Guitars and Accessories

Topics related to guitars, guitar parts, and accessories like cables and pedals

Amplifying your Godin or other Acoustic Guitar

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Godin A6 Koa Extreme

 

Here at UpFront Guitars we sell a lot of Godin and Simon and Patrick acoustic or thinline acoustic guitars. All these guitars have built in electronics, and in most cases the buyer does not ask me for advice on how to amplify it. Without a doubt, amplifying an acoustic or even the thinline Godin acoustic-electrics is a challenging proposition. Despite major advances in on-board electronics, getting a natural sounding amplified tone still takes some work. There are multiple ways to approach amplifying an acoustic guitar with on-board electronics, and here are a few suggestions we’ve stumbled on along the way:

Straight it the Mixer – For many performers, direct into the board is a very common approach. However, many mixer preamps are not that friendly for acoustics and the sound can be a little flat and uninspiring. This gives rise to the Acoustic Preamp, which is typically a stomp box with EQ parameters specially voiced for acoustic guitars. Quite often Acoustic preamps feature special “notch” filtering to help fight feedback, and the ability to adjust not only the gain but center frequency of the all-important midrange. At minimum they also serve to convert the Hi-Z 1/4″ jack signal from the guitar to a Lo-Z XLR input for the mixer. There are many manufacturers of these products including some well know names like L.R. Baggs, Radial, Tech 21, BBE and others. These products run from $129 to $500 for the Taylor K4. My feeling that going “naked” into the mixer is not going to yield desirable results, and some type of signal conditioning is needed.

Tube or Microphone Preamps – An alternative to a specific acoustic preamp stomp box is a microphone preamp. These can range from $99 for an ART tube preamp to thousands of dollars for an Avalon, Universal Audio or other high end studio stuff. In general these are tube-driven devices that are intended to offer a softer, warmer sound and natural analog compression via a vacuum tube circuit. For short money, we’ve played around with a basic ART MP Studio V3 Tube Preamp ($75) and it certainly takes the harsh edge off a piezo-based transducer, and offers some basic amount of tone shaping. Mic preamps also have lots of other uses besides acoustic guitars, so it’s a multi-functional tool. You can spend a ton of money here, so consider whether you are looking for a product for live performance in front of a bunch of drunk people, or a critical recording application.

Powered Speakers – Chances are these days that if you are playing your acoustic into the mixer, there is a good chance that the mixer is feeding a powered 2-way speaker. Powered speakers rule the world of portable and small-medium PA systems, and they also make excellent stand-alone acoustic amplifiers. For most acoustic electric guitar demos our favorite tool is a QSC K-10 powered speaker. It has plenty of power, and the full range frequency response needed to produce complex acoustic guitar tones (acoustics have a wider frequency range and more complex overtones than an electric). Plus as opposed to an electric guitar amplifier, powered speakers typically have a specific woofer and tweeter to accurately produce high an low frequencies. A good preamp, maybe a little reverb and a high quality powered PA speaker is a killer combination, even if you are also feeding the mixer.

Conventional Electric Guitar Amplifiers – As a rule most electric guitar amplifiers are pretty lousy at amplifying acoustic guitars. Mostly because the amplifiers are not designed to produce the wide frequency range needed for a natural acoustic sound. The extended high end needed for an acoustic simply is not needed for an electric guitar, or would have an electric sound overly harsh or icy. But in a pinch, some guitar amplifiers can do a pretty good job, and if you want an amp that can do double duty there are a couple things to look for. First is speaker surface area. More speakers are better, and generally smaller speakers are better than bigger ones. A 2×10 will produce a more detailed sound than a 1×12, and a 4×10 is better than a 2×12 or 1×15. Smaller speakers with lighter weight moving parts can easily produce more detail and nuance than a big 12″ speaker with a 50 ounce magnet. A midrange control is also very handy, and even better if your amp has an active (versus passive) midrange control. Shaping these critical frequencies can mean the difference between a reasonably natural sound and a honky, nasal box o’ noise.

Also, some of the earlier guitar amplifiers based on designs from tube manufacturing handbooks make pretty good acoustic amps. Why? Because they were really not “guitar amp” designs, but rather full-range tube amplifier designs adapted to amplifying guitars. Amps like the Fender Bassman make very good acoustic amplifiers because they are essentially full range amplifiers with four small low-mass speakers in a pine box. We use our Fender Bassman Ltd Reissue to check out acoustics prior to shipping, and it sounds remarkably good. However, our Dr. Z Remedy through a similar 4×10 cabinet with the same speakers as the Bassman sounds more closed and dull. The Remedy is an excellent electric guitar amp, while the Bassman origins are more hi-fi than guitar. Jason Mraz uses two blackface Fender amplifiers for his live stage sound and mixer feed, and his live guitar sound is killer. Surface area and those simple Fender schematics do a great job.

Aurel Exciters – An Aurel Exciter (such as the BBE Sonic Maximizer) use frequency dependent phase shifting and dynamic equalization of (usually) higher order harmonics to make music sound more alive, distinct, and lend a greater feeling of note separation. I really like the results using this type of effect with acoustic guitars, and it’s part of my band’s live acoustic rig. Aurel Exciters are also frequently used in the studio to perk up dull recordings without making them sound overly bright. Aphex and BBE are the best known names in this type of product, and it’s also available as a software plug-in for recording software.

Dedicated Acoustic Amplifiers – I don’t have much to say about dedicated acoustic amplifiers, because it’s been years since I’ve used one. Acoustic guitar amplifiers are optimized specifically for acoustic guitars, and typically have active equalization, and high and low frequency (woofer/tweeter) transducers. As such they are generally overly bright and unsuitable for electric guitars, and if you do double duty with your band, you’re faced with hauling two amps. It just seems more logical to bring your favorite electric guitar amp, and work out a good sounding direct setup for the acoustic.

The Lowdown – Electric guitar players are known to be obsessive about their tone, but acoustic guitars are equally if not more challenging to dial in. A warm, natural sounding acoustic guitar can add a lot of character and richness to any band. Study your acoustic setup, and give it the same attention to detail as you would your solid body. Getting a good sound make take some experimentation, but it’s not necessary to spend hundreds of dollars to spruce up your amplified acoustic tone.

The Godin Core P90 – A New Sound is Waiting for You

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In the interest of full disclosure, I do sell Godin guitars. Actually I sell quite a few Godin guitars, although most of them are the Multiac Electro-Acoustics and the Kingpin Archtop Series. These are guitars that are fairly unique in the marketplace, and for that reason do quite well. In the case of the Multiac series, there is probably nothing better for trouble-free acoustic sound in a live performance setting, especially with a loud band clattering away.

I also carry Godin solid body guitars too, but these often move much slower as buyers more often than not buy a Fender, Gibson, Epiphone, or if a younger guitarist an ESP or Ibanez. This is too bad, as Godin makes as nice a solid body guitar as anybody, and they are made in the USA and Canada to boot. But the lure of the brand is a very powerful thing, and to some degree why buy a Stratocaster-shaped Godin when one can buy a Stratocaster from Fender, and depending on your price point pay anywhere from $199 to $4000?

But instead of having the Fender-versus-the-world discussion, how about trying a guitar that really can really do something different for your tone and your playing? What I’m talking about here is the Godin Core P90. Yes, it is shaped very much like a Les Paul, and yes it has two P-90 pickups, but the world is not choking on P-90 Les Paul’s like it is Stratocasters. So while the Core is derivative, it’s derivative of something that is not all that common in the marketplace. That’s sounds like a questionable marketing plan, but bear with me.

The Core P90 uses a chambered mahogany body with a flat maple top. The chambered body keeps the guitar around 8 pounds, and the maple top gives the guitar a nice high end response. Although it’s not a carved top, it still looks pretty, and besides this is a guitar that you can score for around $850. It’s got a mahogany set neck with rosewood fingerboard, Gibson length scale, a GraphTech wrap tailpiece with adjustable saddles, three-way switch and individual volume and tone controls for each pickup. All good stuff, none of it screams high end, but it’s all far from budget or cheesy.

For pickups the Core uses a Seymour Duncan SP90-1 in the neck and a hotter SP90-3 in the bridge. I’ve heard more than one person remark that they don’t like P-90 pickups, and there are several reasons for this, and some quite justifiably so. A P-90 pickup can sound muffled and dark in an all mahogany guitar. The great exception to this is when they are used with a dog ear mounting like the Les Paul Junior. Getting the pickup up and out of the body really seems to help. Another reason for P-90 disdain is that there are a lot of lousy ones out there. There is temptation to wind them too hot, creating dark nasal pickups that are one-dimensional and have no harmonic qualities at all. Stick these in an all-mahogany guitar and all you’ll want to be is Pete Townsend at the end of the show so you can smash the damn thing to pieces.

So after some initial trepidation upon reading the specs on the Duncan’s, I was more than happy with how they sounded. No doubt helped by the maple top and chambered body, the neck pickup was clear and clean with good note definition, and a midrange that was fat enough to punch but still had a little bit of scoop to it when played up the neck. Single notes had enough girth to stand out, but the overall tone was not so thick as to discourage heavy strumming. Great for the blues, me thinks.

The SP90-3 bridge pickup is considerably hotter in output than the neck, but again I was pleasantly surprised with its overall clarity and lack of harshness. A P-90 in the bridge is the quintessential recipe for classic rock tones. The fat midrange works great with pedals or low powered amps, and the high end is ample enough to produce a lot of sparkle without getting icy or brittle like — you guessed it — a Stratocaster. Whether dialed in to a level of mild crunch like AD/DC or with heavy distortion, a good P-90 is an indispensable rock weapon.

But wait, there’s more. Unlike most of their guitars, Godin very wisely equipped the Core with individual volume and tone controls. This is not a guitar you should just play with everything on ten: With both pickups engaged, small adjustments of volume, tone, or both create varying shades of bright, dark, warm and cool that can expand your playing in ways that you’ve never considered. Neck a little too dark? Blend in some bridge. Bridge not thick enough? Add a little neck. Roll down the tone a little on one of the pickups and you get an almost out-of-phase growl. If you thought a 5-way switch was versatile, you’re in for a real treat.

And if you are a fan of Fender amps, your day just got even better. P-90’s love Tweeds or Deluxe style amps, where the leaner tone of the Fender circuits complement the chunky nature of the P-90. The Core P90 sounds magical through our Bassman Ltd, and positively rips when plugged into the gain side of the 6V6 powered Andrews Para-Dyne 20.

So while most of the world is buying another Stratocaster thinking it’s going to be radically more awesome than their other Stratocasters, here is a guitar that will give you some seriously good tones — different tones — for not a lot of money. The set neck and shorter string length will also provide a different feel and response than a bolt-on 25.5″ string length guitar. There is of course nothing wrong with a Strat: It’s the world’s most popular guitar design. But different guitars make you play differently, unlock different tones and musical thoughts, and expand your range of creativity.

With their Core P90, Godin is building a great guitar that not many people are paying attention to. This chambered maple top P-90 guitar is lean enough that Strat players won’t freak, thick enough that Les Paul players will still dig it, and flexible way beyond its 3-way pickup switch. Does it need anything? Maybe a good wiring kit with better caps and a treble bleed on the volume controls. The tuning machines are nothing fancy, but there are no issues with them either. There are plenty of cork-sniffer P-90’s out there, but for my money I like the sound of this guitar more than their Lollar P-90 equipped Icon 3. Of course that has a mahogany top and an ebony fingerboard, which slides it more to the dark side. No, it really does not need to be “improved” right out of the box. As I sometimes say to my customers, “Be secure enough to spend less.” This is one of those times.

 

 

 

Flat Sawn or Quarter Sawn neck for your G&L?

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When ordering a G&L guitar, there is quite a list of options to choose from. One of the lesser known options is whether to get the standard flat sawn neck, or the optional quarter sawn neck? So what is the difference and does it matter?

Nearly all production necks today are made from what is known as flat sawn lumber. I am not a wood expert, but essentially there is a greater yield of flat sawn lumber for necks when cutting up a tree. Greater yield means lower cost. How do you know if your neck is flat sawn? On a bolt-on maple neck guitar the easiest way to check is to look at the end of the neck where it butts up against the neck pocket. If the grain of the wood is parallel to the fingerboard, it’s flat sawn. The picture below is courtesy of Alberto Bolocan’s blog — or at least he used it too —  and Alberto has some very detailed information on the various sawing techniques.

As you can see, the quarter sawn neck has the grain of the wood perpendicular to the fingerboard.  Having the grain of the wood perpendicular to fingerboard results in a measurably stiffer neck. As you can imagine, bending a piece of wood with the grain is much easier than bending a piece of wood perpendicular or “against” the grain. The density of the quarter sawn lumber is sometimes higher too, also contributing to greater stiffness.

So you can expect a quarter sawn neck to be stiffer, and affected less by changes in weather. This is especially handy with bass guitars and their longer necks, or with guitarists that like to use heavier gauge strings. I find that when setting up a quarter sawn neck that they are naturally very flat, and sometimes it’s hard to get enough relief (bow) out of the neck. Changing up or down a gauge on strings will likely have no effect on a quarter sawn neck.

Quarter sawn necks are also felt to be brighter and more responsive than a flat sawn neck. This is due both to the increased stiffness of the neck and the higher density of the wood. I would generally agree with this observation, although it’s hard to make direct comparisons without actually changing necks on the same guitar. In general though quick attack and good note clarity are characteristic of a quarter sawn neck.

As a side benefit, the grain pattern of the headstock looks really neat when quarter sawn, especially with a vintage tint.

So is quarter sawn worth the money? This option typically adds about $75 to the price of a G&L, so for most people it’s not a deal breaker. If you tour, or live in an area with wide swings in temperature or humidity, a quarter sawn neck is absolutely more stable and will require fewer adjustments. The sonic differences are not dramatic, but if your preference run towards a snappy instrument with a solid attack it certainly cannot hurt. We recently received a custom order guitar — Classic Custom Semi Hollow — with a flame maple top and quarter sawn maple neck. The combination of reflective maple top and stiff neck resulted in a remarkably clean and detailed sound that really projected unlike a garden variety ASAT.

Whether it’s freedom from occasional adjustments or the desire for a more responsive instrument, a quarter sawn neck is a low cost option with obvious benefits.

Fender: 25 Years at the Ensenada Factory

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We sometimes like to take pleasure in kicking the big guys when they are down. GM, Goldman Sachs, Microsoft…the Yankees. Seeing the seemingly invincible struggle sometimes makes us little guys feel better. In the world of guitars, certainly the two electric heavyweights Fender and Gibson have had their share of troubles. Fender has been in headlines for their struggling profitability and the much publicized IPO that never happened (probably because the Private Equity people realized that the stock value just wasn’t there). Gibson of course hit the papers with their government raid and fines related to the improper importation of restricted hardwoods. I still maintain that if everyone else in the industry can manage to buy fingerboards legally, then Gibson most likely was doing something not kosher. Also there’s just something about a $3500 guitar with lacquer drips, but that’s for another day.

Fender however recently hit a real milestone with the 25th anniversary of their manufacturing facility in Ensenada, Mexico. What is so great you say about celebrating a factory that makes guitars in Mexico rather than in the USA? The importance of the Fender Ensenada factory is that over two decades ago Fender realized that as global competition would continue to drive manufacturing to low cost countries, that is was better to control their destiny rather than subcontract it. The Fender factory in Mexico now employs over 1000 people and occupies over a quarter million square feet, turning out electric guitars, acoustics, and amplifiers.

It would be nice to think that this manufacturing could have stayed in the US, but by nature guitar making is labor intensive. And with 80% of the worlds guitar market being under $600, nearly all this market is going to be fulfilled by suppliers in low cost countries. In a recent Music Trades article about the Fender plant, it was pointed out that in 1990 China produced 0% of the world’s guitars. Now China produces over 70% of the world’s guitars, but only 45% of the total market value. In other words, they make a boatload of inexpensive guitars. And most of these China factories don’t have names that we would recognize. They are contract manufacturers that produce guitars and then brand them with names that we do recognize. This is how much of the consumer product world works, but it’s hardly the image we like to have of guitar making as a craft.

Fender deserves a lot of credit for investing to maintain control over their intellectual property, their manufacturing processes, designs, materials and product quality. Building a factory is a huge undertaking, and it would have been much less expensive for Fender to just find a factory to build their designs. However, when we stop manufacturing, we also lose touch with the skills and technology to actually create the product. Product designers who know how their designs are made invariably design better products. Take a guitar pickup for example: Here is a product where several companies can take the same wire, magnets and bobbins but all get different results. It’s the process of making the pickup as much as it is the actual design. When manufacturers and designers work together, products and quality naturally improve at a faster rate. The pace of product development increases too, and it takes less time to bring a new product to market. Although the factory is in Mexico, it’s a day trip from the Fender HQ in Arizona. They are in the same time zone and the same continent, and it makes a difference.

As a lot of people already know and appreciate, a “MIM” (Made in Mexico) Fender is a good quality product. It’s not a cheap guitar; it’s a guitar that delivers top value for the price point. As the factory continues to increase its capabilities, the price point and value of the MIM products  will continue to rise. From the standpoint of brand equity, the Fender MIM products are largely embraced by the guitar playing public, and while some would rather be playing a true USA Fender, nobody is being done a disservice by playing an Ensenada product.

Whether it is Foxconn producing the iPad or whoever actually makes Nike footwear, there is increasing separation between the creators of products and the manufacturers of the products. Some pundits will argue that owning the design is the only true value, and that manufacturing is strictly a matter of finding the lowest cost source. That’s how we get Barbie Dolls with lead paint, and why it’s hard to buy a Toaster Oven that will last more than three years. Guitars are not appliances or toys, and should not be built that way.

Fender has its share of troubles, and for some purists the only real Fender guitars are those made before 1965 when a man named Leo ran the company. But for people of normal means, Fender Ensenada products are the pathway to owning what are arguably the most recognizable shapes in rock and roll. Kudos to Fender for keeping the dream of rock and roll alive.

Will Country Music Save the Electric Guitar?

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If you’re a person of a certain age — let’s say over 35 — your definition of rock music is probably very different than somebody who is currently in high school or college. For the first forty years of rock music, the primary driving force was the electric guitar. From Scotty Moore backing up Elvis in the 50’s to Kurt Kobain in the 90’s the electric guitar was inseparable from the music.

But as rap, hip hop, house music and the generic category of dance pop came to dominate what was left of Top 40 radio, electric guitar and the guitarist started to fade into the background. In the realm of pop music, how easily can you name current popular figures that are known for playing guitar? Unless you are into really hard rock, metal, or ply the pages of Guitar Player it’s not easy to come up with many names. John Mayer perhaps, Dave Grolsch (sort of) but in general it’s a short list. Now of course you might do better if we include College Radio or Adult Contemporary, but in the world of Pop it’s pretty slim pickings.

Go back to any decade, and rock on the radio just oozed guitar. You name it: Chuck Berry, Beatles, Stones, Hendrix, Deep Purple, Steely Dan, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Bon Jovi, Aerosmith, Doobie Brothers, Def Leppard, Pearl Jam, Van Halen….you name it. I’m not even touching on the whole Hair Metal era which essentially revolved around pointy guitars and spandex.

Not all of this was great music, but it all featured guitar, and kids who listened to this music wanted to play guitar. What do they want to play today? Their Laptop? When a lot of today’s music can be sampled, programmed, or mashed, creating music may not involve playing an instrument at all.

For certain, I’m sounding like an old man right now, but this can’t really be good for guitar companies. If the music young people are listening to doesn’t inspire them to play guitar — or they don’t even hear a guitar — guitar sales are going to suffer. It’s not news that companies like Fender and Gibson are struggling, and while some of this is obviously related to the economy, popular music is less guitar driven than it used to be.

Which brings us to the potential savior of the Electric Guitar: Country Music. Go ahead and laugh, but if you want to hear a half-decent electric guitar player on pop radio these days, chances are it’s going to be in a country band. Country music has largely taken the place of rock music on Pop radio, and as it evolves it becomes increasingly less country and more like just like rock. Take away the vapid lyrics about dirt roads, beer and cut-off jeans and bands like Rascal Flats and Jason Aldean are churning out arena rock just like the old days. If you go back a decade or so, producer Mutt Lang (AC/DC’s, Def Leppard) practically created the genre of arena country with his then-wife Shania Twain and her blockbuster album Come on Over.

Country music even has its own guitar heroes. Guys like Brad Paisley and Keith Urban manage to be both really hot players and popular music figures. And in general, some of the most talented bands in popular music are the country bands. Say what you will about the actual star performer, but the bands backing these singers are sharp as a tack. And if you check out their gear you’ll see some interesting stuff: PRS, Mesa, Victoria, Marshall, and of course Brad and his Dr. Z’s. It’s a far cry from the Tele’s and Tweed that defined country music for years.

So if Country Music is the current curator and preserver of electric guitar, should we be concerned? If actual people are playing real guitars in real bands with other instruments but it also happens to be country music, do we look down in scorn? If you feel that way, take some Brent Mason, Vince Gill or Albert Lee and call me in the morning. Talent runs very deep in country music; it’s just that like most forms of music it gets processed and homogenized for popular consumption, often ending up like musical equivalent of Twinkies.

There are quite a few things that bug me about country music, such as the beer-and-wings lyrics, lack of tempo change, and such glossy production that any real energy is often sucked out of the song. But imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and what you have these days is a winning formula, with dozens of also-rans capitalizing on a trend. That’s not so different from any phase, whether it’s the British Invasion or Disco. There are always the creators and imitators. So while much of what is on country radio these days sounds totally packaged and phoned-in, that been true since to dawn of pop music.

I’m not trying to convince anyone to become a country music fan, and it’s certainly not my favorite format. But within any category of music there is true talent, and our job as music lovers is to look past what the “industry” is trying to sell us, and dig deeper to find the people that are truly making music. Country music is a big tent that runs from the traditional to essentially today’s version of pop-rock. In many ways it’s keeping the electric guitar in mainstream music, and if only for that, we rockers need to at least give it a deeper listen.

 

 

 

 

 

American Made Electric Guitars for around $1000

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Updated January, 2016

The solid body electric guitar is a uniquely American invention, but as most people know, very few of them are made in the USA anymore. As with many consumer products, the lure of low cost labor has drawn most manufacturing offshore. The first imports in the 60’s were from Japan, and then as costs rose there, manufacturing shifted to South Korea, then China, and now there is a growing industry in Indonesia. China is still the big dog in terms of guitar production, but as Chinese manufacturing costs continue to increase, more manufacturing will likely shift to Indonesia, and after that, who knows where?  Most players would be surprised to learn that South Korea accounts for only about 5% of electric guitar production, with the USA a couple points below that.

In practical terms, the average guitar player benefits from lower prices for musical instruments and gear. Given the combination of low labor costs and improved manufacturing technology, the bang-for-the-buck on guitars has never been better. About 44% of electric guitars purchased in 2011 cost less than $200. That’s just an astounding number, and even more astounding when you figure that these products are generally something you can actually play and that will stay in tune. Fully 80% of electric guitars purchased in 2011 cost less than $600. While I can’t be certain, I’ll wager that virtually none of these guitars were manufactured in the USA.

But what if you want to purchase something made in the USA, and you are on a budget? There are several options available, and if you are willing to head north of the border, the selection expands considerably. This is not meant to be a totally comprehensive list, but just some of the options out there for guitarists that want a good quality instrument and also support American manufacturing.

G&L – Barring a special release model, the days of a $1000 street price G&L are over. With new dealer and list pricing implemented in July 2015, your not going to see a 2015 G&L at this price; short of a desperate and/or math-challenged dealer blowing them out. There are still quite a few new 2014 models out there, and a base Legacy or SC-2 still might be had for around a grand. G&L continues to offer a unique value in terms of fit, finish, and the ability to special order. If you are willing to stretch your budget, you will be well rewarded.

Godin – Godin gets an honorable mention because while they don’t manufacture complete guitars in the USA, they assemble a variety of models in their New Hampshire facility from Canadian-made parts. Godin also uses a lot of locally sourced and sustainable woods like Maple, Basswood, and Cherry for their guitars. The Session and Progression and Core lines are examples of guitars assembled in the USA, and with a street price of around $500 the Session is a particularly good value. If you consider Canada as the 51st state, the all-Canadian Godin Core is our favorite both in P-90 and Humbucker trim. These street price for around $800, and there is just nothing not to like about them. They even use Seymour Duncan P-90 and bridge Humbucker pickups. Now for a $500 North American guitar don’t expect vintage Alnico pickups, and Godin does use PCB-mounted controls rather than hand-wired pots, but the setup and playability are first rate. All Godin guitars included a gig bag in the price.

Fender – One thing is for certain about Fender, and it’s that they offer a dizzying array of products that is both extensive, confusing, and often unnecessary.  But mixed in there is an assortment of Highway One and American Special guitars that offer good values and prices right at around $1000. Models seem to come and go in the Fender line with little or no warning, so what’s available at any given moment is hard to predict. The pickups in these guitars are decent if not awe inspiring, but overall these guitars are perfectly gig-worthy instruments and great platforms for hot-rodding. Keep in mind the price of these guitars either include no case, or a gig bag.

Gibson – Like Fender, Gibson suffers somewhat from product line schizophrenia. If you are browsing the major online retailers, models tend to come and go, at least from a standpoint of what’s being promoted at the moment. Gibson offers “faded” Les Paul and SG models with prices below $1000. There are also satin finish guitars both with flat and carved tops that come in under $1000. Gibson also offers Melody Maker and Les Paul Junior models, again with satin or aged finishes. We’ve tried the Les Paul Junior, and it’s pretty nifty with lots of bite out of the single dog-ear P-90, and good playing qualities. LP Juniors are fun guitars, and for a for pure elemental rock machine you can’t really go wrong. Gibson fit and finish can sometimes be a little variable, and if you want to mod the pickups or controls, you’ll likely be dealing with a printed circuit board (even if you spend thousands). As with Fender, gig bags may not be in the price, so consider that when you are shopping.

Carvin – By eliminating the retailer and going strictly direct, Carvin has been putting out a broad variety of attractively priced USA guitars for many years. Having never played their guitars I can’t say a wh0le lot, but my personal experience with their pro-audio and bass amplifiers tells me that they do deliver above average performance at a very competitive price. Provided you don’t option them up too much, their ST300, DC127, DC134/5, DC600 and Bolt-On  series guitars can all be had for under $1000. Carvin guitars can be custom built to order, and the array of options available from Carvin is pretty mind-boggling. For under $1000, your going to be looking at a fairly basic guitar — no quilt maple tops or Koa wood — but there is still a lot to choose from. Part of the option list is the case, and essentially you have to buy some sort of case, but the case pricing is very reasonable.

Summary – There is a good feeling about buying something made in the USA, and supporting American manufacturing. After all, the solid body electric guitar was born here, so why not buy one made in the USA? In this global world, made in USA is also subject to interpretation. For many product categories there are specific regulations that control whether a product can be labeled “made in USA” or “assembled in USA” etc. There is likely some amount of foreign content in any USA guitar, most notably electronic components, and of course certain woods like rosewood just don’t exist in the USA. Also, chances of finding a gig bag not made in China is pretty tough. So made in USA can sometimes be a fuzzy term, and certain components just cannot be sourced domestically. With that in mind, you can find a guitar in which the majority of the parts and labor come from domestic sources, and not break the bank doing so.

To see some of the American made guitars carried by UpFront Guitars for around $500 – $1200: www.upfrontguitars.com

 

The Guitar Pedal Boom – Too much of a good thing?

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As anyone who is even a casual player has noticed, the last few years have been truly explosive for the guitar effects market. The rise of stomp box mania has defied current economics trends — sales even grew during the recession —  and is now over a $60 million segment of the MI industry. The number of brands and selection is dizzying, and just browsing one particular online guitar website revealed that they carried over 120 brands!

Why are pedals so popular?

Well for starters, as far as guitar gear goes, pedals are cheap thrills. With the vast majority of pedals being priced under $150, it’s not a big investment to try out a pedal, and if it’s not the cat’s pajamas you can sell it to a friend, put it on the shelf, or stick it on eBay. To some degree it’s pretty hard to wear out a pedal, so a used one on eBay is typically a smart choice. I have a theory that pedals are like the proverbial Christmas Fruitcake; there is actually only one, and everybody just keeps passing the same one around.

For a budding manufacturing or mad scientist, going into the pedal business has a fairly low barrier to entry. Practically everyone uses the same die cast box — now that guy is making a killing — silk screening and painting is pretty low tech (some people even skip the paint) and the actual cost of the components are pretty low too. If you don’t mind hand soldering, there is no need for fancy assembly or wave soldering equipment. It’s also pretty easy to find schematics online, or just back engineer your favorite stomp box. Now there are obviously many serious companies out there doing lot’s of research and making significant investments in R&D and manufacturing. But for somebody who just wants to get into the business, it’s a lot easier than making guitars, amps, or speakers.

One other factor — at least to me anyway — is that if you are looking for great sounding distortion or gain, which is by far the most popular effect type, a pedal is quite often better sounding than most “gain” channels on two or three channel amps. There are many players out there with multichannel amplifiers that tend to play only the clean channel, and rely on pedals for distortion and modulation effects. Why is this so?

Well if you look back to the early amplifiers and the onset of distortion, the distortion was caused by the power tubes clipping, which turned out to sound really good; warm, sweet and very musical. A low powered amplifier with limited headroom such as a Fender Tweed would distort at a reasonable volume level. It sounded great, and everyone saved their hearing. But bands were playing ever larger venues and needed larger amplifiers, with more wattage, and more headroom. Now the amps were louder, which was good, but that warm power tube clipping was gone. Try and get a Fender Twin to distort, I dare you. Players needed volume and distortion that they could control.

But some clever engineers came of with the master volume control. This allowed the player to essentially overdrive a section of the amplifier, but control the overall volume level with the master volume. Presto! distortion at listenable levels. But the characteristic of the distortion was different. It was not warm and creamy but more harsh and fizzy. This is the because the distortion is produced by clipping the preamp tubes, and this distorted sound is then fed into the power tube section for amplification. It’s a sound, but not the sound of an amp being played at the limits of its clean headroom.

Early master volume amplifiers were often harsh and raspy, with an edgy tone that was anything but musical. Fender’s foray with master volume controls in their 70’s Silverface amps were vile, sounding somewhat like a Kazoo Orchestra playing Smoke On The Water. Obviously amplifier designers have gotten much better in producing musical overdriven sounds, typically still by using preamp distortion. The famous Mesa high gain sound is essentially multiple preamp tubes each over-driving the other to produce a thick chunky distortion tone. This is sometimes called cascading gain, and it can sound really good. If you’re a fan of metal, it’s where it’s at.

But this type of distortion is actually fairly easy to emulate using solid state components. It’s not so easy to make a pedal that really sounds like a small amp working hard on a Saturday night, but fuzz and higher gain distortion sounds can be quite convincingly created in a small metal box. It looks a hell of a lot more impressive to have a half stack, but a 1×12 or 2×12 combo with good headroom and a couple pedals can sound pretty mean.

My apologies for a highly compressed and somewhat biased view of amplifier history, but many players have found that an amplifier with a good sounding clean channel is the perfect “canvas” to paint on with the pedal of your choice. Often a well-crafted little box will sound better than an amplifier using preamp distortion to achieve high gain sounds. That’s my experience anyway, and my choice in selecting an amplifier is totally focused on finding the best natural tone possible, and using pedals to color the sound in a way that suits my musical leanings. I also happen to like a little “natural” tube grit to my tone, so I tend to play fairly low powered amplifiers, but even so I’m never going to turn my amp up to “10” for a solo. I’ll use a pedal. As far as I can tell, the only people who turn their amps up to “10” are on YouTube, and live in very small bedrooms.

So pedals are inexpensive, they are plentiful both new and used, and the low investment required to get in pedal business means that lots of people are making them. So it’s all good, right? Sure, there is nothing essentially wrong with having too much of a good thing, and over time the number of pedal makers will reach some sort of natural Darwinian limit: The really good builders with grow and thrive, and the hacks and pure copycats will fade away. I’m of the opinion that pedals are somewhat like pizza: None of it is truly bad, and everyone finds their favorite. There are however many bad amplifiers, and spending $300 on some boutique distortion pedal with rare germanium diodes will not hide the fact that your amp sounds like crap. Start with the amplifier and speakers first. Get your core sound down to where you really love what you hear with nothing more than a guitar, a good cable, and your amp. Then go forth and experiment with the little die cast boxes of your choice.

 

 

 

Guitar Tweaks: Can you hear the difference?

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We’re talking about tweaking your guitars and your amps. You know:  Stuff, gear, tweaks; can you hear the difference?  Once the drummer fires up, does it really matter that you specifically tweaked your pickups, capacitors, pots and speakers? Does it matter to you or to the audience (should you have one) or do you do it just because you love to experiment?

What have you tried?  What can you hear?  What’s for real? The Internet is full of stuff to buy and try.  Some with disputed results, some not.  Some is must have, or at least must try.

For starters, let’s takes strings.  Strings make a real difference in your sound.  Steel, Nickel, Nickel over steel, Nickel over Nickel.  How about even Nickel over round core versus a hex core? It is pretty much undisputed that different strings sound different.  Most people won’t argue that strings make a difference.

The next topic is  Guitar electronics as in “Caps and Pots”.   You commonly hear “was like taking a blanket off my amp”.  Yup a nice old (or new) PIO (paper in oil) cap can really smooth out and open up a dark or muddy guitar.  Some of the “chicklet” caps in today’s guitars are very harsh.   And it all depends on the value of the cap.  .015 is really nice in a LP with a Humbucker in the neck.  Tame a shrill bridge pickup with a .047 in the bridge.  Most guitars, LP’s anyway come with .022’s.  There are a lot of variables here and again most will agree “pots and caps” make a difference because they do.

Pickups: Way to big a field to even start to discuss here.   I’ve tried a bunch.  I’ve heard large changes, not always what I wanted and I’ve found after some installations I can barely hear any difference at all.   It’s nobody’s fault; the whole idea of describing sound is rather vague anyway.  But in general shop wisely and have an idea of what you want, and then pickups are a good solid upgrade.  I’ll throw out a generalization, and that is go for pickups with less output than you think you want.  Pickups wound really hot choke off highs you may want later.  Get the tone out of the guitar and tailor it at the amp.  Also pickup output can be increased with larger magnets as well as windings.  Difference is the larger magnets don’t choke highs like windings. You can also split hairs by changing magnets in the pickups you already have, but that may be getting too OCD for some.

As with pickups, speakers are a huge topic and they can make or break your sound.  Everyone likes something else.  And remember what sounds great alone in practice situations may not sound great in a band setting. Loud alone isn’t the same as loud with a drummer.   This is why I like heads and separate speaker cabs.  Mix and match.  Makes for more options.  So let’s put speakers into the category of yes, makes a difference.  Yes we heard the difference.

So many more things you can change.  Everything matters.  The room you play in matters.  How far is your open back amp from the wall at home vs a practice or gig?   Your amp, your tubes, your tube bias………  Even the pick you use makes a difference.  This is an area where naming all the stuff that matters can’t really be tackled in one blog.  But it is stuff we mostly all agree we can hear, and that it matters.  We want our base tone to be as good as it can be.  If we can hear it, then it was worth it.

So why is it that the web is full of players who argue that you can’t hear the difference in cables?  They say the cable from the guitar to the amp can’t make any difference, and any difference heard is because you just paid a lot for a cable.  It’s all snake oil and pseudo-science, right? Nope, I’m here to say that it matters much more than you think.

A year ago I was at UFG (Upfront Guitars) world headquarters to try some stuff.  I had a nice Gibson R4, my groovy little true PTP wired boutique amp armed with nice old tubes and we’re rockin’ out.  We were trying different cables.  I was playing a solid core cable versus my OK mid-priced name brand stranded cable.  Yes there was a difference.  More clarity, more shimmer (here we go, trying to find words to describe tone) from the solid than from stranded, and less distortion.  Then I tried a coil cable.  I have a tendency to make any straight cable turn itself into a knotted mess in minutes.  I had hopes that the coil cable sounded good.  If it did I was getting it.  It was as clear as day that the coil cable was the worst cable we tried.  Worse than a straight stranded cable.  Worse than my daily cable. No doubt, no question, it was dull, dark, and fuzzy.  No point in debating it, and not close to the solid cable

A real eye (ear) opener was when I did a blind test.  This was not planned but it worked out that way.  I had been playing just guitar with solid core cable into the amp.  Played some chords, riffs, all the stuff you play when you are trying gear out.  Then I added a couple of pedals into my signal chain.  These are good pedals with true bypass, they were all off and I used stranded cable between them and to the amp.  I started playing again.  The other guy in the room whose back had been to me all this time said right away “wow, what did you change?”  All I’d done was add some stranded cable to my signal chain.  The clarity was different, a little more muffled, a little less “shimmer” Also I found that what I had thought was attack-driven dirt when I played harder was actually distortion from the stranded cable and not from me hitting the amp harder. Swapping in solid core cables cleaned up the signal and the distortion was gone. I now have solid cable in my board and the whole signal chain, but I’ll agree that good stranded cable is very close to solid cable.  I’m just looking for a clean signal.  I can wreak havoc later with a pedal, right?

Yes Hendrix liked the sound of a 50’ coiled chord from Radio Shack.  There is also a guy on Youtube with fantastic demos of his ’59 LP and Trainwreck amp.   He likes the sound of a very long (100’?) cable in his signal chain.  He likes what it does for his tone.  His tone BTW is freakin’ awesome.  You may also like either of the above.  You gonna tell Jimi his sound was crap, to get another cable?  He knew what he was doing.  A cable is a tone control.  Don’t ignore it.

I guess I feel like I owe it to myself to get things right. I just want the cleanest purest signal from my guitar to the amp or pedal.  I know that once the band starts up, once the drummer shows up late and starts his noise in the room with the low ceiling and the wall of mirrors across the dance floor you may feel all is lost.  But you gotta have a good thing going in right?   If you can hear it, it will have an impact on your playing. And you can hear it.

 – Neil Swanson

The Fender IPO – Good News for Guitarists?

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The announcement this past week that Fender is releasing its Initial Public Offering  may sound like the American Dream come true. After all, isn’t it the goal of every company to someday go public and cash in big? That’s the image of an IPO anyway. However, not all IPO’s are glamorous get rich stories, and the numbers behind the Fender IPO are not all that rosy.

Disclosure: I am not a professional financial analysis, these are just my own observations from my experience in business over the past 25 years.

In rough terms, Fender had $700 million in sales in 2011 and a net profit of $19M. That’s an improvement from 2010 when the company posted a $1.7M loss. But a net profit of $19M on sales of $700M is a return of only 2.7%. If a 2.7% profit ratio sounds rather unexciting, that’s because it is. Whether private or public, a 2.7% profit ratio is concerning. In a private company while there might be pressure from an investor group (if there is one) their is are requirements to make the company’s performance public. Actually, the financial performance of many privately held companies may not be that great in Wall Street terms. To do some degree if the boss is happy, then everybody is happy. The true financial performance is known only to the person or group that controls the company

Once the company goes public, the financial performance is there for all to see, and of course stock price is closely tied to financial performance. Going public is a great way to raise capital, but the company is obliged to show its dirt laundry. How many investors can you attract with a 2.7% net profit, unless you have plans to do much better. And soon, because it’s Wall Street and they hate to wait.

The second issue with the Fender IPO is debt. The company has $700M in sales, but also about $240M in debt. The stated goal of this IPO is to pay down about $100M in debt, and the balance is for operating capital. There are a couple concerns with this: First, that’s a pretty high debt ratio, and as with any debt there are interest payments on the debt. Also, if the company is selling stock to raise additional operating capital, it could have a cash flow problem too. Cash flow essentially is: Are you taking in money fast enough to cover what you are paying out every month. Debt servicing costs, high inventories, and of course the pace of sales can all have dramatic affects on cash flow. It’s good to sell lots of stuff, but it’s cash flow that determines whether a company lives or dies.

The third factor is the role of Private Equity Capital (PE), in this case an organization called Weston Presidio. Weston Presidio is a major investor in Fender, with about a 40% ownership prior to the IPO, and plans are to retain a similar level of ownership afterward. Weston Presidio is not in the music business. They invest in everything from Restaurant Chains to Movie Theaters to Fender. The goal is to invest in a company, “help” it become more profitable, and then exit that company hopefully at a substantial gain. It’s not very romantic, but if done properly the investors make a lot of money.

Being “helped” can sometimes cause the company being invested in quite a lot of pain. Often a PE group will buy into a company with some amount of their own cash, and money they have borrowed. Once they have control of the company, the company will borrow money to pay the PE group back, effectively putting the company in debt. This is the classic case of Guitar Center, which was bought by Bain Capital and is now loaded with over a billion in debt. Guitar Center loses money every quarter because the cost of debt servicing wipes out its profits. Here is what Moody’s said about Guitar Center last May, “A Moody’s analyst concluded that growth in sales, comparable store sales, and profits will not be sufficient to trim the company’s approximately $1.6 billion debt load to a more manageable level.”   So while I don’t know for certain, part of Fender’s debt could be a by-product of Weston Presidio’s involvement. Companies may seek out PE because they need cash to fund R&D, expand their product lines, or maybe the founder just wants to sell out and go fishing. But PE companies are rarely in it for the long haul, the desire to cash out at a profit in 3-5 years can place an enormous amount of stress on the company.

One last quick measurement of a company’s overall health is their revenue dollars per employee (Total Sales/Number of Employees). A good rule of thumb for both manufacturing and retail organizations is a number somewhere in the range of $300 – $400K. If it is a privately held company, the Revenue per Employee (RPE) number can be substantially lower as long as the major stake holders are in agreement on the definition of success. However if the company is publicly traded, Revenue per Employee — and more importantly Earnings per Share — are critical metrics. Publicly traded companies are all competing for investor dollars, and weak performance metrics makes it hard to attract investors and depresses the stock price. Using 2010 data, Fender’s RPE was $223K. Gibson’s is even more worrisome at $99K, while some Pro Audio companies like Harmon and Audio Technica are $331K and $556K respectively. Of course we are not taking margin into consideration. If you have very high margins you can be financially successful with a lower RPE (because you keep more of each dollar you earn). Still, a low RPE is not a good sign, and Fender’s 2011 net income of $19M strongly suggest that they have a problem with margins, debt, overhead, or some combination of the three.

WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD FOR FENDER AS A PUBLIC COMPANY?

Fender has some strong assets: Good market share, tremendous brand recognition, famous artists that endorse their product, and two of the most classic guitar shapes in history. But it’s clear that they are not that financially healthy. It’s likely that conditions will improve as the economy continues to strengthen, but they have basic issues of profitability and long term debt. Weston Presidio likely wants to get out in the near future — at a profit — which means that the company needs to be attractive to investors so that people will want to buy stock. To compete for investor dollars Fender will have to demonstrate that they can increase their profitability: Lowering costs, raising prices, and/or reducing debt. Increasing sales will help too, provided that sales can be increased without increasing fixed costs. It’s that simple. People invest in company stock because they they think the value of the company will increase. The big question for music lovers is whether increasing shareholder value result in better product. All options are likely on the table: Outsource more products to low cost countries, use less expensive materials, raise prices, or sell off under performing brands (Guild, Charvel, Hamer, etc). Some Guitar-Loving White Knight could always come to rescue and infuse Fender with both cash and a love for the products and the company history. Or a group of demanding investors could force the company to implement severe cost cutting measures in order to improve profits and increase stock value. Unfortunately, the latter scenario is more likely, since if there was a White Knight with deep pockets, Fender would have not needed to go public in the first place. Let’s all hope for the best, but even for the optimists the prognosis is lukewarm.

G&L Neck Profiles – Suggestions – 2015 Updates

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This is an update to an earlier blog post to cover the changes G&L made to their neck offerings during their 2015 mid-year model changes.

One thing that may not be clear to buyers is that neck profile and fretboard radius are independent. Meaning that while the Modern Classic neck that comes standard on most guitars has a 9.5″ radius, it’s available in 7.5″ or 12″ radius too. Any profile is available with any radius, with the exception that you can’t get the 7.5″ radius with a Bigsby. So by decoupling the profile and radius specification, G&L has actually expanded what’s available in terms of options.

As we cover the various neck profiles, we’ll discuss them as much as possible independent of fretboard radius, and we’ll also assume the neck has the standard Jescar 57110 fret. In parenthesis will be the old neck designation where applicable.

Lastly, all neck profile tolerances are +/- .015 (1/64th) relative to their stated dimension (it is wood after all not titanium). From the upper to lower end of the tolerance, this is a difference many people can feel. If you are on the fence about a certain profile but are super sensitive to thickness for example, opt for the thinner/narrower selection.

Modern Classic – The Modern Classic is now the standard neck on all popular Legacy, S-500, Comanche and ASAT models (.820″ at the first fret and .870″ at the 12th fret). On most guitars they use a 9.5″ radius, with the exception of the Invader Models which are 12″.  Think of the Modern Classic as a Slim C with a 1-11/16″ nut width, and the same string spacing. The “MCNK” addresses the two issues of: 1) Occasional string falloff with the 1-5/8 nut width, and 2) “What feels most like a Fender?” With the thinner profile and 9.5″ radius, the additional width is hardly noticeable, whereas on C Plus (Wide C) it can start to feel a little too manly. The MCNK is a good all-things-to-all-people neck, although I find it a little lacking in palm support in the upper frets (which my son really likes, and his hands are a little smaller).

Classic C (#1) – Up until July 2015, the G&L 12″ radius #1 neck was the standard. It is the only neck available on the F-100 and SC-2.  Measuring .830″ at the first fret and .960″ at the 12th fret, it’s mildly beefy and fits most people well. Versus the MCNK, I like the extra thickness in the higher frets to anchor my palm. Every once and a while some necks do exhibit some string falloff on the high E, but it’s rare. We’ve also tried this neck with the Dunlop 6230 vintage fret option, but the combination of flat neck with skinny fret makes the frets seem undersized, and they look a little lost on the wide flat fretboard. (1-5/8″ nut width)

Slim C (#1a) – This is your MCNK neck without the nut width. This is the only neck profile available on the Fallout (yes, really). The G&L #1a is about the same size as the #1 at the first fret, but only .870″ at the 12th. There is very little taper to the neck, so it feels quite slim as you move up the frets. Good for shredders and people who like to be able to reach around the neck and hammer the notes. (1-5/8th nut width)

Heritage ’86 (#1b) – Before the MCNK, when we intentionally wanted a slim neck, this is the one we’d order. The “Heritage C” profile is great for women, people with smaller hands, or folks who like a thinner profile. Feels instantly comfortable and tapers nicely up the frets to .910″. I’ve always liked the feel of this profile more than the #1a, and it’s still a nice option. (1-5/8th nut width)

Modern U (#1c) – This is G&L’s Modern “U” shape, which at .850″ is pretty beefy in the lower frets, but tapers less than most to .910″ at the 12th fret. We’ve only had one of these, and it feels very much like a “C” neck. If you like a more generous neck proportion down low — like a 50’s Gibson — this neck will do the trick. But if you have no strong opinions on neck shape, a Classic C is probably a safer choice. (1-5/8″ nut width)

 Deep V (#1d) – This is G&L’s Modern “V” neck, which is a shape that not a lot of players have experience with, but I’m a big fan. At .890″ at the first fret, it is G&L’s thickest neck, and it tapers to .930 at the 12 fret. The V shape provides a lot of “beef” but since it tapers more rapidly to the sides than a “C” profile, it does not wind up feeling bulky. So you get depth without the drawbacks of a large “C” profile. It’s a pretty neat feel, and personally I find it very comfortable and use it on my pine ASAT Classic. Players such as Eric Clapton have been proponents of this shape, and it’s featured on some of his signature guitars. (1-5/8″ nut width)

Classic C Plus (#3) – This is the Classic C neck with a 1-11/16″ nut width. A good neck for players with larger hands, as the combination of wider nut and classic profile is something you can really feel. Conventional wisdom is that “thinner is faster” but if you like a neck that provides generous palm support, the C Plus is the ticket.

Classic C Wide (#4) – The “Shrek Neck” which is 1-3/4″ wide with additional string spacing. We have not sampled this neck yet, but if you think you need it, you probably do.

Soft V (#2a) – Another neck that we have not tried, but it sounds intriguing given our infatuation with the Deep V profile. In theory it should be the solution for players who find the Classic C a little too chunky down low but want less of a taper than a Slim C. We might have to get one of these….. (1-5/8″ nut width)

Quartersawn versus Flatsawn Necks – All standard G&L necks are flatsawn. If you were to take off the neck and look at the end of the neck you would see that the grain of the wood is parallel to the fingerboard. This makes a stable neck, and also they also get more Flatsawn necks per piece of maple stock, which keeps the cost down. Quartersawn necks have the grain perpendicular to the fingerboard, so the wood is much stiffer in the direction that the neck typically bends. But cutting this way yields fewer necks per piece of maple stock, which increases cost.  Sonically, the stiffer quartersawn neck is felt to be more percussive, with a quicker attack and less note compression than a flatsawn neck (theoretically it makes sense). While it’s not practical to A-B two necks on the same guitar, personal opinion is that guitars I’ve played with a quartersawn necks have a little more attack, but maybe a touch less complexity. Some players swear by them, and if you live in an area that varies widely in temperature and humidity, a quartersawn neck may require less tweaking. Not a bad idea either on bass guitars with their longer necks and string tension. And if you are worried about “dead spots” on a bass, my recommendation would be to opt for quartersawn.