Tabla de contenidos para May 2023 en Guitar Player

HE WAS A warm, confident presence the first time I met him, at Todd Rundgren’s rehearsal space in San Rafael, California. It was late summer 1997, and I was there to interview Todd about his With a Twist album as he and his band worked through the material for their upcoming tour. I was nervous — Todd was my first big interview, and I was a huge fan. But before I met the man, I found myself waiting in a room off the rehearsal space and chatting with an imperturbably cool cat named Jesse Gress, Todd’s guitarist and the talented wizard who, among other things, freed Todd up by handling a fair share of his music’s intricate and stylistically varied guitar work. Jesse put me at ease and made me…

THIS PAGE USUALLY focuses on guitar-oriented records, for obvious reasons. That said, this is my third or fourth non-guitar record spanning almost one hundred columns. To complicate matters even more, the few people who have heard tenor saxophonist Ben Webster’s The Warm Moods playing at my house have asked, “Why are you listening to Muzak?” or said, “My father listened to stuff like this.” All I can say is, we agree to disagree. The Warm Moods is one of my all-time favorite jazz records, and it’s a must-hear. I’ve transcribed many of its tunes with awe and humility, so I feel compelled to share this record, because I love it. The Warm Moods was released in 1961 on Reprise Records, and every track has something special. The great supporting cast…

THIS JAPANESE-MADE steel-string acoustic isn’t the oldest guitar in Slash’s collection, but it is the one he’s had the longest. “I think I was probably in high school when I got it,” he says. “And I cherish the fact that I’ve managed to keep it and nothing’s happened to it.” Slash calls the Epiphone the first “good acoustic” he ever took ownership of, and he received it in a moment of goodwill. “When I was 15, I would do some babysitting, and this one kid I babysat for, his parents had it hanging on the wall next to a mandolin,” he recalls. “I asked them, ‘Can I play it while the kid’s sleeping?’ I was still playing it when they got home, and they actually ended up giving it to…

LEO KOTTKE IS one of the most road-savvy troubadours of all time, and Bob Weir’s Sweetwater Music Hall in Mill Valley, California, is a top-shelf venue, so sound check for such a well-honed solo act should take about five minutes, right? Wrong. After I interviewed Kottke for an extensive Frets feature that ran in the December and Holiday 2020 issues, he graciously extended an invitation to drop in for his show on February 14. I happened to arrive as he was going through a bit of an ordeal to achieve sonic satisfaction. GOING SINGLE ON VALENTINE’S DAY Kottke was sitting in a seat in the fourth row scrutinizing his tone coming over the main house speakers. Surprisingly, he was traveling with one instrument. Even more surprising, it was not his…

TAYLOR INTRODUCED THE no-frills American Dream Series during the summer of 2020, at the height of the pandemic, in order to fulfill increasing demand from the multitudes dreaming of an American-made acoustic at an attainable price. Around the same time, the innovative manufacturer also introduced the Grand Theater body style, which is a bit larger than its travel-sized GS Mini and slightly smaller than a Grand Concert. Now the two concepts come together in the AD11e-SB. The guitar is one of three eye-catching Sunburst additions to the American Dream Series, designated by “SB” in the model title: the Grand Theater AD11e-SB, the slightly larger Grand Concert AD12e-SB, and the soft-shouldered dreadnought Grand Pacific AD17e-SB. All three feature a Tobacco Sunburst finish on a solid Sitka spruce top, with solid walnut…

IF GUITARS COULD have identity crises, the Goya S90 might qualify for one. It was made in Sweden by Hagstrom, given a Spanish name and sold in the United States. Not only that, it’s shaped like a venerable Les Paul and covered in flashy plastics, including a blue sparkle face and a complete wrap of white “mother of toilet seat” pearloid on the back, sides, neck, headstock and fingerboard. Fewer than 200 of these guitars were made during the model’s early 1960s run. Like some other European instrument manufacturers, Hagstrom was known primarily as a maker of accordions. But with the late-’50s guitar boom, the company retooled its plant to include production of electric guitars, hence the use of the otherwise garish plastics and pushbuttons found in these early builds.…

THESE DAYS, SLASH owns several authentic ’59 ’Bursts. But this one, acquired in the early 1990s, was his first, and it remains his favorite. “It has a particular sound that I’m drawn to, a certain kind of attack and personality that I recognize,” he says. “It’s the go-to ’59 for me because I know what it does.” In addition to sporting a gorgeous finish, the guitar is easily identifiable via a telltale “snakebite” — small holes in its top that evidence the one-time addition of a Bigsby vibrato. And while Slash keeps it away from the stage, he says he has used it in the studio with the Conspirators on several occasions, in particular the ballad “The Great Pretender,” from 2016’s Living the Dream, and the band’s cover of Elton…

Les Paul Heritage 80 Series One of the earliest attempts by Gibson to faithfully replicate the celebrated 1959 Les Paul Standard was the Heritage 80 Standard. Introduced, as the name suggests, in 1980, it was made in three variants, with increasingly fancy appointments: the Standard 80, the Standard 80 Elite, and the rare (around 50 were made) Standard 80 Award, which featured gold hardware and a richly figured Cherryburst maple top. Though designed to be accurate reissues, the outline and geometry of the cutaway and body differed slightly from originals. The series was discontinued in 1983. Les Paul Studio Spotting a gap in the market for a U.S.- made Les Paul at a more affordable price, Gibson debuted its Les Paul Studio in 1983. Featuring a one-piece mahogany body with…

Thomas Raggi’s live pedalboard includes a Strymon Mobius modulation and BigSky reverb, an Electro-Harmonix Deluxe Memory Man and POG polyphonic octave generator, an Effetti Di Clara Agata Booster, a Fulltone 2 OCD overdrive, an ISP Technologies Decimator, an Empress Effect Compressor MKII, a Dunlop Cry Baby Rack Wah, a Pro Co Sound RAT distortion, an MXR Talk Box, and the Boss ME-50B bass multieffects and RC-50 Loop Station. “The talk box is a new entry in my pedalboard setup,” Raggi says. “I discovered this effect when I wrote the song ‘Mark Chapman’ for the new album. After I used it for the solo, I figured out how to include it during the live show to create a special talk box moment. “A funny thing happened when I wrote the solo…

DEBASHISH BHATTACHARYA IS truly a player’s player. It’s not unusual for guitarists to heap praise on their pals, but when luminaries gush like an atmospheric river, one must pay attention to what they say, and Bhattacharya inspires an impressive array of artists. His 2013 album, Beyond the Ragasphere, featured world jazz maestro John McLaughlin and Americana Dobro icon Jerry Douglas, and both are passionate in their praise. “Debashish is the master of the slide guitar,” McLaughlin proclaims. “From his soulful playing in the introductions to his compositions, to the brilliance of his up-tempo playing, he has no equal. A must for all guitarists!” Douglas adds that Bhattacharya is “at the forefront of a new body of Indian slide players. His sense of melody is uncanny, and he has all the…

AMERICAN GUITAR MAKERS’ collaborations with major retailers have occasionally resulted in some gems with staying power beyond their original “exclusive-to” intentions. The Gibson USA Les Paul Traditional Pro V is just such a guitar. Offered exclusively for several years by Gibson and Guitar Center, it has been updated for 2023 with two sumptuous new finishes: Transparent Ebony Burst over a flame-maple top (as reviewed here), and a satin Desert Burst on a plain maple top. Otherwise, it retains the raft of hot-rod features that make it a superbly versatile performer, Outwardly, it appears to be a dead-standard Les Paul, and given guitarists’ famously traditional leanings, that’s clearly the idea. But scratch the surface and just about every component hides a notable modification that takes this modern ‘Burst’s capabilities way beyond…

WITH ITS CLASSIC double-cutaway shape and semi-hollow construction, the DJP-1000 represents Donner’s take on one of the most successful electric guitars that Gibson launched in the late 1950s under president Ted McCarty. The DJP-1000 stays essentially true to form by featuring a body made from laminated maple with a solid-maple center block and a glued-in neck carved from maple instead of mahogany. It carries two humbucking pickups under nickel-plated covers, along with the standard configuration of two volume and two tone controls, and a three-way toggle switch for pickup selection. To increase flexibility, both volumes have push-pull coil-split switches. The DJP-1000 is a great looking guitar with its gloss-red finish (it’s also available in gloss black and sunburst) and a preponderance of white binding, which is all carefully done, revealing…

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BUDDY MILLER HAS a lot to answer for. Few guitarists lusted after a Wandré before this first-call Nashville session ace, solo artist and producer began churning out lithe, buttery riffs on one of these oddball guitars. Thanks to Miller, we know these things sound fantastic. As such, they have become the most collectible of the stylish, modernist Italian-made electric guitars of the 1960s, and highly worthy acquisitions for their looks, rarity and playability. The circa-1960 Wandré Roby featured here sits in the sweet spot between art and utility. Whereas some Wandré models look more like a Salvador Dalí painting than a guitar, the Roby abounds with the maker’s signature features and esthetics, while it offers familiarity in form and function. The man behind Wandré guitars was born Antonio Pioli in…

WHEN WE THINK of Slash’s Les Pauls, designs like the Derrig and his signature models come to mind. But it’s likely another Les Paul, one he calls Jessica, that we’ve seen him wield most often. Slash acquired the guitar from Gibson — one of the two factory seconds with three-piece tops the company sent him after he retired the Derrig copy from road work. “It became my main stage guitar with Guns and through Velvet Revolver,” he says. “It still is.” Onstage, he continues, “Jessica is the main Appetite guitar. I open the set with her for ‘It’s So Easy’ and ‘Brownstone,’ I play ‘Paradise City’ with her, and I play ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ with her.” As for what makes the now heavily worn instrument stand apart from his…

AS A TEENAGER, Slash chose a B.C. Rich to be the first “good, brand-name instrument” he ever owned. He has a variety of examples, the most recognizable of which is this red 1980 Mockingbird, which he famously employed in the studio and the music video for the Use Your Illusion track “You Could Be Mine,” as well as on Velvet Revolver songs like “Sucker Train Blues.” “This is the one guitar that I have a photographic memory of acquiring,” Slash says. “I bought it from a guy in front of [defunct L.A. nightclub] the Cathouse. I hardly knew him, but I saw him regularly every Tuesday night when I would go down there. He told me he had a Mockingbird that he was looking to sell, and he goes, ‘I’ll…

IT’S MORNING AS we drive through Bronzeville, passing soul food restaurants, 19th century mansions, humble brick buildings, Baptist churches and a contemporary arts district. This neighborhood on Chicago’s South Side nurtured many American music icons during the Great Migration of 1916–1970: early jazz pioneers King Oliver and Louis Armstrong, electric blues innovators Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf, gospel trailblazers Thomas Dorsey and Mahalia Jackson, and the forerunner of soul, Sam Cooke. Gospel music as an industry was born here when Black congregations took over the churches after the White flight. The new ministers, middle-class and educated, seeking to assimilate with White society, wanted nothing to do with blues. When Dorsey and Jackson became national superstars by embracing their blues roots, the community’s church doors reluctantly opened a crack toward secular…

I HAVE WORKED as a professional music transcriber for most of my life, transferring music (especially guitar music) from the air to the page. Even before that, as a kid, I would always be doing what I then called “figuring stuff out,” trying to decipher the magic I heard in my favorite musicians’ playing. One day, I was struck by Louis Armstrong’s trumpet solo on one of my dad’s old recordings, and I knew right away I had to play it, in particular, one especially cool-sounding phrase. Once I figured it out, I quickly realized it was something I already knew how to play. I recalled that this had happened a couple of times before, and I had simply shrugged it off. But this time, it made me stop and…