Music is the universal language
“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” - Luke 2:14
General Interest
The time Jimi Hendrix met Paul McCartney at a fancy event, and couldn’t handle it: “Paul McCartney’s walking towards me… What shall I do?”
Jimi Hendrix could make a guitar scream, set it on fire and generally look like the coolest man in the room. Put him in front of Paul McCartney without a guitar to hide behind, though, and even Hendrix got the nerves.
That’s what happened when the late legend was invited to a star-studded event at London’s Post Office Tower, as his former roadie Eric Barrett recalls in a new interview with Uncut.
With Hendrix arriving without his usual six-string safety blanket, things got particularly tense when he spotted Beatles star Paul McCartney heading his way.
“Jimi was invited to an event at the Post Office Tower, in the revolving restaurant at the top. Gerry [Stickells, tour manager] couldn’t take him, so I said I’d go along with him,” Barrett recalls. “I have no idea what the function was but I went to loads of events like that, just happy to get the free beer and a canapé and spend some time with Jimi.”
There was just one problem: Hendrix didn’t have his guitar.
“Jimi didn’t have a guitar, so he didn’t have a prop, something to hide behind,” Barrett explains. “We walked in and he saw who was there and started speaking out the side of his mouth: ‘Eric, Eric… Paul McCartney’s walking towards me… What shall I do?’ I told him to relax, it would be fine. Paul McCartney came over and was showering him with praise, but Jimi wasn’t good at that at all.”
According to Barrett, Hendrix was similarly uncomfortable around other famous musicians, despite being a hero to many of them himself.
“He was so shy, he didn’t know how to respond. And he was like that with all the stars he met,” says the former roadie. “He didn’t seem to understand why they were looking up to him. If he had met Paul McCartney in the studio, he’d have been much more comfortable.”
Barrett’s years on the road with Hendrix produced no shortage of memorable stories. In an excerpt from his new memoir, Experienced: On the Road with Jimi Hendrix and Beyond, he also looks back on the guitarist’s habit of destroying his instruments onstage – and what Hendrix told him when he finally asked why.
“Eric, I just couldn’t get any more out of it, man,” Hendrix explained. “I squeezed every note and every sound that guitar was ever going to give me. It had nothing left to give.”
The post The time Jimi Hendrix met Paul McCartney at a fancy event, and couldn’t handle it: “Paul McCartney’s walking towards me… What shall I do?” appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
Meet the little-known boutique builder who makes the secret weapons behind some of metal’s most brutal guitar tones
Sometimes, Michael W. Klein is tagged in posts filled with horrifying noises. They’ve been shared online by musicians fighting to contain the fury and chaos of his Oni pedal, a high-gain collaboration with God’s Hate and Twitching Tongues guitarist Taylor Young that’s capable of peeling skin from skulls. “I’m like a proud father watching their kid round the bases,” Klein says with a laugh when he brings up the videos. “God, that thing is nasty.”
If he wanted to, Klein could field a whole baseball team of bench-clearing brawlers, having spent the past decade building a rep as an amp and pedal maker of particular renown among artists whose tastes run to these kinds of extremes. Alongside Young, also an in-demand producer whose Los Angeles-headquartered studio The Pit has become a hub for musicians seeking grimy, mosh-forward textures, his champions include Sammy Duet, of Goatwhore and sludge-metal comeback kids Acid Bath, Matt Harvey, main man of San Jose death metal veterans Exhumed, and thrash titan Gary Holt, who riffs in both Slayer and Exodus.
Sitting in his basement workshop as we talk over Zoom, Klein wears a cream Eyehategod shirt while surrounded by boxes of stuff – miscellaneous tools, screws, cables, stuff – that he’ll put to work in pursuit of noises that would terrify the average person on the street. “I hate to use the word craftsmanship,” he says, trailing off. But, in fairness, what other word is there? Klein’s approach is a fascinating marriage of creativity, technology and old-school trial and error – he will do the scut work of populating a circuit board by hand while contemplating what it means to devote love and care to something so outwardly confrontational.
“I’ve spoken with Taylor, Sammy, Matt about this – it’s almost like those guys and myself are philosophically grounded and driven,” he says. “As a fan of heavy music I tend to gravitate towards music that feels that way as I’m experiencing it. I’m into builders who are that way, too, like Dean Costello. When you hear his amps, and you see how he builds them, it’s so clear that there’s deeper meaning behind it. I’ve been fortunate that other nerds see that in my stuff.”
Michael W. Klein. Image: Kelly Powell, Elements Brand Haus
Don’t Quit Your Day Job
Klein is fully aware that he is never going to be a unit-shifter of any real note, and equally steadfast in his desire not to be. Based in Kansas City, he has a full-time job that he has no intention of quitting and his equipment is produced in small runs that are pored over in his spare time, reflecting a passion that has been there since he was a teenager studying the chugs on Metallica records. “A friend I used to jam with would tease me about how I spent more time trying to get my guitar rig to sound like [Sepultura’s] Chaos A.D. than playing together,” Klein recalls.
At the same time, the vibrant messageboard scene of the early internet opened doors in terms of starter-pack electronics knowledge and records that pushed his metal fandom towards more esoteric realms. When he emerged from college completely broke and minus all the gear he’d sold to buy food and other unfortunate necessities, Klein stopped short of replacing it. What if, he thought, instead of chasing gear that may or may not sound the way he wants it to, he made it himself? “It just built from there over time,” he says.
“One of the first tube amps I built was a 40-watt simplified Dumble circuit,” he continues. “I had never done anything from scratch quite like that. I remember finishing it, measuring everything, doing startup and it sounded great. That was a turning point for me. In my mind, there were so many legends about tube circuits, specific builders, and all this black magic. I realised there wasn’t anything special – if I could do it, anyone could.”
Image: Kelly Powell, Elements Brand Haus
Access All Areas
This punk commitment to accessibility is fundamental to Klein’s approach – he keeps his prices as low as possible, especially considering the labour involved, and is really only in it to help other people make the cool stuff he’s always liked. Once he realised he could do it, it was a short hop to thinking he’d like to bring some of the sounds in artists’ heads screaming into reality. A crucial moment arrived in 2015 when, following an Exhumed show, he wandered over to Harvey and offered to buy him a drink.
“I told him how much I appreciated what he does,” Klein remembers. “I was like, ‘I build guitar stuff, and if there’s anything you’d ever like to have, I would be honoured to build it.’ He had a pretty lofty idea – a preamp that had the distortion channel of an Ampeg VH-140C, a clean channel, and then built-in reverb that was assignable to either channel. At that time, I was making my circuit boards by hand, drilling every pad, etching them. That was a logistical nightmare to tackle, and it was also such a blast. That was the impetus for the word of mouth.”
Later, Klein approached Duet with a similar offer through Instagram, while Young was introduced to his work by his former Nails bandmate Leon del Muerte, who was himself introduced to Klein by Harvey, his former Exhumed bandmate. The circle, it spins. Now, having seen Klein in action, they’re all intent on hipping people to what’s going down in Missouri. “I really like working with DIY people,” Young observes. “And it doesn’t get more DIY than Michael’s ‘only-man’ operation.”
Oni pedal. Image: Kelly Powell, Elements Brand Haus
Oni Option
To make Oni, Klein was tasked with turning a “pedal chain of ridiculousness” into a box that Young estimates still gets used on 50 per cent of sessions at The Pit. “It was a combo of the original Slayer tone, an OD-1, Boss 10-band EQ and a RAT to get more grit and slime out of it,” Young says. “I floated Michael an idea for this chain as a pedal and he sprinted with it. We landed on modded versions of each pedal in one box, but each with their own individual low boost, and a switch to choose which is first in the internal chain.”
With Acid Bath playing stadiums alongside System of a Down thanks to a Crowbar-style TikTok glow up, plenty of eyes will also be resting on Klein and Duet’s Tube Screamer-esque Dybbuk pedal and their SPD100 amplifier, which both featured in Klein’s latest drop. Crucially, though, he’s not just slapping famous names onto things in order to glom some of their buzz. He’s making tools that are there to be used. “I like everything to make sense and have a purpose,” Klein says, and that extends to the process itself.
On one hand, each component finding its right place is about doing the job to the best of his ability, but on the other it’s also about how it makes him feel. “The thing I realised over time is that I was not only building and designing and modding stuff for this love of guitar tone, it was also a way of managing mental health issues,” Klein notes. “I’m dealing with depression and anxiety and suicidal thoughts, all this stuff.”
“It was a way for me to work with my hands and be creative in a way that helped quiet that stuff down, at least temporarily,” he continues. “I’m in a better place than I’ve been in a while. But that is still there. It’s crazy for me that people are interested in this thing I’ve done for myself, because I’m a hopeless nerd and because I have difficulties. If that interest suddenly stopped, I would still be down here in my shop building stuff because I need to. And, because it’s fun.”
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A Guitar With a 20-Watt Speaker Built In? | Inspire Pro Demo
Usually, if you're bringing an electric guitar to a gig, you need to bring an amp, or at least a speaker, too. The Enya Inspire Pro changes that. It's got one built in. Tom Butwin unpacks a smart guitar that folds an entire signal chain into a carbon fiber body, and makes the case that even the most die-hard traditionalist can find a use for it.
Behind the speaker sits the processing: more than 50 amp models, a deep effects library, an onboard looper, tuner, and drum machine. Switch to line-out mode and all that modeling routes out the quarter-inch jack to an amp, interface, or FRFR cab. Add the wireless footswitch and you're jumping between patches and presets from the floor. The Enya app handles the rest, offering the ability to rearrange effect blocks, dial in parameters, and generate tones from a written or spoken prompt.
The Inspire Pro is available at two price points. The SD carries a USA Seymour Duncan set (SSL-2/SSL-3/TB-4), a titanium alloy and brass bridge, and a gloss finish. The AL swaps in Enya's own Apex Lab pickups and a matte Lazer Radiance finish, keeping all the same smart features.
Save $250 on this killer metal-ready Epiphone Flying V prophecy
The Flying V might have been something of a dud when it originally launched back in 1958, but one of Gibson’s most unique designs is proof positive that some guitars are simply ahead of their time.
Indeed, it took a few decades for the circumstances to be quite right, but nowadays the iconic V shape has become a staple of rockstardom – particularly at the heavier end of the spectrum, where pointy guitars are almost mandatory, and shapes like the V and Explorer have become oft-imitated classics.
Thankfully, the success of the Flying V in the hands of Metallica’s Kirk Hammett, Zakk Wylde, Michael Schenker or scores of others means that the guitar world is well-stocked when it comes to options from both Gibson’s range and the more affordable Epiphone end of the spectrum.
Back in 2021, Epiphone launched the Prophecy collection, which was set up metal fans from the off, complete with all-black livery and crucially, sporting a pair of Fishman Fluence active pickups – and now thanks to the good folk at Sweetwater, you can snag one for a very respectable $250 discount.
In addition to the none more black looks and the Fluence pickups, the Prophecy is a classic mahogany design with a 24-fret ebony fingerboard with an asymmetrical Slim-Taper-shaped neck. You’ll also find upgraded hardware that also includes Grover locking Rotomatic tuners, a LockTone Tune-o-matic bridge, and a Graph Tech NuBone nut.
Given that this guitar was originally over a grand, the $250 discount makes this guitar a real steal – the Fluence pickups would cost you about $400 on their own, and that’s without the guitar it’s attached to!
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Royal Blood Announce New Album "Dead Company"
Royal Blood, one of the most important British rock bands of their generation, return today with an explosive new single “Ten Over Ten” and announce their long-awaited fifth studio album, Dead Company released via Warner Records on November 13th.
Dead Company marks a powerful new chapter for the duo, who last released an album in 2023. Following a period away from the spotlight, Mike Kerr (bass, vocals) and Ben Thatcher (drums) entered the studio in 2025 with no deadline, no distractions and a simple ambition: to see what was possible with two people, 12 notes and infinite outcomes.
Self-produced by Royal Blood, they set out to make an album as raw, human and visceral as possible. Dead Company strips everything back to its core. Immediate and uncompromising, it captures Royal Blood at their most powerful.
The band adds “After putting the Royal Blood engine in neutral for a couple of years, we've been building up the revs and are playing faster and harder than ever with this album. Written and recorded with the stage in mind, we cannot wait to play it live for years to come.”
The first track to be revealed, “ Ten Over Ten ,” is a menacing desert rock meets Motörhead behemoth of a single. The lyrics and vibe were inspired by the frontman training for a marathon, and it became all about endurance and pushing yourself. Click here to listen.
Since they first emerged 12 years ago when they released one of the fastest-selling rock debuts of the century, Royal Blood have made one hell of an impact: each of their four albums has hit Number One in the UK, shifting over 1 million records, becoming an arena-filling, festival-headlining tour de force, and forerunners of the guitar rock revival we’re seeing today.
The album announcement follows news of three sold-out intimate August underplay shows in the UK. Click here for tickets and tour details. U.S. tour and more to be announced soon. Click here for more info.
Ultimately Dead Company is a bold 10-track album. This is what they were born to do, so they might as well turn it up. And with that Royal Blood return louder, sharper and more vital than ever.
This Taylor Swift-vibed Epiphone acoustic is over $400 off at Sweetwater – and that’s a steal whether you’re a Swiftie or not
While Taylor Swift’s 2023-2024 Eras Tour was a global phenomenon, her arsenal of guitars was equally as staggering. However, one guitar stood head and shoulders above the rest in her grandiose collection: the Gibson J-180. The J-180 was the true star of the show, with the superstar wielding multiple versions of the acoustic-electric, from pastel pink to rhinestone-adorned.
With Swift asserting herself as a modern guitar hero, her favoured guitar is certainly worth considering if you’re in the market. Thankfully, Sweetwater currently has a sweet deal on Gibson’s sister brand, Epiphone – meaning you can get an Epiphone J-180 LS for over $400 off.
While Gibson quickly jumped on the hype of Swift’s Eras tour, releasing a Gibson Custom Everly Brothers version of the J-180, that model will set you back by over $4,000. The Epiphone edition was a much more realistic $1,299 at launch, but that’s now been slashed to an even more appealing $899 – and it packs plenty of charm and quality into that price.
The Epiphone J-180 LS is a great way to capture Swiftie tones. Though there isn’t a silver, rhinestone-studded edition, you can get the same $400-off deal on both the lovely pastel pink and classy ebony black options. Both also feature a C-shaped mahogany neck, with popstar-worthy mother-of-pearl star inlays across a laurel fingerboard.
Credit: Sweetwater
With a classic Gibson 25.5-inch scale it’s a comfortable player for anyone, and the classic J-style body shape means much of the guitar’s mass is away from the player’s body, with that svelte waist offering easy access even for smaller frames. It also has onboard LR Baggs Element Bronze VTC preamp electronics for to help amplify and maintain a strong, warm acoustic tone.
While the Eras Tour saw Swift run through the full gamut of guitars she’s used and loved throughout her career, the J-180 was clearly her current favourite squeeze. If it’s good enough for Swift, it’s well worth your time.
While last year saw Swift releasing her album The Life of a Showgirl, this year has seen slightly less musical output from the pop superstar. Though, she did have a feature on the new Toy Story 5 soundtrack, releasing the country pop, acoustic-sprinkled I Knew It, I Knew You.
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“If you have a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and an eighth of speed – I’ll be there” Lemmy’s amazing response when Billy Morrison asked him to play a show
What exactly do you need to get Motörhead legend Lemmy Kilmister to play your gig? If you’re Billy Morrison, apparently just a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and an eighth of speed.
As Morrison recalls in the new issue of Classic Rock, Ozzy Osbourne had given him Lemmy’s number with the assurance that the singer was “easy to deal with”.
“I do these occasional all-star shows in LA, where we play covers with a bunch of famous people,” says the guitarist. “About twenty-five years ago, Ozzy gave me Lemmy’s cell number and said: ‘Drop him a line, he’s easy to deal with.’ So I cold-texted Lemmy Kilmister. And I’m terrified. Because I don’t know how this legend of debauchery is going to respond.”
Morrison kept the message simple, asking Lemmy if he would come down to the Roxy and play Motörhead classics Ace Of Spades and Bomber.
“Within seconds, he responded: ‘If you have a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and an eighth of Beryl’ – that’s Beryl Reid, which is Cockney rhyming slang for speed ‘I’ll be there.’”
True to his word, Lemmy turned up, bringing all the ingredients Morrison had apparently been promised. His guitar tech also brought along the Motörhead frontman’s famously enormous Marshall rig.
“At that show he was everything you would want Lemmy to be,” Morrison says. “His tech brought down his famous Marshall amp. It was ridiculously loud. The cowboy hat, the voice, the volume – he killed it.”
The experience also left Morrison with a unique perspective on Lemmy’s ability to perform through the excesses that had become synonymous with his image.
“I don’t think [playing under the influence] made any difference,” he says. “This is where everyone goes wrong in the music business, me included. You think you’re great, but you’re shit. There are precious few – Keith Richards being one, Lemmy being another – where, actually, it makes no difference. I’ve seen the man drink a bottle of Jack and snort three grams of speed, then I’d have a conversation with him.”
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“It could be the last time we see each other”: Ritchie Blackmore on his “very emotional” Deep Purple reunion
For anyone who thought Ritchie Blackmore and Deep Purple would never share a stage again, last Wednesday night at Jones Beach proved that time really does heal all wounds. More than three decades after his last gig with the band in 1993, the guitarist surprised fans when he walked out onstage to perform Smoke on the Water.
Speaking to Guitar Player, 81-year-old Blackmore reveals that the surprise jam was, in fact, entirely his idea.
“I woke up one morning thinking, the day before their show, ‘You know it would be good for the fans if I just got up for one song, probably ‘Smoke’ and just show that we’re not at each other’s throats and don’t hate each other,’” he explains.
Blackmore’s wife and Blackmore’s Night bandmate Candice Night then got in touch with Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan, who gave the idea his approval.
“I said, ‘What do you think about me getting up for ‘Smoke?’ His exact words were, ‘It made me smile.’ He then put it to the band and it was thumbs-up all around.”
That said, stepping back into a Deep Purple rock show came with some understandable nerves for Blackmore – the guitarist hasn’t played a full-on rock gig since performing with Rainbow in 2019, and he wasn’t sure how he would fit into the band’s current setup alongside guitarist Simon McBride.
“I had my misgivings at first, as I didn’t know if I would be heard or too quiet or whatever,” he admits. “I could see the guitarist [Simon McBride], who is very good, had a big amplifier, and I thought I’ll just bring a 50-watt amp, but luckily it all worked.
The performance itself was deliberately stripped back. Blackmore says he didn’t want to overplay, given the short preparation time he had.
“It was very moving because I went on very quickly and had to play immediately,” he says. “I couldn’t warm up, but I wasn’t there to be playing correct notes. I was there to see old friends. I hadn’t seen in 40 years and we’re all getting older. I think we realised it could be the last time we see each other, maybe.”
“It was tricky; I didn’t play anything too technical, as I felt I should stick to the rudiments of being simple. I still lost my place at one point, but it’s not why I was there. I was there to heal any wounds – but there weren’t any wounds. Everyone was like, we were in the army, all along the Western front and we were all getting together again. Very emotional moment.”
Gillan appeared to feel much the same way. After the performance, he turned to address the New York crowd: “I tell you, it was an absolute pleasure to have back on stage the founder member, the great legend, the immortal Ritchie Blackmore… I’ll see you in the bar.”
McBride also shared a backstage photo with Blackmore, describing it as an “absolute pleasure” to share the stage with the guitarist, whom he called “an inspiration to all.”
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Jimi Hendrix believed guitars were possessed by spirits, and he smashed them up to “set the spirit free”
We often hear guitarists talk about the ‘soul’ of an instrument, but Jimi Hendrix apparently took the idea quite literally. The guitarist believed that different guitars carried different spirits, and according to his former roadie Eric Barrett, he would sometimes smash an instrument to “set the spirit free” once it had given him everything it could.
In a new interview with Uncut, Barrett – who earlier this month released his memoir Experienced: On the Road with Jimi Hendrix and Beyond – recalls one particularly memorable example. Asked about Hendrix’s belief that the spirit of a guitar could depend on the wood it was made from, Barrett explains that the guitarist had certain instruments he would never destroy.
“Jimi believed that. Certain guitars he’d never smash because of the wood they were made from. One time, he smashed up a beautiful brand-new guitar. After the show I said, ‘Why that one, Jimi?’ He told me he couldn’t squeeze one more note out of it. It had given him everything it could, so he smashed it to set the spirit free.”
As dramatic as Hendrix’s guitar-smashing habit was onstage, it also led to some rather amusing moments when the band took its collection of instruments through customs.
“When we travelled we had to fill out a carnet,” Barrett explains, referring to the document used for transporting equipment across international borders. “You’d write down whatever you were taking out of the country. One time we were coming back into America and the customs official said he could only count 12 guitars but there were 22 on the carnet.”
“I opened a case and it was full of pieces of guitar. I said, ‘There’s your other 10.’ I’ll never forget his face.”
The spirit of Hendrix’s guitars wasn’t the only thing Barrett remembers from life on the road. The roadie also has some less-than-glowing memories of Woodstock, despite the festival’s legendary status.
“I was not crazy about Woodstock. It was not The Jimi Hendrix Experience,” he says. “We had to put up with some attitude from one or two of the new musicians, who looked down on Gerry and I – we were just the help. That left a bitter taste in the mouth.”
“We also went on so late,” Barrett continues. “After the show we were due to play The Dick Cavett Show. The band got some sleep in the house in Woodstock while I set up at the TV studio. I got a call saying that Jimi’s not coming. Mitch told me that the network sent a helicopter. Jimi had looked at the chopper and said, ‘I can’t get on that, it doesn’t have enough blades,’ and went back to bed.”
Released on 4 August, Experienced: On the Road with Jimi Hendrix and Beyond offers a firsthand account of Barrett’s years alongside Hendrix during the guitarist’s rise in the late ‘60s.
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What guitar does Taylor Swift use? The varied and unique instruments of The Eras Tour
The most famous person in the world is a guitar player. Yep it’s easy to forget that long before Taylor Swift became perhaps the defining cultural icon of the 2020s, Time’s Person Of The Year and an artist so universally popular that she can single-handedly boost NFL TV ratings and jersey sales, she was an aspiring songwriter with a guitar and a dream. But what guitars did Taylor Swift use?
And like any other guitar lover, the more famous and successful Tay-Tay has become, the more interesting and unique guitars she’s added to to her collection – mainly some acoustics but also a fair few interesting electrics along the way.
The epoch-defining Eras Tour has revealed the full gamut of Taylor’s unique and interesting guitar collection, and also showcased it to a wider audience than ever before – it is of course the highest grossing tour of all time, a $200-million cinema box office smash, and the sort of cultural event that defines an entire generation of music fandom.
Taylor with her baby blue Gibson J-180 (Photo by Fernando Leon/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management)
The Eras Tour is a three and a half hour trip through Taylor’s entire career to date – from her self-titled 2006 debut all the through to Midnights – and most interestingly of all from a Guitar.com perspective, the tour has seen her showcase many of the guitars she used to write and perform those songs at the time.
As such, The Eras Tour gives us a definitive picture of what guitars Taylor Swift uses – many of which are custom-versions of standard models, or rare limited-run designs – read on to find out more about Taylor’s guitar history, and your best options to capture Taylor Swift guitar tones in the real world.
Taylor’s Taylors
Taylor with her diamante-clad Taylor GS6, which was retired in about 2007 (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images)
It’s perhaps not shocking that going all the way back to her earliest records, Taylor Swift has been a fan of Californian acoustic guitar company Taylor Guitars – after all, who needs a signature model when your name is already right there on the headstock!
Taylor’s Taylor guitars are clearly very sentimental to her, as she’s used them constantly throughout her career, and brought out some of her most cherished examples on the Eras Tour – they’re also some of her most iconic instruments, including her custom red Taylor 614ce that was the main acoustic on the Red Tour, and a diamante-encrusted GS6 that was used on the Fearless Tour in 2008.
Taylor Presentation Series PS-24ce Grand Auditorium
Taylor’s Taylor PS24 (Photo by Scott Eisen/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management)
If there’s one guitar that we think might be Taylor’s most sentimental instrument, it’s this one – this stunning guitar has a flamed koa body with a distinctive matching soundhole cover and a ‘Taylor Swift’ in what Taylor calls a ‘Byzantine inlay’ on the fingerboard.
A custom-build, this is based on Taylor’s super-high end Presentation Series PS-24ce Grand Auditorium model, but with a very unconventional ‘Florentine’ cutaway, which has a sharp point, unlike a regular GA model. The guitar also has an ebony peghead and bridge, Gotoh tuners and ivoroid binding.
Taylor started using the guitar around 2007, but it’s clearly a meaningful one as she’s been using it for several songs on The Eras Tour, and displaying it proudly on a stand in front of the audience when she’s not using it.
Get the sound: Taylor’s 214ce is an affordable route to a similar kind of look and sound, with Grand Auditorium body style and koa top
Taylor Grand Symphony “Living Jewels” Series
Taylor’s ‘Living Jewels’ Taylor Guitar (Photo by Ashok Kumar/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management)
This guitar is often referred to as the “Living Jewels” Guitar or the “Koi Guitar”, and is one of the most distinctive and unique instruments seen on The Eras Tour. She first began using the Living Jewels guitar around 2011-2012 during the Speak Now Tour, famously performing songs like Last Kiss. She also used it in 2022 for the music video Anti-Hero, and even put the guitar on display at the Country Music Hall of Fame until it was removed in 2023 for use on the Eras Tour.
This particular guitar came from a very limited series of acoustics designed by Pete Davies Jr. around the year 2000. Only around 100 of these guitars were made, in different designs – one featuring a grey whale, one with a sea turtle, and one with koi fish that Taylor owns. Each of the guitars features beautifully ornate inlay work of the aforementioned sea creatures on the body and fretboard.
Get the sound: Original Living Jewels guitars are almost impossible to find as they were made in very limited numbers and Taylor’s association with them has made them even more collectable, however if you’re not too worried about price, Taylor released a tribute to the guitar back in 2025 that, while not much cheaper, is a little more widely available on the used market.
If seventeen thousand dollars seems a bit rich for a guitar but you’re still in the market for a Taylor Swift-approved Taylor, well you’re in luck – the company has for some time made a Taylor Swift signature version of its entry-level Baby Taylor model. It’s a great starter guitar even without the various Swiftian embellishments.
The Gibson Eras
Taylor with her pink Gibson J-180 (Photo by TAS2023 via Getty Images)
As befits any country star worth her salt, Taylor has had a long love affair with Gibson guitars – particularly the brand’s acoustic instruments. However, the Eras Tour has seen Gibsons replace Taylors as her primary instruments, with a whole host of new and bespoke instruments of various types that often have colours and customisations that reflect the various albums that she’s referencing in that portion of the show.
While none of these guitars have become actual signature models for Taylor (yet!) they have quickly become as iconic as the popularity of the Eras Tour has exploded, with each of the unique instruments telling its own story about a period in Taylor’s glittering music career.
Gibson J-180
Taylor’s diamante-clad Gibson J-180 (Photo by Christopher Jue/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management )
While several of the guitars used on The Eras Tour are instruments she’s pulled out of the rack from the period in question, she’s also brought out several new instruments that are themselves designed to nod to those eras, but with her 2024 sonic preferences.
Key amongst these are a series of Gibson guitars derived from the company’s iconic SJ-200 model – first introduced back in 1937 and used by everyone from The Everly Brothers and Jimmy Page to Billie Joe Armstrong and Justin Timberlake.
Swift recreated her crystal rhinestone-encrusted Taylor Guitars GS6 that was used on the Fearless Tour for The Eras Tour, only this time she used a Gibson J-180 (a thinner-depthed version of the J-200). The GS6 was retired sometime around 2013, but the new guitar featured around 5,400 Swarovski Lead Crystals attached with silicone epoxy by Taylor and her family just days before the tour – the original GS6 was apparently also blinged out by Taylor and her mom.
One notable difference between the new guitar and the original – the addition of a “13” (Swift’s favourite number) rhinestone pattern just behind the bridge.
Taylor clearly really loves the J-180 body shape, as she’s also got several other customised versions of the guitar, including pink and powder blue examples, plus a black one that she auctioned off for charity in 2020 – the guitars are notable for having star inlays on the fretboard as opposed to the usual dots or blocks.
Get the sound: While Taylor still makes the only actual Taylor Swift signature model guitar, Gibson sensibly jumped on the hype train and quickly not only released a Gibson Custom version of the J-180, but also added a trio of more affordable Epiphone models into the line. Conspicuously, these guitars came in hues that were very similar to the custom colour J-180s Taylor used on the Eras tour including pink and blue. It’s a signature model in everything but name.
Gibson J-45
Taylor’s black sparkle Gibson J-45 (Photo by Christopher Jue/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management )
While the J-180 might be her preferred instrument, The Eras Tour also sees Swift playing two different versions of Gibson’s J-45 model – one in a deep red colour and one in a black sparkle finish. Unlike the J-180s these guitars just have standard dot inlays and feel a bit more restrained.
As with pretty much all of Taylor’s guitars though, these J-45s are certainly custom builds, given that they use non-standard finishes, and do not feature pickguards.
Get the sound: Thankfully, Gibson’s J-45 is still in production, though it’s certainly not cheap you can get it in both Cherry Red and Black. If your budget doesn’t stretch to that however, the Epiphone J-45 might be more up your street.
Gibson Hummingbird
Taylor’s Gibson Hummingbird (Photo by Scott Eisen/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management)
Most of the guitars we’ve seen Taylor use on The Eras Tour have been heavily customised and personalised, but there’s one guitar that has the distinction of being stock – a Cherry Sunburst Gibson Hummingbird. Asides from the soundhole plug to prevent feedback (which is common with all her guitars) this instrument is pretty much identical to the guitar you could walk into a store and buy today – including that iconic hummingbird motif on the pickguard.
Get the sound: As mentioned, Taylor’s Hummingbird seems pretty much stock, which means you can buy one from Gibson’s Original Collection today. If you’re not up for spending thousands however, there’s an Epiphone Inspired By version that even comes in the right colour.
Taylor’s Electrics
Taylor with her diamanté-clad Les Paul (Photo by Larry Busacca/TAS/Getty Images for TAS)
The Eras Tour sees Swift relying mostly on her acoustic guitar collection, and leaving the electric guitar work to her backing band – that said, she has been known to use a variety of electric guitars over the years, including a red-sparkle Les Paul Standard, a similar guitar with mini-humbuckers, a Les Paul Studio with red diamante finish, and even Taylor T5 and a Johnny Marr Jaguar back in the day.
The Red Sparkle Les Paul Studio even got a run-out on the opening night of The Eras Tour, though the other guitars have yet to make an appearance – they’re all pretty stock spec-wise however.
Get the sound: Taylor has generally been drawn to Gibson-style single-cut guitars over the years, particularly the Les Paul – while her guitars are custom, the recently revived Gibson Les Paul Studio might be your closest bet here.
Taylor’s Gibson Les Paul with mini-humbuckers (Photo by Mike Marsland/WireImage)
The post What guitar does Taylor Swift use? The varied and unique instruments of The Eras Tour appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
Red Panda RD-1 Pitch Delay review – a clever compact delay with multiple note-manipulating tricks
$229/£224, redpandalab.com
The job of a delay pedal is simple: to listen to what you play then repeat it back to you a few times. Some of them do this job very well – but the really good ones do it extremely badly.
The Red Panda RD-1 Pitch Delay is here to wreck stuff, and that word ‘pitch’ is your big clue as to how: from detuned weirdness to cascading octave screeches, this is all about digital manipulation of notes. Not everything it does is strange and discombobulating – there’s a nice reverse function, and plenty of scope for more standard delay sounds too – but that just means you can lower yourself into the madness gently.
Image: Richard Purvis
What is it?
The RD-1 has been designed as an alternative to the Red Panda Raster 2 for more compact pedalboards (and more compact bank accounts). If you’re familiar with that pedal, you’ll have a decent idea of what to expect here; if you’re not, let me just begin by telling you it’s a gem.
The Raster 2 is a stereo pedal with lots of multi-function knobs, a second footswitch for layered effects, and the ability to store and recall presets. You’re not getting any of that with its diddy sibling, but you are getting three different pitch-altering modes and an input for an expression pedal, plus a hidden tap-tempo option.
Those modes are called ‘frequency shift’, ‘detune’ and ‘chromatic transpose’, and they have a radical effect on what happens when you tweak the shift knob on the left. Like, radically radical…
Image: Richard Purvis
Sounds
The shift dial pitches downwards to the left and upwards to the right, naturally, so when it’s pointing straight up the RD-1 becomes a simple, non-mangling digital delay with standard controls for time, feedback and dry/wet blend. While this sound is nothing special it is pleasant, and you only have to tap the reverse button to turn it into something much more fluid and ambient.
But we’re all here for the pitch effects, so let’s get a shift on. The first one is the most out-there of the three, with strangely metallic repeats that can sound something like church bells run through a ring modulator. It’s extreme, but again the reverse function is a great sweetener; and while the pitch-shifting is cumulative, so that each repeat jumps off from the shoulders of the one before, hitting the ‘once’ button means it will only shift the first time – a very different, much more manageable effect.
The second mode measures its shifting in cents and only goes a couple of notes in either direction; the best use I found for this was setting the knob just a tiny twist beyond noon, with the ‘once’ button engaged, for subtle thickening with a hint of modulation.
But the third mode is the one that I suspect most people will end up sticking with. This offers fixed semitone intervals, so perfect harmonies – delivered with a pleasing hint of lo-fi jitteriness – are now in play. With a single shift of a fifth or an octave up, this can sound creepily pretty; now start dabbling with those two buttons and the feedback knob (plus an expression pedal if you have one), and you might just find yourself in glitchy pitchy noise-scape nirvana.
Image: Richard Purvis
Should I buy one?
Ideally, no, you shouldn’t buy the RD-1 – you should get the Raster 2. But what’s impressive here is how much of that pedal’s unique magic has survived the transition into a properly compact stompbox.
Of course it’s not as good, but it’s closer than I was expecting; and for some players – those who only ever play in mono and don’t need instant access to more than one or two unorthodox delay sounds – the smaller footprint and cleaner interface might even make it more appealing.
Image: Richard Purvis
Alternatives
It’s infinitely more fiddly than the RD-1, but the Gamechanger Audio Auto Delay (€272/£299/$329) can do extreme pitch swoops among its many digital tricks. A more simple option is the Dreadbox Raindrops (€214/£229/$299) – or you could keep it old-school with the Beetronics BeeBeeDee ($299/£289), an analogue delay with digital control.
The post Red Panda RD-1 Pitch Delay review – a clever compact delay with multiple note-manipulating tricks appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
Sully Guitars Adds 24-Fret Version of Singlecut ‘71 Trella
Sully Guitars is now offering a 24-fret version of its set-neck ‘71 Trella singlecut model. Builder Jon "Sully" Sullivan said, "The '71 addresses the issues I had with the classic singlecut while adding my own flair. The design celebrates its 15th birthday this year, and it's been rewarding to see it grow."
The new version adds two frets to the original 22-fret design. According to Sully Guitars, the upper-fret access and neck-to-body balance of the original have been maintained in the update. A '71 Trella 24 prototype has been used on tour by Smashing Pumpkins guitarist Kiki Wong, including on songs such as "1979."
Wong said: "The Trella is by far a work of art embodying all the beauty, versatility, and charisma I need from an instrument. It truly became one of my favorite guitars of all time."
Sully Guitars '71 Trella 24 specs:
- Body/top: Set-neck singlecut with carved top, now available with 24 frets (previously 22).
- Neck: Slim C profile, 24 stainless steel frets, contoured neck heel for upper-fret access.
- Hardware: Hipshot locking tuners; choice of Hipshot, TonePros, or Floyd Rose bridge; Sully's USA-wound pickups.
- Custom options: Sparkle finishes, heavy relic aging, custom inlays, and baritone scale lengths available.
- Build: USA Custom Series instruments are built by a small team in Texas, PLEK'd, and shipped with a handwritten certificate of authenticity from Sullivan.
Sully Guitars’ '71 Trella 24 has a straight price starting at $3,839. For more information visit sullyguitars.com.
On Bass: Are You Playing With Your Ears or Your Eyes?
I was plugging away in my home studio recently and realized I needed to tune my bass. Within arm’s reach I have a rack tuner, a pedal tuner, and even a few clip-on tuners, but since my hand was on the mouse, I pulled up a tuner plugin within my DAW. The aesthetics on the tuner were great, from the pseudo brushed steel “housing” to the wide, beautifully visible strobe that danced nicely until I found my pitch. It was clear that out of the several DAW tuners I have, this one felt like someone wanted to give it a little more design attention than the others.
It’s a tuner. I get it.
What I also understand is marketing. My degree happens to be in marketing (world-traveling bass player was not one of the options at my college - I had to conquer that on my own), and as I spent many hours filling the plastic seats of my classrooms, I gained an understanding of how we are “nudged” toward certain products and when it comes to buying things, our eyes tend to drown out our other senses.
The MI (musical instrument) business is no different. Bass, amp, and pedal companies are all vying for your cash. They know what you are into. Or at least they think they know. They spend a lot of time designing products, sometimes for themselves, sometimes for the consumer. Either way, they are looking for an edge. There is a lot of trial and error, of course, and sometimes our eyes choose a product over all our other senses. Every company wants their product to stand out. Some follow trends and design for the current market (remember the relic’d guitar war of ‘14?), while others stick to their look forever (much like my dad’s haircut), come hell or high water.
“How many times have you turned your nose up at a particular amp based on the name plate or a guitar for its headstock shape?”
How many times have you turned your nose up at a particular amp based on the name plate or a guitar for its headstock shape? How often are we brand-biased and not sonically driven? Often, I think.
When I moved to Nashville two decades ago, I auditioned for a touring indie artist, and thankfully landed the gig. Before the tour, the MD took me aside and said he wanted to see a P-bass in my hands, not the active 5-string I used in the audition. I had other passive 4-strings that were great, but no, he wanted a P. After settling in town, I also learned that producers were looking to see a certain name on the headstock, no matter the tone or pedigree of the bass being played.
There is certainly an argument for a “tried and true” tone formula; however, I know some bass players that can track master recordings with a broom handle and twine, headstock shape be damned. We shouldn’t let a logo run our lives. I like certain features, I like certain tones, and I also like to root for the underdog. We certainly should give all instruments a fair trial before finding them guilty of not being ‘good’.
I have a $10 no-name garage sale bass that I have used on recording sessions. I’ve seen your favorite bands filling arenas running original red Line 6 “bean” PODs and dummy cabinets onstage. If you are using your ears instead of your eyes, you may free yourself a bit.
Variety is the spice of life. No doubt. We aren’t in a Henry Ford era where all the guitars are simply one design, one pickup, and painted black (and thankfully so). We have different musical needs and tonal requirements, so we inevitably search for “the sound,” or the workhorse, or the feature-packed entity that will quench our thirst. We have limitless wood/electronic configurations at our mail-order beck and call, and in the same breath, it is very easy to become a trail horse and only see what we want to see.
Do yourself a favor: go to a local store and pick up an instrument or try a brand you have ignored in the past. Close your eyes and listen. You may be surprised.
The Truth About Vintage Amps, Ep. 169
It’s the 169th episode of the Truth About Vintage Amps, the call-in show where amp tech Skip Simmons fields all of your tube amp and life questions. This week, returning guest Steve Soest joins us for a chat about the vintage days of vintage guitar buying; playing alongside Chuck Berry and Dick Dale; Leo Fender’s dining habits; and more.
Thank you to our sponsors: Grez Guitars; Emerald City Guitars; and Amplified Parts / Mod Electronics.
Some of the topics discussed this week:
:55 What’s on Skip’s Bench: A messed-up Masco MA-17
4:06 Special guest: Guitar and amp legend Steve Soest (Soest Guitars)! A meeting of the amp minds, Danelectro tales, Standel heads, David Lindley, G&L, consulting for Fender, Dick Dale tales, and so much more!
1:16:25 A possessed Ampeg, redux
1:18:26 Skip’s Disney picks
1:20:57 The Tone Quest Report
1:22:58 Woodinville in the WSJ
1:24:43 Gain knob/master volume 101, cleaning Tolex
1:34:02 Hollywood Bob’s Bandmaster
Want amp tech Skip Simmons’ advice on your DIY guitar amp projects? Want to share your top secret family recipe? Need relationship advice? Join us by sending your voice memo or written questions to podcast@fretboardjournal.com! Include a photo, too.
Want to support the show? Join our Patreon page to get to the front of the advice line, see exclusive pics, the occasional video and more.
Hosted by amp tech Skip Simmons and co-hosted/produced by Jason Verlinde of the Fretboard Journal.
Above: What Skip removed from his client’s Masco PA.
The post The Truth About Vintage Amps, Ep. 169 first appeared on Fretboard Journal.
Eric Gales Goes Months Without Playing Guitar
The blues-rock guitar star sits down with PG's Nikos Arvanitis discussing his growth as a player (including prioritizing time away from the instrument), finding inspiration in figures outside of music, engaging with the social-media phenoms for a motivational challenge, and explaining why his partnership with Kiesel is a perfect fit. Sponsored by: https://stewmac.sjv.io/APO2ED
Tokai Hard Puncher Review
When my editor approached me about reviewing this bass, I had a very visceral sensation of being 12 years old again. That’s when I started playing bass—and perusing basses in a Swedish mail order catalog that had everything from home improvement tools to musical instruments. I distinctly remember scanning that catalog, once upon a time, and spotting a Precision Bass lookalike called the “Hard Puncher,” which, I suppose, sounded much more heroic to a non-native, beginning-English speaker than “P-Bass.”
The Hard Puncher, as it turns out, was made by Tokai, a Japanese manufacturer of what are now known colloquially among collectors as “lawsuit guitars.” Tokai’s instruments were more than just catalog eye candy for European and American players that couldn’t afford a real Fender or Gibson. Most Tokais of the ’70s and ’80s were also exceptionally well-made instruments. So, when the company ceased exporting instruments in the ’90s, it left behind a dedicated cult of fans. That cult is bigger these days, and Tokais are no longer cheap, secret sleepers among the collector set. Good ones fetch pretty hefty prices. So, it’s little mystery that Tokai is having a go at exporting these Japan-made gems again—this time with a push from Audio Collective Group, a distribution company founded by Warm Audio.
Picking Up Where They Left Off
The quality that makes original Tokais minor treasures is recognizable here by feel alone. Fretwork, the neck joint, and the bone nut seat are all tight and solid. The gloss polyester finish is rich and very well executed in a deep dakota red with hints of brown and oxblood that looks fantastic against the red tortoiseshell pickguard. Options abound, though—the new Hard Puncher is available in seven different finishes, and Tokai even offers a choice between alder and ash for bodies, and maple and rosewood for fretboards. (You can select these options on the Tokai website, which, in turn, directs you to a dealer with an instrument that matches your order.)
The 1-piece maple neck is U-shaped and employs a fairly thin slice of rosewood for the fretboard, if you opt for one. The neck has a very nice profile for those of us without large hands, and the compound 7.25" – 10.25" radius lends a natural feel under the fingers. But the neck is also reminiscent of real 1960s-vintage Fender Precisions I have known. As nice as that vintage familiarity is, I wouldn’t complain if Tokai opted to eschew authenticity and use a satin finish on the neck instead of the glossy one on our test instrument. But thanks to the general profile, the feel is fast.
More Extra Effort
Though the basic fit and finish on our Hard Puncher was easy to observe, I was impressed by deeper details—like how carefully the pickups were set up. The E-string side of the P-bass pickup was screwed deeper into the body than you tend to see from most manufacturers. This is the very first adjustment I perform on any bass I buy to compensate for naturally louder low E-strings. The move suggests to me that the folks at Tokai are hip to real-world performance challenges as well as pure aesthetics. It’s a nice thing to see.
The action was great, too—neither too low nor too buzzy. And like the pickups, the careful adjustment meant one less change to make before I took the Hard Puncher on the road or to a session. It’s easy to imagine living with the instrument onstage in most other practical respects, too. It’s comfortable, the medium weight feels good, and it’s very well balanced. Perhaps the only disappointment with the design is that the truss-rod access is a little too much like a vintage P-Bass. You can’t make an adjustment without removing the pickguard first. That’s not a big deal for many players, but as a touring professional who travels between drastically different climates, frequent and easy truss rod adjustment is pretty important.
Force and Flexibility
Rumbling through an amp with tone and volume wide open, the Hard Puncher rewards with a rich, punchy, classically P-bass sound. It’s free of the upper-midrange honk that plagues some P-styles, but retains the immediacy and low-mid emphasis in transient notes that a great P-style should have. Just as importantly, the upper notes on the neck have real body and strong sustain, while the lower notes never feel muddy or too big. The output is just very balanced.
It’s very easy to shape the output from that foundation, too. The tone control has a very usable sweep that allowed me to carefully shape the top end I wanted to tame, rather than just going fully bright or completely dark, which happens in some affordable basses. Dark tones still exhibited great sustain, by the way, which perfectly suited my reggae experiments with the Hard Puncher.
As a player who performs a lot of rock shows, I want to know that a P-style instrument will sound big, warm, and almost piano-like in that setting—particularly with a pick. To find out if this was the case with the Hard Puncher, I swapped the nickel-coated strings that came with the bass for steels. The new set really made the Tokai come alive, without sounding too bright—even on the thinner strings. As you might have suspected, it’s a great rock machine
The Verdict
The Hard Puncher’s $1,499 street price puts it in a very competitive bracket. But I think there’s room there for a high-quality, Japan-made instrument like this. The tones are super solid. The feel inspires confidence from a playability and quality standpoint. Plus, there’s just something hip about a Tokai. It’s a cool way to break from the pack, but it’s also just a great performer with a familiar, even vintage-like feel. Even in a crowded product space, the Hard Puncher screams “contender!”
“It’s what we’ve been looking forward to for 21 hours of the day”: Slash on why Guns N’ Roses still love touring and have no plans to stop
For a band that has spent decades on the road, Guns N’ Roses still sound pretty enthusiastic about the prospect of getting onstage. And according to Slash, that enthusiasm comes down to keeping things fresh and, above all, making sure the band still enjoys what it does.
Speaking to New York rock station Q104.3, the guitarist was asked how Guns N’ Roses keep fans engaged after all these years. His answer was refreshingly simple: “We just sort of do what we do.”
“We throw different things in,” Slash continues. “[But] I think we’re more about keeping ourselves, you know, sort of inspired and having a good time and keeping it fresh for us and then we just come out there and do our thing.”
That enthusiasm becomes particularly apparent once the band reaches the venue. Slash explains that while the travelling and waiting that comes with touring isn’t exactly exciting, once they’re there and ready to play, it’s a different story.
“We’re one of those bands that has been around for a long time, but really loves what we do,” he says. “We spend most of our time humming and hawing about traveling until we get to the venue and then we finally get to get unleashed, and, you know, it’s what we’ve been looking forward to for 21 hours out of the day.”
The band also leaves plenty of room for spontaneity in its setlists. Instead of locking themselves into the exact same sequence every night, Guns N’ Roses keep a large pool of songs ready to go and decide what to play as they go.
“We don’t really have what you call a setlist either,” Slash says. “We have an opening song, we have an ending song, and we have a lot of tentpole songs that we’re going to play. And then we mix a lot of stuff up.”
He adds that the band has around 50 songs to choose from, pulling from across their catalogue each night.
In other news, Slash recently revealed that Guns N’ Roses are have been working towards the long-awaited follow-up to 2008’s Chinese Democracy.
“There’s a lot of writing going on with Guns,” the guitarist told Rolling Stone Australia. “So after I get back from [touring with The Conspirators], we’ll see if [Guns N’ Roses] can start putting some stuff together and getting in the studio.”
The post “It’s what we’ve been looking forward to for 21 hours of the day”: Slash on why Guns N’ Roses still love touring and have no plans to stop appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
Guitar Center CEO says they’ve turned their stores into “a theme park for musicians”
Guitar Center CEO Gabe Dalporto wants its stores to be “a theme park for musicians”. It might sound like a fairly ambitious way to describe a chain of music shops, but the company has been putting that idea into practice, creating spaces where musicians can stick around, try out gear and connect with other players.
And so far, the numbers suggest the strategy is working. Guitar Center has recorded nine consecutive quarters of positive growth, with its most recent quarterly sales up 5.2% to $635 million [via Bloomberg]. Time spent across the brand’s roughly 300 stores is also up 16% year over year, while foot traffic has increased for the first time in more than a decade.
Much of that turnaround comes down to a fairly simple idea: make Guitar Center a place where people “want to come and play”.
Speaking to Modern Retail, Dalporto – a guitarist himself – says the company had drifted away from its core audience before he became CEO in 2023. Around 70% of its merchandise was made up of lower-end, entry-level products, despite its most dedicated customers being musicians for whom playing music is “a big part of their identity”.
Guitar Center has since flipped that ratio, with around 70% of its inventory now aimed at “serious musicians”. But it isn’t just about filling the stores with more expensive gear. The company has also made its instruments easier to try, moving guitars and keyboards to eye level, unlocking them and setting them up so customers can actually play.
“If you’re trying guitars, you’re going to try 10 or 15 of them before you find the one you like,” Dalporto says. “Imagine just the terrible experience that is [when products aren’t immediately available].”
The retailer has also put more emphasis on knowledgeable staff after previously scaling back employee training. The result, says Dalporto, is an “experiential environment, with knowledgeable people and great products”.
That experience doesn’t stop at the guitar wall. Guitar Center now runs monthly workshops covering subjects such as modifying guitars and building pedalboards, while individual stores have hosted events with musicians and producers including Smashing Pumpkins guitarist Kiki Wong and producer Zaytoven.
For Dalporto, those events are also a way to make Guitar Center feel like a local music shop rather than a standardised retail chain.
“What we’re trying to do is to engage with all the incredible local musicians in all of our markets locally and provide a national stage for them,” the exec says. “The last thing we want to be is Best Buy – a completely and utterly standardised national box retailer. We want to feel like the local music store who has deep personal connections with local artists.”
That same musician-first approach is now feeding into Guitar Center’s own gear. The retailer is developing a new private-label guitar, but Dalporto isn’t interested in simply slapping the Guitar Center name on another familiar design.
Staffers initially suggested making a version of a Fender Telecaster but Dalporto believes “the last thing the world needs is another Telecaster.”
Instead, the company is asking guitarists what they actually want from a modern instrument through its r/GuitarLab subreddit, where Dalporto and Guitar Center engineers have been gathering feedback on everything from hardware and controls to players’ frustrations with existing guitars.
The retailer is also experimenting with AI, although again with the aim of supporting musicians rather than replacing the human element. Earlier this year, Guitar Center launched Rig Advisor, an AI tool that can answer questions such as, “I want to sound like Jimi Hendrix on Purple Haze. What should I play?” The company is also giving employees access to ChatGPT and using AI to help train staff and improve its guitar-lesson operations.
Still, Guitar Center’s turnaround is far from complete. The company continues to carry significant debt and while the wider guitar market is dealing with pressure from tariffs and shifting consumer spending. But Dalporto believes the retailer has an advantage that online stores can’t easily replicate: giving musicians somewhere to try gear, meet other players and simply hang out.
“We don’t want to be the place where you just come and buy your string instruments and leave,” he says. “We want to be the place where you feel comfortable hanging out, playing [guitar], forming bands. … We’ve invested hugely in making Guitar Center a theme park for musicians.”
The post Guitar Center CEO says they’ve turned their stores into “a theme park for musicians” appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
Guitarist apologises after guitar-throwing stunt sends audience member to hospital
Japanese punk outfit Otoboke Beaver have apologised after guitarist Yoyoyoshie threw a guitar into the crowd at a show earlier this year, accidentally striking and injuring an audience member.
The incident happened during the band’s April show at Umeda Club Quattro in Osaka, Japan. The audience member was taken to the hospital by ambulance, where they were treated for a forehead laceration requiring seven stitches, as well as a cervical sprain.
Otoboke Beaver addressed the incident publicly on 11 August, writing on Instagram that they “wish the injured person a full recovery” and acknowledging: “we caused this accident.”
Beyond the physical injuries, the band said the incident had also caused the fan “significant emotional distress”.
The group – comprising singer Accorinrin, guitarist Yoyoyoshie, bassist Hirochan and drummer Leo – also admit that their response in the aftermath was not as swift as it should have been.
“Coordination between us and the staff member entrusted to act as the point of contact that day, as well as our follow-up response, was not prompt, resulting in a delay to both our direct apology and public statement.”
They added that the apology was being made “in good faith” before concluding: “We are truly sorry.”
The Osaka show was a significant one for Otoboke Beaver beyond the incident, as it marked a farewell to former drummer Kahokiss, who stepped away from the band to go on maternity leave. She was subsequently replaced by Leo.
The post Guitarist apologises after guitar-throwing stunt sends audience member to hospital appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
Soundgarden’s Kim Thayil says it’s “emotionally draining” working on new material using vocals Chris Cornell recorded before he died
Soundgarden’s Kim Thayil says working on new material featuring Chris Cornell’s vocals has been a draining experience, but feels it would be a “disservice” to the fans and the band for them not to release them.
Cornell died by suicide in May 2017. Thayil revealed last year that the bwere planning to release the final album they worked on with Cornell before his passing, and that it had always been a goal for them to complete the record as a gift to the fans, and to Cornell too.
Now, speaking to Guitar World, Thayil shares that the process has been challenging emotionally, but exciting at the same time. Though he confirms they do not have a release date in mind yet, he does say it will “definitely sound like Soundgarden”.
“It’s emotionally draining and there are things about it that are sad and melancholic. But at the same time, it’s exciting to finish the work that we started with Chris. It’s a tribute to Soundgarden and a tribute to Chris. To not do this would be a great disservice to everyone, including the fans who knew we were in a writing cycle while we were touring,” he states.
“I made an aphorism earlier about having too many cooks in the kitchen. Well, now we have one less. But we have these recordings Chris is on, and we all have a strong understanding of Chris’ identity within the band, so we are going to honour that completely, even though Chris isn’t there to throw in his two cents. So, yes, it will definitely sound like Soundgarden and I’m going to sound like me.”
Last month, Taylor Momsen of The Pretty Reckless shared her thoughts on Cornell’s work, and how it had impacted her life. The Pretty Reckless supported Soundgarden on their final tour with Cornell.
“I’ve listened to his solo work and to Soundgarden so many times, but every time I listen to them, it evokes something different in me,” she told NME.
“There is the sheer amount of depth and sensitivity and aggression… [but] also, it’s so smart. It’s musically exquisite and complex — like this never-ending onion where you discover something new about it and about yourself every time you listen to it. I think that is so powerful and so fucking rare. It’s coming from a place that’s so deep and so powerful that it touches your soul.”
The post Soundgarden’s Kim Thayil says it’s “emotionally draining” working on new material using vocals Chris Cornell recorded before he died appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
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