Plaid Blues, 4xEL84s, Know Anyone Who Owns a Hiwatt?

I’m surfing around, minding my own bidness, when I come across this line: “What do you call an amp that has 10 tubes, five transformers, user-controlled variable feedback, variable bias and a built-in Variac?”
I’m thinking, I don’t know…a science experiment? The last act of a tone-desperate man? [...]

Pete vs. John, Hecklers, Feedback
You probably know that Pete Townshend had an important role in Marshall Amplification becoming what it is today. You probably have heard that Pete is responsible for the Marshall stack.
That’s all true, but you may not know the details (I didn’t). So here goes.

All Fender Except the Joe Walsh Rig
I recently subscribed to Guitar Player’s GP2 on-line mag (subscribe here – it’s free) because this time I saw Pete Townshend on the cover. Had to read it, and glad I did. Following are some cool tone-making and tone-recording excerpts from the interview.

Plus Roger’s First Impression of EVH
Here’s the second part of my 3-part interview with founding Heart member Roger Fisher – who unfortunately for all of us hasn’t gotten his due over the years.
Although there’s no doubt, you can tell he’s a guitarist merely by the fact that he can recall his gear details from three [...]

Foreigner is a funny band. One of their songs will cause you to change the station, another will cause you to crank it up – because Mick Jones can throw out cool riffs.
I’ve always been curious about the specifics of Mick’s early Foreigner gear, but there isn’t much info on the web about it. So [...]

Part 2 of 2; Plus George’s Vintage Parts Guitars
If you read part 1 of the Lynch Mob’s Smoke and Mirrors review, you know I’m digging the album. (I’m also really digging Lynch’s Souls of We disc – more on that in a future post.) But what’s odd about it, from a Lynch standpoint, is a [...]

Vid: ‘The Spirit of Radio Lesson’ from Alex

Even though I played in bands that copped multiple tunes off Rush’s Moving Pictures album, my favorite Rush album is Permanent Waves. The band was just on fire for that recording. Lots of energy, great parts, great arrangements that are complex yet understandable.
Did I say great?

I’ve started looking into Tommy Bolin. I’ve heard the name for years, but never looked into him. Still haven’t much, but when researching Bolin on YouTube, I found out that he must have replaced Joe Walsh in the James Gang, and my reaction was: Wait a minute. Joe Walsh? James Gang? There HAD to be [...]