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The Mystery Lights: Garage Punk Meets Musicianship

The Mystery Lights’ Mike Brandon used his ’60s Silvertone 1429 plugged into a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe for this exclusive run through “Together Lost,” from their new album, “Purgatory.” Catch our review in the January issue. Read Now!

Thom Rotella’s Wes Flashback!

Guitarist Thom Rotella is a protégé of the legendary Tommy Tedesco and lists heroes including Montgomery, Green, Benson, and Martino. Here, he and his custom-made TV Jones archtop play “Who Dat?” through a ’63 Fender Concert and a late-’60s Deluxe Reverb. The song is from his latest album, “Side Hustle,” which we review in the January issue. Read Now!

Ronnie Baker Brooks: Windy City Blues Hero

Second-generation blues master Ronnie Baker Brooks grabbed his a custom Gibson ES-336, a Tube Screamer, and his reissue Fender Super Reverb to play the title track from his new album, “Blues In My DNA.” Catch our review and an interview with Ronnie in the January issue. Read Now!

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The Mystery Lights: Garage Punk Meets Musicianship

The Mystery Lights’ Mike Brandon used his ’60s Silvertone 1429 plugged into a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe for this exclusive run through “Together Lost,” from their new album, “Purgatory.” Catch our review in the January issue. Read Now!

Thom Rotella’s Wes Flashback!

Guitarist Thom Rotella is a protégé of the legendary Tommy Tedesco and lists heroes including Montgomery, Green, Benson, and Martino. Here, he and his custom-made TV Jones archtop play “Who Dat?” through a ’63 Fender Concert and a late-’60s Deluxe Reverb. The song is from his latest album, “Side Hustle,” which we review in the January issue. Read Now!

Ronnie Baker Brooks: Windy City Blues Hero

Second-generation blues master Ronnie Baker Brooks grabbed his a custom Gibson ES-336, a Tube Screamer, and his reissue Fender Super Reverb to play the title track from his new album, “Blues In My DNA.” Catch our review and an interview with Ronnie in the January issue. Read Now!

I am text block. Click edit button to change this text. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Ut elit tellus, luctus nec ullamcorper mattis, pulvinar dapibus leo.

Artists

Michael Bloomfield’s ’63 Telecaster

This Guitar Killed Folk!

A silver-spoon teen who loved sneaking into Chicago’s southside blues clubs, Michael Bloomfield reveled in absorbing all he could from the many legendary players he saw perform in the city’s famed joints. The de facto lessons served Bloomfield well as he went on to contribute to the works of many famed performers while forging his […]

by Ward Meeker
Artists

Orianthi

The Power Of O

On Orianthi’s latest album, O, the fierce guitar slinger injects mass quantities of blues-rock fury into a contemporary pop-music setting. While this may seem like textbook marketing to enter the mainstream, in reality it’s one of the pitfalls of being a music lover and an eclectic. Orianthi is a Santana disciple who has worked with […]

by Oscar Jordan
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VG Approved Gear

John Page Classic Ashburn

Turn the Page

With the creation of John Page Classic Guitars in 2006, the guitar builder, designer, and co-founder of the Fender Custom Shop opened a new chapter in his already illustrious career. After launching a line of custom guitars earlier this year, Page teamed up with HRS Unlimited and a Japanese manufacturer to build a more-cost-friendly “custom […]

Artists

Fretprints: Foghat

Slow Ride to Boogie Wonderland

If the ’70s were the era of good times and excess following the tumultuous ’60s, the boogie band would be its champion. Boogie was a leveler – a style, feeling, and groove – affecting everyone from Mississippi bluesman John Lee Hooker (“Boogie Chillen”) and Arthur Smith in early rock and roll (“Guitar Boogie”) to blues-rockers […]

VG Approved Gear

D’Angelico’s EXL-1 and EX-SS

Deco Redux

3rd Power Solo Dream/Switchback amps Price: $1,859 list/$1,149 street (EXL-1); $1,999 list/$1,409 street (EX-SS) Info: www.dangelicoguitars.com. Images of John D’Angelico crafting masterpieces in his Little Italy shop haunt guitar enthusiasts to this day, implying an era of lost glory. Happily, D’Angelico guitars, long inaccessible to average guitarists, are being revived and reinterpreted in a manner […]

Classic Instruments

The Bass That Waited

Rickenbacker’s Early 4000 and 4001

In the January and February installments, we looked at Gibson’s Thunderbird, an instrument condemned by its maker to a quick demise only to be reborn due to late-blooming popularity. Another early bass represents a flipside to that tale – one that was in production for years before becoming a major success. Most players today are […]

Music

Little Wing: The Jimmy McCulloch Story

Paul Salley

When a former Beatle name-checks you before a guitar solo on your very first recording with the band, you must be special. And Jimmy McCulloch was, as evidenced by Paul McCartney’s exuberant “Take me down, Jimmy!” on Wings’ 1974 single “Junior’s Farm.” The Scottish guitarist, who was 26 when he died in 1979, is the […]

Artists

Reb Beach

There’s no two waysabout it – thanks to MTV dunces Beavis and Butthead, Winger gets no respect. But the band knows how write killer pop-rock tunes, has one of the baddest rock-fusion drummers in Rod Morgenstern, and rock-solid bassist Kip Winger knows how to craft a great lyrical hook. And it has a new live […]

Immix Eleven V-Series 30 Amp/Cab
VG Approved Gear

Immix Eleven V-Series 30 Amp/Cab

Lights! Sound! Action!

Immix Eleven V-Series 30 Amp/Cab Price: Amp $1,995 (list); cabinet $895 (list) Contact: www.immix11.com Remember the first time you encountered the Rick 331LS Light Show guitar? You thought, wow, that’s cool, but how does it sound? The Immix Eleven V-Series 30 is a head/speaker design with a little light show all its own, but with […]

Classic Instruments

Danelectro’s Four-String Basses

The guitars and basses made by Danelectro in the ’60s epitomized “no frills.” And though they were considered the nadir of American-made electric instruments of their time, many a babyboomer cut their musical teeth on one. The construction of most “classic” Danelectro-made guitars and basses – whether they were branded as Danelectro or the more-popular […]

Artists

Nick Moss

Backbone Shiver

On Get Your Back Into It!, guitarist Nick Moss and harmonica savant Dennis Gruenling combine blues, swing, and rock and roll into an infectious blend of foot-stomping groove, sweat, and passion. It’s pop music from Chicago’s 1950s, and Moss plays it clean, tasty, and with a bit of help from Freddie King. What is your […]

Classic Instruments

Fender Precision Bass

The “Final” Configuration

The Fender Precision Bass was the first commercially successful solidbody electric bass. Played somewhat like a guitar and sporting a fretted neck, the “P-Bass” won over players in almost every genre who previously had to contend with the cumbersome upright bass. In its original configuration, the instrument, introduced in 1952, had a maple neck with […]

Classic Instruments

Martin 000-30

When a guitar maker introduces an innovative new feature at the same time an appealing, existing feature is being discontinued, the result can be a rare configuration of specifications. Although Martin introduced the 15″-wide 000-size body in 1902 and made the last Style 30 model in 1921, the two groups overlapped on only one guitar […]

George Gruhn and Walter Carter
Artists

Dave Wyndorf

Cover Up

Like most rock bands, the men of Monster Magnet found themselves with a lot of time on their hands once Covid effectively ended tours in 2020. But instead of going into hibernation, Dave Wyndorf and company went to work in the studio, recording an all-covers album, A Better Dystopia, which focuses on proto-metal obscurities (only […]

Artists

VG Q&A: A Gilded ’63 Jazz Bass

Plus, Swappable Pickups, Bartell Guitars, and a Mystery Lap Steel

I am the third owner of a 1963 Jazz Bass with a neck stamp “7Jan63A,” pots dated that May, and serial number from that spring. It also has original gold hardware – even the screws and springs. I know gold hardware was a custom option in the era, but can find no other information regarding […]

VG Approved Gear

Fryette Power Station PS-10

Get It On

There’s nothing like cranking up a tube amp and getting all the punch, feel, dynamics, and juicy goodness of warm valves. But how do you hit your amp’s sweet spot without ticking off the sound guy or waking up the neighbors? Fryette Amplification has a solution. The Fryette Power Station PS-100 is a dual-mode amp-top […]

Classic Instruments

Ampeg’s Jet Reverb Prototype

Ampeg is frequently credited for being not only one of the first makers to put reverb in its amplifiers, but also for producing what was one of the consistently best-sounding reverbs of the 1960s. If we accept that the Ampeg reverb circuit is a noteworthy stop on any tour of tube-amp history, this is one […]

Music

Roy Buchanan and Tom Principato

Telemaster: Live In ’75
Masters of the Telecaster

In 1972, Roy Buchanan shook up the guitar world with his self-titled debut album. The tones he extracted from his ’53 Tele, his facility with eclectic repertoire and techniques, from country to blues to rock – all confirmed rumors of an obscure virtuoso playing The Crossroads bar in Maryland. Since the 48-year-old’s death in 1988, […]

Artists

Alan Lancaster

Alan Lancaster, co-founder and longtime bassist in Status Quo, died September 26. He was 72 and had been living with multiple sclerosis. At age 13, Lancaster formed The Scorpions with schoolmates Francis Rossi, Alan Key, and Jess Jaworski in 1962. After adding guitarist Rick Parfitt in ’67, the band changed its name to The Status […]

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