I don’t know, is this in the “do we really it” catagory?

A device that adjusts for cable capacitance, which as near as I can figure has something to do with the distance your signal has to travel on it’s way to the amp (or line in). Now, guitar companies are always looking for ways to keep selling product, and every once and a while some small company produces a small gewgaw, however useful, they claim is going to revolutionize the way we play guitar, or the way a guitar sounds. Invariably they end up being curiosities, or, at best, embraced by a small group of players. (It’s why Gibson is just shooting themselves in the foot with this digital guitar, but that’s another post.)

Anyway, I listened to the sound clips, and certainly you can hear a distinct difference between all the clips. But would I attest that it’s a desirable difference? I can’t say. Tone is certainly subjective, and while some of those are certainly more tinny than others, some aren’t necessarily bad. And so much of it ends up being carved out by EQ. More frequency spectrum to work with? Or just different.

Anyway, if this is the kind thing will help you be a better guitar player, or get a better tone in your studio, I don’t doubt that it does what it says. I just wonder how imperative it is.

The estimable Peter Kirn @ CDM has a link up to an on-line guitar tuner that looks pretty elaborate. I can’t really test it out myself since my music rig is kept far away from the internet and all the attendant software goes with keeping it connected cleanly. But it got me thinking about my go-to software tuner, APTuner.

Sonar has a tuner plugin included but to be honest I find it doesn’t grab my signal cleanly enough to be very reliable - i.e. it sometimes takes several heavy plucks before the “LED” begins to dance, and once it does it goes away too quickly. (This problem may be less with my new audio interface where I can independently crank the gain of the inst-level input.) But since you can add additional programs through the tools menu, it’s easy enough to wire the stand-alone APTuner to Sonar. (If anyone needs instruction in this let me know and I’ll whip up a post.)

It’s got a large display needle, that is sensitive and accurate and it’s easy to select from the alternate tunings.

However when I went digging for a link I discovered that I had been using the v1.0 line of the shareware. It’s gone through a few revisions. Somewhere along the line it got married to the Windows GDI+ and it doesn’t look quite the same.

I’m not sure how I feel about it, and since I just downloaded it myself, I can’t attest to the functionality being as good. But I do plan on giving it a spin, and if they didn’t ruin it in the process I’ll kick up a few bucks to the developers. If not, I’ll stick with v1.00 which works a treat for me.

Oh yeah, Windows only apparently. But if I’m remembering correctly there is a pretty slick tuner for the Mac; maybe one of those widget things.

Christ at AI has a post up about the new Joe Strummer Tribute Guitar. A commenter brought up the Malcolm Young signature model Gretsch (that’s right, Malcolm).

It seems a fine-line between signature models & these truly crass custom-shop “tributes.” Signature models are definitely designed for the Guitar Center denizen who has no imagination; mass-produced guitars that are knock-offs of already existing models, which can be associated with “famous” musicians, thereby imbuing the player with a certain association. (You have a pretty good idea of what someone playing a Tom Guy-from-Blink-182 powder blue Strat is going to sound like.) These custom shop abortions are like that but multiplied. I have no idea who would drop that kind of coin on this - theme restaurants seems a pretty reasonable guess, or crappy rock clubs.? But, ultimately, either says a lot about its owner that is not entirely favorable.

I’ve actually seen one of the Custom Shop Fenders (”65″ Strat variety), and while the neck and workmanship are indeed impressive (hand-wound pickups, etc.) for the life of me I do not see the point of the distressing. Like those shitty jeans at Old Navy that look like you found them in the trash. And for that kind of money you could buy a few recent era guitars that play and sound just as good. I like Tele’s; maybe someday I’ll own one that costs more the $400. But, come on, even one that was licked by Hendrix himself is only going to do so much for you.

That said, one of the best guitars I’ve ever played was the Elliot Easton (!) model Gretsch.

I also realized that in my “collection” (I’m using quotes because while I own more than one guitar I’ve never acquired one that I didn’t play extensively; I have a couple of acoustics that are worth something, and none of my 3 electric guitars set me back more than $500) I have my DeArmond guitar which strongly resembles Billy Zoom’s primary instrument, a silver-fleck Gretsch. DeArmond were apparently Fender/Guild’s attempt to eat into the Gretsch market when they discovered they had inadvertently acquired the patten to DeArmond pickups (famously identified with Gretsch). (This story may be apocryphal; I have not been able to verify it.) Of course they just outright bought Gretsch a few years later and thus ended the need to cannibalize this market.

Anyway, I’ll admit when I bought it in 97 or whatever, I gravitated towards it because I think that Billy Zoom is one of the best guitarists of my generation. (For whatever that’s worth.) While it in no way helped me to even begin to approach that level of musicality, I’ve kept it. Well, mostly because of inertia but also because I loved the Bigsby. And like I’ve said, I have it high/Nashville strung, and it’s great for helping me play the same tired chords and have them sound slightly original, and cuts nicely through my muddy mixes.