Walked into Guitar Center for the first time in months,

and played a '69 Fender Vibro-champ. I now know what all of the Blackface-fuss is about. Didn't buy it, but sure wanted to.

That is all.

Long absence? What long absence?

...been quite a while. Sorry. Maybe. I've been busy making music and such, which is I guess the whole point of this thing, but also, I just haven't had too much turnover in gear or change in drinking. Maybe I'm getting old and boring. Maybe.

I am currently in the process of auditioning drive pedals. Behold!

I traded an '81 TS9 for a Fulldrive 2 and a Fatboost, and am trying to figure out which 3 of the 8 drive pedals that I have are going to make it onto the board. I've been having a lot of fun with the Morning Glory, but I've never really sat down and done a large-scale shootout of pedals, more so just picked one, played it for a while, picked another one, played that one for a while, etc. And somewhere along the line I ended up with 8 overdrives. I've also streamlined the rest of my pedalboards, but that's a topic for another post, probably once I'm done figuring out which drives I want...

In with the new gear, out with the old.

I've been living the dream of selling off cheap stuff to fund expensive stuff. In the last few months I've been extremely happy with both my new amps (the Valve Jr. that I modded, and the Blues Jr. that I had BillM mod for me), and I've really settled on a pedalboard configuration that works pretty well for me. Not perfect, mind you, but well. For instance, I could see myself getting one of those Line 6 M9s to take the place of my DL4, tremolo and chorus pedal, while also giving me more mods and delays and pitch shifting and all sorts of fun sounds. Mostly because it's pretty rare that I use stuff like my chorus, and I feel like it's just eating up space, but I want to have access to it when I need it. But the biggest area where I've changed things out has been my guitars:

Two new members of the family, with three gone. Basically, I swapped my Gretsch out for a short-lived Strat (sounded okay, but it had noiseless pickups in it which weirds me out in a single-coil guitar) which then got traded for that Tele. It's a 1989 MIJ tele. I was average on it until I put it head-to-head against my Squire Classic Vibe 50's telecaster, wherein I discovered that this one sounds way, way better. Less brightness, better depth of tone, more usable. I'm still not in love with the colors, but it sounds great.

But then that gave me leave to sell off my Classic Vibe since I really, really don't need 2 teles. Then, I sold that along with a my Epiphone Les Paul, some pedals that have been sitting around, some guitar cases, and a lot of other random stuff that I'd been trying to sell for ages, and splurged on a Gibson ES-335. And I love it. And it was way easier to justify having sold over a grand worth of gear, specifically with an eye towards getting this guitar. And, of course, I got a good deal.

Not that I'm done, by any means. I'm just not very good at being "done" at buying gear. But I'm feeling myself starting to settle in, just like I did with my pedal board, just like I did with my amps. I've got parts on the way to push the ES-335 over the top: PAF pickups and 50's style electronics so that this thing will sound like an original 1959 ES-335, with all the bite and mojo and tone faeries and etc. And I can see myself taking a Fender American Special strat and replacing the electronics in that with the electronics in my current strat and then going from there. I know, I know. I said I'd keep it forever. But spending so much time with it, I love how it sounds, I just can start to see a lot of the flaws, all errors in terms of construction and materials. The pickups are incredible, just incredible. It just doesn't feel perfect yet. Besides, if I were going to have a "backup" electric, I think it would be a strat; my playing just seems to fit a Strat the best.

I am a lot closer to completing my gear journey than I was a month ago. At least, that's what I keep telling myself....

Pedalboard update for January

Okay, so what started out as me just wanting to add a few pedals turned into a full-blown cable-building frenzy which has only just now concluded. And the end result is probably the slickest 'board I've ever put together. Mostly because, when I was in Home Depot looking for a wire stripper, I came across some cable tie mounts which were running $2 for 10 of them, so I said, "Why not?" I also ran across a quality multimeter which I needed and a 10-foot piece of 2x10 that eventually became a soldering workstation, but that's neither here nor there. Point is, new pedalboard!

 As you can see, there's a lot of new stuff on there. The current signal chain is:

Guitar -> JHS Little Black Buffer -> Strymon OB. 1 Compressor -> volume pedal -> loopmaster bypass strip:
Tuner out: Hardwire tuner
1. - Fulltone Fulldrive 2
2. - Boss BD-2 (Keeley mod)
3. - Pigtronix Aria Disnortion
4. - Voodoo Labs Tremolo
5. - 2 Boss DD-7s
6. - Line 6 DL4
7. - Boss RV-5
-> BBE Sonic Stomp -> Amp

That's a lot of changes. The astute readers will note that things look an awful lot like Daniel Carson's latest board. That's not entirely by accident. I prefer to think of it as a blend between him and James Duke. Mostly, the fact that we've got a volume pedal, a compressor and a tubescreamer of some kind that's almost always on. I actually had an MXR Dynacomp for about a day that I'd gotten used from guitar center for $40, but it had this nasty mechanical throbbing sound that was probably some sort of malfunction, so back it went, but it reopened my eyes to how much a compressor really adds to a guitar. Does it color my sound? Sure, everything does. But I think I like my tone better (95% of the time) with my OB.1 in the loop.

I also blatantly stole the dual DD-7's synced to a single tap tempo from Carson, but it's great. I love the DD-7, and I've been trying to find a delay like it so I can run dotted 8ths on one and quarters on the other, or quarters and halfs, or just have one doing reverse and one analog, or anything like that. I kept trying out tons of different delays to make it work, when it turns out that all I needed was just another DD-7. And if you're going to try to sync them yourselves, be forewarned; it's hard to find a cable that will do what you want it to do. It's not a good idea from an audio perspective to split your signal like that, so no one really manufactures a cable that will do precisely that, because there's no market for it. I had to invent my own using three separate hunks of cable and a whole lot of solder. But it was fun, and now things are awesome.

They also both have the RV-5. I wanted the RV-3 for a long time. I don't really want to pay $130 for a pedal that was $80 a year ago, though. I don't care about Radiohead. Also, the RV-5 has a modulated reverb that everyone seems to love. Just got it in the mail today, slapped it on, and considered my board to be complete. But the modulated reverb does sound sweet.

Here's what I'm particularly proud (and anal) about:

Yep. All those glorious cable ties. I got some black ones while I was at Home Depot. And you can see my JHS buffer, still hanging out underneath there on the left side, still making my tone awesome without giving away that he's the one to blame for the awesomeness. Booyah.

So that's that. For now. Board rigged up with a bypass looper, a great buffer, and Canare GS-6 cables with G&H Showstopper plugs. I can't possibly complain about my board's tone-sucking abilities anymore. Now any sucking that happens is my own fault. Or my amp/guitar's......

It is finished.

Well, it finally got here.

I put my order in just about six weeks ago, and my Loopmaster bypass strip, tap tempo and pedal board bypass arrived today. I had about ten things to do today, but upon finding a long, thin package on my doorstep this afternoon, I put aside non-childish things and spent the better part of the day getting things set up. Step one (cut a hole in the box?) was to take a side trip to the he-who-must-not-be-named and pick up some more patch cables. And by some, I mean lots. I ended up going with a kit (or three) made by LiveWire, simply because I needed to get the biggest number of cables at as cheap a price as I could, and I got these for around $6 per cable. And it's DIY, meaning that I got every size I needed without any guesswork, which was a huge plus. I am planning, some day, maybe, on getting some really nice cables of the solder variety, simply because, well, I could have paid just a bit more and gotten fantastic cables instead of generic ones, but I also play on a weekly basis and could not have waited for shipping. But first impressions are that they conduct signal passably well. I did have a digital multimeter on hand to check them after assembly, and had to re-assemble two of the twelve I made, so that saved me tons of stress.

The little box next to the strip is a tap tempo. I used the Boss FS-5U for a long time, and it works perfectly, but I could never get velcro to stick to it, and it took up an awful lot of space for a tap tempo, so I went ahead and got one while I was ordering. All the functionality, 1/4 of the size. The box next to that, with the fun stickers on it, is called a pedal board bypass. Basically, I've got everything routed so that I have one consistent and easy-to-reach place to plug in my guitar and amp (marked G and A, respectively), instead of having to find the right place on the bypass strip or to track down which pedal is last and first in my chain. A small touch, but I really like it. I was also going to try to zip-tie it to the bottom of my pedal board, underneath the wah in my picture here so that the I/O ports would seem to almost be a part of the pedal board, but there wasn't quite enough clearance. Still good this way, though, because I can see what I'm doing.

And so, for the last time (until I completely change my setup again...), my chain is:

Guitar -> Strymon OB. 1 -> Loopmaster bypass strip:
1. Vox Wah
2. Boss GE-7
3. Fulltone Fulldrive 2 MOSFET
4. Keeley DS-1
5. Voodoo Labs Tremolo
6. Ernie Ball Volume Pedal
7. Line 6 DL4 -> Boss DD-7 (with tap tempo)
Tuner out: Hardwire HT-2 tuner
-> Amp.

The logic here is that the Strymon compressor is always on, and is true bypass anyway, so it doesn't need to be in a loop. The bypass strip has a master bypass switch, so I can clear out everything and go guitar -> compressor -> amp when I feel like it, and it has a tuner out so that's not in my signal path anymore (though I really don't mind that particular tuner's sound when it's off). The only other thing I have to say is that it's almost like Loopmaster makes their stuff specifically for Pedaltrain pedal boards. The bypass strip fits perfectly on one slat, with the right angle cables hanging neatly down through the first open space. Very orderly and awesome.

I'll leave you with a spaceship shot, since I've never done it and I now have like twice as many LEDs looking back up at me. Happy pedal board day!

Why can't I stop spending money?

Next in an endless series of pictures of my ever-evolving pedalboard, I bring you the latest, newest and improved-est board. I feel like I'm coming to a stasis point with the 'board, so you may only need to endure a few more pictures!

As you can see, this is pretty much identical in terms of pedals as my latest update, but now they're all situated snugly on a giant Pedaltrain board. Not pictured is the ridiculous ATA flightcase that came with this board. It's ridiculous. I felt ridiculous wheeling it in to church on Sunday, but, well, it has wheels which was a huge selling point. I am physically capable of lifting it, case and all, but it weighs in at around 60 pounds; not exactly easy to carry from place to place. The new 'board has room for a bypass strip which is still in process, and I also ordered a smaller tap tempo (and one that actually takes velcro well) and a pedalboard bypass that will let me plug in my guitar and amp into one place, rather than a specific pedal or snaking it in to the bypass strip. It's going to be sweet. And way nicer than I need. Once I get that and install it, then any changes will be small, and will be more "check out this new pedal", rather than, "here's a new picture of my pedalboard!"

The other thing that I've recently used to soak up excess money that I really needed to get rid of (I mean, saving is such a pain in the ass...) is an Epiphone Les Paul. I didn't want an Epiphone. I wanted a Gibson, a real nice guitar that I could keep for an eternity, that would be a good example of a rocking, humbucking guitar. I didn't want to pay for a Gibson unless I found an absolutely perfect example, as I've heard that their quality control isn't what it used to be. What I found, on Craigslist, was a guy who had taken a pair of Epiphone Les Paul Standards, and paid a guitar tech to replace the guts (pickups, pots, switch, everything) with Gibson parts, and to upgrade the tuners to Grovers and do a setup. Now, from what I've read, the only serious problems with an Epiphone Les Paul were staying in tune and uninspiring pickups. Problem solved, and I have a $1,000+ guitar (in theory) for $325.

The guitar itself has a few bumps and scratches, but it plays really well. There's a fret buzz that needs to be hunted down on the low E, but other than that, it's smooth and sounds pretty good. All of my experience has been with single coils, but I really like the chunky, thick tone that comes with this guitar. The pickups are the standard 490r and 498t pickups that come stock in older Les Paul Standards (now they use Burstbucker pickups), and first impressions are that I like them. I've spent a lot of time going back and forth between my new Les Paul and my G&L, and what I've found is mostly common sense; the LP is thicker, more distorted, whereas the G&L gives me a thinner tone that is better defined when overdriven. Neither is better or worse, but I'm happy to finally have a few different guitars that will cover the same ranges and have similar versatility, but that can be used for different tonal coloring.

Point number 3, much more important than money I've spent and sweet deals I've gotten, is that I'm playing electric on a weekly basis! It's fun, because the group I've been playing with already has two acoustic guitarists, so having a wide range of tones to play with is great. At the very least, it makes me feel like I'm being heard, which inspires me way more to be creative and not just blend into the background. Unless the song calls for it. Booyah.

It's a sickness....

I have another guitar. Deets to follow.