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Super PickupGiveaway 2025
Win Big! 11 Sets! 11 Winners! Win a set of pickups from one of these sponsors: Deadline is March 15, 2026. Complete the survey below to enter giveaway. One entry…

Mark Bosch
New York State of Mind
As the longtime lead guitarist for Garland Jeffreys and Ian Hunter, Mark Bosch’s resumé reads like a who’s who of…

Crucial Audio WahVelope
Tube Funk
Crucial Audio makes high-end tube pedals and studio gear at its shop in southern Delaware. Its latest, the WahVelope, is…

Have Guitar Will Travel – 018 Featuring Luke Mossman
In the new episode of “Have Guitar Will Travel,” host James Patrick Regan speaks to guitarist Luke Mossman about his…

Bryan Beller
Bass Aristocracy
If you love daredevil musicians, you’ll dig The Aristocrats. A contemporary-fusion trio, the band includes guitar monster Guthrie Govan (VG,…

Classics: August 2022
Billy Soutar’s custom-order 1936 Gibson L-7
While scanning an Elderly Instruments ad in Vintage Guitar one day in early 2009, Billy Soutar spotted the description of…

Jim Campilongo
“I’m a Guitar Player”
It’s been two years since Jim Campilongo put out a solo record, but on the new Dream Dictionary, his patented…
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Rickenbacker’s Electric 12-Strings
Double-bound for Glory
George Beauchamp and Adolph Rickenbacher founded Electro String in 1931 to manufacture what everyone would soon call “Rickenbacker” guitars. Success came early and their lap steels set standards of quality,…
ARTISTS

Ty Tabor’s Six-String Meditation!
King’s X Guitarists’s solo work is mindful, complex Ty Tabor used his Player Strat (with a JB Jr. pickup at…

Dave Wyndorf
Tab of God
In the early ’90s, a handful of bands were trailblazers in the realm of “stoner rock”; Kyuss, Sleep, Fu Manchu,…

Jeff Plankenhorn’s “Alone At Sea”
Tasty slide on a square-neck Oahu Singer/songwriter Jeff Plankenhorn’s music is a rootsy mix that embraces blues and pop while…

Joe Negri
Royal Handyman, Jazz Legend
Long before becoming Handyman Negri on “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood,” he had already been a teen guitar prodigy, first-generation bopper, and…
CLASSIC INSTRUMENTS

The Guild and Gibson Johnny Smith Models
The name “Johnny Smith” is synonymous with class, elegance, and style. Most guitar players are familiar, if not with the…

’39 Gibson EH-185
Preamp tubes: three 6J7, one 6N7 Output tubes: two 6L6 Rectifier: 5U4 Controls: Instrument Volume, Microphone Volume, Bass and Treble…

Rising Rockers
Five Alternative Club Classic Amps of the ’50s
In an era when the sub-20-watt combo is arguably the most popular guitar-amp format, it’s worth remembering that several classics…

Gibson Kalamazoo Award
Designer's Dream Come True
In 1978, Gibson craftsman Wilbur Fuller produced the company’s first hand-carved, tuned-by-ear custom guitar. The instrument, which in a blind…
NEWSWIRE
APPROVED GEAR
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Live Wire
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Narrow(field) Win
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Take Flight

Guild Surfliner
Hang Ten
The Surfliner is Guild’s first new solidbody to come along in decades. A thoroughly modern design with classic features, there’s…

EHX J Mascis Ram’s Head Big Muff Pi
Always On
When Electro-Harmonix heard that guitarist J Mascis’ prized Deluxe Big Muff Pi was stolen years ago, they decided to make…

Metal Pedals JH-3
Swiss-Army Distortion
Metal Pedals JH-3 Price: $235 (list) Contact: www.metalpedals.com Like a Swiss Army knife, the multifunction Metal Pedals JH-3 Johnny Hiland…

Six-String Kicks
Wood from Famed Bowling Alley Set to Sing
Few things scratch America’s cumulative itch for nostalgia like Route 66 – the famed wagon-trail-cum-highway that offered passage to those…
WHAT ELSE IS NEW
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More Personal
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Rare Pioneer

Kirk Douglas
Music In a Blender
As guitarist on “The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon,” “Captain” Kirk Douglas has an enviable gig. He also performs on…

Henriksen Amplifiers’ The Blu
Sound Cube
One old cliché among gigging musicians is, “They pay me for the aggravation, the music is free.” A good deal…

Vernon Reid
Kind of Blue
Vernon Reid went against the grain of rock guitarists in the 1980s, conjuring Parliament-Funkadelic, Ornette Coleman, Bad Brains, Carlos Santana,…

Mark Lettieri
Baritone Funk
Snarky Puppy’s Empire Central was recorded in front of a live audience and pays homage to the city of Dallas.…













































