Norse Guitar Feeds

One thing I've noticed over the years is that guitar players tend to get very comfortable with their setups and routines. We find a guitar we like, an amp sound we like, a few pedals that become part of “our sound,” and then we stay there. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, but sometimes comfort can quietly limit growth.

Interestingly, some of the biggest improvements in my playing have come when I’ve intentionally added constraints to my practice routine.

At first glance, that sounds counterintuitive. Most of us think improvement comes from adding more options — more gear, more scales, more techniques, more sounds. But sometimes taking things away forces you to think differently and engage with the instrument in a different way.

One example is practicing without pedals.

If you normally rely on overdrive, delay, compression, or reverb, try plugging straight into a clean amp for a while. Suddenly everything becomes more exposed. Your timing has to be tighter, your articulation has to be cleaner, and your phrasing has to carry more weight because there’s nothing masking inconsistencies in your playing.

I’ve found that playing dry also changes the types of phrases I naturally gravitate toward. With a lot of gain and delay, it’s easy to lean into longer sustained notes and ambient textures. Without those effects, you start thinking more rhythmically and dynamically.

Similarly, changing guitars can be incredibly helpful.

If you typically play a Strat like I usually do, spend some time with a Les Paul-style guitar. If you primarily play electric, pick up an acoustic for a few weeks. Even something as simple as a different scale length or neck shape can force you to approach the instrument differently.

For example, when I switch from an electric guitar to an acoustic, I immediately notice how much more deliberate I have to be with vibrato, bends, and fretting pressure. Certain licks that feel easy on one instrument suddenly require more intention on another.

I think this is valuable because so much of guitar playing eventually becomes muscle memory. Constraints interrupt that autopilot feeling.

Another useful exercise is limiting the area of the fretboard you allow yourself to use.

For instance, try improvising while staying within only five frets. Or only use the top three strings. Or force yourself to stay in a single position for an entire solo.

What’s interesting is that limitations like these often increase creativity rather than reduce it. When your normal patterns are unavailable, you naturally start searching for new melodic ideas and phrasing approaches.

The same concept applies to technique.

If you tend to rely heavily on bends and vibrato, try practicing without them for a while. If you mostly play with legato phrasing, spend time focusing exclusively on alternate picking. Constraints like these expose weaknesses very quickly, but they also help round out your playing.

I also think tone itself acts as a kind of creative constraint.

A bright clean tone tends to make me play differently than a saturated lead tone. High gain can encourage more aggressive phrasing, whereas cleaner tones often make rhythmic precision and note choice feel more important.

That’s one reason why it can be beneficial to occasionally practice with tones you wouldn’t normally use live or in recordings.

Ultimately, the goal of constraints isn’t to make playing less enjoyable. It’s to prevent yourself from falling too deeply into habits.

Most guitar players develop tendencies over time — certain licks, certain sounds, certain rhythmic ideas. I know I do. Constraints temporarily remove those comfort zones and force exploration. And often that exploration leads to growth you wouldn’t have found otherwise.

So if your playing feels stagnant, you may not need more options.

You may actually need fewer.

Steve Hackett has revealed that Genesis were accompanied by a rather strange companion in the studio while recording their A Trick Of The Tail album – a lion cub.

Released in 1976, A Trick of the Tail marked the band’s seventh studio album, and was their first record featuring drummer Phil Collins as lead vocalist following the departure of Peter Gabriel. The album celebrates its 50th anniversary this year, and early work began in a peculiar basement rehearsal studio in Acton, London.

• READ MORE: “A Beatle knows who I am? Ridiculous”: Peter Frampton’s response when George Harrison invited him to play on All Things Must Pass

Speaking to Prog Magazine, Hackett recalls of the studio, “I seem to remember at one point that there was a spare lion roaming around. Well, a lion cub: it was like a pussy cat, rolling over, being playful. It did have a very rough tongue, and a big head.

“It was like a cross between a large cat and a medium-sized dog. It had no teeth at that point, but you could feel the strength of the little thing. That said, growing up in the 1950s I went with my dad to a market in Peckham and you could buy baby alligators in fish tanks. I stuck my finger in a monkey’s cage and got it bitten. Of course, I now sympathise with the monkey.”

Speaking of the band’s shifted lineup at the time, he also adds: “I will always miss Pete, but I was very glad to work with the other guys and see that we were all coming up with extraordinary things that were not solely dependent on one guy. Songwriting was very much at the heart of Genesis, which is why people still listen. It can’t be for the hairstyles or the strides!”

Hackett discussed the “imperfections” in classic Genesis albums in an interview last year, and though he feels such flaws do come to sound “sweeter” over time, he’s not opposed to polishing them up when revisiting these records in the present day.

“I think old material sounds sweeter with the passing of time. I think you forgive its imperfections and try and change those things when you go to it again. So things that might have been recorded in haste with aspects of timing and tuning, there’s no excuse for that these days. If you’re going to do a revisit, you might as well straighten out those things,” he said.

The post “At one point that there was a spare lion roaming around”: Steve Hackett on the bizarre recording of Genesis’ A Trick Of The Tail album appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

The idea of an Eddie Van Halen tribute concert is something that’s been discussed a lot since the guitarist tragically died in 2020, but has never come to pass. Now, former Metallica bassist Jason Newsted – who was once in the frame to take part – has made his feelings known about what the concert should entail, should it ever happen.

The idea of a tribute show was reportedly proposed in 2021, a year on from Eddie’s passing, by Alex Van Halen and former Van Halen vocalist David Lee Roth. Joe Satriani said in an interview earlier this year that the idea “fell apart”, and felt uncomfortable with the idea of taking on guitar duties.

• READ MORE: Steve Vai recalls hearing unreleased material at Eddie Van Halen’s house: “Nobody plays like they do when they’re in their room alone… It was such great stuff”

During a chat with Eddie Trunk on TrunkNation, Newsted recalls also being contacted by Alex: “I remember having a phone call with Alex and then telling Joe [Satriani] that I didn’t think it was appropriate, and that was the last I ever heard of it. I think I’m in the same camp as most people [in thinking] that [it needs to] be done properly and concisely.

“It needs to be a special thing, two nights at some place and it’s just that, but it’s getting kind of late to do it correctly, I think. It’s got to be an honour show. It has to be that. It’s not just going to be some kind of rock show. It has to be a hybrid dedication kind of event, and I’m not sure those logistics could be worked out anymore,” he shares.

Trunk then discusses the idea of having a show with a similar format to the tribute concerts the Foo Fighters hosted after the passing of drummer Taylor Hawkins. Newsted then goes on to question if a supposed tribute event would be honouring the whole of the Van Halen band, or just Eddie, and shares opposing ideas for the two.

“How are you going to do that and still pay homage to Alex also and pay homage [to] the band? If you’re going to do an Eddie tribute, then have Nuno Bettencourt and Tom Morello line up a bunch of bad motherfuckers, and you do that thing and everybody takes their shot at one of Eddie’s songs. Something like that. That needs to be its own category and its own thing.

“If you’re going to have a Van Halen honour, then it needs to be for the band. That’s how I see it,” he says. “If somebody would be able to co-ordinate something that was timely and appropriate, like an anniversary of a passing, of the beginning of the band, an anniversary of the biggest album of the band – something that made sense to the fans – and they did it as an honour to the music that was made, not just certain guys that played it, that’s the way it has to be done in my opinion.”

While there are no plans at the moment for any tribute show, Alex Van Halen is putting together an album of unheard Van Halen material with help from Steve Lukather. The record will utilise material that was due to be come the next Van Halen record and re-work it. Lukather has confirmed he is not playing guitar on the record.

The post “Have Nuno Bettencourt and Tom Morello line up a bunch of bad motherf**kers”: Jason Newsted’s vision for an “appropriate” Eddie Van Halen tribute concert appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

$122/£125, ehx.com

It doesn’t take much to get me excited about a new pedal – especially one with the words ‘Big Muff’ on the front. And when it’s a long-forgotten variant that never went into production, found by chance in a pile of old papers and now brought into existence after almost half a century… well, by the time the announcement video finished I was sitting in a pool of my own saliva.

• READ MORE: Strymon Fairfax review – an old-school drive pedal with plenty of rough edges

But then, after I changed my trousers, my inner cynic began to stir. Do we really need yet another Muff? If this circuit is so good, why did Electro-Harmonix choose not to build it in the late 70s? And doesn’t the involvement of JHS Pedals supremo Josh Scott – undisputed world champion of stompbox salesmanship – suggest the whole thing might be more about clever marketing than genuinely new tones?

Electro-Harmonix Big Muff 2 – what is it?

The story goes that Josh and archivist Daniel Danger were researching their book on the history of Electro-Harmonix when, during a visit to the old workshop of original Big Muff designer Bob Myer, they found the hand-drawn schematic of the fuzz that never was. And so, with Bob’s blessing, they made it real – first as an ‘EHX by JHS’ pedal in a large folded metal enclosure, and now also as a nano-sized version produced by EHX.

The technical angle is that it’s powered by dual op-amps rather than transistors. That’s also true of the model favoured by Billy Corgan and recently reissued as the Op Amp Big Muff Pi, but we’re told to expect a different sound here – something “slightly more dynamic, slightly more fuzzy”. It’s controlled by the classic three-knob array of volume, tone and sustain.

Electro-Harmonix Big Muff 2 – what does it sound like?

It sounds big and it sounds muffy, but that doesn’t mean it sounds Big Muffy… at least, not completely. This is a fuzz with no shortage of thickness, and when you hit strident power chords you can certainly hear the rich, gurgly roar that defines the type – while single notes sing out with that familiar boop-boopy smoothness.

It’s only when you crank the tone knob to open up the top end that… well, it doesn’t happen. You can sharpen up the treble for sure, but it never fizzles and sizzles with the freshness of its many siblings. What you get instead is a solid midrange – which is not exactly vintage, and can sound congested at times, but could be welcome if you’re not a fan of the old Big Muff mids-scoop.

Max out the sustain and it gets fuzzier, of course, but you might also notice a jittery gating effect when you stop playing, which is not pleasant. Luckily, there are two ways to avoid this: either keep the sustain down at around halfway, which is quite filthy enough for most use cases, or just carry on playing forever.

Electro-Harmonix Big Muff 2 – should I buy it?

Remember, this circuit wasn’t lost – it was rejected – and there’s nothing in the performance of the Big Muff 2 to suggest that was some sort of calamitous mistake. If you’re looking to buy your first Muff, this is not the one to go for – EHX has several other options that cover the basics better.

Having said that, once you strip away the backstory and judge the pedal on its own merits, it is really rather nice. This is a straightforward fuzz with a powerfully throaty sound that might even hit the spot more satisfactorily than a traditional Muff for some players.

Electro-Harmonix Big Muff 2 alternatives

For something tonally similar but a little more ‘correct’, your first port of call is probably the Electro-Harmonix Green Russian Big Muff Pi ($109/£85). But there are hundreds of refinements to the formula from other makers, including the EarthQuaker Devices Hoof ($179/£195) and ThorpyFX Fallout Cloud (£199.99/$299).

The post Electro-Harmonix Big Muff 2 review – a forgotten fuzz masterpiece, or just a marketing exercise? appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

First, I want to take a moment to thank everyone who has spent time reading, sharing, and supporting Guitar Lifestyle over the years. What started as a simple place to talk about guitars, players, and gear turned into a community of like-minded people who love the instrument. Your comments, emails, and conversations have meant more than you probably realize. I’ve met a number of people I now call friends from this site.

Today I’m excited to share something new.

Introducing Steady Strum

Going forward, all new posts and updates will live on Steady Strum.

Steady Strum is more than just the next version of the blog — it’s an evolution of the idea behind Guitar Lifestyle. The goal is to create a place that doesn’t just talk about becoming a better guitarist, but actually helps you practice, stay consistent, and grow as a player.

Alongside the new site, I’m also launching the Steady Strum web app, designed to support guitarists in building real practice habits and making steady progress.

This is a tool that I built for myself as much as for anyone else. I started playing guitar a long time ago (longer than I care to admit!), but there are still plenty of gaps in my knowledge and ability. That’s where Steady Strum comes in.

A Quick Look at the Steady Strum App

The Steady Strum app is built around a simple idea: consistent practice is what makes better guitarists. The app helps make that easier with features like:

• Structured practice tools to help guide your sessions
• Progress tracking so you can see how your playing improves over time
• Practice reminders and streaks to help build daily consistency
• Learning resources and exercises designed for real-world guitar growth
• A growing library of content for players at different stages of their journey

It’s still early, and I’m just getting started, but the vision is to build something genuinely useful for guitarists who want to get better.

If you’ve been following Guitar Lifestyle for a while, I hope you’ll come along for this next phase.

Looking Ahead

I have a lot of excitement around what Steady Strum can become — not just a blog, but a platform and set of tools that genuinely help guitarists stay motivated and keep improving.

Thank you again to everyone who has supported Guitar Lifestyle over the years. Your support made this next step possible.

Welcome to Steady Strum.

Gretsch isn’t the first brand that comes to mind when you think ‘metal’. Hell, you could argue several other brands under the Fender umbrella – Charvel, Jackson and EVH – already have that sector covered.

But the good folks at Gretsch seem keen to get in on the drop-tuned, heavy riffing action, too, as they unveil a pair of new baritone models, which aim to bring “essential Gretsch power and fidelity at sub-sonic levels”.

• READ MORE: First a Godzilla Strat, now a PAC-MAN Tele…

Arriving in the brand’s mid-priced Electromatic series and adopting the Jet and CVT blueprints, the new guitars come with extended scale lengths (baritones, duh), plus coil-splittable Twin-Six Alnico humbuckers.

The Electromatic Jet Baritone lands with a massive 29.75” scale length, along with a Performance “C” maple neck and bound rosewood fingerboard, a chambered mahogany body with Comfort Contours and a bound carved maple top.

Meanwhile the CVT – a gretsch design touted by the likes of Rory Gallagher, Jimi Hendrix and Josh Homme – aims to “expand players’ sonic palette and help them descent into uncharted depths”, with a 27” scale length, mahogany body with beveled contours, and like the Jet, a Performance “C” maple neck and bound rosewood fingerboard.

These two guitars are far from the first baritones in the Gretsch lineup, but judging by the demo video below – for which the brand has tapped Loathe guitarist Erik Bickerstaffe – it seems its leaning heavily into the heavy metal angle with this launch.

Price-wise, the Electromatic Jet Baritone clocks in at £609 / €719 / $699, while the Electromatic CVT Baritone is priced at £599 / €709 / $599.

Learn more at Gretsch.

The post Gretsch is metal now? Legendary guitar maker unveils two new baritone models begging for downtuned riffs appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

The truss rod might be one of the most misunderstood components on a guitar when it comes to DIY setups. A lot of players think it’s some delicate mechanism that’ll explode if you look at it wrong, while others treat it like a universal fix for every setup issue. The reality sits somewhere in between, and getting it right makes a massive difference in how your guitar plays. So let’s take a look at what a truss rod is and what it actually does.

• READ MORE: What’s the point of a guitar’s pickguard anyway? This is what it’s actually there for…

What a Truss Rod Actually Does

A truss rod is a metal rod running through the length of your guitar neck, and it has one very specific job: counteracting the pull of your strings and contributing to neck stability. That’s really all it does. Your strings create somewhere between 100 and 180 pounds of combined tension pulling on the neck, trying to bow it forward. The truss rod provides resistance against that force.

Picture your neck like a diving board with weight on the end. The strings are that weight, making it curve. The truss rod is what lets you control how much it flexes. When you tighten the rod, you’re pulling the neck backward, reducing the bow. When you loosen it, you’re allowing more forward bow.

As an aside, there are dual-action truss rods, which can bend the neck in either direction, but the vast majority of guitars use standard single-way truss rods. Some guitars and basses use two truss rods to do the same thing, but for the sake of simplicity here we’ll just talk about single-action ones.

This is where the confusion starts. The truss rod doesn’t directly raise or lower your action. It doesn’t fix fret buzz on its own. It won’t help your intonation. It controls one thing: the amount of curve in your neck, which is called “relief.” That relief is the intentional bow you want in the neck to give strings room to vibrate without smacking into frets.

Understanding Relief

Most guitars play best with between 0.005” and 0.012” of relief measured at the center of the neck. You check this by fretting the low E string at both the first fret and where the neck meets the body (typically around the 17th fret), then looking at the gap between the string and the fret around the 7th or 8th fret. That small gap is your relief.

Too much relief makes the middle of the neck feel like it has high action. Playing in that 5th-to-9th fret range becomes harder than it should be. Too little relief – or a back-bow where the center of the neck is actually higher than the ends – causes fret buzz, especially on the lower frets when you’re playing with any real attack.

The right amount depends on your playing style. Light players who mostly strum chords can run less relief. Aggressive pickers and lead players who really dig in need more space for the strings to move around without buzzing out.

Common Mistakes

The most frequent error is using the truss rod to adjust action height when the real problem lies elsewhere. Action is primarily set at the nut and bridge. The truss rod only matters if your neck relief is off.

Another common issue is being overly cautious. Yes, you can damage a truss rod, but it’s not nearly as fragile as people think. These components are designed to be adjusted regularly. The key is making small changes, giving the neck time to settle, and checking your work. A quarter turn, waiting several hours or overnight, then reassessing – that’s the process.

Then there’s adjusting without actually measuring. Some of you out there might have laser eyes, but all it takes is a capo and a feeler gauge to be precise, so why not just measure? In my experience (gained from millions of mistakes), guessing leads to problems.

Finally, people adjust too quickly after changes. Brand new strings, different string gauges, major temperature swings – necks need time to adapt to these changes before you start making adjustments. Give it a few hours at least.

The Correct Approach

Start with your guitar tuned to pitch. Relief changes with string tension, so you need accurate tension to get an accurate measurement.

Check your current relief using the method described earlier – fret at both ends, observe the gap at the middle. Need more bow? Turn the truss rod nut counter-clockwise to loosen it. Need less bow? Turn it clockwise to tighten. Standard threading rules apply here and the truss rod adjustment will normally be at the headstock of the guitar (sometimes beneath a truss rod cover) – but on some models, they are at the base of the neck, where it attached to the neck pocket.

Begin with a quarter turn. That’s 90 degrees of rotation. Retune your guitar since changing neck shape affects string tension slightly. Then wait. Check it the following day. Make another small adjustment if necessary.

If you keep tightening without seeing changes, or if the nut becomes genuinely difficult to turn, stop immediately. You’ve either reached the rod’s adjustment limit or there’s a structural problem that needs professional attention. Truss rods can strip out or seize up depending on their construction, and if that’s the case, it will require an experienced tech to do some surgery, which can require removing the fretboard to access the truss rod.

When the Problem Isn’t Relief

High action uniformly across the entire fretboard points to bridge or saddle height, not relief issues. Buzzing only on the first few frets suggests nut slot problems before relief problems. Buzzing everywhere might mean you need fret leveling work.

The truss rod is one component in a complete setup, not a magic solution. A proper setup involves nut height, truss rod relief, bridge height, intonation adjustment, and sometimes fret work. These elements work together as a system.

Knowing what the truss rod actually controls – and equally important, what it doesn’t control – prevents you from chasing solutions in the wrong direction. Once you understand its actual function, setting up your guitar becomes much more straightforward, and you’ll stop making adjustments that create more problems than they solve.

The post This is how your guitar’s truss rod actually works – and here’s what you’re doing wrong with it appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

Palace Skateboards. Supreme. Jameson Whiskey. Godzilla. It’s generally pretty difficult to know where Fender is heading next in terms of its collaborations, but I bet you didn’t see this one coming.

The guitar giant has just announced its new partnership with Bandai Namco, proudly unveiling its new Limited Edition PAC-MAN Player II Telecaster, coinciding with the 75th anniversary of the Telecaster and the 45th anniversary of the legendary arcade game.

The iconic PAC-MAN maze is unmistakable, and it’s emblazoned in all its glory across the front face of the new Player II Telecaster. We all remember the peril we felt as kids as PAC-MAN’s arch rivals, the ghosts Blinky, Inky, Pinky and Clyde were never far behind… And they’re all featured on the guitar’s eye-catching retro design. There’s also a Fender x PAC-MAN logo on the back of the guitar.

• READ MORE: Fender Godzilla Distortion: imbue your pedalboard with the “sonic might of the King of Monsters”
  

In terms of specs, the Limited Edition PAC-MAN Player II Telecaster features an alder body, Modern C neck profile, 9.5”-radius, 22-fret rosewood fingerboard with rolled edges, a pair of Alnico V single-coil Tele pickups, ClassicGear tuning machines and a six-saddle string-through-body Tele bridge.

The pickups are controlled by three-way blade switch, as well as singular volume and tone controls.

“Teaming up with Bandai Namco isn’t just a partnership, it’s a collision of two cultural forces that have shaped generations,” says Justin Norvell, Chief Product Officer at Fender. 

“Fender and PAC-MAN share something rare: the ability to make people feel something profound, decade after decade. Our new offering honors that legacy with the uncompromising craftsmanship Fender is known for, wrapped in the unmistakable iconography of one of gaming’s greatest legends – a natural expression of two icons that have never stopped inspiring, built for the fans who grew up with both, and for the players who carry that spirit forward.”

“As we celebrate our milestone anniversaries, our PAC-MAN collaboration with Fender captures the endearing legacy of two global icons  that have created memories across generations, and done so in the hands of people who have been able to experience joy and showcase their skill,” adds Susan Tran, Sr. Director of Brand Development for PAC-MAN at Bandai Namco Entertainment America Inc. 

“Seeing and holding the PAC-MAN Player II Telecaster, it just feels right, as if this is exactly how these two timeless brands were meant to come together, in something exquisite that conjures nostalgia, feels familiar, and inspires creativity the moment it is in your hands.”

In addition to the PAC-MAN Tele, the two companies have also unveiled a line of clothing exclusive to Japan under Fender’s F IS FOR FENDER line. Available at Fender’s flagship Tokyo store, and at the F IS FOR FENDER website, the collection includes three retro-inspired premium cotton T-shirts in a range of colours, and two “nostalgia-infused” baseball caps.

The Limited Edition PAC-MAN Player II Telecaster is available now, priced at £949 / $1099.99 / €1099.99.

Learn more at Fender.

The post First a Godzilla Strat, now a PAC-MAN Tele… appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

Session bassist Guy Pratt has revealed how his headless bass was stolen from a music store in London in the 1990s, which remains missing to this day.

Pratt, who has played with Pink Floyd, Michael Jackson, Madonna, and many other huge artists, shared the story during an episode of his Rockonteurs podcast, hosted alongside Gary Kemp of Spandau Ballet. His bass was taken as part of a string of thefts at the time, when a thief used the headless design to their advantage.

• READ MORE: The intriguing history of Steinberger guitars

Pratt recalls (via Guitar World), “I had this bass, and I gave it to the Bass Centre [in London, England] to sell. They called me up one day and said, ‘Really sorry, Guy, but someone’s nicked your bass.’ And it turns out they’d had a raft of thefts of headless basses.

“Eventually, this guy got caught. They went round to his place, and he’s got a flat full of headless basses for the simple reason he’d figured out a way he could nick them, because they don’t have a head, if you had a big carrier bag, you could put the body in the bag and have the neck go up your arm. So he stole about 50 basses.”

The podcast clip has been highlighted by content creator Danny Sapko, who has also shared Pratt’s appeal to locate the missing guitar in return for a reward. The bass you’re looking for is a Steinberger L2, serial number 712.

Speaking of stolen bass guitars, Ian Horne, a former sound engineer for Wings, recently recalled how remarkably relaxed Paul McCartney was when he broke the news to him that his 1961 Höfner 500/1 Violin Bass had been stolen.

While Wings were working in a recording studio, Horne had parked a truck full of their gear on a West London street, which was broken into. The stolen bass became the focus of a BBC Two documentary film, McCartney: The Hunt For The Lost Bass. It has since been reunited with McCartney.

“All these things go through your head,” said Horne in a Radio Times interview. “I must have looked like a beaten man when I knocked on the door. I just came out with it: ‘I’ve got some bad news, Paul. Our truck was broken into and the bass was stolen.’ I expected him to go ballistic, but Paul was lovely about it. He said, ‘It’s all right, I’ve got another one.’”

The post “If you had a big carrier bag, you could put the body in the bag and have the neck go up your arm”: How a prolific guitar thief stole 50 headless bass guitars in the ’90s appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

Despite Angine de Poitrine initially landing on their microtonal sound as a joke, the polka-dotted papier-mâché-headed duo have taken the rock world by storm. Now, guitarist Khn de Poitrine’s wonky, double-necked bass/guitar started out as an experimental Frankensteinian hack job is being sought after by guitarists across the globe – and Eastwood Guitars has recreated it for the masses.

Upon sharing a Guitstarter campaign for the Microtonal Doubleneck 4/6, fans flocked to pre-order and back the model. While Eastwood Guitars only needed 12 backers to make the guitar a reality 36 customers have since bought the $1,299 axe.

• READ MORE: “The guitar gets funny questions because it looks like a dead body”: Angine de Poitrine have to transport their double-necked guitar in a sleeping bag – which causes problems at airport security

The Microtonal Doubleneck 4/6 appears to boast 38 frets on its guitar neck, coming in at 24.75” in scale, while the bass neck has 28 frets and sits at 30.5”. Alongside the bolt-on maple necks with rosewood fingerboards, the guitar features an alder body and Gotoh-style nickel and chrome hardware. It also weighs in at around 11 lbs.

While the model isn’t an official collaboration with Angine de Poitrine, Eastwood explains that there had previously been talks of collaborating with the band’s luthier, Raphael Le Breton. There had been discussion of authentically recreating guitarist Khn de Poitrine’s iconic instrument – but Khn “ultimately decided he would prefer not to have a signature replica of his guitar made available for purchase”.

The company goes on to claim that the decision was one they “fully respect”. However, Eastwood was still keen to release something inspired by the group. “Many years ago, Khn had approached us with a request to build a white, microtonal version of our Eastwood 4/6 Doubleneck featuring black appointments,” the company explains. That old request has finally been brought to life.

There’s still 18 days left to pre-order a model, if you’re interested. Though, be warned – the signature Angine de Poitrine polka-dots are not included.

Though the anonymous Canadian group have kept things pretty private, last month saw them speaking to Cult MTL and explaining that the project is “a culmination of a lot of years of inside jokes”. Even their bizarre names are tongue-in-cheek, with Khn saying: “The names were our alter egos in a 10-minute free jazz project, where I was just fooling around on saxophone and [Klek] was on drums.”

Drummer Klek also forged his partner’s strange, alien guitar as a joke. “I took two guitars, and I took the frets from one board, which was kind of rusty and fucked up anyway, and I put them on a second fret board,” Klek said. “We thought it would look fucking sick, and for 15 seconds, we were like, ‘Oh, that’s a funny joke.’ But it became clear that it was a good idea.”

“The whole idea of the band was to assume a bit of a satirical approach to rock music in general,” Khn added. “We wanted an exaggeration, so the double-neck guitar was the perfect choice to kind of make fun of guitar heroes.”

For more information, head to Eastwood Guitars.

The post Eastwood Guitars unveils an Angine de Poitrine-inspired double neck guitar/bass – polka-dots not included appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

After NAMM President John Mlynczak this week said Donald Trump’s tariffs are “tilting the playing field against American manufacturers, American retailers, and the American children and families who depend on affordable instruments”, EarthQuaker Devices CEO Julie Robbins has announced she has joined a delegation of NAMM members to meet with congress to urge tariff relief on musical instruments.

In a press release shared with Guitar.com by EarthQuaker, it’s revealed that Julie Robbins joined the 20th NAMM Washington DC Advocacy Fly-In, representing the state of Ohio – where EarthQuaker is based – alongside 100 music business leaders and professionals representing all 50 states.

The delegation argued that tariff relief would benefit music retailers, manufacturers, educators and students across the US.

• READ MORE: Taylor Next Generation 324ce review: “this could easily be your forever acoustic”

“EarthQuaker Devices has spent more than $100,000 in tariffs since April 2025,” Robbins says. “That’s money that could have gone toward good jobs for Ohioans and provided our team with more resources to innovate.”

Julie Robbins has been a longtime advocate for tariff relief, and testified on Capitol Hill before the Senate Small Business committee in May 2025 about the harmful effects of tariffs on the musical instruments industry, specifically smaller, family-operated businesses.

“Today, I asked Ohio’s Congressional Representatives to stand up for their constituents,” she said. “And I will continue to advocate for relief as long as I have to in order to get them to join the fight in earnest.

In John Mlynczak’s latest statement on the devastating effects of Trump’s tariffs, he argued that they threaten the flow of new musicians into the industry, on which it so heavily depends.

“[These tariffs] will price beginners out of the market, which will hurt the American students, retailers, and manufacturers that depend on today’s students becoming tomorrow’s customers…” he said. 

“The American professional instrument market is only as strong as the student market that feeds it.”

Learn more about the NAMM Advocacy D.C. Fly-In at NAMM.org.

The post EarthQuaker Devices CEO says the brand has spent “more than $100k in tariffs since April 2025” appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

Not many guitarists out there have the bragging rights to say they’ve played one of Jimi Hendrix’s guitars, but My Chemical Romance’s Ray Toro can, and the experience, he says, was “mind blowing”.

MCR recently put out a teaser post on Instagram in relation to the 15th anniversary of their 2010 album, Danger Days: The True Lives Of The Fabulous Killjoys. The album turned 15 back in November, but now the band have posted a graphic with the roman numerals XV and the famous spider graphic from the album’s artwork.

In a recently republished 2011 Guitar World interview about the album, Toro and fellow guitarist Frank Iero shared what guitars they were playing at that time, when Toro said he’d managed to get hold of a Strat that once belonged to Hendrix.

• READ MORE: “You ain’t gonna hear nothing”: Buddy Guy admits that when he first saw Jimi Hendrix play live he thought he was “too loud” – but the Brits were next level

He said, “I’m still a Les Paul player, but recently I had the chance to play one of Jimi Hendrix’s Strats. Totally mind blowing! This guy, Jimmy, from Mates Rehearsal Studios in California, had one. I had shown up at the studio, and I didn’t have a guitar to play, so Jimmy let me play this Hendrix Strat that he got from Jimi’s old guitar tech.

“The thing was beat to shit, but it was the best-playing guitar ever. I played it for a year – Jimmy let me use it in the studio. Man, I loved that.” He added, “Live, I’m still a Les Paul guy, but playing Jimi Hendrix’s Strat really got me interested in Strats and other guitars. In fact, I’m in desperate search for the ultimate Tele to play. If I can find one, I’m there.”

View this post on Instagram

In other Hendrix-related news, Marshall is marking 60 years since he first played through one of its amplifiers by launching a unique gear drop featuring three items with designs inspired by Hendrix’s style, sound, and interest in science fiction.

The drop includes a reskinned Acton III Bluetooth speaker, a 1959 JMH Half Stack, and a limited-edition Fuzz Face pedal, all featuring nods to his love of velvet, the jewellery he wore, and his unique sound.

More news about MCR’s Danger Days anniversary celebration is set to arrive imminently. Head over to the My Chemical Romance website for further updates, or to check out their full list of tour dates.

The post “The thing was beat to shit”: The time My Chemical Romance’s Ray Toro got to play one of Jimi Hendrix’s Strats appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

When you think of the forefathers of thrash metal, the likes of Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, Anthrax and Exodus spring to mind. Whether the genre’s origins can be traced to a single person is the subject of much debate, but Megadeth drummer Dirk Verbeuren thinks the creator of thrash is clear: Dave Mustaine.

In a new interview with Brazil’s TV Braba, Verbeuren looks back on his 10 years to date with the band, and waxes lyrical on the musical legacy Dave Mustaine has carved out.

• READ MORE: “A Beatle knows who I am? Ridiculous”: Peter Frampton’s response when George Harrison invited him to play on All Things Must Pass

“To be in the band for 10 years and to kind of continue the legacy with great music – obviously everything Dave has done is iconic, but also the amazing drum work of Nick Menza, Gar Samuelson, Chuck Behler [former Megadeth drummers], all the guys that have been in the band since then, it’s truly an honour. In metal music, you can’t really go much higher than that legacy

He goes on: “And to me, Dave is the guy who invented thrash metal. He wrote a lot of the iconic early stuff that kind of defined what that genre sounded like, and you can recognise his riffs among a million riffs. He has such a unique style of playing to this day on the guitar that, to me, Dave is the ultimate rock god. Absolutely.

Elsewhere in the interview, Verbeuren remembers being a fledgling rock fan, and Megadeth being one of the first live shows he ever saw in 1990.

“It’s still surreal to this day to be part of such an iconic band. You have to know that I went to see Megadeth live in 1990, so I was like 15 years old at the time. It was one of the first shows I ever saw. I only saw two other shows before that.”

Dave Mustaine doesn’t pull any punches over how influential he has been on his thrash metal genre-mates, either.

“Kerry [King, Slayer guitarist] and I played together [during the early days of both bands], and I showed him how to play Megadeth songs, which was before [Slayer] started having all their pivotal records. Kerry and I had a really great time together,” he said in a recent interview.

“And I wrote music in Metallica and I wrote music in Megadeth. So I’ve been very influential with the guitar with these three bands.”

“And when I met Scott [Ian, Anthrax guitarist] and the guys in Anthrax out in New York,” he goes on, “the same thing happened. Their first record was very different from the record they made after they met me and the guys in Metallica. So I think that’s great. I love all those bands.”

Megadeth are currently on tour supporting their self-titled final album. Check out a full list of dates at their official website.

The post Megadeth drummer says Dave Mustaine “invented thrash metal” appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

Back in the ‘70s, the rock scene was a bit of a sausage fest. When Heart broke onto the scene, sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson were in the midst of their 20s – and it could sometimes be a struggle to be taken seriously. In her new solo documentary, In My Voice, Ann has reflected on her career thus far, including how men used to belittle her and her sister.

Speaking to Rolling Stone, Wilson admits that the predominantly male rock scene wasn’t very encouraging at first. “You would build yourself up and do something really great, and you’d feel really good about it – then you could get put down and squashed down very easily by the rest of the men,” she admits.

• READ MORE: “I wake up every morning thinking about what’s on my pedalboard” Adam Granduciel on his love of effects and the next The War On Drugs album

Despite her and her sister being branded as a ‘Little Led Zeppelin’ due to their buckets of guitar talent, men never seemed to judge them on their merit. Everything seemed to be pointedly attacking them just because they were young girls. “They could make you feel like you were really silly for even trying,” she adds. “We were lucky enough to have great people around us, but I know other women who were starting up close to our time that had to rebel as hard as they could to get anything happening at all.”

Prior to Heart’s formation, the sisters already had a sense of rock ‘n’ roll’s inherent sexism after walking out of a 1969 Led Zeppelin gig. In an interview with Premier Guitar’s 100 Guitarists podcast, Nancy recalled how appalled her and sister had felt while watching Robert Plant perform “scandalously” suggestive tracks at the Green Lake Aqua Theater in Seattle.

“The singer, he’s so suggestive,” Nancy recalled. “He’s got his shirt wide open, he’s got his bare chest, and his jeans were really low riders. He was moving in this way that was super-suggestive and we were kind of shocked. We’re like, ‘Oh, my God.’”

Aged 15 and 19 at the time, the pair weren’t very comfortable with the sexuality on display. “We were in a little folk band at the time,” she adds. “We were from the suburbs. So we were kind of square, square little hippie chicks to be unenlightened, let’s just say. And so, they were like, ‘Oh, they’re so loud. They’re just being so suggestive and loud.’”

“Then, he sang [the Lemon Song], saying ‘Squeeze My Lemon,’ and we’re like, ‘we must leave…’ because we were just shocked! We actually walked out… We were scandalised!”

Alongside the new documentary, Ann is releasing a new track, Nothing But Love. It’s a track she wrote back in the ‘90s, and will feature on the In My Voice soundtrack. “That track never saw the light of day until now,” she explains.

“I’ve always really liked it, but it didn’t fit with what was going on in the 1990s at all. It’s just so unlike what was going on at that moment, but it seems natural now. It’s got some soul to it. It’s something that I love hearing, and I love singing. I hope people really get lifted by it.”

The post “I know women who had to rebel as hard as they could to get anything happening at all”: Heart’s Ann Wilson recalls the sexism of rock and roll in the ’70s appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

Peter Frampton has looked back on the time he received an unexpected invitation from George Harrison to record on the Beatles legend’s third album, All Things Must Pass.

George Harrison recorded the album predominantly at EMI Studios (now Abbey Road Studios), but the now-defunct Trident Studios – located at 17 St Anne’s Court in Soho – was used for some overdubs, partly in order to utilise its 16-track recording technology.

• READ MORE: “It’s a little bit of a cheat”: John Mayer’s “critical take” on why country songs are always talking about drinking

As the story goes, Peter Frampton first met George Harrison through Terry Doran, Harrison’s personal assistant and a man heavily involved in organising the All Things Must Pass sessions.

And via a chance meeting at a pub between Frampton and Doran, Doran invited Frampton to Trident to meet George Harrison, who was producing a self-titled album for R&B singer Doris Troy.

After playing guitar in front of Harrison, the Beatles man was so impressed that he invited him to EMI Studios to play acoustic guitar on his album, including on tracks If Not For You and Behind That Locked Door.

Now, in a new interview with MOJO, Frampton recalls his interactions with George Harrison while recording the album.

“He was at Trident Studios. In the control room, there was George and he goes, ‘Hello, Pete’ – I thought Pete Townshend must have walked in behind me,” Frampton remembers.

“I mean, a Beatle knows who I am? Ridiculous. He said, ‘You want to play? Stephen Stills is downstairs.’ Klaus Voorman was playing bass, Ringo was playing drums, and George gives me this guitar, which I find out later was the guitar Eric gave him which he played on While My Guitar Gently Weeps. George said, ‘Here’s the chord, let’s go…’”

Elsewhere in the interview, Peter Frampton reflects on his Inclusion Body Myositis, which has progressively hampered his ability to play guitar in recent years.

“It’s become dangerous for me because if I fall I really do hurt myself, and going into a hundred hotels where everything’s different? Whereas I know every square inch of my house,” he says.

“But mentally, physically and otherwise, everything’s fine. It sounds weird but I’m the happiest I’ve ever been.”

Indeed, in another recent interview with the New York Times, the 76-year-old musician also commented on how he stays in a mentally good place despite his diagnosis. “If I don’t accept what I have, I’m going to be mad for the rest of my life,” he said.

Elsewhere, Peter Frampton is set to release his new album Carry the Light this week on 15 May. It marks his first collection of songs since his IBM diagnosis. Listen to Lions at the Gate, a track from the album, below:

The post “A Beatle knows who I am? Ridiculous”: Peter Frampton’s response when George Harrison invited him to play on All Things Must Pass appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.

By Carlos Martin Schwab

If we divide a semitone into 100 cents, the average human ear can hardly perceive variations of less than 5 cents in a musical context. A standard pedal tuner (such as the BOSS TU-3) has an accuracy of ±1 cent. A strobe tuner has an accuracy of 0.1 cents. Let’s take a closer look at this.

The fundamental difference between a strobe tuner and a conventional tuner lies in the nature of their measurements. While a standard tuner (needle or LED) averages the note’s frequency and displays a visual approximation with an accuracy of 1 or 2 cents, the strobe tuner operates in real time without processing latency.

Instead of interpreting the signal, a strobe model allows the input signal to interact directly with a light or wheel pattern, revealing minute harmonic discrepancies with an accuracy of up to 0.1 cents.

For a musician, this means that the conventional tuner is useful for quick adjustments during live performances, but it may overlook slight detunings that affect intonation. In contrast, the strobe tuner is indispensable for octaving instruments and professional recordings, as its display only stops when the frequency is mathematically exact, offering a level of sound fidelity that a standard digital sensor simply cannot achieve.

These tuners are extremely precise—so much so that they are used more for adjusting the technical intonation of the guitar than for a quick tune-up between songs.

Peterson StroboStomp HD

This strobe tuner is widely regarded as the gold standard in the world of tuning, offering unmatched accuracy of 0.1 cents. This pedal is not just an accessory, but a professional-grade tool that ensures every note is mathematically perfect, thanks to its true strobe technology in a compact and extremely durable pedal format.

Key Features

Configurable High-Definition Color LCD Screen: Features a large screen with customizable LED backlighting, making it easy to view in any lighting environment. The user-selectable colors can be used to personalize the tuner or to improve display visibility in varying ambient lighting conditions, depending on the usage environment. The vibrant screen colors can also be assigned to stock or user presets to significantly reduce menu navigation time and increase on-stage tuning confidence during a gig.

“Sweetened” Tunings: Includes 135 exclusive presets that optimize tuning intervals for specific instruments (guitars, basses, banjos, and even wind instruments). Its low-frequency note detection algorithm (such as for 5-string basses) is the most stable in the industry.

Signal Management: The integrity of your signal is vital, especially if you have many pedals. This tuner offers 3 pop-free operating modes: True Bypass, Buffered output (to maintain tone integrity over long cables), and a Monitor mode (tuning always visible) by setting the mode switch located in the battery compartment.

Power: 9V battery or DC jack. It can power other 9V pedals on your board via the power-through jack.

Professional users unanimously praise its ease of use, noting that the stroboscopic wheel is much more intuitive for fine-tuning than traditional needle meters. They also highlight its versatility, as it allows for firmware updates and the loading of sweetened tunings via USB. Although it requires a brief learning curve, it is the ultimate pedal for those seeking maximum harmonic fidelity both in the studio and on international tours.

Fender Strobo Sonic Pro

This is a high-end strobe tuner that redefines precision on stage. Sharing many features with its predecessor, this device stands out for its impressive accuracy of 0.1 cents, positioning itself as one of the most reliable tools on the market for ensuring perfect intonation, even in demanding studio setups.

Key Features

Its rugged aluminum design houses a 2.3-inch LED display with automatic brightness adjustment, ensuring full visibility in both dark stages and broad daylight. It offers two display modes: strobe (for maximum precision) and needle (for quick visual reference). A significant technical advantage is its bypass versatility, allowing you to choose between True Bypass, Buffered Bypass, or an always-on monitoring mode. Additionally, it features space-saving top-mounted connectors and power via 9V or USB-C.

Professional users praise its response speed, which eliminates the annoying lag found in other digital tuners. It does not have sweetened tunings, but it does allow you to calibrate the reference pitch between 430 Hz and 450 Hz. Reviewers agree that it is a direct competitor to the industry standard (Peterson), surpassing it for many in terms of ergonomics and ease of use. Its high-definition color LCD screen, which is its most useful feature, is extremely smooth and offers different display modes (including one that mimics an oscilloscope). It is, arguably, the most beautiful tuner display on the market.

More info: www.petersontuners.com and www.fender.com

Carlos Martin Schwab would like to thank Bob Potsic (Peterson) and Gabriel Madera (Fender) for their help in writing this article.

Adrian Belew has looked back on the leadership of Robert Fripp after King Crimson was reignited in 1981 with new members, after seven years of lying dormant.

The original Crimson lineup disbanded after the release of 1974’s misunderstood record, Red. The new iteration consisted of Fripp, Belew, Bill Bruford, and Tony Levin, and was originally going to be called Discipline. It was Belew who suggested they go out under the Crimson name, and Discipline ultimately became the name of their comeback LP.

• READ MORE: “They’re booby-trapped!” Steve Vai recalls the difficulty he faced learning Robert Fripp’s guitar parts for BEAT

Speaking to MOJO, Belew explains, “I think I just wanted to tell people I was in King Crimson! Robert had already said our music had the spirit of Crimson, different as it was. So he went for it and that upped the stakes immensely – especially for him.

“Every decision went through Robert,” he adds. “If something wasn’t up to snuff he’d tell you. But he also gave me great latitude as a songwriter. Some of my own stuff had been a bit whimsical or personal, but I knew Crimson had to be less specific, more abstract.”

He goes on to explain: “I didn’t want to embarrass myself with these three highly intelligent guys. The only fairly straight-ahead love song was Matte Kudasai, which evolved out of this beautiful guitar instrumental Robert presented to me. That was when I thought, OK, I can write to this crazy music.”

Fripp has since reflected on the rocky release of Red. In a Guitar World interview released earlier this year, he said, “I would’ve stayed as an estate agent in Wimborne, Dorset, if I had known the grief that was coming my way. I would have stayed in real estate!

“My approach has been, if you read your press, you read all of it. And if you read all my press, there have been – by and large – as many people who hated it as who enjoyed it.”

Adrian Belew is now touring with the BEAT band, which plays ’80s King Crimson music and is composed of Steve Vai, Tony Levin, and Danny Carey. View their upcoming tour dates via the BEAT website.

The post “Every decision went through Robert. If something wasn’t up to snuff he’d tell you”: Adrian Belew on Robert Fripp’s leadership of King Crimson appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.