•  Reverend Sensei H90

    VG Approved Gear

     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 have the pitch reliability of a tune-o-matic bridge and locking tuners. Got it. One more thing: it’s got to look cool and old-school. Hmm…. sounds

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Bass Bruiser

The HomeBrew Hematoma Bass Overdrive

Like a lot of gear-making companies whose stuff is warmly received, Joel and Andrea Weaver at HomeBrew Electronics have never rested on their laurels. Instead, the effects-pedal builders have launched…

Buzz Feiten Blues Pro

Buzz Feiten Blues Pro

Cantankerous Tones

Buzz Feiten Blues Pro Price: $2,395 (list) Contact: www.buzzfeitenguitars.com Buzz Feiten is a Woodstock alumnus who has played with a who’s who of music artists and lent his guitar artistry…

LIPVIRTUOSO_HOME-MAIN-BIG

Mike Lipe Virtuoso

Back to the Future

Mike Lipe Virtuoso Price: $4,000 Contact: lipeguitars.com; phone (818) 352-6212 Mike Lipe has built guitars for top players and guitar companies (notably heading up the Ibanez Custom Shop in the…

The Vox AC15 Custom Classic

A Classic Improvement?

Vox AC15 Custom Classic. In the lore surrounding Vox Amplification, the AC30 is the king of the hill, the alpha male, the one that first springs to mind. But history…

JHS Charlie Brown Overdrive

Beautiful Noise

While few guitarists get the opportunity to plug into every vintage Marshall amp and hear their distinguishing tonal characteristics, most know a good crunchy stompbox when they hear it. The…

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 automobile. Some shaved, sprayed, and slammed contemporary two-door sedans, creating…

Music Man Game Changer

Twelve Tons of Tone

Music Man Game Changer Price: $2,275 (street) Contact: www.gamechanger.music-man.com Since the introduction of the electric guitar, builders have sought ways to increase the variety of tones that can be had…

VVT Rick Derringer Hyperdrive

Quad-6V6 Hoochie-Koo

To a certain degree, the Vintage Vacuum Tube Amplifiers Rick Derringer Hyperdrive model was born of intimidation. When VVT proprietors Tony Albany and Jim Hill began discussing a signature amp…

Chicago Blues Box Roadhouse amp

Hot Windy City Tone

Illinois-based Butler Custom Sound recently introduced its Chicago Blues Box amp series with the blues player very much in mind. Company president Dan Butler has repaired and modified countless tube…

HomeWrecker Pickups

Slumbering Strats, Awake!

In 2011, session guitarist Joshua Hernandez began winding pickups in his living room. From these modest beginnings, and with no desire simply to replicate the sounds of vintage pickups, Hernandez…

GODIN-HOME-MAIN-BIG

Godin’s A4 and A5 Ultra SA

Brave New Basses

Godin A4/A5 Ultra SA Price: $1,395 (A4 Ultra SA fretted); $1,645 (A5 Ultra SA fretless) Info: godinguitars.com. For years, Godin Guitars has been finding creative ways to improve guitar and…

National Dueco

Still Resonating

Blues man Charlie Parr recently philosophized in VG that National resonator guitars are as much mechanical creation as musical instrument, which is why maintaining the function of vintage Nationals comes…

Stomp Under Foot Ram’s Head

Piece of the Pi

Matt Pasquerella has a reputation as a pi connoisseur… no, not the eating kind, the fuzzy kind. The creator of Stomp Under Foot effects has been building some of the…

Walden Sean Harkness 12-String, CG4070E

Grand-Auditorium Cousins

Walden Sean Harkness 12-String, CG4070E Price: $1,100 (Sean Harkness Model); $1,350 (CG4070E-CERT) Info: www.waldenguitars.com. With 16 years of producing attractive, understated instruments, Walden Guitars puts an accent on quality materials…

Godin ACS SA

Nylon Dreams

Too often, the notion of plugging in a thin-body guitar and getting a reasonably natural acoustic/electric tone is more dream than reality. With decades of experience, Godin is taking on…

Swart Atomic Jr.

Splitting The Atom

When Swart decided to split their Atomic Jr. five-watt combo into a piggyback, they not only went from an 8″ speaker to a 12″, they added more speaker options, including…

Analog Man’s King of Tone Overdrive

Holiest of Holies

Amid this golden age of music gear, the Analog Man King of Tone Overdrive, first produced in 2005 in collaboration with Jim Weider, heads a distinguished list of “Holy Grail”…

The Jext Telez Jonathan Wilson’s Canyon Climber, Jext Face

Fuzz Buzz

There’s nothing subtle about Jext Telez stompboxes; they’re about loud colors, loud sounds, and loads of fuzz. The latest creations from designers Bob Ebeling and Colin Simon harken to the…

ASIA Symposium

The ASIA Symposium

Kinship and Connections

As much a celebration of kinship as it is an educational forum, the biannual Association of Stringed Instrument Artisans (ASIA) Symposium, held at East Stroudsburg University, in Pennsylvania, is mini…

Carvin PB4

Carvin PB4

Classic Looks, Modern Function

Carvin PB4 Price: $1,899 (list/base); $869 (street/base) Info: www.carvinguitars.com. Trends come and trends go, but tradition stands the test of time. And while Carvin’s designs stand quite well on their…

Henretta Engineering Pedals

Henretta Engineering Pedals

Good Things, Small Packages

Henretta Engineering Pedals Prices: Green Zapper, Bluebird, and Purple Octopus, $125 each; Chord Blaster, $140 Info: www.henrettaengineering.com. Bigger is not necessarily better – especially when you have a pedal board…

Vox Giulietta VGA-3D

Unconventional Archtop

It may look like a conventional archtop, but Vox’s latest box offers something truly different. Within the Giulietta VGA-3D is a modeling engine that can conjure tones from humbucker and…

Teye Guitars’ Master Series Knights Templar

Knight Time

Guitar fanatics find inspiration from different players. And if Woody swapping licks and practicing “the ancient art of weaving” with Keef while playing his famous pearl-topped, single-cut Zemaitis gets your…

Knaggs Guitars’ Steve Stevens Signature Model

Rebel Yell

Knaggs Guitars’ Steve Stevens Signature Model Price: $6,000 Contact: www.knaggsguitars.com Everyone wants to build a better mousetrap, and those who build solidbody guitars are no different. Frequently, they strive to…

Seymour Duncan’s Whole Lotta Humbucker, 59/Custom Hybrid Pickups

Dream Babies

Seymour Duncan’s Whole Lotta Humbucker Price: $94 59/Custom Hybrid Pickups Price: $89 Info: www.seymourduncan.com. In lean times, who can afford to introduce anything but a winner? Wisely, Seymour Duncan has…

Xotic Bass BB Preamp V1.5

In Your Face

Sometimes, bassists need boost, too, like when that bass-solo interlude from Sade’s “Smooth Operator” comes along and it’s time to get busy. This updated version of Xotic’s Bass BB brings…

Chaos Audio Stratus Multi FX Pedal

Smart, Swift Stomp

Imagine a world where all of your pedals work together so seamlessly that you can quickly and easily experiment with new combinations with the swipe of a finger – and…

SIB Echodrive, Varidrive, Fatdrive

They Ain't "Heavy…"

Rick Hamel is one half of the design team behind the SMF 15 Watter amplifier we reviewed in the April ’03 issue. And given his track record, the company he…

Weller Guitars’ Stageliner

Jetson Moderne

More and more, guitar designers are digging deep, thinking out of the box, and using their imaginations to conjure hip, nontraditional designs. Strat, Tele, and Les Paul shapes are no…

H&D, Running Dog, and Gibson L-Style Guitars

Downsize, Upmarket

Huss & Dalton 00-SP Gibson Robert Johnson L-1 In the July issue we looked at affordable L-style flat-tops for the acoustic blues player. This month, we look at similarly inspired…