GuitArcher

The most powerful kind of advertising is most definitely the kind that doesn't seem like advertising... Case in point: That Pedal Show. I'm a huge fan of Dan and Mick, and I have a hard time not watching their videos as soon as they are posted. They manage to walk that fine line of being laid back and affable while being structured and informative in their presentation. What I didn't realize was how much impact they were having on my GAS ( gear acquisition syndrome).  I mostly thought it was limited to focusing more on pedals generally, but my recent acquisition and love of the Blues Driver had me thinking about how my drive section was basically Dan's choice in the $300 pedal board challenge. It doesn't stop there though. I bought an Ibanez JEM Jr. awhile ago, having decided that I wanted to have a guitar that was a little more 80s, with a locking tremolo and a crazy color.  I was looking at Jacksons and Charvels initially, but when the Yellow Jem Jr. p...

Just a collection of thoughts... Time to Reflect Listening to the Guitarcaster Podcast recently has been pretty interesting.  I find that they sit in a middle ground between 60 Cycle Hum and the Guitar Nerds; There's enough structure to not get lost in their nonsense, but not so much that it becomes rigid. Having recently finished their episode about reverb, I found myself thinking about how I approached reverb, which is to say I didn't really think about it, despite owning the Hall of Fame 2.  Turn the knobs to somewhere in the middle, select a preset, and boom, reverb. What really opened up my thinking was their discussion on hall reverb.  I already knew that this was meant to emulate a concert hall, not a hallway, but what I didn't think about was, having been in many concert halls, what the sound actually did.  Yes, the reverb was BIG, but it wasn't long.  After all, a concert hall isn't some deep dark cave where the reverberation goes on for eve...

Pedals are heard. Get it? I had mentioned awhile back that I picked up a quartet of pedals without having tested them first, only to find that two of them didn't work.  It wasn't a huge deal, because I think that $40 a piece for the two pedals that did work was ok, but it still bothered me as the initial feeling of being suckered was slow to wear off. Pictured: Pedals. Also, Sweet Potato. Prior to this, I had purchased a mostly working Boss HM-2 Heavy Metal ($70), which I was keen to get rid of.  I posted it, along with the Boss OD-2, the MXR Phase 90, the Big Muff (listed as broken) and the two Danelectro food series pedals pictured above. For those keeping score at home, that's $150 on the aforementioned pedals. Since then, I've sold the HM-2 and the broken Big Muff for $90, and just returned from selling the MXR Phase 90 for $60. In case you are arithmetically challenged: That's $150, and I still have the Boss Turbo Overdrive and the Danelectro ...

If you've never owned a Boss Blues Driver, go buy one. Now. I'll wait. I came across one earlier in the week for $70, but in a place that was just a little bit too far out of the way for me to justify. What's more, while I haven't made any big purchase in awhile, I seem to be spending $80 here, there, and everywhere. The universe aligned though, and Saturday morning I asked if it was still available.  I assumed that at that price, the poster had just forgotten to take down the listing. Getting a "no" to the question "is this still available?" is a great cure for acute GAS. "Yes, it is available." Fack. Better than Amazon Delivery I asked for the seller's address, and immediately texted my father, who was heading to us that day, and would be (sort of) passing by the sellers house.  I felt a little guilty, but I had recently had success selling his motorcycle on Kijiji, so I felt like he was getting used to this type of...

A visit from my brother last weekend afforded us the chance to A/B some pedals from each our our collections.  Or particular interest to me was the EHX East River Drive, a Tube Screamer clone that apparently had help from Analog Man. We ran both through the Fender 68 DRRI and used an Eric Johnson Rosewood Stratocaster. Comparing it to the Fulltone Fulldrive 2 and the Noah Sark Green, the EHX was really good .  Clearer in the midrange than the Sark, with a bit more of an edge on top than the Fulldrive. If you ever wanted to hear how Screamers could sound different, compare the EXH to another clone. Pictured Somewhere - All the pedals mentioned. The second comparison we took a stab at was the JHS Angry Charlie and the Boss Power Driver. Still running into the Fender, but this time using humbucker equipped guitars, it was really shocking how close the latter could get to the former.  With the Boss, anything above 12 o'clock on the gain compressed too much, bu...

If I haven't written in awhile, it usually means one of two things... I've recently acquired an engrossing video game, which means I'll see you in 80-120 hours. I've recently acquired some gear that is taking my attention away from writing here. Happily, this time it's the second one.

Patience pays off... But it's hard having a piece of gear that holds some nominal value that you have not interest in keeping.  As the days creep on, you begin to rationalize trading it for just about anything useful. Here's the thing though - the value of a piece of gear has NOTHING to do with how useful it is to you, or how much you like it.  It has EVERYTHING to do with how much another person wants it. Such is the case with my Boss BF3 Flanger. I acquired this as part of a trade for a Mini Big Muff, which came from in a trade with a Boss wah for an Ibanez Mini Analog Delay.  With the retail price of the Flanger well in excess of the Muff, combined with the fact that it was "like new in box" (LNIB), it was a no brainer. Plus, flangers are cool right? Well, not for me they're not.  I tried.  Front of chain, back of chain, middle of chain... it didn't matter.  The closest thing I found to an enjoyable sound was everything on full, with the pedal ...

I'm pretty content with my new board, but...

Trading is always better than selling.

Is there an echo in here? Why yes, yes there is... ( terrible)... After taking note of this pedal locally listed for $65 and hearing it mentioned on That Pedal Show's $350 challenge, I decided to throw an offer of $60 to the seller.  The response was... interesting... " Sure, you can have it for $60, but only if you're prompt in picking it up." Prompt? What, pray tell, does that mean? So I asked. Apparently, the seller had multiple buyers not show up over the course of a couple of days. That sucks, but I'm not sure being shitty to the next guy is going to help your cause there bud.  We're all entitled to a bad day though, so I was extra nice in explaining my schedule and when I would be available to pick it up, including being clear that I needed a window of 15-20 minutes to account for traffic - the pedal was local to me, but I was commuting back from work. In any case, transaction complete.  not the friendliest fellow, but they can't all...

I've been a bit pedal board obsessed lately, so this round up focuses almost exclusively on pedals. Boss CS3 Compression Sustainer - $60 I'm starting to get interested in the idea of compression, and combined with my desire to have a buffer on my board*, this is a pretty reasonably priced two-birds-one-stone type of pedal. I'm currently running that Boss Metal Zone at the front of my chain to act as the buffer, and that seems silly. Ibanez Mini AD-9 - $65 Despite attempts to move my mini-Marshall, there have been a bunch of tire-kickers and not any ready to pull the trigger. As a result, I'm thinking about picking up another mini-delay for the loop of the Marshall, as it sounded MUCH better with the delay there. ( Delay in the front sounds terrible with this amp... ) This AD9 mini seems like the perfect low cost solution.  I could buy another Quick Draw through Amazon, but I'm interested to hear how this might be different.  Whichever I like better w...

I've returned from vacation in much the same way I typically do - with more cash in my pocket than I typically carry around.  First world problems, right? It got me thinking: What could I buy with the actual cash I had on me? With $52 dollars burning a hole in my pocket, I turned to Kijiji to see what I could acquire, with the only rules being that I couldn't spend a cent more than I had, and that the location had to be convenient - near home or work, or on the way between. Below is the what I found with a quick search of everything within 40K of my the mid-point of my commute. TC Electronic Mojo Drive - $45 Do I really need another overdrive?  Probably not, especially given that I have a Joyo Ultimate Drive in the mail, but this is still interesting.  Is it a Tubescreamer clone?  Based on the PGS video , this seems to be somewhere in between a TS9 and and OCD.  Pass. Boss Metal Core - $40 I bought a Metal Zone for $30 for a laugh, and despite...

It seems to me that JHS pedals are THE boutique pedal builder right now, and while I can't say for certain that is completely deserved, I will say that I'm really happy with the Angry Charlie. I got lucky and picked one up, used, locally (#47 of V3) for a decent price, but buying one new would have run closer to $300 than $200 (taxes in of course).  That's a lot of money for a drive pedal, and while I'm really happy with it, I can't help but wonder... Enter the recently acquired Metal Zone. I intended to run a comparison and include the Zoom Hyper Lead for a laugh, but and evening of playing with my Les Paul Studio had me experimenting with the two pedals.  Could a pedal that everyone online seems to hate, and that cost me $30, compete with a pedal that is the toast of the online world and cost $180? First off, I tried to EQ the Metal Zone as close to the sound of the Angry Charlie as possible. Messing with the Charlie's settings after that to get close...

I was recently watching That Pedal Show's video with Joey Landreth , and the minute I saw his Suhr, I knew it was time to drop that new pick guard into my Blacktop Stratocaster. The tortoise shell pick guard I bought was for the purposes of finding a home for my EMG 81 and SA (no middle), so the tones are obviously going to be VERY different.  This could be a lot of fun though in combination with the Metal Zone I recently bought.  EMG pickups and a Boss Metal Zone? So. Much. Suck? I'm actually kind of interested in debunking this concept.  Just a few minutes with the Metal Zone led me to the conclusion that it isn't THAT bad.  What if I built two similar rigs from very different pieces and A/B'd them. The first rig would be the Eric Johnson Maple Stratocaster, which has a Tone Zone S in the bridge, into a Fulldrive 2, an Angry Charlie, a Quickdraw delay, and finally int the Dr. Z Maz 8. The second would be the Blacktop Stratocaster, with EMGs, into a ...

Yes, I did. I bought one. Again. And this time I should know better. That's right, the most hated pedal in the world, the Boss Metal Zone MT-2. I'm officially a member of the Metal Zone club once again.

There's lots of gear out there that, while interesting and/or alluring, would end up collecting dust in my collection.  Whether it's motivated by nostalgia, desire for change, or something else, there's always gear that says "yeah, you want me, but you don't really have a good reason to want me." Here's a quick rundown of things that I think I want, but seriously don't need. Boss Metal Zone - $40, maybe? No pedal, since the inception of pedals, has gotten more flak than the Boss Metal Zone.  You know who doesn't care?  Boss.  They hit it out of the park with this one, and an entire generation of guitarists put these on their first pedal boards, including me. Does it sound good?  Not really, but I guess what it does it does reasonably well.  In high school I built my rig around this sound ( kids, right?) , thrashing about all day and night.   WANT IT : Nostalgia, combined with the fact that this is super local. Seller is offering this...

Someday, when my oldest daughter asks me what the first song was we ever played together, I'll get to tell her it was "Another Brink in the Wall, Part 2." I think we could have done a lot worse. Truth be told, the first song she ever sang along to while I played was "Let it Go", from Disney's Frozen, because of course it was.  That doesn't count though.  She was just singing.  This time, she was actually playing drums... Kind of.  She was hitting various drums and cymbals to the rhythm, so in my book that counts. Seriously though, everyone should go out and buy a TC Electronics Ditto.  For such a low price, you can have a creative tool that allows for jamming all by yourself as well as layering opportunities that might arise when you've got a 5 year old eager to become a rock star. Why so Angry? Years and years and years ago, I remember going into the local music store and asking my favorite guy for a recommendation.  It was probably one tha...