An aptly titled collection of songs, if any guitarist was indeed hunting guitar sounds and styles, finding something like this would indeed make for a successful safari.
Composed, played, and recorded by VG contributor Pete Prown, the disc is full of chops. “Attack of the Mysterons” starts with middle-eastern guitar sounds, morphs into a batch of intertwined guitars, and finally has pinched-out notes that would make Billy Gibbons smile. If you want to hear blazing right hand, start here.
Guitar Safari is a mutant form of ’60s surf; you get tons of reverb-drenched guitar, along with hints of metal and pop, plenty of jazz, progressive rock, funk, and all that lies within those genres. If all that weren’t enough, Prown serves up a country burner called “Haybale,” with lots of twangin’. But then he takes a left turn.
While the beat stays country, there’s some very aggressive rock soloing and then some playing that can only be described as shredding. Before it’s all done we also get some steel guitar from Jim Otis. It’s that kind of hybrid mutant tune that makes up all 11 cuts on the album. Within the tunes themselves there’s always a surprise waiting. And those surprises usually involve some impressive guitar work from Prown. His playing, along with the imagination used in the compositions of the songs, keep things interesting through the entire CD.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s Dec. ’09 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
Israel-based Arteffect’s new Bonnie wah pedal is an accurate re-creation of the highly soughtafter vintage Vox Clyde McCoy wah.
The “Clyde wah,” you’ll recall, was designed to help guitar players sound something like a trumpet player manipulating a mute on their horn. Clyde McCoy, the man, was a player known for employing the technique, and thus was recruited as an endorser by Vox for the wah pedal when it was introduced in 1967.
Tom Kochawi and Dan Orr started Arteffect in 2006 and build the Bonnie and their Orangen Tone Boost-Germanium Booster themselves.
From the outside, the Bonnie looks like most wah pedals; it has a die-cast black-powdercoated base and brushed chrome rocker pedal with a rubber foot pad. A peak inside reveals a neatly wired circuit with a chassis-mounted Switchcraft 1/4″ jack, true-bypass footswitch, ICAR taper potentiometer, and FASEL-inspired Halo Replica inductor. Missing are a 9-volt power adaptor jack and LED status indicator – but then, the original Clyde McCoy’s didn’t have them either.
Using a Fender Deluxe Players Stratocaster with a trio of Fender Vintage noiseless pickups plugged into a 65Amps SoHo, the Bonnie offered up a well-voiced wah tone with a throaty, very musical midrange boost and no high-frequency spikes. The “Q” of the filter is smooth and linear until the very top, where it gives a nice, snappy boost to the high mids.
The Bonnie does a remarkable job of mimicking a trumpet mute with its smooth, round tone. It adds very little noise to the gain structure, even with the amp pushed to overdrive. – Phil Feser
This article originally appeared in VG‘s May 2008 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
In his introduction to “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” Shimabukuro explains how a video of him playing the George Harrison classic in Central Park, for New York’s Midnight Ukulele Disco, “changed my life.” That’s an understatement. With more than a million views on youtube and other internet sites, it catapulted him to the top of Billboard‘s World Music chart and to stages playing with Bela Fleck, Jimmy Buffett, and Tommy Emmanuel.
It also changed the way people viewed the ukulele, proving that the lowly four-string was capable of more than “Tiptoe Through The Tulips.” Much more.
From the single-note lines of “Trapped,” which opens this CD, to the complex, powerful rhythms achieved on “Gently Weeps,” Shimabukuro sounds less like he’s playing a ukulele and more like he’s playing a guitar – that is, if the guitar were played by, say, Michael Hedges.
Compiled from many solo performances here and overseas, the set bounces from jazz (Chick Corea’s “Spain”) to classical (Bach’s Two-Part Invention No. 4 In D Minor) to folk (the traditional Japanese koto tune “Sakura Sakura”) to pop (a very interesting version of the Michael Jackson hit “Thriller”) without ever once sounding gimmicky. And his originals – like the catchy melody and impressive percussion break on “Me & Shirley T.” – don’t take a backseat. In fact, his “Let’s Dance,” with its pyrotechnic prelude, and “Wes On Four” (assumedly a nod to Mr. Montgomery) hold their own alongside the more familiar covers.
Except for “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” of course. That’s one even Jake will have a hard time topping any time soon.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s Jul. ’09 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
The year is 1979. The disco era is nearing its end and the “Me Generation” is approaching like a freight train. With the impending new decade full of fresh ideas in fashion, music, and everything possible a furniture engineer housed in a New York wood co-op finds his destiny. The man was Ned Steinberger, who through his early design work for luthier Stuart Spector, found himself designing innovative concepts in musical instruments.
Steinberger premiered the now-classic L2 bass at NAMM and at Frankfurt’s MusikMesse that same year, and fired up his company, Steinberger Sound, in 1980, making several bass and guitar models, all with new concepts like the TransTrem, which could transpose the pitch of individual strings.
In 1992, Ned sold Steinberger to Gibson. But he kept a close eye on his and other design evolutions. And he has continued to be involved with new product including the current Synapse line, which includes the ZT3 Custom electric guitar.
The ZT3 Custom uses a more conventional offset body shape. Its three-ply body binding, translucent finish over flamed maple, joined with the classic Steinberger headless neck, screams that this is something new for the guitar world. Unlike early all-graphite Steinbergers, the ZT3 Custom has a bolt-on 251/2″-scale three-piece Rock maple neck integrated with a CybroSonic graphite U-channel with adjustable truss rod and a phenolic fingerboard. The end result is all the stability of the early graphite models with the added warmth of a wood neck. The neck has a slightly more rounded profile, similar to a late-’50s era Gibson. The high-gloss-finished neck feels quite comfortable and the phenolic fingerboard’s sonic properties are reminiscent of an ebony fingerboard in terms of tone and feel.
From a player’s point of view, the electronics of the ZT3 Custom are considerably more versatile. It does not have active EMG pickups like so many early versions. Instead it uses U.S.-built, Gibson designed US90R and US91T in the rhythm and treble positions respectively. This upgrade alone helps warm the tone considerably from earlier models. Switching to the passive pickups also paved the way for the ZT3s sonic flexibility with the addition of push/pull series/parallel knobs for both the neck and bridge pickups.
Even though the pickups are not coil-tapped, they can mimic a single-coil tone quite well. With both in series, the ZT3 had enormous drive through a Mesa-Boogie Dual Rectifier and 4×12 cab. The pickups had plenty of output for even the heaviest distortion, yet kept great definition. Through the EL84-driven US Masters TVA30 it yielded an exceptional blues overdrive, and switching to parallel gave a nice Gilmour-esque tone, a la “Comfortably Numb.”
The ZT3’s clean tone has a nice, full-bodied warmth regardless of which pickup is selected. Using the neck pickup in series, with the Tone rolled off produced a very useable jazz tone. The bridge pickup in parallel worked exceptionally well for country-style chicken pickin’ as well as a fairly decent surf tone. Most impressive was the sound of both pickups run clean in parallel through a Fender Deluxe. This setup was great for a number of genres on a session, especially for funk rhythm parts. Apparent throughout was a nice articulation and attack, whether distorted or clean.
The ZT3 Custom’s secret weapon is the third-generation TransTrem. As a stand-alone guitar, the ZT3 is quite capable of hanging with a number of high-end instruments on the market. The TransTrem allows a player to individually bend each string so pitch changes are even across all six. This allows for bending of entire chords with no pitch issues. Once perfected, this allows for faux steel guitar lines that sound fairly convincing.
The biggest improvement on the TransTrem is five incremental settings you can lock into with the whammy bar. They de-tune or up-tune the guitar in half-step increments from F# to D, eliminating the need for a capo. You can bend up to key with a half-step in between. Even though it took a little time to get accustomed to the positions, the ZT3 stays in tune in each. One drawback is that you lose the ability of the vibrato, as each locked position then essentially turns the guitar into a stop-tail.
In drop D through the Mesa, the ZT3 had loads of heavy grind. In the same position, the ZT3 had a quasi-baritone sound through the EL84 amp. Bending up to F# and playing up the neck allowed for a mandolin-esque vibe on a country session, as well. The tester’s TransTrem was sadly slightly clunky going into the different positions, but Steinberger says this has been remedied in production models.
The ZT3 Custom is another truly great achievement from the mind of Ned Steinberger. Ned’s commitment to putting the player’s needs first while retaining form and function is well-preserved in this guitar. Its appearance may be unconventional, but the ZT3 Custom leaps forward from the days of Wayfarer sunglasses, Don Johnson jackets, and way too much Aqua-Net.
Steinberger ZT3 Custom Price $2,665 Contact Steinberger c/o Gibson Musical Instruments, 645 Massman Drive, Nashville, TN 37210; phone 800-4GIBSON; www.steinberger.com.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s November 2008 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited. The Steinberger ZT-3 Custom
Seth Walker’s latest effort takes a slightly different path, mixing blues with soul and a group-driven R&B feel.
Old-school horn charts dominate “Can’t Come With You,” where Walker’s vocals take on the soul/bluesman persona. His soulful slide guitar here is as sublime as it is different from the fingerpicked acoustic of his last effort. The tones on most solos here are very well done – thick and creamy – and transport the listener a few decades back in time.
Most cuts sound primitive (in a good way!) and the songs cover a range from the swinging shuffle of the title track to the acoustic soul/gospel of “Lay Down (River of Faith).” The very fun “I Don’t Dance” is plain ol’ boogie-woogie with tasty playing and singing. “Something Fast” is a smooth R&B that lets the listener know how imaginative a guitarist Walker is. While a lot of this music would make it easy for players to fall into clichés, he never does. “Memory Pain” is a funky, horn-driven blues with slinky guitar fills that drive the song throughout. The dirty, percussive solo is the perfect fit for the song.
Walker’s vocals are a pleasant surprise. He makes an honest effort to sound like a soul singer. It’s the kind of performance that helps you appreciate what an all-around talent he is and what he has to offer.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s May. ’09 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
Moore with his signature model Gibson Les Paul. Photo: Rob Verhorst/Redferns Music Picture Library.
Irish guitarist Gary Moore is a man in perpetual motion, onstage and in the studio. A veteran blues/rocker who spent time in the legendary Thin Lizzy, Moore, who has amassed a number of renowned albums in his solo career, recently spoke with Vintage Guitar while he was on tour with B.B. King. The topic at hand was his two recent releases with very different material.
One is a DVD of a tribute concert for late Thin Lizzy bassist/vocalist Phil Lynott, recorded with other former Thin Lizzy guitarists and drummer Brian Downey. The other new release is an album that mixes several styles, Old New Ballads Blues.
One Night in Dublin: A Tribute to Phil Lynott was recorded on August 20, 2005, commemorating what would have been Lynott’s 56th birthday. A statue of the late bassist was unveiled in Dublin earlier that day.
“There had been talk about putting up a statue in Dublin for some time,” Moore told VG. “And Brian and I had been talking about doing something around that event. He told me there was no gig planned, but then I got a letter from my agent about a concert being worked up, asking if I’d be interested in headlining. I said I would, but then I thought about it, and said ‘I’m not just gonna bring my band. That doesn’t make sense.
So when I spoke to Brian again, we decided to ask Brian Robertson, and once I’d asked Brian, I figured I’d better ask Scott Gorham, and then I asked (original guitarist) Eric Bell, because he’s an old friend of mine. I chose the guys I considered to have been the main players with the band. We only had about an hour-and-ten-minute set to do, so I really couldn’t go any further into it.”
Jethro Tull bassist Jonathan Noyce completed the rhythm section.
I started the evening as a three-piece, and then we had them come on one at a time. I started the show with one of my songs, ‘Walking By Myself,’ then we got into the Thin Lizzy material. I didn’t want to come out and launch straight into something like ‘Jailbreak.’ I had to learn Phil’s vocal parts, and I’d never sung some of those songs onstage, so I first wanted to find my feet.”
Classic Lizzy tunes and riffs delighted the sold-out venue, and Moore closed the show with “Parisienne Walkways,” a song that has become a concert staple of his solo career.
Moore uses two Gibson Les Pauls on the DVD. One is his signature model, while the other has a quilted maple top in a charcoal finish.
“I found that one at a Gibson artists’ show in London,” Moore said of the latter axe. “I thought it looked very pretty. It’d been made for the guitarist with the Corrs, but he didn’t like it because it wasn’t light enough. So I said, ‘Well, I’m gonna take it home with me!’ It’s more of a rock guitar; I wouldn’t play blues on that one.”
The new CD also features Noyce on bass, as well drummer Darrin Mooney, who’s been with him for about seven years. Keyboard player Don Airey, who was on Moore’s Still Got The Blues, fills out the lineup. The Midnight Horns (Nick Payn, Nick Pentelow, Frank Mead, and Sid Gould) appear on two tracks.
Old New Ballads Blues lives up to its title as a genre-hopping effort, and Moore utilized several guitars on it, including his signature Les Paul, a ’59 Les Paul, and a Telecaster, which he admitted “…is very unusual for me.”
The proceedings start with Moore playing slide and leaning on his wah pedal to introduce “Done Somebody Wrong.”
“I do that sometimes,” he noted. “It gives the song a real edge.”
Unique and melodic solo guitar abound, as on “Gonna Rain Today” and “Flesh and Blood.”
The former employs a clean guitar sound on a Moore signature Les Paul. “It’s turned down – very, very quiet, through a Marshall that was set very clean. I made of point of playing softly, so it’s kind of an old soul thing to it – an intimate Memphis vibe. On ‘Flesh and Blood,’ I was trying to create a music-box sound… a Christmas Eve bell-like sound. I used three guitars layered on top of each other, with a rotating speaker sound on a Line 6 POD, so you’re hearing sort of a shimmering fast-Leslie (speaker) sound. I played harmonies that cascade down a bit.”
One of the notable Telecaster songs is “No Reason to Cry,” where Moore makes effective use of the guitar’s volume control.
“Last year, I rediscovered Roy Buchanan,” he explained. “I hadn’t listened to him in a long time, and I’d forgotten how much I loved his playing. So you definitely hear that kind of influence (on that song).”
Two tracks that originally appeared on Still Got the Blues have been re-recorded.
“To tell you the truth, I wasn’t happy with the version of ‘Midnight Blues’ we’d done originally,” said Moore. “We’d kind of ended up using the demo on the album; I always thought it sounded kind of thin. I wanted to give it some more depth this time, so I put the horns on there to give it a bit more flavor. I think it sounds better now. ‘All Your Love’ has always been a very important song that I heard Eric Clapton play in the ’60s with John Mayall on the Bluesbreakers album. And I wanted another shot at getting it right, so this version is more faithful.”
Obviously, Moore was delighted with his tour slot with B.B. King (“He’s 80 years old, and he’s incredible!”), but he’s also upbeat about the two new releases, which should make for interesting viewing and listening for fans of both Lizzy and Moore.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s September 2006 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
Like his longtime associate (as both producer and producee) Elvis Costello, Nick Lowe may have come onto the scene via punk rock, but soon proved he was much more. In hindsight, Costello’s initial punk stance seems more sincere and ardent, as illustrated by their contrasting versions of Lowe’s anthemic “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding.” Even in its original 1974 rendition by pub rockers Brinsley Schwarz, Lowe seems reflective while Costello is in your face.
And while Costello proved his versatility and eclecticism by releasing a country record, a soul album, a lounge set, and a classical CD, Lowe’s many sides revealed themselves more organically, homages to his influences subtly seeping into his body of work.
That body of work is re-examined in this two-CD, one-DVD set, spanning 33 years, and to say it’s impressive would be a gross understatement.
Actually, the collection focuses on only one side of Lowe’s body of work, his songwriting. In the liner notes, producer Greg Geller explains that this represents (and admittedly subjectively) only Lowe’s originals, while bemoaning the absence of some of Nick’s choice covers, like Dallas Frazier and Doddle Owens’ “True Love Travels On A Gravel Road.” (A second collection, Yep Roc. Please.)
But it’s hard to argue with the 49 choices here – from “Without Love,” a country shuffle worthy of (and covered by) Johnny Cash to the Cajun drone of “Wishing Well”; from his catchy 1979 hit “Cruel To Be Kind” to the Doug Sahm Tex-Mex of “Half A Boy And Half A Man” and the rockabilly rave “I Knew The Bride (When She Used To Rock And Roll),” featuring Huey Lewis & The News.
Group efforts here include the opening Brinsley track and two cuts from Rockpile’s lone album. And after lending his “one-note” bass style to John Hiatt’s 1987 breakthrough Bring The Family album, Lowe became one-fourth of the same quartet (with Hiatt, drummer Jim Keltner, and slide master Ry Cooder) as Little Village.
A plethora of guitar greats pepper the overview. In addition to Cooder and Brinsley’s Martin Belmont, Rockpile’s Dave Edmunds shows up repeatedly (sometimes as producer), as does the quartet’s Billy Bremner (on “Without Love”). On more recent work, Steve Donnelly is featured, and the King Of Dieselbilly, Bill Kirchen, shines on 1994’s The Impossible Bird.
The deluxe version of this package includes a DVD featuring nine song videos and 17 tunes from a 2007 concert in Belgium. Not essential, but they help complete the portrait of this formidable artist.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s Jun. ’09 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
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, Taylor Guitars, the step seemed logical and maybe even a little overdue. And when Taylor released the semi-acoustic T5 three years ago, it was greeted by many as a tantalizing hint. But again, “When?”
“When we have something to offer…” was Bob’s oft-repeated reply.
Then, as part of the general process of exploration and experimentation that goes on at the company, longtime employee David Hosler devised a new pickup. Instead of dropping it in yet another Strat or Les Paul clone, Hosler and Bob Taylor agreed the new pickup demanded a new guitar.
What they came up with is the SolidBody series with variations dubbed Classic, Custom, and Standard. All are flat-front/single-cutaway guitars with two pickups, a standard Taylor C-shaped neck (the same used on their acoustics), a 247/8″ scale, and a nut that measures 111/16″ wide.
The Classic’s neck is maple with a rosewood fingerboard, while the Custom and Standard sport necks of sapele with ebony fretboards. All use Taylor’s sealed tuners, and the very flat 15″ radius fretboard has 22 medium frets. The neck is attached with Taylor’s proprietary T-Lock system, where an Allen bolt goes through the body and pulls the neck into a pocket shaped like a W. The light-gauge (0.10-0.46″) Elixir strings end at the aluminum bridge, which is, like the pickups, a new design. There are only two control knobs – one for volume, the other for tone – and the five-way selector switch manipulates an interesting pickup-wiring configuration.
While the Classic is solid swamp ash, the Custom and the Standard are chambered. The Custom has a sapele or blackwood body with either walnut or koa top, while the Standard has a sapele body with a tamo ash top. The Custom and the Standard are edged with ivoroid binding.
The Classic and the Custom are both loaded with the new Style 1 pickups, while the Standard has traditional-style humbuckers. While Hosler is keeping tight-lipped about the exact construction of the Style 1, he did divulge that the wire is coiled around three magnets and two blades. Moving the five-way from the neck toward the bridge selects the coils in the following order: position one, both coils of the neck pickup; position two, the inside coils of the neck and bridge pickup in parallel: position three, both coils of the neck pickup plus the inside coil of the bridge pickup; position four, the inside coils of each pickup series; position five, both coils of the bridge pickup.
Taylor SolidBody Custom.
The bridge common to all three is cast aluminum with an art deco appearance designed to remain free of sharp edges. Individual bridge saddles are adjustable and can be locked down through a plate in the back of the guitar. That means the strings can be replaced without having the saddles move at all.
The T-Lock neck system is so tight that, viewed from any angle but the back, the neck appears to be glued in. This system eliminates the need for a neck heel, which greatly improves feel, as well as access to the upper frets.
The basic shape of the Taylor solidbodies is captivating, and they are also extremely comfortable to hold and play. The neck has a “three bears” quality – it’s not too thick, not too thin… this one is just right. The fret ends are perfect and the action suspiciously low for a neck with almost no relief. The bevels on both sides of the cutaway encourage exploration of tones in the upper register, and the contour at the top of the back will come as a relief during long practice and recording sessions while seated.
Sonically, the five-way blade switch in position one on the Classic (least expensive of the group) offers a warm, jazzy tone with just a little more treble edge than a traditional humbucker. Dialing up a mild overdrive from a tube amp, the neck pickup gives off a deep, throaty growl with a hint of that magic steel-on-glass tone of a great Stratocaster-type pickup. In position two, the Classic solves that age-old problem of adjusting for too much low-end when you go from lead to rhythm. Its open, airy sound is still distinctly electric, but won’t muddy up the mix.
The central position adds midrange and lower-mids, offering a deeper, more forceful rhythm sound that is still unobtrusive. Skipping to position five (both coils in the bridge pickup) dishes out a tone very reminiscent of a Telecaster, though not quite as bright or with the same edge.
Backing up a notch to position four takes the tone of the bridge-only spot on the blade and boosts it with lower-mids and adds just a hint of cluck; in other words, a great lead tone.
With the switch in position one, the Custom introduces a number of pleasing acoustic-type overtones. However, when pushed hard, it still gives up a beautiful growl. In position two, it has a warm, almost muted jazz tone. Surprisingly, the cluck of the Classic is totally absent!
In position three, lower-mids are reintroduced; this position works excellently for leads or as a standard-sounding humbucker rhythm. Skipping again to position five, the Custom gives off a Telecaster tone like the Classic, but unlike the Classic, the treble from the Custom is a little sharper and more defined. Position four beefs up the position five tone with added low-mids and a much more aggressive attack.
Taylor SolidBody Standard.
Taylor says the optional koa top on the Custom is simply a cosmetic choice, but with it the guitar has a slightly brighter and cleaner tone. Particularly in position two, it makes a bit more of the cluck found in the Classic. In position five, it has more jangle, with a brighter (but still very smooth) high-end response. In position four, it offers just slightly less midrange and low-mid frequencies.
The Standard has the traditional-sized humbuckers and produces more overall output than the Classic or Custom. The neck pickup alone (position one) offers some of the prettiest tones of any humbucker. Think Gary Moore, but with a little more air and treble definition.
Low-end and lower-mids are reduced considerably in position two, just like with the Classic and the Custom, but the tone is fuller with much more upper-mid tones than the other two instruments. Hitting position three gets a very full humbucker tone with a bit of acoustic zing on the top.
Position five on the Standard offers a bright humbucker sound with a little jangle and no nasal congestion. Pushed, the pickup can have a very hard but useful edge, which is not a bad thing when playing harder rock and even (dare it be said?) metal. Come back a notch and the clear, strong treble of the bridge pickup remains but the lower mids come in to give it a deeper attack.
If your single-coil guitar is just a little too bright or thin-sounding, or if your humbuckers don’t offer the definition and treble you’d like, Taylor SolidBody guitars might be the answer for you. Or maybe you just don’t want to yet another guitarist with a Strat or Les Paul. In that case, Taylor might be able help you adjust your image while providing with a new palette of tones.
Taylor Solidbody guitars Price $1,748 to $3,798 Contact Taylor Guitars, 1980 Gillespie Way, El Cajon, CA 92020; (619) 258-6957; taylorguitars.com.
David Hosler, Brian Swerdfeger, Bob Taylor.
Hey, Bob! Why a Solidbody?
Taylor Guitars’ new SolidBody line of guitars drew much attention at last January’s NAMM show, so it seemed a good idea to ask company President Bob Taylor why, after years of fielding requests, they decided 2008 would be the year. Joining Taylor for our talk were David Hosler, from Taylor product development, and Vice President of Marketing Brian Swerdfeger:
Bob, what finally persuaded you to take the plunge and build a solidbody guitar? Bob Taylor: Because our ideas came… well, now. You can only work on so much at a time. First of all, we didn’t have the right pickups before. This guitar was completely built on these pickups that we all loved the sound of. They were originally on what would be the next prototype for the T5. We heard the pickups David came up with and liked them, but didn’t think they should be on a T5 or on a future T6. They sounded like they should go in a solidbody. The pickup was the catalyst in that we knew it had to be in a solidbody guitar.
When we decided it was going to be a solidbody, the question was, “Fender- or Gibson-type?” The answer was it couldn’t be either because they both exist, so it had to be our own design and innovation. Then, when we were deciding whose bridge to put on it – Gotoh or Kahler or someone else’s – we said, “Let’s make our own.” We came up with the same answer for everything else – knobs, neck, everything.
These are the things we instantly think of when we decide we’re going to make something, so we really didn’t have to discuss it. The point is, we made a pickup, we loved the way it sounded, so we had to put in the hard work of designing a guitar around it.
David, you were instrumental in designing the Style 1 pickup. David Hosler: Well, nothing happens on its own. The T5 had become instrumental in our evolution, and the S was going back even farther, and then the NT neck joint. Each thing has bred something else in the way we move forward with design.
Being a player most of my life, like Brian and Bob and others here, you always know the challenges we’ve had as electric guitar players and the things we want to hear. Most people eventually lock in on a signal path they like and they never sell key pieces of gear and they always want one style of pickup. We all recognize the struggles you have to go through to find those things, so the idea was, can we design something and come up with something with which you don’t have to work so darn hard to get the sound you want at the output levels you want. As Brian says, to get the vintage tones with the modern output. That’s a legitimate challenge in a magnetic design. That’s one of the things we were trying to overcome.
Once you came up with the basic pickup, did it take long to complete? David: Not really. We had been fussing with ideas related to transformer design and being able to control magnetic coupling and flux. We were messing with things just to see where they led, and they led to a different approach to pickup design. But it was just a couple months. We don’t work continuously on one idea.
Brian Swerdfeger: People want to romanticize the development of an idea; our industry loves the thought of some guy spending nights agonizing over things and experimenting to the point of discovering something. But invention and innovation are part of our culture. Bob has bred that into everything we do. So there’s continuous innovation and exploration. David said [the idea for the pickup] kind of came quickly, it’s true, but it’s because of this culture. It’s not, “I sat down and calculated the new design.” We’re not that smart (laughs)! Although our development doesn’t involve one guy slaving to make his own magnets, for example, if you come here it looks like Sid’s room from the movie Toy Story; there are the equivalents of spider bodies with doll heads on them – acoustic guitars with Bigsbys, things that don’t exist in nature. There might be something that was part of an experiment that maybe proved something completely different.
How has the public reaction been to the solidbodies in comparison to your acoustic guitars? Bob: We’re still primarily an acoustic guitar company, but we’ve shipped over 3,000 solidbodies in just a couple of months, and we’re producing 50 a day. For us, that’s a lot of brand new guitars on the market. At the NAMM show, these guitars invited a whole new group of people into the booth – people who always dug what we were doing but weren’t acoustic players. –
This article originally appeared in VG‘s July 2008 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited. SolidBody: Impressions by Marc Seal
Filmed in Chicago in 1981, this video captures Muddy with a band featuring Mojo Buford on harp, guitarists John Primer and Rick Kreher, pianist Lovie Lee, bassist Earnest Johnson, and drummer Ray Allison. And while it isn’t the finest Muddy video, is anything with Muddy really bad?
The band treats a loving crowd to a set of the classics, opening with “Mannish Boy” – which you’d think he’d save for an encore, but instead makes a bold opening statement. Muddy’s in fine voice and plays the crowd beautifully, doing a dance in the middle. He straps on his Tele for a couple of cuts, including an incendiary version of “They Call Me Muddy Waters” which features a nasty Muddy solo that splits the song wide open. Primer has the unfortunate task of following that solo, but proves up to it. Johnny Winter pops onstage for the final third of the concert, and despite some technical difficulties he fits in perfectly even if his blustery solo on “Going Down Slow” is a bit out of place. Later, Mighty Joe Young and Big Twist pay tribute to Muddy before the set ends with a stomping rendition of “Got My Mojo Working.”
Again, it’s not a perfect DVD. There are some sound problems and a brief bit of discoloration on the video during one of the songs, and at times the band seems uninspired. Nonetheless, this is an enjoyable work of art.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s Jul. ’09 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
Texas-based Amalfitano Pickups specializes in hand-wound pickups as well as pickup rewinding and restoration. Owner Jerry Amalfitano uses high-grade Alnico magnets, 42-gauge vintage enameled magnetic wire, vintage-style cloth-covered leads, and he lightly pots his pickups to control microphonics.
His line of pickups has a decided vintage bent and includes three single-coil replacement sets for your offset-double-cutaway guitar; the SP High-Output, with Alnico V magnets, the VS 1950s with Alnico III, and the ’62 Vintage with large-diameter (.194″) Alnico III. All three are available with beveled polepieces, reverse-wound middle pickup, and even in left-handed configuration. If you’re more into classic single-cut tones, Amalfitano’s TP has Alnico V magnets in both the neck and bridge, for a more balanced output, a reverse-wound/reverse-polarity neck pickup for hum-canceling in the middle position, and a copper-clad baseplate on the bridge pickup for a punchier, smoother traditional sound.
Under the category “humbucker,” Amalfitano offers the Fullbucker and Vintage sets, which are wound with Alnico II, Alnico V, and ceramic magnets (depending on customer preference) along with nickel/steel baseplates, overwound bobbins, maple spacer blocks and single-conductor leads (four-conductor is an option). Other options include chrome and nickel distressed covers, as well as bobbins in black, cream, and zebra if you prefer to fly without covers.
Last but not least, the P90 Soapbar set uses a choice of Alnico II or the warmer-sounding Alnico V magnets and have a reverse-wound/reverse-polarity neck pickup for humbucking in the middle position.
We installed a ’62 Vintage set in a late-model Fender Stratocaster and a Vintage humbucker set with chrome covers in a late-’90s Gibson Les Paul Standard. Both were plugged into a 65Amp SoHo head (EF86/12AX7/EL84) and 2×12″ cabinet with Celestion Alnico Blue G12H speakers, as well as a Randall Lynch Box head (12AX7/EL34) and Randall LB 4×12″ cab with Eminence Super V speakers.
The Strat set produced a balanced, accurate early-’60s tone with a lot of single-coil spank and punchy low-end. They offered relatively equal output in relation to their placement; the bridge pickup has a crisp, twangy sound with nice high-end bite that retains its clarity even with overdrive piled on, and without getting really harsh. The middle pickup has a fair amount of high-end bite, but with more body and midrange, while the neck pickup exhibited the throaty, round neck-position sound exemplified by the Strat, again with nice clarity even with heavy overdrive. The two out-of-phase positions produce plenty of quack with shimmering lush highs. And in keeping with the set’s true-vintage vibe, the middle pickup is not reverse-wound/reverse-phased, so the “classic” single-coil noise that comes with the classic tone remains noticeable. The light wax potting controls microphonics and feedback very well, and the staggered polepieces compensate for the fretboard radius and string-to-string output, so the pickups can be adjusted to sit close to the strings without suffering pull.
The humbucking Vintage Set also produces a full, rich, well-balanced sound; the bridge pickup is clear and bright with ample complex midrange, while the neck pickup is slightly darker without being mushy. The combination of the slightly bright bridge pickup and the slightly dark neck pickup make for a lush, overtone-thick combination in the middle position. With the overdrive dimed in both amps, the bridge pickup offers an articulate, crunchy tone, with a smooth body and chunky low-end response. The neck pickup, while also very smooth, washes out only slightly under heavy distortion.
Amalfitano’s Vintage humbucking and ’62 Vintage single-coil pickup sets offer excellent-quality, classic vintage tones and utilize top shelf components and excellent construction.
Amalfitano Pickups Price $250/per set (SP High-Output, VS 1950s, ’62 Vintage, Fullbucker, Humbucker), $210 (TP set), $200 (P90 Soapbar set). Contact Amalfitano Pickups, 13027 Brittmoore Park Drive, Houston, TX 77041; phone (817) 917-8707; www.amalfitanopickups.com.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s August 2008 issue. All opyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
