A Few Notes
16th Oct 2000
Decided to indulge myself. For a while now I've been amplifying my guitar by running a Pandora through my stereo in my living room so I couldn't jam along with CD's. My old Marshall head is a bit fucked. So I went out and bought a practice amp. Tried a few (Laneys and Marshalls), and finally settled on a 30w Peavey. It has its faults, but for my tastes this little guy has a great overdrive channel and a sparkly clean channel. Tomorrow I'll try it out through the Marshall cabs...
So now all I have to decide is what to buy for when I want to play LOUD.
6th Oct 2000
A friend of mine known only as the mysterious 'J' has a cool site with some great guitar tutorials on it, so check it out. 'specially good for all you guys just learning to spank the plank...
2nd Oct 2000
I sanded the neck on the Kramer for a satin finish 'cos I keep sticking to the gloss... Five minutes with a fine-grade sandpaper makes an amazing difference to the feel of the neck. Try it...
13th Sep 2000
I was listening to Gary Moore's A Different Beat on the way to work. How does he manage to get that kind of sustain? And that tone and vibrato... God I hate him!
Anyway I've got tickets to see him again at the London Apollo in April next year.
10th Sep 2000
Woohoo! Got my Kramer back from the Shop! Chandler's did a really great job on that ol' thang.. it's like a new guitar. They ground the frets, set the neck and the trem, so it feels/plays better, it holds its tuning and the intonation is true. On their recommendation I had Duncans fitted to replace the crap factory-fitted pickups, a '59 in the neck position and a 'George Lynch Screamin Demon' in the bridge. I was a bit worried about the demon but it sounds great, its actually quite smooth and cleans up well, not what I expected.
OK so I still prefer my JEM but now I have two electrics which I enjoy playing.
19th Aug 2000
Still haven't got my Kramer back from the repair shop :(
4th Aug 2000
Just remembered, I heard that the outro jam on Tonight on Diary of a Madman went on for another five minutes or so after the fade-out. I'd give my left nut for a copy of that jam...
1st Aug 2000
Added the entire Black Sabbath back catalogue to my CD collection... well, the Ozzy ones anyway. Paranoid was the very first guitar solo I ever learned to play. I think Tony Iommi is a really underrated and influential player, and he practically invented the Heavy metal sound. Listening to those early albums I was quite impressed with some of his stuff, and I got to thinking he'd already done much of what Randy Rhoads got credit for on the first two Ozzy solo albums...
... then I listened to Diary of a Madman again on the way home. It's still my favourite album of all time. And between Iommi and Randy Rhoads, there's just no fucking comparison. None whatsoever.
Look for a RR tribute page on this site in the future.
28th Jul 2000
My other guitar is an old Kramer which is currently in Chandler's for some customisation. It's a Focus 3000 which I bought in like '88 or something, and it's seen some action over the years.
They already reground the frets and set the trem and neck up, which made a new guitar out of it (still second fiddle to the JEM though). So now I've got them replacing the entire scratchplate assembly with some DUncans and custom wiring. Should be ready soon
26th Jul 2000
My current Six-String-Thing is an Ibanez JEM7VWH. I went out down Denmark Street (that's in London, folks) back in '98 with a budget and a plan to try quite a few though I had an idea what I wanted. I tried a few all right but wasn't much impressed. Why do they insist on running you through the crappest rig in the shop when you try out a guitar?
Anyway I went into Andy's Guitar Centre and there she was, hanging up and priced at about twice my budget. For once they ran me through a decent rig, I forget what, and after a couple of notes a red mist came over my eyes, and the next thing I remember is walking out of the shop with the JEM and a grin you could see in the next street.
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