Month: June 2013

Fargen Amplification’s Pete Anderson Tumbleweed pedal is based on the original Tumbleweed circuit, with a new design. Made in the U.S.A., it offers clear sustain and clean gain. Learn more at www.fargenamps.com.

John Hiatt and his band, The Combo (Doug Lancio, Kenneth Blevins, Nathan Gehri and Brandon Young), will tour North America in support of his latest album, Mystic Pinball, which was produced by Kevin Shirley (Aerosmith, Iron Maiden, Joe Bonamassa). For more information, including a complete list of dates, go to www.johnhiatt.com.

Lace Music is providing its Nitro Hemi pickups to Gibson for the company’s new Bill Kelliher Golden Axe Explorer. Described as a “modern humbucker,” the passive/zero-noise unit was designed for rock and heavy-metal players and uses Barium Ferrite magnets with Lace’s Sensor design. Dressed in gold-colored covers, the pickups were specially built for the run, and can be split for a single-coil tones. Kelliher, guitarist in Mastodon, is a longtime Lace endorser. For more, visit www.lacemusic.com and www.gibson.com.

Hottie Guitars’ 383 double-cutaway electric guitar has a one-piece mahogany body with a carved maple top, TonePros wrap-around bridge or Bigsby vibrato, one- or two-pickup configuration, bone nut, and Soft-V or ’59-C hand-carved neck.  Hottie Guitars are hand-made in Portland. Visit www.hottieguitars.com.

Bigsby, a division of Fender/Gretsch, is reintroducing the aluminum neck shim designed by Paul Bigsby for use with the Bigsby B16 vibrato, which is specifically designed for use on the Telecaster. Though the shim is not required for use with the B16, it adds height (3/16”) and pitch angle for the neck, and many suggest adds sustain and high-end response to the tone. To learn more, visit www.bigsby.com.

Airline Guitars will soon offer two new models based on the early-’60s Silvertone Jupiter H49. The Airline Jupiter Pro replaces the H49’s wooden bridge with a Tone Pros Tun-o-matic, upgrades the bolt-on neck with a set maple neck, and has upgraded hardware. It uses two Airline Argyle pickups, a three way flipper switch, two controls for Volume, two for Tone, and a Blend control that pans between the pickups.

The company’s Dallas Green Signature version adds a unique logo, Honeyburst Finish, and a tweed Airline hard case. Learn more at www.myrareguitars.com.

Team Josie, an American Cancer Society Relay for Life team sponsored by Vintage Guitar, participated in its sixth annual benefit walk, June 1 in Grand Forks, North Dakota. Each year, VG works with a guitar builder and several of its advertisers to raise donations via a raffle in the weeks leading up to the event. This year, pledges, raffle tickets, and sponsorships raised $11,200, bringing the team’s six-year total fundraising to $57,500.

Paul Gamble, of New Mexico, was the winner of this year’s grand prize, which included a Fender American Vintage ’59 Stratocaster, along with a Fulltone Tube Tape Echo and a Poerava hand-made Wing Tip strap.

Team Josie is named in memory of Josie Alise Greenwood, who died in April of 2007, after being diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). She was three years old. Josie was the daughter of VG webmaster Joe Greenwood and grand-niece of VG founder Alan Greenwood.

The Seymour Duncan Sentient neck pickup is voiced to capture a blend of vintage PAF and modern tones with enough output to deliver harmonically-rich distorted lead tones with deep, detailed cleans. The Sentient is available for 7- and 8-string guitars and ships in an active mount (soapbar-sized) version for guitars with active pickups. For more, visit www.seymourduncan.com.

Acoustic Science guitar strings are modified with a molecular surface treatment that removes residues from the winding process, then placed in a plasma system where ultra-high-vacuum pumps are used to create an atmosphere where there are no gasses, water vapor, or contaminants. Then, proprietary compounds are activated in a electromagnetic plasma, modifying the surface of the strings. The company says this creates a string resistant to finger oils, corrosion, and foreign material.  The strings have a low surface energy, which causes water, grime and oils to bead up and roll off, rather than stick to the string. Learn more at www.acoustic-science.com.