The '62 with schecter custom shop neck..

The Specs:
Fender USA 62Ri body weighing in at 3,14Lbs Olympic white but more yellowish, vanilla
vintage schecter guitar research custom shop neck
fatboy relic plastics..simply the best
Sliders from australia SRV 59s, no rewound in the middle.
Fender SRV wiring complete running a 0,22 cap
62ri tuners
fender '56 custom shop tremelo complete

Simply outstanding tone !

2 down...1 to go...

With a hefty tag of $450 for the set, I wasn't really too eager to get a set of Joe Barden Strat pickups despite reading and hearing so many positives.Then the fact that they were re-issues made me even more budget toight..
Then I saw one on ebay from london, a standard which is to say it fits under a cover if required as its slightly smaller..well, wtf.made an offer and won the bridge pup.
The same day came across a 99 deluxe for the middle for a tad more, so won that as well after I asked the owner if he'd do a BIN on the pup and ship to Sweden.
So now, two Bardens, both vintage on their way over.

Now then..the Schecter Tangerine are made for these I reckon.Brass block, Iroko body tone and Bardens with a mastertone and a push/pull switch between neck and bridge for that telecaster sound..Its also probably gonna inherit the birdseye neck and 22 frets as well as a white single ply 8 hole pickguard..

Gettin' there..

Every day that goes by and trying to play things on the projects is more and more fun.Thats the way it should be with everything, if it aint enjoyable you tend to not really do it.
Its really important to understand where you are when climbing up the stairs to perfection or quality.Just now I'm at the base of the stairs to the temple but its gettin' there.
There are pitfalls which I feel too many players go through. Trying to copy other signature guitarists or simply copying tab..helps technique perhaps but removes imagination, as in your own.
Styles as well, try them all, mix n match and then of course find your own style.
Thats why you get such a mix up on this blog.

Whats coming up next is kinda cool, a planned mix of players to record some craic down at the club..
Thats after the software is purchased but thats soon....

Good pickin'....

rare interview..Danny Gatton "You can't be fat and play metal, you gotta be thin and hungry-looking,"

Of course, Joe had been playing with Danny at the age of 12....

Soundclip from Youtube is a clue..

Okay, no idea who the person is sho is playing this but the sound of the pups is the key..Your all familiar with Danny gatton and the work he did with the Joe Barden company.Well, I decided , once I had a listen to this, that the enxt project would have a set of Joe Barden deluxes.
So far I have managed to source 2 vintage JBs from before he went out of business in the late 2000. So one more and I have a set.Of course I could just stack them in the infamous telecaster which has space for 2 normal sized pups..infact, thats probably what will happen, but you never know this early in the project.



In fact I think the project will be as follows:

EJ 57 body
Birdseye brazilian rosewood neck
Joe bardens
Black 8 hole 57 pickguard
77 cts 5 way switch
250 master volume pot cts
250 mastertone no load pot cts/fender
250 switch DP for bridge/neck combo
0,22 cap

keeps the faith...

Just the other day a guy asked me if I'd watched or listened to the most recent Black Crowes release...has to be said there are a few bands that I'm usually very sharp about their releases, so I was surprised this one had sneeked past the radar..

As soon as I got to work I bought the album "before the frost" from Itunes and once again The Crowes gives us oldies a chance to smile and breath again past all the pseudo studio overdubbed midi keyboard shite that we have to listen too most of the time..Its a frikken slice of the 70s meets 2010 with class!It makes you want to get a joint on the go and plug into a Vox and make some toons!


First time I watched them was way back in the early 90's , when a friend who worked for EMA in Stockholm managed to get me a ticket to a theatre gig in stockholm..well, since then they have been a driving force in the music collection..can't really put my finger on it..but they have a really special song writing ability which seems to be the influence of the drugs..

There is DVD of the recording of the release, from a cabin in the woods..The whole idea is such a nostalgia memory trap..you know, the idea that back in the day you got your band into a cabin and recorded onto an 8 track whilst drinking some beer and smoking on some weed..Well, they went out and did it in front of a studio audience..class!

Straight away I started thinking about the same project...bunch a guys down at the rugby club, a lock in with 10 crates of booze , 10,0000 ciggies and whatever else turns up and a bunch a amps and intruments.Its on! Signing people now..you cant lose with the cheap costs of recording and software abilities nowadays..be a great craic to pull it off and just the kinda thing that I'm up for just now the M-Audio gear is on the way. Obviously the more cynical just gaze a weary eye, but fukk em, this is gonna work and the results will be awesome, as well as a fantastic way to have a creative weekend, "doon the Klubb"

So, Project "DTK" starts kinda now. Theres already a whole loada gear, so now its finding people who would be interested in putting down some tracks together with a bunch a guys and seeing what happens.

Fender Vibratone

Wouldn't mind one of these..SRV, Gilmour and a host of other guitarists have used this Leslie style cabinet to spin off their chorus sounds..
Just found one out in the outback, have to see if I can land it...

Bab...

Many years ago I worked with the wailers.They played in Uppsala and I was fortunate to be a humper for the gig, Ziggy marley singing and a bunch of old wailers playing the type of equipment you only read about from a bygone age and played by the real Mcoy.lets just say they weren't smoking ciggies and the funniest thing were the complaints coming fast and furious from the ladies toilet..Apparently the bass was so huge it was vibrating the toilets so they were nearly unusuable...I would have expected a Q..Simply great Reggae musicianship..
Now, Bob Marley is worth a listen and I can recommend this concert found on Wolfgangsvault;
If you havent registered for the Vault , then do so and listen to some fantastic live concerts! This being one of my favorites..listen to the composition...
http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/bob-marley-and-the-wailers/concerts/music-hall-june-08-1978-early-show.html

Simply awesome!


Then of course, his guitar was pretty cool as well..looks almost as if it smoked as much weed as its owner...

Intonation, truss rods and the solder iron...

Friday night and I decided enough was enough with some of the issues I had with some of the fenders.So I decided to check the intonation, truss rod and see what was what.
Basically all you need is the appropriate allen key for the bridge, or philips, and then a business card which you can use on the 6th fret once the first and twelve are held down on the low E.
To intonate, get a harmonic on the 12th fret strings and get a reading on a guitar tuner.Then fret the same note on the twelve and see if you get any difference.Ajust suitably.
Simple and the results are always positive.
Keep in mind the vintage trem blocks also move when tuning, so that has to be adjusted as well to your requirements.Quite a good tip with regards the corrct adjustment is that you should be able to double bend a note without the trem blcok moving and the note underneath once played directly after the bend should be okay.
Once again, it takes time and of course its fun to work on.
Solder iron came out to sort out a volume pot on the 77 fender strat which has a 73 body, i'll post pics soon.
I decided to rewire the strat with an Eric Johnson set up which is to say the tone pots effect the bridge and neck but leave out the middle pot.
The Mr Horsepower Telecaster needed to also have a 78 tone pot stuck in and the 3 way switch resoldered as something wasn't right.I used a 65 wiring diagram for that.

This week I'll post pics of the most recent projects which include the Sami Mk III which is an incredible guitar.
The schecter iroko bodied strat with the mastertone and thinskin 59 custom shop pups will also be posted.

On the way are two tone caps, a tbx switch, a no-load switch and some vintage wire.
Building a 62RI which should be interesting.
Also this week I'll be looking at audio interface soundcards as its time to get some chords and stuff recorded.

Best, bestest...The most Famed Mosrite?

If you wind back all the way to the near beginnings of this blog you'll find a few pics of my first Univox flyer which I stuck a dimarzio fs 1 reissue into the tail.
The univox guitars are okay, but to be honest they feel as if they're made of balsa wood and you can use the neck as a whammy bar...

The real mcoy..well here is my favorite of all Mosrites and I'm currently in the chase for a rep...found one..but the piggy bank is bare..

Despite the fact that JR had a minibucker in the neck, he unplugged it..and if you listen to the Ramones last gig " we're outta here", his sound is massive!

Yowza! its the real relic deal....

Loks like a white over sunburst as well....

If you found one, buy it!

I'll be the first to admit that I'm a person who will try and avoid anything and everything that is Made in China.It took me long enough to realise that the Japanese can actually make fine musical instruments, but otherwise I'm more old school conservative thinking were buying Euro gear and some items from the USA come first and foremost.
So when I heard this Hayden and I heard it was PRC I was a bit surprised. I did some research and discovered that Hayden was in fact a British company who had jumped on the band wagon and moved some building rights deep into the PRC but also retained a custom shop and UK based plant.hand wired point to point amplifiers.
The sound of these amplifiers is almost a slap in the face to the high end priced amps.I cant really describe it, I suggest you give one a shot.You'll be surprised.
A friend who is a very good guitarist put guitars from budget to high end fender custom shop thru the test and they all sounded great.
Okay, my Marshall Silver Jubilee is an awesome amp, but you just cant get the same warm sound out of it that you get from the Hayden and of course not for the price.
try one, you'll not be disappointed.

Tone Quest..don't forget the Caps!

hours upon hours of reading through peoples experiences with caps, different pickups and of course the tone yer looking for.Clapton used 0.015s @ 100v, SRV apparently last used 0,22s, normal set up from fender went from 1.0 down to 0,47 in 1997.
You gotta keep your eye open for @ volts as well..decisions, decisions...keeping it low and your up to a brighter tone..Think I'll go for a Vintage Cap running at 047 or 022...but with a master tone running on a no load pot, I could use a 1.0 vintage copy and still open wide on 10 missing out the cap completely...then the question of a blender pot...

Eleven Rack

Probably a wee bit too over the top for my ambitions, but interesting all the same.
Now i'm reading about different software for guitar and it gets a bit over the top.
Basically all I want is a line to a mic to record live from my marshall or any other cab as opposed to plugging into a pc and using software cabs and effects.

On the cards is guitar rig session which gives me that ability.Basically a soundcard and a mic with some recording software, which i believe is cubase for the guitar rig.

Project Schecter a step forwards..

We're here:

Schecter iroko strat body
Schecter maple neck or unmarked schecter strat style rosewood neck
Fender brassman tremelo block
Fender malmsteen brass nut
Gold Schaller vintage tuners
Brass claw and "silent" trem springs.
Fatboy Mint green pickguard 62ri plus covers

So basically theres enough material to put together 2 complete projects here.
With the 83 JVSQ white body waiting for a neck, and with the beautiful iroko orange/red nitro schecter body waiting for a neck, the question is which one goes where.

I'm thinking the maple neck will move onto Sami MkII to make her Sami Mk III

JVSQ will then inherit the SRV Signature neck with the relic mint green 62ri parts and retain the JV trem block.This will be more reliced than the other 62Ri

The schecter will inherit the Schecter AG neck with all brass parts as they were back in the day. saying that it will only be brass parts through the string line, not the pickguard which will end up being a white single play 57 I think.

we shall see..the options are all there.I'll update once the parts arrive.

Fender CS '59 thin skins...

The quest doesn't stop for the next build and once again I managed to find a set of pretty rare pups that had been ripped out of a Fender Stratocaster 59 "thin skin" custome shop model. Apparently these pups are only available in these limited models and I was happy that the middle mup was not reverse wound as I already have that set up in my SRV Slider vintage scatterwounds.
The outputs are;
neck 5.9/
Mid 5.9/
Bridge 6.1

Now the idea is to set up a wiring diagram which will have a mastertone and tone blender for neck and bridge pups (you can find that wiring diagram in the blog).
I'm not 100% yet on this as I may also buy an srv cap and just set up normally.
Regardless, these were a very good purchase!

just had too..schecter custom shop.....

Apparently a certain mr Billy Gibbons handed a schecter neck to a certain Stevie Ray Vaughn who stuck it on his "Lenny" guitar..This neck was apparently built by the same custom shop...I just had to get this for the schecter body...

Mr Horsepower meets Andy Summers Bridge!

Amazing quality brass bridge like the Andy Summers bridge.
Mr Horsepower, already a heavy beast, has now become even heavier but she needed a looking over anyway as something wasn't well with the electrics.
So now she has two 77 pots wired up and a more solid Gibson style jackplate as the other simply fried my mind.

mixing it up...

The 62ri that I put together was disappointing for several reasons.
But as I had a few bits n bobs hanging around I decided to stick a 77 fender pickguard with knobs and switch , together with the MasterTone set up I had on the 62RI pups, but replaced them with a coupe of 78 Dimarzio SDS 1s.These original SDS 1s are fantastic pickups and despite their hot output can be used for any style.

One problem is trying to match them up with other pickups, so I didn't.I went the Richie Blackmore way and simply left out a pup, although his guitars had dummies, I used black tape.
I also realised the tremelo was badly setup as I had to raise the height of the strings to clear the taller than normal Dimarzio and I didnt want to remove wood.

The result is awesome! I'm more and more understanding that as opposed to buying other players signatures, you should build your own from parts! This one has gone up in my estimations.
Parts are: 84 jv/sq 62 ri body
Warmoth pro rosewood/birdseye AAA neck
Vintage Dimarzio SDS 1s
Fender 77 pickguard and plastic
Master Tone setup