When it comes to cheap gear, few firms can lay a glove on Behringer. Now it’s teasing a new pedal line, with each stompbox price at just $10 – $15 apiece.

While Behringer’s habit of releasing super-affordable versions of classic pedals has often landed the firm in hot water – it's legal tussle with Klon creator Bill Finnegan was highly publicized – the German’s reputation for cheap slices of gear is formidable.

But even with that in mind, this new line-up of all-metal pedals is something else. It will see Behringer double down on tiny outlays for – hopefully, at least – big sounds.

“Guitar players. We owe you an apology. We’ve been so busy disrupting synthesizers, mixers and DJ gear that we completely forgot about you,” Behringer says in a new social post.

Sure, the firm has been doing a lot in those spaces of late, but has still had time to release four new Klon copies, and simultaneously make fun of their lawsuit drama.

Still, the new pedal range sounds sizable. It will surely make up for a little guitarist neglect.

Priced as little as a couple of packs of strings per pedal the new range takes in “200–300 all-metal guitar, analog and digital pedals” ranging “from legendary legacy pedals to wildly innovative new designs.”

There’s also the promise of “open-source pedals you can hack, modify and reinvent yourself.” Behringer certainly isn’t doing half measures here.

It also jokes that it will “probably” disrupt the pedal market in the process, with the lineup shown in the post said to be “just the beginning”.

As Behringer puts it, “Great tone should come from your fingers, not your credit card.”

The photo has everything from a Brat analog distortion – a Rat copy, no less – to Time Bridge delay, and a Space Temple reverb. There’s also an intriguing analog phaser called Whetstone, and some interesting-sounding mini-stompboxes, including one called Slow Motion, and one simply called Noise.

Beyond that, there is pretty much every effect you can think of – from overdrives, distortions, and fuzzes to vibrato, octaver, and modulations including chorus. We’ve also spotted two Zentara overdrive pedals, which means its already cheap Klonalike is set for an even cheaper offering. Or are they just in there for effect?

“Will this upset a few boutique pedal manufacturers? Probably,” Behringer bluntly writes.

Responding to one user’s comment, Behringer also promises that bass players will be accommodated in the new range. But when it’s set to be launched is currently a closely guarded secret.

Whatever the case, Behringer will b e looking to flip the budget pedal market on its head with this range. $10 for a pedal is insanely cheap, much cheaper than the company's cult classic SF300 Super Fuzz.

It also looks to undercut Doner’s own range of $29, all-metal pedals considerably.

Ironically, Behringer has been issuing lawsuits of its own, and recently targeted Boss over a polyphonic tuner.

James Hetfield says he’s a huge admirer of fast-rising American hardcore band Turnstile, but has revealed the band turned down a chance to tour with them.

Speaking on his SiriusXM show, Hetfield’s Riff Life, over the weekend, he spoke highly of the band, who have reached new levels following the release of their fourth album, NEVER ENOUGH, last year. But it doesn’t appear that Hetfield’s admiration has manifested into the two bands hitting the road together.

“What a vibe they bring,” he says (via Louder Sound). “They are so fun. Go see them play if you can. Just like many, many bands, they sound great on their records, but man, when you see them live, you totally get it.

“We have seen them live,” he adds. “We wanted to get them on tour, and they said no. They’re doing good on their own already.

Doing well on their own they most certainly are. Hetfield’s comments come after the band played a free benefit show outside the Washington Monument on October 24. The Baltimore hardcore band drew an estimated 60,000 fans to the show, and raised $280,000 for humanitarian aid for Palestine, Sudan, and Lebanon in the process.

It highlights a notable difference between the two bands and their live ethos. Recently, Hetfield came under fire for taking a shot at artists who use their platforms to make political statements. Hetfield, who was slammed by Roger Waters for his comments, made the statement weeks after the recent Macklemore-Ed Sheeran debacle.

Whatever the case, Metallica has a rich track record of taking hotly-tipped metal bands on tour with them, including Knocked Loose and Avatar. But for Hetfield, Turnstile remains the one that got away.

Not content with becoming punk’s new heroes, Turnstile have also been a huge inspiration to Olivia Rodrgio’s live shows. The band scooped up two Grammys this year, including Best Rock Album. They are doing fine on their own.

In related Turnstile news, the band's former guitarist Brady Ebert is currently facing attempted murder charges.

In a week where two of their classic rock peers canceled shows due to medical emergencies and another scrapped their touring plans for 2027 entirely, it’s no small relief that Aerosmith – whose five original members are now a combined 378 years old – takes the stage as advertised on November 1 (insert your own day of the dead joke here) for the second of their two California, Dream On: Aerosmith & Friends concerts at the Hollywood Bowl.

The pair of shows was hastily announced just four weeks ago, and Thursday’s initial performance, which saw the Boston legends play live for the first time since 2023 (when their Peace Out farewell tour was scrapped after just three dates due to front man Steven Tyler suffering a fractured larynx) yielded more questions than answers.

Was it, as comedian emcee Bill Burr told the crowd, the first of the final two Aerosmith shows in history? Was it instead fodder for an unannounced documentary or concert film of some sort? Or, much like Brian Johnson’s unexpected return to AC/DC after overcoming issues related to hearing loss, had Tyler’s vocal cords sufficiently healed to the point that the band could resume its farewell tour?

While media in attendance on Thursday claimed Tyler was back in top form during the band’s six-song set – which saw them join forces with Dave Grohl before welcoming back original drummer Joey Kramer for the first time since 2020 for a show-closing performance of Walk This Way – reviews of the “& Friends” portion of the show (which featured the likes of Guns N’ Roses, The Black Crowes, Heart and Sammy Hagar) were more mixed. The same was true of the evening’s set list, which largely eschewed Aerosmith’s MTV hits in favor of deeper cuts from their 1970s catalog.

Although night #2 continued to dig deep, fans who grew up during the music video era were thrown a few more bones. In addition to Billy Idol and Steve Stevens and Heart’s Ann and Nancy Wilson making return appearances to respectively perform Livin’ On The Edge and Janie’s Got A Gun, Grace Potter delivers a rousing rendition of the 1989 power ballad What It Takes before yielding the stage to Train vocalist Pat Monahan.

After a passable take on the Toys In The Attic power ballad You See Me Crying (which features a cool solo swap between “house band” guitarists Phil X and Audley Freed), Monahan endears himself the crowd by saying that Aerosmith was his first concert as a Pennsylvania teen and proceeds to win them over further with an impressive Angel. He then welcomes back Potter for an inspired duet of the once-ubiquitious Cryin’, the most recent hit included in tonight’s oeuvre.

Earlier, blues rocker Marcus King kicks off the evening’s festivities with a fiery cover of Same Old Song And Dance, and he sticks around to perform two more songs (Draw The Line and Nobody’s Fault) with Jerry Cantrell, Mike Inez and guest singer Richie Kotzen. It’s admittedly strange seeing the latter on stage without a Fender, but his soulful, powerful voice proves to be one of the night’s highlights.

For sheer vocal power, though, tonight’s trophy goes to Lzzy Hale. Accompanied by Tom Morello, Hale performs knockout renditions of Kings and Queens and Round and Round, the latter of which sees Morello briefly play with his teeth. In the process, he shows off the underside of his guitar, which he’s adorned with the handwritten message Dream On.

Like most all-star jams, some performances during the 75-minute “& Friends” portion of the show are more uneven than others, and there’s certainly something of a “celebrity Aerosmith karaoke” vibe throughout – but everyone’s hearts (no pun intended!) seem to be in the right spots, so it’s hard to judge anyone too harshly.

The same can be said for Guns N’ Roses, who gamely cover four Aerosmith songs (and, to their credit, different ones than they tackled on Thursday) before performing two of their own. While Axl Rose’s current falsetto range lacks the power he once brought to Mama Kin, Slash seems like a kid in a candy store on S.O.S. (Too Bad), and it’s cool to see the band reunite with Use Your Illusion tour alumnus Teddy Andreadis on Rats In the Cellar, on which he plays harmonica. (“That was fun - rather festive!” Rose says afterward.)

For their final salute to Aerosmith, GNR cover the Rocks track Sick As A Dog, which features a notable solo by Richard Fortus prior to a dizzying outro lead by Slash. After, Rose tells the crowd that it’s a “great honor” for the band to have been invited to perform.

Including the three covers they aired on Thursday, “That was seven Aerosmith songs [altogether],” Rose says, “and I’m still nervous as hell because it meant so much to us.” It’s no surprise, then, that he seems more confident on Sweet Child O’ Mine and Nightrain, the latter of which sounds like a direct through-line from the band whose influence they wear proudly on their sleeves.

The Black Crowes’ performance, meanwhile, proves they might well be direct musical descendants. Their effortless takes on two other Rocks songs and a rollicking Let The Music Do The Talking earn loud cheers, but their cover of 1975’s No More No More – which features a tasty solo by Rich Robinson – impresses most tonight.

Tonight’s main event – which sees Aerosmith play one more song (their take on The Beatles’ Come Together) than they did on Thursday – kicks off with a literal bang, as fireworks accompany the classic Toys In The Attic.

Seeing Tyler with one arm wrapped around Joe Perry while holding a scarf-wrapped microphone stand in the other feels like you’re witnessing an iconic rock moment – only for the duo to top themselves later in the set when fog erupts as Tyler wails the epic coda of Dream On atop a grand piano before which Perry stands at center stage.

Back In The Saddle and Sweet Emotion serve as reminders that, unlike the locked-in tightness of AC/DC, there’s a loose, deceptive swagger to Aerosmith’s best material that makes the band sound in danger of going off the rails. It’s a neat trick – but not as neat as the one they have up their sleeve tonight for Walk This Way.

After introducing Kramer as they did on Thursday, the band begins the song only to suddenly slam on the brakes. “Something’s wrong – we’re missing something,” Tyler says. When Run-DMC subsequently join the group on stage, it feels like you’re witnessing the musical equivalent of a historical battle reenactment – one that changed pop culture forever.

Especially considering Tyler’s participation in the Ozzy/Sabbath celebration Back To The Beginning – one of only a handful of times he previously performed publicly over the past three years – one wonders if Aerosmith & Friends was designed as a similar vehicle to give fans a chance to say a proper goodbye to their heroes while they’re still with us. It seemed to serve a similar purpose for tonight’s guest performers, who repeatedly voiced appreciation for the chance to pay tribute to what’s arguably America’s greatest rock band.

Perhaps its primary purpose, though, was to give the band a chance to go out on their own terms. (“At the end of the world, there will only be cockroaches, Aerosmith and Bill Burr,” Tyler quips at one point.)

That said, whether Aerosmith & Friends marked a return, a farewell or both remains to be seen. It’s surely impractical to take a production like this on the road, or even to use it as the model for a residency (a format to which the band is no stranger).

For two nights, though, the Aerosmith train managed to get back on the tracks – and, health permitting, here’s hoping it can keep a-rolling for just a bit longer.

Aerosmith & Friends: California, Dream On - Night Two setlist

1. Aerosmith & Friends: California, Dream On - Night Two setlist
2. Same Old Song And Dance (Marcus King)
3. Draw The Line (Jerry Cantrell)
4. Nobody’s Fault (Jerry Cantrell)
5. Kings & Queens (Tom Morello / Lizzy Hale)
6. Round & Round (Tom Morello / Lizzy Hale)
7. Livin’ On The Edge (Billy Idol / Steve Stevens)
8. What It Takes (Grace Potter)
9. You See Me Crying (Pat Monahan)
10. Angel (Pat Monahan)
11. Cryin’ (Pat Monahan / Grace Potter)
12. Janie’s Got A Gun (Heart)
13. Barracuda (Heart)
14. Let The Music Do The Talking (Black Crowes)
15. Get The Lead Out (Black Crowes)
16. Combination (Black Crowes)
17. No More No More (Black Crowes)
18. Chip Away The Stone (Black Crowes)
19. Mama Kin (Guns N' Roses)
20. SOS (Too Bad) (Guns N' Roses)
21. Rats In The Celar (Guns N' Roses)
22. Sick As A Dog (Guns N' Roses)
23. Sweet Child O Mine (Guns N' Roses)
24. Nightrain (Guns N' Roses)
25. Toys In The Attic (Aerosmith, with John Douglas on drums)
26. Back In The Saddle (Aerosmith, with John Douglas)
27. Sweet Emotion (Aerosmith, with John Douglas)
28. Dream On (Aerosmith, with John Douglas)
29. Come Together (Aerosmith, with John Douglas)
30. Walk This Way (Aerosmith and Run DMC, with Joey Kramer and John Douglas on drums)
31. Train Kept A Rollin’ (Aerosmith, with John Douglas)

In my introductory column last month, I discussed a few different approaches to legato phrasing. The term legato means “smooth and connected,” and on the guitar legato articulations include hammer-ons, pull-offs and finger slides.

Legendary fusion guitarist Allan Holdsworth is widely considered as the greatest legato player of all time, and he was certainly a major influence in the development of my own approach to legato-style phrasing.

Last month, we analyzed a legato phrase that I played on the Testament song So Many Lies, which is in the key of E and based on the E Lydian b7 scale, also unknown as the E Lydian-dominant mode (E, F#, G#, A#, B, C#, D). I would now like to take the same melodic and fretboard pattern and apply it to a different mode.

Figure 1 presents a fast cascading legato phrase that’s based on the B Dorian mode (B, C#, D, E, F#, G#, A), starting in 7th position and then, as the phrase progresses, shifts down to 6th and then 5th positions.

I begin with my index finger on B, 1st string, 7th fret, and then hammer-on to the 10th fret with my pinkie, followed by a double pull-off to the 9th and 7th frets with my ring and index fingers. The pinkie then hammers-on “from nowhere” to the 10th fret on the B string to sound A (the note is not picked).

Similar pull-offs and hammer-ons are then performed on the B string in virtually the same sequence, followed by a move to the G string and a repeat of this melodic “shape,” fretted with the pinkie and middle and index fingers. Beats 3 and 4 continue the crosses to the lower strings, rearticulating the identical melodic pattern while remaining diatonic to (within the scale structure of) B Dorian.

A great way to execute legato phrases like this is to utilize a “three notes per string”’ fingering. As shown in bar 1 of Figure 2, this approach is applied to ascending through the first octave of B Dorian in 7th position. In bar 2, the three-notes-per-string approach is applied to the second octave; the exception is the G string, where only two notes are sounded.

In Figure 3, the same fingerings are illustrated through B Dorian played in a descending manner.

One should practice the scale in as many other positions as possible. Figure 4 illustrates B Dorian as played in a combination of 5th, 6th and 7th positions, once again favoring the three-notes-per-string approach, played ascending and descending.

In Figure 5, I begin by sounding a Bm7 chord first, in order to provide the proper tonal reference for the B Dorian single-note line. When moving the lick to different areas of the fretboard, I suggest playing a Bm7 chord initially, in order to keep that harmonic reference clear.

Keep in mind that B Dorian is the second mode of the A major scale (A, B, C#, D, E, F#, G#), also known as the A Ionian mode. The other six related modes that begin on each scale degree of A major are C# Phrygian, D Lydian, E Mixolydian, F# Aeolian and G# Locrian.

Figure 6 demonstrates the same type of fast, cascading legato run from Figure 1 applied to the A major scale in 5th position.

Now that you have a clear picture of the note sequence, or “melodic shape,” as it descends across the fretboard, try applying it to the six other modes in various positions. This is a fantastic way to sharpen your fret-hand legato technique.

• This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.

If you’re a tone chaser obsessed with vintage blues rock legends, specifically Stevie Ray Vaughan and Jimi Hendrix, you may have already come across Pedal Pawn. The company was founded in 2019 by British guitarist Chris King Robinson, who started out working from his mother’s garage.

Since then, they’ve delivered a range of guitar products for those enthralled by two of the most influential Strat-wielders of all time – even going as far as tracking down SRV’s TS9 to reverse-engineer their BluesPrint dual overdrive in 2023.

Today, they announce the arrival of the Say Wah – their first-ever foray into the world of wah pedals, named after the opening track of SRV’s third studio album, released in 1985.

“I’m stupidly excited about this one,” says Robinson, admitting that it’s the longest he’s ever spent developing a product to the point where he felt happy putting his company’s name on it.

“The first Say Wah concept actually dates back to 2020, so it’s taken about six years to finally get here. A wah has probably been the most requested Pedal Pawn product over the years, but I never wanted to make one just because people kept asking for it.”

Having owned and played hundreds of wahs over the years, Robinson is the first to admit he’s “ridiculously picky” when it comes to the legendary spectral glide sound.

Some of them, for example, might have “amazing midrange quack,” but not quite have that magic touch “at the top end.” Others might boast “a great sweep while lacking that all-important vocal quality”.

When it comes to the greatest wah recordings of all time, he cites Hendrix’s Voodoo Child (Slight Return) as “almost impossible to beat, because that’s the sound most people hear in their head when you say ‘wah pedal.’” He also cites SRV’s Say What! for its “aggressive, throaty, almost vowel-like midrange.”

The true bypass Say Wah comes with a hand-wound inductor, custom-designed PCB and circuitry plus a CTS 100K custom-taper McCon-O-Pot II. Every unit is hand-assembled in the UK.

“The big inspiration was those late 60s/early 70s Italian-style wah sounds, particularly one of my favourite vintage V846s with the old TDK-style inductor,” adds Robinson. “But we didn’t want to just photocopy one old wah.

“Over the years we’d heard characteristics we loved in different examples, so it became about understanding why certain ones had that really vocal midrange and then building our own version around that.”

The Say Wah circuit was developed from scratch in order to get the right response, especially when engaged alongside fuzz and overdrive effects.

“For the pot, we teamed up with Mike McConachie, the man behind the McCon-O-Wah,” Robinson says. “He’d already absolutely nailed the feel with his CTS 100K custom-taper McCon-O-Pot II. Rather than pretend we could improve on it, we put his pot in ours.

“It’s rated for two million cycles, which is also a massive bonus because scratchy old pots are one of those things every vintage wah owner knows all too well. And because vintage wahs can vary so massively, I’m personally setting up and testing every single Say Wah at the end of production.

“I want every customer to get one that has the magic rather than having to hunt through 10 of them hoping to find a good one.”

• The Say Wah will retail for £327/$435. Head to pedalpawn.com for more information. 

“Most people who own our bridges aren’t beating the door down to get them on their vintage guitars,” says Matt Blackett, EverTune’s director of market development. “That’s like putting a moustache on the Mona Lisa.”

Blackett, who was Guitar Player editor for 15 years, has always championed industry innovations. So when he discovered Cosmos Lyles’ bridge design that promised to never go out of tune, he jumped aboard. He knows the bridges aren’t for everyone – but the firm’s reach is growing beyond the prog metal realm, gaining prominence in Nashville and in studios.

Lyles dreamed up the idea on July 4 weekend 2005. “I was high,” the designer admits, “and thinking outside the box.” It would be another six years before the EverTune as we know it was considered complete, but the big turning point came in 2007: “My engineering partner, Paul Dowd, successfully tested the first prototype with the current mechanics, which he devised,” Lyles says.

“It had a swinging arm as a cam to balance the change in spring tension, and it worked surprisingly well. That's when I knew we had something; it went from abstract idea to physical model.” In essence, EverTune bridges are alive. Each string gets a dedicated system of springs and levers that react to everything from pick attack to environmental factors, maintaining consistent string tension.

The initial setup is finicky, but restrings after that – so long as you stay in the same tuning – are business as usual. There’s comparable preparation with Floyd Roses and Bigsbys too.

Six-string bridges for Gibsons, Strats and Teles cost $350, and installation potentially doubles that once you’ve found a certified installer – there are 53 approved worldwide. Blackett admits making the jump “is a commitment,” but insists it’ll “intonate flawlessly.”

“You can do a monster bend and it won’t come back flat,” he states. “I just played a gig in more than 90-degree heat and never went out of tune.

“Keeping string tension constant means the pitch of a note’s attack is identical to the pitch of its sustain, so producers love us. They’re on us every day asking, ‘Where’s the bass bridge?’

He points out the system is more flexible than some people realize: “Some producers like it so bends don’t affect the pitch; they don’t want someone squeezing a chord out of tune in the middle of a really good take. But this idea that you can’t bend is completely false; you just need to understand how it works.

“Typically, bends and vibrato are 99% normal. For the system to do its job, there needs to be a slight lag between when you bend a note and when the bend kicks – but it can be very subtle.”

He adds that players can turn off the system on any string and choose the sensitivity of their bends. Still, there are caveats. Installing one requires a fairly extensive route made in the guitar (similar to those for Floyd Roses and Strat trems).

Players who want to drop the low string mid-gig can do it at the headstock, but note that it won’t get the EverTune benefits. Another sensitive point is how, at roughly 1.28 pounds, they’re heavy – given the modifications to the body, an average bridge adds around 0.5 pounds to a guitar’s weight. The changes are more noticeable on lighter instruments. Whether it impacts tone has left players split.

“Some people think it adds highs; some people think it’s darker sounding,” Blackett notes. “But it absolutely changes the way the guitar resonates and responds. In the upper registers there’s a difference in terms of how it sustains. They don’t resonate like a PRS McCarty with a one-piece wraparound bridge.”

He continues: “They play a little bit stiffer too. So 9s feel like 10s, 10s feel like 11s. I typically go with 9-46 strings, but I’m experimenting now with 8s on my ESP, and it's a freaking hot rod!”

He calls these “tradeoffs” and says all bridges have them. That’s why many are embracing his company’s technology. “Ron Nevison was doing a session in LA and needed an EverTune Telecaster,” Blackett says.

“I knew Cosmos was a huge fan, so I said, ‘Do you mind loaning him your guitar for a session?’ He goes, ‘Sure, but I haven't played it in a while. It's going to need a setup.’ While we’re on the phone, he pulls it out of the case, hits a chord – and it’s perfectly in tune.

“We installed an EverTune for Steve Vai on an eight-string, and he loved what it did on the low strings; it threw him on the high strings. We told him, ‘You can have the bridge only working on the low strings. Keep those as tight as you want, and take the others out of the equation.”

Then there’s Spiritbox’s Mike Stringer, who craved an EverTune on his multi-scale Aristides. With little resources to spend on the project, the Dutch firm asked to take the reins to make multi-scale EverTune bridges a reality. “They're a very agile company,” Blackett says. “They can turn on a dime. We thought about it for a split second and said, ‘Why not?’”

He wasn’t convinced there’d be demand for them – but he was proven wrong. Now aftermarket options are available, and they’re also options with Kiesel’s new made-to-order Antares guitars.

What about EverTune’s future? Blackett says smaller, lighter bridges with less invasive routes will represent “a natural evolution.” The resonance factor is also under the microscope and headless guitars are also on its radar. The possibilities are endless – sort of.

“What’s really exciting is this technology works for anything that requires tension,” he says. “We could come up with systems for acoustic guitar, piano and drums. We just can't devote any resources to that right now.”

• Find out more at the EverTune website.

Hero Hiker has come to the aid of intrepid explorers who want to trek mountains but still have a guitar in tow with two ultra-light takes on travel guitar designs.

The simply named Ultralight Travel Guitar packs 19 frets across a 24” scale length and weighs just under one pound. The Trekking Pole Guitar, meanwhile, weighs less than half a pound and is designed to partner with hiker trekking poles for a very unusual way to bust out campfire chords while on your travels.

Travel guitars have come a long way in recent years, with easily transportable and foldable designs now way past the point of being mere gimmicks. Hero Hiker is separating itself from the pack by taking lightness and compactness to new extremes.

Made from industrial strength carbon fiber and nylon, they are said to be built to handle the high demands of travel and the outdoors. The Ultralight Travel Guitar features a detachable bottom for backpackers who want to slide the guitar into the side pouch of their packs while hiking.

It is, in essence, a neck and headstock with a tiny soundhole for a body, and it has nylon strings. The inclusion of a storage space for guitar picks is smart, too.

The Trekking Pole takes a different approach. It has a tiny, four-fret fingerboard for cowboy chords exclusively, and it relies on hikers using their trekking poles as a big part of its architecture. It’s quite a nifty space-saving idea: the guitar collapses into a tiny drawstring bag when not in use. But it does mean restringing before each playing session.

Here, because the soundhole is just a hole with no chamber in which to resonate, there are straps in place to nestle in a 3.5” to 5” cooking pot to amplify the guitar’s sound. Afterwards, simply collapse the poles, unwind the strings, and store it away.

It is worth noting that while the Trekking Pole guitar kit is designed to work with any brand of poles that have clasps, foldable or twist-lock poles are not compatible.

Still, when traveling requires a lot of backpack real estate, these two guitars offer solutions so players needn’t be away from their electric and acoustic guitars, without taking up the space of a dreadnought or grand auditorium.

The Ultralight Travel Guitar is available for a pre-order price of $199 before rising to $249. The Trekking Pole guitar costs $99.

See Hero Hiker for more.

Pete Townshend has given fresh insight into the reasons for his decades-long indifference towards Led Zeppelin, but appears to be warming to the band after trying to reach out to Jimmy Page.

Back in May, the Who vocalist Roger Daltrey told Rolling Stone that the Who were the world’s first heavy metal band. It is an honor which, for many, goes to Black Sabbath – though Led Zeppelin is included in that conversation, too.

Those comments were brought up as Townshend spoke recently with Classic Album Review as he was quizzed on the Who’s cultural and musical impact, including their potential foundation-laying for metal guitar playing.

“No, I don’t necessarily think so,” he says. “I think [our 1970 live album] Live At Leeds is probably as explosive as it got [for us]. The only heavy metal I really listened to was AC/DC.”

Historically, Townshend hasn’t spoken too kindly about Led Zeppelin. Back in 1995, Townshend unloaded on the group, saying, “I don’t like a single thing that they have done,” and that he “hates the fact that I’m ever even slightly compared to them” (via Guitar Player).

But it seems his perspective on the band has been shifting, while giving an insight into where his original disliking of the group may have stemmed from.

“I never really got into Led Zeppelin,” he continues, “which is strange because today I’ve recently been trying to get Jimmy Page to have lunch with me. I sent him a note recently just saying, ‘I’ve been listening to all of the Zeppelin albums again,’ and I thought I should. And there’s some fucking great stuff there.

“At the time I didn’t like it that they were, in a sense, trying to pinch our audience,” he develops. “I’d been through it before with Jimi Hendrix coming over with his big amplifiers and his distortion and his wah-wah pedal, and having to admit, ‘Wow, here is a guitar genius.’”

It will be interesting to see what the pair discuss if they do link up for lunch. A collaboration feels a little far fetched at this moment, though. Baby steps.

Elsewhere, Peter Frampton has recalled the time Townshend offered him a spot in the Who before ghosting him, and Royal Blood’s Mike Kerr has looked back on the time he played a gig in front of Jimmy Page, and was justifiably terrified.

Flea has never been one to keep his opinions to himself. As the Red Hot Chili Peppers rose to international stardom in the early ’90s, he remained fiercely outspoken about the music industry, the commercialization of rock and the difference between artistic integrity and simply being famous.

For Flea, there was no contradiction in wanting to make great music and getting paid handsomely for it – and certainly no reason to apologize either.

Speaking to Bass Player in January 1992, Flea said, “People get on us because we make money. In an interview a while ago, I was talking about how important music is to me and that art is all that matters.

“The interviewer said, ‘Well, what about all that money you get?’ My response to people like that is: So? What do you want us to do, turn it down? It’s ridiculous. I'll take all the money I can get, and I won’t feel guilty about it at all.”

Success, as far as Flea’s concerned, was nothing to be ashamed of. Believing in music as an art form, he saw no reason why that should mean sacrificing the financial rewards that come with it.

“The music business is just like any other business: it’s about buying and selling things. There are a few people who really care about music, but they’re rare. Obviously, the independent labels are more willing to take risks; they go for creativity, not what will make them a lot of money.

“But there are a lot of slimy people in the industry, and most of them want to keep their expense accounts, so they promote bands that have no creativity whatsoever – bands that fit into the latest trendy pop format. It’s disgusting.”

As the Chili Peppers continued to grow in popularity, Flea became increasingly frustrated with a mainstream rock scene that seemed more concerned with image and commercial appeal than genuine creativity.

“I don’t want to mention names, but these metal groups of guys with straight, long blond hair – there are about seven or eight of them – all sound exactly the same. It’s the most unemotional, formulaic stuff in the world.

“Why do they bother? Do they even play instruments, or are they just poster children for bad music? One thing’s for sure: You don’t get paid for being a musician – you get paid for being a rock star.

“Of course, there’s good stuff out there, too. I love Fugazi, Jane’s Addiction, the Butthole Surfers, Nirvana, Public Enemy, and Ice Cube.

“Especially Fugazi – you've got to respect a band with that much integrity. They make it as easy and cheap as possible for people to hear and see them. We want to make money and be comfortable, but they’re into being thoroughly righteous and compassionate down to the marrow.”

It was Fugazi’s frontman, Ian MacKaye, in particular, who seemed to embody everything Flea wanted from a band.

“I read this Tom Robbins book, Jitterbug Perfume, and there’s a cool character who has bees living in his head; he gets killed by a police officer, and for weeks the bees terrorize the police. I was thinking that if something happened to Fugazi’s lan MacKaye, all of nature should rise up against the evil forces that oppose him. But the world is so fucked up that won’t happen.

“Another guy I like is Les Claypool of Primus. Some people compare him and me, but I think that’s ridiculous. Les plays lead bass – bass guitar is the featured instrument, and the rest of the band supports it. In the Chili Peppers, my parts are important, but they’re not lead bass.

“Even the busiest stuff I do is all about playing the bottom and being part of the rhythm section. What Les does is completely different, but it’s great in its own way. It's not that one style is cooler than the other – it's just a different trip.”

Changing a successful formula can be risky, but bassist Ben McKee has form when it comes to taking chances. McKee was months away from graduating from Berklee College of Music when Imagine Dragons frontman Dan Reynolds called with an offer that meant leaving Boston, abandoning his degree and heading to Las Vegas.

“I was just months away from getting my degree when Daniel called me,” said McKee in the March 2015 issue of Bass Player. “He just asked if I wanted to join a band in Vegas with him.

“I went to Berklee planning to be a jazz virtuoso. It was really what I wanted to do: take crazy solos and play chords on the bass. But there was an attitude there, a competitive vibe that everybody had, where it seemed like people weren’t really making music to entertain people, they were doing it to show off their skills and prove that they were better than the other people at that school.

“So I didn’t accomplish what I wanted to at Berklee. I found myself in a jazz class where everyone was out to prove they were the best.

“I was one semester away from graduating, and our guitarist Wayne had graduated the semester before and called me to say that he had met our singer, Dan, and that they’d started making music with some promise.

“They were going to head out to Las Vegas and try and make it a career, and I was at a point where I was working hard to get this degree that wasn’t going to help me get the career that I wanted. I didn’t want to teach music.

“I knew Daniel wasn’t a guy to make frivolous decisions. So when he called, based on his word, I immediately took off for Vegas.”

The move paid off more than he could have imagined. On the strength of their platinum selling debut, McKee and his alternative four-piece toured the world and were recruited by Hans Zimmer and Steve Jablonsky to score Transformers: Age of Extinction.

You met some of the other members of Imagine Dragons at Berklee, correct?

Our guitarist, Wayne Sermon, and our drummer Daniel Platzman, were both at Berklee with me: we played in a fusion ensemble together called the Eclectic Electrics, It was five electric guitarists, bass and drums, and we would do Bill Evans piano solos arranged for guitars, or horn tracks from Miles Davis’s Birth Of The Cool. We did that for three years at school: it wasn't something that we needed for credits, it was just a treat that we gave ourselves.

What did it cost to study at Berklee?

Berklee is an expensive school. I don’t know what it costs now, but back then I think a semester cost between $30,000 and $40,000, if you didn’t get any scholarships. It was a lot, and you can be there for four years. I was there for three and a half: fortunately, there were a lot of opportunities for scholarships.

Was it worth it?

I wouldn't be where I am now if it wasn’t for that school, although it kind of turned me off jazz. I started taking classes on the music of Joni Mitchell, and the music of the Beatles, and the music of Laurel Canyon – all those amazing composers like Warren Zevon and Stravinsky. I really got connected to songwriting, and learning about music that people who aren’t necessarily musicians can relate to.

Did you study technique?

There was a long period of time when I would just lock myself in my room. I was practising bass for no less than nine hours a day: not working on particularly interesting music, just on techniques. I used to play different patterns around a metronome, and work on classical études. There was a lot of three-fingered technique. It’s useful for jazz solos, so I really worked hard on that.

Presumably Imagine Dragons would still have become successful without advanced bass chops on your part?

Exactly! Although if you look at some of our early, early stuff, there were some jam-out, extended solo bass and keyboard moments. This was well before anyone was remotely interested in putting our music up on Youtube, so I think that stuff is pretty impossible to find at this point.

We’ve definitely grown and evolved a lot as a band: the place where we all thrive is when we come together and focus on creating songs that people can get behind and sing and rock out to. The albums are really about an experience that you can sing along with, like the albums that we grew up with.

Who were your influences?

Some of the first bass players that I admired were Ray Brown and Paul Chambers. Ray Brown is the definition of solid time. I used to listen to him with the Oscar Peterson Trio all the time: for about 12 years all I listened to was instrumental jazz from before 1975. I was a big, big nerd.

I got into the fusion stuff for a while too – the Yellowjackets and Shakti and all that amazing stuff. Victor Wooten was another idol of mine: I spent a long time working out his double thumbing technique. Mike Dirnt was a big influence too, and James Jamerson, and Pino Palladino was huge for me. I went through my Jaco phase, as everybody does. But Paul McCartney, James Jamerson and Pino are the three bass guitarists that I try to channel stylistically when I'm playing.

Any tips on retaining sanity while touring?

Find balance, which will help you to find energy when you’re at your darkest and most depressed and you need to get off the tour bus and play. Go into town: walk about a bit, it’ll brighten your mood. There are lots of experiences to have on the road... it’s all about what you make of them!

This month in Bought & Sold, the former Joan Jett And The Blackhearts six-stringer Ricky Byrd digs into his love for cheap electric guitars, versatile tones, and why he’s now a Fender amp guy through and through.

What was the first serious guitar you bought with your own money?

Because I love Leslie West and Mountain, I bought – and there’s a picture of me playing it in a club when I was 16 – a 1956 single-cutaway sunburst Gibson Les Paul Junior. It was just like what Leslie West played. It might have cost me $350, and it took a while to save that up! [laughs]

I purchased it on Music Row on 48th Street in New York City. I don’t know where it is now because when you’re a kid, you say, “Oh, let me trade for this, and trade for that…” But that was the first guitar that I purchased.

What was the last guitar you bought, and why?

I bought a Maton. It’s a Mini, but I’m getting a full-sized one. I do these acoustic Recovery shows and events [Ricky now has over 30 years of sobriety], and I hate having to travel with a freaking coffin [hardshell case], but this can go in a soft shell.

I had seen Keith Urban using a Maton Mini, and I said to my wife, “God, that sounds amazing,” so I went on eBay and I purchased one.

What’s the most incredible find or bargain that you’ve ever had when buying guitars?

Yikes! I moved into the neighbourhood I’m in now and I met some guy at a store who said, ‘You’re that musician guy… I’ve got a couple of guitars. Maybe you’d be interested?’ It was like he’d just come out of The Godfather or something [laughs]. So I met him at my house, he opens his trunk and he says, “I’ve got these two guitars…”

It was a cheap Danelectro, like the one Jimmy Page used with the lipstick pickups. I bought it for a few hundred bucks and I used it with Southside Johnny for like a year, even though it was a one-trick pony.

What’s your strongest case of buyer’s remorse you’ve ever had after buying gear?

Let me put it this way: there are guitars that you buy because you know, at some point, you’re gonna trade it or sell it for something else. There are different categories of stuff that I have. Some stuff I fell into, like maybe I’ll use it to barter for a better thing. But some of those guitars are good for certain things.

Like, a Hagstrom that’s sitting on a rack is dirty and hasn’t been cleaned in ages. The strings are probably 20 years old and the action is really high. But when I’m gonna do slide, maybe I’ll pull out that Hagstrom. So there’s a guitar for every purpose. They’re all valid.

Have you ever sold a guitar that you now intensely regret letting go?

I had a ’53, a dark red double-cutaway Les Paul Junior, that was like the one Keith Richards had. I used it all the time with Joan [Jett], and I remember being on tour with Ian Hunter and he wanted to buy it. I appreciate it more now, and I used it on a lot of Blackhearts stuff, but it was a one-trick pony and it had one P-90.

One day, GE Smith called me and said, “Chelsea Guitars has a ’53 gold ES-295… I believe it belonged to one of the guys that played with Otis Redding on the road.” So I ran down there and I traded that Les Paul Junior plus some cash for that ES-295. It was great. It was beautiful. But I sold it.

I got a good price for it. But now, if you look on Reverb, some of them are going for like $17,000 [laughs]. I mean, who is buying these guitars? Who can afford to just spend $17,000 on a guitar? When you have a house and need a new roof or the freaking hot water heater needs to be replaced, you can’t do that. But, I mean… somebody is buying these guitars.

What’s your best buying tip for anyone looking to buy their ultimate guitar?

I would go down and sit in the room, and pull them off the wall one by one, and find out what you lean toward. Are you a Fender guy? Are you a Gibson guy? Are you an Epiphone guy? I mean, parents will ask me what they should get their sons and daughters who want to play, and they’re like 15. I always say not to get them anything expensive to start.

There’s plenty of really good, not-too-expensive guitars, so don’t spend a lot of money starting off. As a teenager, I was obsessed, but some people go through phases, right? They wanna play guitar and then they wanna do something else. And for someone playing for a long time, if you want to buy a really special guitar, pull it off the wall and try it out.

When was the last time you stopped and looked in a guitar shop window, or browsed online, and what were you looking at?

You know, you see something in a magazine, or you see somebody playing something, and you go, ‘I need that guitar.’ And I’m not really a collector, I have maybe 25 guitars, but guitar playing and collecting is an addictive disease! I’m on this kick with 1970s guitars because that’s when I was a teenager, you know?

I saw this black 1974 ES-335 and, man, you know what happens when you look at something on social media and then it grabs you by the short and curlies [laughs]? It’s only a matter of time before I hit PayPal, right?

If forced to make a choice, would you rather buy a really good guitar and a cheap amp, or a cheap guitar and a top-notch amp?

I don’t have a freaking clue! But listen, you could get a cheap amp and get a great sound; I’m into that. I can’t give you a good answer, but I can give you good options. If you want to be a unique guitar player with your own sound, get a different kind of amp.

Look for the real mutt in the store, where you go, “What’s that? Let me try it…” I mean, what do you think the blues guys used? Do you think they used Marshall stacks? No. They used what they could afford. And those are records that we drool over.

If you could only use humbuckers or single coils for the rest of your career, which would it be, and why?

Man… I love P-90s. Listen to Leslie West’s sound and that squeal when you pinch the note at the end of the pick, I love that. But there are certain things you really can’t do with a P-90, so humbuckers are great.

They’re both good! I can’t give a good answer because it depends on what you’re doing. P-90s are crunchy and crude, and you can do that with humbuckers, but it’s different. It’s got a handicap, like you’re playing golf, or something.

Ricky’s Go-To Rig

“I can’t tell you the last time I used a Marshall amp. For amps, it’s all Fenders now. I’ll try Marshalls every once in a while, but I don’t like the way they sound and they hurt my ears these days. I don’t know what it is, but I’m just a Fender guy, even though the Marshall was my signature sound for years with the Blackhearts.

“I’ve got a few Les Pauls from the early 70s and a Gibson ES-335 that I love. I’ve also got a ’73 Fender Tele and a ‘Franken-Tele’, which is all body parts with nothing Fender about it. And I have a tiny pedalboard, with just the essentials: I’ve got a tuner, an overdrive, a delay and maybe a chorus – all plugged direct into a Fender amp.”

• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.
  

Welcome to Guitar World’s weekly gear round-up, your one-stop-shop for keeping up to date with what’s been happening in the big wide world of guitar gear over the past seven days.

From new electric guitars to amp modeler updates, the guitar industry is never short of fresh releases, and it can sometimes be hard to stay in the loop with every new launch.

To make things a little easier, we’ve put together an essential must-read guide that will cover the major releases, the boutique drops, and everything in between.

Below you'll find my personal highlights from the week, along with plenty of honorable mentions for the new gear you might have missed. Agree with my picks? Have a highlight of your own? Let us know in the comments.

Boss Katana-25

There is a strong case to be made that the new Katana-25 combo amp is the most beginner-friendly amp Boss has made yet, and is maybe one of the best beginner amps on the market, period.

For one, it’s compact, with 25-watts of solid-state power driving a single 8” speaker, and the power can be switched down to a half-watt setting for cranking at modest volumes. It is everything you need from a bedroom practice amp.

It comes with six amp voices, one of which is dedicated to acoustic electric guitars. There are more than 60 Boss effects onboard, and 30 presets (out of the box it has 20 to get you started). There is a tap tempo for time-based effects.

There is all the digital functionality you could want, with the Boss Tone Studio app the place where deep edits can happen. You can even cue up a track from YouTube, play along and programme where you want the amp to change preset for you (say from crunch to lead, or clean to crunch) automatically.

The tones are convincing. This is the same Gen 3 Tube Logic tech that powers the larger amps in the Katana series. And it’s just $199. But for all that digital functionality, it’s still a simple control face, with everything you need available from that front panel.

See Boss for more.

Fender Kim Gordon Jazzmaster

Who knows what would have become of the Jazzmaster had Sonic Youth not come along to pluck it out of obscurity and turn it into the electric guitar of choice for alt-rock, indie and punk players who wanted something different, something offset and angular – and above all cheap.

Kim Gordon’s signature Jazzmaster reimagines the original. For a start, the notoriously arcane electronics have been stripped down and simplified. Here, we only have a three-way pickup selector toggle, volume and tone. And that oversized single-coil at the bridge has been swapped out for a Seymour Duncan JB humbucker (or a TB-4, trembucker to accommodate the wider strings spacing of the vibrato).

At the neck you’ve got the humbucker-sized Alnico V single-coil pickup. You have the floating vibrato with the Mustang saddles. And that’s it. With that black pickguard and the Olympic White finish, plus the matching painted headcap and witch hat controls, it's one sweet Jazzmaster. The block inlays give it an upscale look, too.

Gordon says you don’t need a whole bunch of effects to get creative with it. Just plug it in and play.

“One thing that’s great about the Jazzmaster, if you have a guitar that sounds good by just plugging it into an amplifier, it doesn’t need effects,” she says. “That’s really satisfying…I just really like the sound…Electricity in the guitar is the gateway to losing yourself.”

Find out more at Fender.

Epiphone Prophecy

This is the week that Epiphone showed its teeth to unveil its most-metal metal guitar collection yet, as the Prophecy series gets a serious upgrade.

This is as advanced/high-performance as an Epiphone gets. We’re talking stainless steel jumbo frets, compound radius fingerboards, custom-voiced Fishman pickups, locking tuners, a quick and thing Hyperglide neck profile and there’s even a baritone Les Paul in the lineup too.

The Gibson DNA is there for all to see. There’s a whiff of the Custom Shop courtesy of the multi-ply body binding, the split-diamond headstock inlays and the mother-of-pearl block inlays on the fingerboards. And yet these are no purist retro-builds. Heck, they all have 25.5” scale lengths for a start (the baritone LP has 27”). The pickups will give you a high-output humbucker voicing, a PAF-alike vintage ‘bucker, and an “optimized single-coil” voicing.

The range includes the Flying V, Les Paul and SG, plus a Floyd Rose-equipped Victory double-cut, the Les Paul Baritone, and wait? Where’s the Explorer? That’s the only question we have TBH, but maybe that will come in the spring. You can’t have the most metal Epiphones ever without the most metal model, right?

Anyway, these look the part. Check them out at Epiphone.

Also Launched This Week

JHS Pedals Pherb

Hands up who loves the Flerb setting from Electro-Harmonix’s Holy Grail reverb pedal? JHS Pedals supremo Josh Scott does not have his hand up right now, but he does know how many of you love it, because you keep on asking him to make a Flerb.

Well, he wasn’t going to do that. He just does not like the sound of flanger inside a reverb. But a phaser? Yes, that works, and so he’s added it to the $99 3 Series, and you can stop bugging him about it.

See more at JHS Pedals.

Dr. No Blameshifter

This is the third collab between Queens of the Stone Age guitarist Troy Van Leeuwen and Dr. No Effects, and it’s all kinds of gruesome. The idea behind it was an inside joke, that what if they had a pedal that could route a mistake to someone else’s amp. Hence the name of the pedal, and the severed finger.

But the actual Blameshifter is really a top-quality buffer and routing box. You plug your guitar in, there’s an “ultra-transparent” buffer, then four outputs for switching between complex amp setups. Each is handmade and signed by Van Leeuwen.

See more at Dr. No Effects.

Fender x Pokémon Stratocaster and Telecaster

There are some guitars that you would need to win the lottery to own, a 1959 Gibson Les Paul Standard, a 1962 Strat, something vintage and rare like that. But the Pokémon Telecaster and Stratocaster is LITERALLY a guitar you need to win a lottery to win. That’s how rare they are.

Furthermore, it’s a Fender Japan deal. But these are very cool, a red and green Telecaster and Strat, something something something to do with Pokémon which is – I admit – not of my jurisdiction, but they do have this push-pull on the volume knob that activates an 8-bit effect that is truly a tantalizing prospect.

For more: Pokémon

Ibanez x Dragonball Z

Another Japanese pop-cultural tie-in, this time between Ibanez and Dragon Ball Z, and it includes guitar picks, guitar cases, straps, T-shirts and a ukulele, but most importantly a unique Tube Screamer TS808, a stunning MIJ RG, plus graphic finish electric guitars and basses that will be rolled out across 2027. That little green box will sure be collectible. But that RG looks incredible.

For more: Dragon Ball

Neighborhood Circuits Porter headphone amp

The Porter is a pocket-sized headphone amp that has an all-analogue design, is intended for use with your pedals, and just needs a little financial push to meet its crowd-funding target of $10,000.

Described as “a tool, not a toy,” Porter has a simple design; one knob, it clips to your strap. There’s a line in to play along with external audio and a USB to charge it.

For more: Crowd Supply

Model 1: The Full Modular Guitar

One of the things we all love about electric guitar – and especially the bolt-on – is that there is a sense of modularity about it. You can swap out the neck, change the hardware, retrofit new pickups. The Model 1, however, takes this idea its logical conclusion.

It’s only at Kickstarter stage but it promises a super-lightweight build (1.6kg), “no wood, no truss rod” and no headstock ‘cos headstocks are for dorks, and it has this triple-voiced pickup.

For more: Kickstarter

EarthQuaker Devices Plumes Jr. and Blumes Jr. MOSFET Mod

Jamie Stillman has taken two EQD stalwarts and shrunk them down into mini pedal format, and then modded them with an extra Mosfet stage accessed via a toggle switch. That's three clipping options, one mini pedal, and here for a limited time only.

For more: EarthQuaker Devices

Positive Grid Spark CAB 2

You don’t have to own a Spark to get the most out of Positive Grid’s refreshed FRFR speaker. When it comes down to it, this 140-watt beast is brand-agnostic. But it will help you expand your Spark rig for the stage, and can provide power – and volume – for your Spark amp and pedal family.

For more: Positive Grid

As mentioned in a previous Power Tools column about the Electro-Harmonix Electric Mistress flanger, the introduction of low-cost bucket-brigade device (BBD) integrated circuits kicked off a revolutionary period for the guitar-effects marketplace.

Dozens of companies introduced new chorus, flanger and analog delay pedals all around the same time in 1976, which makes it nearly impossible to determine which product came first. Like the Electric Mistress, the Electro-Harmonix Memory Man can’t be verified as being the very first analog delay pedal on the market, but it was certainly among the first.

The original 1976 Memory Man was a basic analog delay effect featuring three controls and a maximum 300ms delay time. In 1977, EHX rolled out the first version of the Deluxe Memory Man with four knobs (a Level control was added) and a slightly increased delay time. The model that really put the Deluxe Memory Man on the map was the five-knob version (generally known as the EH-7850, then EH-1343B, then EH-7850C) introduced in late 1978 that added a chorus/vibrato effect and individual wet and dry outputs.

With its maximum delay time increased to about 550ms, this version of the Deluxe Memory Man provided almost twice the maximum delay time of more expensive competitors like the MXR M-118, which topped out at 300ms.

Thanks to its affordable price and expanded features, the five-knob Deluxe Memory Man became an instant hit. Its modulated delay sounds quickly made the pedal irresistible to numerous pros in the studio and on stage for crafting warm, lush textures and complex rhythms.

The preamp is also a key element of the Deluxe Memory Man’s sonic personality, adding sumptuous grit and body to the sound when the Level control is cranked up far enough to make the overload LED illuminate. Many players, including Adrian Belew, Geordie Walker, Robert Smith and (most notably) the Edge, used the box as a cornerstone of their signature sounds during the early Eighties and beyond.

The Deluxe Memory Man virtually vanished from guitarists’ thoughts when Electro-Harmonix temporarily went out of business in 1984 and digital delay pedals started gaining popularity. However, the original “big box” version made a comeback as the reissue EH-2000 and EH-2002 versions produced between 1996-2007.

With the exception of a few modifications like true bypass switching and an external 24vdc adapter, the reissues offered an accurate reproduction of the original unit that even looked like the real thing. This version was promptly embraced by a new generation of grunge and alternative artists seeking retro tones.

Initially the reissue even used the same pair of Matsushita MN3005 BBD chips as the earlier version. Online forums are filled with varying opinions about whether the dual MN3005 configuration sounds better than the quad MN3008 circuit and whether the Xvive MN3005 reproductions featured in the current pedals sound as good as the originals.

As with any musical gear, users should let their own ears be the guiding force. It’s worth noting that a properly calibrated original or reissue is going to sound much better regardless of what type of chips it has inside.

Anyone looking for a 2007 or earlier unit should also replace the electrolytic capacitors, which also can improve sound and performance considerably.

• This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.

Hello there, and welcome to Guitar World Editors’ Picks – our monthly guide to the guitar tracks that have captured the attention of our editors over the past four weeks or so.

With the aid of our Spotify playlist below, we’ve rounded up all our favorite new releases from this spooky season, a.k.a. October, and noted our personal highlights – the playing, tones, and songwriting that most set our six-string senses a-tingling.

Highlights this month include the new Queens of the Stone Age album, Tony Iommi’s first album in over two decades, frenetic metal from England-based multinational band Calva Louise, and experimentation galore from The Mars Volta.

All that and much more in our playlist below.

Track of the month: Tony Iommi – Over the Violent Sun

This month saw the release of Tony Iommi’s first new album in 21(!) years, and From the Dark lays bare his eternal influence on the world of metal. Standout cut Over the Violent Sun is one of the best riffs I’ve heard all year – and it came from a 78-year-old.

In an age where we’ve given up all hope of some of rock’s other big beasts ever putting out new material – whatever happened to that Jimmy Page solo album, eh? – it’s invigorating to hear Iommi turning out songs that give guitarists a quarter of his age a run for their money.

Also playing:

• Grace Bowers – 19
• Shy, Low – The Bloat
• Fontaines D.C. – Demolition

Track of the month: Purple Pilgrims – Outside

Fall is always a busy time for the music industry, so it’s been a tough call this month. Power Trip’s return is huge news, Calva Louise’s La Promesa is bonkers, brilliant and brutal in equal measure, and I remain addicted to Cleopatrick’s slurred take on rock. Somehow, though, amid all this noise, for me it is the woozy Outside from New Zealand dream-pop duo Purple Pilgrims that has won through and been played almost daily across October.

There are elements of ’60s pastoral folk heroes like Vashti Bunyan, Beach House’s cavernous space and floating tones, and muted rhythm parts that twinkle in and out of the mix. It is an enveloping listen that – in unison with the lyrics – brings you from the outside in. The album Given to the Night (due November 27) has much more to offer, too.

Also playing:

• Power Trip – Precinct 13
• Calva Louise – La Promesa
• Cleopatrick – WHAAT

Track of the month: Queens of the Stone Age – From the Cliff

My entry for this month almost looked very different, but given I’ve been spinning the new Queens of the Stone Age record this morning, it forced me into a little rethink. Because this isn’t your regular QOTSA album – this one is far more brooding, almost melancholic, quite clearly inspired by the band’s acoustic turn in the Parisian catacombs last year.

Don’t expect too much by way of ear-shattering riffs and guzzling guitars. Yes, there are frenetic interludes led by Josh Homme – Sunday’s gallop fits nicely into that vibe –, but they are the exception here.

Instead, Homme and co. go big on the acoustics, leaning into a far more quirky edge. That’s no more apparent than on the jangly fingerstyle folk of From The Cliff – a lovely see-sawing number with layered arpeggios.

Also playing:

• Remi Wolf, John Mayer – Moon So High
• Molly Tuttle – 9 to 5
• Polyphia – Let There Be Light

Track of the month: The Mars Volta – Voice In My Knives / Poseedora De Mi Sombra & The Iron Rose

There’s no better band for a dose of much-needed out-of-the-box inspiration and pre-Halloween eeriness than The Mars Volta. This month, we’ve been treated to not only one, but two (or, rather, three) Mars Volta gems: The Iron Rose – which dropped today – and the 20-ish-minute-long Voice In My Knives / Poseedora De Mi Sombra, released earlier this month.

And while they’re not entirely new tracks (they’re reimagined renditions of their 2025 in-studio counterparts, after all), they capture a project that’s constantly in motion – both sonically and conceptually. When it comes to The Mars Volta, albums aren’t static paintings, made to be exhibited in a museum, but ever-evolving installation pieces. Genres are well and truly thrown out the window.

Guitars are mere paintbrushes, used to illustrate an expansive, cinematic sound, more akin to Radiohead’s Kid A than that of a typical “guitar band.” Latin flavours and jazz-like musings are splattered across the canvas rather than laid bare. Transcendentally insane, in the best possible way.

Also playing:

• PINS – All Over
• Lambrini Girls – The Basement
• Heartworms – Guess I’m Stuck in the Dark

John 5 has played with some huge acts across the years, but joining Mötley Crüe – a band of which he is a huge fan – is a standout milestone in his prolific career. Unfortunately, when he was performing on one of the biggest stages the band has ever graced, disaster nearly struck.

Crüe had been chosen to play the NFL draft in 2023, a huge date in the American sporting calendar. Taking place at Union Station in Kansas City, Missouri, it was meant to be a moment to savor. But for the Telecaster addict, it was memorable for all the wrong reasons.

“There's something I haven't talked about,” he tells Guitar World in a new interview. “For [1985 hit] Home Sweet Home, we’re playing on this different stage, way out in the crowd. I’m walking out, and I hear [white noise through his in-ear monitors]. The further I get, the louder it gets.

“It is so loud that it’s almost hurting my ears, so I can’t hear anything except for [white noise]. That’s all I heard.”

John 5 had everyone reason to panic. This was still relatively early days in his Crüe career. It was live TV. Millions were watching. And he could not hear a thing. How was he going to get through the show?

Well, ever the consummate pro, John 5 didn’t flap. He just had to rely on another one of his senses to get him through the spot. Tommy Lee, who plays the song’s piano intro, was his first human-shaped guide rope.

“I had to watch Tommy,” he says. “That’s all I could do. I couldn’t hear myself. I couldn’t hear anyone. It was as if I was deaf. I was just watching his fingers

“I was praying, because it was live TV – there were like a billion people watching. Then when he got behind the drums, I’m watching Nikki’s [Sixx, bass] hand and I’m watching Tommy play – that’s the only thing I could do.”

John 5 actually solos over the intro, and you would never have known a thing. It is actually insanely impressive, all things considered. The camera also pans to him, where he can be seen fiddling with his in-ear pack, hoping to fix the issue.

He may have been stressing at the time, but John 5 walked out unscathed. In fact, he put on a good show.

“I'll never forget it,” he says. “I was walking back to the stage, and you could tell my face was so mad. I remember going to the sound engineer, and I go, ‘How was it?’ And he goes, ‘Perfect!’”

Cue a sigh of relief. “I was shitting it,” he wraps. “I couldn't believe it. My good karma just must have come out. I was so lucky.”

Elsewhere, John 5 has been explaining how he ended up a Fender artist, and why the Squier versions of his signature Tele are not to be snuffed at. As of October 2026, he is Fender’s most decorated signature Telecaster artist.

What is it?

While it is certainly a rewarding experience, learning an instrument is hard. Thankfully, as far as the guitar goes, there are plenty of readily-available resources, including online guitar lessons through which anyone can teach themselves, as well as a huge selection of entry-level guitars to choose from. The new Litejam RGB24 aims to combine both of these things, offering an instrument that not only serves as your first electric guitar, but also your teacher.

It does this through color-coded LEDs set into the frets that show you exactly where to put your fingers. These lights are controlled via an app, which tells the guitar which LEDs to display. For example, tell the app you want a C chord, and the app will (over Bluetooth) make the guitar light up the relevant frets, color-coded to tell you which finger should go where. A pretty straightforward concept - at least on paper.

Before getting into review-writing, I spent a decade teaching guitar, and still do a little of it here and there. So, I’m left wondering if this is something that will help or hinder students. Time to find out.

Specs

• Launch price: $579 | £395 | €446
• Made: China
• Type: Six-string electric guitar
• Body: Basswood
• Neck: Maple, C-shape
• Fingerboard: Rosewood
• Scale length: 25.5"
• Nut/width: Bone, 41mm
• Frets: 24, medium jumbo
• Hardware: Litejam chrome premium die-cast tuners, chrome vibrato bridge
• String spacing at bridge: 11mm
• Electrics: HSH, ceramic pickups, bridge pickup coil split
• Weight: 7.4lbs/3.4kg
• Options: N/A
• Left-handed options: Yes, black and white
• Finishes: White (as reviewed), Black
• Cases: Litejam soft case
• Contact: Litejam

Build quality

Build quality rating: ★★★

Putting the lights aside for a second, the guitar itself consists of a basswood body, maple neck, and a rosewood fingerboard. Initial impressions are good, with no obvious defects out of the box.

The RGB24 sports 24 medium-jumbo frets that feel a little grainy under the strings, so could use a little polishing. Similarly, the action is high out of the box at a less than beginner-friendly 2mm on the low E and 1.75mm on the high E.

The Litejam Premium die-cast tuners feel robust in use for an affordable guitar, and while tuning does slip after a few over-the-top bends, it is acceptable for the price. That is until the tremolo arm is used, at which point tuning quickly wanders.

The trem also makes a lot of spring noise. I would expect a little of this with any tremolo system, of course, but the system on the RGB24 is notably louder than any I’ve tried on comparable models.

At $579, the Litejam RGB24 isn’t as cheap as some beginner electric guitars (the $379 Yamaha Pacifica 112V, for example), but we have to consider the additional tech, which includes those LED lights, Bluetooth connectivity, the app, and a USB-C rechargeable battery with eight to ten hours of life per charge.

And that tech is free from compromise, as the LEDs are bright and vibrantly colorful, the connection to the app is stable, and the app itself has plenty of imagery that makes it feel premium.

Aesthetically, I have the White finish (no fancy color names here) with chrome hardware, which is problem-free, but also a little plain when the LED’s are turned off. The back of the headstock sports a QR code, which, in my opinion, cheapens the impression the guitar gives.

That QR code takes you to a web page entitled ‘Instruction’ which advertises the included warranty, fast shipping, and a 14-day refund, then other Litejam products, before finally listing the links to manuals as the second-to-last item on the page. In other words, it's primarily an advert permanently ingrained on the product.

Given that the customer has already spent their hard-earned cash, it feels a little disrespectful to include advertising of this sort on a bought product.

Playability

Playability/Usability rating: ★★★

Putting the tech aside for a second and judging the Litejam RGB as a guitar first, playability inevitably suffers from the aforementioned high action and grainy frets.

This means that playing chords and simple lead lines at the lower frets is easy enough, but bends don’t feel particularly smooth, and the high action gets in the way when playing higher up the neck.

However, this is rescued somewhat by the light strings the guitar arrives with, and could be helped with some setup work. At this point, I would be remiss not to acknowledge that the beginners the Lightjam RGB24 is aimed at will be highly unlikely to know how to do that setup.

The neck improves things as it is a comfortable C-shape. It’s not too chunky, nor is it too skinny, making it a great middle ground for those learning how to play. The Satin finish makes it easy to move around on, too.

The app, to be blunt, is impressive. It’s designed to allow the user to select what they want the LED’s on the guitar to display and does so through four sections: Chord, Scale, Play, and Learn.

It is all delightfully easy to use; for example, if I want to learn a chord, I go to the Chord section, where I am presented with a page featuring a fret diagram at the top and highly intuitive visual menus to select the Chord and Chord quality below the diagram.

When the desired chord is chosen, the LED’s immediately change to show the chord on the guitar, color-coded to indicate which finger should be used where. Easy.

Scales work similarly, with a number of options to display the scales in helpful ways across the fretboard. For example, a traditional ‘CAGED’ type shape with the whole scale shown within four frets, or what the app calls ‘Scale Flow’ with the scale spanning seven frets.

The highlight for me is the ‘Learn’ section, where Litejam has curated a selection of songs. Playing these songs will display the required frets in real time on the guitar’s LED’s, and the track can be slowed down and looped so as to help nail those tricky sections.

Similarly, the Chord Section contains a ‘Progression’ page where a chord progression can be selected and then played through, again with the LED’s changing in real time. In short, it’s all very clever.

However, there is a flaw here. The lights line up perfectly with the strings from a bird's-eye perspective, looking directly down on the fretboard from above. But in a playing position (i.e side on), the gap between the strings and LED’s changes this perspective slightly, meaning things don’t line up quite as well. This isn’t a deal breaker, rather something that just needs a little adjusting too.

A bigger issue is that once you are playing the guitar, your fingers are on top of the LEDs, which often renders a selection of them blocked from view. For example, a finger on the third fret of the A string will get in the way of the LED’s on the third fret of the D, G, B, and high E strings.

This isn’t a problem when you are learning chords one at a time, but it does make playing through scales and along with the aforementioned tracks awkward if you are relying on the LED’s.

When you are ready to turn them off completely, the lights can enter a Perform mode, where they will illuminate in various patterns. There is no escaping the fact that this looks cool.

Sounds

Sounds rating: ★★★

Litejam lists the pickups as ‘HSH ceramic’. In other words, a humbucker in the bridge, a single coil in the middle, and what Litejam calls a mini-humbucker in the neck. It’s important to note that this is a single-coil-sized 'blade'-style humbucker rather than a version of a Gibson-style mini-humbucker.

Purveying through all the pickup positions available via the five-way selector is a low end that feels a bit hollow, and a brightness that is a little harsh with low gain and clean tones, but a lot of fun when a good helping of gain is applied.

I am using a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe IV with a Browne Amplification Ethane dual drive pedal for some grunt, and when I’ve got both sides of the pedal on, the pickups' relatively high output and brightness lead to saturation that retains a nice articulation, especially on the bridge pickup.

The bridge humbucker is split in position two, which, in combination with the single-coil middle pickup, makes for a Stratocaster-reminiscent quack. It’s a similar story in position four, with that soft, scooped tone made famous by Strat players the likes of John Mayer.

My favourite pickup is the neck humbucker, as it offsets that brightness a little, making those cleans and lightly driven sounds more palatable while working well for distorted, cello-like leads.

This particular model suffers from a clicking sound when gain is applied (often associated with digital circuitry getting in the way of the audio). This could be a fault within this specific example of the guitar, rather than the instrument in general.

Verdict

Considering the Litejam RGB24 as just a guitar first, it is obvious we are talking about a beginner electric guitar here. It needs a good setup, tuning stability is not perfect, and the pickups can be harsh while lacking low-end punch. But these are the sort of compromises you might expect on a cheaper guitar.

The app, however, is very impressive. The Bluetooth connection remained stable throughout the entirety of testing, and it displays a lot of information and options in a way that is very easy to understand.

The LED’s are equally as impressive, particularly in how they change in real time to reflect the Litejam official tracks in the app. The concept, however, is a little flawed given that your fingers will inevitably cover LED’s as you are playing, making it hard to keep up with those real-time changes. Instead, where it works well is in showing the learner where to place their fingers when learning individual chord shapes, scales, and arpeggios.

It is a novel alternative to the likes of chord charts and scale diagrams that may well inspire a few more players to pick the instrument up. However, with tablature and (relatively) easy-to-understand chord charts, I suspect that a lot of learners may be better off investing the money in a higher-quality instrument and making use of some readily available online resources.

As a teacher, I am a little wary of students leaning too heavily on the LED lights, too. I want my students to be doing a little thinking, as it is the process of figuring things out that leads to more efficient learning.

In my opinion, the lights are great to get learners started and to help them check that they are playing things correctly, as long as the aim is to eventually turn them off.

Furthermore, the hard part of learning guitar is in developing the co-ordination, muscle memory and finger strength to play those scales and chords, rather than just knowing where to put your fingers.

Guitar World verdict: The Litejam RGB 24 is an impressive piece of kit. It shows learners where to put their fingers in a novel way, which may just encourage a few more players to start learning. However, most may benefit more from a higher-quality guitar and readily available online resources.

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Hands-on videos

Litejam

Paul Davids

Johnny Marr’s latest record, The Age of Everything, with its mix of jangle-meets-abrasion, hits like a handcuff to the wrist. It’s so striking that, after all these years, the wizardry behind Marr’s licks begs the question: is he still some sort of sky-bound enigma?

“I just sort of throw paint on it,” Marr tells Guitar World. “And then I refine it. The results are what matters. But don’t get it wrong – sometimes, I plug in, nail it, and walk around like the bee’s knees. [Laughs]

“But on my own stuff, I value bypassing critical faculty, and engineering a sense of discovery. It’s the not knowing what you’re doing. I like using my ears and not my brains, you know?”

Indeed, we do know. It’s what makes new cuts like Spin and Ophelia as memorable as Marr’s work with The Smiths, Electronic, Modest Mouse, and The Cribs. “Like any craft,” Marr says, “You can’t lie to yourself.”

“Being a songwriter is a curious mix of massive megalomania, and egomania,” Marr laughs. “And really crippling insecurity! But despite it being schizophrenic, you get there in the end.”

What quirks or habits have become parts of your style?

One thing I’ve learned – which borders on eccentric – is that I like not knowing what the chords are. It’s a little tricky on my own songs, but certainly on other people’s songs. It started when I was playing on Beck’s album [1999’s Midnite Vultures], and I did the same thing with Talking Heads [on 1988’s Naked].

If someone wants me to play on their album I tend to say, “Don’t send it to me yet. Let me get my sound and plug in. Then I’ll listen to the song and react instinctively.” That means I’m probably going to make some mistakes, so it takes some ego management. It might sound sketchy for 10 minutes – but we’ll get there, and it’ll be worth it in the end.

You have to be okay with sounding like you suck for 10 minutes. The important thing is that it’s not my job to go in and dazzle; it’s about what it sounds like when I leave.

What’s been your greatest gear find?

I’ve got this ‘60s Fender Deluxe Reverb, which I wouldn’t get rid of for anybody. For this album, we really wanted that pure Fender sound.

Which guitar do you have the closest relationship with?

The red 1984 Les Paul I bought for the Smiths album Meat is Murder, which I use exclusively clean. I changed the pickups out at some point in the ‘80s and I put a Bigsby on it. Those things make it behave and sound unlike a regular Les Paul. That guitar absolutely makes me play in a way that people seem to like. People like Noel Gallagher and Gorillaz seem to want me to play that on their records.

But I also put so much work and obsession into the design of my signature Jaguar, and it really does a big job. The thing with the Jag, the new and the original one, is that by accident – or maybe intuition – it sounds like a Rickenbacker crossed with a Gretsch, but plays like a Fender. It’s like 50 shades of treble!

What’s a piece of gear you own that might surprise people?

Funnily enough the Les Paul surprises people, because it’s almost exclusively thought of as being a rock and blues thing. But I’m always looking to do on any guitar what that guitar brings out in me.

What’s your number one tone tip?

You have to be very deliberate and know what you’re looking for. You can plug into so many types of amps now. I’m by no means a dogged purist in any way; it’s just that the quality has to be good. It might have different tonal aspects, but the bottom line is, “Is it good?”

All of us have options now. If you just pull up a bunch of plugins, you might tell yourself it’s great, and it might be – but it might not be as good as it could be]. What I’ve found with Synergy amps that the stereo is really good; it has a musical sound. With Kempers, I’ve started to hear the Kemper-ness! Again, it’s not dogmatic, or hanging on for the old days.

I marvel at guitar technology. I absolutely love it. If it aids creativity, and makes me a better player and it’s good quality, it’s a really good thing. Just as long as it doesn’t sound like crap!

Tell me about a a lightbulb moment you had.

I have friends who just write and write and write, then, when they’ve got enough songs for a record, they go and record. But I go into writing and making an album knowing that’s what I’m doing. I’m going to use a dedicate a chunk of time in my life to writing. Birthdays are forgotten, anniversaries get forgotten, the dogs get locked outside the house by mistake!

But with this record, we went and gigged and played the songs live. It was a bit scary, but when you’ve play things live and they’ve gone down well, you’re thinking, “We know this one’s a banger” when you record.

We knew Spin was happening, and Ophelia. I knew they were in the bag; because when you record, there’s things like getting it in the right key and all that – but when you’re in front of an audience you make those decisions real quick!

Who’s the most exciting guitarist out there today?

Ella Feingold is great. She never talks it up too much, and she always makes it accessible for people who want to learn. She’s so generous. She’s got that real down-home funk attitude, but she’s also a bit of a scientist on the sly. It bends my brain when she starts talking about her intervals and tunings. She’s the best guitar player I’ve seen for years.

What’s the hardest or toughest time you’ve had as a musician?

With writing songs, we’d all like to think it’s all about inspiration – but some of it’s tenacity and craft. I can finish a song at 2 o’clock in the morning, thinking it’s the greatest thing I’ve ever heard, which is the way it should be. Then in the morning I listen back, and I’m thinking, “Oh. Okay…” It can be emotionally up and down.

When I’m writing, I’m not casual about it; it means a lot to me. So when I think about the tough things, it’s probably having to come back and work on melodies. Riffs come easily to me. I’m pretty decisive with my guitar parts because I’ve been doing it for so long. Sure, I like to experiment, but I tend to know what I’m going for.

Which of your songs do you find most challenging to play?

With some of the Modest Mouse stuff, luckily, I was in the right band. That’s when I started working with the Jag, and my job was to come up with so many diverse sounds. And because I wasn’t a founding member, I was reproducing their older material, which a Jaguar had no business going near! But I had to do it – and I was competing with Jazzmasters.

I was also competing with Isaac Brock, who plays so loud through his Fender Super Sixes, and has these crazy tones. He’s a really remarkable artist and he kept me on my toes. So, songs like Doin’ the Cockroach and Bury Me with It, I had to do that with my Jag.

And The Smiths’ The Headmaster Ritual is pretty tricky because I’m singing on it. When I wrote that song – it’s in open E and it’s quite intricate – I was merely the guitarist stage left. But I’ve learned to sing and play.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received, and who gave it to you?

When I first met Nils Lofgren, I asked him how he got to be such a great singer and a great guitarist. He said, “Just don’t mess up the singing, because people will notice that.” But I think when you’re as good as Nils Lofgren, you say that! You just have to practice and practice.

What’s the biggest misconception about you?

If you’d asked me that in my 20s I’d have had a whole long list of young, attitude shit to be angsty about! But when you’ve been making records for as long as I’ve done, you’re pretty sanguine about whatever.

But it is a fact that for over 40 years, you’d be forgiven for thinking that my name actually had the words “jingle” and “jangle” in it! I can bring a sort of decidedly un-jangly sound if it’s required – and sometimes, it’s absolutely required. But you’ve got to be philosophical about these things. You’ve got to be genuinely grateful and awed that you have a distinctive, recognizable signature sound.

So, to contradict entirely what I’m saying, I reckon if you’ve got something of your own, then go with it, and do it loud. That’s where I’m at.

• The Age of Everything is out now via BMG.

When Brent Hinds left Mastodon in March 2025, guitarist Bill Kelliher admits it was “a relief [though] bittersweet”. And when Hinds died just a few months later in August of last year, following a motorcycle crash, Kelliher – ever honest – tells Guitarist, “I was shocked, but not surprised.”

So when it came time for Mastodon to write their upcoming ninth record, Marrow Deep, Kelliher admits, “We couldn’t just write a happy record.” So, they didn’t. Songs such as Poisonous Weapons, Your Ghost Again, The Vanishing and The Three Fates are all clearly impacted by Hinds’ exit from Mastodon and subsequent death.

“I fucking cranked it,” Kelliher says of the first time he listened to Marrow Deep back proper. “After the first couple songs, there were tears like someone was squeezing my tear ducts. I could not control it. It was really bizarre.”

Sad as he is about Hinds being gone, Kelliher has newfound freedom.

“I’m free to write whatever without having to think about Brent not liking it,” Kelliher says. “He was a different person every day. Some days he would love Mastodon. But other days he would be like, ‘I fucking hate metal.’ I’d be like, ‘Okay, we’re a metal band. I don’t know what to tell you, bro…’”

With a new line-up featuring Nick Johnston on guitar, João Nogueira on keyboards, along with original members Brann Dailor and Troy Sanders, Kelliher feels good about Mastodon’s future, though, of course, he misses Hinds.

“We’d always be friends in the end,” he says. “It was really hard; we always wanted to keep the band as the four of us, but it’s onward and upward for me. This is my life. I live and breathe Mastodon.”

Was work on Marrow Deep started before or after Brent’s death?

I’m constantly writing. With Brent, it was always a competition, which I didn’t understand. It was one-sided with him. He was interesting – a great fucking guitar player and songwriter – but it was difficult to write with him. With this new stuff, I’m writing all the time and putting riffs into my phone. But with Brent, after a while, he was just on his own wave…

He just wasn’t into it any more. I was like, “Dude, how great is it that we get to go up on stage, have people buy our albums and worship you?” But he just had this self-destructive streak. It just became that we were on totally different ends of the spectrum as far as guitar and personality.

We did have a lot of things in common, but he was dangerous. I think that’s what made the Mastodon we were in the early days. He would just do whatever the fuck he wanted to do, but that got old after a while.

How did it feel when Brent left the band?

Honestly, it was like a big weight had been lifted. I was doing the lion’s share of the writing, but I always had to think, “Is Brent gonna like this?” And pretty soon, he just didn’t like anything that we would come up with.

How did living and working in a post-Brent world impact the writing of Marrow Deep?

The subject matter definitely changed a lot. After losing Brent, we were like, “This is huge. We can’t ignore this. We have to pay tribute. We have to talk about it and get it out and off our chests.”

What has Brent’s replacement, Nick Johnston, brought to the band?

Nick’s got really big shoes to fill – but Nick has really big feet. No-one could replace Brent, and we’re not trying to. But Nick is a wonderful human being and he doesn’t play a wrong note. He’s got such a unique style, so it took a second when he first joined, but he’s settled in now.”

What’s the story behind the track entitled Your Ghost Again?

That song was totally different at first. I wrote most of the song and Brann wrote a chorus, and slowly every riff came out of the song and got replaced with what’s there now. It happens like that sometimes, where a riff here or there gets cannibalised, but since we overdub the vocals last, we always focus on the song structure, riffs and harmonies.

What about Snakes For Dinner, which features Josh Homme?

Josh is the Elvis of our generation. He’s got the swagger, the coolness, and he’s handsome as hell [laughs]. He’s been a friend of ours for a long time, and so he ended up on that song. But the chorus of that song just came out of me sifting through my pile of riffs. We were putting it together, and I’m like, ‘Oh, I might have a riff that might go well there,’ and I went through my phone and found it.

What guitars did you lean on while you were recording the album?

I have a white Les Paul Custom that’s yellowed now. It’s a ’77 and it has these old Lace pickups in there from before I designed my signature [Mojotone Hellbender] pickups. Man, whatever that guitar does, it just sounds fucking amazing.

Nick used it a lot for his solos, too. I also used an ESP Viper Baritone on a bunch of stuff, like Barbarians Blood because it stays in tune really well. Nothing else would stay in tune for that song but the ESP.

This is a new era for Mastodon. What’s your outlook as you move forward?

I’m still processing it. It’s not something I’ll ever fully process… it’s bittersweet. Unfortunately, he’s gone, and I was shocked but not surprised. I was waiting for that phone call about him because he was always living on the edge.

But he’s at peace now… he just seemed like he couldn’t find peace, you know? And, honestly, with the band now, I see great things continuing to happen.

But if it ended today, I’d be appreciative, and if I could say anything to Brent now, it would be, ‘No hard feelings.’ I’d say, ‘Hey man, remember the good times? Because there were a fucking lot of them.’ I mean, every night was a good time, dude. People change and you fall out of love with people and you don’t wanna be in a band any more. That’s fine. It’s water under the bridge.

• Marrow Deep is out now via Loma Vista Recordings
• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.

Fresh from becoming the first artist to get a signature Squier Paranormal guitar, Queens of the Stone Age’s Troy Van Leeuwen is releasing a new stompbox with Dr. No Effects – and it features a severed finger.

The TvL Blameshifter is being labeled as a “switching architect” and has been 10 years in the making, having started as a rehearsal room joke.

Back in 2016, Van Leeuwen and Dr. No Effects worked on two signature pedals, the TvL Raven and TvL Octavia – a clean boost and vintage fuzz, respectively.

The latter featured the word “blameshifter” beneath one of its knobs, which led to the in-house QOTSA line of, “What if there was an effect that shifts the blame for a fuck-up to the other guy’s amp?”

A decade later, after a severed finger fell out of a draw one day in the Dr. No workshop – no further context has been given – the Dutch firm has given birth to the Blameshifter.

What the story ultimately amounts to is a switching pedal built on a quartet of outputs with ultra-transparent buffers and a new approach to effects loop switching.

The severed finger points to where the signal is routed. Output 1 offers a buffered effects loop or an amp send (dealer’s choice) for adding an extra amp to your rig, with Output 3 the return.

That means players can create two separate loops, engage entire pedal chains at once, and return to their main output when it’s disengaged.

But it’s Output 2, described as an “A/B marvel”, where things go a little more left-field. Flick the side-mounted miniswitch to A, and you’ll get Output 2 only. Position B engages Output 2 and the main Output, providing “wet/dry chaos”.

“Troy mapped the labyrinth like a Sonic Architect, Dr. No gave it a body and soul,” the firm says.

The pedals are all handmade from out of Eindhoven, and ship with a goodie box including guitar picks, stickers, and buttons, to the tune of $375.40.

The Blameshifter is currently on pre-order, with shipping expected on November 15.

See Dr. No Effects for more.

Fender has confirmed that NAM A2 is coming to the Tone Master Pro in what is set to be the modeler’s most significant update yet.

Matt Gutnik, Fender’s Chief Product Officer, confirmed rumors online. It will find Fender capitalizing on a tech innovation that has taken the amp modeler world by storm over the past few months.

NAM A2, which launched in June, is an open-source gear modeling architecture that lets users capture their gear, and explore both brand- and user-generated amp, cab, and pedal models.

Its maker humbly calls it the “most accurate and best sounding amp modeling technology in history”, but there was some credence to the claims: NAM A2 beat a number of its biggest modeling rivals in a blind listening test.

Modelers with access to NAM – which includes the newly announced Zoom Neurig and the Blackstar Blackstar BEAM Mini – have access to thousands of pro- and user-made tones via the TONE3000 platform. The raft of options is only going to keep on growing, too.

That makes Fender's embrace of the tech all the more significant. It also makes the company one of the earliest big-name modeler makers to partner with NAM A2, getting ahead of the likes of Neural DSP, Line 6 and IK Multimedia.

The confirmation comes from a post made to the official Tone Master Pro Users forum and shared via Reddit.

Sadly, no release date has been mooted yet, with Gutnik saying Fender’s in-house team is currently “putting it through its paces,” with Fender aiming to strike a balance between getting it ready at pace, and not rushing matters.

“Our goal,” he says, “is to make TMP an amazing platform to play NAM, just like we do with the rest of your amps and effects.

“Captures drop into your signal chain like any other amp, and they work with the touchscreen and in the app like everything else,” Gutnik then explains. “You will even be able to assign each one its own cool graphic.”

While it isn’t likely to completely eradicate the need for other amp models, such as those that come baked into our favorite modelers, NAM A2 does vastly expand the tonal capabilities of any unit that can accommodate it.

How long we’ll have to wait is anyone’s guess – the TMP’s last major update was a biggie in December 2025. But with Fender wanting to reveal it’s in the works, it’s clear it is desperate to get ahead of the curve.

Orianthi’s new Band of Gypsys-inspired power trio, the Power of 3, have unveiled their third single, and it features a previously unheard guitar riff from Jimi Hendrix.

The former Michael Jackson guitarist has teamed up with drummer Cindy Blackman Santana (Buckethead, Lenny Kravitz) and Prince bassist Rhonda Smith for a band that pays tribute to Hendrix’s firebrand psychedelic blues.

They’ve even partnered with the late guitar legend’s producer, Eddie Kramer, for their debut record. Taxi, their latest single, takes their Hendrix lore to new extremes.

The four-strong team were granted access to the fabled Hendrix archives for the record. During her explorations, Orianthi discovered a Hendrix riff that’s never before seen the light of day, and so Taxi was built around it.

The song starts with some city streets foley, and is immediately reminiscent of Crosstown Traffic, before a galloping riff takes hold. Orianthi is a PRS artist, but there’s a snapping, Strat-like quality to her tone here. And she unloads a pretty tasty guitar solo, too, with enough whammy bar fluctuations and personal flourishes to take it away from being solely impressionistic.

“Getting to hear something from Jimi that the world hasn’t heard before was pretty incredible,” Orianthi says. “The moment I heard that riff, I knew there was something special there and immediately started imagining what we could do with it.

“There’s something really powerful about the three of us creating something new around a piece of music from someone who has inspired us so much,” she adds. “It’s our way of honoring Jimi while making something that's completely our own.”

The band’s self-titled debut album releases on December 11 via She2Music. Carlos Santana is set for a guest spot, too.

Las Vegas Raiders owner Mark Davis encouraged Orianthi to assemble a Band of Gypsys-inspired power trio several years ago, and the project has grown legs since. The album follows two performances at the Raider’s Allegiant Stadium, where Nita Strauss just made her Alice Cooper return.

For many, the band is a better alternative to Eddie Kramer’s suggestion of using AI to bring more Hendrix material to life, just as the Beatles did with Now and Then.

The Power of 3 is out December 11 via She2Music and available to preorder/presave now.

A wild Strat appeared! Fender Japan has teamed up with Pokémon for two special pixel art guitars that tip their headstocks to the enduring franchise’s first two video games.

The Red Stratocaster and Green Telecaster both get snazzy semi-transparent pickguards (that glow in fluorescent colors depending on the angle, no less) to better show off the pixel art on the body. Honestly, it’s a really smart way to celebrate Pokémon’s 30th anniversary.

The art display includes everything from Pokémon and character sprites to a Poké Ball and a Game Boy Color. The pickguards also get pixelated edging, which is really nice.

Better still, both guitars get Poké Ball inlays on their fretboards (maple for the Tele, rosewood for the Strat). It really ties into the game exclusive concept that runs through the monster-catching franchise.

Both rock traditional single-coil electronic configurations, then... Oh? The pickups are evolving! Engaging the push/pull Volume knob injects an 8-bit sound sound into your playing. It’s wholly unnecessary, but also genius.

They both also get a unique Pocket Monsters 30th neck plate, complete with a little Pikachu sprite.

The timing of the launch is miraculous, too, coming just days after Ibanez partnered up with another long-standing Japanese anime and game franchise, Dragon Ball Z. It’s been a hell of a week of guitar playing nerds – this writer included.

What I will say is that it feels like Fender Japan has entered the design phase with a little more nuance and imagination. Still, it continues a run of interesting collabs from Fender, including a Game of Thrones guitar launched with a star-studded cast, a Monster Hunter tie-in, and even one with Godzilla.

Each guitar ships with a hard case, Pokémon guitar pick set, and certificate of authenticity.

But there is a slight, er, catch: the guitars are so limited, and are probably going to be so damn popular, that the guitars are only available by lottery.

Applications for the lottery sale will be accepted at the Pokémon Center Online, which you can visit for more info.

J Mascis has looked back on the time he first crossed paths with the guitar that has defined his sound – and admitted it wasn’t the Fender guitar he was initially after.

The Dinosaur Jr. guitarist features in The One. For New York – Fender’s three-day concert film set in the Big Apple, which marks the released of the American Professional range.

“New York was the first place we came where we had any fans or acceptance. We just kind of gravitated towards New York,” Mascis reflects in the documentary.

Mascis famously started out as a drummer, playing alongside future Dinosaur Jr bandmate Lou Barlow in the hugely influential Massachusetts hardcore band Deep Wound.

When he stepped out from behind the drum it, he said that he found guitar playing “one-dimensional” and that made him try to find new techniques to make it more dynamic.

Speaking in The One. For New York, he says it was always a Fender electric he wanted – and he had his eye on a Strat until one day in New York he found what he was looking for.

“Starting a band I decided I wanted a Fender,” says Mascis.” I went to buy a Strat but they had a Jaguar for $200 and Jazzmaster for $300. The neck felt better on the Jazzmaster, it was worn in like a baseball bat so I just went for the Jazzmaster.”

And the rest is history. Mascis has had a long relationship with Fender as a signature artist. He has put his name to an MIJ Fender Jazzmaster and a more affordable Squier version, and to a Telecaster that’s finished in a Blue Sparkle paint job just like the vintage Gretsch drum sets Mascis liked.

Mascis helped popularize the offset among a new generation of punk-rock and indie players.

“People first thought it was weird playing distorted music with a Jazzmaster because they only thought of surf and stuff with them,” said Mascis, speaking to MusicRadar in 2012. “But by now it’s become pretty accepted that they can make a lot of noise also."

The Jazzmaster was the guitar he learned to play on. He built his sound around it. Everything else – including the Strat – could sound thin. But was the Jazzmaster his ultimate guitar? That might be tough to call. He has gone on record saying he likes his playing on the Telecaster better.

“I just end up liking what I play better on the Tele,” he said, speaking to MusicRadar in 2021. “If I play two solos on two different guitars, I usually end up liking it more on the Tele.”

There’s been a host of big-name players auctioning off huge swathes of their guitar collections in recent years, but Noel Gallagher says he struggles to let go of his guitars. That makes the time he gifted one to an Oasis tribute band all the more special.

From Mark Knopfler and Jeff Beck to Gallagher’s good friend Johnny Marr, hundreds of guitars with great provenance have hit the auction block and fetched high prices recently.

But don’t expect Gallagher to follow suit, as he reveals on his recent appearance on Chicken Shop Date with comedian and host Amelia Dimoldenberg. That's not to say he hasn't parted ways with a few guitars in the past, though.

“I’m a hoarder,” he admits. “[But] I’ve given a few away. I once gave a guitar to a guy who played me in a tribute band [called Noasis. We went to see them [and it was] sold out! I brought [a guitar] down and gave it to the lad.”

It’s a touching story, but there’s actually a little bit of backstory to it.

“We met Noel once,” a member of the band revealed on Radio X in 2022. “It was 2008 and [someone we know] had done some work on Noel’s house and told us where he lived.

“So when we were [playing] down in London, we went and knocked on his door like school girls. His wife answered, and we told her who we were. She said, ‘Oh, I know you! I’ll go get him.’”

Noel Gallagher appeared at the door, and was cordially invited to the show. His response? “No. I’m not interested.”

Perhaps then, the guitar was gifted as a way of admonishing guilt, or at least extended an olive branch to his riff-touting counterpart after the initial snub.

Gallagher played a big role in the auction of Johnny Marr’s gear recently, and in doing so, revealed the handy buying advice he learned from the Smiths guitarist that he still swears by today.

Gallagher has also revealed his hatred for playing lead guitar, but says he was forced to do it so he could join the band.

Fifty years. The timeline does not lie – even if 73-year-old Martin Simpson is liable to disagree (“That’s obviously impossible because I’m only 28!”). Fortunately, the Scunthorpe-born folk hero has wasted not a beat of his half-century since 1976’s debut, Golden Vanity, planting his flag as a songwriter, performer, collaborator, author and teacher.

Simpson’s new album, Some Kind Of Jubilee, cannot hope to entirely distil that fascinating career. Yet it comes closer than you might think, nodding to his back pages on formative standards and fan-favorites reimagined with cello and pedal steel, while airing bold new songs that announce he’s far from done.

Over a summer’s afternoon at his home in Sheffield, the affable maestro held court, spinning war stories, airing his formidable fingerstyle and nudging Guitarist to pass over so many of his favorite instruments that we started to feel like a golf caddy.

How does it feel to reach that 50-year milestone?

It’s beautifully shocking. Without being sentimental, it’s allowed me to really look at my 50 years of recording. And the thing I like is that I feel like I’m actually at my best now. I also think I’ve grown to love what I do more and more as time passes.

Making this latest record was like a series of dreams come true. I recorded with Louis Campbell – he’s 25 now and a monster guitar player – Liz Hanks [cello] and Ben Nicholls [bass]. We started in a place out on the North Yorkshire moors.

Then we went to Jackson Browne’s studio in Santa Monica [Groove Masters] because I really wanted to work with Greg Leisz. He’s my favourite pedal steel player. There are so many recordings where I’ve gone, ‘Who the hell is playing that?’ And it’s always Greg, y’know?

We sat down – very close, as far away as we are now – and he would be playing a Weissenborn or a National Tri-Plate and overdubbing pedal steel.

Back in England, I got Zak Hobbs to come in and do overdubs on three tracks. He’s Richard Thompson’s grandson and just a great player. The record sounds huge. It’s really orchestral-sounding, which is funny because it’s all guitars, except for the cello.

What’s the vintage of the material on this record?

I’ve allowed myself to be retrospective. When I lived in the States, I wrote a song called Love Never Dies about a road trip from Memphis to Little Rock, Arkansas. I never felt I’d recorded it right. So we did that live, with Greg playing National on his lap, then overdubbing pedal steel.

It’s a body of work that goes back a long way. When I was four, my mother had a 78 of spirituals. I heard Paul Robeson sing Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child and that was it for me. I could not understand how a piece of music could make me feel so much. And the feeling was of extraordinary melancholy, which I totally adored [laughs].

I joke about it, but I decided that when I grew up, I was going to make people cry for a living. Which I think is a noble ambition, and it seems to have worked. So each of the vinyl editions of this new album finishes with a different version of Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child.

How about the new songs you wrote for the album?

One is called Ruby Bridges, which I wrote on that banjo that’s currently being photographed. She was the first black child to break segregation in New Orleans schools. There’s another called Survivor that I wrote about an elm tree in the valley down there, and it just moves me every time I walk past it.

What tunings are you working in?

CGCFCD is the tuning that comes up the most at the moment, like on the tune called The Recruited Collier. One of the things about open tunings – and I always say this in my workshops – is that they dictate, and it’s up to you to go, “Don’t tell me what to do.”

Let’s look at the guitars you’ve picked out for us…

They’re utterly remarkable for how dissimilar they are, and each one has an incredible backstory. We recorded a track for the record with Paul Reed Smith at his studio in Maryland.

He’s mad as a box of frogs, in the best possible way. This is an Angelus Cutaway. Cocobolo, curly mahogany neck… It’s so beautiful. The guitar itself had been shipped to Japan in 2012 with some of the first acoustics that Paul made.

Unbeknownst to him, they had decided there was no market for PRS acoustics. So they put ’em in a warehouse. And they didn’t tell him. So this guitar sat in a warehouse for 13 years. You might think that when it came out of the case, it might sound a bit closed down. But I cannot believe this guitar. It’s insane.

And the next is a Stefan Sobell creation, right?

Yeah. This is the guitar that gets used the most at the moment. Doesn’t sound like anything else. Stefan is so influential. Completely different sound. And, for me, the separation, the piano element of it, is one of the reasons that I play the way that I play.

They’re all wide fingerboards. Stefan made this guitar in 2022, and it’s one of his 40th anniversary models. The woods are stupid. I’ve never seen German spruce that looks like that before: gorgeous. And the Brazilian rosewood: that insane green thing happens.

Stefan has been putting Highlander pickups into guitars for me since I met him. I first came across Highlanders when I was living in California. Most guitar makers just say, “I’m not going to put a Highlander in a guitar. I don’t want to do it. It’s too difficult. It’s just a nightmare. It’s arcane.” And, in fact, Highlander is no longer in business.

But Stefan bought 12 of them from Japan, and one of the things that he’s utterly brilliant at is the installation of these pickups. He said to me, “If you tell anybody how, I’ll have to kill them.” It’s got a Highlander and a K&K, so it’s the two signals.

I use them both at the same time – two DI boxes – and every soundman I’ve worked with since I had this installation has gone, “That’s the best acoustic sound I’ve ever heard.”

And this next model is a Turnstone build by Rosie Heydenrych, isn’t it?

I’m sure she wouldn’t mind me telling this story. Rosie had built a guitar for me, which I loved, but at the end of a couple of hours, my right hand was going, “I don’t like this.” So I called her up and said, “Rosie, I hate to say this. This guitar is absolutely fucking brilliant, but…” And she said, “Hooray! I’ve been listening to you play and thinking about your tone production, and I really wanted an excuse to make you another guitar because I think I can do it better.”

So we ended up making this. This is Mexican royal ebony, which is called Katalox as well. It’s an Adirondack top; I like European and Adirondack. I just think they do the business. And it has an English sycamore neck, which I just think is absolutely incredible. Her work is insanely beautiful.

What can you tell us about this Fylde?

I had a 1931 Martin 000-18 12-fret, which was just revelatory. Everybody that played it went, “For fuck’s sake! Oh my God!” But I didn’t keep it because it was such an iconic instrument. I couldn’t put pickups in it. I couldn’t take it out. I’d play it in the studio and wrote a bunch of stuff on it. Then I went, ‘Let’s see what other people do with this idea.’

Roger [Bucknall] makes my 12-fret guitars, and this was the second one that he made. Sonically, it’s always been just absolutely ridiculous. But it had some intonation issues. Roger, fortunately, is a very flexible human being. So he said, “Well, why don’t I put a new neck on it?” And I said, “Yeah, great. Why don’t you model it on my old Martin?” The neck is ebony, dyed maple, and mahogany. It’s got a huge voice.

Let’s take a closer look at the Taran.

If you were to talk to the absolute woodworking kings, like Ralph Bown, their opinion is that the guy actually pushing the envelope the most is Rory [Dowling]. This has done at least 250 gigs. It’s the most in-tune guitar. Before he built it, Rory asked me, “What’s your favourite colour?” I said, “What is this, Smash Hits?”

He said, “Just wait.” So if you look at the interior walls, they’re Kingfisher Blue. When I got this guitar, I went, “Oh fucking hell!” I called Rory and said, “Right, my first question is, where did you get that burl?” I could hear him grinning down the phone. He said, “From a Bentley.”

On the electric side, tell us about this Galanti?

I saw this at Rich Tone. It belonged to one of the guys that worked there. I went, “What the fuck is that?” And they said, “It’s a ’65, Italian.” It’s clearly Italian. You know, this is one of the best electric guitars I’ve ever played in my life. Look at the quality of that piece of construction.

This whammy bar is so beautifully made. Stays completely in tune. They should have licensed it to everybody because it’s way better than [better-known vibrato formats]. And, of course, Galanti is an accordion maker, so it’s got the mute button.

The interesting thing about this, for me, is that everything about it, spacing-wise, is friendly to an acoustic player. I think it’s cool as fuck. I’ve just been getting further and further away from what most people think are great electric guitars. That [Jazzmaster] completely changed my life, too. It sits right. It feels like a proper guitar.

We’re celebrating your half-century of music-making. Where did it all start?

I got my first guitar when I was 12, and I was very fortunate that literally 400 yards around the corner from where I lived was the home of the Scunthorpe Folk Club. It kicked off around about the same time as I got my guitar, so that’d be 1965.

At that point, the folk scene was absolutely on fire, and it was very eclectic. So there was the chance you might go and see somebody playing blues, like Mike Cooper, who was a phenomenal technician, used to play country-blues stuff really, really well on a National Tri-Plate. The next week it might be The Watersons, which was equally avant-garde, when you think about it – this family of travelers singing wild harmonies.

Stefan Grossman. Martin Carthy. Mike Chapman. Nic Jones. Everybody would come through the folk club. These people who were incredible, pushing the envelope.

It must have been amazing to be at that flashpoint.

Meanwhile, I had two teachers at my school who formed the John Leggott College Folk Song Society, and they’d take us on school trips to see Pentangle. Obviously, there was Bert [Jansch] and John [Renbourn], but what blew me away was Danny Thompson doing a solo on Blue Monk.

That was beyond belief to me. I could kind of comprehend the role of the guitar in this. I could not comprehend this guy with this unbelievably huge instrument playing a solo Thelonious Monk piece. I will never forget that.

All these years later, what’s your next move?

I absolutely love what I do. I absolutely love playing the guitar. I love the mechanics. I love when you find the right way to play a phrase. I spend hours sometimes just figuring out where to put my fingers. I never tire of it. In fact, rather than tiring of it, it just elevates me even more, I think. This album is a big piece of work. It’s finished. It’s mastered. And I find myself thinking, “Right, what are we going to do now…?”

• Some Kind of Jubilee is out now via Topic Records
• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.

The online guitar community has rallied in support of YouTuber and bass player Danny Sapko, who recently found himself at the center of another fake guitar player scandal.

Sapko has built a healthy following on the video platform and currently has over 620,000 subscribers. Much of his content is concerned with calling out fake playing and bad practices in the guitar community.

In a recent video, Sapko accused Marcelo Perez Schneider – a viral Argentinian guitarist/bassist – of fake playing, alleging that he mimes along to pre-recorded tracks live in order to "fool" his audience.

Schneider's playing videos – which have been praised by Nuno Bettencourt, Kiko Loureiro and Michael Anthony – are characterized by hyper-technical runs and speed-tapping sequences.

Sapko alleges that the viral bassist mimes along to pre-programmed tracks live. In his first video on the topic, he drew attention to multiple audio and playing discrepancies – such as mistimed slides, song cuts, and passages where notes and phrases don't match up.

In response to his allegations, though, Sapko received a serious copyright strike on his video, causing it to get pulled from YouTube entirely.

Copyright strikes against YouTube channels are serious business, cutting creators off from monetization opportunities, and even seeing the channel taken down entirely if they’re hit with too many strikes.

“In less than two days, [my accusation video] gathered over a million views with people in absolute disbelief of the evidence presented,” Sapko explained in a follow-up video, addressing the scandal.

“How did Marcelo respond? He turned off all comments on his Instagram after the backlash and had my video removed with a copyright strike put on my channel.”

The video was taken down entirely by YouTube because of a seven-second, phone-filmed live clip, meaning that was copyright strike one against Sapko’s channel.

If history had repeated itself with his second video, which alerted viewers to the copyright strike, Sapko says: “I am one step away from whole channel deletion.”

Key figures in YouTube community offered support for Sapko, who alleged his attempts to highlight the fake playing were being silenced. Ola Englund, for example, hit back, saying in his own video of support: “Using the copyright system to silence criticism is a dangerous thing.”

Englund encouraged people to hop over to Sapko’s channel and show support via comments and subscribing to his channel. Sapko also has a Patreon, where the original video is being hosted for free.

“I started posting regularly on YouTube to get out of the job center,” Sapko explained. “So, if you've ever thought about supporting this channel, now would be the time because I have had a proper wake up today about how quickly this could all be taken away.”

His first video has since been reinstated, and the copyright strike against Sapko's channel has been removed.

Sapko noted to Guitar World that it was a minor victory for YouTube creators, but says there are still huge problems with the copyright system and how easily entire channels could be deleted because of people abusing the process.

Fake playing accusations are rife in the online guitar sphere. Last year, Sapko was also at the center of the Giacomo Turra storm. He was one of the earliest voices to accuse the social media guitarist of stealing other musicians’ songs for content.

Head over to Danny Sapko's YouTube channel for more.

Matthieu Lucas, the founder of Parisian artist guitar boutique Matt’s Guitar Shop, has built quite a reputation for his Indiana Jones-esque approach to excavating long-lost guitars.

Earlier this year, Lucas unearthed Eric Clapton’s ‘Summersburst’ Les Paul after it had been lost for 60 years. Now, another legendary guitar is set to hit the showroom in Paris and stages worldwide – Pete Townshend’s 1969 Gibson SG Special.

The Cherry Red guitar with two P90 pickups is forever etched into rock history after it was smashed onstage at a particularly chaotic show at New York’s Metropolitan Opera House, on June 7, 1970.

Binky Philips, a superfan who had already been to 16 Who shows, was sitting outside the venue for days, hoping to nab a ticket. Turns out, he ended up nabbing more than he initially bargained for.

“Pete Townshend was familiar with Binky's face from seeing him coming to the shows,” Lucas tells Guitar World in an exclusive interview.

“During the show, Pete was soloing and was so much in fusion with his guitar that he didn't see that he was closer than he expected to his Hiwatt amps. He touched the amps and went way off-tune during a cover of Shakin’ All Over, which, of course, made him angry. This resulted in Pete throwing the guitar on the floor.

“A tech tried to grab the SG quickly to give Pete his spare guitar, but Pete didn't want his tech to grab the guitar and walked in his direction like, ‘No! Don't take this away!’ He walked on the guitar by accident, and that's how the headstock cracked. Funnily enough, this guitar was not destroyed intentionally that day.

“Binky and Pete made eye contact when the SG's headstock got cracked. Pete looked at Binky and said, ‘You ready?!’ That was Binky's moment.”

Philips ended up catching the guitar on the night of his 17th Who concert. As a true superfan, Binky sought to fix the guitar, so he took it to Charles LoBue – a popular luthier who also worked for Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley at the time. He managed to salvage it by grafting a new piece of wood onto the headstock, making the guitar playable again.

Lo and behold, Philips kept it for 56 years – until Lucas got in touch with a private collector who happened to know the Who superfan.

Lucas explains, “That guitar was Binky's pride and joy – his connection to his guitar hero. Now, it's time to be played again and enjoyed by somebody else. While it's with us, it's gonna be played by every musician who wants to play this on stage.”

So how did Lucas know that the SG is the real deal? “Well, you can tell this is the very strap Pete used during that show, and the story is well-known if you are a Pete fan,” he replies.

“Pete and Binky also stayed in touch over the years, and Pete knows about this very guitar. There are pics of Pete playing this guitar, and it's been featured in many exhibitions in the US over the last 15 years or so.

“I can tell you one thing: this guitar sounds like him. I had the chance to play this guitar through one of Pete's original Hiwatts and cranked the volume up to 10; this was the sound, the dynamic was there, the magic was there… This is without a doubt the most iconic guitar associated with Pete.”

Lucas’ long-standing ethos is that legendary guitars aren’t museum pieces, but need to be played again. So if you happen to be in Paris and fancy playing Pete's guitar... well, the door's open.

“Everybody is welcome to come to the shop and play it,” he insists. “Craig Ross [Lenny Kravitz’s guitarist] was supposed to play it in Central Park in September, but Mother Nature had other plans, and the show was cancelled due to wind and rain. I’m sure Craig can’t wait to play that guitar.

“Also, any younger bands who are inspired by Pete should reach out to me. The guitar is legendary, but it has to be played!”

Earlier this year, Lucas took Guitar World beyond the veil of the collectible guitar market.

With the anticipation of Black Friday guitar deals in full swing, there’s a whole bunch of retailers starting their sales unseasonably early – great news if you can’t wait to steal a deal on some awesome guitar gear. Head over to Guitar Center now, and you'll find up to 30% off a massive range of big-name brands in the Pre-Black Friday Sale.

This epic early Black Friday offer includes up to 20% off guitars, 40% off select pedals and effects, and Guitar Center's lowest prices of the year on popular gear.

This deal lasts only until Wednesday, November 11th, so you’ve got a short time to grab something! That said, the sale will likely be replaced by the official Black Friday bargains soon after.

As you can imagine, this sale includes a wealth of discounted goodies. So, to make this a little easier, we've hand-selected a few of our favorites.

First up is the Epiphone Les Paul Custom Widow, down from $799 to $679. If you like your Les Pauls a little less traditional and a bit more ‘metal’, this amazing-looking Epiphone Les Paul Custom Widow might just take your fancy. It’s got a nice $120 sale discount and is exclusively available at Guitar Center, so you won’t find this finish anywhere else.

Dual ProBucker humbuckers deliver searing rock and metal tones, and it has CTS potentiometers like a more expensive Gibson model. Grover tuners and a Locktone tune-o-matic bridge make up a rock-solid hardware offering, making this a great guitar for gigging on a budget.

Next, I've found a generous $130 off the IK Multimedia ToneX. In our glowing review, we said, "There is no shortage of applications for the TONEX. It's a no-brainer for any player who wants to take a digital version of their rig to their gig in a compact, portable, and affordable format. But it's a similarly practical tool for the home or studio."

Lastly, I've spotted $100 off one of my favorite beginner acoustic guitars, the stunning D'Angelico Premier Gramercy CS. The D’Angelico Premier Gramercy is, undoubtedly, a fine guitar for the money. It is well-made, sounds great, and looks interesting. Some players may like the tone on the bright side, but it can't be denied that the Premier Gramercy offers outstanding value for players of all levels and is even better at only $299!

Now, there's a lot more on offer in this sale, so I highly recommend browsing the full offering. You have until November 11 to get involved.

Growing up in Whittier, California, Tracy Grijalva – best known as Tracy G – was in a band with his father. “At the age of seven, my mom and dad asked if I wanted to learn an instrument,” he recalls. “My father was a drummer, so I said, ‘I’d like to take guitar lessons so I can jam with him.’”

It didn’t come easy, though: “I had really small hands, but the main challenge was that I’m left-handed, and the guitar teacher taught me as a right-handed player.” But he stuck at it, and five years later he discovered heavy metal. “When I heard the first Black Sabbath album, I was immediately drawn to the riffs. I naturally went down that road.”

By his late teens, G had made guitar his life’s work. He played in a variety of bands in the early ‘90s, hooking up with Love/Hate frontman Jizzy Pearl and former Great White mouthpiece Jack Russell. “I played in many local bands, as many young musicians do,” he says. “Jack and Jizzy were in a couple of them.”

That’s when he assembled the gear he still uses today: “Old Marshalls, old Randalls, my Sandoval guitar that Karl Sandoval made for me in 1985, and a bunch of random pedals.”

Then, in 1993, at 24, G found himself in Ronnie James Dio’s band. “Vinny Appice and Jimmy Bain were the rhythm section for Dio, and also WWIII, the band I had before Dio,” he says. “They told Ronnie about me, and I auditioned.”

Of course, the singer was no stranger to guitar heroics, having shared stages with Ritchie Blackmore, Tony Iommi, Vivian Campbell, Craig Goldy and Rowan Robertson. “I showed up to play and Vinny, Jimmy and Ronnie were there,” G remembers.

“No soloing, no songs – just jamming with Vinny and Jimmy while Ronnie listened. He was interested in a guitar player who could write for him. They ended up calling me back; I played again then Vinny called and said, ‘Ronnie wants you in the band.’”

He hit the ground running with Dio, who was coming off the success of 1990’s Lock Up the Wolves and 1992 Black Sabbath reunion album Dehumanizer. The musical landscape was awash with alternative music, meaning a sonic pivot was required. Luckily for Dio, Grijalva was up for the challenge.

“The sessions for Strange Highways went good,” G says. “It took about six weeks to record that album, and maybe eight weeks to record Angry Machines.”

The guitarist’s embracing of ‘90s grunge and industrial vibes made Dio – who, in his 40s, was considered by some to be over the musical hill – was relevant again. But G wasn’t chasing trends: “That’s just the way I play. I’m influenced by many other players, but I always try to be myself and play what I feel.”

Given that situation, it’s puzzling that Dio reinstated Craig Goldy without warning in 1999, relegating G to rhythm duties.

“I didn’t go for that,” he says. “I’d played lead guitar for six years. When I solo, that’s how I express myself. If you take that from me, I’m out.”

But he gives Dio a pass for the move. “It wasn’t insulting,” he insists. “I knew Ronnie was doing what the record company and management wanted him to do.” Even so, the pair never crossed paths after that. “I was never at odds with him,” G says. “After I left I called his office to wish him merry Christmas and left him a message. I never heard back from him.”

With one adventure cut short, he formed The Tracy G Group and other outfits. “I went into my studio and started writing new music – heavy metal, classic rock, blues and even flamenco. Since then I’ve put out 25 CDs on my own label. I still make music through many different projects, but my main band is the Tracy G Group.”

Now 67, G has few regrets; although many fans believe he was given a raw deal, and Strange Highways and Angry Machines are regarded as among Dio’s finest solo works. Both musicians went on to other things, but one can’t help wonder what might have been.

“I’m very proud of the albums that I made with Dio,” G states. “I was honored to play and create with him for six years. That was enough. I think I handled it great.”

• Keep up with G via his website.

Does using heavier guitar strings actually give you better tone? It's a conversation that's divided players for decades – and in the early 1980s, The Edge made his position on the debate crystal clear.

Back in 1982, The Edge accused players of becoming “lazy” because of their string gauge choices. For the U2 guitarist, anything lighter than 10s threatens to have a negative impact on your sound.

Speaking in the January 1982 issue of Guitar World, following the release of U2’s Platinum-rated October, The Edge came out swinging on the matter of string gauges.

“Light strings are a bit of a fallacy,” he claimed. “They’ll help your playing if you’re into speed, but you sacrifice sound. Jimi Hendrix and others in his day used heavy strings, and you can tell the difference on the records. People have gone a bit lazy now.”

For his own personal picks back then, he used Ernie Ball 10 gauge on the Explorer and Gibson 11s (with a 56 on the low E) on the Strat. Nothing too crazy, but by no means the lightest strings, either.

Unsurprisingly, The Edge's viewpoint isn't one that's universally shared. B.B. King and Billy Gibbons, for example, would both have disagreed. After all, when ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons crossed paths with the legendary bluesman, he got some game-changing advice on guitar tone.

At that time, Gibbons felt there was a correlation between heavy-gauge strings, and bit tone and his Pearly Gates Les Paul reflected that belief. Then his perspective was flipped around.

“When B.B. asked to try a few licks on my guitar, he quickly smiled and asked, ‘Why you working so hard?’” Gibbons recalls. “He then laid it down to show off a new set of his super-light-gauge strings.

“It was at that very moment that everything turned around. As BB then said, ‘Light is all right!’”

On the other end of the spectrum, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Dick Dale and Pete Townshend preferred thicker strings. For Townshend, it meant fuller-sounding chords; a belief that Alex Lifeson later leaned into.

And then there's Hendrix himself. Hendrix’s former guitar tech, Roger Mayer, has stated that the late virtuoso was very specific when it came to what strings he wound onto his Fender Stratocasters. His set was actually pretty standard: 010, .013, .015, .026, .032 and .038.

“The big difference there is that you're using the .015 for the third, because if you use the .017 for the third, the actual sound of the guitar is very G-heavy,” Mayer told Guitar World in 2022.

“The electrical output of the strings is dependent on the square of the diameter; if you square all the diameters and look at them, you can get much more of an idea about the balance of the guitar.”

So, perhaps, the Edge’s point about Hendrix using heavy strings was actually misguided. Of course, it all depends on what one considers "heavy". For The Edge, 10s were heavy enough.

Other players won't have time for the thicker strings, thicker tone argument. John Mayer once said that string gauges don’t matter, and called it one of the silliest arguments guitarists can engage in it. It really comes down to a matter of preference.

Steve Lukather’s Christmas turn back in the early aughts took everyone by surprise – including the Toto guitarist himself.

“Elliot Scheiner had put together a record label [Bop City Records], and they wanted me to be their first artist… and they specifically wanted me to do a Christmas record,” he tells Guitar World of his full-blown festive album, SantaMental.

“I was like, ‘A Christmas record? What the fuck makes you think I’m Santa Claus, man?’ I started laughing, going, ‘You gotta be kidding me!’”

13 years later, Lukather managed to secure the rights to the album and is re-releasing it just in time for the holidays in aid of charity.

What makes this album special for all the guitar heads out there is that it features a Rolodex of virtuosos that Lukather somehow managed to assemble – all for a Christmas album, no less.

“Larry [Carlton] is very, very special,” says Lukather. Carlton, who had worked with Lukather in the past, came onboard as the arranger on a track for the project.

“We were on that live record that we won a Grammy for [No Substitutions: Live in Osaka]. When I was a kid, everyone wanted to be Larry Carlton. He was one of the cats I looked up to.

“When me and Larry went on that tour, I got an hour every day before the show, where we’d sit in a room, and warm up. We’d be playing, and I’d get a little fucking guitar lesson from Carlton every night.”

Lukather most wanted to learn Carlton's approach to “chord melody stuff”. Understandable, considering his exceptionally tasty, liquid jazz-blues style.

“He was very gracious and kind, and spent time with me – and sometimes rolled his eyes – and showed me some things. And I’d go, ‘It’s Christmas time, so give me a Christmas song.’ We’d start messing around with that stuff, so I’ve gotta give him some credit for a lot of the cool shit, and I gave him an arranging credit.”

SantaMental also includes the six-string contributions of Eddie Van Halen, Steve Vai, Slash, and Michael Landau, as well as those of the then 14-year-old Trev Lukather.

The album is set to be re-released on November 7 and is currently available for pre-order.

100 percent of proceeds will go towards the Ed Asner Family Center (TEAFC) for Autism in Los Angeles.

Guitar World's full interview with Lukather will be published in the coming weeks.

Hearing Carl Carlton spin his life story is almost as thrilling as sitting opposite him as he rattles a slide lick up the neck of his Telecaster.

Born on 20 April 1955, as the son of a livestock farmer in Germany’s sleepy Friesland region, the teenage guitarist found himself at the right time – but entirely the wrong place – for the rock ’n’ roll boom.

Yet Carlton – real name Karl Buskohl – soon defied his circumstances, upping sticks for the country’s roughneck port towns to learn his craft at the sharp end, before becoming a first-call sideman who inspired giants like Robert Palmer and Eric Burdon to Grammy-nominated career heights.

Carlton always ran his own bands in parallel, with new album, Miles Of Time – alongside vocalist and partner Melanie Wiegmann – the official reason for today’s interview. But as the 71-year-old folds his 6ft 5in frame onto the Guitarist sofa, he’s happy to wind back the clock.

Do you remember how music came into your world?

My father was a farmer and once a week he’d take the animals to market. So they did the deal and afterwards we’d go to a pub with a jukebox on the counter. The publican looked a bit like a Gypsy, with a gold tooth.

People loved him. And the music on his jukebox wasn’t the usual German oompah or schlager. He had Ray Charles, Elvis, Beatles, Stones, Kinks. My father played cards and he always gave me coins for the jukebox. That was a revelation: “What the fuck is this?” I’d never heard anything like it.

How did you start down the road to becoming a guitarist?

Christmas ’66, I got my first guitar. First song I learnt was House Of The Rising Sun. 40 years later, I’m playing a tour with Eric Burdon in Toronto, Canada. And Eric says, “We have a guest today, the original guitar player from The Animals, Hilton Valentine.” So we’re on stage together playing the first song I ever learnt. These things come in circles.

How did your musicianship develop?

I was at a boarding school on one of the Frisian islands. All the other kids came from Berlin and Hamburg, failures from dysfunctional rich families. But there were some players. I remember guys three years older who showed me John Mayall and Canned Heat. Coming back to Friesland, I played drums, bass, whatever was needed. I played in these Top 40 bands, who also played quite progressive stuff – not just Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep but The Doobie Brothers.

They were amazing musicians, and the shit sounded exactly like the record. They were very precise at copying. Most of these guys had their own ‘serious’ bands, but they were making good money playing covers [on the side]. I could play Blue Suede Shoes really well, so I did that for 15 bucks and a bottle of wine, and I was happy.

You’re renowned as a slide player. How did you discover that side of your palette?

Again, The Rolling Stones were the culprits because through them I heard so many new sounds and names, like Ry Cooder. Around 1970, I became a big Cooder fan and there was also Little Feat’s first album. So I was sold on that slide sound.

Someone who played more regular slide was Jesse Ed Davis, Taj Mahal’s underrated guitar hero. Of course, you didn’t have YouTube, so it took a while. They must have thought I killed a cat next door. At the same time, I learned a lot of slide and slow solo playing from Joe Walsh.

How did your early career gather momentum?

My first bands started to clash with school. But I was really radical in what I wanted. It was the lifestyle and the music. I just broke out. I moved to a port town near the Dutch border where there was plenty of work.

I learnt how to defend myself. Witnessed crime and sex for the first time. I changed my bands like my shirts, always with the dream of writing my own material.

One of my bands opened up for a Dutch group called Long Tall Ernie & The Shakers. They had hits in Germany, Holland, Belgium, France with 50s-style rock ’n’ roll. And they needed a guitar player. It wasn’t all my cup of tea because they were teddy boys. I don’t know what drove me.

But they had flight cases and they had a crew. I thought, “Fuck it, I’ll get back to what I want later.” So I joined them. And playing in that band taught me the ABC of rock ’n’ roll. We even had a No 1 in [the Netherlands] in 1977 with Do You Remember.

How did success change things for you?

Out of the blue, I made what to me was a lot of money. It might have been £10,000 or something. So I bought a big old Cadillac, second or third-hand, and we had a summer break, so I drove down to Cannes with my dog. Ridiculous, in that big ship!

I ended up at the Carlton Hotel and nearly blew all my money there. Then my car broke down in Paris. I literally gave it away at a petrol station. And I hitch-hiked home.

When I got back, the band started calling me Carlton. And it stuck. Then some executive from the label thought that was actually my name and got it wrong on the records.

But we opened up for Golden Earring with my new band and the bass player, Rinus Gerritsen, said, “That’s not a bad name. Keep it.” So because of that money, I not only got my name but felt secure enough to break out and start my own band.

How did you start working with Robert Palmer in the 90s?

I was always a big fan. At the time, I had a group of well-oiled musicians around me and we called ourselves The Treatment. In ’94 or ’95, Robert just had a greatest hits out, so the head of CBS called me up and said, “Carl, could you get a band together? Robert needs horns. He needs percussion.”

Robert’s MD came over with the setlist and, with no particular instructions, we just learned it off the records. But I went back to the arrangements from his first Island albums like Sneakin’ Sally Through The Alley [1974], y’know, when he was backed by The Meters and Little Feat. I was young and sassy. And in the middle of rehearsals, the door opens, Robert flies in, gives it a listen, throws away his coat, starts singing and that was it. I could have been fired. But Robert loved to improvise. So off we went.”

Tell us about the genesis of your all-star Songdogs project around the millennium.

We did a Robert Palmer show and Ronnie Wood was there. We talked about this band and Ronnie said, “Oh man, let’s call Mac,” – y’know, Ian McLagan from the Small Faces and the Faces. So he came and Bobby Keys, the saxophone player from The Stones.

So that’s how the band grew. It was almost like a summer camp down in Louisiana. And during that session, BB King’s producer was there. He said he knew Levon Helm and thought he’d love what we were doing.

That was at a low point for Levon. He’d just had cancer. It was the end of the 90s and nobody knew who he was any more. But we knew who he was. We were all like trembling schoolboys on the porch when his car arrived with his famous mandolin. Even Sonny Landreth next to me was kind of trembling.

You were wondering how he could even see in the car because it was so full of weed smoke. And he became a lifelong friend. While Robert to me was like an elder brother because I had lost my parents very early, Levon really became a bit like a stepfather figure.

What do you remember about Robert Palmer’s final album, Drive, from 2003?

After Robert guested on [2001’s Robert Johnson tribute album] Hellhound On My Trail, he told me, “Y’know, I’d love to do a whole album like that.” But he said, “Let’s give it a timeframe and do rock ’n’ roll and rhythm and blues from the end of the 40s into ’55, no later.” If you listen to the record, there’s actually a bit more. Y’know, there’s even a ZZ Top cover on it [TV Dinners]. But that was the idea, and we dug deep into the blues.

I remember, for one song, he told me, “Play some straight eights, but think ‘swing.’” I replied, “Robert, are you nuts? Did you have one martini too many? What do you mean?” Because I was short-tempered and not very patient.

But after you’ve played them for a while, those eights don’t quite go into a swing, but they go somewhere in-between. I’m getting the chills right now talking about it. That was Robert. He brought some authentic shit out in you, which is all pure African or Caribbean.

On your new album, Miles Of Time, what were your go-to guitars?

I use different acoustics for different tunings. Because the guitars suffer if you constantly change the tunings, especially the acoustics, from the weight of the strings. So certain acoustics, I always keep in the same key. I have this old Gibson ’39 J-whatever-it-is that’s always in G. It even comes out of the box in tune now.

But I also used a ’55 Country Western – my birth year – and that beautiful-sounding Gibson from ’39, from a pawn shop in New Orleans. I very much like the new Larson Prairie State. But sometimes I need a funny sound and I take a not-so-good-sounding new Fender Paramount. Cheap can sound good. Super-cool-sounding is not always great. Too much cake, y’know? Sometimes you want it lo-fi or dirty or whatever.

We have to ask about your signature Duesenberg CC.

Dieter Gölsdorf and I were friends, and he said, “Carl, what would be your ideal guitar?” Well, I’m 6ft 5in, and I always thought I was uncool because I didn’t look like Steve Marriott or Paul Kossoff, these tiny men with big guitars.

I mean, if Marriott wore a Gretsch, he looked so cool. Everybody says, “Oh, be happy you’re so tall.” But I wasn’t. I wanted to be tiny like the Small Faces. The Les Paul on me looks like a ukulele, right? So that’s why I started playing 335s, all the big Gibsons and Gretsches.

Anyway, I said to Dieter, “Well, it’s got to be big like a 335. It needs to have a single coil and a humbucker.” And I love Bigsbys. They look cool even if you don’t use them, but they were always out of tune. So I said, “Can you invent something like a Bigsby, but which doesn’t go out of tune and it’s easier to handle when you change the strings?”

So he came back with this guitar and it was an amazing sound. Then they built smaller ones called the Starplayer: very similar to this but with a semi-hollow Les Paul[-style] body. That’s how it all started. And it’s been a big success story.

And do you use the CC for your standard-tuning, non-slide playing?

Yeah, I more or less use my Teles or weird old Nationals for slide. But not always. Sometimes the more melodic slide, I do on the Duesenberg. My tunings depend on the song. I love the D tuning, or E, which is literally the same, just one step up or down. Every key has its own character. Like, on our new album, if I play, say, Daddy’s Little Pumpkin in G, it doesn’t sound like it would in Bb. That’s just the right tuning for it.

Sometimes, the band will say to me, “Oh Carl, does it always have to be in Bb?” And I’ll say “No, let’s move it to A.” But that half-step is such a big difference in vibe. All the Chuck Berry tunes are in Bb. It also suits my vocal and it’s very sassy. It’s kinky. It’s passive-aggressive in a way. I really love that. But not for all songs. For others, I prefer D or G. Also, the capo is my best friend, y’know?

You’ve achieved so much in your career. Have you ever had a moment of self-doubt?

I always had imposter syndrome. When I played with Manfred Mann or something, I always thought, “Any minute, they’re going to find out I’m no good.” I didn’t think I could be a good guitarist. It was like, “I’m from this little farm in the middle of nowhere. I’m not from London or some hip city. I’m nothing. And they will find out.”

But during the recording of Drive, Robert really helped me out without realising. I was working on a really tough tune – Stella – which was like a calypso groove by Mighty Sparrow. But the cassette I was working from was, like, from the 50s. It was very hard to make out. And on top of that, for whatever reason, I decided to challenge myself and do it in open G, with all these jazz chords.

What happened next?

We went to Metropolis Studios in London to finish the song, and I just couldn’t get it together. And I was so nervous because my friend Robbie McIntosh – who played with us live – was in the control room. Also, to commercialise Drive, the record company had suggested Eric Clapton as a guest. So rumour had it EC would be there any minute. So I got really nervous. I just couldn’t get this song together, and I got really angry.

So Robert came in, with his martini and his cigarette, and he said, “Carl, what’s the matter? Can I make you a drink? A Bloody Mary? A glass of Champagne?” And I’m like, “No! I can’t get this shit to work and Robbie’s sat there and Clapton’s coming any minute!” And he’d never seen me like that. He said, “Please, Carl, take all the time you want. I don’t want Robbie. I don’t want Clapton. I want you.” And that triggered off the imposter syndrome big-time. I was like: “That’s a fucking lie!”

But it wasn’t. I had a bit of a nervous breakdown, went out to the toilet crying. But someone’s girlfriend walked past me and said, “Carl, what’s the matter?” And I told her. And she said, “No, Robert is always talking to everyone about your playing and your feel. And he wants you – nobody else.”

So I found out that it was true: Robert meant it when he said he liked my playing and he was confident that I would make the song work. So that helped me out a lot. That was a big step for me…

• Miles of Time is out now via Timezone
• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.
  

Boss is expanding its celebrated Katana range of amp modelers with the Katana-25 – a compact practice amp that fills the last remaining gap in the Katana lineup.

The 25W combo is designed for home practice, and sits comfortably between the giggable 50W Katana-50 and the desktop Katana-Mini. It's an edition of the Katana platform many have been waiting for.

It has six amp characters and over 60 onboard effects, with Boss promising “studio-grade sounds” from its 8” speaker and open-back design.

Tube Logic tech is central to the Katana-25, promising authentic tube amp sound and dynamic responsiveness. Its speaker and the 25W reactive analog power section tag team for a “highly interactive playing experience” that belies its lack of tubes.

Of its amp sounds, one is tailored specifically for electro-acoustic instruments, while the others cover genres including pop, blues, country, rock and high-gain metal.

Its 60-plus effects library brings forth familiar Boss pedal magic, with the Katana-25 able to run five simultaneously. In-depth sound editing is available via the Boss Tone Studio app and software.

The amp ships with 20 pre-made presets and a further empty 10 slots for players to fill. There's also a tap tempo button for delays, and a built in tuner, to help make the amp suitable for practice.

Further still, a Power Control helps players enjoy the sound of a blaring amp at lower volumes, with full- and half-watt modes available. That helps keep relations sweet with housemates and neighbors alike.

Bluetooth connectivity makes it easier to jam along to songs, and sees the Katana-25 double up as a home audio speaker. A nifty Session feature takes this concept further, letting players browse and play YouTube content in the app, and set key frames within the videos that automatically signal tone changes.

So, if you want to play along to a track with clean guitars in the verses, and full on distortion in the choruses, the Session feature helps users focus on playing over tap dancing.

It’s also compatible with external (and sold separately) Boss switches, including the EV-1-WL Wireless Expression Pedal.

“With its friendly interface, versatile tones, and integrated practice tools, Katana-25 is an easy choice for players looking to explore their sound and discover their unique voice,” says Boss.

Priced at $199.99, the Katana-25 joins a family of amps that includes other solid practice tools like the Katana-50, Mini-X, and Katana-500 bass head.

See Boss for more.

A seven-string isn’t the only option for huge, earth-shaking riffs. In fact, countless players choose to stay with a traditional six-string and use lower tunings to do the heavy lifting.

Drop D tuning (D-A-D-G-B-E) has been very popular with rock, metal and blues bands for decades, Led Zeppelin’s Moby Dick, The Foo Fighters’ Everlong and Killing In The Name Of by Rage Against The Machine are three fantastic examples. However, as good as it is, Drop D is not quite heavy enough for some modern players.

Enter Drop C tuning.

Drop D and Drop C share the same basic foundation: the sixth and fourth strings are the same note an octave apart. What makes Drop C heavier is the first through to fifth strings are tuned down a whole step then the sixth string is detuned by two whole steps. So, Drop C is essentially Drop D, just tuned one whole step lower across all strings. This provides the tuning of (low to high): C-G-C-F-A-D.

Due to the lower tuning, it would be wise to consider having a thicker string gauge: typical choices would be either .011-0.54 or .011-0.56 if you'd like a little less give in the sixth string which provides the low C.

In addition, you (or your local guitar tech) might like to cut the nut’s string slots a little wider and tweak the truss rod so it's fine tuned (sic) to deal with extra string thicknesses.

So what are the benefits with Drop C?

Like Drop D, Drop C tuning is great to play an open position power chord with the lowest three strings: where Drop D provides D5, Drop C produces C5. This instant powerchord can also be applied to fretted movable shapes, enabling multiple (and quick moving) powerchords with just one finger.

There's also fun to be had on the fourth string: raise the fourth string by two whole tones (4 frets worth) from a one finger barre to get a major chord, or a tone and a half (3 frets worth) for a minor chord. This is great as you can still use a high gain tone without sounding muddy.

You can also raise the fourth string by a whole tone (2 frets worth) from the one finger barre, resulting in a movable sus2 chord. Perfect for demonizing Andy Summers or Dave Grohl riffs.

Of course, a tuning doesn’t gain iconic status without prominent players championing it. Bands like Alter Bridge, Periphery, and Killswitch Engage use Drop C tuning to craft expansive, atmospheric chord voicings while delivering thick, hard-hitting riffs.

Others who implement Drop C include Metallica, Nickelback, System of a Down, Arch Enemy, Children of Bodom and Bullet For My Valentine.

Whether you're a seasoned musician looking to refresh your creativity or a new player eager to dive into heavier styles, Drop C is a really vibrant place to start. It offers accessibility, inspiration, and a distinctive voice that continues to define the sound of contemporary guitar music. Now to the playing examples!

Example 1 - Power chord study

For this first example you can re-familiarize yourself with the three basic open position power chords, but with the added tonal weight of Drop C tuning. Whilst the voicings of these chords will sound familiar, their tone and sound will be much thicker and darker.

It also shows how you can expand your chordal vocabulary with movable versions of both the A5 and D5 shapes (we will address the movable E shape in the next example).

Example 2 - One finger power chord and repeating octaves

This illustrates how easy it is to play a power chord shape in both the open position and as a movable shape, with the root note located on the sixth string.

Thanks to the Drop C tuning you can play an open C5 power chord by simply playing the bottom three open strings. By fretting these same strings with one finger, you can achieve a movable power chord shape which enables easy and fast riffing.

Another element to consider is how you can play phrases on the sixth string and repeat them an octave higher in the same position on the fourth string. This makes single note riffs very easy to achieve with minimal movement of the fretting hand.

Here you will combine both low string open position power chords and one finger fretted power chords. There is also sixth and fourth string jumping to create interesting riffing.

Example 3 - Alter Bridge style

This looks at how Mark Tremonti and Myles Kennedy of Alter Bridge employ Drop C tuning to craft their melodic chord progressions and heavy riffs. Bars 1-4 feature a clean chord arpeggio sequence.

Notice how you can extend sixth string root power chords to achieve both major and minor chords, as well as adding additional color with the 11th or 4th on the fifth string.

Bars 9-17 introduce another Alter Bridge inspired riff demonstrating the heavier side of the band's iconic sound. This section makes use of a two string chord on the fifth and fourth strings, whilst pedalling on the palm muted open sixth string.

Example 4 - Nickelback Style

Not often spoken about, there is a very heavy side to Canadian rockers Nickelback. This is often due to the band's use of Drop C, transforming traditional Drop D riffs into music that is darker and heavier. Bars 1-4 kick off with a single note riff figure, pedalling off the palm muted open C5 power chord.

This riff concludes with a symmetrical descending line that makes use of our repeating octave shape on the fourth and sixth strings. This riff is also embellished with one finger power chords.

Bars 9-17 introduce a second riff that is performed exclusively with one finger power chords. Pay attention to the occasional palm muted open C5 power chord, as well as the thick palm muted “chug” added to the D5 in bar 12.

Example 5 - Metallica style

In 2003, Metallica released an angry sounding album that featured great use of Drop C. This is reflected in the next example.

Bars 1-4 kick off with a repeating sequence based around fast alternate picking, as well as one finger and open power chords. Bars 5-8 see this develop further with a tight reversed gallop figure performed on the sixth string.

Bars 9-16 focus on a single note figure played on the sixth string, embellished with one finger power chords. Bars 17-21 conclude the example with atmospheric chord picking, with a shifting figure utilizing open strings. Take care with this example, as it's quite demanding on the picking hand.

Example 6 - Arch Enemy style

This example looks at the aggressive style of the Swedish death metal band, Arch Enemy and its players Jeff Loomis, Micheal Amott and Fredrik Åkesson. The band is known for their fusion of progressive and death metal styles, producing a very unique sound.

Bars 1-8 kick off with a melodic pedal tone riff performed on the fourth string. This two-bar figure is repeated a total of four times. Bars 9-16 feature a palm-muted 16th note rhythmic chug on the open sixth string, embellished with power chords and major third intervals. Make sure you keep your picking hand relaxed and consistent for this riff.

Bars 17-24 have a strong power metal feel, with shifting two-string chords pedalling off a driving palm muted 8th note rhythm, performed on the open sixth string. The final sinister riff employs the octave at the same fret between the fourth and sixth strings.

Notice the whole tone bend from the 1st fret/sixth string, with the octave performed on the 3rd fret/fourth string. You’ll finish with tight eighth note palm muted chugging on the open C5 power chord. Once again, this example is demanding on the picking hand so take your time with note clarity and rhythmic precision.

Example 7 - Periphery style

Progressive/Djent pioneers Periphery excel at using Drop C to achieve their unique blend of crushing riffs, intricate lines, and atmospheric chords.

The three guitar onslaught of Misha Mansoor, Jake Bowen and Mark Holcomb has raised the bar in terms of the guitar's technical and melodic applications in modern metal, with the band being credited for pioneering the Djent sound.

Bars 1-16 feature the first riff, which makes use of the 7/4 time signature (7 beats in a bar with each beat being worth a 1/4 note). This is based around a melodic keyboard-like sequence, performed with a consistent eighth note rhythm that outlines the harmony of the progression.

Bars 17-32 show the second riff, which is based around a 4/4 time signature. This riff introduces a tight 16th note syncopated C5 figure, followed by the extended movable shape of the D5 power chord.

In contrast to the tight metal fused power chord riffs, each riff is answered with an extended melodic phrase that includes wide intervals, position shifts, arpeggios, and dissonance. Extended lines such as the ones in this second riff play a big part in the intricate and progressive nature of Periphery’s music.

Example 8 - Killswitch Engage style

This final example looks at Metalcore pioneers Killswitch Engage, driven by guitar duo Adam Dutkiewicz and Joel Stroetzel. Their sound blends syncopated Drop C riffs with ethereal chord harmony.

Bars 1-8 kick off with a single note metal riff performed on the sixth string. This riff makes use of both hammer-ons and fast alternate picking, as well as shifting power chords. Pay attention to the timing of the riff, and keep your picking hand relaxed and focused.

Bars 9-12 introduce a second riff which, in contrast to the first riff, has a tighter feel and makes use of space. This riff also includes octaves as well as fast trills. Bars 13-20 include a straight eighth note riff based predominantly around power chords.

The arpeggiated C minor is achieved with three fretted strings and open first string (D string). The closing Fsus2-Cm-Dbsus2 section features a first finger stretch backwards on the first string to facilitate the three note repetition.

Eastman Guitars’ director of Fretted Instruments, Pepijn ’t Hart, tells us more about the company, the Kauffmann series, and some of Eastman’s principal characters – and explains how a lot of the far-out design ideas come from chief designer Otto D’Ambrosio.

Can you fill the readers in on Albert Kauffmann and Otto D’Ambrosio – what’s their individual involvement?

Otto D’Ambrosio is our chief designer and the one who designed and builds the D’Ambrosio series guitars in our Los Angeles custom shop. The story is that we were reaching out to Albert Kauffmann as we had a D’Ambrosio guitar with a chip out of the lacquer – it was nitrocellulose – and we asked him if he could repair the chip.

His answer was, ‘I can’t make it better, but I’d love to make it worse.’ Famous words that led to a range of Eastman Kauffmann series guitars.

There are three body shapes, just like the D’Ambrosio and FullerTone ranges: SC (Single Cut), DC (Double Cut) and Offset, which is the Offset version of the SC. With Albert we wanted to create a real vintage vibe, based on this newly designed guitar.

Mainly due to his colours and his Time Travel treatment speciality, these guitars turned out better than we ever could have expected. It’s really special stuff.

Why the choice of Charlie Christian pickup? Of course it’s a unit we find on the original Gibson ES-150 and solidbodies used by players such as Danny Gatton, Julian Lage, Bill Frisell and, of course, John Lennon.

Well, it’s actually more because for each body shape we like to offer three pickup options. These are all Lollar pickups, and with the SC it’s these: SC Vintage, Lollar Royal T in the neck and Special T in the bridge; SC Classic [as reviewed this issue], Lollar Charlie Christian in the neck and Special T in the bridge; and SC Deluxe, Lollar Lollartron in the neck and Special T in the bridge.

The very first Fender prototypes and the short first run of actual guitars were pine, like the SC Classic. Was that the inspiration here, or was it for weight and sound?

Well, yes, it was for weight and sound but also because of the fact that the trees grow fast. So, to me, this is the ultimate wood for bolt-on guitars. It’s so resonant.

Eastman seems to have manufacturing facilities all over the place. Where exactly are the guitars made now?

Eastman builds guitars in China, where the majority of our instruments are built; in Pomona, California, where Otto’s workshop is located; and in Holland, where Albert Kauffmann and his team are building the Kauffmann series. Albert Kauffmann’s workshop is in the Eastman Europe headquarters in Mijdrecht in Holland.

Is there a reason the pickguard is set into the body? Or was it simply a nice thing to do – it certainly lets the neck sit lower into the body.

This is one of the brilliant things that Otto came up with. When Otto and I are designing the guitars, he does all the ‘out of this world’ stuff and this is a great example.

The Otto D’Ambrosio-designed FullerTone neck is wittily named, but it bears no relation to Fender’s bolt-on system.

And that’s why we won’t do a Fender-style neck joint. Otto’s neck is the evolution of what Leo brilliantly did – but adding more tone, more sustain and more stability. With 30 per cent more contact with the body it is, in a way, the first ‘long neck tenon bolt-on’, and it uses only two bolts. It’s one of the brilliant things of the FullerTone neck; it sits as smooth as can be.

It’s unusual to find a tilted-back (pitched) headstock on a bolt-on guitar…

Well, the unique FullerTone neck joint allows us to set the neck low in the body. So unlike most bolt-ons this allows us to add a slight back-pitch or tilt to give the correct string clearance over the body and pickups, and to the bridge.

When Otto and I are designing guitars we try to add as many beautiful elements as we can, without ever compromising the ergonomics or playability of the guitar. We use Gotoh tuners with the HAP-M mechanism, so we don’t need a string tree.

We’re presuming the colour of our review guitar is a nod to the debut album and Butterscotch Telecaster of a certain legendary artist?

The instrument you are reviewing is kindly supplied by Mak’s guitars in London. It’s a light relic, ‘Time Travel’, and the reason why we call the colour Asbury Butterscotch is indeed a hats-off to the colour of the Telecaster – actually, it was originally an Esquire – played by The Boss – Greetings From Asbury Park.

• Find out more at Eastman Guitars
• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.

What is it?

Every guitar company and its dog is making a baritone guitar at the moment, and now it’s the time for one of the biggest players in the guitar game to make their mark. The Epiphone Prophecy Les Paul Baritone is very much a baritone aimed at metal guitar players, with its all-black-everything aesthetic, Fishman Fluence active pickups, and hefty string gauge.

Despite feeling like a bit of a rarity for the Gibson/Epiphone stable, the company has form for extended-range guitars. The Epiphone Les Paul Standard Baritone released in the mid '00s is the obvious one, with a similar model being launched for Gibson around the same time. There’s also the Buckethead Signature Les Paul, which featured a baritone scale, and more recently the SG Baritone and Gibson Victory Baritone.

While this isn’t the first Epiphone baritone, it is the first one for the Prophecy line and its range of guitars aimed at players of heavy riffs. It’s got an ultra-modern, weight-relieved mahogany body with a maple top and figured veneer in an Obsidian Storm Satin finish. The classic LP shape is here with the single cut and multi-ply body binding, a belly carve, and a modern contoured neck heel.

The glued-in, set neck is composed of a thermally-aged, one-piece maple neck and is also finished in satin. It features the HyperGlide profile and a single-ply bound ebony fingerboard, with 24 stainless steel frets and a compound radius that moves from 10 to 14 inches as you get higher up the fretboard. It’s a 27-inch scale, so not as long as some baritones, but a clear step away from the typical Gibson 24.75-inch we’re used to.

Six Grover Rotomatic locking tuners sit upon the headstock, with a Graph Tech nut and a LockTone Modern bridge. The bass strings go through the body at a much sharper angle than the treble side to balance the string feel a baritone needs in the low end with a more slinky feel in the treble end.

Finally, the electronics feature two Fishman Fluence humbuckers developed exclusively for the Prophecy series. Each pickup delivers three voices, with a modern high-output tone, a PAF-type sound, and a single-coil tone. These are accessible via push-pull pots, which feature on both volume and tone controls. The volume controls handle the coil split, while the tone controls change the voices. A three-way toggle selector enables you to switch between bridge pickup, neck pickup, and both at the same time.

Specs

• Launch price: $1,499 | £1,249 | €1,449
• Made: China
• Type: Six-string baritone electric guitar
• Body: Mahogany with maple top and figured maple veneer, multi-ply binding, satin finish
• Neck: Thermally-aged one-piece maple, satin finish, glued-in set neck, HyperGlide profile
• Fingerboard: Ebony, single-ply bound, 10-inch to 14-inch compound radius, block inlays
• Scale length: 27 in / 685.8 mm
• Nut/width: Graph Tech nut, 42mm
• Frets: 24, stainless steel
• Hardware: Black nickel, Grover Rotomatic locking tuners
• String spacing at bridge: 49.3mm
• Electrics: Fishman Fluence pickups (neck and bridge), push/pull controls give three voices (modern high-output active humbucker, vintage-style humbucker, single-coil-style), 3-way toggle, two volume, two tone controls
• Weight: 4 kg, 8.8 lbs
• Options: N/A
• Left-handed options: N/A
• Finishes: Obsidian Storm Satin
• Case: Protector Ultralite gig bag included
• Contact: Epiphone

Build quality

Build quality rating: ★★★★½

There’s no denying it, this Epiphone Prophecy Baritone is squarely aimed at heavy-playing guitarists. Pulling it out of the sturdy-feeling Protector Ultralite semi-rigid gig bag, the aesthetic is unmistakable. Satin black with a hint of the figured maple veneer peering through on the body, the hardware is black, the pickups are black, the fretboard is black, and so on…

Even the block inlays haven’t been spared, with a dark and stormy look that’s less reflective than those you’d see on a typical Epiphone Les Paul. They’re all very nicely applied, and running my hand up and down the neck, it feels very smooth, with no fret ends sticking out anywhere. The binding is a different color on the front-facing part than it is on the portion where the side dots reside. It’s a small detail, but it would be even nicer looking if these were the same.

It’s quite a heavy guitar, weighing in at a full 4kg (8.8lbs) on my scales despite the weight-relieved body construction. I dread to think what it would’ve been like sans the modern weight relief. The body binding has a little rough bit near the cutaway where it isn’t entirely smooth, but honestly this is a detail you’d only notice really close up and doesn’t spoil the overall image of the guitar.

The back of the guitar features a belly carve and a sculpted neck heel for better upper fret access. The panel for the 9V battery is part of the cover for the volume and tone controls, and the way it folds out is very slick compared to other active pickup-equipped guitars I’ve tried.

Playability

Playability rating: ★★★★☆

Sitting down to play it for the first time, I immediately notice the neck profile is different from most Epiphones I’ve played. It feels like a ‘D’ profile in my hand, with an almost flat part in the middle of the neck I can rest my thumb on. It's more like something you’d find on a high-performance shred guitar than typical LP fare, although it’s not quite as slim as a pure shredder guitar.

The satin finish on the back of the neck takes some breaking in. After one session with a few hours of playing, I can already feel it gunk-ing-up, with little bits of organic detritus from my hands sticking to the back of the neck. This will get better over time, but it’s distracting initially, and a bit of a chore having to wipe it down every time I play.

I also notice it’s quite unbalanced and neck-heavy in my lap. If I take my left hand off the neck, it wants to dive downwards straight away. It exhibits the same behavior on a guitar strap, with the headstock plummeting to the earth as soon as I stand up.

The factory string gauge of 12-60 is quite light for a baritone. This means it feels really slinky and easy to play, but when I go to tune it down to drop A, I can feel straight away that the strings are pretty much already getting too loose. If you’re the sort that likes to tune G# and beyond, you’re gonna need a bigger string. Luckily, that's a small, affordable adjustment.

As it is, though, it’s surprisingly easy to bend the strings versus my normal baritone, which has a 13-72 set of strings on it. I can even muster some Gilmour-style two-tone bends on it with a couple of supporting fingers, something I’ve not really been able to do on other baritones I’ve tested. It plays much more like a normal guitar than a baritone at the treble end of the neck.

At the other end, it’s more what I’m used to, with a big stretch from 1st to 5th fret. The action measures just past 1mm at the 12th fret of the low string with my finger on the 1st fret. This low action from the factory definitely assists in the overall slinky feel of the guitar. If you're a little skeptical about how well you’ll adjust from a regular scale electric guitar, the Prophecy Les Paul Baritone makes the change feel a lot more seamless than others I’ve tested.

As I play the guitar for longer, I start to experience issues with the tuning stability. At first, I figure this is just the guitar bedding-in, but after playing fairly regularly for a week, I still find that it goes out of tune rather frequently. It being a hardtail with locking tuners, I’d expect it to be much more stable. It could be a setup issue with the nut, or it wasn’t strung correctly at the factory. Either way, it’s something I’d want to address before recording or gigging with it.

Sounds

Sounds rating: ★★★★☆

With it plugged into my audio interface and the Neural DSP plugin Nolly X loaded up, I’m straight into chugging territory with the voicing of the humbuckers. It’s that classic, high-output, modern active tone that’s compressed and aggressive, with bags of midrange gut punch and a controlled low end. Digging in with the pick and some hulking power chords in the neck position, it’s straight into that modern metal sound.

It’s not totally lifeless, though. These aren’t extremely surgical like an EMG can be, so there’s a bit of play here when I adjust my picking dynamics. You can get a great rock tone out of them if you want to get onto the more bluesy end of the heavy guitar spectrum. The sustain on the pickups is absolutely fantastic, too. I strike a low A, and it rings out for days, great for sludgy doom riffing.

Using the voice switch on the tone control, I’m not convinced about the claims of Patent Applied For-like tone. The sound changes, but it feels more like the same voice turned down rather than moving from an active humbucker to a vintage humbucker. It’s the same with the single-coil voice. I don’t feel like it gets more spanky and brighter; it’s more like a light shroud has been placed over the original tone that makes it quieter. In fairness, this is a common theme with split-humbuckers.

The push-pull pots work well if I want to tone it down a bit in the verse and then bring it back up for the chorus quickly, but it’s not such a drastic tone change that you couldn’t achieve using the volume control. This feels like a bit of a missed opportunity, because the overall sound of the pickups is really quite good, and having a couple more distinctive voices would make it even more versatile.

As they are, and despite the look of the guitar, it can cover a decent amount of ground. Switching to the newly released Tone King MkII X plugin, the clean tones are surprisingly organic-sounding, particularly on the neck pickup. Playing gently plucked triads further up the neck, it’s hard to believe I’m playing a baritone guitar with active pickups installed. That said, these tones are still in the realm of rock, and it's not able to deliver the more dynamic tones of a true low-output humbucker or single coil.

Verdict

The Epiphone Prophecy Les Paul Baritone is overall a really great guitar. The Fishman Fluence humbuckers deliver superb tones for all kinds of heavy music, and are versatile enough to handle rock, punk, and blues, too. It’s got an incredibly playable neck, and doesn’t feel like a massive jump from a regular scale electric guitar.

It’s let down by a few things, the most major of which is the lack of tuning stability on my review model. Despite being a hardtail bridge with locking tuners, I had to retune the guitar fairly consistently over my time with it. It’s also really neck-heavy, so it wants to tip itself out of your lap when sitting. Finally, I wanted a bit more from the different voices of the Fishman humbuckers.

Guitar World verdict: The Epiphone Prophecy Les Paul Baritone is really close to being one of the best metal-oriented baritones on the market. If it wasn’t for a couple of issues with tuning stability and the lack of depth from the pickup voicing, it could truly stake a claim as being the best of the bunch. Superb playability and a great core tone for heavy music make it a good metal guitar that falls just shy of greatness.

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Andertons

Lonnie Mack’s guitar rig fetched over half a million dollars at a guitar auction that took place on October 15. The esteemed collection included Mack’s workhorse Flying V, dubbed “Number 7” because it was the seventh off the assembly line when Gibson first introduced the model.

The 1958 Flying V opened at $300,000 at Heritage Auctions’ Vintage Guitars and Musical Instruments Signature Auction. It ended up selling for $550,000, alongside his Magnatone Custom 440 combo amplifier and custom leather stage strap.

Just two days ago, Derek Trucks wielded the Flying V at a Tedeschi Trucks Band show at the Chicago Theatre. The new owner was revealed to be Bobby Tseitlin, the man behind Family Guitars – the “living, breathing guitar collection based in Chicago” with guitars that “continue to be played, heard, and experienced the way they were meant to be.”

Trucks laid down a blistering, improvisational solo that paid homage to Lonnie Mack’s unique style.

While Mack never quite became a household name, his ability to combine country- and blues-style fingerpicking influenced generations of players. This guitar is as influential as his playing, having featured on concert stages, television broadcasts, recording sessions, and album covers throughout his career.

The modifications to “Number 7” continue to add to its lore. Mack commissioned a guitar shop owner to add a Bigsby tremolo arm, which required a steel bar fitted between the Flying V’s two “wings” to brace the device.

He made such extensive use of it that guitarists began calling it a “whammy bar,” in reference to his debut single and album. As we all know, the nickname well and truly stuck.

And if that wasn’t enough, the guitar was also played through Stevie Ray Vaughan’s rig. The two guitarists ended up working together on 1985's Strike Like Lightning, Mack’s comeback record.

In addition to this historic Flying V, Trucks played another Tseitlin purchase earlier this year – Jerry Garcia’s iconic “Tiger” – just one day after it went under the hammer for an astounding $11.56 million.

“It’s super-unique. It weighs about 14lbs, which is about twice what my guitar weighs, but it’s super-articulate,” Trucks said in an interview with Howard Stern when talking about “Tiger”.

“There’s a unique sound. It was very Jerry Garcia-sounding – like, you play it, and you know it was his. It was a very 1980s instrument.”

Epiphone has launched the latest evolution of its Prophecy Series, unveiling what it calls some of the most advanced Epiphone guitars it has ever produced.

The company is debuting a wealth of new appointments here. We have the first-ever Epiphone Victory, the first Epiphone baritone Les Paul in more than two decades, a new HyperGlide neck profile, custom-voiced Fishman Fluence humbuckers, and more.

The series is “a ground-up reimagining of its most performance-focused electric guitars”, arriving after Epiphone's Futura Series also brought big changes to its builds. This continues that hot streak.

Comprising a Prophecy Victory FR, 27” Les Paul Baritone, 25.5” Les Paul, SG, and Flying V, each model gets a thermally aged, graphite-reinforced one-piece maple neck with that fast-playing HyperGlide profile.

“Richard Akers [Senior Product Development Engineer] and I really wanted to create the most comfortable and fastest-playing guitar neck we've ever offered, and HyperGlide is the result,” Aljon Go, Epiphone’s Product Development Manager, explains to Guitar World.

“The profile is based on a performance-oriented D shape and features a satin finish on the back, so it feels incredibly smooth and effortless when you play,” Go adds.

The neck profile is paired with a bound, 10”-14” radius ebony fretboard, 24 stainless steel frets, and to prove these guitars aren’t living in the past, they’re equipped with Fishman Fluence humbuckers.

But these aren’t your standard Fluence ‘buckers – these are custom-voiced and developed exclusively for the series. A three-voice system promises to provide modern, high-output active humbucker tones, vintage-inspired PAF flavors, and single-coils in one set.

Notably, they’re mounted using DAPS (Dual-Axis Pickup Stabilization), which is a proprietary, body-anchored system. The idea is that it keeps the pickups parallel to the strings while allowing players to make precise height adjustments. The design also eliminates conventional pickup mounting rings for a sleeker look.

“For us, it wasn't about creating pickups that only do one thing well,” Go says. “We wanted a pickup system that lets players move between styles and applications without compromise.”

Elsewhere, there are highly figured flame maple veneers, Grover tuners, and some model-specific bridge options. The Victory rocks a Floyd Rose 1000 series tremolo, while the others offer a through-body, Frequensator-inspired tailpiece design and a LockTone Modern bridge.

There are a range of finishes available, including Orchid Bloom Satin, Obsidian Storm Satin, Crimson Fog Satin, Forest Phantom Satin, and Aqua Smoke Satin.

“The Prophecy Series is built for players who expect more from their instruments,” says Aljon Go, Product Development Manager at Epiphone. “We’ve built a lineup that's fast, versatile, reliable, and built for today's players.”

It’s certainly a bold rebuild. The arrival of the Les Paul Baritone alone is cause for celebration. Fans have been asking for one for years.

“A lot of what we do starts with listening to players,” notes Lewis McKinney III, Marketing Manager at Epiphone. “The baritone Les Paul is something we’ve heard requested repeatedly. We’re excited that players who've been asking for its return can finally get their hands on one. It's been over twenty years.”

Priced around $1,499 each, the refresh should see the guitars competing with other big-brand metal guitars in a market currently dominated by the likes of Ibanez and Jackson. And maybe convert a few players in the process...

See Epiphone for more.

Few modern rock bands have gone from playing pubs and clubs to arenas quite as quickly as British duo Royal Blood, and they’ve swept up rock royalty along the way.

The bass and drum pairing of Mike Kerr and Ben Thatcher took off with their self-titled debut album in 2014. Their third album, 2021’s Typhoons, was co-produced by Josh Homme – who is but one of the many A-list artists who count themselves as Royal Blood fans.

“I still can’t believe that happened,” Kerr tells Spin’s Lipps Service podcast of the time none other than Jimmy Page turned up to a show. “It was [over] 10 years ago, but it was a moment I’ll never forget.”

The show was at New York’s Mercury Lounge back in May 2014, just as mammoth anthems like Figure it Out and Little Monster saw the band explode. “My hero came to the gig,” Kerr later wrote on Facebook.

“We got a heads up that he was coming, but it wasn’t a sure thing,” Kerr recalls. “And then some security rocked up a couple of hours before doors. Then I was like, ‘I think he’s coming.’”

That US tour provided firsts for the young bands everyday. This was a whole other level of terrifying.

“I didn’t know for sure he was there until I was walking on stage,” he says. “At the Mercury Lounge, the dressing rooms are at the back of the venue, so I had to walk past Jimmy to get to the stage. That was probably the most nervous I’ve ever been in my life.”

Still, like everything else, Kerr and Thatcher took every turn of the band’s rollercoaster in their stride.

“I think we opened with a tune called Hole [the B-Side for Little Monster], and I remember finding his eyes about a minute into the track. I could see he was engaged and enjoying it, and the weight was kind of lifted.

“It definitely gives you a run for your money, but that show in particular felt really special.”

Years later, the band was still running into rock royalty, from covering Foo Fighters with members of Biffy Clyro, Coldplay, and pop queen Dua Lipa, to taking on a Metallica classic as part of their bumper Black Album anniversary.

The band is now set to release their fifth album, Dead Company, next week. It was tracked at the prestigious Sound City Studios.

Positive Grid has given its flagship FRFR speaker a reboot with the Spark CAB 2 – which potentially resolves the only drawback of the original.

On paper, the powered Full Range, Flat Response speaker – designed to amplify digital amp modelers without extra coloration – still serves up 140 watts of power, offering “ample headroom and room-filling sound”.

So, what’s new? Well, the lightweight cab has had its acoustics completely retuned for better detail and clarity, while the low-end has been tightened so it can handle extended-range guitars and bass with ease. The cab’s conversion stage and gain staging have also been revised for a cleaner sound.

It’s a major upgrade. In our review of the original, the only thing the Spark CAB lost marks on was the fact it was a little bass-heavy. With a new setup and a refashioned character, this could go a long way to addressing that.

At its heart is a 10” woofer and two 1” tweeters. Connectivity-wise, it has been designed with nearly every type of Spark offering in mind – from the excellent new Spark Pedal to the portable Spark Edge – via dedicated Spark inputs.

There are also combo XLR/TRS inputs and a balanced XLR output, ensuring the party isn’t Spark exclusive. The XLR output can also feed into a PA, and independent volume controls allow player and audience levels to be individually set.

Naturally, there’s a USB-C port, which is handy not just for updates, but it can also power a player’s Spark. DC output is there for powering the Spark 40 and Spark 2.

The Positive Grid Spark CAB 2 is available in Black and Pearl colorways, priced at $399 apiece.

Check out Positive Grid for more.

Fresh off final rehearsals in a humid Florida airplane hangar, Trivium’s guitar-playing powerhouse and lead vocalist Matt Heafy takes a moment to catch his breath before packing his bags for an Australian tour.

“Sorry I'm driving during this, but don't worry, it’s hands-free,” he jokes. But with the band gearing up to release their 11th studio album, and Heafy revamping his entire guitar arsenal ahead of a massive global tour, we’ll forgive the frontman for multitasking.

For nearly two decades, Heafy has long been associated with Gibson and Epiphone models – the Les Paul to be specific. A loyal advocate of traditional body shapes and long-term relationships, Heafy picked up a Gibson when he was just 11 years old, and has had several signature models to date, with the most recent being his Origins, a guitar that appears to have been quietly discontinued by Epiphone.

Astute fans recently noticed a seismic shift in his guitar choices during his Twitch streams, with Heafy now seen mainly playing the Jackson Kelly, starting the rumor mill racing that he was parting ways with Gibson. He’s now confirmed that this is, in fact, true.

“I’ve loved my time with Gibson and Epiphone. I’ve been a Gibson player since I was 11-and-a-half years old, which is an insane amount of time,” he reflects. “I’m usually someone that sticks with very, very longterm things. Like Trivium, I’ve been in the band since I was 12-and-a-half years old. I like to keep things longterm, but there was something that was just calling to me,” he says. “It’s like, let’s see what’s going on. Let’s see what else is out there.”

Of course, Heafy has played other guitars in the past apart from Gibson and Epiphone, having a brief brush with Dean back in 2006, and he has used Aristides guitars extensively, too.

“I’ve obviously been a fan of a lot of brands. I think it’s important to try everything. When you’re a guitar player, it’s fun to love gear. It’s fun to be obsessed with gear. I think that’s one of the best parts of being a guitar player.”

Heafy candidly explains that part of the decision to work with Jackson stemmed from a desire to collaborate more closely with a company where he could help lead the charge.

“When it came down to Gibson, there are so many legends on Gibson. It’s not an ego thing, but I knew that I wanted to be somewhere where I could be one of the main guys on a roster – because that’s the way we are everywhere else,” he continues.

Among the fleet of Jackson guitars he has been testing, including his bandmate Corey Beaulieu's USA Custom Shop King V and a white Kelly, one instrument in particular has captured his heart.

“I got to say that the relic’d gold top Jackson Kelly USA Custom Shop is one of the best guitars I’ve ever played in my life,” he says.

“I’ve always loved the Kelly body. I loved it on Marty Friedman, and I’m a huge Jeff Loomis fan, too. Everyone knows how partial I am to the Explorer. Like, Hetfield’s the reason why I play guitar. But I was like, ‘Man, do the Kellys look even better than the Explorer to me now?’”

Moving over to Jackson has also been an eye-opening experiment for Heafy in more ways than one, as he found himself falling in love with a bridge setup he'd previously ditched.

“I swore off Floyd Roses a long time ago,” he admits. “I know I had a Floyd in my Dean [Razorback], but I just couldn’t stand them. But recently, I started noticing that it was actually easier to play on a Floyd Rose guitar than a non-Floyd Rose. I feel like I can dig in more, and I feel like I play even more like myself – for both leads and rhythm.”

For fans speculating on what a potential signature model might look like, Heafy hints that the aggressive, sharp lines of the Kelly shape are the leading contender, and he’s tempted to bring back the colorway of his previous Dean model.

“I have been playing with hypothetical color schemes in mind for future guitars, and one of the ones that I mocked up was actually an all-white guitar with all gold hardware – it looks pretty cool,” reveals Heafy.

One thing we can safely say is that whatever the Trivium frontman decides to put out, it will be budget-friendly.

“It’s very important for me to have my guitar at an affordable level. I’m hoping in that $1,200 to $1,600 price point, where anyone could buy it anywhere. I want to be able to spec something out just like I did with my Epiphone line. That was one of the best-selling Epiphones they’ve ever had, between my Origin and its predecessor.”

It’s also likely to feature Heafy’s brand-new Fishman pickups, slated for release very soon. This new version of his signature pickups, while not fully passive because they feature a 9V battery, is voiced to sound like a true passive pup.

For years, active pickups dominated modern metal rhythm tracks. However, while crafting Trivium’s new album, Crown in the Grave, Heafy and the band made a crucial discovery. They revisited passive electronics, tracking all the rhythm tracks with a custom Aristides loaded with a set of Bare Knuckle pickups.

“To me, with passives, it accentuates even more the sound of the hand of the player, whereas actives always have an active sound to it,” says Heafy. Working alongside Fishman engineer Ken Susi right inside Trivium’s Hangar, they custom-designed a new pickup set from the ground up to capture the tone of a passive humbucker.

“It is a true passive tone when you’re using voice one, but if someone’s like, ‘Oh man, I miss Matt’s active voice’, pull it up, and voice two is the active version of that passive. Then there’s a split coil for both. So there’s tons of tone options,” explains Heafy.

“They sound really wonderful. It’s not going to make someone sound like me. It’s going to make someone sound even more like themselves, which was my goal.”

On the upcoming album, Heafy reveals they kept things pretty simple in the amp department. The band plugged in a classic EVH 5150-III head paired with a Maxon OD9 overdrive pedal, and according to the frontman, it may be the best the band has sounded.

“Our new record’s guitar tone is my favorite guitar tone we've ever done,” Heafy declares. “It can go toe-to-toe with Ascendancy, with In Waves, with Shogun. Shogun was actually passive pickups, Ascendancy was passive pickups, and the new one's passive pickups.”

This new release is a massive milestone for the band, and marks the first with Alex ‘Rudi’ Rüdinger behind the kit. It’s fair to say the drummer was thrown straight into the deep end during his very first day.

“He showed up, prepared with the set. Then we said, ‘We’re not even going to run the set with you. We’re going to write new music with you. Welcome, this is your first day with us!’” Heafy laughs.

The resulting album is something Heafy finds himself repeatedly listening to anytime he gets the chance. “With Crown, I cannot stop listening to it. And I don’t know what that means. Again, it’s not an egotistical thing, but it’s that we wrote the kind of music we felt was missing for us as fans of metal.”

Reflecting on Trivium's legacy brings up upcoming milestones, notably anniversaries surrounding their polarizing 2006 record, The Crusade, which turns 20 this year. After the astronomical, runaway success of 2005’s Ascendancy, the young band made a conscious, deliberate pivot, removing breakdowns and screaming in favor of clean thrash vocals and hyper-technical, progressive arrangements.

“We went from being the greatest band in the world that’s on all these magazine covers to that album being hailed as the worst record of all time,” Heafy remembers. “So that was a really strange time for us, for me, but it did teach me some things that Trivium doesn't work well in constraints.”

Decades later, the tide has dramatically turned. A younger generation of metal fans has embraced The Crusade, with guitar covers of Entrance to the Conflagration popping up on social media daily.

“It is nuts to see all these young players covering Entrance to the Conflagration, Detonation and Ignition, and all this stuff,” Heafy says with a smile. “It’s so cool that people finally get it.”

There are things Matt would change on the album if he could go back, admitting that he’d probably drop The World Can't Tear Us Apart, and that Contempt Breeds Contamination wasn’t really fully thought out and finished the way he would have liked, but he says,

“There are a lot of really fantastic songs where we nailed it. We didn’t get credit for how technical the record actually is, how sociopolitically and societally important the lyrics are.”

So with new gear dialed-in, a studio built, and Crown in the Grave ready to be released to the world, Trivium is gearing up for a massive global tour that'll take them from Australia to North America, Europe and the UK.

On pulling off the tones live, Heafy explains that even though they switched from amp modelers to tube amps for the Ascendancy anniversary tour last year, they’ve switched back to their trusty Fractal Axe-Fx, citing the extra production value and convenience.

“We’re back to using the Axe-Fx. I know a lot of bands don’t like it, and some fans are mixed on the idea of a band playing with click tracks, but I think that’s so important,” he explains.

“Yes, flex can happen live, but I feel like the band’s heartbeat needs to be the same heartbeat. I feel like that’s what we have. Now we can do it so our amps can change alongside the time code for the lights and the pyro, and everything can work together around this overall master heartbeat.”

• For more information on upcoming tour dates, head over to Trivium.org.

The Scratch have built a career around a blaring combination of traditional Irish music, heavy metal, and wildly distorted acoustic tones. It’s enough to stop anyone in their tracks – most notably Iggy Pop.

The rock legend gave The Scratch an honorable mention on his BBC Radio 6 show a few years back, calling their sound “righteous” before offering them an opening slot at his Dublin show in 2025 – an event described by the band’s Conor ‘Dock’ Dockery as “a mad buzz.”

The guitarist recalls: “Iggy was a big fan; a shining example of how you should behave and how you should give back to music. You’re never too old and never too far into your career to not be listening to new bands.”

Their unignorable blend of roaring riffs and tasteful tunings – which Dockery and bandmate Gary Regan claim only work on their unusual Cole Clark True Hybrid acoustics – have seen the four-piece through three studio albums. Their most recent, Pull Like A Dog, dropped earlier this year.

Rewind a decade, and most of the group were already playing together in a metal band. Then, one evening, they detuned their guitars and began dabbling with an instrumental version of Gold, a song by the Irish band Interference. “It was specifically a cover by the late Glen Hansard,” Dockery explains.

“They started learning this song, and the tuning Glen had his guitar in was EBEEBE from top to bottom. They wrote an instrumental track and called me in to listen to it. I was just blown away – I hadn’t heard anything like it.” An EP, Old Songs, soon followed.

“Having a guitar in this mad open tuning was so inspiring,” he reflects. “Tunes were just falling out of us. We could see pretty early on that our music was connecting with people in a way none of us had witnessed in any other band.”

He says that tuning, now shifted down to DADDAD for vocal ease, still accounts for 80 percent of their set. The lineup now consisting of lead singer and percussionist Daniel Lang, guitarists and backing vocalists Dockery and Regan, and bassist Cathal McKenna.

They’ve made a few friends since their debut album in 2019. Celtic punk stalwarts Dropkick Murphys, in particular, formed a bond with the group, after they were semi-forced to welcome The Scratch on their European tour.

“We played with them in the 3Arena in Dublin,” Dockery recalls, “Then one of their tour bands dropped out in Europe. We were like: ‘We’ll do it, we’ll do it!’”

That led to an additional two US tours, and an unexpected feature from Murphys bassist Kevin Rheault on The Scratch’s track Pullin’ Teeth. “It hadn’t been released yet,” says Regan. “On the European tour with the Murphys, Kev came into our dressing room and sang the part just out of nowhere.

“He knew the words – they’re a bit mad. We said, ‘You might as well come and play that with us every night.’ So he did, then we asked him to jump on the recording. He sounds amazing on it.

“The Dropkick Murphys really got us going in America and I really credit them for that,” Dockery says, “They’re the loveliest people to tour with, and a super inspiring band.”

Regan joined The Scratch amid their US tour run, replacing previous guitarist Jordan O’Leary. Tensions were high: “It was very uncertain and very stressful, then you’re grieving in the middle of that as well,” says Dockery.

“But Gary brought energy, enthusiasm, talent – and friendship, which is important. There was hope again. Once he came in, we were ready to finish Pull Like A Dog.”

The guitarists contributed monstrous tones on the album, as heard in the stomping track Gladrags, which took some going over. They used their Cole Clarks run through a Quad Cortex, which they found especially efficient for the dual signal guitars.

“I remember listening to Gladrags and thinking: ‘Something’s off with the tone.’ It wasn’t sitting right with the riff,” says Dockery. “Our producer, Spud, came in one day and dialed something on the computer. I pulled up the Fortin Amp – used by Meshuggah – and then it all just clicked. Gladrags required a different tone to make it shine.”

He did try the song’s lead riff on an electric “for the craic,” but it didn’t feel the same. Both guitarists now have Jackson endorsements for any electric requirements on tour, but their acoustic devotion runs deep on the record, no matter how distorted it gets. That said, there’s one exception: a homage to their beloved Thin Lizzy.

“I’ll let you in on a little secret,” says Dockery. “The Horsefly solo was recorded on a Les Paul. But that’s the only part of the album recorded on a Les Paul!”

• Pull Like a Dog is on sale now. The Scratch tour the US in November.

Some bands have a song that made them famous. They have a song that changed everything. Wild Cherry was one of them. But their breakout hit, Play That Funky Music, wasn’t just a ticket to the big league, bigger venues, and the financial success that comes with it. This song changed their sound.

Bryan Bassett, the Foghat guitarist and member of Wild Cherry from 1975 to ’78, was there when it happened, and in a new interview with Guitar World, he explained how it all went down – and how it all started during one of their club shows.

“We were a rock band, and loved Zeppelin, Rainbow, and ZZ Top,” says Bassett. “But bands like The Bee Gees, Earth, Wind & Fire, and all that were turning up on the club scene.”

They were playing rock covers at venues like Pittsburgh’s 2001 Club. If there was a sense that this was a band out of time, whose set was growing little stale, too stiff for the dance floor, it took some kindly stranger to alert them to it.

“There was this dance-and-R&B vibe, and someone came up to our drummer and said, ‘You better start playing some funky music, white boy,’” recalls Bassett. This was the Eureka! moment for frontman Rob Parissi, who started working on it right away.

“We laughed about it in the dressing room, but then Rob started writing lyrics right then and there,” says Bassett. “But we were still a rock band playing the clubs, though we definitely woodshedded and changed-out the whole sound to learn a lot of the hits, and keep our club scene alive.”

Wild Cherry knew what they wanted. And they knew that the song worked. In those days, the reaction was immediate, and it was sincere. If people liked your song they would dance to it. Their audience would go wild for Play That Funky Music. And if they liked it in the clubs, then it stands to reason that people would want to listen to it in bars up and down the country.

“Well, back then jukeboxes were still a big deal, and we wanted to produce a single of our own for those,” says Bassett. “We’d been playing it live, so we knew we had something because people would start hitting the dance floor when we’d do that song. That was before it was even recorded, so we knew people were responding to it in the clubs.”

They started tracking it but they needed someone to put it out. An A&R guy from a new Cleveland-based label, Sweet City, showed interest. Sweet City was a subsidiary of Epic Records.

The die was cast. Sweet City would put it out, Epic would distribute it, and Wild Cherry would explode. The year 1976 was good to Bassett and co.

“We went from clubs to arenas. It was crazy,” says Bassett. “Within a month or two, it went up the charts… It was a mind-blowing time.”

They didn’t have the budget for an extended studio session. There was no time to do take after take. Bassett says it was all one or two takes. “It was minimal, but it was pretty cool,” he says.

And he remembers what he played on it. You can hear him as the song opens.

“I borrowed my friend’s Fender Strat for that session,” he says. “It was a blonde maple Stratocaster with a black pickguard, and it was probably from the early ‘70s. I played that through a Music Man 410, which I loved.”

Guitar World's full interview with Bryan Bassett will be published in the coming weeks.

Eric Johnson is one of those rare artists who has created a unique style from classic elements of blues, jazz and rock.

His playing covers a diverse range of sonic bases, from delicate harmonics and super-clean crystalline chords to edgy rhythms and roaring distorted solo lines. He delivers all these using a vintage or signature model Strat, according to his preference of the moment.

His modest pedalboard features a few carefully chosen pieces, plus the switching for his multi-amp setup – a rig that has hardly changed since his debut solo record, Tones, dating back to 1986.

Although Eric is renowned for his forensic approach to getting the perfect tone, he certainly isn’t one to jump on the latest fads looking for shortcuts and isn’t seduced by the novelty of new gear.

It’s worth noting that Eric has more recently been experimenting with modern digital units, so clearly has an eye on the future when it comes to his rig, but in the meantime recently shipped his whole backline to Europe, to avoid compromising his sound. That’s commitment to the art over profit!

The example solo, though split into four sections, was played as a continuous take. It borrows heavily from Eric’s approach to pentatonics, arpeggios and touches of Texas blues. And while I don’t claim to have duplicated Eric’s tone or style definitively here, this solo is very much inspired by him.

It contains quite a few ideas that can hopefully be of use should you wish to incorporate a bit of the ‘EJ magic’ into your own playing.

This isn’t a fast ‘shred’-type affair, but it does require sustained accuracy and concentration. Very much a case of building up to it, rather than expecting to jump straight in… Hope you enjoy and see you next time!

Example 1.

This first example aims to establish the feel, featuring a Texas blues shuffle-style riff with some pentatonic fills. As there’s a fairly sparse backing here of just bass and drums (echoing the line up of Eric’s live band), it felt important not to rush into a single-note solo immediately.

The feel is fairly loose – though there are some staccato notes, you’ll hear the open fourth and fifth strings ringing occasionally, such as in bars 1 and 3.

Example 2.

The ascending run during the first two bars features some wide intervallic skips based around D-Em-D7-G-Am chord shapes – all superimposed over a D on the bass. I’ve opted to pick these, but Eric will sometimes use a hybrid pick-and-fingers style, as he does on Cliffs Of Dover.

We break out of this into a more melodic D major based run, then some bluesy doublestops and 6ths (F#) as we move back to A in the bass.

Example 3.

Over the C major and D major chords I’ve opted to play a line influenced by Eric’s playing on the track Camel’s Night Out, then changed position with a few slides and legato moves to land at a D major arpeggio, which is played in triplets.

This is one of those moments that can be deceptively difficult to articulate, but running it through slowly (in fact, very slowly is surprisingly helpful) while maintaining a relaxed posture will definitely get you there. More haste, less speed…

Example 4.

Jumping down for that low E helps fill the gap between solo guitar and bass, followed by an E pentatonic/Mixolydian run and an E major arpeggio-based pattern. Framing the chords with arpeggios like this can also help with filling in any harmonic ‘information’ in this trio format, as we saw in Example 3.

The pinched harmonic at the end can be a hit and miss affair. Eric has a pretty good hit rate on these, but it’s important to be realistic – try just behind the neck pickup and you’ll find it somewhere there!

HEAR IT HERE

Eric Johnson – Ah Via Musicom

From Eric’s second solo album, we’re coming in here with the most obvious first choice, Cliffs Of Dover, a track that definitively demonstrates Eric’s blazing lead tone and cascading pentatonic lines.

Also, check out Desert Rose for more of his unique take on pentatonics, plus chord harmony in his solo lines. While you’re there, have a listen to Trademark to hear Eric switching between tones/amp rigs to great effect. Finally, Righteous is a great demonstration of Eric’s approach to a fast Texas blues shuffle.

Eric Johnson – Venus Isle

A lot to check out on this record. Firstly, Eric’s Hendrix-style chord accompaniment and stratospheric solo on the title track. There’s also a lovely extended solo at the end of All About You. Elsewhere, it’s well worth a listen to Camel’s Night Out (apparently played on a Gibson Flying V) and When The Sun Meets The Sky.

You’ll hear some switches in tone – sometimes a switch between amps, sometimes maybe a punch-in during the recording process. Whatever, the results speak for themselves!

Eric Johnson – Live From Austin, TX

It’s always interesting to check out the live versions of tracks for extra insight into the creative process and production/arrangements. Here, it also demonstrates that Eric is every bit as astonishing live as he is in the studio.

We hear him switching between amps, tones and techniques in real-time on tracks such as Trail Of Tears and an extended intro on Cliffs Of Dover. Live versions of Righteous and Zap feature lots of fluid solo playing. It’s worth noting that many of these tracks are available on video, too.

• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.

Les Paul’s work in revolutionizing the electric guitar and forever changing music recording is well known, but his inventions didn’t stop there.

For example, when a car crash left the engineer staring down the barrel of a possible arm amputation, he conceived a guitar that would have allowed him to play on should the worst happen.

On January 2, 1948, Les Paul and Mary Ford were driving through a snowstorm on Route 66, somewhere in Oklahoma. They hit a patch of ice and skidded off a bridge, landing in a ravine some 20 feet below them.

The damage was devastating, with Paul breaking multiple ribs and his nose, cracking vertebrae, fracturing his pelvis, puncturing his spleen and, most heartbreakingly of all, shattering his right arm.

Paul was resolute. He asked for his arm to be set in such a position that would allow him to play the guitar while he recovered from a crash that very nearly killed him.

Doctors, meanwhile, feared his arm wouldn’t recover. Amputation was a stark possibility. So the man that changed the course of music and guitar history started thinking of a backup plan.

“I thought, if they're going to amputate my arm, I’ll play the guitar with one hand,” Paul told Guitar World in March 1983. “To do that, I conceived the synthesized guitar, which you play with your left hand. You key the notes so it sounds like you’re playing with both hands.”

Thankfully, Les Paul’s right arm – and just about every other damaged body part – recovered. Had it not, who knows what might have happened to his flagship. The Log had been design just a year earlier. The Les Paul would eventually arrive in 1952. His focus may have been elsewhere.

Still, he never forgot his synth guitar idea, which would have been his saving grace had an amputation been necessary. But there was another overarching reason he never went further down the rabbit hole with it.

“Years later, I was at a National Association of Music Merchandisers show with the Gibson people, and they said, ‘Les, we want to show you something we want to invest in,’” he recalled.

“They were talking to me about this fellow from Belgium with a guitar that sounded like an organ. I said, ‘You want me to tell you just how he does it? I know all about it; I can tell you exactly what he does!’

“They were shocked that before we knocked on his door I'd already told them how this man was doing it, and how expensive it would be,” he added. “Terribly expensive, and probably not worth getting involved with. I know they never followed through.’”

Tragically, Les Paul’s former home and workshop was destroyed by private developers last month. That building had birthed some of Les Paul’s and music’s most vital inventions.

While much of the original equipment had long been relocated to the Les Paul Recording Studio (opened in March 2025), Paul’s son has been left “heartbroken” by the building’s demolition.

Richard Fortus has been busy rock ’n’ rolling with Guns N' Roses for over two decades. Being part of such a high-profile band means he has managed to add quite a few guitars to his collection.

That includes a rather special Les Paul ’Burst, which he’d pick as the one guitar from his collection that he’d save from a burning building.

“I would grab the ’Burst just because of the value,” he tells Guitar World matter-of-factly.

“I originally started selling [guitars] because I wanted to buy a ’Burst. I was looking for something with a broken headstock, or snake bites, which would make it more reasonable… I guess,” he adds.

Fortus goes on to say that he probably tried out around eight ’Bursts before he finally found his perfect match – one that had all the right snake bites, AKA road marks.

He continues, “A friend of mine was traveling through town and had this guitar. He called me up, saying, ‘Hey, I know you’re looking for something with snake bites… You gotta see this guitar.’

“And as soon as I plugged it in, I thought, ‘Fuck. This is it. I’m screwed now because that’s the guitar. It’s just perfect.’ It’s the best-sounding,” he gushes.

“Those can differ vastly from guitar to guitar, mainly because of the pickups' sound. They just sound so different, but this one had everything.”

According to Fortus, his ’Burst can be best described as “the perfect-sounding Les Paul.”

The guitarist was so committed to his ’Burst quest that, around five years ago, he put up more than 200 pieces of gear as part of the Richard Fortus Collection at the Chicago Music Exchange – all in the hope of trading them for the ultimate collector’s prize: a ’Burst.

Sonic Youth bassist-turned-rule-ignoring guitarist Kim Gordon has been honored with a stunning new signature Fender Jazzmaster.

After 20 years in the highly experimental band, Gordon has since enjoyed a fruitful solo career, cementing herself as a standout innovator in the alt-rock scene. More often than not, she’s done it with a Jazzmaster in her hand.

Here, she’s opted for an Olympic White alder body and modern C-profile maple neck for a blend of classic tonewoods and contemporary playability. Its 22-fret rosewood fingerboard is crafted with a 9.5” radius, rolled edges and block pearloid inlays, and plenty of firepower with its pickups.

You'll find a Seymour Duncan JB TB-4 humbucker in the bridge, complete with zebra-style bobbins, and a chiming Player Series Alnico V P-90 pickup in the neck. It’s clear Gordon wants to cover all bases here.

Hardware specs include a Jazzmaster bridge with floating tremolo further bolstered by Mustang saddles, which will please offset fans.

As a fierce Jazzmaster loyalist, multiple Grammy nominee, and an adored, rule-breaking musician, a Kim Gordon Jazzmaster makes for a formidable addition to Fender's artist lineup.

“Kim has always used the guitar as a tool for exploration rather than following convention, and that spirit is at the heart of this Jazzmaster,” believes Fender Chief Product Officer, Justin Norvell.

“Her impact reaches far beyond any one genre, with a creative practice that has shaped music, art and culture. We wanted to capture that sense of individuality and experimentation while staying true to the character and feel of the Jazzmaster.”

Despite a 20-year stay in Sonic Youth, Gordon never saw herself as a bassist, and tells Fender she fell in love with the guitar as a tool for weird noise-making. “Something about playing dissonant music becomes so freeing,” she says.

In a more recent interview with Guitar World, Gordon teased the development of her signature Jazzmaster, saying, “My amazing guitar tech, Salar Rajabnik, he helped me through the process and did a lot of research. The signature model took a really long time. We finally got Fender to use Seymour Duncan pickups.”

The limited edition Fender Kim Gordon Jazzmaster is available for $1,099.99/£1,449/€1,699.

Visit Fender for more.

It’s been a busy few weeks for Fender, having reunited with Mark Hoppus for a quirky new signature bass and unveiled the next-generation American Professional range.

JHS Pedals founder has built some crazy pedals, often based on classic or cult favorite designs. The infamous Flerb setting of the EHX Holy Grail has been one that fans have been dying for him to turn his hands to, and now he’s done just that… almost.

According to company founder Josh Scott, the JHS Pedals comments sections, its Discord channel and email boxes are all unanimous in their requests: “Josh,” they say, “build us a Flerb.”

But here, Scott doesn’t want to be a copyist, so he’s made the JHS Pedals Pherb instead – a “dark, moody lo-fi reverb”.

The term Flerb is an amalgamation of flanger and reverb, which is what you get with that quirky Holy Grail setting. But Scott has gone slightly off-piste, this time combining phaser and flanger.

Impressively, the whole pedal was turned around in 35 hours, making it the quickest pedal to go from dream to reality in JHS history. Its very simple-but-effective core is largely to thank for that.

Of its three controls, Mix dials in the amount of phaser and reverb (which are tied to the same dial), Speed is for just the phaser alone, and Length controls reverb decay and pre-delay.

There’s also a Break mode, which, JHS says, “takes the whole signal – reverb, phaser and your dry guitar – and destroys it.”

In literal terms, it adds a bit crusher with analog-style clipping before it hits the twin effects. To our ears, it produces an altogether more mangled sound, ideal for those wanting to sprinkle a little more chaos and carnage into the mix.

Finally, there are two other key perks. With the Break switch turned off the phaser can actually be turned off completely via the Speed switch, and turning the Mix dial down and engaging the Break mode finds the bit crusher operating solo.

“You asked us for Flerb, says Josh Scott. “You're getting Pherb.”

Honestly, it seems a really cool compromise, and puts a nice spin on an effect that has, over the years, become half-adored, and half-meme. Scott is on the latter side.

“Flanger inside of a reverb just makes my skin itch,” he notes. “Phaser inside of a reverb however, is a different story, and that's the one nobody ever built. So I'm giving you the thing that should have been and never was.

“The reverb is dark, moody and lo-fi on purpose,” he adds. “Not a plate. Not a hall. It's chorused and chunky, and at longer decay times it slightly pulses.

“The phaser is a four-stage vintage style phase shifter (think MXR Phase 90) with the feedback left off and the notch sweeps moved up through the frequency spectrum, so they stay out of the way of the reverb's low mids.”

The JHS Pedals Pherb can be yours today for $99.99.

See JHS Pedals for more.

Scott, meanwhile, is sticking some weird and wonderful items from his personal gear collection onto Reverb, after cramming two of its best-loved overdrive pedals into one ultimate stompbox.

Dan Wilson has written or co-written hit Semisonic songs Closing Time, Adele’s Someone Like You and The Chicks’ Not Ready to Make Nice, but he doesn’t analyze his work. “I’ve never thought, ‘I have a knack for writing songs,’” he says. “It feels like a pure expression of who I am, rather than something I do well – or poorly!”

That knack for expression served him well in the ‘90s – but without his wife, Closing Time might not have been a hit. “We were trying to decide what the first single from the album would be,” he explains. “Diane and I listened through the whole record. She said, ‘If you want to stay indie rock, put out Never You Mind. But if you want to go big, it’s Closing Time. And I think it’s time for you guys to go big.’ She was totally right.”

He reflects: “That song continues to change my life all the time. I would never in a million years have imagined that they’d still be playing it in bars in 2026.”

What got you hooked on guitar?

I’d been taking piano lessons since second grade. When I got to eighth grade I met a few kids who owned acoustic guitars. They’d play folk rock in the halls between classes – and during them. So I asked my parents about getting a guitar. They bought me and my brother Matt a cheap acoustic to share when I was 13. I’ve never stopped playing. We were writing songs from the minute we owned that guitar.

Your early band was Trip Shakespeare – how did you end up there?

It was a trio Matt started with bassist John Munson and drummer Elaine Harris. They’d made an album with Matt playing two guitar tracks on every song; I think they were panned hard left and hard right. Matt asked me to join so they had someone to play the right-speaker parts.

It turned into a democracy although it had started as Matt’s vision. The frustration of having the band decide everything together was tough for him. On the other hand, it was a big part of why our jams were legendary.

How did Semisonic form?

I started Semisonic with John Munson and Jacob Slichter to make demos of the songs I was writing on my own and with Jake. We’d record in Jake’s basement on a Tascam DA-88, and we’d learn cool covers so we could play shows. That organically developed into Semisonic. John was hesitant to commit to it being a working band, but I think the songs were pretty convincing.

What sort of guitars and amps did you use on Semisonic’s debut, The Great Divide?

I was playing my Lace Sensor Strat a lot, although we rented a bunch of other guitars. I remember playing a Danelectro electric sitar on Temptation. And there was a Les Paul of some kind that made its way onto the album.

I played through a Peavey 5150 on a lot of the tracks. I also used an amazing-sounding old Fender Deluxe a lot. That was the first time I understood, ‘This is what it feels like to play a great amp!’ That Deluxe is like a holy grail that I’ve been looking for ever since.

The Great Divide got great reviews. Did you feel confident going into Feeling Strangely Fine?

I was happy about the reviews, but I thought it was more mainstream than it really was. MCA didn’t sell very many copies. Going into Feeling Strangely Fine I was very confident in my songwriting and guitar playing, and I was getting more confident in my singing.

But my mindset was, ‘Let’s make an art record.’ We’d tried being more pop and it was received as an art project. So, this time I thought ‘Let’s double down and make our Abbey Road’ – complete freedom to experiment with the studio as an instrument.

Tell us about the writing and recording of Closing Time.

I wrote it in about 20 minutes in my living room in Minneapolis, and I wrote the bridge while demoing it with John and Jake a week or so later. I wrote about 60 songs during the run-up to the recording sessions. For us, Closing Time was just one of many.

What gear did you use whilst recording the track?

At that time I was still playing my Strat, but I wrote all the songs on acoustic guitar. In the studio, our producer Nick Launay convinced me to use other guitars. John Kukor, the owner of Seedy Underbelly, where we recorded a lot of our songs, had a huge collection of amazing amps, guitars, and recording gear, and we used a lot of it.

I played Closing Time on two guitars and two amps: a late-50s Gretsch Silver Jet, and a 1959 Black Beauty Les Paul – that’s probably worth a quarter of a million dollars now! I played the Silver Jet through a ‘90s Soldano 100-watt and the Les Paul through a Marshall Plexi 100 from the ‘60s.

The lead guitar track featured my brand-new Z.Vex Fuzz Factory distortion pedal. Zach Vex brought it to my birthday party in 1996; serial number 005. I used it on Closing Time, Completely Pleased, All Worked Out and California. It was a new sound for me, so I used it as much as I could.

Nick Launay complained it sounded “irritating” and I knew what he meant – but I was so excited about it! So he rose to the challenge and made it sound huge. I think it was generally a new way to use fuzz in a pop song, and I’m proud that. I thank Zach regularly for bringing me that pedal. I think it sounds incredible on California, even now.

Singing In My Sleep and Secret Smile were hits too.

Singing In My Sleep was the other song I brought to John and Jake’s basement to demo with Closing Time. I’d written it about a couple of very influential mixtapes I’d received, including one from Diane.

Secret Smile came to me in a dream. I woke up in the early morning with a song running through my head. I think I’d been dreaming about writing the song. I went to my Wurlitzer electric piano to play it, wrote down the words and chords, and fell back asleep. Next morning I saw my notes and sang the song to myself – and it was incredible!

There was a whole great verse and a whole great chorus. I wrote another verse and a bridge and the song was done. I spent months playing it for friends and asking them, “Have you heard this before?” Everyone would say, “No, that sounds like a new Dan song.”

Long after that, I learned that Paul McCartney had almost the exact same experience writing Yesterday. One difference between me and Sir Paul is that my dream included most of the lyrics - Sir Paul had to spend a few months writing lyrics for Yesterday. So I had an easier time with my dream-written song!

Where was your head at when you recorded All About Chemistry, and what got you into solo music after that?

All About Chemistry was a rough time for me. Our daughter Coco had come home from hospital with a tracheostomy, oxygen tanks, and 24-hour nursing to operate her breathing machines. Diane and my marriage had become one gigantic and terrifying medical adventure – call it newborn baby plus PTSD.”

I was about to make another album for MCA, the label which had rejected Feeling Strangely Fine as having ‘no singles,’ and I had zero trust in their ability to hear the value in what we did.

The label was essentially telling us to get something, anything, done, because their research was showing that our fans were forgetting us at an alarming rate. I didn’t care about those knuckleheads’ research, but I knew all upcoming decisions about the band would be steered by it.

I love many of those songs, but as we got gentler and more loving, alternative rock music was getting more and more harsh, misogynistic, blustering – a radio soundtrack for current or would-be bullies. Our single Chemistry chimed with bright piano and jangly Telecaster guitars. It didn’t sound right coming before or after Nookie, Spit it Out or Kim.

I thought what would happen next would be a solo album, do a tour, and get back into it with John and Jake. But it didn’t work out that way.

Elsewhere, you’ve co-written hit songs like Not Ready to Make Nice with The Chicks and Someone Like You with Adele.

Not Ready to Make Nice happened during a two-day session. We got together at The Village Studio in Santa Monica. On the first day we had quite an uproarious time – lots of laughter, and much tea spilled. We wrote It’s So Hard When it Doesn’t Come Easy about being a parent to a hard-won child. All of us had some kind of experience with that.

Earlier in the day The Chicks had showed me a lot of the songs on their album. I left feeling like they could use a song that addressed their blacklisting by the Bush administration head-on. In the morning, in the hotel room with my guitar in hand, I thought of the title ‘I’m Not Ready to Make Nice.’

It was something my prairie-raised mom would say if you angered her or hurt her feelings and didn’t give her enough time to cool down. But the whole story of the song and the recording sessions would be an entire interview!

What’s next for Semisonic, and for you?

Semisonic has had a very adventurous year. John had a stroke 18 months ago and has now recovered well enough to be able to play the bass. So, we put him – and me and Jake – to work recording our latest single, Don’t Give Up Yet. It’s dedicated to my people in Minneapolis and their heroic actions supporting and protecting their neighbors against the ICE invasion.

Since then, we played a heartwarming theater show in Minneapolis this summer, then the huge MN Yacht Club festival. There were 35,000 Minnesotans who sang along to Closing Time, Singing in My Sleep, and Don’t Give Up Yet – one of the top five peak experiences I’ve had with my band.

I’ve been co-writing and producing a lot of songs over the past few years, so I’m sure a lot of tracks will be coming out.

• Keep up with Wilson’s progress via his website.

Ibanez has teamed up with long-running anime series Dragon Ball Z for a nerd-friendly collection of guitars, a Tube Screamer and accessories.

The martial arts fantasy show ran for seven years and 291 episodes between 1989 and 1996, and has been dubbed in 81 countries across the globe, cementing it as a huge part of Japan’s media heritage.

Ibanez, then, is celebrating its shared Japanese heritage with a surprise collaboration that has some notable players fawning.

The collection comprises two electric guitars – an eye-catching RG with a Son Goku motif, and a Super Saiyan Son Goku-inspired S-type – a Vegeta-emblazoned bass, and a classic Tube Screamer TS808 that gets a more subtle Dragonball theming.

The RG gets a bold, bright orange colorway and is spec'd with a gold Edge Tremolo and Gotoh tuners, a Super Wizard Neck for rapid fire shredding, and a HSH pickup configuration.

There’s a lovely Son Goku design on its black pickguard, and it ships in a hardcase filled with other goodies, including a strap, badges, and a certificate of authenticity.

Elsewhere, the S-Type features full body artwork inspired by Son Goku’s awakening to Super Saiyan, and is simply spec'd with a single humbucker featuring a dragon etching and a T106 hardtail bridge.

But the bass is arguably the prettiest of the trio. It too is geared for easy playing with a single humbucker, slim neck, and a B10 bridge.

Beyond that, there’s a concert-sized ukulele with father and son Goku and Gohan artwork, a piccolo guitar (there simply had to be, given there’s a character of the same name), a soft gig bag, guitar strap, and picks set.

There’s a bunch of t-shirts available, too, but this writer’s dreams of a Freezer-coded seven-string have sadly been dashed.

Yet the pick of the punch might just be the Tube Screamer, which rebrands itself with the Dragon Ball Z font, gets a single-star Dragon Ball led light, and some snazzy side decals. Stevie Ray Vaughan would have lost his mind.

It’s a shrewd move from Ibanez, too, given the huge crossover between the two worlds. The comments on its Instagram posts announcing the collection proves that.

Modenr fusion virtuosos Manuel Gardner Fernanes and Andrew Baena have both expressed their sheer excitement for the tie-in, with Clayton King gushing that “the DBZ RG550 is the greatest thing I’ve ever seen.” Jack Gardiner is even considering switching to bass given his love of Vegeta.

And in true Dragon Ball Z fashion, the announcement ends on a cliffhanger. We’ll have to wait a little longer to learn more, with the collection set to roll out to distributors in 2027.

There will be plenty hoping for some more high-end offerings with stage-ready specs though, we’re sure.

File it under pleasantly unexpected collabs, which have been a theme in recent months, with PRS parking up with Land Rover, Fender getting swish with British designer Paul Smith, and, perhaps most shockingly, Joe Bonamassa and a digital amp.