OK, maybe not that real. The idea that one guitar pick (Satan’s tooth or not) can turn you into a guitar god might be downright ludicrous, but the thought that your playing and tone can be improved by using a different pick isn’t so far-fetched.
Picture this if you will: you’re playing your guitar, and you’re unhappy with your tone. It’s not full enough! We’ve all been there, and chances are one of the first things to pop into your head was “Gee, I need a new guitar. Or an amp… or both”.

Now, new stuff is fun and all, but personally I’m all for not spending thousands of dollars (or fighting Satan) if I can fix a tonal problem for virtually zero cost. One such way would be by experimenting with different picks.

The three big factors you need to pay attention to when looking for the right pick to use would be it’s thickness, shape, and material. Using a super thin pick, for example, means that when you play,  a lot of force is spent on the bending of the pick instead of the plucking of the string. Consequently, you get a much quieter and thinner tone. While the vibrational note of the string may be quieter, the percussive “picking” sound against the string is actually amplified as the thin pick slaps-back. For this reason, a thinner pick can be used if you’re looking for a softer, rhythmic strumming sound, almost as though a washboard is playing in the background.

On the other hand, if you’re looking for a more articulate, loud and full sound, you might want to look into trying out a thicker pick. Any style of playing where you need to be able to move quickly and freely between strings, tremolo pick, or hit loud and nasty chords would work better with a substantial pick in your hand. Just try some fast tremolo picking with a super floppy pick – it won’t really work. You need the pick to be able to glide through the strings, not get caught and flop around.

In addition to thickness, what the pick is made out of can impact your playing in a couple of ways. First, the attack and resonance of a string can be slightly altered by the pick’s material. For example, if you took a metal coin and plucked your strings, then did the same with a pick of the same thickness, you will notice a difference in sound. Picks have been made of all kinds of things.. plastic, metal, tortoise shell, even stone. That said, some are more common than others, and in stores, the three most likely you will see would be plastic, nylon, and “tortex”. You’ll really just have to experiment with different materials to find what you like. A thick plastic, rounded pick can work well for playing that requires a heavy attack and smooth articulation, while nylon might work well if you prefer a thinner pick. Personally, I’m a fan of “tortex”.

Back in the day, the material heralded as the absolute best for guitar picks was real tortoise-shell. I’ve never used one, but have heard time and again that the feel and sound from these is second-to-none. “Tortex” is a plastic material crafted by Dunlop to resemble real tortoise shell. While I can’t say from experience whether or not they successfully achieved this, I can say they successfully made my pick of choice! I think it’s something about their look and feel. Shiny plastic just looks and feels cheap to me, while these have some sort of grittiness to them that not only feels nice, but makes them easier to grip. As a matter of fact, I still have one of my first ones. Check it out! (on the right, of course.)

All in all, once again it’s just about experimentation. Using one guitar, try switching between a few different picks. You’ll be amazed at the difference in tone and feel.

Happy playing!

Tips on Tones: Issue #22 from MyRareGuitars.com

At some point in your guitar-playing life, you’ll likely experience a faulty tuning key and need to replace it. Maybe your current tuners aren’t accurate enough, or seem to weigh your headstock down? Or maybe you just like the look of Kluson “green keys” instead of your Gotoh’s. Whatever the reason, it’s important to have at least somewhat of an understanding of what these things are and how they work before you spend money to replace them.

The first thing you’ll need to look at, of course, are the technical specs of the tuners you currently have to make sure you don’t cause yourself too much grief installing the next ones. The best case scenario would be you finding a set that will slip seamlessly into the peg-holes of your guitar without any modification. The next best would be the required installation of “adapter bushings”, which are basically just different thicknesses of metal used to, well, adapt to variations in diameter.

The last thing you want to end up doing is widen the peg holes. Sure, it might work – but if you’re doing this to a valuable guitar, you don’t want to be doing anything that is changing it from its original condition.
Most machine heads will show in-depth measurements of all of their components so there are no surprises when it comes time to install. A good example would be here on Stewmac’s site that shows basically everything you’d need to know as far as sizing goes.

Aside from the physical-size measurements of the peg, one of the first specs you’ll always see is a ratio such as “14:1”. This has nothing to do with the installation of the part, but rather its functionality. Now, let’s not forget the ultimate reason these things exist… to keep your guitar in tune! If you were having trouble tuning, or your tuner seemed to constantly “skip” over notes or pitches, this ratio is something you want to pay close attention to. Essentially, the higher the number, the finer the tuning you are able to do. The first number is the number of full turns it takes you to turn the peg before the inner gear completes one full cycle. Therefore, if you had something that was 1:1, you can imagine how hard it would be to zero in on any given pitch. If you feel like you want something that’s a little more precise, try to find a higher ratio tuning key. I’d recommend something 16:1 or higher.

A further method of helping keep your guitar in tune would be to invest in a set of locking tuners. They basically do what the name suggests – lock your strings in place. They help prevent string slippage without the string having to be wrapped around the peg-shaft “X” number of times, which makes for an easier re-string. At the end of the day, a string is going to go out of tune because something moved somewhere. Locking things in place is a good way of preventing that!
If you’ve ever held a really old guitar in your hands and tried to tune it, you may have seen plastic tuning pegs literally fall apart in your hands. Over time, and from lots of use, the plastic can come loose from the metal. At first this can cause tuning problems as it doesn’t properly grasp the mechanism when you turn it, and later, the piece can crumble and break. You can find high-quality keys made with plastic that will last longer than others, but if you really want something that will stand the test of time, metal is your best bet.

The last thing you might want to ask yourself when considering a new set of pegs is “will this change affect my tone?” You’ll get a different answer for this depending on who you ask.
First of all, of course a better set of pegs will be less prone to rattle, fall out of tune or break which are all things that I think we can all agree makes your guitar sound better. The only other thing that can really be argued for having an affect on your tone here would be the weight of the pegs. Different players and luthiers could argue for days over which is better – a heavier headstock or lighter. Some would say the heaviness would take away from the vibration of the neck, while others would say it adds sustain. Some would argue that it really doesn’t matter. One thing that we can be sure of, however, is that a heavier/lighter set of pegs might change how you play. A guitar that is heavier or lighter at the headstock will have a different balance, and will feel different in your hands and around your shoulders. Probably not by much, but it doesn’t take much for a guitar to feel different, and consequently make you play different. My advice would be to go with a set that doesn’t change the balance of your guitar too much.
Remember, the majority of your tone comes from your fingertips, which comes from you, which comes from your current state of mind, which can be affected by how comfortable or uncomfortable an instrument is in your hands!

Tips on Tones: Issue #21 – Machine Heads from MyRareGuitars.com

Perhaps you’re not the person who has a soundproofed studio in their basement to record your hottest new guitar solo idea at ungodly levels. Maybe you don’t have a giant rehearsal space in your living room to host jam parties until four in the morning. These are things that any musician can relate to, or can at least say they have had to relate to at some point in their lives!

So if you’re living in a crowded neighborhood or apartment, how can you play your guitar and truly enjoy the sound you’re getting without receiving angry letters from next door?

1) Power Soaker / Attenuator

This is for those of you who just can’t put aside your powerful tube amp. The phrase “sounding good while playing loud” is synonymous with “tube amp” – you really want the tubes to be running hot in order to get their full potential. What a power attenuator does, essentially, is keep the tubes running hot while reducing your overall volume level. The tubes may still be running hot (your amp turned up to a desirable level) but a large portion of the power can be re-routed to the attenuator instead of all of it going to the speaker.

That said, you are still sucking power from the amp. If you’re driving the attenuator at too high a level, you’ll likely end up sucking out some of that tone that you’re trying to preserve. If this is the route you must go, invest in a good quality attenuator. The Rivera Rock Crusher or the THD Hotplate are each strong examples of a good place to start.

2) Go Solid-state

As time progresses, technology gets better and better. While it still hasn’t captured the sound and feel of a real, loud tube amp (in my opinion), a good quality solid state amp can sound far better than many tube amps when comparing “bedroom” levels. In addition, many solid state amps today come with a plethora of onboard effects you can explore without breaking your bank. Here’s a couple examples of good solid state amps to check out:
Roland Cube

I love the Roland Cubes! They have an excellent clean tone, and a few different levels of crunch that go all the way up to “R-Fier Stack”, which by name seems to be a mesa boogie simulator. While extreme levels of saturation are rarely pristine sounding on solid state practice amps, I really like the “tweed” and “classic stack” settings on this one. Dial in a little reverb and slap-back delay (which you can have both of directly from the amp) and you’ll have a sweet bluesy tone from a small, quiet amp. Some of the upgraded versions feature an onboard tuner, and loop recorder as well.

Yamaha THR5

Like the cube, the THR5 has an incredible clean tone and features a bunch of different onboard gain settings and effects. It comes with a tap delay that doubles as a tuner when you hold the button down. The coolest thing about this amp though is the included THR Editor. This is computer software that allows you to go in and edit your amp’s effects and amp simulators at any time. Think of the THR5 as a guitar amp combined with an audio interface – for under $300! Upon loading up the THR editor, you’ll notice a ton of options to choose from and sounds you can create. On top of all this, the amp has a vintage-cool look to it with an orange glow coming through the front grill to make it look like it’s got tubes working hard on the inside.

3) Plug into your Computer

Again, with the advancement of the digital age, more and more of the ways of old are being phased out to make room for that of the new. The theme seems to be “convenience over quality”. While you can get everything you need in one little box, many would argue that you end up sacrificing overall sound quality. With these advancements comes (for some people) the irrelevance of even having a practice amp in their practice room. New products are always coming out that allow you to simulate amp sound and dial in tones that were previously thought unimaginable without actually having the amp at your disposal. A big name that has been taking the market by storm in recent years is known as “Axe-FX” by Fractal Audio Systems.

It is an entirely digital unit that features not only a large bank of remarkable sounding amp emulations, but also endless editing options for these emulations, or basic effects that you wish to change or create yourself. The positive thing about using a system like this is that your limitations are greatly reduced in comparison to using a physical amplifier. That is, the number of parameters you can play with go far beyond the pre-programmed “bass, mid and treble” you get in a stock amplifier. It’s no surprise that many artists are catching on to this way of playing and recording, with the likes of Adrian Belew, Guthrie Govan, Tom Cochrane and Alex Lifeson (to name a few) all singing its praises.

I guess the best advice would have to be: don’t be afraid to leave the comfort zone. We’ve all heard for years that the only way to play and sound good is to go all tube and use a 3,000 dollar guitar. But then, isn’t playing music supposed to be about an individual’s feeling and originality, and maybe not trying to do what everyone else already is? I think it’s great to explore, and realize that quality sounds can come from the “wrong” places; and they can do it without giving you a bad rap amongst your neighbours, too!

Happy Playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue 13 from MyRareGuitars.com

1. Know your parts.

Sure, spontaneity has its time and place, and often a lot of things that make the final cut of a song are things that have been written or jammed out on the spot. That said, having a solid grasp on your songs and the parts you are going to play means you get more time to focus on tweaking tone rather than making mistakes or writing as you go. In the studio, time is money! The more takes you can bang out, the bigger the pool you have to choose from when piecing things together.

2. “Magicians” can only go so far…

 As I said, there are some extremely gifted individuals in the recording industry. However, as a wise man once said, “you can’t polish a turd.” If you enter the studio with a guitar that hasn’t been restrung or set-up in months, your recording is already doomed to mediocrity. Here’s an example: take a black marker, and a brown marker. Draw two lines. Do they look different? Yes, they are different colors! By the same token, let’s say you’re using two different guitars on your recording – one that’s set up properly and one that hasn’t been touched in months. Even if they’re both bang-on in tune in the open position, chances are the intonation on one is going to be all askew. It’s going to be the brown marker, and there’s nothing you can do to change that other than use the black marker again. Or just get the guitar intonated.

3. Then tune. Then tune…

This should be obvious, but keep your guitar in tune! Check your tuning before and after each take to ensure nothing has slipped out. As a general rule, if you’re recording with another guitar player, bass player etc. be sure to use the same tuner they used. Different tuners can vary ever so slightly in their readings, and discrepancies are far more audible when played back than when played live.

4. Layering

“The wall of sound” as it’s so famously described! You’ll want to double track a lot of your guitar parts – especially your rhythms. It can sound pretty powerful just using the same guitar and settings, but for a thicker sound try using a different guitar. Two different instruments can add a more “live”, or “real” sound to the mix even if it’s the same person playing the parts. If a second guitar isn’t available, or you simply enjoy the feel of one in particular, try switching pickups or rolling off some tone. The idea is to add depth and thickness to the guitar track, so you may as well make it sound like two guitars!

5. Distortion

If your songs played live involve a lot of distortion, that doesn’t necessarily mean you want to match that amount on the recording. Too much distortion can take away from articulation drastically and just make for a jumbled sounding mix. You’d be surprised how big of a sound you can get in a recording with a much smaller amount of distortion – especially with the layering technique I talked about in point 3!

6. Mic Placement

Your ears work a little bit different than microphones. When you listen to a guitar played through an amp live, it’s not just the guitar and the amp that are vibrating. You’re making the room move, too, and depending on where you place your mics you can pick up some of this room sound. If you’re looking for straight, tight, pure guitar tone then you’ll want to use a close-miking technique to capture just what the amp’s giving you. For a more airy, ambient and open sound, try a more distant mic. If your cabinet has multiple speakers, it’s a good idea to choose one to mic up. Find the speaker cone, and see what it sounds like depending on where you aim the mic. You can also try using more than one microphone on the same speaker in a different location, or even try miking a separate speaker. The closer to the center of the cone, the harsher and brighter the tone. The further out, the opposite! Try it out!

7. Signal Processing

We all love a nice slap-back delay and wet reverb, but it’s a good idea to record your guitar as dry as possible without any effects. You’re going to be EQing your guitar tone after it’s recorded, and you’ll generally want any changes like this to be done to just guitar and not the effects. You can easily add these on after the fact. If you’re like me, and you absolutely have to hear some effects when recording (if you sound better, you play better!) then you can have the effects sent to your headphones but not to the recording track. That way you hear what you want without potentially compromising anything.

These are just a few things to consider when trying to get the best guitar sound possible in your recording. There’s lots more to keep in mind, but it’s good even to have the basics down. Best of luck in your studio adventures!

Happy Playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue 12 from MyRareGuitars.com

Not exactly. Sure, a guitar’s color is really just for show – but the construction and design of both the guitar’s neck and body do have an effect on your sound. Last time I talked about some of the woods that can be used in a guitar’s construction, and here I’ll talk about a couple of the ways it can be put together to both look and sound unique.

The earliest form of the electric guitar wasn’t far off from the acoustic. After all, the original intention was to simply find a method of effectively amplifying the guitar’s volume so it could compete better on stage with other popular instruments of the day. Eighty-five years later, we still see this original design in use all over the world: the semi-acoustic.

“Traditional” looking semi-acoustics retain the aesthetics of the acoustic guitar. The Gibson ES-150 was the first commercially successful of this type: a very large, thick and hollow guitar that was widely used in jazz ensembles.

When referring to the tone of a semi acoustic, the most common word you will hear is: feedback. Depending on who you are, this could be either a very good or a very bad thing! When your guitar and amp levels go up, these guitars are notorious for that high pitched growl that (if not desired or controlled) will make your ears bleed. When they were invented, there was no need to set a guitar to the level that induced such sounds. Once they were discovered as a culprit of feedback, alternative construction methods were sought out (which I’ll talk about later) while certain individuals embraced their “faults”.

Charlie Christian, Joe Pass, T. Bone Walker, Chuck Berry, John Lennon, B.B. King, and Eric Clapton are just a few notable examples of musicians who made great use of the semi-acoustic guitar. The first two I listed were two of the earliest electric guitar players to live. Their use of the instrument is one way that it can still be used well today: jazz. The earliest guitar tones heard in jazz, rockabilly, blues etc. were done using a semi acoustic. If you are looking for the warmest, roundest yet most “chimey” tone you can find that really holds a “vintage” appeal, then make sure to invest in one of these. On the contrary, if you’re looking for a hard rock, gritty snarl that will give you ample feedback whenever you need, this is the easiest way to achieve it. Not to mention: if you already own a solid body guitar (or are in a band with another guitarist who does) you can create some pretty thick sounding tones when layering a semi acoustic with a solid body.

Designers and luthiers are always looking for ways to make things better, and that’s why when feedback became an issue, they looked for other options. This is when the solid body electric guitar began to surface. The idea was that without the resonating air space that came with the hollowbody guitars, feedback could be reduced. Long story short: it worked, and the solid body electric guitar is now the most recognizable design that can be associated with the words “electric guitar”.

The obvious benefit of the solid body guitar is that it allows you to crank your level and gain to heights you wouldn’t be able to with a semi acoustic without getting nasty feedback. That’s not to say you can’t get any. Look at Jimi Hendrix and Steve Vai – both are masters of controlling overpowered equipment. Another benefit is that the guitar is not as delicate. If you’re one to throw your guitar around, or are prone to dropping things… a solid body is less likely to break on you. You might say it’s pretty solid.

More options tend to come with solid body guitars. For example, the “Set-neck” construction was really the only design used before the birth of the solid body. Neck-through guitars and bolt-on guitars came later, and offer other subtleties in tone and functionality. The bolt-on, for example can be removed or replaced on a whim, while a neck-through guitar is commonly regarded as the best design available to achieve the most sustain. Another advantage of the solid body is that they tend to be easier to work on. Most semi acoustic guitars don’t feature a back panel, so in order to get at their electronics you have to pull everything through their pickup cavity or their F holes. Many solid bodies do feature a pack panel, and the ones that don’t tend to have their electronics mounted to their pick guard. It makes life a whole lot easier for you or your technician!

All in all, there’s a couple things to consider when deciding between these two options. Do you want to play heavy and loud without the fear of unwanted feedback? Do you want to maintain the dynamics and subtleties of your guitar while sacrificing headroom? As always, listen to your heroes and then listen to yourself. Test things out, and see what you like! If you still can’t decide, then just do what every guitarist ends up doing: buy one of everything!

Happy Playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue 11 from MyRareGuitars.com

Wear and tear is one thing. Dirt and grime buildup is a completely separate thing! Sweat, oil, and dead skin builds up on the fret board when you play and has a tendency of getting trapped under the frets. Think of it like plaque buildup on your teeth. Metal can become tarnished, or just build up grime on the bridge especially. A lacquered body collects all the oil and sweat from your arms, hands and fingers leaving scuffs and fingerprints. If a criminal touched a black guitar at the scene of a crime, police wouldn’t even need to dust the thing for prints to find the culprit.

Looking at a clean guitar is obviously much more appealing than the opposite. It makes you want to pick it up and play, and it doesn’t feel gross when you do so. In this article, I’ll list and explain some of the products I use when it comes time to maintaining the clean look of your instrument.

I found a dirty old bass neck in the shop, so I’ll go over the process with photos using that.

1)     The Fret board.

This one was never played, so luckily there’s none of the characteristic “green powder” in and around the frets, but I’ll still do what I normally so in this situation.

For polishing the tops of the frets, I find the “fret erasers” from Stewmac work best. You don’t need to use all of them, but it’s good to go over each fret with at least a couple different grits. Here’s the difference between a dirty fret and one I went over with just the red fret eraser:

Small shavings of the fret eraser and dirt will be collected around the frets, so before cleaning, I spray the board with some compressed air. Next, it’s time to clean the fret board.

The product I use here is called “Simple Green”, which is just a general cleaner. Be advised, you don’t want this to soak into the wood! It’s very much a karate-kid technique: scrub on, scrub off.

Make a few sprays along the neck, and scrub it in using a scrub brush or toothbrush paying extra attention to where the fret meets the wood. Once you’ve scrubbed everywhere, wipe it off with a shop towel.

While this process cleans the board nicely, it can dry it out. Next you’ll have to give back some moisture. There’s different oils you can use like lemon oil or linseed oil. I haven’t tried the latter but have heard it does the trick. Applying it is the same idea as the Simple Green here, except instead of scrubbing I use a shop towel to rub the oil in, and then out. After all is said and done, your neck should look like this:

2) The Headstock

The headstock had some weird water marks caked onto it, so for this I used a small amount of “Goo Gone”. This stuff works great, especially for removing sticker residue. Don’t use too much, and remember to wipe it off. This should be a “last resort” product for stuff that just won’t come off, and even with it you’ll still need to use a little elbow grease. It also tends to leave the guitar feeling greasy, and the product itself is very runny. Here’s what the headstock looked like after:

3) Hardware

Next I did the tuning pegs. For all things metal, lighter fluid or any fluid that contains the flammable “naphtha” chemical mixture works very well. Naphtha is getting harder to find, (at least where I’m located) and some brands are removing it from their formulas. Double check that the fluid contains it before you buy.

For light grime, you can just rub the fluid onto the metal with a shop towel. Don’t light a smoke while doing this, unless you want to be in a Jimi Hendrix tribute band.

If the stuff isn’t coming off, you can remove the metal components, and leave them to soak in a bowl full of the solution. A good alternative is a metal polisher like “X-treem metal polish”, but the powder is very dry and messy so if you go that route be sure to wear gloves.

4) The Body

As most people likely did, the first time I polished guitars I used the standard “guitar polish” you find in guitar stores. I’ve never found that to do a fantastic job, leaving swirl marks and taking forever to wipe in and out. One day I bought a product to try and cover up small surface scratches, and found that it served as a brilliant guitar polish! The product is called “Scratch Doctor”, and is intended for car finishes.

Just put some on a shop towel, wipe it onto the guitar body until it’s evened out (it’s easy to see where it’s been applied) then wipe it off. The pictures here don’t really do it justice, but you can kind of tell:

Make sure you don’t re-use these shop towels. The product can harden a bit on the towel, and you don’t want to leave scratch marks later on.

5) Electronics

If you’ve ever spun a knob and heard a static, crackly noise, chances are you’ve got a dirty pot. A quick spray from electronic cleaner will typically fix it right up. I use “Deox-It” – this is a very expensive cleaner, but it’s also a very good one. A tiny spray is all you need, so the canister goes a long way.

With the pot exposed, you’ll see a small hole in the bottom somewhere. Spray the cleaner in, then rotate the pot back and forth until the noise is gone. Voila! The same process can be used for a dirty toggle switch.

That’s the basics! Try some of these out if you wish. I do not work for any of these product manufacturers, I just find that they work best for me!

Do your research, talk to some techs and see what other opinions are. Most importantly, make sure a product is safe to use before you use it.

Happy playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 8 from MyRareGuitars.com

It’s important to understand how your amp reacts to its settings to get the tone you want – especially if you’re one to use multiple guitars.

The first thing to understand are your basic controls. Bass, Mid, Treble, and Presence would be a good place to start. The first three are generally understood. This is a fixed 3-band EQ, meaning that each control handles a pre-set section of frequencies. As I said earlier, not all amps operate the same so it is important to get an idea for how each dial affects the signal. While bass and treble knobs almost always boost in level, sometimes an amp’s “mid” knob will actually be cutting the level.

The other thing to get a handle of is how much each knob changes the tone, and where in its rotation it does this. Sometimes you can’t even hear a change in tone from 0-5, while other times you end up on a different planet.

A good way to test your EQ dials would be “over exaggerating”. First off, make sure your amp’s volume is set where you want it because cranking it or decreasing it will have an effect on the EQ.

Next, set the EQs somewhere you would never actually set them to – either all zero or all full. From here, you can sweep each one either way to see the effect it has on your overall tone. You will likely notice a point in each knob’s rotation where you can really hear a drastic difference. Some people use this “break” point as the setting for each knob, but it really comes down to your own ears and what you’re looking for.

“Presence” is one of many other parameters that you can find on an amp. Other common names could be “shape”, “contour”, or “enhance”. Again, these effect pre-set frequencies but can be thought of more as a master tone knob. “Presence” will typically boost your high mids – highs, while “Enhance” might boost the lows and the highs. It’s important that you look up your specific amp, because again, the controls will vary from amp to amp.
Another thing to keep in mind is the tone you set yourself when you’re playing alone at home probably isn’t the same tone you want to keep when you’re playing with a band. It’s important that the instruments aren’t fighting to be heard, especially if you have another guitarist in the group. You will likely find that in order to have your guitar cut through and really sound good in the mix might not sound as good on its own.

The last thing to look out for that I’ll talk about is your gain setting. It’s very easy to become comfortable with a very saturated and warm level of gain.

While a higher gain setting can sound super sweet (or menacing as the case may be), too much distortion throws your frequency range all over the place and can potentially mess things up… and not in a good way! The other thing that tends to happen with a lot of gain is your mistakes aren’t as audible. While some may say “but… that’s a good thing!”, getting used to playing without all that distortion can really improve your articulation, and, in turn, improve your tone!

Happy Playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue 5 from MyRareGuitars.com

Last time I talked about the benefits of compression, which led me to want to talk about some of the other heavy hitters in the world of signal processing. The first thing you need to ask yourself is: “what am I looking for?” Are you looking for a boost or more gain? The opposite? Are you looking for something to thicken up your tone, or maybe just some fancy sounding effects? In this article I’ll give some examples for each of these, and an idea as to where they can be used.

Let’s say you’re looking to enhance the clarity of your tone, and perhaps even clean things up beyond what the EQ enables you to do. This is where a compressor pedal would come in handy (like I talked about in my last article) or even a filtration/EQ pedal. There are some pedals that allow you to dial in and adjust specific frequencies, which could be useful if you’re playing a venue that doesn’t have a professional sound system / technician. You could also purposely crank or take out certain frequencies to create interesting effects, or to make it easier to get feedback from your amp if that’s your thing! Other pedals have a pre-set frequency range that they alter, such as the popular Ibanez Tube Screamer. This guy pushes your midrange, and is a very effective way to make your lead guitar work…well… scream.

Perhaps rather than cleaning up, you’re looking to make things dirty or just give yourself a nice boost. With a tube amp, generally speaking you want your tubes to run hot to get your best tone. That said, the more gain you put in, the dirtier the signal will be when it comes out.

A good boost pedal (I’m partial to the MXR micro amp) will increase the signal level of your guitar before it reaches the amp, thus pushing the amp harder. Think of it as instantly raising the height of your pickups with the flick of a switch… Or stomp of a foot. You can use one of these in band situations during a solo section where you need to be heard, or just to enhance your tone if you like it dirty! Many boost pedals come with an output volume knob, so you could theoretically use it in the opposite way to quiet yourself down, or clean up your tone a bit.

Modulation and time-based effects processors are next: these are the ones that fall under the “fancy effects” category.
Modulation effects are things like chorus, flangers, phasers and tremolo. You can use any of these to add flavour to particular riffs, or in some cases drive the feel of the guitar in the entire song! Here’s an example of a heavy phaser effect used by Eddie Van Halen:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-IUB62zDlA

And some chorus used by Kurt Cobain:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YyDg9tT0Vw
Time-based effects are things like delay and reverb. A lot of amps come with their own reverb installed, but you can always experiment with different pedals to try a variety of different sounding ones. Generally, reverb is used to thicken up your tone. Be careful not to use too much! While it may sound nice and creamy right next to your amp, in large rooms especially you can start to sound very muddy if you over do it.

A “slap-back” delay is another way of getting a thick sounding guitar tone. “Slap-back” is a term used to describe a delay of just one repeat that comes very quickly after the initial hit. Again, you can use a delay pedal not just as a tone enhancer, but also as an effects pedal by playing around with the settings!

Once you have a few pedals, it’s important to decide which order you’re going to chain them in. While the generally accepted rule of thumb is to start with your dynamics, then do EQs and filters, then modulation, followed by boosts, and finally time based processors… you’re always free to experiment! Maybe you want your delay to go through a boost, or maybe you want to boost everything before you put on that tremolo. After all, these effects you’re using weren’t created without experimentation! There’s a world of soundscapes to explore.

Happy playing!

Written by: Vince Schaljo

Tips on Tones – Issue 3 from MyRareGuitars.com

The range between the quietest sound something can make and the loudest is what’s known as the “dynamic range”, and it’s very important to make use of it in the correct way not just in movies, but also in your guitar playing.

Generally speaking, to get the best sound out of a tube amp you have to run it hot. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean you have to constantly dig in and play loud. Try experimenting with different thicknesses of picks, or even without a pick at all. That said, there’s nothing quite like a crushing strum of the strings through a stupidly loud amp.  Look at the iconic “windmill” gimmick – sure it looks cool, but the idea was first done for a heavy strike.

Using your fingers with a low gain setting at high volumes can give you a very warm sounding tone, while still enabling you to really bite in when necessary. The way you pluck the strings will have the greatest influence on the output you get though the amp, while the settings on the amp will process and alter the sounds you are feeding it.

These knobs are essentially volume knobs that are assigned to a specific range of frequencies. The bass handles the lows, while the treble handles the highs. Therefore, if you’ve got everything turned on full, you’ve basically just turned up your overall volume rather than EQ anything. The best thing you can do is play with your settings, and understand that every guitar is different. You will likely adjust settings every time you plug a new guitar in.

All this being said, in a band situation it’s about sitting well in the mix. You don’t want to be fighting anyone for level, and you want to sound articulate and clear. Jumping from super quiet to super loud, or hitting notes slightly weaker than others can turn out sounding sloppy. If the style of music you are playing doesn’t require you to explore your entire dynamic range, it would be a good idea to shorten it! It’s for this reason that one of the most common things you’ll see on a guitarists pedal board is a compressor.

A compressor takes the dynamic range, and “squishes” it. Very basically, it is quieting down the super loud parts so everything is on a more level playing field. This way, slight variations in picking attack or finger pressure are not as obvious as they would be without a compressor.

Many compressors only have a few controls, and often times things are labeled differently, but I’ll outline the main parameters here.

Threshold: The threshold control determines the level at which the compressor fixes the incoming signal. Whatever level you set the threshold to, everything above that value will be compressed, while whatever’s below it will remain untouched. So, the lower your threshold, the more you are actually compressing. Many guitar pedal compressors don’t have this control, meaning the threshold value is pre-set. The only way to adjust how much is being compressed with these type of pedals is to, well, make things louder! Increase your input, and more will be affected.

Ratio: This is the amount that the compressor will choke the signal by. A ratio of 8:1 means that when your input signal is 8 decibels over your threshold, the output becomes only 1 decibel over your threshold.

Attack: This is the setting that determines how quickly the compressor decreases the level when the threshold is reached.

Release:  This is the setting that determines how quickly the signal comes back to the level your ratio is set to once your input falls below the threshold.

Be careful setting your release! Let’s say you have a guitar part that’s really loud and very soon after dips down quiet.  With a release that’s too slow, the signal is still being compressed when you go to play that quiet part which may make it a lot quieter than you would like! On the other hand, setting a release value too quickly can give you an unwanted “pumping” sound as you hear the level being adjusted in and out.

Compressors can be difficult to learn, but once you’ve got it down you’ll greatly appreciate the difference they make in your dynamic range!

Happy playing!

written by Vince Schaljo

Tips on Tones – Issue 2 from MyRareGuitars.com

Last month, I published a survey that asked questions about the state of electric guitar tone as it is today vs. what I called the “golden age” of rock and roll.

If you missed it you can find the survey here.

Survey Questions & Results:

1) There’s lots of high quality gear available if you’re willing to pay for it, but how has the flood of inexpensive gear affected tone quality in general?

• 62% – I believe that, compared to the golden age of rock and roll, the average piece of gear’s tone quality has decreased.
• 38% – I believe that, compared to the golden age of rock and roll, the average piece of gear’s tone quality is at least as good.

2) Compared to the 60’s and 70’s, has the glut of inexpensive gear on the market caused a general decline in electric guitar tone as heard on recordings, in live venues and at home?

• 59% – I believe that, in general, electric guitar tone is not as good as it was in the 60’s and 70’s.
• 41% – I believe that, in general, electric guitar tone is at least as good as it was in the 60’s and 70’s.

3) With all this inexpensive gear at their fingertips, do today’s guitarists spend less time working on their craft and more on finding equipment to make them sound “good”?

• 74% – I believe that, in general, today’s guitarists spend less time perfecting their skills and more time trying to find gear that will make them sound good.
• 26% – I believe that, in general, today’s guitarists spend at least as much time perfecting their skills as they did in the 60’s and 70’s.

The results were conclusive and interesting!

In general, the majority of the over 120 survey respondents believe that the electric guitar world was a better place in the 60’s and 70’s.

60% of them believe that gear and recorded/live guitar tone sounded better back then.

However, when it came to how much effort guitarists invest in improving their skills, almost 75% of respondents said that today’s guitarists are slackers compared to the good old days.

Comments ranged from wistful nostalgia and anecdotes from back in the day to virtual shots to the head demanding that guitarists get over vintage envy and take advantage of the cornucopia of gear available to today’s guitarist.

Click here to check out all of the survey comments.

So, are you surprised by the results?

Does it confirm that the gear market and guitarists in general have strayed from the path of tonal nirvana and earnest sweat and toil or that most of us are hopelessly stuck in the past?

Should the gear industry take note and make product development decisions on what appears to be a majority view that, on average, their products just aren’t as good as they once were or should they forge ahead taking as much advantage of technological development as possible?

Email me at Don@MackAmps.com with your thoughts and if I get enough feedback I’ll discuss the deeper issues related to this topic in next month’s article.

Don Mackrill
www.MackAmps.com
Don@MackAmps.com

Better Now or Then? – The Tone Survey Results!!! from MyRareGuitars.com

Says Dave:

The guitars were American-made and made at the height of American craftsmanship, the Marshalls were made with quality parts, and you had quality players – you couldn’t record a record unless you had a high level of ability.  Plus studios had the best mics in the world, they had good consoles and tape. Now we might have more stuff available, but it’s not as high-quality.

Jay goes on to ponder the current state of electric guitar gear and whether it is actually more difficult to get what he calls “a convincing, old-school rock tone” than it was when Page, Clapton and Beck were young. So, here’s the deal!  I thought I would ask what you think about this topic…

First, read Jay’s article. Then click on the link below to take a quick four question survey and tell me what YOU think!

CLICK HERE TO TAKE THE “BETTER NOW OR THEN?” SURVEY!

As always, I’ll share the results next month!!

Cheers!

Don Mackrill – Don@MackAmps.com

PS: Check out another article on Woody Tone: “Mack of Mack Amps on EL84s and Tone Controls”. In this two part interview I explain why I like EL84s, how the Heatseeker line of amps came about and why I don’t like TMB tone stacks!!

PPS: Join the Mack Amps mailing list and take advantage of the current Member’s-Only discount on Heatseeker HS-18 and Skyraider SR-15 boutique amps!

Better Now or Then? (The Tone Survey!) from MyRareGuitars.com

This month we’ll look at a few aspects of getting a good live sound. While this article is mostly aimed at those of us with who have don’t have much or any stage experience, there may be something of interest here for almost anyone.

Last week I had the genuine pleasure of attending a League of Rock ‘dark stage’ rehearsal night at Toronto’s famous Chick’n Deli night club. This was an opportunity for the six bands in the current session to rehearse their three songs on a real stage – and in this case, somewhat unexpectedly, in front of a real audience.

League of Rock is the creation of Terry Moshenberg, a dynamic entrepreneur and experienced marketer and promoter – who also happens to be a guitar playing musician.

Each LOR session, of which there are three per year, some 26 to 30 amateur musicians – ‘regular’ folks, some of whom have never before been in a band let alone performed live – are formed into six ‘bands’ and, over a 12 week period, work up three songs. Each session culminates in a recording date in a pro studio and the final gala gig at a major Toronto live music venue.

So, how did I end up at a LOR gig? Well, Mack Amps is pleased to announce that it is now the official guitar amp sponsor of LOR, Toronto!

Along with meeting a bunch of great people and having a blast, witnessing 18 songs being performed by a diverse group of guitar players who, for the most part, used various Mack amps (2 guys brought their own amps!), was a tremendous live guitar sound learning experience.

Here are some thoughts about what I learned.

The Guitar’s Place In The Stage Mix

I think of live guitar ‘sound’ as being comprised of two concepts: how good is the tone and can it be heard by you and the audience?

Consider what is going on when a typical rock band performs live:

• Drums: A drum kit produces a tremendous amount of sound energy with fundamental frequencies that range from the bass part of the audible frequency spectrum to mid range. Harmonics of fundamental tones reach all the way into the high midrange and even high frequency portions of the spectrum. You might be surprised at how much high frequency sound energy is present in a kick drum thwack not to mention toms!
• Cymbals. Of course, cymbals produce lots of high-mid and high frequency sound energy. However, their fundamental tones are centered in the mid range.
• Bass. True to its name, the bass produces fundamental tones in the bass to mid range frequencies.
• Vocalist. The vocalist is producing mid range fundamentals with high-mid and high frequency harmonics.
• Keyboards. If your band includes keyboards, they can be pumping out sound that spans the entire frequency spectrum from sub-bass to highs.

The guitar’s fundamental tones span bass to mid range frequencies and the guitar’s harmonics add energy in the high-mid range.

If you simplify each instrument’s frequency range to be generally characterized by its fundamental tones you can get a fairly realistic picture of what’s happening on stage:

• Lots of bass and low-mid energy from drums and bass.
• Lots of high-mid and high frequency energy from cymbals, vocals and often keys.
• Lots of mid range energy from low frequency instrument harmonics and lower fundamental tones from vocals and keys.

There is a LOT of competition on stage fighting to be heard!

Obviously, guitars are a critical part of a band’s sound and are known for being heard, but how do you obtain that ideal combination of stellar tone that is easily heard by both you and your audience?

EQing guitars in a recording mix is a topic of many books and is well beyond the scope of this article. However, there are a few simple things that any guitarist can do to get good live sound.

Analyze Your Guitar Tone

Your tone may sound great when you are practicing at home or playing along with recordings. However, it may not translate well to the live stage.

A fairly common characteristic of what I heard the other night is guitar sounds that seemed muffled and lost in the low-mid wash of sound booming from the stage.

In these situations the guitar players usually increased the volume at the amp in an effort to hear themselves, further adding to the general pandemonium going on in the lower half of the audio spectrum.

What to do? Here are two very basic, but critical suggestions:

1. Turn your guitar volume to 10. Many, but not all guitars feature a ‘volume control bypass capacitor’. No, that’s not something from a Star Trek episode, it’s an electronic component wired across a guitar volume control that prevents your tone from becoming muffled (reduction in high midrange frequencies) as the volume is turned down. If your guitar does NOT have one, whenever you turn down its volume your tone will generally lose presence and recede into the mix. In this case keep your guitar’s volume at 10 to help you stand out. If your guitar does have a volume bypass cap, it’s still a good idea for you to have all of your guitar volume pots full up when you hit the stage and adjust your sound before the first song’s count-in. This will ensure that you are tweaking your sound with the most signal possible coming from your guitar and gives you the best chance of avoiding a gear adjustment that will actually fight against getting a good stage sound.
2. Turn your guitar tone to 10. Guitar tone controls have one function: they roll of high and high mid range frequencies. Since we are trying to achieve optimum ‘sound’ – the combination of great tone that is easily heard by you and your audience – and since guitar tone ‘lives’ in the upper and high mid range frequencies, it makes sense to hit the stage with tone on 10. As with guitar volume, this gives you the best opportunity to properly adjust your gear and it ensures that you do not inadvertently roll of the highs and cause your sound to recede into the mix. Having said that, there are times when a tone control adjustment is certainly warranted: for example, removing the ‘ice pick’ quality from some Teles or getting Eric Clapton ‘woman’ tone from a humbucker guitar. But, generally tone on 10 will help you cut through the mix.

3 Ways To Get Clean Electric Guitar Tone On-Stage

The term ‘clean headroom’ is often used, but having spoken to many guitarists over the years there is generally some confusion as to what it means.

The practical definition of clean headroom is the volume level at which your guitar signal starts to become distorted. The volume at which your tone just starts to breakup or overdrive is the point of maximum clean headroom. How loud you can get a clean tone depends on many variables such as how hard you pick, pickup output level, amp design and settings, etc.

There are three ways to achieve a clean tone:

1. Guitar volume 10, amp clean. Your basic sound is clean and, if you use overdrive and distortion it will come from pedals.
2. Guitar volume less than 10, amp dirty. In this case you set up your amp for a distorted tone and roll off your guitar volume to get a clean tone. Your distorted tone is only a flip of the guitar volume away. Note that this contradicts my earlier recommendation to leave your guitar volume on 10. “Switching” from clean to overdrive and distortion via your guitar volume control is a great strategy if your guitar volume pot is set up properly (see above) and your amp is sensitive enough to changes in guitar volume. Some amps do a great job of changing their tone with guitar volume changes and some don’t – check our your amp to see how it responds.
3. Guitar volume 10, amp channel switching. If your amp has multiple channels one is usually adjusted for a clean tone and one for an overdriven or distorted tone.

Any of the above methods of achieving a loud clean tone is valid. The one you choose depends on your gear, the music you play and whether switching tones within a song is a necessity.

Note that a clean tone will most likely have a better chance of cutting through the stage mix. Generally, the balance of upper and high mids will be greater than an overdriven or distorted tone and your guitar sound will be less compressed allowing your picking and playing dynamics to be heard.

Distorted Electric Guitar Tone On-Stage

Whoever came up with the phrase “Less is more” must have been referring to distorted electric guitar tone!

You will likely have heard this before, but some of the heaviest electric guitar tones feature relatively little distortion.

For example, Keith Richards, ACDC, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page, Pete Townshend, etc. have recorded some of the heaviest rock guitar sounds ever – and many of these iconic ‘heavy’ tones are really not all that distorted.

I realize that LOTS of great guitar tones feature LOTS of distortion, but to achieve the best stage guitar sound for classic rock and blues music styles, dialing down the distortion is almost always beneficial.

While there are many flavors of distortion – overdrive, fuzz, etc. – I generally think about it related to two needs: rhythm and lead.

If a song requires a distorted rhythm tone, often referred to as ‘crunch’, the ‘less is more’ credo is critical. Richards and the Young brothers are the masters of getting incredibly juicy, resonant and HEAVY crunch tones that are, when you listen closely, amazingly clean relative to their impact.

The distortion required for lead playing is dependent on the song and the player. However, I believe that the ‘right’ amount of distortion for solos is just enough to produce ‘flow’. What’s flow? It’s that musical moment where your tone is distorted and compressed enough and possesses enough sustain that the player can focus on their performance without having to ‘fight’ their way through a solo.

This may sound kind of esoteric, but I am sure you have wrestled with solos where your tone wasn’t quite there – either there wasn’t enough sustain or not enough distorted breakup and compression. Dialing up the distortion to get to that point of ‘flow’ alleviates the problem, but overdoing it will cause your sound to, once again, recede into the stage mix.

I also believe that the amount of distortion needed to obtain flow varies according to the song. Heavy songs with lots of crunch backing the solo requires more distortion; a much less distorted tone is often the perfect fit for obtaining flow with ‘lighter’ songs.

Having said that, I know there are lots of examples of impossibly distorted solos in otherwise clean songs and clean solos in heavy songs – in those cases the contrast is what works. However, I believe that a good rule of thumb is to use just as much distortion as it takes to get you into flow – and no more.

What happens if you use too much distortion on stage?

Your tone won’t fit the song and will negatively impact the quality of your band’s overall sound and its performance. Part of getting a great stage sound is making sure your audience isn’t cringing even if they can hear you LOUD and clear. Since the primary objective of performing live is to provide your audience with an enjoyable experience, this problem should be avoided at all costs!

Worse yet, using too much distortion can overly compress your tone and, depending on how the distorted tone is EQ’d, there can be a dramatic perceived loss in highs and clarity and you end up not blending in with the song and not being heard properly! I suppose that if your tone is negatively affecting the overall performance, not being heard might be a good thing, but I think you get my point.

How do you easily get the right amount of distortion on stage?

So,this is how to best get a distortion sound on stage and still be heard properly:

1. Crunch. My favorite method of getting good crunch is from an amp – preferably one that features power tube distortion. Richards and the Youngs rely on plugging a great guitar into a great amp and turning it up until they get the tone they want. Although there are lots of overdrive and boost pedals that can get crunch tones, for the most part you will find that amp crunch is more dynamic, resonant and pleasing to the ear. Dynamics are important because a good amp will respond to your picking attack by changing the amount of crunch. Organically altering your distorted tone by playing harder and softer during a song is FUN!
2. Lead. This is where pedals can really come into play. Stomping on a box to elevate your tone for solos is a classic method. However, you can get great amp lead tone by setting your amp for lead distortion and rolling your guitar volume down for clean/crunch and up for solos. Or, if you have a multi-channel amp it is easy to set up rhythm and lead tones.

There are many more aspects of live guitar sound that we haven’t covered. If there is enough interest in this topic I’ll continue next month.

Let me know how you get great live guitar tone by emailing me at Don@MackAmps.com or simply post your reply, below!

Don Mackrill
www.MackAmps.com

Getting Great Guitar Sound On Stage 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

The Meaning of Boutique
Boutique is a French word whose literal translation is “shop”. It appears to have come to prominence worldwide in reference to the fashion industry: boutique fashion designers and boutique clothing stores that sold pieces made by boutique designers.

Two dictionary definitions of the word boutique reads: “a small business, department, etc., specializing in one aspect of a larger industry” and “a small, exclusive producer or business”.

These are somewhat vague explanations and if we were to get really philosophical we would examine the terms “specializing” and “exclusive” in an attempt to achieve a precise definition. You’ll be please to learn that we won’t go there in this article!

It appears that there is a common theme developing regarding the concept of business size: to be considered boutique a business must be small.

However, is there more required of an amp company to be considered boutique?

The Boutique Debate
If you spend any time at all browsing online forum threads that address this topic you will see a number of different criteria discussed relative to defining a boutique amp and/or amp company.

Following is my assessment of the most commonly mentioned characteristics. And, I’ll give you my 2¢ worth on each one!

• Size: Yes, as the tired joke goes “size does matter”, but in this case small is better (if only my wife would agree…). Virtually every participant in the online boutique debate agrees that to be considered a boutique amp company small or limited production capacity is a requirement. A common example is Mesa Boogie. Often considered the first boutique amp company, Mesa seems to have outgrown the genre. I agree that mass production is not a characteristic of a boutique builder. There are some fine amps that are mass produced – many by Mesa – but, that is not the essence of a boutique builder as will be discussed below.
• Philosophy: There’s that word again. Don’t worry! A few thoughtful forum dwellers brought up the idea that boutique amp companies have a different mission than non-boutique companies. They believe that a boutique amp builder’s primary focus is on the integrity of their product concept: “built to a standard not to a price” was how one put it.I think this is a critical characteristic of boutique amp companies. Whether a builder focuses on replicating vintage designs or developing unique creations, each one follows their own recipe to make a ‘better than mass produced’ amp.Evidence of this is seen in any boutique builder’s product line. There is almost always a direction or common theme to which their products adhere. You don’t see boutique builders going after widely divergent market segments as some ‘big’ companies do: $200 entry level amps all the way to multi-thousand dollar, hand wired reissues!
• Hand wired vs. printed circuit boards: There is much lively debate concerning the authenticity of boutique amps that use printed circuit boards (PCBs). Is this an oxymoron? Many guitarists think so. The hand wired camp believe that only an amp whose every component and wire has been hand soldered can be considered boutique. However, there are many amp companies that are generally considered to be boutique, such as Soldano, Rivera, Fuchs and THD to name a few (Mack uses a PCB in the Gem) that use PCBs. Note that while these amps use PCBs, they are hand assembled and, in at least the case of the Gem, are hand wired to the chassis mounted components.Does an amp have to be hand wired to be considered boutique? Not in my opinion. The manner in which components are attached and soldered to a circuit board simply does not affect tone. A poorly laid out eyelet board will sound just as bad as a poorly designed PCB. A well designed PCB amp will sound indistinguishable from a hand wired example.Reliability is often cited as a problem with PCB amps. While a poorly designed, mass produced amp is a recipe for problems, a well designed PCB amp will be at least as reliable as a hand wired amp. After all, PCBs are used in spacecraft and military electronics – two of the most inhospitable environments on or around the planet – and, since in both of those applications cost is insignificant compared to reliability, hand wired electronics would be the norm if PCBs were unreliable.
• Price: Many guitarists believe that boutique amps are very expensive – and many are. As we all know boutique amp prices can easily run from $2,000 up to tens of thousands for Dumbles and the like. However, there is a growing segment of boutique builders who offer amps at prices in the $1,000 range and sometimes less. While $1,000 is not inexpensive, it is much less than many guitarists believe possible for a boutique amp. Plus, there are many mass produced amps from big companies that are in this price range – and higher!Nonetheless, relative to a small builder (there’s that size thing again) price is indicative of what goes into their products. Building amps completely by hand or hand assembling them simply requires more labor than if the same product is mass produced. That means a higher price. When you add in the additional cost of high-end and sometimes custom components that some boutique builders use, the price quickly escalates. BTW, my explanation of high priced, mass produced amps is that their price reflects what the company thinks they can get for them.
• Location: Most if not all participants in the boutique debate seem to agree that to be considered a boutique amp builder, production must take place locally – not in Asia or other areas of the world where labor rates are low. To my knowledge there is no small amp building company from these areas that claims boutique status (although there is a Malaysian maker of reportedly high quality amp kits that many consider be in the boutique category).I tend to agree with the assessment that an amp builder should not be considered ’boutique’ if it has their product manufactured by a third party company in, say, China. I believe that the ability to maintain product integrity relative to component quality, build quality and functional consistency is compromised if production is not close at hand.There appears to be a growing body of evidence supporting this belief based on a North American amp company that would have previously been considered boutique, but who has, it appears, elected to manufacture at least some of their product overseas. While their amps have proven to be popular and are now sold at GC (the boutique builder kiss of death?), anecdotal reports suggest that the tone and build quality of the amps are not on par with their past, domestically produced, products.
• Tone: It’s interesting to note that in all of the online forum threads that I studied, VERY few participants mentioned tone as a defining factor of a boutique amp! A few commented that not all boutique amps sound good to them. Most did not mention relative tone quality at all!I think this reflects the reality that while many boutique amps produce exceptional tone, there are mass produced amps that sound good too – or at least ‘good enough’. This is where price enters the thought process of guitarists. Is the improvement in tone worth the extra money for a boutique amp? Or, is there even an improvement in tone at all? Since tone is such a subjective assessment there are many answers to the above questions. That said, I think there are many guitarists who don’t equate significantly better tone with a boutique amp simply because they would never consider buying one.Nonetheless, I believe that if an amp claims to be boutique, that it should produce very good tone indeed. This leads to another personal belief: once in the boutique price range every increment in price should produce a noticeable improvement in tone – otherwise the value of the higher price amp is degraded.

What Is A Boutique Amp?
I believe that a boutique amp is made by a small manufacturer who follows their own philosophy of how to build amps that are better than mass produced products.

Yes, there are lots of ways to interpret that… and that’s why there are lots of boutique amp companies!

Mack Amps Heatseeker HS-18

Send me an email and let me know what you think!

Don Mackrill
Don@MackAmps.com
MACK AMPS

What Is A Boutique Guitar Amp? 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

The topic is… branding.

WAIT!

Before you click the back button, hear me out.

The simple definition of the word ‘brand’ is the image that a particular product has in a person’s mind. Let’s use some examples to illustrate this idea.

If I were to say the word… facial tissue… and ask you what product name comes into your head first, those of you in North America would likely say… Kleenex.

If we were talking about cars and I said… safety… what car would you think of? Most likely Volvo. Staying on the car theme, what if I said… ultra-luxury? Rolls Royce, right?

OK, you get the picture. Now, let’s play the same game only related to guitar amps. Here’s a couple to get you warmed up.

Metal. Let’s see, I would probably say… Mesa Dual Recto. Jazz. Hmmm… I’d go for Polytone Mini Brute. Rare. Easy! I’ve only ever seen one of these… on stage behind Robben Ford… Dumble.

Wanna have a go at it? Just copy the following table, paste it into an email (click on the link at the bottom of this article), fill in as many answers as you want and click on send. I’ve left some blanks so you can even write in a few of your own categories. Easy! I’ll tabulate the results and Next month we’ll see if there are any surprises! I’ll also let you know how the answers varied in each category.

Let’s have some fun!

Guitar Amps: What’s in a Brand Name? from MyRareGuitars.com

More tone controls are better – treble, middle, bass – a tone stack for every channel! Always has been, always will be… maybe not!

WHY?

Tradition is a powerful thing and change is hard to make. But, if you consider how tone controls affect an amp’s signal chain, investigate what a guitar and amp sound like with minimal tone controls (or none!) and then decide if you REALLY need them, you might be surprised at your conclusion.

Tone controls change or modify the tone of an electric guitar signal as it passes through an amp. However, the primary determinant of how your electric guitar sounds is the instrument itself, the amp’s overall design (gain stages, pre vs. power tube overdrive, etc.), its tubes, the speaker(s) and YOU the player. Tone controls are but one in a long line of factors strung between your brain, your gear and your ears.

We all have used tone controls to change the sound that our amp produces. Roll off the bass for a humbucker equipped guitar; trim the treble when you plug in that ice-pick Tele; peg the bass when playing your Strat; boost the mids to cut through the mix. All useful stuff. But, what would you sound like if you didn’t have tone controls at all?

In my opinion, despite their tone tweaking usefulness, traditional tone controls can detract from the quality of the tone… if you consider what your amp would sound like without them. Let’s dive into the nature of tone controls to find out why I hold this wacky belief!

Virtually every tone control you’ll run across, at least in a typical tube amp, is a ‘passive’ device. That means that it cuts or reduces the volume of certain frequencies. A passive tone control cannot boost frequencies.

Terminology check: tone controls are often referred to as ‘tone stacks’. The passive components that comprise tone controls – resistors, capacitors and potentiometers – are connected in such a way that when they are drawn on a piece of paper – a schematic – the treble, middle and bass controls look like they are ‘stacked’ on each other. That’s where the term tone stack comes from.

Because tone stacks are constructed from passive components, even if you turn the knobs up to 10, each tone control still reduces certain frequencies.

Yes, that’s right. With passive tone controls there is no such thing as a TRUE ‘flat’ setting where the signal is not affected in any way there is always some signal loss.

What the heck does all that mean?

Below is a graph that shows the frequency response of a typical treble, middle, bass (TMB) tone control often used by an amp company originally located in southern California. The graph depicts the level of frequencies with all the tone controls set to 10. As you can see the signal level at all frequencies is well below 0 dB — that means that the signal level is being attenuated or reduced as it goes through the tone stack – even at a 10 setting (yes Nigel, the same would hold true at 11 too!).

What does this mean? Two things.

First, a tone stack reduces the overall level of your signal. That’s why amps with traditional tone stacks need an extra gain stage to return the signal to its level before it got hosed down by the tone stack – more components, more cost, more complexity.

Second, even when all the knobs are on 10 the stack is changing the tone profile of your signal. The tone stack’s frequency response as shown in the graph has a big dip centered on 300 Hz. That means that the volume level of those frequencies around 300 Hz is a lot less than the rest of the frequencies – a cut in the low mids.

Here’s our tone stack’s frequency response set to provide a flat frequency response. Note that although the tone controls are not shaping the tone – all frequencies are being passed at an equal level -the signal has been severely attenuated across the board.

• 10Hz
• 100 Hz
• 1000 Hz
• 10000 Hz

You’ll likely be surprised to learn that to produce this ‘flat’ response the controls have to be set as follows:

• Bass = 1
• Middle = 8
• Treble = 0

I bet that’s not where you set your tone controls!

There are a few things at play here. First, at this flat response point you have to really boost the volume to compensate for the gain loss through the tone stack. Second, it shows how much the typical tone stack scoops mids – bass and treble have to be severely attenuated to match the low mid-frequency response of the stack. Finally, this shows that the tone controls are highly interactive and changes in one dramatically affect the other – you have to dial in crazy settings to get a flat response.

So, if it takes this dramatic an alteration of your tone controls to get a true representation of what your guitar sounds like why bother?

Is all this ‘bad’? Not necessarily. The tone stack in question has been used in dozens of amp designs that produce great tone. Maybe you won’t like the true sound of your guitar!

However, I want to plant a crazy idea in your brain: what would happen if you didn’t have a tone stack or you had a very simple tone control that could make subtle tone changes, but would not suck nearly as much gain and would not dramatically alter the frequency response of your guitar?

Well, in my experience you can really ‘hear’ your guitar (!) … you’ll hear a more balanced tone coming from your rig. Your tone will have more presence and, with an amp that has been designed with minimal or no tone controls, you will experience a more responsive, dynamic feel. If you like that sort of thing it’s VERY cool!

Of course, it’s impossible to properly convey the sound of a ‘tone-stacklessR17; amp on a piece of paper … you have to hear the difference!

So, when you see amps with minimal tone controls don’t dismiss them. Play through them when you get the opportunity so you can see for yourself. You may be surprised at what you hear and feel!

Send me an EMAIL (Don Mackrill) if you would like to discuss this further!

PS: Crystal ball time! I predict you’ll see an increasing number of amps with ‘lift’ switches that take the tone stack completely out of the circuit. A few big name amps have had this feature for years labeled as a “solo” switch. Why call it a solo switch? Because eliminating the tone stack increases gain and midrange response – both perfect for bringing your sound front and center! Wouldn’t that boost in tonality be a good thing all the time?

Consider having your local amp tech add a lift switch to your favorite box so you can experiment for yourself … the stack might get lifted and never put back!

Amp Tone Controls: Tone & Gain Sucking Leeches? 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

So, I was looking for a single-ended amp. Say what you will about class A/B amps (and, to be fair, most of the great recorded tones in rock history are class A/B push-pull amps), some of them don’t really get singing until they’re too loud for the bedroom or studio. Sometimes you just need to hear that cranked tone without getting the knock from the neighbors. To quickly recap:

1. I wanted a small, easy to carry amp that screamed at relatively low volumes.
2. I didn’t want to spend much money (I’m a cheap bastard…part of me thinks I could never truly love a 59 Bassman unless I scored it at a yard sale for a hundred bucks. Now, tone matters more than money to me, but I tend to love the tone of crappy amps just as much as high enders, so I’d feel like a stooge dropping that kind of money on an amp. Especially since I play them and would ruin the collectable value of anything by gigging with it).
3. It needs to be an amp that another guitar player would say, “What the fuck is that?

1940s Fidelity Amplifier

So what did I buy? A late 1940’s FIDELITY, of course. Haven’t heard of FIDELITY? Me, neither. But it met the needs. It was very light an easy to carry. As for meeting my volume needs…it was VERY quiet. Dead quiet. As in, silent. So, that part needed some work. Sixty bucks. Not bad. Less than an assembly-line stomp box. It looked like a 50’s space heater in crap brown with tootsie roll brown and vanilla cream paint and chicken head knobs. Score, Daddio

When it showed up, my wife shook her head. This can be a good sign or a bad sign…it depends on how it turns out down the road. Sometimes, I fix these things up and make lots of money and buy her a new bass. Sometimes, I lose money and crap piles up in the garage. I try to remind her often of the former and play down the latter as much as possible.

1940s Fidelity Amplifier

Anyway, this little beast didn’t need much work. This is one of the pleasures of working on a Champ-style practice amp. They have so little in them, there’s simply not much to go wrong or fix. This one, it turned out, only needed a filter cap job, a new preamp tube and one coupling cap. Piece o’ cake. Twenty minutes of soldering and one $4.00 7F7 tube later, I had a monster little Champ-esque amplifier (actually it sounds a little more like the Gibson Skylark than a Champ, but that’s cool by me) for under $80.

1940s Fidelity Amplifier

Quirks? Some. The old Rola was kind of tired, so I saved it and put in a new Jensen Mod I had laying around (not a bad little speaker, but not a vintage Jensen, either…expect a future upgrade). The 7F7’s are supposed to be very loud and micro-phonic (which was why we don’t tend to see them in guitar amps after the mid-late 40’s), but this one sounds just fine. And they’re cheap, so it’s not like you’re hunting down good EL86’s or anything. Also, one thing that took some getting used to was the tone knob is backwards by contemporary standards. That is, turn the creamy chickenhead to the left, you get more treble (and more drive and volume). Turn to the right, and it gets very bassy and like a chewy jazzy tone.

The other cool thing about these old non-collectable brands? A modification isn’t sacrilege. I added a “speaker out” jack to drive a bigger cab (using a practice amp cranked through 4X12’s is too much fun…a little amp can move a lot of air in a big cab) and a “line out” jack to use this as a pre-amp with a bigger power amplifier at shows.

1940s Fidelity Amplifier

Where can you find one? My guess is that FIDELITY was a housebrand (like Holiday or Silvertone), and these might be Valcos or some other maker. But I have since seen 2 or 3 of them on Ebay, not going for too much money. Also, there are several other brands (and no-brands) that look much like these, so keep your eyes peeled, don’t pay too much, and score a little gem that will have other guitar players saying “what the hell is that” and have your significant other shaking his or her head when the UPS/Fedex people come knocking.

Rob’s Crazy eBay Finds: 1940’s Fidelity Amplifier from MyRareGuitars.com

Stacks & Stacks of Marshall Amps

Now let us address the scourge of the alleged soundman, you know that angry guy in the sweatpants behind the soundboard that keeps telling you to turn down. Well you know what my fellow guitar slingers, don’t do it. If we all refuse en masse to turn down it will cause a groundswell where soundman across the globe will know that we ain’t turning down. And when I say turn down I don’t mean a smidge I mean to where they are happy (yeah right) and we sound like we are coming out of an AM radio. This whole concept of low volume from your amp and “I will make you big out front” is a joke. You can only amplify the sound coming from the amp and if it sounds thin? Then guess what? You will too.

Now I know when there are exceptions, like the time I saw a very famous multi guitar band from the 70’s play Madison Square Garden and they were all playing blackface Deluxe Reverbs, and the bass player was using a silver face Bassman. And they sounded awesome, but there were extenuating circumstances to this scenario. First off they were using a blackface Deluxe Reverbs, one of the best sounding amps in the history of guitar amplification. Secondly, they had a state of the art sound and monitor system, manned by the best live sound engineers money could rent. And last but not least they were all matched amps played by master musicians who respected each other, and could play dynamically.

So, should we bring a Marshall 100 watter to a club date? Probably not. I really believe that a 2×10, a 2×12 or a low wattage 4×10 will be more then enough to move some air around and get a good sound. I believe a 30. 40 or 50 watt amp is plenty for a club or bar gig as we know that you have to crank an amp to get a good tone. That is a pretty undisputable fact sorry to say.

Bring two small amps and run them with an AB switch. You can get a great tone from a very small Champ sized amp but, you will not be able to hear it well enough unless its pumped through the monitors but you must remember monitors are not voiced for guitar and it will color your sound and could impact your decisions you make onstage concerning your sound.

I will also like to state that I think that 4×12 cabinets do not work well for low wattage applications (anything 50 watts or lower). Leave your 4×12 cab at home unless it’s a big venue because you will not be able to drive it adequately to get a good tone. I have seen many bands over the years using 4×12’s in clubs for the “effect” and aside from the visual effect the only other effect I could come up with was a thin sound. Another good idea is to install tilt back legs on any amp you intend to gig with, it will give you a real picture of what you sound like, We all tend to set our amps to what sounds good to us, but what about what the audience hears. I do a little thing occasionally in my live show where I sit on the edge of the stage (for effect) and play some blues, it usually grabs the audiences attention and also made me realize how harsh sounding my rig was.

My story goes like this, when I play a club or any venue and a soundman/ club owner tells me I am a bit too loud I smile and say thank you. They are usually confused by this statement and walk away but, when questioned further I always say “I am trying to play a bit too loud”. When and if questioned further I will say “you are paying me to play guitar and I want to make sure you are getting your money’s worth.”

I will say at this point as a professional guitar player you must always keep an eye on the patrons, if any person is holding there ears or leaving you should turn down. We all want people to enjoy our music. And usually if the audience wants you to play softer you should, and if it really bothers you to play softer then just do not play there any more. Personally I believe that pleasing people with music is our number one priority.

Now having said that here are a few general suggestions:

#1. You must always bring a back up amp.
I could not personally feel comfortable at a gig knowing that if my amp goes south I will not be able to play. The show must go on! My suggestion is that you should bring a smaller but similar sounding back up amp. This will serve you three ways, one you will have a back up just in case your main amp fails, second is that it will be easier to carry and pack as it is smaller, and last but not least just in case you will have to play softer, you will be able to and still get a nice tone.

#2. You should tailor your sound around the level of the drums.
Listen to great rock records and see where the guitar is mixed in comparison to the drums. If your drummer is a tasty feel kind of cat adjust volume accordingly, nothing is more annoying than a good drummer covered up by an inappropriate guitar or bass player. Remember it”s not all about you its all about the music! If your drummer is a banger, get right there with him. Your db’s should be directly related to his, the only difference is the eq. Your eq should be in the high to low mids (unless you play the kind of metal guitar that calls for that ultra low eq), and his should be lows (kick and toms) and highs (snare and cymbals) with the bass player rounding out the sound with some ultra lows. Here’s a little advice for those of you doing your own sound, do not clutter the eq’s. What I mean here is do not shelve more then one instrument in a certain eq range as this will make them both disappear. Try your best to run as much stuff as you can through your board flat (eq) and let the natural texture of the individual instruments come through. The same thing goes for graphic and parametric eqs. The best thing about parametrics is that they are not usually set to look cool (the famous graphic eq “V’ ooohhhh). The worst thing about parametrics are that literally nobody knows how to use one.

Thanks for all your responses to my columns. Horst the Maranello lover revealed that my recent list of perfect guitars did not have one European or Asian made guitar..sorry my fellow guitar lovers, not much experience with those formidable axes, but guess what? I think I am going to have to get one of those Hofner Presidents.

That’s it for now…..Joey says “don’t turn down”!!!

I Play a Bit Too Loud? Thank You! from MyRareGuitars.com

So, then, let’s say you’ve got your wonderful freakazoid guitar collection underway. What’s the next move for you’ You like collecting gear, but you think those folks who spend three grand on a 75 Strat are loons of the highest order. Why, for that kind of money, a sane person could buy ten guitars! (well, sorta sane, anyway) So you got a few offbeat guitars and now you need something to plug your Guyatones and Kawais and Kapas and Airlines and so on into. What’s the point of getting such a strange one-of-a-kind guitar and then plugging it into some amp that anyone could wander into a guitar center and buy off the rack. So, where do you go from here?

Here’s a bunch of oddball and wonderful off-brand sleeper amplifiers you may or may not have heard of. For each brand/model, I’ll include some of the features (the Skinny), the tube complement and the ease or lack of ease for a DIY-er to work on the amp (Geek Love), a sound comparison to a more familiar amplifier (Sounds Like), and what you might expect to pay, and what price would be an absolute steal (Price). I’ll also include a section on why you should want this amp, and why you might want to stay away from this amp. (Why You Want This Amp/Why You Don’t Want This Amp).

Here is a group of, in my opinion, seriously undervalued amps. Even the priciest of them are still, in these times of inflated value for anything tube or tweed, well worth the coin.

Univox U45 Guitar Amplifier

1) Univox U45 and Univox U60 Guitar Amplifiers

Got the blues, but don’t want your wallet to have them too’ Check out the Univox U45 and U60 models.

• The Skinny: These are relatively simple amps with a very basic control panel (Volume and Tone and only Speed for the Tremolo). Most of these are housed in a black tolex cab that holds a single 12″ speaker (usually a ceramic Jensen). With a silver grille cloth and the Univox (or Lafayette) logo, these are good looking, if somewhat aesthetically pedestrian amps. Very lightweight – super for recording or a small jam where you need a nice bluesy overdrive at low volume. Not the most versatile amp on the list, but a very cool one-trick pony at, often, a great price.
• Geek Love: Both these amps use the seldom-seen 6MB8 output tubes. The U45B’s I’ve seen have two 12AX7’s for preamps, while the U60’s have had either two or one 12AX7. They are low powered (8-12 watts) amps, with a great smooth overdrive with crisp highs and woody, warm mids and lows. Cathode-bias, non-feedback loop amps allow for plenty of spongy tone and singing sustain. These are Printed Circuit Board (PCB) amps from the late 60’s and early 70’s, but they are incredibly simple in their layout and they are a surprising joy to work on. Well laid out. Simple wiring to follow (for a PCB amp). Plenty of space for upgraded Sprague Atom, or other high end, Electrolytic caps. This means either you’ll enjoy working on them, or your tech will have fewer headaches, which translates (or should) into lower repair and maintenance bills.
• Sounds Like: Well, the 6MB8 output tubes have a tone all their own. They are a little bit like a slightly rounder, mellower EL84. They reach overdrive and grit a little sooner, at lower volumes. Think of a low(er) powered Vox AC-15…the same woody warmth when overdriven.
• Price: Expect to pay between $150-$250 for a U45 or U60 in great condition. They’re very lightweight, which makes them cheaper on shipping if you see it on Ebay (should be 25-30 bucks anywhere in the lower 48, slightly more north of the border), or an on-line dealer. Anything under $150 for a good working model is a steal. Your friends will drool when they hear the tone you get out of this little unsung brand.
• Why You Want It: You get great tone for well under $300? You need an answer for that? They generally have 20 watt Jensen Special Design speakers in them that weren’t pushed hard (due to the power of the amp). A small gig (to be fair, a VERY small gig or, for bigger shows, a mic’d through a PA gig)/practice/recording amp that’s easy to repair for this price? Why not?
• Why You Don’t Want It: The tremolo rarely works in these, and when it does, it’s anemic and only the frequency (SPEED) is controllable. You will need a good tremolo pedal if you use that function. Plus, you’ll need a reverb pedal, if you want it, since this has none. The 6MB8 tubes are strange, but they can be found NOS and they won’t kill you, price-wise (30 bucks a matched pair seems to be the on-line price). Stay away, in general from NATIONAL tubes. They are the easiest to find, and there’s probably a reason for this. I haven’t heard a good set yet of them in the 6MB8s OR the 7189A’s. Another minor negative about the Univox models: While you can never tell about such things, they show no signs of being collectable. So, buy a player, not a collector. None of these factors are prohibitive, but they are things to consider if you’re negotiating for one of these little gems.

Silvertone 1482 Guitar Amplifier

2) Silvertone Amp 1472 and Silvertone Amp 1482

Since the boutique amp boom of the early 90’s, one of the most commonly copied circuits is the 50’s Fender Tweed Deluxe. And while this IS an awesome amp, one absolutely worthy of copying, there are several low-budget funky alternatives for those who love the bluesy grind of a 6V6 circuit. The most frequently seen, and hence, easiest to find are the Silvertone Amp 1472 and 1482 Model. AKA the “TV set” model. A new boutique version of this general circuit can cost you around a grand and up. Heck, a KIT for this amp goes from $400, and more. And those prices are legit – there are cool parts in them. But why not buy one of these models and get your hands dirty for under two hundred bucks and get that Link Wray Rumble tone on the cheap?

• The Skinny: Two channels, which are bridge-able with a patch cord for super thick sound. Volume, tone controls for each channel, and speed and depth for the Tremolo (foot-switch for the Tremolo, which is frequently lost on old models). No Reverb. A single 12″ alnico speaker, frequently a Jensen or Oxford, depending on the year. This little guy, made by Danelectro, comes in a small, portable and astoundingly light cabinet. Covered in a gray wallpaper-ish material, and front-facing controls running vertically down the side, this is one cool looking amp.
• Geek Love: This is where it earns the nickname of a poor person’s Tweed Deluxe, even if that’s stretching the facts a bit, since it the transformers and the rectifiers are quite different. Still, it does have a lot of the same tone, as a result of the cathode-biased 6V6’s in a non feedback loop amp. Two12AX7s for preamp, 6X4 rectifier, 6AU6 (for tremolo) and two 6V6’s for output. These amps are very easy to work on, well laid out and astoundingly simple for a gigable amp. A cool geek factor is that, as a result of the way the amp is laid out in back, you can sub 6L6’s in the output for a little more headroom, and the trannys seem to be able to handle the extra heat nicely in these models.
• Sounds Like: Well, like their reputation (and nickname) says, they sound a lot like a Tweed Deluxe, though a bit looser and wilder. Like the Tweed Deluxe spunky, unkempt friend. Decent cleans at low volume. Nice bottom, rich, textured mids. But, get the volume up past 11 O’clock, and these amps really start to show their stuff. Great overdrive – the classic American tube push of the 6V6’s. Just a great, classic blues and garage rock tube sound. Great, deep 60’s style tremolo with a good sweep of speed control. I’ve A/B’d several of these models with a buddy’s 1958 Tweed Deluxe and they handle the comparison well. Are they as well made as the 1958 Fender? Nope, not at all. They’re not as rugged or durable, or well put together. BUT, they are not $2,500, either. Which leads us to:
• Price: You can snag these in excellent condition between $250 and $300. But, only get a minty one if you’re a collector. If you’re a player, these cheap pressed paper cabinets will get dinged so quickly it isn’t funny. So, why pay more if you’re going to use the amp? You can get these in great playing shape frequently in the $150-$225 range (a friend of mine just got one at a Los Angeles pawn shop, hardly the town for bargain pawn deals, for $150). They are cheap to ship, because of the light weight. If you find one in need of minor work (a tune up, new tubes and/or a cap job), you can get a steal in the low $100’s. Just stay away from the ones with rust on the transformers. It happens a lot with these type of amps – possibly because they were quickly forgotten by budding guitarists and left in their parent’s basements and garages for years of quiet neglect.
• Why You Want It: For the price, it’s just a great amp. Actually, for a good amount more, it would still be a great amp. Super for any recording studio (they’re an awesome little harp amp, too) with lush fat cleans at very low volume, and total blues and garage snarl at mid and high volume. Really easy to find tubes, and at this price you can buy a super speaker to replace the original if it’s tired, and get boutique tone well under $400. (It’s a good idea, if it’s in decent shape, to take out the original speaker, anyway. They aren’t made to crank and they’re made of 40 year-old paper. Keep the original in working condition if/when you want to sell it, and it will retain more value). They’re way cool looking, too.
• Why You Don’t Want It: Well, there’s really no reason to not have one of these. BUT, the big strike against them is their cabinet construction, which makes them a dubious choice for touring. And while you should never allow your friends to sit on your amps, these Danos are amps you REALLY don’t want folks sitting on. Crush, kill, destroy.
• See Also: There are several great and affordable vintage amps, made by Danelectro and Valco, that are so similar in sound to the Silvertone 1472 and 1482’s that giving them their own entry here would be redundant, so I’ll give a short list, with some important ways they differ from the above amps.

Harmony 210 Guitar Amplifier Ad

Harmony Model H210 Guitar Amplifier

The Airline (made by Dano) mid-60’s 90813A amp. Much like the 1482 (the guts are the same), but a top mounted control panel, in black tolex-look paper. You can’t fit a 6L6 in these, as a result of the back cab angle, but otherwise, they are the same awesome amp. You can get these, often, in the $200 range. Highly recommended.

The Harmony 210 (made in the late 50’s by Valco). While several Valco models (mostly the SUPRO-labeled ones, as a result, partially of all the Jimmy Page rumored usage on the early Zep albums) are starting to fetch major dough on the vintage market, these Harmonys are still pretty much dirt-cheap. This may be partially as a result of Aspen Pittman’s misinformation about Harmony amps in the latest Tube Amp Book and we should thank him for this. Where else can you get a wood cabinet (mostly, anyway, except for the top) two 6V6 amp with a 12″ alnico Jensen, made by Valco, for under 200 bucks’ These are sweet amps, and they use a 6X5 rectifier, which is cheap and easy to find.

The later model Harmony 306A (in the black paper covering with the blue painted control panel with white chicken-head knobs) was also made by Valco and has the same features with only a 5Y3 rectifier as the difference from the Harmony above. You can get these between $200-300. The Jensen Special Design ceramic speaker is a nice feature – it sings the blues very well.

The best (and most rare) of this cool bunch, though, may be the Valco-made Kay 6V6 amp. These have all of the great sound and features of the amps above, but the added cool factor of a two-tone (cream and red) cabinet and a swirl grille cloth. PLUS, they use the more common (these days) 5Y3 rectifier, which also makes replacing (if you have to) the power transformer easier and cheaper. These go in the $175-275 range. These are frequently mis-labeled as “Airline” amps – if you see a two 6V6 amp with a 12″ speaker that looks like a bigger red and cream version of the familiar, small (and anemic) Kay 703, snag it, no matter what the seller is calling it. Inside, this and the Harmony 306A are the same amp. They sound sweet – and they look like what made have happened if Frigadaire and Studebaker merged and started making amps.

Magnatone M10A Guitar Amplifier

3) Magnatone M10A Guitar Amplifier

Want some more features, but still don’t want to take out a 2nd mortgage for your rocking amp collection? Try the Magnatone M10A. The easiest-to-find of the Magnatone (by this time in the mid 60’s, Estey-owned) suitcase models, these are either some of the ugliest or funkiest amplifier ever made, depending on your take on them.

• The Skinny: This is one of the most well-appointed and versatile tube amps ever made. Both channel one and two have Volume, Treble and Bass controls, plus a three-position switch for ‘Mellow/Bright/Tone Boost.’ Channel One has tube-driven Reverb (control only for Depth) and the truly amazing Magnatone true pitch shift Vibrato (Speed and Depth controls). If you’ve never heard real Vibrato (Fenders and other amps used Tremolo, which is volume shifting, and labeled them Vibrato’only Maggies actually shift pitch) in an amp, it IS a treat.
• The two channels are bridge-able by an input labeled ‘stereo’ which exponentially expands this amp’s versatility. Put channel one on ‘Bright’ (you get the Reverb and Vibrato as long as you’re using channel one…only when channel two is used alone are they not activated), and channel two on ‘Tone Boost’ and you can dial in all kinds of great chime and grind. This is an amp that you can tweak and play around with for hours.
• Reverb and Vibrato are foot-switch able. All this goes into a closed back cabinet that houses a 12′ speaker (I’ve seen Utahs and Oxfords in these, along with Jensen ceramics). There’s an ‘Extension Speaker’ out on the control panel.
• Geek Love: Magnatone is somewhat famous (infamous) for using oddball tubes in their amps (such as the rare, expensive and hard to get 6CZ5’s in the awesome 280 Stereo Vibrato amps from the late 50’s), and this amp is, sadly, no exception. The preamp and reverb driver and recovery tubes are the usual suspects (12AX7’s and 12AU7’s, depending on the application), but the output tubes are the rare 7189A’s in cathode-bias. On the plus side, this is a great sounding tube. It’s the high-voltage sibling of the 6BQ5 (EL84), with a tolerance for a 100 more volts on the plates. An EL84’s on steroids, with a great overdriven sound.
• Inside, this amp is a tech’s nightmare. You may have a qualified tech in your town, but he or she may have never seen a Magnatone. And if they have, they may have seen the more common and simpler 213 and 260’s made by Magna Electronics in Torrance, CA. When the company moved after the Estey purchase, followed, years later by the introduction of these suitcase models, the amps got even more complex. The power supply and solid-state rectifier are in the bottom of the amp. They are connected, via much spaghetti to the chassis, which is housed in the suitcase top. Here, you have a (relatively) complex circuit with plenty of places where things can go wrong. In engineering, it’s always nice to have a simple design that leaves fewer areas where things can break or go wrong. This amp makes you (or your tech and your wallet) pay the price for all of its cool features.
• Sounds Like: Nothing you’ve ever heard, in many of its settings. However, you can get some very British sounds out of this American-made (1964-66) amplifier when you play around with it. Set up properly, these can crank to rival any 18-watt Marshall or Vox AC-15. At lower volumes, you can’t beat this lush (more Ampeg-ish than Fender) Reverb and Vibrato for surf sounds, ambient music or clean country. In between, it gets a nice crunch rhythm. This amp can do anything but metal, and do it well. Really well. And it will look like a mid-sixties Samsonite Luggage bag while doing it, which may or not be a positive for you.
• Price: In mint condition, expect to pay anywhere from $450-$550 for this amp. Beat up cosmetically, you can score them for between $200 and $350. They cost a lot to ship (it’s VERY heavy for a single 12′ combo). And because of their strange and finicky construction, the suitcase models frequently get damaged in shipping. Consider trying to find one locally, but if you get one at an on-line site (auction or shop), make sure they know how to ship an amp (true of all vintage amps, but especially true here).
• Why You Want One: The tone, man, the tone! The Vibrato. You hear this thing, and you’ll want to grab Elwood and Jake and get the band back together. This is simply one of the best-sounding, most versatile amps you’ll ever have the pleasure of playing. Hook it up to an extension cab, let that vibrato and reverb work on you, and get lost. It responds really well to different guitars and pickups and has rich cleans and creamy overdrive. If you’re just going by tone and price, it’s hard to argue against the M10A. And, you’d be one of the few people around who have one, and they are VERY funky looking.
• Why You Don’t Want One: Here’s the rub. Actually, there’s a few rubs involved with this amp. A pair of good, NOS 7189A’s cost at least $50. Sometimes, much more. Techs, many of them, have no idea how to work on a Magnatone (many do, but I’d check with your local people before you buy one). You CAN modify this amplifier to take EL84’s (a MUCH cheaper tube that sounds great in many circuits), but I haven’t heard one that sounds quite as good as it did with the 7189A’s. The Vibrato rarely goes bad in these (a good thing, as the Varistors are hard to get), but the Reverb is temperamental. The whole amp is oddly put together and top-heavy. They get damaged so often in shipping simply because they are not very well designed (two thin aluminum arms carry most of the tension and weight of the top). It has gig power and tone, but it doesn’t like something as simple as a bumpy ride in a car. A Fender Twin, it ain’t.
• I am a huge fan of rugged amps you can treat like the tools they are. I HATE finicky amps that always need attention if you take them out of the house. The fact that I would not get rid of my M10A for anything except 10% above market value speaks volumes for what a beautiful and individual sounding amplifier this is.

Fender Telecaster Guitar & Danelectro Challenger Amp

1950’s Danelectro Challenger Guitar Amplifier

4) 1950’s Danelectro Challenger Guitar Amplifier

Who has ever played in a band with a guitar player would wouldn’t turn down because he (or she, though in my experience, this is sadly just us guys) couldn’t get ‘their tone’? Or, worse, who has BEEN that guitar player (my hand would be raised if I weren’t typing)? It’s an understandable, if annoying, dilemma. You want pure, beautiful, overdriven tone, but you can’t get it unless you amp is really pushed. If you own a Fender Twin Reverb, you may be the most hated person in your band. Want some great gigging tone with an early breakup, yet a lot of punch and a huge bottom’ You want a mid 50’sDanelectro Challenger (from their ‘C’ series). An amp that sounds huge, even at low volume settings.

• The Skinny: Ain’t nothing skinny about this one. If it ate, it would eat nothing but fried stuff and starches. If it could talk, it’ll swear a blue streak. It’s built for comfort and it’s not build for speed and if you want to sound like Hubert Sumlin (and if you don’t, I feel safe in saying, without fear of argument, there is something wrong with you on a fundamental level, my friend), you might want to try this amplifier out. Two channels, but they are independent and can’t be bridged. Hard wired footswitch Tremolo (mis-labeled, of course, ‘Vibrato’). Volume, Bass and Treble on each channel. Two inputs per channel. A 15′ alnico speaker. That’s it. This is a set it and forget it amp’control your grit, grease and cleans from your guitar’s volume and tone, and just play all night.
• Geek Love: Here is where it gets really interesting. A four 6V6 output section gives this amp lots of snarl with more power and oomph than most of us are used to hearing from 6V6 circuits (which usually come in pairs). Preamps are a 12AX7 and a 6SN7. Tremolo is driven by a metal-cased12SJ7. Rectification comes courtesy of a 5U4 tube. The insides of this amp are a little clustered and messy. It’s point-to-point wired, but not as well laid out as, say a Fender or an Ampeg of the same period. It is, however, spacious and pretty simple and easy to work on. An issue of working on this amp is that the chassis is rather awkwardly mounted to the cabinet, and sometimes it feels as if you could use three hands to get it in and out of the amp. But, overall, it’s pretty straightforward and the tubes are not very hard to find, and the guts are pretty simple to service.
• Sounds Like: It sounds a little bit like any number of the Valco or Danelectro models with two 6V6’s but, with the doubling of output tubes, plus the 15′ speaker, MUCH bigger and nastier. This may be THE sleeper blues club/gig amp out there. At low volumes, you get a rich, thick, warm and bouncy clean sound with great response and dynamics. Turn up the volume (or ‘Amplification’ as it is labeled), and the 6V6’s really get going to the point where this has the rich, classic rock bigness and breakup of the Fender Bassman at a lower, more club and band-friendly volume. Plug a single coil guitar into it, you get chimey, crisp highs, underneath the bluesy breakup. Plug a P90 or humbucker guitar into it, and stand back and listen to the thick, luscious sustain. This isn’t a guitar that’s going to do surf or clean jazz, but for rock, blues, fusion, garage rock or snarly Dave Allen-style instrumentals, man it’s hard to beat. There’s not an amp out there that sounds like this one. The Tremolo is lush and swirling. Set it all the way up and feel the floor move, it’s got so much bottom. Lovely.
• Price: It’s pretty rare, so it’s hard to get a market sense of this as easily as you could an amp that is more frequently seen o the used market. However, in good working shape, expect to pay $350-500 for this amp. Think about it’that’s less that you could probably grab a Peavey Delta Blues for, and it’s a much better amplifier, and one that will increase in value over the years.
• Why You Want It: Well, it’s always nice to have a variety of amps (I think you should have probably one for every guitar, on average, but this is bad math for a successful relationship and home life). And it’s not too common (other than some old Bell and Howell PA’s from the 50’s, or some super expensive Jim Kelly amps from the 80’s) to have a four 6V6 power section, and nothing sounds quite like it. Add that to the 15′ speaker, and you have a unique tonal experience with this amp. The dynamics are fantastic. This is the kind of an amplifier that reminds you these amplifier gizmos are not just things that make instruments louder; they ARE instruments. An amp that responds to the player’s touch is a beautiful thing to feel and hear. This is one of those amps. It’s incredibly lightweight for a large(r) amp. Plus, it looks radical. Fake brown leatherette paper, with a three inch gold stripe around the perimeter, and brown burlap grille cloth all add up to a piece that looks as good in the living room as it sounds on the stage or in the studio.
• Why You Don’t Want It: Great tone, cool looks, a hip factor that’s hard to match (who else has one’ And it looks funkier than Pee Wee Herman’s bike!)…what’s not to love’ Well, the big snag might be its…err… PAPER cabinet. That’s right. Pressed paper! So, if you find one still in one piece after fifty-plus years, consider yourself extremely lucky and find a woodworker or cabinet maker who can copy its simple lines and put the chassis into some wood, and THEN you may take it on the road. As it stands, it would be a tricky and dangerous thing to take this amp out for anything more than a local gig. The good news here is that most weekend woodworkers could copy this cabinet, it’s so very basic. Also, the chassis mounts on four small points, and most of these I have seen have weakened metal on the chassis by the screws. Not the end of the word (it can be re-enforced), but, clearly, a design flaw.

Montgomery Ward 6L6 Guitar Amp Head

5) Montgomery Ward / Valco Two and Four 6L6 Amp Heads

In the wake of Jack White and the White Stripes success, the price of the Silvertone 1484 Twin Twelve (with the two 6L6’s and the 2X12′ cabinet) and the 1485 (with the four 6L6’s and the 6X10′ cabinet) have gone through the roof. They may be worth the prices they’re commanding, but they are no longer sleepers or unknowns on the used market. So, what’s a gear freak to do? Look to the Montgomery Ward/Valco two and four 6L6 heads. These are great amps, somewhat rare, but if and when you see them, they can be had for some really great prices.

• The Skinny: Two channels. Volume, Bass and Treble on each. Depth for Reverb. Speed and Intensity on the Tremolo. All housed in a really cool looking head that has three lights (and a separate switch just for the lights!) that run across the top of the head like a 60’s dashboard. The knobs are huge (silver-dollar sized faces), and with the lights on, they are easy to see and set on a darkened stage. I have never seen one of these with its original speaker cab, but I have run them into cabs with two twelve inch speakers and into cabs with fifteens, and had great luck.
• Geek Love: Both amps (the 40 watt and the 80 watt) use three 12AX7’s in the preamp, a 12AU7 for the Tremolo, and a rare choice of a 6V6 to drive the surprisingly good Reverb circuit. The layout inside of these amps is stunning. Really beautifully structured and very easy to work on. Much better than one might expect from an amp that could be ordered out of a Montgomery Ward Catalog. The particle board case for the head, however, tends to get stripped by the wood screws if it’s been taken in and out too much and/or jarred hard on the road. The smaller head has the two 6L6’s for output while the larger one has four 6L6’s.
• Sounds Like: Well, if the Silvertone 1482 is the poor person’s Tweed Deluxe, these heads are the poor person’s Dual Showman head. These amps offer huge bottom and tons of clean (unusual in the bargain tube amp business) that would be positively great for the surf band on a budget. Try plugging your Eko or your Rangemaster into this and see the cool/rare envy pop in the crowd. Surf will be up, but it will be odd.
• Can you get these into overdrive? Well, yes, the two 6L6 version, at any rate. But it’s a very tight-bottomed, snappy and crisp high-powered overdrive (partially as a result of the solid state rectifier). The 80 watt version of this amp will stay clean until your neighbor’s neighbors are begging you to turn it down and calling the local authorities. This makes it quite the sleeper for the club-sized bass head, as well.
• The big surprise on these amps, as alluded to earlier, is the reverb. Anybody who has owned (and loved) the Danelectro-made Silvertone 1484s and 1485s knows that, great as they are, they have some of the cheesiest reverb ever produced. Their reverb pan is the side of a small tissue box. And it sounds kinda awful. Not even really usable as an odd effect, even after you have long given up on it as a useful reverb. These Montgomery Ward heads, however, use Hammond-Gibbs reverb pans (2 and 3 spring) that are driven by a 6V6 tube and they have a wonderful depth and texture. Very cool. Also, the tremolo has a harder clipping than the smooth tube driven tremolo common in the early to mid-60’s. A monster depth accompanies a wide speed control. Very interesting sounds available from this amp, and a killer rockabilly or surf tube amp.
• Price: While it’s become hard to touch the Silvertone heads in good shape for under $275, their Montgomery Ward counterparts can be had in the $100-200 range with some regularity for the two 6L6 model and a little higher (50 bucks) for the four output tube model.
• Why You Want It: Your surf band is starting to play bigger clubs and you need to Dick Dale the crowd into submission with your mega glissando. If you want to feel it under your Chuck Taylors when your descend-throb that low E-string, but you want gas money left over to get home from the show, this is the amp for you. Plus, it has that cool light-up panel on the front. You can toss in blinking X-mass lights and have a light show while you play. Snazzy. Also, it sounds, like many great clean tube amps do, wonderful with pedals in front of it. This amp likes pedals quite a bit, so if you’re the kind of a player who uses their amp as a pallet for your sound, rather than as the only aspect of your sound (other than the guitar), this might be for you.
• Why You Don’t Want It: Not a lot of negatives. If you don’t like it, the resale value blows, but that only matters if you paid a lot for it. The particle board construction was a cost-cutting measure for a reason: it’s cheap. And, as a result, it breaks easily. But at this price, hey, that’s why they sell duct tape. If you find one in the hundred-dollar range, hell, buy two. Anytime you can get a stylin’ vintage tube amp for less than a boutique pedal, well, you have to buy it, don’t you? Don’t you?

Silvertone 1464 Solidstate Twin Twelve Guitar Amp Head

6) Silvertone 1464 SolidState Twin Twelve Guitar Amplifier

The last amp on the list for now is where I turn away from the tubes and check out the solid state of the nation address. While, in general, tube amps are the thing for vintage tone, it’s true that solid state done right is better sounding than tubes done wrong. Also, if you loved the sound of the first Velvet Underground album, or many of the songs on the Nuggets compilations, you’ve been tapping those fingers on your steering wheel while listening to and groovin with transistors. So, my last amplifier here is a name you’ve heard, but maybe not a model many of us have played, the Silvertone 1464 SolidState Twin Twelve.

• The Skinny: Two channels, one with reverb and tremolo. Controls for volume, bass and treble on each. A lightweight, simply laid out head that tucks, like its tube amp brethren, into the cabinet that houses two ceramic-magnet Jensens.
• Geek Love: Well, there’s not much to love for tech geeks here. SolidState technology offers fewer areas for modification and whatnot. On the up side, not much tends to go wrong with these (unlike, say, the first Fender Solid State offerings, which were notorious for not working and equally notorious for their shrill sound when they did). The filter caps DO go bad (just like on the tube amps), and they are pretty easy to get to and replace.
• Sounds Like: See above. Listen to the guitar on ‘Run, Run, Run’ or ‘Waiting For My Man’ by the Velvet Underground, and you’re hearing the swampy trashy overdrive of the Silvertone (and a solid state Vox bass amp, according to most reports). It’s edgier than most tube amps, but these Silvertones are NOT without warmth, by any means. The tone controls are very responsive, and the amps are lovely through their clean range for Jazz, Country, or Surf music. And, with a good pedal in front of them, you can get some great crunch from them.
• Price: The heads show up a lot on eBay and on-line sellers (and pawnshops), and they don’t command mucho dinero. You should be able to catch a head in really good condition for $100 or under. With a minty cab (and, remember, those twin twelve Jensens work with your tubes heads, too…good to have around), you’re still talking about under two hundred bucks. How cool is THAT?
• What You Want It: Like I said, the cab is a good thing to have. It’s also really great to run this along side a tube amp and either A/B foot-switch them for clean and overdrive, OR just run them both together for fat, rich complex sound. Too cool. And while I don’t think many players would choose solid state as their main sound, it’s good to have a variety of tones at your fingertips. Plus, the price is right. For now.
• Why You Don’t Want It: Well, they aren’t worth much on the resale market, so you may find yourself with an old solid state head with a bad rep (deserved or not) that is hard to get rid of. But that only applies if you want to get rid of it, which I don’t think most folks would, especially if they got it for around a hundred and fifty clams.
• A minor negative (seeing a trend here with these cheapies): The cab is an odd combination of particle board and pressed paper. If Fenders, Traynors and Hiwatts are the brick houses of the amplifier world that no amount of huffing and puffing can bring down, well, under minimal stress these Dano made cabs are pretty much like a trailer park in a hurricane. They’re not made for the rough life’so baby them a little bit, and you’ll get many more years out of them.

So, there you have it. Some affordable amplifiers that will go well with your oddball guitars. And they will keep your friends (and your drummer) shaking their heads and saying, ‘A new amp’ I thought you had an amp’ Why do you need two (or three, four, five, etc….whatever number your sickness has progressed to.)’ Tune up, plug in, drop out. Enjoy.

Oddball Amps: Univox, Silvertone Amp, Harmony, Danelectro, Magnatone & More from MyRareGuitars.com

Now the next question you may ask is, “are there any guitars that will cut through coming from one of these Tweed amps?” I say yes, plug a Strat in that same Pro and see how awesome it sounds, thick yet trebly.

So the point of this column is, the choice of guitars is a primary decision – I don’t think there are many players out there saying “I wanna play a Twin Reverb what guitar should I get?” – and the amplifier choice is key in getting the sound you want. I am sure that there are some guitar strummers out there who would embrace the potential “mismatch” in guitar and amp symmetry, to assist in them finding there own voice. To this I say Cheerio! Always seek your own sound. Sometimes I believe that playing a Tele through a Twin Reverb can be a potentially intimidating experience as so many great guitar players have that combo as part of their signature sound.

So here are a few suggestions that seem to work for me.

Fender Vibrolux Amp (Blackface)

#1: Fender Blackface Vibrolux amp and most Gibson equipped guitars especially a Les Paul, an SG, or any ES series guitar.

This is a great combo for rock, blues, country, pop and even jazz at a low volume. This was originally brought to my attention by my friend and fellow Vermonter John Sprung (knower of all Fender amplifier lore, etc). And as always he was right, this combo sound great!

#2: Fender Brownface tremolo-equipped amp and a Stratocaster. This is a sound from the gods, an incredibly thick, full, hypnotic sound, not too dissimilar to Jimi’s sound using the Uni-Vibe but, I feel a more organic sound than even that striking sound. I do believe that when you start to overdrive this set-up from the front end with a pedal you do lose some of the clarity and basic integrity of this sound. If you don’t have a Brownface Fender and don’t want to change your primary amp you are now using just to get this sound, you might want to check out the Victoria Tremverb, it’s a tweed free standing unit ala the Fender Reverb unit but has the Brownface tremolo circuit also.

1974 Marshall 18-watt combo amp

#3: Marshall 18-watt combo amp and a Les Paul. Not much else to say here really, this sound will absolutely blow you away, it’s the sound we all marveled at on those early Clapton/ Peter Green recordings. I know a lot of you are saying that’s the “Bluesbreaker” sound and yes you are right it is but, I believe you can only get that sound from a hand-wired Bluesbreaker combo.

The new Reissue Marshall 1974x HW is the absolute balls! I own three of these and cannot tell you how happy I am with them. Get one!

Fender Twin Reverb Amp (Blackface)

#4: Fender Blackface Twin Reverb amp and a Fender Telecaster. Clean, toppy and true, baby. Your technique will show through with this set-up like no other. If you are confident and want to be heard this is true test. And please don’t fool yourself into thinking that this is a country exclusive combination, because it is not, ask Mike Bloomfield. Those of you familiar with his guitar lineage will know that before the great Bloomfield went to the “Burst” he played a Tele through a Twin for years. Again I will tell you that this set-up will work for blues, rock, country and yes, even jazz.

If you are looking for this sound in a more manageable context try the “Baby Twin” the BF Pro Reverb instead. It will sound similar but break up a bit easier, and a bit more “club owner friendly.”

Vox AC-30 Guitar Amp

#5: Vox AC-30 amp and the Rickenbacker 12-string and the Gretsch Chet Atkins Models. Yeah I know another no-brainer, but how could I speak on the guitar-amp relationship without discussing the perfect one. As a foolish young man I was heard to say on occasion “imagine if the Beatles had used Fender amps and Gibson guitars instead of those god awful sounding Gretsch’s.” Oh boy was that a moment of genius, heh?

The AC-30 and its Top Boost circuit helped the Gretsch cut through so well on those recordings while still remaining full and complete sounding across the frequency range of the guitar (a reoccurring theme in this column I’d say).

Now onto the Rick 12 and the ¾ scale 325 model that John Lennon favored in the early Beatle days. Both of these guitars were equipped with what has been called the “toaster pickups”, These pickups did not have a lot of output which only enhanced the “jangly” sound we all came to love back then. The AC-30 embraced this aspect and produced a clean but yet again strong sound with not much in the bass end but with plenty of treble and mids. Another seldom ignored aspect of this sound was the fact that the Ricks came with flatwound strings and were smart enough to supply the Lads with replacements.

Just a couple of quickies for you.

• Polytone Mini-Brute and a Gibson ES 175 (Joe Pass sound, but you can’t buy his technique, sorry!)
• Magnatone tremolo amp with a Stratocaster (if it’s good enough for Buddy Holly its good enough for me)
• Any cheapo hand wired amp from the early 60’s (Valco, Supro, Kalamazoo, take your pick) with a Danelectro lipstick pickup outfitted solid body guitar.
• And last but not least, a Tweed Fender Champ and any quality solid body guitar, cranked up to 10 baby!!!!

Feel free to email me some of your faves and I will include thrm in future columns.

Amplifiers: The Real Voice of the Electric Guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

Rickenbacker 360/12 Old Style 12-String Electric Guitar

For me, it all started with the two Godfathers of the electric 12 string: George Harrison of the Beatles and Roger McGuinn of The Byrds. Obviously, the first ingredient is a great 12 string. The Granddaddy of them all is the Rickenbacker 12 string.

Ricks have been handmade in the same factory in Santa Ana, California for many years and if you can find a dealer that sells and stocks Rickenbacker, you will pay thousands of dollars and you may end up waiting many months for the model of your dreams. I waited 8 months for my 360/12 Old Style when I bought it in 1990.

If you play in a weekend band or jam with your friends, you may find that the electric 12 string, once you have done all of the mandatory Beatles, Byrds, Animals, Who, Tom Petty, R.E.M., and Smiths tunes, has a rather limited use for the rest of your repertoire. Or, maybe not. If you’re like me, you’d happily play the electric 12 all night!

12-String Guitarist: David Love & His Rickenbacker 12-string

Crank up the input gain, compress the bejeezuz out of your 12 string and jangle away!

Tone Secret Number One: Compression!

George Harrison’s great 12 string tone came from a combination of three things: his matchless technique, the venerable Vox AC 30, and the Altec limiter that was in the Abbey Road studios. The Vox, with its all-tube EL 84 platform and its GZ34 rectifier gives any guitar that creamy, brown, compression sustain and chime but it really sparkles when you play an electric12 through it.

The Altec limiter is an old tube-type studio compressor/limiter that squishes the sound at the mixing console and simply enhanced the sound of those old AC 30’s.

Roger McGuinn of The Byrds has said that his tone came from recording his Rickenbacker directly into the console and running it through not one, but two Pultec Limiters at the same time! Listen to the opening figure of “Mr.Tambourine Man” and you’ll hear those compressors squeezing away!

Now I know many of you don’t have George’s or Roger’s technique (neither do I), or access to old AC 30’s (that can cost upwards of $5,000 for collectible examples) or old pieces of studio gear like Altec or Pultec limiters, but you can achieve the same effect with a good quality stomp box compressor. My personal favourite is the Diamond Compressor made here in Canada but any good compressor will do: Keely, Ross, Analog Man, Barber, MXR DynaComp, and the old standby BOSS CS-2 or 3.

Tone Secret Number Two: Flatwounds!

I discovered this Tone Secret the day I got my Rickenbacker 12. I had played other makes of electric 12’s before but they had never produced “that sound” that my Rick had. What was different about it? The single coil pickups that come standard on a Rick? The way Rickenbacker arranged the strings with the root string on top and the octave string underneath?

Both of these things had an influence on the way it sounded but the most important difference to me was the strings. They were not round wound like 99% of the strings that are on the market these days: they were flat wound!

Back when George and Roger were young men (1964), and before the late Ernie Ball started making round wound light gauge guitar strings in California, almost everybody played flat wound strings – that’s what was widely popular and available at the time. Round wounds were available but it wasn’t until The Shadows made them popular that there was a demand for them in Europe. The best flat wound strings in the world came from Germany (and still do) and were sold under the brand names of Pyramid and Thomastik.

Rickenbacker in California was buying Pyramids from Germany at the time (presumably because of the relationship they enjoyed with West German music retailers who were selling Rickenbacker guitars) so that was the string that was being installed on Rickenbackers from the California factory in early ’63 and ’64. So, the sound you hear on Beatles, Byrds, and The Who recordings – those are flat wound strings! The great Pete Townsend refers to them as “tape wound”. He won’t play his 12 string with anything else but!
Pyramid strings are still available to this day (you can find them on the Internet) and Rickenbacker still sells their Number 95404 Compressed Medium Round Wound.

(ground wound) set for about $20.00 a set. I buy them by the box of 12 from a store in New York. I prefer the Rick strings: just a tad brighter than Pyramids.

Round wound strings on an electric 12 string sound like doo-doo. Too crashy and too clangy. Flat wounds or ground round wounds are the way to go if you want “that sound”. If you can’t find Rickenbacker strings where you live, your local music store probably sells or can order D’Addario Chrome singles in a flat wound with which you can assemble your own 12 string set.

The string gauge shipped on every new Rickenbacker is as follows from low to high:

• .042/.026
• .034/.020W
• .026/.013plain
• .020wound/.010
• .013/.013
• .010/.010.

12-String Guitarist: David Love & His Rickenbacker 12-string

Tone Secret Number Three: Use a light gauge pick!

Try it! It works! A medium is too stiff and , in my opinion, “sends” too much signal to the pickup. I have found that with a light gauge pick, you can strum harder but still have a sound that doesn’t break up from string distortion (over strumming).

That kind of vibe (string distortion) works great for, say, a PRS through a Dual Rectifier but not for the sweet chimey strings on your 12 string. I keep a medium and a thin pick in my back pocket whenever I’m on stage depending on whether it’s a 12 string song or a 6 string song.

The great Colin Cripps of Hamilton, Ontario, revealed this Tone Secret to me many years ago. Colin is the guitar player/composer/producer of bands like Crash Vegas, Junkhouse, The Jim Cuddy Band, and Kathleen Edwards.

Tone Secret Number Four: Get your 12-string set up!

Find yourself a good guitar technician and get him or her to set up your 12 string.

The #1 complaint I hear from new 12 string players is that they put the guitar down because it’s too difficult to play.

The 12 string, by its design, is a different and difficult instrument to play because basically you are stuffing 12 strings into the same real estate as 6 strings. Players with small hands (like me) don’t find a problem especially with Rickenbackers, which have notoriously narrow necks.

A good guitar tech will straighten the neck as well as it can possibly can be – this is really important. He/she may also suggest that the frets be “dressed”, polished and leveled. This will benefit your 12 string and make it very playable. Ask him/her to set the action as low as possible – this is really important!

Another innovation that Rickenbacker has developed is the 12 saddle tuneomatic bridge, which ensures near-perfect intonation. If your 12 string doesn’t have one, don’t despair. Any good guitar tech worth his or her salt will get your 12 string intonated as close as it can possibly be even if you have a 6 saddle bridge – very important if you want those big jangly chords to be as sweetly in tune as they should be.

A well-set electric 12 string should play like a brand new PRS or (insert your favourite guitar brand here). If it doesn’t, find yourself a new guitar tech!

The best affordable 12-String Guitars

As a professional musician – yes, I’ve got the Vintage AC-30 and the Ricky 12 – hard to see it any other way. However, there is a price to pay for perfection, and therefor II recommend to my guitar-playing friends who jam for fun, to buy an electric 12 that’s a little more affordable than a Rick. There aren’t many electric 12 strings on the market these days but a few models by Eastwood fit the bill very nicely, such as the Eastwood Nashville 12 (discontinued) or the Classic 12.

The Eastwood Classic 12, setting a new standard in price vs. affordability

Mike Robinson from Eastwood consulted with me prior to the development of the Nashville 12. We discussed a variety of options and settled on this style as is was possible to achieve the tone (mini-humbukers) and setup (flat neck, low action) that would make it a “professional” grade instrument at an affordable price. Last month I visited Eastwood Guitars and took the prototype for a test drive. Two big thumbs up…… jangle away!

Currently, though, the hugely popular Eastwood Classic 12 is the model setting the standard for affordable, high-quality 12-strings, and is the best bet if you want to discover the joys of playing a 12-string guitar:

Still want more? Visit the Eastwood Guitars website for a look at their full range of 12-string guitars:

Suggested Listening:

• Mr.Tambourine Man by The Byrds
• I Should Have Known Better by The Beatles
• A Hard Day’s Night by The Beatles
• The Waiting by Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers
• Kicks by Paul Revere and The Raiders
• You Were On My Mind by We Five
• Turn!Turn!Turn! by The Byrds
• Can’t Explain by The Who
• The Kids Are Alright by The Who
• It’s My Life by The Animals

Tone Secrets of the Electric 12-String Guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

Slinky: Link Wray & the Wraymen

Link learned the guitar at the age of nine from a carnie named Hambone, in town with the Barnum and Bailey Circus. They began their friendship when Hambone noticed Link strumming an old acoustic on his parents’ front porch. As an army brat, Link was used to a nomadic lifestyle. By the age of fifteen he was paying twenty dollars a night to sit in with country-great Tex Ritter, so he could continue to learn his craft.

Lacking the technical know-how of the jazz luminaries of the day, TalFarlow and Django Reinhardt being his favorites, and unable to sing due to the loss of a lung to childhood tuberculosis, Link began to experiment with his sound. He tried such original ideas as poking holes in his amplifier speakers to get a new kind of distortion. Teaming with his brother Doug and first cousin Shorty, The Wraymenwere born. Prestigious venues and Top 20 success followed in 1958, when Rumble (actually titled Oddball by Link) made the Charts.

Link Wray

This ushered in the era of the guitar instrumental, and Link stayed ahead of the pack by using unique guitars and the electronics of the day, creating probably one of the first home studios. He called it the Three Track Shack because it was housed in a shed and had only one three-track tape recorder, ;state of the art for the time. By merging chugging blues, surf twang, and psychedelia into a sound that was soulful, irreverent, and individual, Link Wray created a new music. Some people call it Rock and Roll.

A friend of mine had every Link Wray album. My education began by playing each of these albums over and over. So when Link came to town, it was the show I had been waiting. We plotted and planned, bought tickets and then lost them, bought them again. Two nights later we were ready to go. I slicked up my shoes and slimed up my hair in true Rockabilly fashion, donning a western shirt embossed with tigers. My friend was dressed to dazzle in a late 50s ruby red velvet dress and a pair of knee-high stiletto boots.

Link Wray with a Supro Dual Tone Guitar

We arrived as Link roared into Rumble. The thrust and the volume of the song was even more powerful live. Link stood firm and anchored the band with ultra-fuzz arpeggio riffs, keeping the trio in tow. With his lanky lumbering frame, a fierce ponytail, and motorcycle jacket, he hunched into his guitar. It was incredible that the man producing this wall of brute sonic strength was in his seventies. As he roared along, I realized that this timeless music has never been more alive. After Jack the Ripper, Rawhide, and Ace of Spades (some were played twice during the evening), he launched into one of his more way-out songs. He cranked it all the way up and I realized this was probably the last song of the night.

Link Wray concert ticket (October 2000)

My friend and I rushed forward to witness the rollicking rave-up. We slid in next to the stage, and with a wail of his guitar he seemed to play off of us alone, looking our way with an expression of childlike wonder. I figured he had his eye on my lady friend. Then something remarkable occurred. He walked over to face me, continuing to play. As the eyes of a shaman stared into mine, he strummed with his right hand and motioned for me to play the neck. And there I was, dear reader, simultaneously reaping the riffage with the legend himself. As tom toms rolled and cymbals crashed and the electric bass pounded to a climax, Link looked directly at me and nodded as though we had shared an intimate secret. In the next moment he was center stage again, commanding the final surge of power and sound to ecstatic applause. My friend also reveled in the moment, a firsthand witness to a dream come true.

Link Wray on stage

All the greats have come across Link at one point in their musical development. He didn’t live to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but was inducted into its Rockabilly counterpart. Bob Dylan, hearing of Link’s death, covered Rumble last week. Neil Young once said, if he could see any band in the world, he would chose Link Wray and The Wraymen. Simply put, the king is gone, but he is not forgotten.

Post by: Devin Patrick

The Night I Played Link Wray’s Guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

The problem…

Probably every guitar player knows the problem, especially on jam sessions or on jobs with non-professional musicians: You are standing on a small stage or in your practicing room, the band plays well and as loud as they can, the mood and the feeling of the song reaches heavenly highs. The volume knob of your electric guitar is already on 10 and the pedal of your volume pedal is pushed to its maximum already. The speakers of your amp are almost bleeding sweat and tears. You’re not able to control your tone nor the feeling of your notes anymore, playing gets harder and harder and your hands are turning to stone. All you can hear is a wild mess of way too much drum, along whit some misty basslines and your guitar solo disappears into the background of a bad sound mix. Frustration pure for guitar players. Could it be that you have placed your amp in the wrong spot?

Another problem…

Another problem with amps (especially with Fender style amps) are certain high frequencies. They cut through almost everything like a knife cuts through butter. When you’re on stage and you have put your amp against the crowd, people sitting or standing directly in front of your speaker will suffer an unforgettable highs experience that drops out of your amp. Don’t need to mention the problems of the sound engineer to mix a smooth, fine sound out of a band, when certain units/frequencies on stage are louder than the P.A., especially on smaller gigs.

One solution…

Of course, I have seen different amp stands in music stores before. But for bigger ams (like my Fender Bassman), I could not find anything that was sturdy enough or easy to transport. I did not wanted to change the look of my priceless amp by putting some amp holders on it’s sides, which means to drill holes in the side of the amp. I wanted a system I could use with different amps without having the problem of the size or weight of the amp. It had to be sturdy, even on the sometimes unstable stages of small outdoor concerts.

Another solution…

My solution was an easy to build, self-made amp stand. It’s made out of 3 wooden boards and 4 movable angles. Since I use this construction, I always can hear myself properly, which makes playing much easier of course. My engineer (on live gigs) does not have troubles anymore with the sometimes extreme highs, because the speakers look upwards now. And, most important, I can use any of the three amps I own, without changing the look or diminish the worth of my amps by drilling holes.

Homemade Amp Stand

Homemade Amp Stand

Homemade Amp Stand

Homemade Amp Stand

Homemade Amp Stand

Homemade Amp Stand

Homemade Amp Stand

Homemade Amp Stand

The pictures show you how to construct this easy, sturdy amp stand.

Greetings from twangy Switzerland

Post by: Dano, the Catman

Making an Amp Stand from MyRareGuitars.com

Music is Mathematics

There are two basic numbering systems in music. One has to do with the scale, the other with the key.

Let’s look at the numbers relating to the scale first.

There are seven notes in the scale. Simple enough. The order of intervals, or spaces, between these 7 notes is what makes it unique. The formula, as we should all know by now is Tone, Tone, semitone, Tone, Tone, Tone, semitone.

Pythagoras ratios for guitar

Understanding the notes

So our first little bit of math is to understand that from the TWELVE notes of the chromatic scale — all the notes — the scale uses SEVEN, spaced out as described. If there were six notes in the scale, you could imagine them evenly spaced a tone away from each other. But there are seven, so there have to be a couple of semitones thrown in.

(These seven notes by the way, weren’t simply chosen by someone long ago to be the ones we’d all use. They also come from mathematics, from fractions. For example, a vibrating string tuned to A440, when halved will produce another A note, but vibrating at 880 cycles / second, an octave up. That same string doubled in length will vibrate at 220 cycle / second, yet another A an octave down. That same string cut in 3 will produce E notes, and if you cut it into quarters and make 3/4 of it ring, you’ll be listening to a D note. Try it out on your guitar, you’ll hear for yourself. By the way, the halfway mark of guitar strings is the twelfth fret, the one third mark is the seventh fret, the one quarter mark is at the fifth fret.)

Back to the seven scale notes. Chords are made by combining alternate notes from the scale. The simplest chord of all is the triad. It uses three alternate scale notes. The old one-three-five.

You can add other scale notes to those to make an extended chord. The next alternate note is the seven. So a One-Three-Five-Seven combination is called a major seventh.

Mathematics Quote from Oswald Veblen (1924)

You can add a ‘Two’ note to the chord, but it has be added on the treble side of the grouping, so you’re actually using the ‘Two’ from the next octave up. Since the root (One) note of that octave can be seen as the eighth note of the scale, a ‘Two’ note is the next one up, the ‘Nine’.

You can use the ‘Four’ note if you want, but since it’s only one semitone away from the ‘Three’, it actually replaces the ‘Three’. This chord is called ‘Sus Four’. It begs to be brought back to the Three.

If you add not the Seven note that is in the scale but the next note down, the ‘minor Seven’ it’s sometimes called, you wind up with a Seventh chord, as distinct from the major seventh. They’re also referred to as ‘dominant’.

‘Elevens’ are ‘Fours’, ‘Thirteens’ are ‘Sixes’. (Simply subtract seven from those big numbers to find out which note is being called for). And so on and so. It’s pretty straight forward really: the numbers refer to the the seven notes by their order. Just remember that the One-Three-Five are taken for granted as being present.

The next set of numbers refers to the chords within the key. Each of the seven scale notes qualifies as a starting note to build a chord using the alternate note rule. These chords are often written as Roman numerals.

I — II — III — IV — V — VI — VII

Sometimes, you’ll see them written like this:

I — ii — iii — IV — V — vi — vii

This is a good way of doing it because it shows the major / minor quality of the chords. As I’ve been trying to impress upon you, it’s really important to instantly know what all those chords are for any key. Remember The Music Building I wrote about recently.

Let’s say you see a chord written as V7. What does that mean? It means it’s the Five chord from whatever key you’re in, and it’s the Dominant Seventh version. So if you’re in C, you’re looking at a G7. Or a vi7? That would be Am7.

Record producers often write tunes out simply using the numbers. If they’re unsure of the singer’s range, they will choose a suitable the key in the studio. Only then will the numbers become actual chords, mentally converted by the players. Nashville is famous for this kind of notation.

Of course, time signatures and tempo are also related to mathematics. In fact the method we use to crank up a song is for someone to yell out ONE – TWO, A ONE – TWO – THREE – FOUR. The whole of music is one seething mass of numbers when it comes down to it. Lucky for us it sounds and feels so good to make listen back to, otherwise who would bother trying to figure it out?

I hope this article hasn’t put anyone off. The fact is, all these numbers simply become music when you do put a bit of effort into practising it. The layers of music become distinct and workable. Then the fun begins…

Kirk Lorange is one of Australia’s best know slide guitarists. He is also the author of PlaneTalk guitar method. Check out his sites: www.KirkLorange.com and www.ThatllTeachYou.com

Music is Mathematics from MyRareGuitars.com