Calling All Guitarists- Bassists, Too!

[rcannonp]

I just picked up a THD Hot Plate for myself. I was looking at low watt amps in GC, but I figured that I might as well do what I can to use the amp that I've got. I really like my Marshall and now I can get a proper tone out of it without making the neighbors ears bleed.

[Hard2Hear]

1. Of the guitars you own, which one(s) are your favorite to play and why?

my Taylor 814ce - has this awesome piano like tone that gets compliments everywhere I use it. Also my 1973 Gibson SG standard It has a skinny neck thats really easy for me to play on and the tone screams pure rock and roll.

2. Of the guitars you do not own, which one(s) do you covet and why?

I'd like a James Olson acoustic. I think its the pinnacle of acoustic guitar building.

3. What are your preferred pre's, heads, cabinets and cables-- and style of music?

amp - my Divided By 13 ERT33 combo modded by Fred with a RSA23 mid boost.
cables, I got a bunch of Monster Rock, Jazz, and 1000 for free, I use those.
style - roots rock with some funky back, reggae to relax

4. Strings!! Gauge? Brand? Frequency you change them?

Elixir Phosphor Bronze on acoustics, alot of different stuff on electrics. I really like Snake Oil Strings on electric, but I like Gibson VR's too.

5. Name your top five favorite guitarists or bassists of all time.

Phil Keaggy, Robert Randolph, Slash, Flea, Les Claypool

[JadeLatrell]

1. Of the guitars you own, which one(s) are your favorite to play and why?

2. Of the guitars you do not own, which one(s) do you covet and why?

3. What are your preferred pre's, heads, cabinets and cables-- and style of music?

4. Strings!! Gauge? Brand? Frequency you change them?

5. Name your top five favorite guitarists or bassists of all time.

As a bass player:
1. Musicman Stingray fretless 4 string and an Ibanez ATK (Made in the USA)
2. I am gunning for a Ken Smith 5 string
3. I am an SWR man, loved my Henry the 8x8 (gave it away) but am really digging my backup Yorkville these days. I play mostly rock and rock-funk.
4. I love a light gauge string. Been using Ken Smith Slap Masters for years. I change them when I feel like I need to but not as often as I should.
5. Really loving Robert Trujullio (huge range), used to love Claypool (til the brown album), Sting, Jaco Pastorius, Probably Flea to round it out.

[twistedtom]

This is a hard one Frodo.

1, It depends upon what kind of music I am playing.

I play my Jackson Dinky a lot, it is good for rock, metal and blues. It has a Floyd Rose.

My Ovation standard balladeer is good for jazzy stuff, folk soft rock and blues.

I have one of the new Schechter••™s you now one of the numetal kinds with jumbo frets I use it for metal and drop D. (No Floyds on it)

I also have a Fender, a Dean and an Ibanez.

2, I would like a hollow body or a custom Strat no Floyds on it with multi pick ups.
I have never met a Telly I did not like.

3, I mostly use my Line 6 amp.and my Marshal amp. Mostly Rock, blues, Grunge, hard rock, punk and jazz

4, On the Jackson 9••™s, on the Schechter 10••™s. I change them as needed Jackson gets it today. I like DR's

5, Now you are asking a real hard one, Joe Satriani , Eric Johnston, Yngwie Malmsteen , Jeff Beck, Stevie Ray Vaughan, BB king to Joe Pass.

I was sitting on a road case on the side of the stage of a Yes concert and Steve Howe stood right in front facing my wife and me and played a solo, he is on my list.

I was back stage and stuck my head between Ted Nugent••™s amps to watch the show (Big mistake, ears rang for days) he rocked put him on the list.

I could list a lot more, also most or all of the ones other people listed are fine also.

[Frodo]

Wow-- what a great Yesstory!

I've always enjoyed them a lot. We've talked a little about Yes before-- "Close To The Edge" really changed my life at a time when I'd almost quit listening to rock. I've only heard Yes once in concert-- and I must say my seats were not nearly as close as yours!!

[gearboy]

1. Of the guitars you own, which one(s) are your favorite to play and why?

Out of the four electric guitars, Taylor acoustic, and Fender P-bass that I own, my 2003 Fender Highway 1 Telecaster is my current favorite. It just feels right and sounds nasty.

2. Of the guitars you do not own, which one(s) do you covet and why?

So many guitars, so little cash. I would like to have a nice vintage Gibson J45 and Martin HD28 (notice that I did not say "or"). I also would like custom built Warmoth Jazzmaster and Telecaster Deluxe copies, and I plan on doing this at some point. I can't afford the real vintagey deals, and custom building them will be fun fun fun.

I want a vintage Les Paul and a vintage ES-Style Gibson as well. For now, the Epiphone Sheraton II (Korea, 2004... AMAZING guitar) and Elitist Les Paul Standard Plus (Japan, 2005... better than most Gibsons that I've played) are keeping me company.

3. What are your preferred pre's, heads, cabinets and cables-- and style of music?

I play indie rock and ambient loop-based gtr music, as well as acoustic folk and finger-picked stuff. I am bandless these days, so mostly just writing.

I own a Mesa DC-3, which I love, as well as a Fender Pro Jr, which I am still getting the hang of. I really want a vintage Fender Twin AND a vintage Fender Deluxe AND a vintage Fender Princeton AND Vintage Fender Vibro-Champ... etc etc etc. My dream is to have like 10 combos for ReAmping through, and eventually I will. The Twin will be my live amp.

4. Strings!! Gauge? Brand? Frequency you change them?

Electric, Fender Scale Length: 10s (Fender Bullets, D'Addario, Ernie Ball)
Electric, Gibson/Epiphone Scale Length: 11s (D'Addario, Ernie Ball)
Acoustic: 12s (Elixir)

5. Name your top five favorite guitarists or bassists of all time.

This is tough, because I love so many styles of music and so many players' unique styles.

Off of the top of my head:

Jimmy Page (he's so brilliant!)
Trey Anastasio (rock improv king)
Jeff Beck (just listen to the way that he bends notes)
Jimi Hendrix (well... he's freakin' Jimi Hendrix!)
John McLaughlin (from Miles, to solo, to Mahavishnu, to Shakti... passion, grace, and fire. John is an amazing musician)

...but there are so many more. Sonic Youth, GBV, Frippertronics, various Wilco members, The Black Crowes back in the day, Built to Spill, Steve Vai (I'll always have a special place in my heart for Vai's playing)...

Jeff

[ltemma74]

1. Of the guitars you own, which one(s) are your favorite to play and why?

early '90s SG Standard for gigs (stock); '92 LP Classic with Seth Lovers and after market trem for recording and backup to SG live; '97 Hendrix Tribute Strat (stock) for recording and live use; early '90s Guild D4 Acoustic for writing

I also own a Jazz Bass and a telecaster, but they don't get much use.

2. Of the guitars you do not own, which one(s) do you covet and why?

a high-end acoustic for a little variation from the guild. i really want a vintage Les Paul Junior Double Cut with P90s in TV Yellow. I'm thinking of swapping out the seth lovers in the LP for some humbucker-sized P90s. Nothing growls like a P90!

3. What are your preferred pre's, heads, cabinets and cables-- and style of music?

Marshall 50 watt Plexi with a marshall 4x12 loaded with greenbacks. I don't recall the brand of cables I use, but they are good. Rock music. The plexi is warm and full of harmonics. It can be clean or dirty and takes pedals like it's nobody's business. I also like heads from Orange, the Vox AC-30 and Fender Twin

4. Strings!! Gauge? Brand? Frequency you change them?

D'Addario...10's...change them whenever they loose bounce, elasticity and chime...or before a gig to minimize the chance of breakage!

5. Name your top five favorite guitarists or bassists of all time.

I'll stick to my favorite rock guitarists because that's what I play:

Hendrix (uh...Jimi)
Page (Led Zep)
Slash (GNR)

then it gets tougher...Frusciante (RHCP), Morello (RATM), Rodriguez-Lopez (Mars Volta), others

[davedempsey]

1. I'm down to one electric and one acoustic. A modified strat and my Maton acoustic - which was custom made to my specs. Love them both.
2. Really covet a beautiful old Spainish concert guitar - maybe one day.
3. Prefer to make my own cables. Pres: Still like to use an ADA MP-1 for distorted tones and have a nice old Seymor Duncan that's not too bad for cleaner tones. Marshall 9000 series stereo 50w power amp and Celestion speakers at the noisier end. I've always preferred the Marshall tone.
4. Strings are 10 - 46 and I've tried lots of brands - latest is the Cleartone coated - last a long time and feel clean under the fingers for weeks - sound fine too! When I was a gigging guitarist (haven't been on stage for 10 years and sure do miss it) I was in the habit of stringing for every gig. I always had a soldering iron in the bits and pieces trunk - before you string up put a dab of solder at the ball end where the string wraps around on itself - that stops the major tuning problems once you've done the stretching and tuning routine.
5. Favourite guitarists is a tough one but I tend to put Jeff Beck pretty well at the top - he makes it sing. Wes Montgomery, Charlie Christian (chords, chords, chords), Segovia, and dozens more - all great.

[Frodo]

How can it be that so many people in one place can have such impeccable taste!!??

Thanks again for the data. This really incredible stuff here.

Keep it coming in!!

[monkey man]

How can it be that so many people in one place can have such impeccable taste!!??

Easy. We're impeccable folks.

I really should've mentioned Jeff Beck, so here goes:
Jeff Beck.
If George Duke was a guitarist, I'd have mentioned him too!

Doh! GD reminded me of GB. Has anyone mentioned the master?
OK, I will: George Benson.

[AlMacMeister]

Epiphone Sheraton II (Korea, 2004... AMAZING guitar)

I have one of those Sheratons as well (although I have a Sheraton I, not the II; I think the only difference is the bridge); they really do play and sound really nice for the money (and at a fraction of the cost of a 335). Love the tone on the neck pickup.

[twistedtom]

Monkey when I was in collage a record company represenitive came to one of my music classes and gave out a bunch of albums, I snached up a all the different ones he had. Two George Duke albums were in the bunch. Fell in love with his music that night.

[kelldammit]

1. either a '92 prs custom (wide-thin neck) or a similar vintage fender strat plus (american). they're both very comfortable (though the prs wins out in that regard for me), sound great, are versitile, low-noise, and stay in tune. ex-gf kept the sheraton II and yes, it was a great guitar. i miss it.

2. i'd love a big-ass gretsch (6120 or somesuch) or a howard roberts les paul. just cause they're sooo coool. i love hollowbodies. though, a taylor acoustic would also be nice...

3. i like my sansamp into a pa. pretty reliable and consistent. for amps, i'd love a roland jazz chorus 120, and something like a boogie mkIV combo, or the like.
i play mostly rhythm and supporting/textural stuff, primarily rock/alt.

4. i'm a sissy. i like 9-42's. preferably dean markley blue steels or d'addarios. i like them fresh for recording, but in general, i like them when they've been worn in a bit, and are a bit grungy. i like the mellower sound.

5. hmmm. johnny marr (smiths), robin guthrie (cocteau twins), dominic miller (sting), alex lifeson (rush), and in a dead tie, any of the beatles head to head with hendrix and ride the puppets-era james hetfield (metallica).

kell

[monkey man]

...and ride the puppets-era james hetfield (metallica).
kell

Master of Puppets was awesome.
Easily their best, IMHO.

Monkey when I was in collage a record company represenitive came to one of my music classes and gave out a bunch of albums, I snached up a all the different ones he had. Two George Duke albums were in the bunch. Fell in love with his music that night.

Yay! Cool, Tom. I'm so glad you appreciate him.
I could tell from the first few bars I heard that George has a heart of gold, a bold/daring and powerful creativity, and a keen sense of melody and resolution.

There seemed to be at least 5 distinct modes for George:

1) The critically unacclaimed and mostly unheard '60s jazz stuff.
2) The early to late '70s fusion where he shone brightest (IMHO) and pushed boundaries.
3) The 70s solo album attempts.
4) The collaborations with Stan Clarke which were melodic but too fluffy for some.
5) The '80s George Benson-style sellout stuff which was too fluffy for most.

Whilst my favourite material is the way-trippy and imaginative '70s stuff, I do appreciate "modes" 3, 4 and 5.
Having only heard a few bars of the '60s jazz stuff, it wouldn't be fair for me to make a judgement.
Dang, considering my chops I shouldn't be commenting on anyone, but I pride myself on knowing what's good and what isn't, even if it's beyond my apparent abilities.

I'll bet Frodo also appreciates the Master, the Funkster, the ol' Dukey stick.

[gearboy]

I am patiently awaiting the arrival of my latest purchase.

A 1963 Gibson LG-0. All original except strings and bridge. The original bridge was plastic (Brazillian Rosewood from 1958-1962, plastic from 1962-1967, Rosewood from 1967 until the mid 1970s, when it was discontinued). The newer professionally installed bridge is ebony. It even includes the original case. $650.







Like I said... patiently waiting.

Jeff