Walrus Audio’s Mako Series MKII bolster the sounds of their first-gen predecessors, using altered algorithms, new controls, and better tonal quality. The most-obvious changes are new fine-tune settings and a menu screen. The M1 High-Fidelity Modulation Machine offers Chorus, Phaser, Tremolo, Vibrato, Rotary, and Filters. Running between a Deluxe Reverb a Les Paul Traditional or…

Seamless Sheen
Twelve years ago, Janglebox founder Steve Lasko set out to create effects pedals that capture the sparkling clean chime made famous by bands like The Beatles and The Byrds. Since…
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…

Bring The Fuzz
EarthQuaker Devices is one of the most admired pedal builders today, thanks to their original designs that feature tweakable controls which allow players to easily dial in their own unique…
LSL Instruments is best known for high-end Leo-style guitar builds, but they’ve also started delving into overdrive pedals. The Lucid OD is their version of a Klon Centaur – one of the priciest stompboxes in human history ($5,000-plus for the first-gen gold box with the horse logo). The box offers Volume, Gain, and Tone knobs…
With is Clean compressor, Chase Bliss set out to create a pedal that would duplicate the vivid interactivity of a dirty tube amp, but with a completely clean tone. While a standard compressor can give your guitar (bass, keyboard, etc.) a professional sheen, the Clean is a stereo unit that can polish mixes or deliver…
Wait – what? Did Eastwood just bring back the Super Axe, that incredibly rare bird from the late ’70s? Indeed, they did. A Korean-made reissue, it captures the spirit of Gretsch’s chambered curiosity. Grabbing one, the first thing you’ll notice is the oversized yet thin body, with its arched top and the enchanting lines of…

Impressive Amenities
More and more, guitarists’ passion for tube amps is being balanced by the rise of quality digital, solidstate, and modeling amps, and for good reason – they’re often inexpensive while…

Boom Box
Martin’s new Modern Deluxe line offers a tantalizing idea – a traditional-looking/playing premium acoustic, but with high-tech innovations under the hood. Being a revised take on an iconic dreadnought, it…

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 handful of luthiers have dedicated their work to building instruments…

Power Station
Are you tripping over a spiderweb of effects power cords? Have a pedalboard that requires an advanced degree in electrical engineering to operate? Or are you just confounded by your…
B-Bender, Stealth, and Mania
This month’s guest reviewer is so good I asked him to stick around for two sessions so we could savor his down home humor and nasty guitar playing for twice…

Paint It Sunburst
Legend has it that during a break in the filming of Help!, George Harrison picked up a sitar left behind by the prop men and attempted to play it. Soon…
So often has the phrase “Mark Sampson era” been applied to pre-2000 Matchless amps or early examples of the Bad Cat line that the term has become a “thing” in and of itself. As applied to Bad Cat’s new Era 30, it means Sampson is back in the fold (see our interview in the March…
Now more than 90 years old, the lap steel was the earliest example of an electric guitar and remains a stringed instrument every guitarist should try, largely because it’s so accessible. In fact, a lap steel is about as straightforward as you can get – it’s a plank that sits on your lap and is…
If the iconic Soldano SLO-100 is perpetually on your wish list but its price tag keeps you from pulling the trigger, its creator now has a realistic alternative. Expanding on the original single-channel SLO Overdrive pedal, the SLO Plus introduces a Normal channel alongside Overdrive, each with dedicated controls that allow for detailed tweaking of…
For 2025, Orange has expanded on its compact Pedal Baby introduced a few years back with a new trio – the Dual Baby, Gain Baby, and Tour Baby. All 100-watt amps with solid-state Class A/B output stages, Jfet preamp stages (another form of solid-state), and two footswitchable channels, they’re housed in 12″ x 3.25″ x…
Based on the famed Roland SDE-3000 rack unit, Boss’ SDE-3 combines some classic delay sounds of the 1980s, updated with a bevy of modern tricks and features. Like a lot of delays, it can be run in mono, but you’ll get the biggest bang going in stereo to different amps or outputs. The core of…
The evolution of Randall Smith’s legendary high-gain Mesa/Boogie design into the revered Mark IIC+ of the mid ’80s established a rock amp that many guitarists still consider the epitome of the form. Building on what was already a high-gain amp by the standards of the day, the M/B team piled on even more gain, more…

Get Up, Stand Up
When it comes to famous Bobs in rock, Dylan is first to mind. But just behind him is another songwriting behemoth – Marley. As it turns out, the Jamaican icon…

Upscale Touch
In the late ’70s, rock guitarists fell down the rabbit hole trying to achieve more sustain, harmonics, and extra crunch via pickup swaps. Seymour Duncan has created a new PAF…

Tonewood Tales
When hunting for a new acoustic, it’s useful to learn about tonewoods and construction, as both play a huge role in how an instrument sounds. With Taylor’s Grand Symphony body…

Tone To Carry-On
Tech 21 Fly Rig 5 Price: $249 (list) Contact: www.tech21nyc.com Long before the Line6 POD, the Box of Rock, or the iRig, there was the SansAmp from Tech 21 –…

Wavy Gravy
Everyone loves modulation and filter pedals – those swishy, soupy sound makers that doll up a guitar’s signal. Maestro is now offering a new trio with the Agena Envelope Filter,…

One For The Masses
Taylor 814ce Price: $129.95 (list) Info: www.b-blender.com Why aren’t we guitarists ever happy to have our guitars sound like guitars? We wanted to emulate a trumpet’s blare, so we invented…

Sound Cube
One old cliché among gigging musicians is, “They pay me for the aggravation, the music is free.” A good deal of that aggravation comes from lugging gear. If you play…

Hang Ten
The Surfliner is Guild’s first new solidbody to come along in decades. A thoroughly modern design with classic features, there’s no mistaking the influence in this offset guitar. Named after…

Big-Sky Steel
Self-taught guitar builder Sean Kochel has always been a compulsive tinkerer, even as a child. Years ago, he and his father side-hustled by dismantling homesteader farmhouses, barns, commercial buildings, schools,…

Royal Rock
The Peavey ValveKing II Micro-head 20-Watt Amplifier Price: $429.99 Contact: www.peavey.com Famous for their sturdy build and quality overdriven sounds, Peavey’s original ValveKing amplifiers were marketed to musicians who required…

Too Cool For School
Face it. They may look oh-so-cool, but rarely do you really, truly need that full amp stack. Most gigs for mere mortals these days are in smaller venues where smaller…

In the ’60s, Gibson strived mightily to meet the demands of players of all levels while also working to maintain its image as industry leader. One of its primary attempts…

Three In One
Players who love a hotrod Lincoln, a good drive-in, or a rocking retro guitar are familiar with Reverend Guitars, a brand that builds instruments that all but ooze vintage style…
Tone, With a Big T
Bacino Bac 18 Mike Bacino makes no bones about his mission in recreating the Marshall 18-watt model 1958 2×10″ combo from the mid 1960s. The original amps are rare and…

100-Proof Tone
While many pedal makers tinker away on effects that exhibit their personal tonal philosophies, the fact is that most don’t play gigs or compose music. Seraphim Marcopoulous of ToneConcepts was…

OM, Gee!
McElroy OM Model Price: $7,500 (base; $8,500 as reviewed) Info: www.mcelroyguitars.com. Brent McElroy is a Seattle luthier specializing in high-quality acoustics. One of them, the OM Model from his Generation…
Steve and G.E.'s Excellent Adventure
One of the standouts at this year’s NAMM Show in California was the new retro series of amplifiers from Bedrock. Derived from an uncommon formula (in other words, not just…

Bring The Fuzz
EarthQuaker Devices is one of the most admired pedal builders today, thanks to their original designs that feature tweakable controls which allow players to easily dial in their own unique…
Stand out in a crowd
For over 15 years, artist and designer Jodi Head has been producing high-quality hand- beaded products, including guitar straps, and her client list reads like the guest list to the…
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…

Rock Machine
Mike Soldano is the man behind amp tones that influenced a generation of guitarists, his hot-rodded ideas having been used on countless albums by artists from Warren Haynes and George…