Friday, 30 January 2004
Global guitars: From a headquarters behind his Brookfield home, Rick Tedesco supplies guitars to musicians around the world. See also: www.guitarhangar.com
Martin Celebrates the 1 Million Mark with their most elaborately designed guitar ever! Intricate inlays of abalone, mother of pearl, sea snail, 18-karat gold, white gold and precious gems, including diamonds, emeralds, rubies, sapphires and aquamarines, cover the back, fingerboard, headstock, rosette, pickguard and inset soundhole "rose."
Thursday, 29 January 2004
Happy Birthday to Sacha Distel, who is 71 years old today.
"What, that old French crooner?", you ask.
"Yes indeed, the very same," I reply. He also happens to be a very fine jazz guitarist.
Wednesday, 28 January 2004
New Firebird Studio from Gibson USA: Gibson USA expands the X-Factor series with the Firebird Studio model, featuring the classic "reverse" body shape but with a conventional "set" neck and full-size, "Hot Ceramic" humbucking pickups.
Tuesday, 27 January 2004
Nashville seeking guitar art: Nashville - following other cities that have decorated the landscape with signature elements - needs 50 original design (read wild and flamboyant) 10-foot-tall fiberglass guitars for its public art project. The oversized sculptures will be scattered across Music City - in front of landmarks and businesses - for a year, then sold in a charity auction to benefit 10 nonprofits, including the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Schecter unveils Hellcat VI: Not a guitar, bass or even a baritone in today's terms, the Hellcat VI is designed to be an improvement of the '6-string bass' instrument of the early 1960s. The 30" scale, the Hellcat VI is standard tuned, but one octave below a normal guitar. Designed with input from Perry Bamonte and Robert Smith of the Cure.
Ibanez DMM1 Daron Malakian Signature Guitar: Featuring a graphic design created by his father, System of a Down guitarist Daron Malakian gets his own Ibanez signature guitar based on the Iceman body style.
Thursday, 22 January 2004
Schecter introduce Baron Series Basses: These certainly look cool - Telecaster shaped body and MusicMan pickup.
Gibson Guitar puts team in place for IPO goal: With a new senior management team in place, Nashville-based Gibson Guitar Co. is moving closer to its goal of taking the company public, co-founder Henry Juszkiewicz said this week. Though there’s no date on the horizon, the instrument manufacturer is "much closer" to pursuing public ownership than when the idea was floated nearly two years ago, said Juszkiewicz, Gibson’s chairman and chief executive officer.
Wednesday, 21 January 2004
Ferndale music man builds guitars with great care: Jerry Strock puts in time and patience to craft stringed instruments. He says it takes about 100 hours, working three hours a day for three days each week, to finish an instrument.
Gibson Guitar moving division to Memphis: Gibson Guitar Corp. is moving its Custom, Art and Historic guitar division from Nashville to its Memphis factory, Chairman and CEO Henry Juszkiewicz said yesterday.
Tuesday, 20 January 2004
HagstromCanada.com: a fantastic wesbite all about these Swedish oddball guitars (and those Super Swede guitars could give Les Pauls a run for their money).
Epiphone Mandobird: with its Firebird stylings, this has got to be the coolest looking mandolin ever!
Epiphone launch Les Paul Baritone: Epiphone will be introducing a long-scale baritone guitar that adds beefy, bottom-end tones to the legendary Les Paul model. The new Les Paul Standard Baritone features a 27.75-inch scale length, which is 3 inches longer than a standard Les Paul, and it also debuts a simplified control system and a unique choice of finish colors and graphics.
Daisy Rock Expands Stardust Series with Acoustic/Electric Guitars: "Like all Daisy Rock guitars, each Stardust Acoustic/Electric guitar is designed to fit the female body and hands. The slim neck is easier for girls with smaller hands to play and the ultra thin, lightweight contoured body is more comfortable for girls to hold."
...actually, looking at the Daisy Rock website, it seems that they have a few more different ranges of models since I last looked, e.g. the Rock Candy series and the Butterfly series. I do wonder sometimes, if perhaps some of their instruments are a little bit too girly for some tastes. However, a good friend of mine is Louisa Carr from the Brighton-based band Teasing LuLu, and she plays a Heartbreaker bass and absolutely loves it.
...actually, looking at the Daisy Rock website, it seems that they have a few more different ranges of models since I last looked, e.g. the Rock Candy series and the Butterfly series. I do wonder sometimes, if perhaps some of their instruments are a little bit too girly for some tastes. However, a good friend of mine is Louisa Carr from the Brighton-based band Teasing LuLu, and she plays a Heartbreaker bass and absolutely loves it.
DT200 Destroyer Debuts at Winter NAMM: By popular demand, Ibanez returns the famous Destroyer to the line as a regular model after a nearly 20 year hiatus. Like the first Destroyer versions first introduced in the '70s, the DT200 features a mahogany body for thick tone and sustain.
Monday, 19 January 2004
*sigh* ... Oh well, we didn't get nominated for "Best Weblog about music" - or any other categories come to that - in The Bloggies. I don't know why I thought we were in with a chance really, as it's just the same old names and blog in-crowd as usual. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
(Bastards).
(Bastards).
Beatle's guitar lawsuit settled: George Harrison's estate has settled its dispute against a doctor it accused of coercing the dying ex-Beatle into signing the doctor's son's guitar. The guitar "will be disposed of privately" and Dr Gilbert Lederman's son will be given a new guitar.
Allowing the guitar player within to emerge: Dave Nordstrand writing for The Californian is "Quasimodo on strings".
Rocker man: The Observer Profile: Jack White of The White Stripes. So, his so-called "sister" IS his ex-wife! Weird.
Sunday, 18 January 2004
Happy birthday to Crispian Mills who's 31 today. Whatever happened to Kula Shaker anyway?
Friday, 16 January 2004
Ten Stratocaster Guitars To Die For!: The world's most famous Strats as owned by Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Hank Marvin, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Rory Gallagher, Dave Gilmour, and George Harrison.
News from Winter NAMM 2004 - Fender Anniversary Stratocasters: Special Custom Shop editions to celebrate 50 years of the Fender Strat.
Thursday, 15 January 2004
Ex-Evanescence guitarist working on new Avril Lavigne CD: Wow, he's got good taste. (That's sarcasm, by the way).
Jenna Jameson Poses for Promotional Photos for Jackson Guitars: I think she's a porn star, seeing as the story came from Adult Video News (I found this story on a search for "guitars", honest guvnor).
Harrison signed guitar as 'gesture of appreciation': the case continues! George Harrison signed a guitar for a doctor as a "gesture of appreciation" and not because he was coerced while on his death bed, the medic's lawyer has claimed.
Legendary rock band Yes documentary and live simulcast performance to be presented at regal entertainment group theaters, January 26th: Yesspeak and live acoustic set presented for one night only(tm) in 25 markets across the U.S.
Wednesday, 14 January 2004
Happy Birthday to Patricia Morrison who, in December, decided that the show must go on and played a UK tour with The Damned despite the minor inconvenience of the fact that she was approximately 8 months pregnant. (The baby must be due soon, surely?)
Patricia also has the distinction of being the longest serving bass player that The Damned have had (and they've had a few - I can count eight), having been with them since 1998.
Surviving Ted Nugent's Chainsaw: Ted Nugent injured in bizarre reality TV stunt. Personally, I'd like to see him mauled by a menagerie of the animals that so loves to hunt. The git.
Tuesday, 13 January 2004
The Darkness convince the sceptics: Flamboyant rock group The Darkness are at the front of the race for this year's Brit Awards after a meteoric rise over the last 12 months. (Alice Cooper was on the music quiz show "Never Mind The Buzzcocks" on BBC2 last night, and he said that The Darkness had supported him on tour recently and that he couldn't tell if they were for real or if they were a big send up.)
Scorpions announce new bassist: Veteran German hard rockers The Scorpions have announced the addition of Polish bassist Pawel Maciwoda (Section 31, Urbanator) to the group's ranks.
Monday, 12 January 2004
Eric Clapton covers Robert Johnson: Eric Clapton will have two new albums in 2004. The second, towards the end of the year, will be a studio album of all new songs. The first album due late March will be an album of Robert Johnson covers.
Sunday, 11 January 2004
Evanescence singer confirms possible collaboration with ex-Limp Bizkit guitarist: from what I heard about their recent London shows following their guitarists departure, Evanescence as a live act are a complete waste of time and money, whilst someone else I was speaking to referred to them as "dinner party metal". Says it all, really.
Saturday, 10 January 2004
The Darkness score highest-climbing album on U.S. Billboard chart: Love them or hate them, one thing's for sure - this lot are helping make guitars and guitar music popular again!
Friday, 9 January 2004
Wow! Two Led Zeppelin birthdays in one month!
Happy Birthday to the maestro himself, Mr Jimmy Page who is 60 today.
FOR SALE -- FOR SALE -- FOR SALE -- FOR SALE -- FOR SALE
Fender Squier Stagemaster 7 - seven string guitar SOLD 18 Jan 04
Aria FET-DLX Elecord Electro Acoustic Guitar SOLD 18 Jan 04
Teisco '63 MJ2 electric guitar
These guitars are being offered for sale on eBay in the UK. Sorry, but I cannot accept bids from outside of the UK, not unless you are prepared to arrange collection yourself and are fully aware of the costs involved.
Squire makes a splash: Former Stone Roses guitarist John Squire is putting on an exhibition of his paintings to coincide with his new album.
Thursday, 8 January 2004
Why on earth didn't I get one sooner?
Here's my new Gibson Flying V Faded. After the agony of having it sitting next to me at my desk in the office yesterday, I finally got to take it home and plug it in.And what can I say? It has been beautifully built, it feels great, and has that classic Gibson sound. I tried it through - in turn - my Vox Brian May amp, a Zoom 505 FX unit, and a Danelectro Studio E15 headphone amp, and it sounded fantastic through all three. It has all those classic rock tones, but also what surprised me a bit was that it has a very pleasing "acoustic" tone when playing with those clean sounds. Those lads in Nashville certainly know how to build guitars!
Someone said to me that it's the kind of guitar you have to play either standing up (on a strap, obviously) or lying down. However, I have found that it is possible to comfortably play whilst sitting; you have to position the lower pointy bit between your legs and hold the guitar in an almost classical posture.
I have to confess that years ago I really disliked Flying Vs. I suppose they were associated with all those naff metal bands in the late 70s and 80s. But those bands all moved on to more outrageous guitars, and the Flying V was picked up by other types of guitarist, acquiring some new-found retro-cool in the process. To me, the Flying V became the epitome of 50s modernistic design, just like the cars from that period with their tailfins and lashings of chrome.
Other than the metal merchants, look at the cool cats who have played the Gibson Fliyng V: Jimi Hendrix, Marc Bolan, Dave Davies of The Kinks, Bryan Gregory of The Cramps, Lenny Kravitz, Gruff Rhys from the Super Furry Animals, the guy from Ash, errrr... The Wombles... the list goes on!
To sum up, I have to say "Where have you been all my life?" This guitar totally blows away all the other guitars I have ever played!
Gibson Guitar Being Fine-Tuned: Gibson Guitar Corp. chairman and CEO Henry Juszkiewicz instituted a policy that no second-rate guitar would leave a factory. "We have a pile of rejects, and we cut them up in front of the employees," he says. "Some people actually break down and cry. ... Everybody thought I was nuts. But my position was and continues to be: If you're buying a Gibson, there is no second-quality Gibson; it's either the best there is, or it doesn't exist."
Happy Birthday to David Bowie, who is a very youthful 57 years old today.
Although he's not known as a guitarist as such, he has proved himself to be very capable on the instrument over the years; for example on the "Diamond Dogs" album he played all the lead guitars. Nice to see him playing more guitar too on the recent "Reality" tour. What was that guitar he was using? A fibreglass-bodied Supro is my guess, but I have no idea as to the specifics.
Wednesday, 7 January 2004
I've just taken delivery of my new toy - a Gibson Flying V "Faded" . It appears to be a lovely guitar, but as I had to have it delivered to the office, I've not been able to try it out yet.
Tuesday, 6 January 2004
Gibson Talk - Gibson Electric Guitar Message Board Forum and Gibson Guitar Lounge: I'll be able to join in the talk here soon, as I'm waiting for my new toy to be delivered! More about that later!
Altera Enables Gibson Guitar to Spread MaGIC: Altera Products Replace Competitive FPGA and Off-the-Shelf Processor to Lower Costs of Adoption for Revolutionary Media Protocol... (Eh? Can we have that in English please?)
Pistols whipped: On this day in history, January 6, 1977, gentle folk balladeers the Sex Pistols were dropped by EMI Records. Presumably for refusing to do an acoustic rendition of 'Annie's Song' - or something. Here's how the proto-punks at MegaStar reported the news...
Monday, 5 January 2004
The jangled world of the vintage guitar market: Old guitars are not necessarily the best buys as dealers feel we are in another golden world of instrument-makers.
Saturday, 3 January 2004
Happy Birthday to ex Friday, 2 January 2004
Ozzy's Guitarist Honoured: Ozzy Osbourne's late guitarist Randy Rhoads is to be honored on Hollywood's Rock Walk of Fame in March.