Gries Amps – Yowza!

I seem to change my gear every other month for better or worse. One of those seemingly worse decisions came a couple of months ago when I decided that I needed a Vox amp. I had owned a Vox AC30CC1 a while back and it was way too loud, so I thought that an AC15CC1 would do the trick. I couldn’t afford to just add another amp to my set-up, so I had to sell my #1 amp. That amp was a 1973 Fender Princeton non-reverb that had been well taken care of and had the blackface control plate on the front and had a wheat grille put on it. This amp sounded amazing. I was able to double my investment, but as soon as I got the Vox I realized in the words of Gob Bluth, “I’ve made a terrible mistake.”

The Vox is an okay sounding amp (which I will give some tips on getting better tone out of in a future post), but I am a Fender guy through and through. So, I immediately put the Vox on eBay and began my search for a new Fender amp. The Princeton just killed, but to buy another one would require probably some TLC to get it up to where my old one used to be, plus I could not find a blackface control plate anywhere. So, I began looking around for some alternatives to the Fender name brand, and it led me to Gries Amps. Gries (pronounced Gr-ice) Amps are handmade in Massachusetts with the best materials around. Dave Gries specializes in tweaked blackface circuits.

I decided after looking at his line-up that the Gries 5 would be right up my alley. I don’t need much volume, as I already have all sorts of issues with stage volume. So, I put some feelers out on The Gear Page and found a couple of used ones available. I ended up with a black Gries 5 in immaculate condition. It comes loaded with an Eminence Tonkerlite 12” speaker and built with Mercury Magnets transformers. The Gries 5 has controls for volume, treble, bass, gain and master volume. The gain knob is very unique in that it adds the obvious gain and drive, but also overrides the tone knobs to give you a pure sounding overdrive. This amp gets me everything I need, fantastic blackface clean and killer overdrive. As sweet as my Princeton is, the Gries is just plain better. The Gries resonates in the extra large cab like nothing I’ve ever heard. The tone and sustain are amazing. The 5 watts can get plenty loud with that 12” speaker. There isn’t a ton of headroom, but I always played mic’d anyway. If you are looking to buy a Fender amp, check out Gries and their line of amps. You’ll pay a little bit more (and I mean a little) for a spectacular hand built boutique amp that is more flexible than the standard offerings. Check them out at www.griesamps.com.

Tips on Getting Gear on the Cheap – Part Two

Last time, I talked about using eBay to find good deals on gear. As one person noted in the comments, eBay is the best place to sell gear. I would have to agree with this. You definitely get the most out of your gear by selling on eBay. You get to sell your gear at the same price a music store or pawn shop is, so you aren’t taking out their cut. 

There are other places besides eBay to get great gear. My personal favorite is on guitar forums. I frequent several guitar forums (thegearpage.net & vintagemps.com, among others). First of all, these forums are a great place to get others’ opinions on guitars, amps and pedals as well as playing tips. They can also be a cool place to hang out and chat about whatever. Unfortunately, I sometimes find myself spending more time talking guitar than playing. Most forums have a classified section where members can post items for sale. I generally buy the majority of my gear from these forums, as they have the best prices. A word of caution, though, just like eBay, I take into account the number of posts the person has. If they have over 100 posts on a board, it tells me that they’ve been there a while and should be trustworthy. Also, I generally only pay with PayPal and with a credit card at that. If the seller hasn’t posted any pictures of the items, you can always ask for a picture to confirm that they have the item. I’ve only ever had one issue on the forums, and that was the situation I mentioned in the last post. 

Beyond guitar forums, Craigslist can be a valuable resource. If you live in a larger area, you probably have an active Craigslist for your area. You can occasionally find some great deals (I recently picked up a Standard Strat for $100), though, I’ve found that prices aren’t typically as good here. Craigslist can be a good place to sell, so that you don’t have to deal with shipping. The downside is trying to work out meeting up with the buyer and dealing with potentially sketchy people in person. Be aware that there are many people trying to run scams on buyers on Craigslist. These usually involve someone with a money order who wants you to ship the item to a different city. It can be pretty comical how complicated their story can be, as long as you don’t fall for it. Only take cash if you are selling on Craigslist and save yourself some headaches. Also, not a bad idea to meet in a public place (probably doesn’t work if you are buying an amp and want to test it out). 

Finally, scour your newspaper for garage sales with musical instruments. I have yet to buy anything guitar related at a garage sale, but I hear ridiculous stories of great scores and it makes me want to get up early on Saturdays.  Doing your homework can save you lots of money buying gear and can maximize your money when selling. 

Tips on Getting Gear on the Cheap – Part One

Seems like everywhere you turn it’s gloom-and-doom in the financial world. Money is tight and certainly that trickles down to church finances as well. But, services are still going on and you still need (or maybe just want) to get guitar gear. I’ve become something of a reverse snob, I rarely buy any sort of guitar gear new, except strings of course. Looking at my gear right now, only one guitar and one pedal were purchased brand new. The only reason that the guitar was purchased new was that I got it for cheaper than I could buy it used. I have bought and sold literally hundreds of pieces of gear in search for what fits me best. I thought I would share some tips on stretching your dollar in your search for tone. 

Some of you will only buy new, and that’s fine. If you look around, though, you can find gear that is in like-new condition for beat-up prices. I purchased a 1974 Fender Princeton amp in great condition for $300 (value btw $500-$600) from a guitar forum. Guitar pedals generally lose their value like a new-car, especially mass produced pedals like Boss or Digitech. Buying used can get you great tone without breaking the bank. And if you are buying at a good price, you can sell it if you don’t like it without losing any money. Consider it your used money back guarantee.  

Aside from the local pawn shop, eBay is the most accessible source for used gear. I use eBay frequently, but mostly to sell gear. If you are new to using eBay, the two main things you need to know about are feedback and PayPal. The feedback system is a rating tool for buyers and sellers to communicate their satisfaction with the transaction. A seller’s rating is located right under their screen name. If a seller’s feedback rating is under 99%, I will click on it to see the details of their rating. If there are frequent and recent negative feedback, I might be cautious in buying from them. Looking at the details of the negative feedback will give you an idea of the types of issues the seller is handling. If the seller has under 99% feedback and less that 50 transactions, I may not buy from them. I never buy from someone with less than 10 transactions and even that low of a number is risky. The more you are looking to spend, the more you should investigate the seller. Asking the seller for more detail or additional pictures is a good idea if you are uncomfortable. Their speed and depth of response will probably give you a feel for how the transaction might go. 

The second thing to be familiar with is the PayPal system. PayPal is the financial system that eBay owns and uses with their site. PayPal allows for credit card and bank transfers between customers using their e-mail address as their username. PayPal charges a premium for this service (currently around 3%, though charges can vary), but it is the easiest way to buy and sell between individuals online. PP is much maligned by it’s users, but unfortunately they’ve monopolized this type of service.  I personally have had good experiences using PP, though I recently learned a valuable lesson in using it. I bought a pedal off of a guy on a guitar forum and paid via credit card using PP. I didn’t hear anything from the guy for a week and the pedal didn’t show up. I tried contacting him several times, but received no response. I decided to file a claim in PP on the basis that I had not received the merchandise. After a set period of time, the seller did not respond to PP and the claim was awarded in my favor. Now, I sent the guy $130 for the pedal, and PP was able to get $2.78 from the seller. So, I called PP and spoke with a customer service representative. She told me that they would take action against the sellers account, which meant suspending it (does me a lot of good!), but suggested that I dispute the charge with my credit card company. Herein lies the lesson: Use a credit card when paying from PP! If I had paid out of my PP balance or my bank account, I’d be out the $128. I definitely was unaware of this, as a previous dispute had been resolved with the seller and PP did not have to take money from the seller.  

In my next post, we’ll look at alternatives to eBay in the hunt for good, used gear.

Review: T-Rex Moller Overdrive/Boost

T-Rex Moller Overdrive The Tube Screamer is the Samuel L. Jackson of guitar pedals. Seems like it’s everywhere, but it’s not always great. The entire boutique effects market sprung up from builders like Analogman modifying the TS and improving on the basic flaws in the design. The appeal (and also the complaint) of the TS is its bump in the midrange when engaged. That bump along with an output boost readily overdrives an amp’s tubes.  When I was searching for an overdrive pedal for my Vox AC30, I ran through quite an assortment of pedals. The Vox is very picky with pedals, as it has it’s own strong focus in the upper mids. So, a TS pedal would seem like a poor fit, which is it. However, I ended up falling in love with one for use with my AC30. That TS-style pedal is the T-Rex Moller overdrive. It’s a pedal that is built in Denmark by a company that has generated quite a bit of excitement over it’s Replica delay pedal.

The reason the Moller works so well with my Vox is the enormous flexibility in its controls. The Moller is a dual-function pedal with the left switch controlling the overdrive and the right switch controlling a clean boost. The boost is completely independent of the overdrive circuit, allowing even more flexibility. The boost is very transparent, with maybe a little increase in the high frequencies, but never overpowering.  The overdrive side of the pedal is where the Moller shines. The design takes the functions of the Fulltone Fulldrive and the Voodoo Labs Sparkle Drive and sticks them in one pedal. From the Fulldrive, the Moller incorporates the Voice button, which switches the mid-hump in and out. For use with my Vox, I switch the mids out, giving me a transparent eq which allows the natural tone of the amp to go through. With my Fender Princeton, I switch the mids back in, as the amp has an inherent scooping in the mids. From the Sparkle Drive comes the Blend control. This knob allows for a blending of your signal coming into the pedal with the distortion from the circuit. There is a lot of variation you can get here. I like to get the gain around 2 o’clock and blend the signal 50/50. This gives me some nice break-up with the sweetness of my clean tone. Another nice option is to crank the gain and blend in just a hint of the distortion with the clean tone. This gives you great definition from your clean with the sustain of the distortion, a Dumble-style tone.

The one downside to the pedal is the price. New it runs $280 at most of the major online stores, though it can be had for less elsewhere. I would be hard-pressed to say it was worth that much, though it is a great pedal. If you are interested, I would scour eBay, where they go for less than $200. The Moller definitely has that classic tone that you’ve heard on countless songs. The flexibility of the pedal and the clean boost make it a worthwhile addition to any pedalboard.

Hybrid Guitars In Worship

Most of my worship playing is with our youth group band. I have been working with senior high students for nearly a decade at my church. I’ve had the privilege of playing with some great guitar players over the years. Over the past year, my other guitarists have graduated and moved on and I’ve become the solo guitarist for the band. I’m comfortable just playing acoustic solo, but I like to have the tone of the electric guitar for some songs. When doing an up-tempo song, it’s nice to have a little kick to the sound. But, I also wanted to fill out the sound of our band a little as well. This started my quest for a hybrid guitar. These come in many shapes and configurations, but the basic idea is this: combining acoustic and electric tones in a single instrument. For years, Boss has produced the Acoustic Simulator pedal to imitate the tone of an acoustic. This may get you near the ballpark, but is still pretty limited. The hybrid takes it a step further by having acoustic and electric pickups in the same body.  I tried out several guitars in the hybrid camp when I was looking. There are several guitars that have come out recently in this niche, Michael Kelly Hybrid, Ovation VXT, Carvin AE185, Parkwood Hybrid, Taylor T5, Anderson Crowdster Plus, and the Epiphone Les Paul Ultra II among others. I myself picked up a Peavey Generation EXP, which is a Nashville Telecaster-style guitar with a Graftech piezo in the bridge. It has a 5-way pickup switch, volume and tone control for the electric and volume control for the acoustic, along with a 3-way switch to choose electric, electric/acoustic, or acoustic pickups. It has a stereo output jack, which allows me to plug in my custom Lava Cable Y-cable and run the acoustic and electric signals separately. I’ve found this to be a generally useful solution in my band situation. It lets me play two tones at once, which fills in the sound a little bit. It also cuts down on the gear I need to bring each week, which is a bonus. It lets me have more freedom to change the sound of the song in the middle without changing guitars, which would be impossible. I can play acoustic on the verse and then kick in the electric for the chorus to give it some more emphasis. To have even more control, you can run an A/B/Y box to let you use a pedal to switch the tones or you could use a stereo pan pedal to do the same thing. I have a tuner running through the electric side that allows me to mute my signal that I use in the same way. I figure I can have the acoustic pickup always on to double my sound. The one gripe I have is that the acoustic sound is somewhat bland. This is common in all of the hybrids I’ve tried out (I didn’t try all of them in the list above), because aside from the Crowdster Plus, they are electric guitar bodies doing acoustic sounds. There’s obviously going to be some compromise with hybrid guitars, they won’t replace your Les Paul or your D-28, but they are a useful tool. I’m looking forward to a new offering from Ibanez, the Montage (www.ibanez.com/acoustic/series.aspx?s=Montage) which is an acoustic body with the electric trimmings, along with built in chorus, reverb and distortion. It also allows you to have instant access to a clean or distorted electric signal. I definitely have my doubts about the quality of the overdrive, but I do like the concept of the acoustic-centered hybrid.  All in all, the hybrid offers some convenience and performance advantages at the cost of some tone. I generally look at the set that we’re going to be doing for worship that week and decide if I absolutely need an acoustic or if I can get by with the hybrid. This is where I hope the Montage will make that decision much easier.

Review: Alfonso Hermida Zendrive

Judging from the recent explosion of manufacturers seeking to capture the tone of revered Dumble amps in pedal form and the resulting fervor with which these pedals are talked about on various guitar forums, the Zendrive seems like a good starting place for this site. If you are unfamiliar with Dumble amps, they have been made since the late 1960’s by Howard Dumble. These are extremely rare amps, with only about 300 in existence. They have been the standard tone for artists such as Carlos Santana, Larry Carlton and Robben Ford. A Dumble has also become a part of John Mayer’s extensive rig. They are admired for their incredible dynamic response. I cannot claim to ever have played a real Dumble (they sell for well over $10,000), but I decided to get a taste of the Dumble tone with the Alfonso Hermida Zendrive.  The Zendrive is available direct from www.hermidaaudio.com for $179 + shipping, though there is quite a wait for the pedal. They can be had via eBay for a premium if you don’t want to wait. I got on the list back in 2006 and my name came up just over a year later. You might be thinking “why would you wait around for a pedal for a year when you could go to Guitar Center and buy one today?” I can only say that I didn’t have to put any money down, so there was no loss. I’m still waiting on my Analogman King of Tone, which I’ve been on the list prior to getting on the Zen list. I’m getting close, though. Maybe.  

So, is it worth the wait? Well again, I cannot compare it to playing the real deal, but I found the Zendrive to be a fantastic pedal. The Zendrive can be great for rhythm playing, and with the gain around 9 o’clock, you can have a great jazz tone that is clean with just a hint of dirt. But, the main event here is using it as a lead pedal for searing, well-defined solos. The Zen really excels in giving you smooth, ringing sustain on every note. With the gain right around noon, every note just blooms and holds. Slide around the fretboard and you are just getting singing tone on every note. It’s quite remarkable. With the gain cranked you never lose note definition. Granted, this isn’t a high gain pedal in a distortion sense, but going full blast on the gain gets you some good drive and is very reactive to your touch. The Zendrive has two knobs that affect the tone of the pedal, tone and voice. The voice knob is almost like a presence knob, opening up the pedal as you turn the knob right. The tone control is pretty much the standard you would find on most pedals. However, the two knobs are very interactive and have enough range to match the pedal to your particular rig. You may not ever even see a Dumble amp in person, much less play one, but the tone is within your reach with the Zendrive.

Review: Tone Factor/Mojo Hand Mule

One of my favorite tones ever is that opening riff to the Rolling Stones’ “Start Me Up.” It’s one of the first things I play when I’m at the guitar shop. It’s kind of the tone that is stuck in my head that I use as a baseline comparison when I’m checking out gear. Keith Richards has famously been using a Fender Tweed Twin. I love that kind of nasty drive that tweeds are known for. I’ve been on the search for a “tweed in a box” pedal for a while. I came across the Mojo Hand Mule (available from tonefactor.com) which has been pumped up as having tweed tone in spades. So, I plugged in the little two-knobbed box and hoped that it would transform my tone into Keef’s, but leave my physical appearance unharmed.  I plugged in my Fender Baja Telecaster into the Mule into my ’74 Princeton and hit that riff. Hello tweed! The Mule gave me that gnarly drive for sure. Just really rude, loose distortion. The thing that struck me most about the Mule is how open it is. Kick on an Tubescreamer and you’ll think you have a blanket over your speaker. The Mule sounds big, like you’re on stage in front of 30,000 fans with stacks of amps behind you. There’s quite a range in drive available using the drive knob. All the way off, you get just a tiny hint of breaking up. It’s like this up to about 9-10 o’clock where it starts getting more pronounced. One you get the drive knob cranked, you’re definitely approaching fuzz territory. Maxed out, you’re not looking at heavy metal distortion, though you’ve never seen a tweed do that anyway. There is plenty of boost on tap with the level knob. You can easily overdrive your amp with the output from this pedal. It also cleans up very well by using the volume knob on your guitar.  While I love the drive from the Mule, the lack of tone control is what keeps this from being a perfect pedal. The Mule is very bright in the upper mids and treble. With my Tele, I was reaching for the tone knob constantly to keep my ears from bleeding. With a darker amp and guitar, your experience may be much different. On the neck pickup, the bass can get pretty muddy, though, to the extent that I only used it on the bridge pickup. The Mule was close to getting me that tweed tone, but ultimately the lack of tone control left me wanting more.

Low-Teching Your Lyric Slides

I realize with programs like Media Shout on the market, this is going to sound like the most ridiculous idea you’ve ever heard. While Media Shout and the like display very dynamic presentations for your lyrics, there are settings where you may not have access to the program and you are end up using Power Point. Our church has been using Power Point for years and has looked at making the switch to something more cutting edge, though we’re not to that point yet.  My personal frustration with PP is that there is no way to pull from a different slide if things go out of order. For example, there are times that we may, in the moment, go back to the bridge instead of doing the chorus again, which would be the next slide. This leaves the person monitoring the slide show to start clicking around to find the appropriate slide, which becomes incredibly distracting to the audience. I quickly tired of having situations like this arise. I realize that there is something to be said for deciding on a song structure and sticking to it. There also is the issue of the person at the computer having an itchy trigger finger and advancing to the next slide too quickly and cutting off the words as people are still singing them. At some point, I decided to eliminate the clicking from PP altogether. This led me to putting all of the lyrics for the song on one slide, which gave me the freedom to not worry about deviating from a particular song structure and breaking the atmosphere in worship with frenzied clicking through slides. It also solved another dilemma that I have when leading worship in a small group where there may not be someone familiar enough with the songs to feel comfortable clicking through the slides. The song is up there and the only time we click is when we move to the next song. This is obviously the polar opposite of the Media Shout experience, but it has become invaluable for my worship setting. Now, this is not for everyone and may be a terrible idea for your setting and your audience. Just something a little different that you may not have thought of before.

Review: Fender Baja Telecaster

I readily admit to not being able to hold onto gear for very long before I get an itch to try something new. I’ve played guitar for over 10 years and a few years ago I began to play electric for the first time. Being an acoustic player, I was completely unaware of all of the gear available for guitar. Well, I quickly became taken by the electric guitar and all of the fun toys to go along with it. I’ve owned several different electrics in the past three years (Stratocaster, 335-style, Les Paul-style, Gretch Pro Jet). Last fall, I really got bitten by the Tele bug. I just had to have a Telecaster. I’m not even sure why, but I headed off to the guitar shop to check some out.

 

I briefly had a Xaviere XV-800 which is an import Telecaster available from guitarfetish.com. I really liked the guitar, but the neck just killed my hands. I admittedly have the hands of a 10-year old girl, but the shallow neck depth led to instant pain in my hands while playing barre chords. So, I was on the lookout for something that felt comfortable in my hands. My mother has pretty bad arthritis, so I’m definitely looking for something that isn’t going to limit my playing days.

 

Checking out the offerings from the inventing company of the Telecaster, I just couldn’t find one that really felt right. The closest I found was the Fender Telecaster ’72 Deluxe. I liked the feel of the guitar, but I wanted something with single coils and an ash body. This led me to pick up the made-in-Mexico Baja Telecaster. The Baja is designed by Fender Custom Shop Master Builder Chris Fleming as his dream ‘50’s style Tele. It’s Desert Sand-colored body is made of ash and it has a maple fingerboard. The Baja is loaded with Custom Shop pickups, a Twisted Tele in the neck and a Broadcaster in the bridge. It is also equipped with a 4-position switch and the S-1 option in a button on the volume control. It’s a great sounding guitar, but I fell in love with the neck. Oh my, that neck. It’s a soft-V shape, which definitely felt a little big in my hand at first. In fact, the first few days after having it at home, I was sure I would be taking it back. Since then, anything much shallower really fatigues my hand. It just feels perfect.

 

Honestly, even if the Baja sounded like crap, I probably would have kept it because of how natural it feels to play. The good news is that it not only plays great but sounds just as great. The Custom Shop pickups really shine on the Baja. The Broadcaster bridge pickup has a really full sound, but with plenty of that Tele bite. The Twisted Tele pickup just kills for those sweet single-coil neck sounds. Great for some nice blues tone. Now, this is where it gets interesting. The 4-position switch gives you the bridge and neck in parallel as usual. This position is well balanced between the two pickups. The 4^th position is the bridge and neck in series. I know almost nothing about wiring and the like, but putting the pickups in series results in a fatter, hotter output than position 2. It’s not a full-on humbucker tone, but close. If you set your amp for the single pickups to be on the verge of breaking up, then position 4 will definitely get you some serious drive. The S1 button opens up two more tones from the pickups. Positions 1 (bridge only) and 3 (neck only) are unaffected by the S1 (though you can hear the switch go on and off in those positions). The S1 switch puts the pickups out of phase. In position 4, this results in an almost AM radio tone. I haven’t found that I would ever use this tone as a regular tone, though it could definitely be used as an interesting intro tone to a song. It’s much more useable with distortion, though it’s still not all that enticing. In position 2 with the S1 button down, you get in to some near-Strat tone. This is great for some nice, clean funk tones. Really doesn’t do much with distortion, though.

 

After all of the guitar changes I’ve been making, I will (probably) never get rid of this Baja. The tone and feel is unlike anything else I’ve come across in a mass-produced guitar. Yes it is made in Mexico, and yes there are some definite variations from guitar to guitar. I highly recommend playing more than one of these. With the ash bodies, there can be some significant differences in body weight. I also had a bad solder joint in my switch that I had to get fixed at no cost due to the warranty. So, it does behoove you to check out more than one. I’ve definitely come to the conclusion that I would rather have a guitar that felt great playing than one that was really pretty to look at. The Baja isn’t ugly by any means, but it plays like a dream. Highly recommended.

Hello world!

Welcome to Modernworship.wordpress.com! I decided to put this blog together to hopefully offer a little something of value to the worship community. I play guitar and manage one of the worship teams at my church (I don’t lead because my voice leaves a lot to be desired to say the least). It’s truly a blessing to be involved in leading others into worship of God. In this blog you will find gear reviews and thoughts on issues relevant to modern worship. I look forward to your interaction with this site and hopefully you’ll find something helpful.