One of my best buds who has a sweet vintage guitar collection came over today with a few new acquisitions: an original, vintage '65 Fender Jaguar, in amazing condition and complete with the original bridge cover; a gorgeous PRS Archtop Artist model from a few years back; a mid 60s Maestro fuzz, and an untouched, never-played gold Klon Centaur still new in the box (I was interested in buying this pedal but he beat me to it!).
I brought out my pedalboard, my McCarty Singlecut, and my vintage '65 Gibson SG Special. We played everything through my PRS David Grissom Custom 30 amp.
The DG amp truly sounded great with all the guitars and pedals. The Maestro fuzz was exceptional, sounded exactly like the Keef "Satisfaction" lick, and proves once again why IMHO it's the best sounding fuzz of all time. The fact that my nephew borrowed my original 1966 model, never returned it, and on top of everything threw it out because he didn't know it was worth anything still grinds my azz...
Neither of the '65s could touch the McCarty Singlecut for tone quality or vibe. You can talk to me all you want about the virtues of vintage guitars, but it wasn't even close. My friend (whose collection includes lots of 60s stuff, and even some vintage D'Angelicos and D'Aquistos) agreed.
Granted, The Hammer is a different beast than an old SG or an old Jaguar, but it had so much more vibe that it made both of these seriously good vintage guitars sound like they needed a personality transplant. That's saying something, as both of the vintage guitars are very fine examples of their breeds!
The PRS Archtop surprised me in two ways; this one had McCarty pickups (original pickups for that model). First, it was much brighter and crisper than I imagined it would be, and second, the piezo was really good sounding through the DG amp, even blended with the magnetic pickups. This guitar really is perfect for the piezo pickup, and I was absolutely floored by how really nice it was. My friend loved it through the DG30, and dug the amp and cab.
He'd played his guitars through his old Fender and Magnatone amp collection, but hadn't played them through a more versatile, modern amp.
The Klon was indeed new and untouched, in the box, with all the original papers, bill of sale, everything. Still wrapped in the plastic bag. I told my friend not to unwrap it. If you've got an original gold Klon horsie model NIB, why mess that up? I wanted to mess with it, but it just didn't seem right for some reason. If I'd bought it, I'd have put it on the pedal board, but I'm not a collector, and he is. I figured he should preserve the value he paid for.
So we had a great afternoon.
I brought out my pedalboard, my McCarty Singlecut, and my vintage '65 Gibson SG Special. We played everything through my PRS David Grissom Custom 30 amp.
The DG amp truly sounded great with all the guitars and pedals. The Maestro fuzz was exceptional, sounded exactly like the Keef "Satisfaction" lick, and proves once again why IMHO it's the best sounding fuzz of all time. The fact that my nephew borrowed my original 1966 model, never returned it, and on top of everything threw it out because he didn't know it was worth anything still grinds my azz...
Neither of the '65s could touch the McCarty Singlecut for tone quality or vibe. You can talk to me all you want about the virtues of vintage guitars, but it wasn't even close. My friend (whose collection includes lots of 60s stuff, and even some vintage D'Angelicos and D'Aquistos) agreed.
Granted, The Hammer is a different beast than an old SG or an old Jaguar, but it had so much more vibe that it made both of these seriously good vintage guitars sound like they needed a personality transplant. That's saying something, as both of the vintage guitars are very fine examples of their breeds!
The PRS Archtop surprised me in two ways; this one had McCarty pickups (original pickups for that model). First, it was much brighter and crisper than I imagined it would be, and second, the piezo was really good sounding through the DG amp, even blended with the magnetic pickups. This guitar really is perfect for the piezo pickup, and I was absolutely floored by how really nice it was. My friend loved it through the DG30, and dug the amp and cab.
He'd played his guitars through his old Fender and Magnatone amp collection, but hadn't played them through a more versatile, modern amp.
The Klon was indeed new and untouched, in the box, with all the original papers, bill of sale, everything. Still wrapped in the plastic bag. I told my friend not to unwrap it. If you've got an original gold Klon horsie model NIB, why mess that up? I wanted to mess with it, but it just didn't seem right for some reason. If I'd bought it, I'd have put it on the pedal board, but I'm not a collector, and he is. I figured he should preserve the value he paid for.
So we had a great afternoon.
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