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We’ve got a gig!
Congratulations 🙂 I know you know this but get the setlist together and all the other decision making becomes easier because you can focus on practising those songs and getting the gear sorted. As for the outfit, you don't need any encouragement from us !!
Yep, set list is coming together (although the graceful ebb and flow of the arc of the set is yet to be determined... Saying that, though, everything is pretty loud and pretty fast-past. There is no real ebb...) 🙂
Nice one.
I may be guesting with one of the ex's bands next time I'm down the coast. Luckily I know her sets pretty much off pat. And equally she knows my abilities so there'll be no tricky stuff in there. Pretty much blues and soul covers.
Just the Strat and the mini pedal board will do it and run it all straight into her PA.
Which is a shame as I finished this today (bit big to carry on the train though...)
https://flic.kr/p/2mxAmXF
https://flic.kr/p/2mxK9bt
https://flic.kr/p/2mxK9a6
https://flic.kr/p/2mxEqVX
GigRig for the power supply and I love the patchbay built in, all I do just plug in the power cord and the guitar and then outs to the PA or an amp o FRFR. I just have to do decide how to mount the expression pedal. (And even decide if I actually want it on the board or an a fly lead off to one side.)
First proper pedalboard ever.
Nice looking board! I love the patchbay too...
I think you need to get the set-square out on a couple of those top row pedals though... 😉
Set-square? - thats the day job. I don't do right angles after 6pm. 🙂
One day I'll sort out a pedal board, one day. Thanks for the inspiration.
Your comment "favourite" had me thinking "which is my favourite guitare". The acoustic is easy, my Epi Texan with a 41mm nut. The electric is far more complicated. A guitar will be left hanging on the wall for months then get taken down because it's good for a particualr tune and stay down for months as I readopt it. I can't even decide which is my favourite neck, two are more or less identical (Fender), but the others are different widths, radii, frets, woods, profiles, finishes... . As I sit playing a Warmoth shredder neck with a 43mm nut I think "should I have ordered it with a 41 or 42mm nut". Spoilt for choice. Or just plain spoilt. 🙂
Favourite and Best?
My 'best' guitar is my least favourite, and I'm not sure what to do about this situation. It's a Les Paul Standard which is a work of art. After 6 years at university, I spent my first paycheque on the first instalment, the guitar I wanted ever since I started playing. All my guitar heroes had one. It's got a flawless flamed maple top with honey burst, and hanging on the wall, it looks <chef's kiss>.
But... I don't love playing it and I'm always reaching for the Tele first. The LP is a bit lardy, the neck is a bit big, the sound a bit dark for me. Perhaps I'm just a Fender guy? It feels weird playing a (relatively) cheap Mexican Tele or Strat and leaving the expensive thing collecting dust. But at the same time, it's a lovely object and it represents a particular period in my life, so I don't think I can bring myself to sell it. Perhaps the answer is to buy a really expensive Custom Shop Strat so I can end up playing my 'best' guitar all the time. Does anyone else feel guilty for neglecting an expensive guitar? WWSTWD?
My best and favourite guitar is a quilted maple top Japanese Tokai Les Paul from the early 2000s I've had from new.
Best playing and sounding out of any of my guitars and with an HB-sized P90 in the neck and treble bleed caps it's also the most versatile.
The one guitar I'll never sell.
I do normally play my Dean Z explorer on stage though as it's cooler looking
Strat update: https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/my-lockdown-project-complete-guitar-content/#post-12064532
Am I allowed to call it 'Red'?
Been doing some looping recently. This is a pretty ambitious one. Realised I’m ok if I can scrub out mistakes, but doing it flawlessly in a single take is really hard. Single pedal loop, one take.
Anyway, it’s good fun.
I like that a lot. Nice work.
Good work and topical. I'm intrigued how you do that with just one loop. How about doing a Youtube?
I thought about doing a video (dressed in Tux, naturally), but it seemed like a lot of work!
Brief explanation: It's one loop, overdubbed. Using my Helix floor which has a built in looper.
Start the loop, did the first two bars you hear, then close the loop. Overdubbed the 'drum' track (muted strings), then stopped overdubbing while playing the main theme. Overdubbing back on for the rest of the mix, with various layers of effects and bass sim at different times. I struggled to end it coherently, I just ended up abruptly stopping the loop and playing the last bit as a normal guitar part.
I have done a better 'mix' with stereo panning of different parts which sounds cool (and a slightly more accurately timed loop) but I found it too complex to fit it all into one take.
Who knows about Tremolos?
I want one of my guitars to have a trem.
My current one is a Harley Benton PRS copy. It's a really enjoyable thing to play. I've set it up really well, with the help of a local luthier who filed the nut for me. It's now got Kent Armstrong noiseless P90s so I've spent as much on upgrades as it cost but the trem is awful. It goes out of tune as soon as it's used so I blocked it off. It's (or says it's) a Wilkinson, but came as standard on a Chinese £200 guitar so who knows?
My future guitar is a Telecaster. Well, it will be as soon as I've made it. There's a brilliant local maker near to me, MD Guitars, and Martin Dixon does "build your own" courses. As a carpenter - well, why wouldn't I? I've seen some Telecaster tremolos from Wudtone and Super-Vee Maverick that have the brass saddles and ashtray bridges with the diagonal pickup cutout. Yes, I know they cost getting on for £200 but I'm going to be spending a fair bit on the guitar. Martin makes excellent instruments and he assures me the end result will be worth it.
So, what's the chance of one of those being any good at keeping in tune? Or should I replace the "Wilkinson" on the Harley Benton with a good quality Strat type trem that should fit straight in, with minimum re-working?
Thanks for the explantion, Superficial, my ears told me a lot was going on and you've confirmed it. A nicely constructed piece.
I've managed to get every trem I've spent time on to balance and stay acceptably in tune, BigJohn.
Essentials are:
1/ strings sliding freely through the nut. Infuences are the position of string trees (I prefer just one on e and B and not too close to the nut), the cut of the nut (not tight), lubrication (a bit of pencil lead) and the strings (some cheap ones dont slide well).
2/ the 2/6 screws holding the trem on, the trem needs to move smoothly and return to the same point each time which it won't if the screws are too tight or too loose.
3/ The height of the saddles. You can get the same action with low saddles and a high trem or visa versa. I find it easier to balance the trem if the saddles are quite high but this does limit how much the trem can raise a note - but means you can dive bomb lower.
My experience of trems suggest that most problems are set up or expecting too much from a non locking system.
A well made nut and good string trees are essential. Without these you will struggle to get back in tune. Crappy tuners can cause problems as can poor stringing technique with too many winds or overlapping winds on the posts.
The bridge itself has seldom been a problem if it has been installed and tweaked properly. 6 bolt Strat trems have a definite need to be understood before you tighten or loosen the screws too much. There are a lot of good videos on setup on the Tube of You.
The tone and note selection/fingering on that James Bond one above are nice but the timing makes me feel queasy.
Just trying to get Little Wing proper sorted and I found this great take of it with some signicant guys commenting...
“Does anyone else feel guilty for neglecting an expensive guitar?”
I struggle with playing more than one instrument in a given phase of my life. My first proper bass was a nice old Warwick, one I got that I defretted my beginner bass but it didn’t get used much. Then I had a custom five built and the Warwick got sidelined. Now I’ve got a StingRay and the other two have been sidelined. I got given a Wattplower and that isn’t really me. If I didn’t need them for work I’m not sure what I’d do - I don’t like instruments sitting around unused, it feels wrong!
Ironically 99% of my playing time over the last few years has been on a cheap acoustic bass guitar I got to play at home. Just came up with the bones of a new song on it:
https://soundcloud.app.goo.gl/K8YAj8n5uixSsUZi6
I feel there's a single-coil missing in my life. I've got a p90 loaded Les Paul, and some split coils on another Les Paul. But it's still not that Fendery twang and spank.
What would you guys reckon is worth looking at, single-coiled. My head is just stuck in Strats or Teles!
Blues, and rock, and a bit of smashing it through a Hoof fuzz for fun.
How about a Duo Sonic? Short scale fun with a choice of a bridge 'bucker or single coil.
Jaguar/Jazzmaster?
But you won’t go wrong with a Strat or Tele…
Hey guys
My kid has Solar guitar with a Floyd rose tremolo...he has had it a year now .
My question is do you need to change on this type guitar every year to keep the tune?
Do you mean do you need to change the strings often?
If so, it depends on much you play. And how much you care about tone and staying in tune.
Bedroom playing a couple of hours a day, I'd probably change once a month.
Playing a couple of hours a day? That means I'd have to change strings about once every two years! (I do share the playing between several guitars, though) 🙂
Yes sorry ..seemed to miss the word strings...lol
He hasd a problem with a certain string last month D I think....it was intune but 12th fret it wasn't.
In the end I sussed it was because he had changed 2 strings in 12 months and they were changed to regular slinkys....and because the other strings were blacksmiths.. it was causing the Floyd Rose be out ( well its what ithink anyway).
So I changed all the strings to new reg slinkys and hey presto..its back in tune.
Wow once a month..he does play a fair bit, he likes his rock and thrash metal..so when he plays , he plays hard!!
He best get himself a part time job..ha ha ha
What would you guys reckon is worth looking at, single-coiled.
If you want a Strat, buy a Strat. Otherwise, a Tele.
I'll elaborate a bit: Strats are great guitars, they're obviously perfect for certain tones of some great musicians, and they're super comfy/playable for me. So if you want a guitar to specifically emulate a Strat tone, there's only one choice and a Teles can't really get that near. But Teles are far more versatile - if you want a generally playable, do-everything guitar, I wouldn't go for a Strat. I'd go for a Tele, ideally with some parallel-->serial switching. In your case if you have other guitars to cover that warmer humbucky ground, I'd be tempted by a Strat.
Obviously there are non-Fender options too. I keep ogling Yamaha Revstars. Or Jaguars. Or Jazzmasters.
But Teles are far more versatile – if you want a generally playable, do-everything guitar, I wouldn’t go for a Strat.
Bollocks.
I’d like to be polite but Strats are versatile.
A strat will do most of what a Tele will and then some more, they're versatile. I've got both but whenever there's a public I take the Tele. If I break a string it stays in tune and then there's the sound. The first time I heard a Tele live was Slade at Birmingham town hall in 72. Nod was using his black Noddycaster and the intros to each song were glorious. This one in particular:
I will admit a weakness for country too: Vince Gill, Brad Paisley, James Burton... . And pop, the pretenders, Francis Cabrel... . And punk... . And. A Tele covers them all just fine. I like the P90 sound too, Téléphone in particular. Humbuckers? Plugged straight into a Marshall you get "that sound". But most of the time I don't want "that sound". I'm forever flicking the split switch and wishing there was more bottom end growl and chime split, or not quite so much dirt in bucking mode.
Learning “Can’t find my way home” for a gig next month and after a bit of searching on the Tubes this opted up in my recommendations. I really like it.
BTW: No relation to Edukator’s Slade link...
Oh, and re the gig mentioned above I've got my 'flyrig' tidied up. Well it sounds better than saying my Cross Country rail service rig...
It looks so sweet in its little gigbag that I'm in danger of adult onset diabetes.
https://flic.kr/p/2mAozbu
https://flic.kr/p/2mAozdD
https://flic.kr/p/2mAtYUs
I can run it mono (or stereo) into an amp or two using the different IRs built in or via balanced outs using XLR adapters to the PA direct.
That's some pretty neat wiring (though if you had right angle connectors, it would be even neater...) 🙂
Looks great, though. I'm sure it sounds ace, too. I had a band rehearsal tonight and I'm trying to just live with my Victory Kraken and a Barefaced 10in cab. It's a tiny and hugely loud setup. And it (just) goes clean enough that I can get the three sounds out of it I need (pushed clean, crunch and bonkers, with two different volume levels on a switch too).
Ta for the nice words.
right angle connectors
They’re BOSS solderless so they’re straight or right angled depending on how I fold them. 🙂
Got to say I’m pretty happy with it. I can pop the FS7 footswitch off and throw my Ditto on there and plug the Expresion pedal in if I want. All looks pretty good. Looking to get a Tone Master Deluxe to go with it. Although I have already got another Line6 L2m to handle modelled output.
None of which will ever get really used as I am playing mainly through my Waza Air headphones these days..
Let me know how the TM Deluxe is... It's on my list for a living room amp - that or a new Vibroverb Champ thing (though they still haven't come out!)
I can tell you how ot is- ficken awesome. sadly the one I wanted got snapped up by someone else. One will be mine, but this one was in tweed and a good price.
Good afternoon Chips
I'm interested how the bare faced cabs are?
Many thanks
Lorne
The Barefaced cab is awesome! I've been running either an EVH Lunchbox, or a Victory Kraken into it. It's a 1x10 version, which is tiny and light - really light. But it competes perfectly well with a loud drummer and a deaf lead guitarist. The 1x12 perhaps has a tiny bit more bass, but the 1x10 is so teeny and loud that I went for that instead.
My only issue is that the head is so small, that other amp heads won't fit on top of it 🙂
Barefaced does a moneyback, 30 day trial, so it's well worth a try if you're interested. Or if you're passing Todmorden any time...
Hi Chipps
Thank you for the run down
I have a small head that would go perfectly with it. Just never tried one
Appreciate the offer of trying yours but 'london' so not many opportunities as I'd like to get home where you are
Cheers
Lorne
No problem. Have a look on their website - they do a 'Buy now and send it back after 30 days if you don't love it' offer. I got a 10 and a 12in cab and tried both and returning the 12in...
It's actually so tiny that I have a little folding stool to take to rehearsals to put it on. Perhaps I can persuade them to do me a 2 x 10 vertical cab, just so it's a better height to adjust the amp knobs... 🙂
Learning some songs takes longer than others. I'm still having a go at Pinball Wizard from time to time and having watched Townsend do it acoustic live on Youtube tried again. The G string intonation at the 12th isn't good because I'm trying a thicker string which makes it 10cents sharp.
Sounds good. Interesting how it has evolved in your performance of it. Sounds better as an acoustic number to me.
Any thoughts on software or gear to create some backing tracks for me to play my bass along to.
I have a Mac and an iPad and a midi keyboard controller, but I’m also looking at the volca beats units.
Any ideas / suggestions?
Have you not discovered the drummers in Garageband on the Mac? You're a few clicks away from endless, automated, customisable drum tracks.
Also the ipad version of Garageband has a great sequencer style drum machine that's easy to get your head around for beginners.
Thanks, I’ll have a look
Hi,
Is this wire suppose to be disconnected? It’s connected to the bridge. If not, what should it be connected to? Thanks.
