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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…

Magic Magnets
TV Jones’ Starwood Humbuckers
Best known for making the vintage-sounding Magna’Tron, Power’Tron, and Supra’Tron pickups, TV Jones has expanded its well-regarded line to include…

Furry Lewis’ 1968 Gibson B-25N
Heart In Hand
Born in the heart of Mississippi’s fabled Delta region – from where Robert Johnson emerged and a blues-music form was…

Death By Audio’s Deep Animation
The Other Side
If you thought envelope filters died out after Jerry Garcia passed into the great beyond, think again. Submitted as proof…

Ana Patan’s funky “General Conspiracy”
“Live” from a Swedish forest From her home deep in a forest in Sweden, Ana Patan and her Framus Renegade…

The Rickenbacker B14A
Silver Service
For most guitarists today, glimpsing a vintage Rickenbacker combo elicits a response like, “Wait… Rickenbacker made amps?” But remember,…
Bobby Black
Steel Before and After Commander Cody
When he got the invitation, Bobby Black wasn’t sure. The pedal-steel virtuoso, a 20-plus-year veteran of San Francisco’s music scene,…
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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

The (Way) Back Beat: A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody
Fretted cheesecake advertising through the years, Part Two
Last month, we began looking at some of the more entertaining fretted instrument advertising of the 20th century, in what…

Dave Specter
Chicago Deep Dish
There are many styles of blues guitar, from haunting Delta acoustic to volcanic blues-rock. Hailing from the mecca of Chicago,…

Joe Osborn
A Few (Hundred) Hits
Ed. Note: Joe passed away December 14th, 2018, he was 81. Joe Osborn. His face has never been on a…

Brian Ray
From Blues to Beatles
Brian Ray spent the last 11 years playing guitar as Paul McCartney’s side man. While such duty would be a…
CLASSIC INSTRUMENTS

“Buy That Guitar” podcast with special guest Alan Greenwood
Season 02 Episode 1 VG’s “Buy That Guitar” podcast opens its second season with host Ram Tuli joined by Alan…

Parsons/White StringBender
From the origins of country-rock to Jimmy Page, Metallica, and a slew of modern country-pickin’ wizards, the string bender lends…

Star Board: Elliot Easton
Elliot Easton’s “Pedalboard” Though Elliot Easton enjoys his loaded full-size Pedaltrain board, his new band, The Empty Hearts (with Clem…

Gibson GA-CB Custom Built
Gibson GA-CB Preamp tubes: three 6SJ7, two SQ7, two Sj5 Output tubes: two 6L6 Rectifier: 5T4 Controls: Microphone Gain, Instrument…
NEWSWIRE
APPROVED GEAR
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Live Wire
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Narrow(field) Win
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Take Flight

Eastwood’s Classic 6 TA PHo
Phish Food
If you’ve seen Phish guitarist Trey Anastasio onstage, you may have noticed an unusual archtop in his mitts – a…

Retro and Wonderful
The EHX Mainframe Bit Crusher
The Mainframe Bit Crusher is a nasty little pedal that warps, mangles, distorts and produces lo-fi digital sounds and trippy…

Preston Thompson 00-45
New Old Vintage
Given their scarcity, few mortal pickers will ever own a pre-war Martin 00 or 000 with 45-level appointments. But a…

Friedman Motor City Drive & Fuzz Fiend
Sonic Rapture
An innovative designer, builder, and repairman, Dave Friedman has worked with some of the biggest names in the music industry,…
WHAT ELSE IS NEW
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More Personal
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Rare Pioneer

Dick Taylor
From R&B Psychedelia With the Pretty Things
When the Pretty Things’ 50th anniversary was marked with Bouquets From A Cloudy Sky – a huge boxed set containing…

Visual Sound Route 66 V3 American Overdrive
Get Yer’ Kick
Visual Sound Route 66 V3 American Overdrive Price: $179 (street) Contact: www.truetone.com/ Over the years, the Route 66 pedal by…

Black Sabbath
Live Evil 40th Anniversary
Four decades on, Ronnie James Dio’s stint in Black Sabbath is revered almost as much as the Ozzy epoch. This…
Park 75
Park 75 Preamp tubes: three ECC83 (12AX7 equivalents) Output tubes: two KT88 Rectifier: solidstate Controls: Volume II, Volume I, Treble,…












































