gnr guitarist bumblefoot needs a hand/foot

on may 12th of this year guns and roses confirmed that their new lead guitarist was ron "bumblefoot" thal, replacing guitarist buckethead , who had been with the band since 2000. up until just recently, bumblefoot played this unique guitar. the axe was built in collaboration with vigier , and it had become bumblefoot's main guitar. main guitar until recently that is. seems the guitar took a beating when bfoot took it out on the road for gnr's latest european tour, and now it's on the verge of being permanently retired. so, bumblefoot has turned to the masses for inspiration on what he's calling "foot guitar version 2.0". he's asking for "something new, something cool, something designed by you!" check out the invitation here .

the guitars of cbgb's

his halloween night will be the last one at cbgb's ; it seems the rumours are coming true, the music venue will be closing on october 31st. i've been searching out the web for real confirmation (for some reason, i can't find it mentioned in cbgb.com ), and have stumbled across enough first hand knowledge, to start to believe it. many large scale media outlets have written about it, but in times past the news proved to be rumours. the word is the club entertained the idea of moving to las vegas(!), but it looks like it will be reopened in new york.


so, a look back at the guitars (and guitarists) who have played at cbgb's;

joey ramones' univox hi flyer





tom verlaine of televisions' fender jazzmaster


elvis costello backstage with a fender strat(?)


sting and andy summers of the police with fender pre and telecaster

cbgb's guitar stuff

cbgb's in new york is one of the infamous music venues in the world; aguably the birthplace of north american punk, and the launching pad for a great many bands that changed the music landscape, and a vibey place of rock and roll. you can own a bit of cbgb's - or at least bring some of it to your next gig - by using this strap to hang your axe, or maybe this pick , or jazz up your get up with these trinkets .

madonna les paul for sale

guitar tech john griswold is selling a prized possession; a gibson les paul once owned, played and autographed by madonna! the guitar was one of the few possessions that griswold was able to rescue from his water damaged home in new orleans after it was hit by hurricane katrina. the financial crunch and hardship from katrina have forced him to sell the guitar. it goes up on ebay for auction on october 6, 07 at 7:00 pm pst untill october 16th by ebay power seller pierce jensen from sonora calif (he was contacted by griswold to auction the guitar). check it out here . the opening bid starts at $49,999.00!

japanese surf guitar classics?!

wfmu's beware of the blog; a radio station that bites back is the blog of an internet radio station, and they have featured this album lately. It's Japanese guitarist takeshi terauchi and his band "the bunnys" recording of surf versions of classical pieces. The albums called "lets go classics'! go cats go!

thanks for your patience

been extremely busy with life; thanks for being patient and coming by to visit at guitar guitar guitar.
earl

gene autry celebration guitar

gene autry, america's "singing cowboy", is a legend, and is personally responsible for an entire corral of future guitarists first being enchanted with the picture of a lone cowboy hand strumming an acoustic guitar around the campfire with a pale western sky fading behind him. moments like those are life changing; the beatles on sullivan, page with bow in hand, or those grainy black and white screen images of gene form the genesis of a life time passion for the guitar for many of us. now, in celebration of mr. autry's 99th birthday, a festival is being held at the southfork ranch in plano, texas, and on oct 8th, 2006 there will be a drawing and some one is going to be walking away with this martin dm. signed by Christian Fredrick Martin IV, Willie Nelson, Bobbie Nelson, Paul English, George Strait, Ray Price, Gary P. Nunn, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Don Edwards, Sons of the San Joaquin, David Allen Coe, Leon Russell, Johnny Bush, Darrell McCall, Hank Thompson, D'Jango Walker, Noel Haggard, Shooter Jennings, Pauline Reese, Ray Benson, Billie Joe Shaver and Kinky Friedman. truly a one of a kind instrument. more details at goldbucklenetwork

dave navarro's guitars

dave navarro's new band, the panic channel has just announced that they are going to be opening for supernova (the t.v. show based band) on tour starting this month (sep). dave's touring in support of his new album one, recorded by his new band. note of interest; panic channel features stephen perkins, drummer for jane's addiction. dave's had his fair share of publicity, lately, but as my interests are with guitars, guitarists, and gear, i was interested in looking at his gear.

the paul reed smith dave navarro signature model. dave has been playing prs guitars for over 17 years, and has recorded with them while in jane's addiction and the red hot chili peppers. the guitar features a relatively short 25" scale, 24 fret, brazilian rosewood fingerboard, a carved maple top on mahogany body, a prs trem, hfs treble and vintage bass pickups, 3 way toggle, and a jet white finish.

the yamaha dave navarro signature model llx6 dn acoustic guitar. dave's signature yamaha acoustic guitar is based on yamaha's llx6, but customized for the artist. according to dave, white 'pops' on stage, and changes color with stage lighting, so the yamaha comes in a pure white finish with accents of black; black binding, pickguard, and headstock. the neck is mahogany, the fingerboard is ebony, and the body is a solid englemann spruce top with maple back and sides. 25.5" scale, 20 frets, piezo and condenser mic on an adjustable goose neck for amplification.


the marshall jcm900 (small clubs) or the marshall mode 4 mf350. the mode 4 is a 350 watt into 8 ohms amp. it features two totally separate tube pre amp circuits, and a power amp circuit that reconfigures itself according to the amp selected. amp1 has clean and crunch, amp2 has od1 and od2.
dave also has used of owned; gibson les pauls, sg's, and flying v's; fender john 5 signature telecaster, vox teardrops, evh charvel, and fender strats. the top picture is a studio shot of navarro's guitars during recording of one.

dave navarro originally came to the attention of guitarists, and the world in general with jane's addiction. he's since played in/or with; deconstruction, nine inch nails, alanis morisette, porno for pyros, the rhcp, a reunited janes', spread/his solo record "trust no one", an all star project named camp freddy, and now his newest band; the panic channel. navarro's also got his own internet radio station up and running; which he broadcasts from his house!

cure that pain in the neck

warmoth guitars is one of the original manufacturers of guitar replacement bodies and necks; offering a great selection of necks/bodies that will cover any unique features you could want. a recent cool addition to their line is their replacement necks and bodies for the line 6 variax; you can even swap over to a short scale or baritone conversion neck on your variax!

line 6 guitarport xt

line 6 has a unique product with the guitarport, and they've now upgraded the package and just released the guitarport xt version. this time around mac's are included, with support for mac os x, including the new mac intels! (windows is still supported) also added is access to the gearbox platform, and new amp models based on; marshall 1974x (18w reissue), an orange (yeah!) ad30t. new effects include; sans amp bass driver, maestro bass brassmaster, arbiter cry baby, and sub octaves!

air guitar nation!

they say immitation is a form of flattery, and if so, then air guitar is a sincere show of great affection for the guitar. at air guitar nation the act of air guitar is king, and is "america's unofficial pastime". air guitar nation is actually a feature length documentary, and follows the trend from new york to oulu, finland, where the air guitar world championships are held every august. the film has caught the attention of micheal moore and was screened at moore's traverse city film festival, and has won the audience award at sxsw!

martin 000-40s mark knopfler guitar

searching out mark knopfler's latest happenings - which began when i came upon his racing story i posted a couple days back - i came across this beautiful martin just released this summer. the 000-40s mark knopfler was a further request from mark to c.f. martin on the heals of the hd-40mk mark knopfler signature edition guitar, which was released in '01. this time 'round, mark wanted a guitar that followed the signatures of the hd-40mk, but was designed primarily for fingerpicking; the 000-40s is the result. based on martin's grand tradition of 12 fret guitars, it's got a 25.4" scale, 1-13/16" wide neck (nut width), a 'modified v-shape' neck, and a slotted headstock. beautiful!

bixonic expandora EXP-2000R distortion pedal

the bixonic expandora exp-2000r is an update of bixonic's exp-2000, the original little 'tin can' that was a huge hit in itself, and became one of the must have's of the pedal world when it came out. now, with this re-issue, bixonic has moved the small dip switches out of the guts and onto the front of the pedal, and expanded the control options; switch between guitar and bass, and choose between crunch, overdrive, distortion, and forbidden overdrives. gain, control and level knobs, and a bypass foot switch complete the front.

"...check out guitar george, he knows all the curves.."

speed is something that all guitarists want. i know; taste, style, finess, and all the other things guitarists work toward are important too, but all guitarists would like the option of blinding others with out and out speed once in awhile. well, mark knopfler has it covered; seems he placed within the top ten of his class in the recent running of the le mans classic in france, driving his '54 austin healey 100s! who knew?!

via fender news

from hawaii to picks

my travels on the web - like most, i'm sure - are not very linear. i think that's what makes the 'net so interesting. the amount of, and the wide variation of, the information out there in the ether of those vast cyberfields is so undefined and scattered that looking for something specific almost always leads one to stumble onto an unforeseen and unplanned sidetrip. here's my path to this final interesting guitar pick link; guitar blog/fire and light blog/youtube/classical guitar videos/welcome to pottersville/youtube(again) guitar videos/hawaii slack key guitar (thanks darin for the link to tortis; they really are a find!)/tortis picks. what? cool picks, though.

sbm custom built guitars

these are three examples of the unique, cool instruments cranked out by s.b. macdonald custom built guitars, and they are seriously cool! i stumbled upon scott's guitar blog, which is a blog posted by scott himself, and followed the link back to s.b. macdonald where i found these babies! check out his site here.

play guitar with the ventures!

props to hall of records; though michael doesn't specifically post on guitars, he has just posted a great guitar find of vinyl; "the ventures show you how to play by ear" "...by the guitar phonic system..." this is one cool record! i'm a total fan of guitar how-to records ( and every other type of guitar how-to media), and this is a total find! very cool. also, the whole hall of records is great; check out his site!

guitar strings for the future

they vibrate at 1.3 billion cycles per second, and are not guaranteed not to break no matter how much you bend 'em!
actually, a physicist at uc berkeley created these nanoscale guitar 'strings' to measure biological molecules. they're made of carbon and they are strung to a nanoscale 'guitar'; the strings vibrate at a specific rate, and, when that rate is interrupted, the deviation can be measured and the mass of the molecules can be determined. yeah, but, can i detune them?

funtwo revealed

on december 20, 2005 guitar90 posted a video on youtube of a guitarist playing a metal variation of pachelbel's canon which he had gotten from another site; fast forward to Aug 27, 2006 and the nytimes.com is publishing the guitarist's name and picture, and the video now clocks in with over 7.2 million views!
quick version of the story; jerry chang, a 25 year old taiwanese guitarist works up an arrangement of a rocked out version of the song which demands great hands, tabs it, and video's himself playing it and uploads onto his band's site. a bunch of guitarists dig it, and try their own hand(s) at it. one of them is funtwo, the guitarist revealed today in the paper.
you at least owe it a listen, and then form your own opinion.....

res-o-glas cool

came across this cool post by thevintageguitarcast; there's some cool pictures of a few valco's national brand "map' guitars. these were cool guitar that were reknowned for their 'map' shape. they were produced from '61 to '64, and were made out of a material made of polyester resin and glass threads; res-o-glas.
david lindley uses these, and this is a beautiful example of a national from his collection.

check out the rest of his instruments at davidlindley.

powertune tm system for guitar

the days when one onstage guitar tuned to A440 would do you through the complete five sets of the night are fading fast. so much of today's music is written in drop tunings or altered tunings, that you need four or five guitars placed out in strategic order with you on stage to be able to accomodate all the different tunings needed! so, besides borrowing your buddy's caravan each time you head out to the corner watering whole to carry all those guitars of yours, what can a gigging guitarist do? hey; how about a guitar which could retune itself to a different tuning with a touch of a button? nah, it'd sure be nice though....

in search of a better mousetrap; building the egonomic guitar

many guitarists have experienced different levels of pain and/or discomfort while playing - or as an after effect of playing - guitar. some guitarists come to the instrument with pain or discomfort caused by other forces outside the guitar. i've had my own experiences with stiffness or soreness caused by guitar playing. most guitarists, including myself, change or alter their physical approach to the instrument to accomodate to the physical mechanics of the guitar, but, what if the problem was approached from the viewpoint of the instrument itself, and not the player? what if the instrument's design was defined differently, or adjusted physically in order to better accomodate the physical structure of the guitarist? through the ages, the basic guitar shape has remainded fairly entrenched in the tried and true designs of the past; given, these designs work well and design elements have been adopted to better suit players, but by and large the shape and designs of guitars have remained the same for quite some time.
robert at building the ergonomic guitar, has a great site up which serves as a documentation of his approach to redesigning the electric guitar with an eye to the ergonomic aspects of the guitar. rob does a great job of shedding light on the process, and - upon further explorations of his site - he succinctly explores the reasons why and how the quest began. anyone interested in guitar design, ergonomics, or generally guitar should check his site out!
good job, rob.

Calder guitar cases

my old pals at Calder guitar cases have been busy since i've last checked in on them. their design blog shows the new models of guitar (and violin) cases that are going to be going into production soon. the website is an interesting read; watching the preproduction moving through different stages is cool to see. the cases look great!