I’ve been working on my music…. man.

Posted on by kylar

Over the last couple months I’ve become more interested in working on my guitar stuff. For the last 10 years or so I’ve been playing through the exact same stuff: an american standard strat, or a washburn electric (KC-40) straight into a multi-effects unit, a Boss GT-6 and direct into the PA. Very little mess, no fuss. And it was pretty good. That’s the problem. As I’ve come to realize recently, (slowly, actually, over the course of the last 6 months or so: “great is the enemy of good”). And so I decided that I didn’t want to have good tone anymore. I wanted *GREAT* tone. So I set out on my quest. I started using my tube amp again (Fender HotRod) – great clean tone. Great reverb. Horrible crunch. I looked at two people who had tone I liked. Dave Matsumura and a friend of mine, Steve garber. I talked to them about what they used. Dave pointed me to Fulltone pedals, and they were great. Steve talked to me about delays. I went to guitar showcase and tried different stuff. I read forums about what people liked. Then I tried stuff. And more stuff. Aaron loaned me some pedals. Andy Loaned me a crybaby. Try this. Try that. This guitar. That guitar. The fulltone stuff blew me away. The Crybaby wah didn’t. Andy says “Try a VOX.” Someone points me to H20 pedals. I got a bonus this fall and bought the ones I really liked. Then asked for one at christmas. Swapped some tubes on my Hot Rod to get more power tube saturation. Finally I’m getting to where I like my tone. I’m not satisfied yet, since I want to shape the sound a little more. Anyways, here’s where I ended up:

Pedal Board
Pedal Board

I’ll use these to show you what is what(B = Bottom, T = Top, number = from left, so T1 = top left, B5=Bottom right (Vox Wah).

  • T1: Canuck Custom A/B Box (Green)
  • T2: Boss DD-3 Digital Delay (white)
  • T3: Ibanez SoundTank Chorus (black)
  • T4: DOD/Digitech Stereo Flanger (GFX75) (green)
  • T5: DOD Compressor/Sustainer (FX80-B) (orange)
  • B1: Fender Amp Footswitch (Channel, Drive/More Drive)
  • B2: Fulltone Fulldrive-2 (blue)
  • B3: Fulltone OCD (white)
  • B4: Passive Volume Pedal (black)
  • B5: Vox 847 Wah (black/silver)

My signal flow goes as follows: Guitar->B5->B4->T5->B3->B2->T4->T3->T2->T1->Amp

A/B Box

Posted on by kylar

Last night I built an A/B box for my guitar setup (to switch between two signal paths, usually effects->Amp A/Amp B or Guitar -> Signal Path/Tuner. It was a first little foray to see if I could do something like this. It worked out pretty well – I got a diagram from www.fulltone.com and pretty much copied it – I got most of the parts from pedalparts – although with the exception of the 3pdt switch you could get them all at frys for about $15. if it’s not plugged in to power, the LED’s don’t work, but for some reason, the power seems to add a tiny bit of noise. I’m not sure why yet.
ab box inside
A/B Box

State Of The World, Pre-Halloween

Posted on by kylar

So I’ve been wanting a ‘classic’ strat for a while, and when I got a small bonus at work recently, I decided that I was going to sell my other strat (2000 American Standard) and buy a ’62 reissue. I sold it this week and have been checking around to see where I can get a good deal. They had one at Guitar Showcase but not in any of the colors I want (I wanted Olympic White, Seafoam Green or 3-tone sunburst). List $2K, Sale price $1399. I have a friend that works at an online music retailer who said he could get it for around $1100-1150, depending on the color (apparently the sunburst is more expensive.) And he could either get it during the Christmas window or here at their local store when he was back for Thanksgiving. I went over to the store and they didn’t have any of them in stock, and said they’d have to special order it (with a deposit) if I wanted it. After hanging out with my wife, I convinced her to come back to Guitar Showcase and check out the guitar and show her the colors I was thinking of. (She rolls her eyes but puts up with me! Love ya hun!) And after we do that, I show her the ‘vintage’ room where they have some amazing guitars and such behind glass, and a bunch of Fender Custom shop stuff, custom relic’s etc. And as we’re leaving the vintage room, I see tucked behind another guitar, a ’62 reissue sunburst. I check the tag and it’s on Consignment. I pull it out and look it over, and it’s unreal, completely unused, tags and plastic still on the pickguard.
It looked as though it had never been used, ever. The guy goes to check on the listing and eventually comes back with the case, brown tolex, perfect shape, not a single nick even on the case. So what do I do? Look with pleading eyes at my amazing wife who, with great wisdom tells me “Pay for it so we can go get the kids.” Pictures coming soon.

In Other News: We appeared on Mystery Diagnosis this week, the episode was called “The Woman Who Craved Pickles”, and it wasn’t as horrible as I thought it was going to be.

Also, my virtual band is going to play a real gig. Well, half of us anyways. Will update further.