In December, 1968, Mike Bloomfield asked Johnny Winter to perform at the Fillmore East in New York at a Super Session jam with Al Kooper. That night, Winter played B.B. King’s “It’s My Own Fault” and blew away the audience. Reps from Columbia were in attendance, and Winter was signed to the biggest advance in …

In the mid 1960s, England’s Vox company was in the right place at the right time. Buoyed by frontline British Invasion endorsers such as the Beatles and American bands such as Paul Revere & the Raiders, the instrument/amplifier maker signed deals with almost every popular band. Even one-hit-wonders such as Music Machine (“Talk Talk”) brandished …

“My intention was to do more of a singer/songwriter thing,” Jimmy Leslie says of his new CD, Surfin’ the Swamp. “The rhythm section I’d lined up in San Francisco bailed at the last minute. So I called Stanton Moore and Robert Mercurio, from Galactic. We did a couple of songs and I realized it was …

Gibson was a late entry into the flat-top guitar market, offering its first model in 1926, but Gibson was a pioneer in developing a dreadnought-sized flat-top, as illustrated by this unusual round-shouldered guitar with a 1929 serial number. It was made during a period when Gibson’s flat-tops were evolving at a frantic pace as Gibson …

Park 75 Preamp tubes: three ECC83 (12AX7 equivalents) Output tubes: two KT88 Rectifier: solidstate Controls: Volume II, Volume I, Treble, Middle, Bass, Brightness Output: approximately 75 watts RMS We might not expect anyone to give much of a hoot for an amplifier with “Park” on its badge – a brand that has also graced budget-grade …

Xaviere is a company that imports its guitars from China, sets them up in its Massachusetts shop, then sells direct. The company’s XV-JT90 Offset Hybrid is a solidbody with a body shape reminiscent of a Jazzmaster, yet it has a bridge pickup more like you’d find on a Telecaster, making it more adaptable for everything …

Viewed from our contemporary perspective, it’s difficult to fully appreciate how different the music scene in general – and the guitar scene in particular – was back in the early part of the last century. When the electric guitar hit the ground as a viable entity in the mid 1930s, everything was up for grabs… …

ES-Les Paul Price: $2,799 to $3,199 (list) Contact: www.gibson.com Gibson’s latest version of the Les Paul isn’t the first with f-shaped sound holes. Various Florentine models have been offered, but this semi-hollowbody makes a greater effort than its predecessors to thread the needle between the Les Paul and ES-335. The result is an interesting guitar …

When the Kids In The Hall, an irreverent sketch comedy troupe from Toronto, got their own TV show in ’89, they chose “Having An Average Weekend,” an instrumental by a local trio, Shadowy Men On A Shadowy Planet, as its theme song. This provided massive exposure on a level that other “surf revival” bands didn’t …

Orange TH30 Combo Price:$1,379 (list) Info: www.orangeamps.com Beyond their eye-catching color, Orange amplifiers have always rendered a distinct sound. Today, the company offers an assortment of amps, and its TH30C combo offers something to guitarists who need upscale tones for small-/mid-sized venues. Rated at a variable 30 watts output pumped through a Celestion G12H30, the …

In an industry where success is measured in weeks or months rather than years, marking a 25th anniversary is no small feat. But Barry Poss, founder and head of Sugar Hill Records, is doing that. To celebrate the accomplishment, the label has released a four-CD box set with a DVD of performances from the archives. …

Ken Fischer’s prolonged illness and subsequent death at the age of 61 remains one of the great tragedies of the guitar-amp world. Aside from the fact he was a good soul taken too soon, if this rare and genuine tube-amp guru had enjoyed better health and greater longevity, he would most likely have blessed the …

One of the leaders of what we might call the second wave of high-end high-gain tube amps, Soldano has been making a big noise since 1987 – the year Michael J. Soldano released his first production model, the Super Lead Overdrive (SLO-100). The SLO’s ability to churn out searing lead tones with a certain sonic …

Spanish flamenco guitarist Paco de Lucia died February 26 after suffering a heart attack in Cancun, Mexico. He was 66. In the U.S., de Lucia was best known for his collaborations with jazz-rockers like John McLaughlin, Chick Corea, Larry Coryell, and Al Di Meola, with whom he recorded “Mediterranean Sundance” in 1977. This seminal recording …

One of the more successful Japanese-made guitar brands of the 1970s was Electra, the brand name used for electric guitars sold by St. Louis Music of St. Louis, Missouri.  If prices on eBay are any indicator, it’s clear that guitar aficionados have little appreciation about how good and innovative these guitars were. Let’s take this …

For Paul Quinn, music begins and ends with the blues. The soft-spoken guitarist began playing by listening to British blues icons and helped make Saxon one of Europe’s biggest heavy-metal acts. Quinn has been there since the band’s inception in 1976, and it recently released its 20th album, Sacrifice. “It was good to make it,” …

If Nashville is the pedal-steel capital, surely Southern California is a lap steel hotspot. David Lindley and Ben Harper, along with luthier Bill Asher, have taken what some consider an archaic design and put it fully into the public ear. Harper cut his steel teeth on the Weissenborn, and the Asher Ben Harper Model is …