A chorus of approval

I'm ending July with this sharing. I've been plugging solid body guitars into my acoustic amp for clean tones. The tone benefits from the onboard chorus feature, making it a little brighter so that the instrument's tone knob can be of more use to vary proceedings. Many of us are guilty of ignoring the tone control, letting it be at maximum setting regardless of what we play, be it driven or clean tones.

That's right, the key consideration there is chorus; it makes clean tones happier & more defined in terms of clarity. Fellow chorus users, I don't know if you hear this but I am very happy with that slight push in gain when the chorus is activated. I went out to hunt for the most affordable chorus pedal out there to make sure I wasn't tripping on make belief. The Danelectro Cool Cat chorus here was less than $40 & it generates a range of very inviting tones. I'm not a modulation fan, effects like chorus, phaser & flanger are very annoying (to me) & they get in the way of single note definition. However, the chorus is something beneficial for clean tones & shouldn't be written off for its less than appealing performance with distortion in general. 

Price watch: Fender American Special

Now that the Fender American Standard models had been removed from the catalog & replaced with the American Pro line, the most affordable American Fender instrument is the American Special which recently saw a 24%+/- price hike (happening everywhere)- no revision in features though, just the price. As we hesitate, prices go up 😒

Spalted mirage

A new one by Edwards- a spalted maple top (alder body) 7-string M-series. Looks like Edwards are slowly (but surely) revamping their line up. 

Lo strike

I used to own the Carl Martin Plexi Tone, sold it away as I prefer a Marshall amp drive to pedal emulation. This Lo-gain version was struck off my wish list because I managed to grab a JHS Morning Glory which offers a polite break-up type Marshall tone (Bluesbreaker if you will) with enough creamy goodness to prevent it from treading the Tube Screamer way. However, a recent re-think made me try this Lo-gain version. The aforementioned voicing aside, cranking this up (Level) while keeping the Gain pretty low (25% or lesser) turned it into a potent boost. So what appealed (to me) really, was the saturation coupled with low gain, lower than I usually use. 

Head turner

Still bringing you some Summer NAMM 2017 left-overs; Ibanez RGR652. That's right, the RG652 is so darn appealing (up to your interpretation, that), they have make a reverse headstock version of it while retaining the ash body & DiMarzio (Fusion Edge) humbuckers. No idea if these will make it here. 😕

G&L goodness

So a good guitar deserves a worthy mention. This one's a G&L ASAT Classic, basically a good American. It's not hiding the fact that it's a Telecaster & a proud manifestation of a hallowed heritage. I particularly like the satin finished neck; it's not too silky & does not require excessive time for a broken in feel. 

It's not mine though, belongs to a cousin- you might know his band, Urban Sensation. The instruction was to re-set up the guitar for a set of 10s & it so happened that I had a pack of 10 - 46 Blue Steel in the house. 

The guitar is a pre-owned instrument & from what I was dealing with, it looked under-played with almost no signs of wear (or play) at all, less the oxidized pair of screws that mount the metal control plate to the body. The frets looked dull as well & those received the fret eraser treatment. The string saddles were re-aligned to accommodate the new action which required a little height increment. 

Tone-wise, the Alnico pickups aren't high octane & they sound sweet clean. Under some settings, the neck sounded woolly & on the brink of turning muddy but a spike in treble over at the amp did help with clarity. I got the sweetest response with a Tube Screamer pedal pushing a dirty amp channel running on 1/4 drive; Nick Johnston territory with a Tele twang input- not bad at all.