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Archive for the ‘announcements’ Category

New Gear: Roland Cube 80x Amp

Posted in amplifiers, amps, Amps/Amplification, announcements, GAS, gear, gear find, guitar gear, guitarists, Guitars, Music, musicians, new gear, Roland Cube 80x, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 18, 2009| 2 Comments »

Roland Cube 80x

This is actually kind of exciting news: Roland has just released its most powerful Cube amp, the Cube 80x. Sporting 80 Watts of power through a 12″ speaker, this amp is poised to pack a serious punch. The Cube 60 has been quite successful since its inception a few years ago. Hell! Even I have a Cube 60 and I love it! The Cube 80x while being more powerful, also has some new features that are sure to turn heads (taken from the Roland web site):

* Powerful 80-watt output into a high performance 12″ speaker
* 10 COSM® amp models including new DLX Combo model
* Two channels: Clean and Lead plus new SOLO memory function
* New Spring Reverb modeling for vintage reverb sounds
* Easy to use Looper for unique live performance
* Convenient built in chromatic tuner
* Aux input for connecting MP-3 players or other audio sources

The Cube series amps have been known for their versatility. They sound great a pretty much any volume level, and they have enough features packed into them to make it easy to just pack the amp, a guitar and go. I have a couple of friends who use Cubes for club gigs!

There are a few of standout features that really pique my interest: 1. The ability to hook up an MP3 player to the amp to practice with; 2) The looper function, and finally; 3) The built-in chromatic tuner. This amp is made for gigging, and with the line out, you can go right into a board – which I’ve done many times with my Cube 60.

If you’re looking for a great, versatile amp, you can’t go wrong with a Cube. Just pick the one that suits the volume level you need (or the features you want), and you’re good to go!

For more information, visit the Roland Web Site!

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New Site: GuitarAffair.com

Posted in announcements, guitar, guitarists, Guitars, Music, musicians, tagged , , , , , , , , on April 8, 2009| 3 Comments »

Guitar AffairActually, GuitarAffair.com has been around for a few months now, but I discovered it when it was still pretty new back in January of this year. GuitarAffair.com is a great take on “try before you buy” with high-end guitars. Owned and operated by Jim Basara (yes, that’s the same Jim Basara who does reviews for Guitar Jam Daily), the site is set up to let people rent high-end guitars for a period of time – but they can keep them if they like them (of course, they have to pay for them). Here’s an excerpt from Jim in an e-mail he sent to me:

There are two parts to my business.  One model is to rent  guitars to business travelers who are guitar enthusiasts and never get to play  because they travel a lot (I used to be one of these guys).  The other  is, of course, to sell guitars.  By targeting business travelers, my goal  is to get boutique instruments into the hands of people with the means to buy  them.  I ship all over the country, so it’s a fairly large pool.  For  the sales piece, if someone rents a guitar and then purchases one, I rebate the rental fee.  This turns the business into kind of a demo program for  those manufacturers I am a dealer for.  And on that note, as a custom  builder, you may be interested in what I’m doing for Gigliotti Guitars…   …for people who are interested in purchasing a Gigliotti,  but want to play one [before buying one outright], I send them a Gigliotti and three  additional necks with the more popular neck profiles.  Each of those  necks is fretted with three different sized fretwire.  This way, the  buyer gets to play the Gigliotti but also feel more comfortable about picking  the neck carve and fret wire…  …I’ve also had interest  from some tier-2 pros who don’t like the hassle of taking their guitars on  commercial planes all the time.

While Jim targets business travelers, the business is pretty much open to anyone who wants to try a guitar out before buying it – or just wants to be able to play some great guitars! Check out the site! It is very cool!

On a personal note, GuitarAffair is one of those ideas I wish I had come up with… I dig it when people latch on to a great idea and expand on it to make living out of their passion. That’s exactly what Jim hopes to do with GuitarAffair.com.

A note about Jim…

Jim BasaraJim has a long history with vintage guitars, having established himself as a vintage gear guru and technician, having learned the ins and outs of guitar tech at Fretworks. He has also been writing reviews for Guitar Jam Daily since day one, which is how I first encountered him. An avid player himself, he has played for several years, and loves to play so much taken guitars with him on trips the world over! The dude knows his stuff!

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New Gear: VOX Tonelab ST

Posted in amps, Amps/Amplification, announcements, effect pedals, Effects, GAS, gear, gear find, guitar, guitar effects, guitar gear, guitar pedals, Music, musicians, pedals, vox, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 7, 2009| Leave a Comment »

VOX Tonelab ST

VOX Tonelab ST

I got my first introduction to VOX Tonelab boards when I saw a dude playing one direct into his PA at a casino a couple of years back. I was amazed at how awesome it sounded, and completely changed my opinion of using models in a live situation. Since then, I’ve played with some of the Tonelab series boards and Valvetronix amps, and have generally been pleased with them. But with the Tonelab SE, I think I’m going to take a really good look at this new offering from Vox.

  • First off, it’s nice and compact. It’s their smallest footprint yet!
  • 50 Presets and 50 User programs.
  • 33 amps and a 11 cabinets – more than you’ll ever need to customize your sound.
  • I’ve always dug the fact that it has an on-board expression pedal to adjust a bunch of different parameters – but most of all, to use as a wah (the wah is actually pretty sweet on these units).
  • Finally, at $199 (street), there’s tons of value in this little unit!

For more information, check out the VOX Tonelabe page.

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Gear Find: Catalinbread Dirty Little Secret

Posted in announcements, distortion, effect pedals, Effects, GAS, gear, gear find, guitar, guitar effects, guitar gear, guitar pedals, guitarists, Guitars, Music, musicians, overdrive, pedals, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 1, 2009| 5 Comments »

Catalinbread Dirty Little SecretI always love being able to get great tone at a bargain. It’s not that I’m cheap. I’ll pay top-dollar for great gear, but when potentially great gear comes at an incredibly affordable price, the Dawg’s ears perk up, and his nose starts sniffing around to see where he can play some gear.

Such was the case when I first came across this little pedal company located in Portland, Oregon called Catalinbread. I had run across the name on a couple of gear forums, but didn’t get a chance to check out their site until today when I read their press release in Harmony Central Effects News. After I read the press release, I had to check out Catalinbread’s site, and much to my pleasure, Catalinbread offers several, very cool pedals.

One thing that makes them stand apart is their diminutive size. As noted in ProGuitarShop’s Catalinbread company page, “One of the defining features of Catalinbread effects pedals is the size. Catalinbread pedals are half the size of your standard MXR. That’s right, take a Phase 90 and cut it in half vertically and you’ve got the basic size of Catalinbread’s pint-sized pedals.” But, as they say, size isn’t everything. Apparently Catalinbread’s pedals pack a lot of sonic punch.

The other thing that makes Catalinbread pedals stand apart is their price. Their most expensive pedal that I found was US$179.95. Several of their pedals are under US$120.00! Mind you, these are handmade pedals! That’s so awesome! Catalinbread is definitely taking the stand of selling gear at lower prices to get it into players’ hands. Creation Audio Labs does this with their awesome pedals, and Aracom Amps does it with their VRX line. This ain’t trivial stuff, either. This is great, handmade gear at a great price!

Can you keep a secret?

The Dirty Little Secret could be construed as another “amp in a box” pedal. But from what I’ve heard from sound clips, it’s far from that. Catalinbread claims to have built into the box amp-like touch sensitivity that accurately respond to your playing dynamics and volume input; so much so that you feel like you’re playing in front of an amp, and not through a pedal. But there are several videos on the DLS product page that bears this out. Check out that page here.

Of course, only a live test will reveal if that is true, but I’m intrigued enough to go try one out if I can. The only problem with that is there are none to be found. This pedal’s so scarce that you can’t even order one on the Catalinbread’s web site! I have a feeling they’re being sucked up as fast as the company can produce them. Even retailers who were hawking the pedals awhile ago have either removed their sale pages or replaced their “buy now” link with ‘Email us about ordering.”

Well… my brother lives up in Portland. Maybe I’ll have him look these guys up!

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Gear Find: Acoustic Image Corus+

Posted in amplifiers, amps, Amps/Amplification, announcements, GAS, gear, gear find, guitar, guitar gear, guitarists, Guitars, Music, musicians, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 31, 2009| Leave a Comment »

A couple of weeks ago, the Dawg was sniffing around for some new and interesting gear, and came across a little company in Raleigh, NC called Acoustic Image, that specializes in acoustic and bass amps. While I love my Roland Cube 60 for its acoustic channel, I was really impressed by the sound of the Acoustic Image Corus. Now, I could only go off the sound of the YouTube video below, but this puppy has some serious, natural tone. Amazingly enough, it’s a diminutive amp with a 10″ downward firing woofer, a 5″ midrange driver, and 1″ tweeter. It produces 450W at 8 ohms and 800W at 4 ohms. That’s a boatload of power! But we’re talking solid state here, so it’s tough to compare to tube amps. But power isn’t everything – it’s the sound that counts, and from what I can tell, this amp sounds fantastic! I need to get to a store that carries these to try it out with my acoustic/electric. Check out the video!

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Have you ever had a #1 of anything?

Posted in 6V6, amplifiers, amps, Amps/Amplification, announcements, aracom amps, buying gear, GAS, gear, guitar, guitar gear, guitarists, Guitars, VRX22, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 21, 2009| 4 Comments »

Aracom Amps VRX22 - First in the series

Aracom Amps VRX22 - First in the series

I’ve never had a #1 of anything in my life – or at least nothing of consequence – but this weekend, I’m taking delivery of the very first production amp in the Aracom VRX 22 line! That’s it to the left! OMG!!! I’m excited! This is a real special time for me. I’ve played all sorts of fantastic gear, but I’ve never played something so impactful on my music where I got the first unit! It’ll probably never happen again, but who cares? It’s happened once, and that’s all that matters.

I decided to go with the separate head and cab for more versatility (plus I could use the cab with other amps – like my Fender Champ, and as an extra speaker for my Hot Rod). This amp is just perfect, driven by a couple of 6V6 power tubes. Read the review I gave it previously! In a nutshell, when I had the pre-production unit, I just couldn’t stop playing it! I’d totally lose track of time! That’s the mark of a special piece of gear!

The cool thing about the cab is that it has removable slats so I can go from fully closed to get extra bass response to wide open. Jeff made this suggestion when we were talking about what I was looking for in an extension cabinet. A musician himself, he’s constantly thinking of how he’d use his amps in a live situation, and he made this suggestion to add tonal versatility to the cabinet because we were talking about closed back versus open back designs. So why not the best of both worlds?

Also, the speaker is a Jensen P12N Alnico. I tried this speaker out in a different amp that I was testing for Jeff, and just fell in love with it! It is a very dynamic speaker capable of handling a wide range of tones.

So how did I end up with the very first amp in the line? Easy. I tested the original prototype, and the final pre-production unit. When Jeff picked it up, he was going to bring over other amps for me to try out, but I told him that the VRX 22 was the one I wanted, and verbally placed my order.

This is a real special amp, and it is so versatile. It is capable of going from super chimey cleans to all-out snarling overdrive. Here are some sound samples from the Aracom site (sorry, no cleans in this set – I’ll record some and post them later):

Slight Grind (this one says it’s the combo, but it’s the head into a prototype cabinet – I know because I recorded the clip 🙂 )

The following clips were recorded with the head plugged into a 4 X 12 cabinet.

Slight grind with a slide:

Grinding Blues:

More grinding Blues:

Fully cranked in Channel 2! Volume and Master on 10!

While the clips all sound great, this amp live is absolutely gorgeous-sounding!

Oh, and by the way, the amp head only costs $895. But don’t be fooled by the price: The VRX (as well as all Aracom Amps) is completely handwired and uses a solid-state rectifier and voltage sag simulator, which accounts for the lower price. But who cares? It sounds freakin’ awesome. I gigged with both the prototype and the pre-production units, and I can attest to how great it sounds. And great sound at a price like this is simply amazing!

For more information on this amp, go to the Aracom Amps web site.

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Gear Alert! Aracom Amps to Release a New Model!!!

Posted in amplifiers, amps, Amps/Amplification, announcements, aracom amps, buying gear, GAS, gear, gear reviews, guitar, guitarists, Guitars, Music, musicians, Tone, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 14, 2009| 1 Comment »

The Dawg always has his nose to the ground, trying to pick up the scent of new gear. And for the past few months with the economy in a deep recession, new gear has been tough to find; especially from the small-run manufacturers. Well, I just picked up the scent of a brand new amp from Aracom Amps, and despite the recommendations of its maker, Jeff Aragaki to wait until he updates his site, sorry Jeff, this alert just can’t wait!!! 🙂

The new amp is called the Vintage Rox Series, and is based upon his absolutely kick-ass RoxBox series, which is an EL84-based, 18 Watt head or combo. The Vintage Rox, or VRX, series on the other hand, uses the same chassis and layout as the RoxBox, but is 6V6-based, producing 22 Watts of output. Now you have a choice in low-wattage solutions from Aracom!

Time to come clean…

Okay, I’ll admit it: I didn’t just discover this amp. I was actually the primary tester for the amp (there are distinct advantages to being local to a manufacturer), and I have been literally waiting weeks and chomping at the bit to announce it. I’ve hinted at its existence in previous article, but couldn’t provide any details.

Why am I so excited? For lots of reasons. But I’ll name two. First, with this amp, I think Jeff has definitely hit the sweet spot for low-wattage amp solutions! With the RoxBox 18 and the VRX 22, players have a voicing choice that not many boutique builders offer. But even more special, both the RoxBox and VRX amps sell for significantly less; in many cases more than half as much as other boutique amps at the same or similar wattage.

Secondly, the tone this amp produces is freakin’ marvelous! So much so, that I’m taking delivery of the first production amp. When Jeff brought the first prototype to me several weeks ago as an “experiment” he was working on, my immediate feedback was that this was a special amp, and I couldn’t wait until he had a production model because that was the amp I wanted to get from him.

I’ll have a full review of the amp once I get some pictures from Jeff, but for now, start checking out the Aracom Amps site for the VRX 22 announcement. It should be up by tomorrow!

Folks, I haven’t been this excited about an amp since I reviewed the Reason SM25! It’s one special amp that really deserves your attention. Also, if you subscribe to Vintage Guitar mag, you should see a review of the Aracom Evolver there in the newest issue!

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Gear Announcement: Red Bear Trading Releases the Tuff-Tone Line of Picks

Posted in announcements, GAS, gear, guitar, guitar gear, guitar picks, guitarists, Guitars, Music, musicians, picks, plectrum, Red Bear Trading, Tuff-Tone, Tuff-Tone Picks, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 9, 2009| 3 Comments »

Red Bear Trading Tuff-Tone Classic H

Red Bear Trading Tuff-Tone Classic H

I occasionally browse Red Bear Trading’s web site to see if Dave Skowron has come up with anything new, and much to my surprise, he has! Red Bear has come up with a new pick line called the Tuff-Tone line that apparently sound just as good as his originals. But the big difference is that these picks are made of a material that is much more durable than the Tortis material of the original Red Bear picks! Apparently, they also sound just as good as the originals. Could this be a death knell for Tortis? I doubt it. Dave’s Tortis picks are the absolute bomb, and the natural feel of the Tortis when you’re playing is absolutely to die for!

In any case, here’s an excerpt from the Tuff-Tone web page:

Are they tough enough? You bet. These picks aren’t going to warp or break on you anytime soon. They will pick up some discoloration from your guitar strings. When this happens, simply wash them with soap and water. Go ahead and run them through the washer and dryer! No problem! Keep them in your pocket full of change – see if we care! These picks are really tough!

Not only are the tougher, they cost half the price of a regular Red Bear pick at $10.00! This is something I’m going to have to check out – and soon! For more information, check out the Tuff-Tone information page at Red Bear Trading!

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First Impressions: Prestige Guitars Heritage Elite

Posted in announcements, buying gear, GAS, gear, gear reviews, guitar, guitar gear, guitarists, Guitars, prestige guitars, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on March 7, 2009| 1 Comment »

Prestige Heritage - Lite Sunburst

Prestige Heritage Elite - Lite Sunburst

I did a gear find about Prestige Guitars a couple of weeks ago, and was very intrigued about how this company could do such high-end work for a reasonable price. So I contacted them to do a review on their top-of-the-line Heritage Elite model. The guitar arrived late yesterday, but I had a gig last night so I couldn’t play it – oh well…

So with great anticipation, I jumped out of bed at 7 am this morning, and unwrapped the package. The guitar came with a nice, form-fitting old-school, black tolex-covered case. When I lifted the lid to see the guitar, I was blown away by how awesome it looked! The abalone binding on the body, neck and headstock was gorgeous, and the mother-of-pearl vine inlay on the fretboard is spectacular. But that said, if I had my druthers, I’d skip the abalone binding on the neck, but that’s just a nit – it’s all beautiful.

The finish on the body is incredible, with the burst stain bringing nicely bringing out the contours of the curly maple top. Around 8:30 am, my buddy Phil texted me and asked if I had received the guitar (I show him all the gear that I review), and demanded that we meet for coffee so he could see this gorgeous guitar. He fell in love with it immediately.

Out of the box, the setup was awesome, though during shipping, the intonation got thrown off a bit on the 6th string. That was very easy to remedy though, so it wasn’t really a problem. I also expect that out of instruments shipped to me, so it’s not a negative. The action on this guitar is low – very nicely low – with no string buzz unless you really hammer the strings, which is to be expected. To me, the action is perfect! The neck is nice and fast, and with a 24 3/4″ scale length, you can really move around on the neck. Another nice feature of the guitar is that it doesn’t have a big neck joint, so reaching notes in the upper registers is a breeze.

So, how does it sound? In a word, awesome. It’s very much like a Les Paul, with a Duncan ’59 in the neck and a SH-4JB in the bridge – two of my favorite pickups. The bridge pickup is nicely damp and rich sounding, and the treble pickup really screams. Played through my Hot Rod Deluxe, it’s got a great, mid-rangy sound. I especially like the bridge pickup. It’s nice and tight and doesn’t lose bottom end, which is a beef I’ve had about some Les Pauls I’ve played.

All-in-all, this is one sweet guitar, and at about US $1450, it’s a guitar that has a ton of boutique features at a relatively reasonable price point. I need to play with it for a few days to get to know it better, and I’ll do a full review.

But my preliminary rating is 4.75 Tone Bones. This is a great guitar!

4.75 Tone Bones - Almost perfect but not quite

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New Gear: Orange Amplification launches ‘Limited Edition 2009’ White Finish’

Posted in amplifiers, amps, Amps/Amplification, announcements, buying gear, GAS, gear, guitar, guitarists, Guitars, Music, musicians, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 4, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Orange Amps Limited Edition 2009 White FinishI love writing this blog. In order to keep my content fresh, I have to top into a lot of resources. No doubt, I get A LOT of announcements and stuff. Most of it I just let rot in my inbox, but there are some, like this press release from Orange that really catch my eye. Here’s the verbiage:

British amplifier manufacturer Orange, have for decades produced their instantly recognisable, brightly coloured Orange Amplifiers and picture-frame cabinets and more recently offered Black as a standard option. Their revolutionary styling, have not only set them apart, but literally helped guitarists the world over, stand out from the crowd.

Orange can now announce a ‘limited edition 2009’ white finish on their UK built, valve amps and cabs. The cabs have a stunning white finish, complete with black fittings and come with the classic Orange front grill cloth, Orange logo and crest. This finish has previously only been available for artist’s special orders and is now being offered as a special limited edition for the duration of 2009 and will cease to be obtainable thereafter.

The white finish has already been used by artists as diverse as Madonna, Monte Pittman and The View and following numerous requests, Orange are able to offer this for a limited period only at the same price as existing Orange amps and heads.

For further information contact:

UK and rest of world info@omec.com  and for the USA info@orangeusa.com

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