make you smile.

Heavy Rock Sound:
Again I remind you I am an old school guy so I say….

• Guitars: Gibson SG w/ humbuckers is my choice for ultimate heavy rock guitar. It cuts and yet is still as fat as your fifth grade Home Ec. teacher. Tony Iommi, Angus Young, and Glen Buxton (the most underrated heavy rock guitar player) are shining examples of what an SG in the hands of a capable axe murderer can do. Gibson Les Paul Customs like Steve Jones and Mick Ronson used to play also kill.
• Those pointy guitars from the 80’s, Jackson, Charvel, Ibanex JEM and ESP’s are all a bit more edgy and hotter then a stock SG or Les Paul.
• I also love the sound of P90 equipped solid body axes for a great crunch sound, maybe a more punky sound is a better explanation. Les Paul Jr.’s ala Johnny Thunders and Leslie West are prime examples of this guitars sound when cranked. I am sure these guys influenced Billy Joe Armstrong in his choice de axe. Again, Eastwood offers some great single coil guitars of this ilk, the P90 Special, Stormbird and JR Elite just to name a few.
  1962 Fender Telecaster Guitar – Sunburst
• Amps: Marshall, Marshall and more Marshall. The JTM 800 is numero uno in my book, as well as the JCM 900 for a more modern shred vibe. I was also impressed with the Carvin stack offerings back in the day. THD, Randall, and Peavey also have really good sounding shred generators in many configurations.

Marshall Guitar Amps

Rock and Alternative Sound:
This is a potpourri of suggestions, please take one and pass the rest back.

• Guitars: Well take your pick, I am just gonna rattle em off….first the off the wall ones. These are the “next big things.” Maybe? Remember Cobain’s JagStang? Gretsch solid bodies from the 70’s and 80’s ugly as your neighbors AMC Gremlin. Silvertone’s and Danelectro’s from the 60’s. Link Wray, Jimmy Page, duh! Kramer’s from the 80’s, Eddie something or other played one of these. Carvin solidbodies from the 80’s. Still a great deal on Ebay. Ovation guitars form the late 60’s and 70’s (the Deacon, the Breadwinner, and Tornado.) The pickups were nasty sounding, but oh so cool. Legit ones. Fender Telecaster, Rickenbacker solid and semi-solid guitars, Gretsch arch tops, Mosrite solidbodies, and Gibson solidbodies guitars w/ P90’s.
• Amps: The Vox AC-30 is a seriously important amp in the history of rock and roll, for a very good reason, it’s an original. History tells us that early Marshall’s are in essence copies of a Fender Tweed Bassman. So the Vox is the only original amp design of the “Big Three”. Best news about that is that it sounds great! The Vox AC-15 is also a slammin’ amp. Portable, strong and ballsy just like my first wife.
• Fender Deluxe Reverb, crank it up and feel the magic. The singularly most versatile amplifier in the history of guitardom. This little dynamo is IMHO the best sounding amp ever made (Blackface models produced from 1964 to 1967).
• The Silvertone/Danelectro Twin Twelve. What a great/cheap amplifier should be. Two twelve inch speakers (usually Jensen’s) a killer tremolo and reverb. Most models I have seen run four 6L6’s in the output section. Although I own an early Danelectro Twin Twelve which runs a duet of 6L6’s that is a great amp. Also any of the Valco made amps will do the trick (Supro, National, Airline, Montgomery Ward).
• There are so many great boutique amps out there that are really well built and versatile. They are expensive, usually very expensive. Also they are tough to try out as many of these amps are not in music stores. Making it hard to test drive them . And if they do have one, that’s the problem they only have one, so you can’t a/b them with your favorite guitar plugged into them. Some of the ones I have either owned or played are Victoria (a tweed Fender vibe), Matchless (some Vox like models). I also really liked the early Bedrock amps that were basically JTM 45 clones.

Getting Your Own Sound with Guitars & Amps from MyRareGuitars.com

For instance, the since-discontinued Behringer Vintager AC112, is a pretty great solid state amp/tube hybrid (a single 12AX7 in the preamp stage) with some killer digital effects. You can snag them for under $150 on eBay and they’re worth every penny, if for the eleven reverbs alone. Yup, that’s right. Eleven reverbs – various models from spring reverb emulation to studio, stage, chamber and plate reverb. And all pretty snazzy sounding. Is everything about it great? Nope – or else I wouldn’t own all these Valcos and Magnatones and Silvertones. What doesn’t it do? Well, for one, the distortion blows chunks. It doesn’t have the richness and depth and dimension when it saturates – which, for me, is the true greatness of tubes specifically and analog technology in general.

Take, for instance, the difference of recording drums on digital versus tape. Push the tape a little hard and you get a warm thick lush saturation. Push the digital too hard and you get that crappy “fcccttttt” sound. Digital does cleans really well, but when you want that sound of tape saturation, there’s nothing quite like the real thing.

This is especially true with tape delay units. Run in front of a good tube amp, a nice tape echo unit can act as a great thickening preamp, along with its more obvious (and intended) applications, such as the delay itself.

What tape delay unit should you get? Got a thousand bucks – then go for the Fulltone Tube Tape Echo. It’s an amazing piece of machinery and probably the best sounding delay I’ve ever heard. However, most of us (especially us Valco/Teisco/Silvertone loving dweebs) wouldn’t pay a grand for a tape delay, when there are several really cool options available for a lot less money. And add the fact that they sound as good in their own way, and, wow, let’s go shopping.

Along with the Fulltone, at the high dollar end of the market, is a vintage Maestro Echoplex. This is the Jimmy Page classic – sounds great. Well designed and pretty awesome. But also really expensive – so, not for us. Another classic, really expensive and not for us tube tape delay? The Watkins Copycat.

If we’re going to come down the price ladder, we’re going to have to get to the solid state vintage devices. And here, I’d argue, is where a lot of the great deals (and great sounding units) and hiding out, waiting to be snagged up. Solid state tape delay units are a great deal on the vintage market – and since so much of the vintage delay tone comes from the tape itself and not the tube, the solid state is a great, reliable, good sounding option here.

Arguably the most famous of the solid state delays is the Brian Setzer favorite – the Roland Space Echo. This is a killer sounding unit – capable of combining (in the RE-301 model, at least) the slap-back delay along with Roland’s awesome chorus effect – quite a combination. These seem to be going in the $450-700 range these days on eBay. Better than the price of the tube units, but still too much for the frugal (i.e. cheap bastards) among us.

So, what’s a rockabilly boy or girl to do? Two relatively unsung (but worthy of praise) vintage tape delay models are a good option here. The Univox Echo Tech (reputedly used, for what it’s worth, on Van Halen’s Eruption – not my cup of tone tea, but one many people love big time). The Univox units go for around $200 (for one needing work) to $350, but they are more often than not broken, or in need of work (more than the other vintage units, these seem to lose a point or two for reliability).

Electra EP 350 Flat Response Tape Echo

And, last but definitely not least in this roundup is this month’s crazy eBay find: The Electra EP 350 Flat Response Tape Echo. Like the Roland, this is a combination unit (the Electra carries a reverb along with the tape delay, rather than a chorus). Unlike say, an Echoplex, the Electra doesn’t use a tape cartridge – but rather has a loop of tape running free on one side, then it gets fed over six heads as it travels around a see-though top (which is just too cool).

How does it sound? Pretty awesome – as good as the Roland Space Echo. Rich, with a fat density and a very versatile (for analog – no 15 second delays here – also no cool “Sound on Sound” feature like an Echoplex, sadly) range of echo tones. The reverbs are pretty cool. There’s a standard reverb that sounds very much like one from an Ampeg (the jazzy verb as opposed to Fender’s surf vibe), plus a “cathedral” reverb that’s very cavernous indeed.

Electra EP 350 Flat Response Tape Echo

On the echo side, there’s the echo alone, or the echo combined with any (or all!) of the reverbs. You can choose several modes – with different tape heads being engaged in a number of combinations. With controls for “Echo” (depth), “Echo Repeat” and “Delay Time” you can go anywhere from a subtle doubling/thickening, to full rockabilly slapback, to full feedback freakout (and NOTHING sounds quite like a tape echo with the “Repeat” and “Delay Time” both cranked and played with it’s a zany sonic assault).

For the investigators and hunters among us, who made the Electra? Hard to say. Electra was imported and branded by the St. Louis Music company (of Ampeg fame, among others), but made in Japan at one of the many great effects manufactures there. Probably manufactured at the Shin-ei factory, but that’s an educated (or semi-educated) guess. Be on the lookout. These are true Tape Echo units that have that singular vintage analog sound that you can only get from tape, and they can be had for half the price of most other vintage units (the finicky Univox excepted).

Rob’s Crazy eBay Finds: Electra EP 350 Flat Response Tape Echo from MyRareGuitars.com

You’ve finally made your decision to slap down some of your scarce cash on a reissue or new model tube amp built in the Far East for a BIG name manufacturer. It seems like a great deal: the vintage amps of this model sell for thousands of dollars more, it looks like the real thing and the specs appear to be the same (same tubes, same power, same controls, etc.). And, it sounded pretty darn good in the store too.

So, why should you NOT buy it and instead consider a hand made, BUDGET BOUTIQUE amp?

An excellent question and on that I’m sure will generate many opinions. Following is my take on this scenario. It may change how you pursue your quest for spine tingling tone … without having to re-mortgage your house to get it!

Why shouldn’t you buy the reasonably priced BIG name amp? That question can be answered in two words:

Value and Quality

BORING you may be thinking: these are goals that any business tries to achieve. However, in this case they really mean something and by paying attention to them you can have a significantly better amp ownership experience.

Bottom line: you CAN get an amp that sounds better and is more reliable than the BIG name, mass produced amp made in the Far East … for not a lot more money.

That’s right, in exchange for a reasonable price premium (I know … yeah right, you’re thinking) you really can get kick-ass tone that puts a mile-wide grin on your face and a piece of gear that is versatile and won’t break (and if it does it’s fixed pronto by someone who cares!). That’s the definition of a BUDGET BOUTIQUE amp. Sounds like good value? It is.

Here’s the alternate scenario to the one above. Magically, you’re now presented with a second amp featuring:

• All tube circuitry
• Kick-ass tube tone that blows you away
• Telepathic sensitivity to the player’s touch
• The ability to morph from chime to crunch to face-ripping distortion with the twist of your guitar’s volume knob
• Hand made, hand wired construction that is robust and reliable
• Customer service provided by a company that cares about creating a great ownership experience

All for only $200 – $300 more than recent Fender reissues or the same price or LESS than many Marshall tube amps… that are made in the Far East featuring printed circuit boards to minimize cost.

How do you decide whether to spring for the BUDGET BOUTIQUE amp? Let’s play out the scenario.

Is the tone difference that big a deal?
You bet it is – that’s owners speaking, not me. The difference between playing through an amp that sounds pretty darn good vs. playing through a BUDGET BOUTIQUE amp that blows you away is huge – you deserve the experience! BUDGET BOUTIQUE amps can do that.

Touch sensitivity isn’t even on my radar screen, what’s up with that?
An amp that is sensitive to your playing dynamics and instantly responds to your picking hand is a revelation. Warm, vibrant notes pop out of the amp almost before you play them. It adds a new dimension to your sound and a whole new layer of pleasure to your playing.

In my experience I set my amp up for a good tone and go for it. If I want to change tones I twiddle with the amp or throw pedals in front of it. What’s wrong with that?
Nothing. But, a really good BUDGET BOUTIQUE amp will be versatile giving you a range of awesome tones controllable from your guitar. Set the maximum volume and level of distortion you desire and then roll off your guitar’s volume to morph into beautiful clean tones and everything in between.

Won’t a mass produced amp with machine-stuffed, printed circuit boards be more reliable than a hand made amp?
Talk to owners of these amps and read on-line reviews to discover the answer. Amps that use printed circuit boards instead of hand wired boards or point-to-point wiring are inherently more difficult to repair. For example, a simple component replacement job that takes a few minutes on a hand wired amp could take an hour on a printed circuit board amp.

My local music store gives me good service. They’ll look after my amp if it breaks won’t they?
Sure they will or at least they’ll try. Unfortunately, the good people at your local music store are often stuck with a BIG name amp manufacturer’s less than satisfactory repair policy and response time. Dealing with a small amp builder can be a vastly different experience. Most recognize that satisfying EVERY customer is absolutely critical because they don’t have as many as the big guys and they know that bad customer service can sink their business. That means you get responsive service designed to get you back up and playing as quickly as possible.

Hand made, boutique amps have an image of being extremely expensive. However, BUDGET BOUTIQUE builders really do provide terrific amp value. It just takes a little effort to find them. Believe me, they’re out there all right … making great amps.

So, for a few hundred dollars more – or in some cases at the same or even lower price (!) – you can get strikingly better tone, much better reliability and personalized product support if anything goes wrong. Which amp would you choose?

BUY TONE NOT GLITZ!

Budget Boutique Amps: What Are They and Why Should You Buy One from MyRareGuitars.com

MXR Micro Amp Guitar Effects Pedal

#1: MXR Micro Amp

This is by far the most useful pedal I have ever used/seen. What this pedal does is so simple yet so valuable to any guitarist playing any kind of music. What it does is makes your sound either a bit louder or much louder. Don’t sound like much, but think about it, how many times were you playing and thought gee I would like to be a bit louder without changing my sound.

So before I get all excited, let me tell you what this pedal actually does. The Micro-Amp is an FET preamp with a 0 to 20+ db gain structure that does not color your sound at all (aside from the fact that you are pushing your preamp section of your amp harder which usually causes your sound to be a bit darker). In my effects chain it is my last in line (btw I only use 4 pedals). Over the twenty-five plus years I have owned one I have used it not only as a boost but have also used it to boost line levels when using long cable runs to isolation booths when recording. I have also used it in a pinch when amplifying an acoustic guitar with a piezo pickup and no onboard preamp. One other comment about this pedal, the battery life (especially the early versions with no LED) is extremely long. Yipee!!! Check one out you will not be sorry.

Uni-Vibe Guitar Effects Pedal

#2: Uni-Vibe

Yeah I know Jimi Hendrix used one, and after he died Robin Trower used one on his post Procal Harum albums. There is a reason these cats used one, I think the reason is that there is a magic to the Uni-Vibe that you can’t put a finger on. The best way I can describe it is that it’s thick yet lets the guitars dynamics come through. I have also always believed that it works best with single coil guitars, again I believe this is due to its fatness. IMHO if you want a similar vibe (pun) for your Les Paul or SG use a flanger.

I recommend the original of course, they are not cheap and not too road worthy but they sound unreal. The Dunlop reissues sound okay but I believe the Line 6 Modulation POD Uni-Vibe sound is better and cleaner. I also recommend the FulltoneDeja-Vibe.

Ibanez Maxon AD9 Analog Delay Guitar Effects Pedal

#3: Ibanez (Maxon) AD9 analog delay

The AD9 is a great sounding analog delay, with three controls, feedback (repeats), delay time, and mix. These pedals were made in the late 80’s if my memory serves me correct. Before my brief analysis of this pedal let me proudly say that back in the late 80’s when we all got sucked into the idea that “digital delay was so much cleaner” mentality, I remember saying to my friend Jimmy Agnello “I dunno I like analog delays alot better”. Well now I think we all know that if it’s a toss up between sounding like Chet Atkins or Big Country…. well you get the picture.

When comparing the AD9 to its predecessor the AD909 I think the AD9 sounds more guitar friendly and less science-fictionary. I think that the AD9 sounds more Echoplexy than the Boss DC-2, and lets face it isn’t that what we want.

Musitronics Mutron V Envelope Follower Guitar Effects Pedal

#4: Musictronics Mutron Micro V Envelope Follower

I bought one of these little buggers back in the early 80’s when I was playing bass and wanted to funk up my sound a bit. It worked pretty good on the bass, but when I shifted over to guitar and finally got the nerve to plug it in it really started speaking in funky tongues. Although all it had was one button, dude that’s all it needed. It also sported a switch that went from high to low, which accentuated the higher or lower frequencies. I can’t say for sure whether Frank Zappa used the MicroV or the full sized Mutron for his auto-wah effect but this pedal cops his signature auto-wah effect perfectly.

I also love the Ibanez offering from their early small button series, but this one sounds even better. Another aspect of this pedal that I like is that it is a bit more touch sensitive than any other Envelope follower I have tried.

Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer Overdrive Pro Guitar Effects Pedal

#5: Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer

What can you say about a pedal that sells for ten times its initial price only 20 years later. The 808 in its original form had a small square on/off button on top, three knobs (distortion/tone and volume) and an LED light.. For most of us that have used this pedal the best way to describe it is its warm sounding even at its most trebly setting and it compliments the sound of any guitar and amp combination it is used with.

The pedal has its own sound no doubt, but part of that sound is its ability to not color your sound so much. To me it’s the perfect distortion pedal if you are prone to go back and forth from a cleaner sound to a slightly dirtier sound. The 808 is virtually indestructible and its battery life is pretty good.

Now onto the reissues and clones, first I will say that I like the reissue Ibanez TS808 that is currently available. I have A/b’ed it with a few of my original 808’s and they sound almost identical. I wish the lED was briter as on the originals you could gauge your battery life with it. The Maxon version which is in a smaller, flimsier case is not roadworthy at all. It sounds similar but not as close as the Ibanez reissue. The on/off switch is noisy and the pots are too close together for that foot adjustment we all have gotten used to with the original 808.

I must also mention a fellow Vermonter and electronics whiz Mr. Denny Coleman make a great version of this pedal under the name Musicians Junkyard Screamer this pedal is very close to the original, although I will say that it has a texture that my 808 does not, a kind of barely audible octave overtone that I like very much. Check it out.

Vox Clyde McCoy WahWah Guitar Effects Pedal

#6: The Vox Clyde McCoy wahwah pedal (model V848)

Yes my friends I know that there are many wahwahs that are classics and similar (Cry Baby’s etc.). I owned and used an original “Clyde” for years without knowing what a classic and valuable pedal it was. During this time I was using a Cry Baby also and was easily able to hear the difference between the two pedals.

Now I will also say that over the years I have had many guitar players complain about their wahs, and most of their complaints were based on the pedals not being setup right. The “throw” or the aperture (opening) needs to be set to your own taste, and that usually rights whatever problems you might have. (That adjustment is easily made by loosening the retainer screw which holds a plastic piece that comes down from the pedal and once this screw is loose you can adjust the throw on the potentiometer that controls the wah effect.

As far as the sound is concerned, I think that what separates the Clyde from the CryBaby is that it sounds a bit fatter in the low end and a bit less harsh in the open position. I also think that is has a nicer notch in the middle which helps for that wahwah sustain that Jimi used so well. I have never been a fan of the Morley pedals as their throw is too big and I can’t use them comfortably while standing.

Vox has reissued the Clyde with a true bypass and I own four of them and they are great, maybe even a bit cleaner than the originals which is a 50/50 aspect, some might like it, some won’t. I like these so much that I did sell my original Clyde for an insane amount of money.

Dan Armstrong Purple Peaker Plug-in Guitar Effects Pedal

#7: Dan Armstrong Purple Peaker Plug-in effects

These very cool little pedals were designed by Dan himself. They plugged right in the guitars output, which makes them IMHO a more studio friendly effect, but with a very simple reverse wiring you can plug them into the amp, and you’re good to go. The real winners of the line were the Orange Squeezer and Purple Peaker. Both of these add-ons were used by RyCooder, and David Lindley, and Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo used the Blue Clipper Fuzz duct taped to his guitar.

Here’s some really good news, after some really poor quality Korean copies of these high quality units were made back in the 90’s, these great little units are being handmade again in the USA using the original designs, and they sound great!!! Rumor has it that there will be some stomp box versions out soon too!

Now here’s some quickies….

• Vox Tonebender: classic 60’s fuzz box
• Boss pitch shifting delay pedal: very cool pedal for that quick harmony
• Ibanez Phase Tone: early script lettering one button, one pot, not the most versatile phaser but a great one
• MXR Dyna Comp: great compressor, can be very subtle as well as a real scwelcher. Also a great combo with any Chorus/phaser/flanger
• Boss Distortion (Orange Box): great direct into the board distortion effect, used it many times in the studio always with a shocked look from the engineer.
• Boss CE-3 Chorus: “the” chorus pedal as far as I can tell, it has the sound. It’s versatile, not very noisy and sturdy as a Tonka Toy.
• DeArmond Volume Pedal: until the Morley volume pedal strolled onto the scene this was the only show in town. The DeArmond was the industry standard throughout my formative years in this business. Keyboard players used it as well as horn players as well, but as a guitar player it affords you the luxury of leaving your guitar full out taking advantage of its full tonal voice.
• MXR Phase 90: another industry standard, sturdy, sounds great how can you look yourself in the mirror knowing you don’t have one kicking around your effects bag.
• Sam Ash fuzz box: red box probably made by Unicord, anyway old school fuzz box and ugly as a monkey’s rear end.

Some many effects so little time….

Please send me your favorite effects and I will add them in future columns.

A Gaggle of My Favorite Guitar Pedals, Effects Boxes, Units, Whatever!!! from MyRareGuitars.com