GP0214

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A N e w B A y M e d i A P u B l i c A t i o N g u i t A r P l A y e r . c o M ®

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6 months NO interest

MADE IN

USA

Not all active electronics are created equal.

We design and build our own active guitar pickups and modules

in-house using our amp and pro sound engineers to our

advan-tage offering guitar electronics with top-notch components.

This gives you a superior product with full-sized tone and lower

signal-to-noise ratio breaking the typical thin, over-compressed

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Figured Walnut Top Matching Walnut Headstock Black Back and Sides Bird’s Eye Maple Fingerboard Black Acrylic Block Inlays Gold Hardware

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• Maple neck through alder body with smooth neck to body heel

• 27” scale fingerboard with 24 Medium Jumbo frets

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• Carvin premium 19:1 ratio locking tuners

• Hipshot hardtail bridge

• Active electronics with volume, tone, 3-way pickup selector

• A70N and A70B humbucking pickups

• Neck: 1.91” wide at nut, 2.62” wide 24

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(4)

Mick Taylor / Guitarist Mick Taylor / Guitarist Mick Taylor / Guitarist

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Art Thompson / Guitar Player Art Thompson / Guitar Player Art Thompson / Guitar Player Art Thompson / Guitar Player Art Thompson / Guitar Player Art Thompson / Guitar Player

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Mick Taylor / Guitarist Mick Taylor / Guitarist Mick Taylor / Guitarist Mick Taylor / Guitarist Mick Taylor / Guitarist Mick Taylor / Guitarist

*GUITARIST MAG. TEST RESULTS Build Quality

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GUITARIST RATING

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These are fi ve great reasons to check

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Great tone, smooth feel, consistent performance from gig to gig. Guitar strings that sound better for longer, removing the hassle and expense of frequent string changes.

Elixir®_{Strings is the only coated string brand to protect the entire}

string, keeping tone-killing gunk out of the gaps between the string windings. Our innovative Anti-Rust Plated Plain Steel Strings prevent corrosion, ensuring longer life for the entire set.

Guitarists tell us Elixir Strings retain their tone longer than any other string, uncoated or coated.

Extending your tone life

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George Marinelli plays Elixir Strings Electric

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5x THE TONE. 5x THE LONGEVITY.

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Unless you’ve been jamming under a rock, you

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Made in the U.S.A.

(9)

The new

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Made in Maryland • Starting at $1,179

Manufactured with new processes and specs in the same Maryland factory as all US-made PRS

instruments, the new S2 Series brings classic PRS playability and reliability to a new price point.

With a simple, straightforward design these guitars have serious style and expressive tone.

Check one out at a PRS dealer near you and see for yourself. www.prsguitars.com/s2series

(10)

• Digital 24-bit/48 kHz wireless operation for ultimate sound quality & dependable performance

• 2.4 GHz range – completely free from TV interference • 3 levels of diversity assurance: frequency, time, & space • Automatic frequency selection for seamless,

interference-free operation

FEATURES

Introducing rock-solid high-fi delity digital wireless for performing musicians. Operating in the 2.4 GHz range far from TV interference, Audio-Technica’s new System 10 offers advanced 24-bit operation, three levels of diversity assurance and amazingly clear sound. Wherever your passion for music takes you, listen for more. audio-technica.com

LISTENING

50 SYSTEM

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12 G U I TA R P L AY E R . C O M /F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 4 g u i t a r p l a y e r . c o m Editor in chiEf Michael Molenda [email protected] Managing Editor Kevin Owens [email protected] sEnior Editor Art Thompson [email protected] associatE Editors Matt Blackett [email protected] Barry Cleveland [email protected] los angElEs Editor Jude Gold [email protected] consulting Editors Jim Campilongo, Joe Gore, Jesse Gress, Henry Kaiser, Michael Ross, Leni Stern, David Torn, Tom Wheeler art dirEctor Paul Haggard Music coPYist Elizabeth Ledgerwood Production ManagEr Beatrice Kim PublishEr: Joe Perry [email protected], 212.378.0464 advErtising dirEctor, EastErn rEgion, MidwEst & EuroPE: Jeff Donnenwerth [email protected], 770.643.1425 advErtising dirEctor, wEstErn rEgion & asia Mari Deetz [email protected], 650.238.0344 advErtising salEs, EastErn accounts: Anna Blumenthal [email protected], 646.723.5404 sPEcialtY salEs advErtising, wEst: Michelle Eigen [email protected], 650.238.0325 sPEcialtY salEs advErtising, East: Jon Brudner [email protected], 917.281.4721 thE nEwbaY Music grouP vicE PrEsidEnt, Publishing dirEctor: Bill Amstutz grouP PublishEr: Bob Ziltz Editorial dirEctor: Brad Tolinski sEnior financial analYst: Bob Jenkins Production dEPartMEnt ManagEr: Beatrice Kim MarkEting & EvEnts: Christopher Campana Motion graPhics dEsignEr: Tim Tsuruda it tEch: Bill Brooks consuMEr MarkEting dirEctor: Crystal Hudson consuMEr MarkEting coordinator: Dominique Rennell fulfillMEnt coordinator: Ulises Cabrera officEs sErvicEs coordinator: Mara Hampson nEwbaY MEdia corPoratE PrEsidEnt & cEo Steve Palm chiEf financial officEr Paul Mastronardi controllEr Jack Liedke vicE PrEsidEnt, digital stratEgY & oPErations Robert Ames vicE PrEsidEnt, audiEncE dEvEloPMEnt Denise Robbins vicE PrEsidEnt, contEnt & MarkEting Anthony Savona it dirEctor Anthony Verbanic vicE PrEsidEnt, huMan rEsourcEs Ray Vollmer for custoM rEPrints & E-Prints PlEasE contact our rEPrints Coordinator at Wright’s Media 877-652-5295 or [email protected] list rEntal: 914-925-2449 or [email protected] PlEasE dirEct advErtising and Editorial inQuiriEs to: GUITAR PLAYER, 1111 BAYHILL DR., SUITE 125, SAN BRUNO, CA 94066; (650) 238-0300; FAX (650) 238-0261; [email protected]. PlEasE dirEct subscriPtion ordErs, inQuiriEs, and addrEss changes to GUITAR PLAYER, BOX 469073, Escondido, CA 92046-9073, or phone (800) 289-9839, or send an email to [email protected], or click to subscriber services at guitarplayer.com. back issuEs: Back Issues are available for $10 each by calling (800) 289-9839 or by contacting [email protected]. Guitar

Player is a registered trademark of Newbay Media. All material pub-lished in Guitar Player is copyrighted © 2014 by Newbay Media. All rights reserved. Reproduction of material appearing in Guitar Player is prohibited without written permission. Publisher assumes no responsibility for return of unsolicited manuscripts, photos, or artwork. All product information is subject to change; publisher assumes no responsibility for such changes. All listed model numbers and product names are manufacturers’ registered trademarks. follow Guitar Player online at: PublishEd in thE u.s.a. v o l . 4 8 , n o . 2 , f E b r u a r Y 2 0 1 4

(13)

WE SPEAK GUITAR

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AND MORE!

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*Subject to credit approval. Minimum monthly payments required. Call your Sweetwater Sales Engineer for details or visit Sweetwater.com/fi nancing. **Please note: Apple products are excluded from this warranty, and other restrictions may apply. Please visit Sweetwater.com/warranty for complete details.

(800) 222-4700

Sweetwater.com

2-YEAR

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SWEETWATER HAS THE MOST KNOWLEDGEABLE

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WE SPEAK GUITAR

SWEETWATER HAS THE MOST KNOWLEDGEABLE

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MF Delay

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ON SELECT BRANDS, USING YOUR SWEETWATER MUSICIAN’S ALL ACCESS PLATINUM CARD,

THROUGH FEBRUARY 28, 2014*

SPECIAL FINANCING

AVAILABLE

55-POINT EVALUATION

PROVIDES

MAXIMUM PLAYABILITY

Nearly every bass and guitar that we stock receives a detailed 55-point Evaluation before it’s shipped. We make sure it looks and sounds great — and plays as well as it possibly can — right out of the box! Visit Sweetwater.com/55-point for more details.

GUITAR GALLERY

SHOWS YOUR

ACTUAL BASS OR GUITAR

Sweetwater’s new and improved online Guitar Gallery lets you check out our world-class inventory of basses and guitars in beautiful multiple-photo detail. Then, you can pick the exact bass or guitar you want by serial number! Visit Sweetwater.com/guitargallery. Private Reserve Mark V

(14)

GP COMMUNITY

16

We all want a sense of community? Share your photos, gear and CD/DVD reviews, likes/dislikes, favorite amps and guitars, tone and technique tips, gig stories, and more with the Guitar Player reader community. Come on! Join in!

OPENING SHOTS

18

We get up close and personal with the gigs, the gear, and the glory that make playing guitar the coolest thing in the world.

RIFFS

22

Soren Hansen’s must-have touring gear; Craig Locicero’s top Spiral Arms guitar moments;Steve Vai, Joe Perry, and Eric Johnson at the Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp; Jim Hall

remembered; and more!

NOW HEAR THIS

32

Jerry Stucker

33

Adrian Galysh

COVER STORY

66 50 Badass Blues Solos You Must Hear!

The GP staff runs down our list of 50 classic—and soon-to-be classic—blues breaks. Bonus! The all-time greats

are also represented, with their no-brainer famous tunes as well as some lesser-known hidden gems.

ARTISTS

36 Dean DeLeo

44 Jim Campilongo

50 Henry Kaiser

60 Pete Anderson

SPOTLIGHT THEN AND NOW

162

Lenny Breau Fingerstyle Jazz (from the September 1983 issue of GP)

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Guitar Player, Box 469073, Escondido, CA 92046. Guitar Player (ISSN 0017-5463) is pub-lished monthly with an extra issue in December by Newbay Media, LLC, 1111 Bayhill Drive, Suite 125, San Bruno, CA 94066. Period-icals postage paid at San Bruno, CA, and at additional mailing offices. Canada Post: Publications Mail Agreement #40612608. Canada Returns to be sent to Bleuchip International, P.O. Box 25542, London, ON N6C 6B2.

f e b r u a r y 2 0 1 4 | V o l u m e 4 8 , N u m b e r 2

C

o

ntents

B A R O N W O L M A N /A T L A S I C O N S 14 G u I Ta r P l ay e r . C o m /f e b r u a r y 2 0 1 4

(15)

LESSONS

82 Under Investigation

A thorough examination of a particular style or player. This month: King Crimson’s “Elephant Talk.”

90 Guthrie Govan

An introduction to blindingly fast strumming.

92 You’re Playing It Wrong

You might think you know how to play classic riffs like “Satch Boogie.” Here’s the absolute real deal.

94 Fretboard Recipes

Major Scales Pt. 2

96 Rhythm Workshop

Bending in Rhythm Pt. 2 New SectioN!

GET SMART

144 Carl Verheyen on

Performing

145 Craig Anderton on

Technology

Albert King

Cover photo: Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

MORE ONLINE!

Expand your experience far beyond the pages of Guitar Player at

guitarplayer.com/february2014

COOL STUFF 24/7!

• Watch Del Castillo burn at guitarplayer.com/video • Learn about the Cort Z44 at guitarplayer.com/gear

• Learn how to play like Tommy Bolin at guitarplayer.com/lessons

• Check in with Ray Russell at guitarplayer.com/artists

JOIN THE GP COMMUNITY!

Facebook Get news and post comments at facebook.com/guitarplayermag

GP Forum Debate, shock, educate, and share with fellow readers at

guitarplayer.com/community

Twitter Follow daily tweets at twitter.com/guitarplayernow

GEAR

34 New Gear

98 Special Report!

Winter NAMM sneak peak

105 Roundup!

Three new Eastwood electrics

114 Ernie Ball M-Steel Strings

118 Andrew White Freja 1022 and Eos 110 acoustics

124 Musicvox MI-5 and Spaceranger

MVX-30 Studio Custom

130 ENGL Ironball

132 Stompbox Fever

Spontaneous Audio Devices Son of Kong

136 Stompbox Fever

TWA Great Divide

140 Whack Job

1967 Goya Rangemaster 116-SB

142 Fable Fighters

What’s the Big Deal About Jumbo Frets?

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GP Community

If I Were edItor of Guitar Player…

GP POLL

Favorite Tuning/

inTonaTion CorreCTion

SySTem?

Cast your vote! New poll every week at guitarplayer.Com

What can you learn from the blues today? When Guitar

Player first started in 1967, many

of the great bluesmen and blues-women were still alive, and their stories filled the pages of this mag-azine. Now, they say everyone can feel the blues—and I mostly believe that to be true—but some people feel it more intensely and honestly than others. Most of the old guard received their blues from the fields, or in the cities, and practically all of it from being outcast, segregated,

and/or treated unfairly in ways both subtle and harsh. Many of these players were quite gracious about it when talking to journalists, musi-cians, and fans, but, whoa, those souls had to experience a whole lot of hellholes before the blues could set itself up consistently— and proudly—in arenas.

Society is obviously different today. Music is absorbed differently from past eras, as well. You might argue music has become more like a background soundtrack for one’s daily life than a vessel of protest and cultural enlightenment. Sure, there has always been easy-listen-ing, day-dreamy music, but styles such as electric blues and rock seemed to strike out against the malaise and struggle and sweat for a deeper relevance that could lift a person up, or show them a mirror

of a world that was so wrong and evil that it had to change.

Do you feel that in the blues songs of today?

There’s no disrespect meant here to the fabulously talented blues musicians of this moment in time, who certainly can’t be faulted for not being born in 1905, or for not living a certain type of life. And even if today’s players were 100-year-old vampires, the audience would have changed around them, anyway. It’s hard to make arguments against progress. But that’s where I always thought musicians were so lucky. We bow to things like feel and vibe and cre-ation. Technique can get stronger, fingers faster, amps and guitars and other gizmos improved and so on. But our hearts seek truth, and only we can water down or “deepen up”

the sounds that come from our fin-gers and mouths. Progress doesn’t matter. Technology doesn’t matter. It also doesn’t matter whether you play blues or jazz or rock or coun-try or punk—unvarnished emotion should explode from your every musical gesture.

The old guard may have had truth and passion on their side because they struggled in ways many of us can only imagine. Life may not be as desperate for us now, and, if so, how do you keep your music honest and deep and instructive when, well, things are basically good? A conundrum? Please share your thoughts at [email protected].

noIze from the edItor

[email protected].

evertune

Bridge

16%

Buzz Feiten

tuning System

39%

earvana Nut

16%

tronical/Gibson

robot Guitar

14%

true temperament

Neck

8%

Peavey w/antares

auto-tune for Guitar

7%

We left the photo credit off the groovy photo of Groovy Judy in the January 2014 “Now Hear This” feature. The photographer is David Durkee, daviddurkee.com. Our apologies.

OOPS!

I Would quIt IgnorIng the expandIng market of the dIgItal modeling crowd. for example, message boards constantly ask, “What is the best speaker set up for working in the digital realm?” I would do a shootout between several powered, 12” full frequency flat response (frfr) monitors, run them with axefx, kemper, line 6, zoom, and other digital preamps, and tell which works best and why. I’d see if conventional power amp and speaker cabinet configurations beat out frfrs, as well, and also compare power amps for accuracy and realism. then, there’s applying specific techniques to specific pieces of software, or running a guitar signal though software oscillators or filters. I’d explore the best way to re-amp a guitar track, or warm one up—all using amp sims and plug-ins. these kinds of questions are everywhere on the forums, but they never get discussed to any useful degree in any of the guitar mags.

—Alex FilAcchione

For 2014, “Rant of the Month” has become “If I Were Editor.” Now, you get to share your wisdom in a more focused and productive way about a specific element you’d like to change about

GP. Take my job! Make the magazine better! Send your ideas to mmolenda@musicplayer.

com with the subject line, “If I Were Editor.” Due to space constraints, we can only handle around 75 to 100 words. — M i c h A e l M o l e n d A

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f e b r u a r y 2 0 1 4 /G u I Ta r P L ay e r . C O M 17

Here are my PrS CuStom

24 and my Warmoth Strat-style in hum-sing-sing configuration with Suhr pickups. My pedal-board is loaded with a Voodoo Labs Pedal Power 2, a GtrWrks 19 Sixty 3, A GtrWrks b V, a Carl Martin Plexitone, an MXR Carbon Copy, and a black-label Boss CE-2 Chorus. Everything is run through a Tech 21 Trademark 60 solid-state combo. After being a tube snob all my life—and, in fact, I still am—I am shocked at the versatility and tone of the Trademark 60. I get a ton of com-pliments on it. I also have a 1966 blackface Fender Champ and ten more great guitars, but this is my main rig. —Gary Hicks

GP POLL

Interact!

Join tHe GP Community!

sOUND OFF! GET EXcLUsiVE NEWs. cOMMENT. criTiQUE. sHarE TiPs aND TEcHNiQUEs. sUBscriBE TO OUr E-NEWsLETTEr.

FacEBOOk.cOM/GUiTarPLayErMaG TWiTTEr.cOM/GUiTarPLayErNOW

GUiTarPLayEr.cOM/cOMMUNiTy

Michael Molenda, Editor In Chief [email protected]

art thoMpson, Senior Editor [email protected]

Matt Blackett, Associate Editor [email protected]

Barry cleveland, Associate Editor [email protected]

kevin owens, Managing Editor [email protected]

paul haggard, Art Director [email protected]

FaceBook

court oF opinion

dane osen “Death Letter,” Jack White Joe lucasti Chet Atkins and Roy Clark.

kunal Bhattacharya “Midnight in Harlem,” Tedeschi-Trucks Band Bryn Jones “Talk to Your Daughter,” Robben Ford thomas eckert “Too Roll-ing Stoned,” Robin Trower thomas Bowen “The Sky is Crying,” SRV artemio J arciaga “Hoochie Coochie Man,” Jeff Healey lawrence clark “Just a Loser,” Robert Cray doug hamilton “Still Got the Blues,” Gary Moore Joe poturica “I Wonder Who” (live), Rory Gallagher Michael d’wayne ross Jr. “Blues Power,” Albert King the GP editors picked theirs for this issue,

so what are your favorite blues solos?

hamish Beef-hearturzappa peter “Feelin’ Bad Blues,” Ry Cooder arthur Boyd “Since I’ve Been Loving You,” Jimmy Page

GOT A QUESTION FOR YOUR COMMUNITY? [email protected]

Dig

MY

Rig

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18 G U I TA R P L AY E R . C O M /F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 4

Opening Shots

D a vi D Re D fe R n/ Getty ima G e s

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F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 4 /G U I TA R P L AY E R . C O M 19

hallowed hall

Jim Hall made such extraordinary, beautiful music, like nothing we had heard before. He was absolutely one of a kind, a master—we all know that. But, what I’m thinking about now is the humanity, humility, generos-ity, and strength. In all his interac-tions—whether on the bandstand or in everyday conversation—it always seemed as if his energy and attention were directed outward, away from himself. He listened. Listened, in such a big way, and cared. He was so aware of what was going on around him and could transform it, bring it (us) together, and lift it up. It wasn’t about him. It was about all of us. He never looked back, never settled, uncom-promising, kept going and going, stayed excited, curious, like a little kid. Wow. Jim Hall! Amazing. — B I l l F r I s e l l

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20 G U I TA R P L AY E R . C O M /F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 4

Opening Shots

NEIL ZL O Z O WER/ A TLA S IC ONS