The good news Is I have been practicing about an hour, 3-4 days a week, and can really tell the difference it is making. I’m not doing anything hardcore or anything, just reviewing scales, the shapes, up and down the neck and scales on individual strings (up and down the neck on one string). Basically stuff to break my monotony. I have 2 scale shapes I wear out, and I really would like to use more of the guitar’s neck!

So here is my current board setup. I’ve been playing this since September, approximately 5 weeks now:

"Boutique" Board 2011

• Effects chain: Guitar ->T1m MSB (unity, as a buffer) ->Ernie Ball VPjr (Boss TU2 on tuner out) ->Analogman King of Tone ->Hermida Zendrive ->Fulltone OCD (12v) ->Toneczar Dove (18v) ->Cusack Tap-a-whirl (tremolo) ->Strymon Timeline ->Strymon Brigadier (with Railhead Effects Favorite switch)-> AMP

This board is a work of art!! And was WORK to put it together. My Lytboard has been incredible! We’re working on our 5th year over here. However, these original models took some work routing power through out them. With this new setup, I had to get my electric drill out and drill through several of the braces enough to allow cords to reach everything, sand, polish and re-velcro. I finally adapted to a Pedal Power 2 to power the board. I will say this- for the money, the 1-Spot is amazing! But there is a huge difference with the PP2. Over $100 difference? I’m not sure, but now that I have several “Power hungry” pedals that need their own juice, the PP2 is the clear winner. Just for clarification– I’m keeping all the 1-Spots I have.

These effects have worked well for me and I enjoy the range of gain from my “top shelf” pedals:

• I like the addition of the KOT which makes a great “cleanish” sound and nice “grind” overdrive without sticking out. The Zen is noticeably more “rounder” in sound, and cuts through the mix much better- for when I want to stand out more. The differences between these 2 allow a great range of tones- and I always have a solo-boost through ANY of the pedals thanks to the KOT 2nd side.

• The OCD is my main “distortion” pedal. When heavy distortion is needed, this slightly scooped pedal really delivers. There is a touch more headroom and sparkle at 12v, which really makes this pedal something special. I’m sorry I ever sold it!

• The Toneczar has finally made it on my board. I don’t know if because I was scared to play it out (loads of gain) or afraid It would stink (it was a long wait and a bit of $$$). Overall, I’m very pleased. I don’t think I’m using it as it was intended, but Its became my ‘base’ tone 1/2 of the time. I dial in the slightest bit of crunch and use dynamics for clean/dirty. I boost through it with the KOT or Zen for solos. Just in dynamics alone you can have a nice clean sound to incredibly dirty. It really is something special. However, what has impressed me the most is the working Eq of the pedal. You can dial in such a range of tones!! I’m only using 1/10th of the potential of this thing, yet am completely happy with it!

• Timeline: yup, like it. I’m only using 6 pre-sets, and nothing weird, but I like it. Its easier to use “on-the-fly” than my DD20, sounds better, and takes up less space. Good enough for me!

• As for the Brigadier- i really like this delay, except for the tap-tempo is a 3pdt tru-bypass type switch. This makes tapping in your tempo INCREDIBLY loud! Thus, I typically run it as an always-on delay that adds an ambient rumble in the background. I really enjoy this application.

Changes to this chain:
I’m still playing with using the weird effects of the Boss RV3 at the end of the chain vs the Brigadier. Both are awesome.

The T1M MSB is typically used for my single-coil guitars to help push the signal. For humbuckers, I replace it with the Plutonium Chi-wah-wah. This wah is small as a Boss pedal, and …. well, just watch this:

This way I get some great ambient sound with the Wah, and the buffer in the way pushes the signal through. I realllllly have been enjoying this wah!

Lastly, I picked up this guitar a few months ago at a steal! I always thought this guitar was neat and wanted to have it, but couldn’t afford the new price. Then, once I finished school and could afford it- this model was discontinued! So one day I’m chilling at my buddy’s music store and he says, “This collector just unloaded this guitar, I don’t think he has ever played it.” Next thing you know, I’m paying 1/2 of retail for a guitar that still had the little cling-plastic on the pickup covers and the tags on the tuners.
I give you, the Epiphone Alleykat:

A gentle rocker

This guitar has a beautiful acoustic-y clean tone and between the mini-hum in the neck and the vintage 57′ style bridge pup it can really hold its own. I’ve been impressed by how smooth it wants to play. The neck is fatter than I typically play and that felt awkward the first few times I played it out. But now, I almost prefer that style of neck. The strings are slightly further apart  and I feel I’m more accurate with my picking this way.

There ya go, an update! Hoping to post more soon!

Thus my “signature” lick. I have been asked before what “that” was that I play sometimes, so here it is. You see, I don’t play really fast, I’m more bluesy and melodic. However, I do have 2-3 licks that I “rip” off to melt faces for a second when needed. This lick I sometimes start out with then go to a slower, more melodic part. Other times I go slower then end with something similar to this to allow a feeling of finality on the solo. Give it a shot. Practice each note by note, until it sounds about right then slowly speed it up until it is the same speed as the recording. As with anything musical, find the slow, deliberate notes- perfecting the scales/licks- then speed the tempo up until you are where you want to be.

That last note ( @10) is a passing note… slide off. Listen to the recording.

For those interested, that was the mini-humbucker on an Epiphone Alleykat into DrZ Maz Jr NR. No pedals used.

Special Thanks to Rhoy for the tab-helps.

A few months ago I stumbled on: http://www.petermalinoskiart.com/ and was very impressed by some very unusual, but pretty guitars. This guy is a true artist with wood and then took that art form to building guitars. I love the carefully sculpted contours and the overall “round” nature- these guitars appeal to the eye inasmuch as they do to the ear. Part of Peter’s philosophy is to create guitars that aren’t the typical mass-produced guitar. He has succeeded! These guitars are their own thing for sure.

I finally have gotten a chance to play one of these awesome guitars. It is truly something different and special. Take a look with me (click on the photo for a larger view):

Not your typical guitar

Yes, even the humbucker covers are wooden!

Pretty-cool Headstock design too!

Neck inlay!

Look at the grain!

For the back... admire the contoured "belly cut."

For those that really, REALLY want to know the insane details on this guitar, they can be found here: Peter Malinoski’s Guitar #58. I just don’t know if my explanation of the details could do it justice. I’m still stuck on the fact that the humbuckers (handwound by the builder) are covered in wood!!

As I’m not really sure how to explain this guitar, I’m simply going to list Pros/Cons as that seems to make more sense to me:

PROS:

• Basically this guitar has probably the nicest neck carve I have played. Finished in oil, it is smooooth and you can still feel the wood.
• I really like the playability of the neck.
• It has a nice, hollow, woody tone to it. You can feel the tone resonating through the guitar’s wood.
• This guitar was designed for maximum tonage: the 5 way selector switch and push pull knobs give many different usable tones. The switch: 1) Neck Humbucker, 2) Neck and Bridge Humbucker, 3) N and B in Series, 4) N and B in Reverse Phase and 5) Bridge only. Volume Pull-Pot: Splits Coils. Tone Pull Pot: Activates Piezo pickup (an acoustic pickup) under the Bridge. Then you can mix all those options. I really like the Piezo with the neck single coil.
• The guitar is extremely light weight (particularly when I’m used to LesPauls).
• The “Belly Cut” is really smooth and the guitar HUGS my body. I really like how comfortable this is to play!
• It smells good. The body is Cedar, and it really smells good!

CONS:

• Too many options (haha). I think If I were to keep this guitar I’d put in a 3 way selector switch and leave the coil/piezo push-pull.
• The push pull and 5 way switch is loud. Live w/gain there were noticeable popping sounds.
• I only had this problem when playing live: when I really got into the song (aka: “Rocking out”), my right hand/strumming hand started bumping the volume knob- effectively turning myself off. I might recommend putting that back about 1 inch.
• If you play this at a gig or church- every guitar player will come up to you wanting an explanation of the guitar. I know that’s not a huge con, but I was over an hour late going home the 1 time I played this out!! (much to the chagrin of my wife!)

So what does it sound like? Well, here is my humble recording. I didn’t want to showcase my chops, I wanted to show the tones in this guitar. There is a lot of the same chord work but with switched knobs/settings so you can hear the difference. This is also an idea of my sound/tone and what I believe the typical guitarist plays from week to week. (Yeah, I’m not one of those super-fast shredders or insane jazz players).

Equipment:

Peter Malinoski Art Guitar #58 with various settings –> Hermida Audio Zendrive –> Strymon Brigadier (airy dotted eighth) –> Dr Z Maz Jr NR w/ JJs Tubes (EL84).

Recorded via Apogee ONE through Quicktime.

I also am changing a few things on my blog. I think I’m going to steer this blog away from some religious discussions and keep it more toward gear/guitars etc… I’ll still write mainly to the guitar player in a church setting, but I’ve felt that this blog is guitar-oriented. I get tons of hits from all over the world and don’t want to chase anyone off.

However, I do have tons of religious/theological discussion that pops into my head. And it is the type of conversations that perhaps are too deep, or pretty random for a site completely about gear. Now I’ll be a bit free-er to speak my mind. So… If that’s something you want to follow, come visit here: http://disenchantedtheist.wordpress.com/

Basically both this blog and the other are going through updates and should be doing better in a week or two.

I leave this opportunity out there: Any requests? What do you want to know about? What do you want discussed?
Leave it in a comment below!

-L