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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…
Jim McCarty
Detroit Rock Royalty
Playing Detroit in 2013, Joe Bonamassa had a special treat in store for the crowd. “The best, most badass guitar…
Fender American Professional Jazzmaster
Return Of The Rebel
From the get-go, Fender’s Jazzmaster was the black sheep of the family – that wild-at-heart uncle your ma warned you…
Beat Portraits: Burns Volume 7
1965: Summer Of The Hollowbodies
The Way Back Beat survey of instruments designed by James Ormston Burns continues with the final products developed by his…
Headline: In Memoriam: Ian Bairnson
Guitarist Ian Bairnson, a member of the Alan Parsons Project who played on the band’s 10 studio albums from 1976…
Fretprints: Van Halen
Birth of the Brown Sound
In the late 1970s, hard rock was on the ropes. Always a guitar-dominated form of music, it had been diluted…
Raul Malo’s Instrumental Side
Mavericks frontman with a vintage Jazzmaster Though he is renowned and beloved for his vocals in the Mavericks, Raul…
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Reverend Sensei H90
Live Wire
So you want a Gibson-style solidbody that can cover humbucker-powered rock, yet also twangier/glassier tones using a P-90 pickup. Check. You also want to grab high frets via double-cutaway and…
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ARTISTS
Steve Dawson and his Tricone, “Singin’ the Blues”
Roots Artists Expands the Genren The wildly talented Steve Dawson uses a modern National Tricone for this take on “Singin’…
Fretprints: Stevie Ray Vaughan
Texas Flood
Stevie Ray Vaughan was unknown when he premiered at the 1982 Montreux Jazz Festival. Born and bred in Dallas, he’d…
Louie Shelton
Gold Coast Gigmeister
On August 16, 1966, the Beatle-esque guitar riff that opens “Last Train To Clarksville” crackled out of radios across America…
Susan Santos’ Blues-Rock Riffage
Solo take on “Have Mercy” Susan Santos grabbed her LsL T Bone, plugged into a Bugera V5 Infinium amp, and…
CLASSIC INSTRUMENTS
The Valley Arts Custom Pro Bass
Keeping the Arts Alive
In 1969, when a North Hollywood guitar teacher named Duke Miller teamed up to start a music store with students…
Tonk Brothers/Washburn 5241
From the late 1920s through the early ’40s, Gibson produced instruments under a variety of brand names for retailers like…
B.C. Rich Acrylic Warlock
Most industries know a great idea when they see it and aren’t shy about jumping on a bandwagon. In 1969,…
Classics: May 2022
“Wild” Jimmy Spruill’s ’66 Fender Jaguar
Wilbert Harrison’s 1959 version of Leiber and Stoller’s “Kansas City” shares space at the summit of all-time blues/pop classics, its…
NEWSWIRE
APPROVED GEAR
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Live Wire
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Narrow(field) Win
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Take Flight
Worland Prairie
Built For Speed
Worland Prairie Price: $1,950 Info: www.worlandguitars.com. It’s been well-documented how car-crazy vets and teens in postwar America reimagined the American…
Fishman’s Fluence Greg Koch Gristle-Tone P90
A Quiet Place
With the miracle of micro-electronics, you can pack a massive amount of tone into a tight space. Case in point:…
DNA Analogic Effects
Chemical Reaction
If you‘re a “first impressions mean a lot” kind of gearhead, DNA Analogic’s line of effects pedals may just win…
BBE Sonic Stomp Pro & Green Screamer V2
Maximized Tone
Contributing to a recent burst of creative releases in the effects market, BBE added a pair of stompboxes to its…
WHAT ELSE IS NEW
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Consentrik Quartet
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Lookout Highway
Guild’s B-240EF
Stop Your Frettin’
It would be easy to look at the price of Guild’s B-240EF and assume it’s just another low-end acoustic/electric bass…
Gibson Johnny Smith
In 1961, Gibson’s Johnny Smith model not only associated Gibson with one of the most popular guitar stylists of the…
Styx
Crash of the Crown
BreaBreaking While 2017’s concept album The Mission embraced progressive rock, the new Styx album has even higher ambitions. Returning to…
Tony Mottola
Mr. Big, Guitar Pioneer
Some argue that Tony Mottola was more legendary than famous. In a career spanning 50 years, the guitarist logged thousands…
