•  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

    Read more >>

Eastwood EEB-1 and EUB-1

Horizontal Vibe

Eastwood’s EEB-1 and the EUB-1 Eastwood’s EEB-1 and the EUB-1 take their design inspiration from Ampeg’s quirky mid-’60s Horizontal Bass series, the brainchild of Dennis Kager, an amp technician and…

SX SST-57 Guitar and SJB-57 Bass

Redefining "Low-End" Gear

SX SST-57 guitar. Once upon a time, cheap guitars were just that – inferior imported planks bought as Christmas gifts then replaced as fast as one could afford. But with…

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…

Crazy Tube Circuit White Whale V2

Twin Tones

Introduced in 2017, Christos Ntaifotis’ original White Whale tremolo/reverb became one of his company’s best sellers. Its success, however, didn’t breed complacency, and after years of gathering user input, they…

Electro-Harmonix 45000 Multi-Track Recorder

Gettin’ Loopy!

Electro-Harmonix 45000 Multi-Track Recorder Price: $476.21 (street); $119.25 (foot controller) Info: www.ehx.com. Looping has a rich history, with roots tracing to modern classical composers like Phillip Glass, Steve Reich, and…

Eventide H9

Maximum Effect

Eventide H9 Price: $499 Info: www.eventide.com. Stompbox evolution is getting to the point where huge libraries of sound are coming out of single pedals. You might say, “Well, those are…

The Daddy Mojo Ozark

All But The Kitchen Sink

For a decade, Daddy Mojo has been making cigar-box guitars that refine the vibe of those rudimentary instruments. In 2016, the company debuted a line of traditional guitars under the…

Brown Guitar Factory Chambered Electric

Beast Mode

To use a slightly skewed metaphor, John Brown builds guitars to the beat of a different drummer. After all, who wants a custom builder without vision, churning out yet another…

Guild Bluesbird

Flyin’ High Again

The Guild Bluesbird has a long history that began in the 1950s with Guild’s answer to the Gibson Les Paul –the M-75 Aristocrat, later renamed the M-75 Bluesbird. The guitar…

Yamaha THR10

Practice Perfection?

Yamaha THR10 Price: $299 Contact: usa.yamaha.com As a rule of thumb, practice amps are a compromise. Blissfully portable, they typically lack tone and features. Yet whether in a bedroom or…

Legendary Tones Time Machine Boost

Built like a tank, but sings like a bird…

To call Legendary Tones’ Time Machine Boost “…a distortion pedal” would be to sell it extremely short. Designed for use with high-quality tube amps, the Time Machine’s purpose is to…

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 both auto-wah and envelope filter – and it also hides…

Seymour Duncan Shape Shifter

Tremolo Transformed

Tremolo is a simple effect: the amplitude, or volume, of an incoming signal is raised and lowered in pulsating waves. With the Seymour Duncan Shape Shifter, the player is invited…

Reverend Avenger

Tough, Bold, and Fun

Our first entry this month is a new line of instruments, Reverend Guitars, from veteran inventor Joe Naylor, a graduate of the Roberto-Venn School of Lutherie, and well-known maker of…

Collings OM1 T

Faultless Flat-Top?

To the hands, hearts, and minds of many an experienced guitarist, an OM-size body with a 25.5″ scale feels the perfect flat-top. Spend time with Collings’ OM1 T, and you’ll…

The Supro Hampton

Island Unto Itself

Supro’s vintage Ozark guitar is famed as Jimi Hendrix’s first axe. According to legend, his father bought him an off-white ’57 Model 1560S in 1959 from Seattle’s Myers Music for…

Ibanez Artcore AGS73FM and Vintage VSA500HB

Solid Semis

In the past several years, many import guitar brands have improved their build quality while continuing to offer their goods at very friendly prices. They’ve included a variety of semi-hollow…

Mu-FX TruTron 3X

ToneVille Amplifiers Broadway

Red-Carpet Ready

ToneVille Amplifiers Broadway Price: $2,295 Contact: www.tonevilleamps.com What is it that drives boutique amp builders to expend gallons of skull sweat striving for a more-perfect union between the pluck of…

McGregor Pedals’ Crunch and Crunch Plus

Transparent Pair

McGregor Pedals founder and self-proclaimed “Chief Mad Scientist” Garth McGregor Heslop hand-wires pedals in his Vancouver shop. Two of them – the Crunch and Crunch Plus – are overdrives that…

Maestro Comet Chorus and Discoverer Delay

Return to the Space(y) Age

Maestro’s Comet Chorus and Discoverer Delay, from the company’s Original Collection effects series, may have a retro-chic aesthetic, but they bring a pronounced (and welcome) modern twist. Both are analog…

Taylor Classic, Custom, and Standard

Worth the Wait

Taylor SolidBody Classic. For years, Bob Taylor fended off the question, “When are you going to build a solidbody guitar?” Well-known as a builder of top-notch acoustics, for his company,…

ValveTrain PowerTrain Studio 20

Tube Savior

We’ve all watched the guitar amp deconstruct before our eyes, as pedals, preamps, and power amps all shrink – and migrate to the pedalboard. The builders at ValveTrain know this,…

Blackstar Amped 2

Satisfying Sounds

Blackstar’s entry to the growing market of “all in one” compact amplifier/effects units claims to offer a high degree of usability built around famous tones – but don’t they all?…

EVH Wolfgang WG Standard

EVH Wolfgang WG Standard

Atomic Punk

EVH Wolfgang WG Standard Price: $799.99 (list); $599.99 (street) Contact: www.evhgear.com Decades after the release of the first Van Halen album, universal acceptance of Edward Van Halen as the last…

Dan’s Guitar RX: Reviving a ’56 Duo-Jet, Part Two

Ugly, But An Oldy

In the March issue, I introduced you to my apprentice, Blake Burkholder, and the restoration he was doing to a ’56 Duo-Jet. Blake, who operates Peach Ridge Guitars, in West…

Bergen Guitars ST and TL

Messing with Perfection

Bergen Guitars ST and TL Price: $2,195 (ST, base)/$2,595 (as tested); $1,895 (TL, base)/$2,295 (as tested) Info: www.bergenguitars.com. If your goal, as a solitary craftsman, is to improve upon two…

Teye Guitars Gypsy Queen

Teye Guitars Gypsy Queen

The Art of Tone

For Austin-based Teye Guitars, taking guitar construction to new artistic heights has been a basic tenet since their inception. Mastermind luthier Teye Wijnterp, an accomplished guitarist, forged his concept of…

Guyatone FR3000V Reverb, MT-3, WR3 and MD3

effects deliver, regardless of size

Guyatone FR3000V Reverb Reverb! King of guitar effects. If there’s an extracurricular sound guitarists most want, it’s reverb. Maybe because even if they’re playing the most low-down, dirty dive, they…

ZT Amplifiers Club and Lunchbox Acoustic

Big Things, Small Packages

In two short years of existence, ZT Amplifiers has found a unique place for itself in the world of boutique amplification. ZT engineering guru Ken Kantor’s flagship amp is called…

Wampler Effects Pedals

Filling the Gaps

Brian Wampler, who developed a reputation first for modding effects pedals, then for building originals including a custom overdrive for heavy-hitter country picker Brad Paisley, plays by the rules set…