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The Guitar Pron Thread


Celery Man

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NGD, at least for now. Not sure I'll keep it.

bulletLPtele.jpg

 

Stupid deal early this week for the Squire Bullet Tele in Lake Placid Blue...allegedly. Crappy phone pic, and I haven't seen it in really good daylight because it was getting dark, but doesn't really look LP blue to my eyes, which was the only reason I bought it. But even worse, they did the bait and switch on the bridge. This one has the shitty top load stringer as opposed to the string-through-body on previous versions, like the butterscotch version I got in 2018. It looks nice, but not what I wanted. I was looking at some more recent youtube reviews and foudn out the newer Bullets have the shitty bridge and the newer Affinitiy have the real Tele type bridge, the exact opposite of what it was a year or two ago.

When I saw that I tried  to cancel the order berfore it shipped. I was told it was shipping from Guitar Center store 20 miles down the road and there for could not be cancelled. I had to wait and get it first. it was "Processing" for three freaking days before I got a tracking number, when I could have just drover of there the same day and picked the bitch up if the whole thing wasn't a total clusterfuck.

It looks pretty nice otherwise. Indian Laurel definitely looks better than the shitty looking Pau Ferro they used on Fenders. The 3 position switch that people bitch about is actually quite smooth. The neck looks slightly thinner than my other Bullet Tele. It definitely sounds "plinkier" acoustically than the older, likely due to the shitty bridge. Haven't plugged it in. 

I was thinking, for the price maybe I should just keep it and take the small loss of $140. I could get rid of the crap fake tele bridge and slap a Bigsby type on it, then it could be kinda cool. Not sure I wanna mess with all that, though.

Edited by DougO
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Love me some Chuck Prophet.

He was playing that Squier the first time I saw him in the mid-90s at Liberty Lunch. Aside from acoustics, it's the only guitar I've seen him play.

Press release on it (with specs) from 1990: http://chuckprophet.com/press/prophet_margin/

And another when it was stolen in 2012 (it was recovered a week later): http://www.chuckprophet.com/news/my-1984-fender-squire-telecaster-is-gone.-im-offering-a-reward-of-500.00

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3 hours ago, AnotherUTFan said:

Any of you Austin guys know a band called the Hickoids? We've been asked to play with them when they come through town next month. What i saw on YouTube kinda looks like a punky, parody cover band.
 

LOL.  Yeah.  They're legends.  They lost one of their main dudes but they're still going at it.  My daughter's band played their Saustex Records showcase at SXSW last year.

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Chuck Prophet is a fucking genius.  I don't mean a musical genius -- I mean, he basically is -- he's an IQ genius.  He came by my little dumpy studio to visit Scrappy Jud when Scrappy was producing an album for Mike Hall, and I just sorta sat there slack-jawed listening to those three shoot the shit.  All three, mega-talented, smart smart smart, wry, acerbic dudes.  It was like watching Bill Hicks, Bill Burr and Jon Stewart trade songs.  

Days like that tell a man he has no fucking business being in that business.

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LOL.  Yeah.  They're legends.  They lost one of their main dudes but they're still going at it.  My daughter's band played their Saustex Records showcase at SXSW last year.
Well, that's too bad. By the time we got a response from our drummer, the spot was filled. That's 2 good gigs we've lost that way, plus we nearly blew the Psycho thing becuase our singer doesnt know how to read his email.

At least our band name checks out.

I'll try to go check them out anyway.

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2 hours ago, AnotherUTFan said:

You really need to upgrade your tuner pedal to this one, especially with that many pedals after it. Trust me.
1e71cc54a57423e40b2e5e17ba3eef7f.jpg

What is it specifically you like about it?

I'd like to find a pedal that's basically an on/off switch, with no circuitry between in and out (other than the switch).  I continue to dream of a parts-tele with one pickup and no volume/tone, but I'd need a way to kill the stage volume.

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surely.... someone could make a kill switch like that for not a lot? if I got a wild hair up my ass like that, I would go bug my buddy Julio at Moon Music to connect me with whatever local boutique pedal guys who's stuff he's selling, and see what they'd charge to put that together with bonus points if it could be in some cool form factor. "Suck" button or something more clever than that.

Since we're on the verge of a pedal tuner discussion, I have a sonic labs Turbo Tuner.  It's highly accurate and fast as shit, it is highly visible on dark stages but sucks for outdoor daylight, and I still wish I could have an analog peterson strobe somehow.

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1 hour ago, Napoleon said:

Is this the GUITAR 🎸 thread? Or the Pedalphilia thread?

Some drop a suggestion of go-to cabled and lates guitar strap barn find…

PEDALS go here=> 

 

No one in that thread and as I stated before I live in a lawless surly nation where all music equipment talk in one big thread. Guitar bass pedals bring it

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What is it specifically you like about it?
I'd like to find a pedal that's basically an on/off switch, with no circuitry between in and out (other than the switch).  I continue to dream of a parts-tele with one pickup and no volume/tone, but I'd need a way to kill the stage volume.

This is, by far, the best tuner pedal on the market. I can't remember who pointed it to me to it when Vary Mary was playing regularly, I thought it was here. Best pedal I ever bought.

Its Poly, so you can strum all 6 strings at once and 6 red lights go across the top with green lights above and below that show if any are out of tune and roughly by how much.

So you see the G string is a little sharp, it's always the G string, and when you pick just that string, the big, bright G shows on the display and you have multiple options for how you want it to indicate the tuning - including strobe.

On top of all that it has a built in buffer, which you should have at the beginning of any chain of 3 or more pedals anyway, and it's form factor is smaller than most other tuner pedals.this replaced both a bigger Poly tuner I had and a buffer, and does a better job at both.

I do use mine as a big on/off switch. It's true bypass.
Bass player shows up with this and I want it. Nice big display. 
You do want it. I have a lot more guitars (13-ish) than I do basses (2), but the tuner pedal plays great w all of them.

Edit - it's green lights for in tune in Poly mode, like this.
37822dfeebffa1fdcdb56b9a872b6b64.jpg
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+1 on the Polytune. It’s great.

Back to CM’s drop D comment: I started with drop D so I could play all the heavy stuff, but then I saw guys like Isbell and Childers using it and realized it was so much more versatile.

It’s still really fun for big meaty distorted power chords though.

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I learned drop d by picking up "Cover Me Up" and "Speed Trap Town". Which, y'all should learn those using the tutorials on that Tim channel that I just linked because he is great and the songs are basically the same thing, and teach you the drop d chord shapes you use all the time. I feel like you hardly ever play the top string in drop D, but if you drop the top one to D as well you can hit it for another D which is nice and sometimes necessary. Sometimes in a song like "Relatively Easy" (also isbell) you need to do that little top string D chord riff you often do so you need the E.

But yeah then you realize there's all this other fun cool shit that's in drop D. For the dirty countryish stuff, Man of Constant Sorrow or Whitehouse Road by Childers. Or Choctaw Blues. Then you've got the chunky power chord stuff like Buzzrock is talking about - I had previously dabbled in drop D to learn "The Middle" by Jimmy Eat World for a corporate battle of the bands thing. Or... Stuck Between Stations by The Hold Steady. Just that growly distorted sound and then the balls on the open D chord is so fun.

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Taking the Highway 1 to my tech today.  I really want to like this guitar, but there are some issues beyond the known fret notches that I’ve noticed when trying to get it set up as I like.  The one that has me most concerned is that I now have the truss rod tightened fully, I can’t make the neck any straighter with the truss rod, but there is still a bit more up-bow than I like.

I am wondering if a lack of humidity over its 18 year life has caused the wood to contract and shrink and cause more upbow than can be compensated for with the truss rod.  If that’s the case, I wonder if just unstringing it and loosening the truss rod and letting it readjust to proper humidity might allow it to be adjusted for proper relief with room to spare on the truss rod.

Anyone know if this might be a realistic root cause?  My tech will be able to figure it out, just curious what insight you guys might have.

I have until Thursday to return the guitar, so I’ll be making a decision between now and then.

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When I got my 77 LP the other week, I actually put it in drop D for a minute since I had used it in the past as my alternate tuning guitar. It's a very dark sounding are so I always felt it was suited to that. Typically it was more open G but it was really quick to drop the low E down just to give it a listen. Played some of our old tunes from the 90s when drop D was de rigueur. It was fun for a moment,  but I have always found drop D to really be unsuitable for ensemble work in general. If anything, taking the low E string completely of the guitar is way more appropriate.

 

It's a similar thing to learning what guitar tone is good in a mix vs by itself. Lightly accompanied guitar can be great in drop D, as well as some heavy riffing, but overall in a band I'm not a fan usually.

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27 minutes ago, Goredho said:

Taking the Highway 1 to my tech today.  I really want to like this guitar, but there are some issues beyond the known fret notches that I’ve noticed when trying to get it set up as I like.  The one that has me most concerned is that I now have the truss rod tightened fully, I can’t make the neck any straighter with the truss rod, but there is still a bit more up-bow than I like.

I am wondering if a lack of humidity over its 18 year life has caused the wood to contract and shrink and cause more upbow than can be compensated for with the truss rod.  If that’s the case, I wonder if just unstringing it and loosening the truss rod and letting it readjust to proper humidity might allow it to be adjusted for proper relief with room to spare on the truss rod.

Anyone know if this might be a realistic root cause?  My tech will be able to figure it out, just curious what insight you guys might have.

I have until Thursday to return the guitar, so I’ll be making a decision between now and then.

The AS Strat I picked up a few months ago actually had to have the truss rod maxed to get close to flat enough for me, it had come from Nevada and I assumed it was because of lack of humidity. Develped a very small twist as well, but not bad enough to hurt terribly.

 

I'm not sure undoing the strings and rod will help, but I'm not a luthier so who knows.

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King's X turned me on to Drop D style in their early days. They were doing it as a regular thing, before other bands caught on and started to follow and tuned down lower and lower.  I think it's great for a three piece band where it's easy to play that bottom rhythm thing while complimenting the stuff on the higher strings so you can sound much bigger, almost like two guitar players, if you do it right. It was also pretty easy figuring out a lot of their tunes. It's fun to jam around with, and then you can dip into some of that old low down stanky bluesy type stuff, too.

 

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1 minute ago, Celery Man said:

my old band we tuned the guitars to Eb mostly because the guitarist loved... Metallica? But in retrospect it's a great move if you have brass, because they love flat keys.

I've played in Eb for probably 25 years at this point. Lower string tension. Plus you are always ready to break out Welcome to the Jungle if necessary.

 

Ironically I was a sax player in my youth, I never even made that connection lol.

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2 minutes ago, tbone_ said:

We play can’t find my way home and midnight rider in drop D. Love it. Just makes the acoustic sound way bigger.

These are very good examples. My opinion is that acoustic guitars typically benefit from open tunings in general in a lot of instances.

 

Just to expound a bit on my earlier post, clearly a ton of music has been made with guitars with low E strings, so it's not like you should never play that string or anything. Its more that guitarists in particular can be oblivious to frequency packing. I think this got way more acute in the 90s as well when pairs of heavy distorted guitars became en vogue and drop D tuning exacerbated it. The fundamental on a Bass low E is 42Hz, but typical there's more amplitude on the 2nd harmonic, 84Hz, which happens to be the low E on a guitar. So you put a couple guys hammering it in this range and it gets crowded quick. It's one reason I like to steer people to playing on the top 5 strings early. People that are naturally talented at arrangement can do wonders here. Things like playing barre chords using a wrap around thumb vs barring with the index finger, chord inversions, counterpoint bass etc.. make an immense difference. Jimmy Page and Jimi Hendrix were both master of that. Another example is Black Crowes version of Hard to Handle one of the guitars plays the top 5 strings to give more space while the bass line moves around and doesn't just play roots.

Obviously a lot of this has to do with mixing and stuff, but I think it's a pretty critical skill to develop, being able to self arrange.

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the first time I played my Matchless (alone in our lockout at st elmo music lab) i was... kinda crestfallen. i've learned the amp much more and get lots of sounds I love out of it playing all by myself but that day I was like "oh fuck maybe this thing isn't that special". and then the other guys showed up and yeaaaaah there it is

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Def eye opening how different things can sound solo Vs in a mix.

All good points by 650 above. In our specific case, my guitar is the only source of our music other than vocals. So I’ve had to learn how to to do different things than just if I’m a guitar player in a band. Have to provide the groove, try to fill the whole spectrum, make it sound full, have no holes in the sound ie make sure certain strings/notes/etc keep ringing during changes etc etc etc. Its been a lot of fun to try to develop.

Hardly anyone ever notices, or says anything, but the other day after a show a guy (who was clearly a guitar player) said man you were killing it with your right hand up there tonight. I don’t get many compliments, so I appreciate them all, but that one might have been my favorite.

When we play the full band, it’s back to a completely different way of playing.

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13 minutes ago, tbone_ said:

Def eye opening how different things can sound solo Vs in a mix.

All good points by 650 above. In our specific case, my guitar is the only source of our music other than vocals. So I’ve had to learn how to to do different things than just if I’m a guitar player in a band. Have to provide the groove, try to fill the whole spectrum, make it sound full, have no holes in the sound ie make sure certain strings/notes/etc keep ringing during changes etc etc etc. Its been a lot of fun to try to develop.

Hardly anyone ever notices, or says anything, but the other day after a show a guy (who was clearly a guitar player) said man you were killing it with your right hand up there tonight. I don’t get many compliments, so I appreciate them all, but that one might have been my favorite.

When we play the full band, it’s back to a completely different way of playing.

Oh yeah, that's a totally different challenge. You have to be a huge part of the sonic spectrum, those big tunings are crucial.

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Soooooo I was picking up a prescription for my daughter and was talking with my wife about a pc cable for my son' Spark40 amp...   and the pharmacist evidently over hears us and says "hey I'm moving and I have a tube amp that is amazing, it's an Ampeg Reverbrocket 212.  I can't use it at the new apartment.  I'll bring it in tomorrow you can check it out.  I gave my strat to my brother in law and gave up on guitar al together"

Goes on for a few minute talking it up and basically insisting he bring it into CVS for me to try out?!  

  1. WTF?  Boundries
  2. He said all of that before I got a word in edge wise
  3. Is that a decent AMP?   I'm kind of looking for an AMP but this seems cray cray
  4. I asked him how much he wants for it and he just avoided the question (but he seems really really motivated)
  5. He says I can try it out and that it's OK because he knows where I live

What say you Shaggites?

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9 minutes ago, G650 said:

Dude sounds insane. Probably sampling the wares.

Yeah he spent at least 3 minutes flipping through his phone looking for a picture and then apologizing that his cat was also in the picture... (Amp looked pristine from the cat pic)  the whole time this is what I was thinking...

 

ea695228186a5ef8f026c9eac9142325--far-si

But ya know a cool amp for dirt cheap?  Accommodations can be made...  I just have no idea if that's even a desirable AMP.   I'd been more thinking of a Roland JC-120 (or smaller)

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