The Riffs, Beards & Gear Podcast
Join Ryan "Fluff" Bruce and Mike Squires for an unfiltered, deep-dive look into the world of professional music, content creation, and the gear that powers it all. Building on the legacy of the Riffs, Beards & Gear YouTube channel, Ryan and Mike skip the marketing fluff to bring you honest conversations about gear, guitars, the Music Industry and more!
The Riffs, Beards & Gear Podcast
Episode 8 - Great Budget Guitars, Gear Regrets & Reverb Feeds
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In this episode of the Riffs, Beards & Gear Podcast Mike and Fluff discuss just how great inexpensive gear has become in the last 30 years, gear purchase regrets and what is in our Reverb feeds!
Chick Chick-ity do dah. Chickity A. Whatever the hell that means. Zippity doo-dah. Zippity-doo-dah.
SPEAKER_02Copyright strike. What if you right here comes Mr. Disney soon?
SPEAKER_00What if you were a guy or a per a person? What if you were a person who wrote an iconic ditty, and that's what ended up on your tombstone?
SPEAKER_02It's funny.
SPEAKER_00Ryan Bruce. Here lies Ryan Bruce. He wrote the Ivers jingle.
SPEAKER_02My I have a buddy who wrote uh uh an iconic uh an iconic jingle, but it was when he was um just at a production house, uh a marketing firm, and it was just his job that day. He got assigned the McDonald's jingle, Yuri at Sure. He wrote, Ba ba ba ba ba. I'm loving it. Really? He wrote that. Yeah. Someone else, I was at Shure headquarters and someone else mentioned it. I went, Are you messing with me? And they're like, and he was like, No, that was me. I was like, What? He was like, It's just part of the job at the time in the 90s. He was a young keyboard player.
SPEAKER_00For a while, I never got one of these. I've I've submitted and and been accepted for music in a few different like some a couple commercials, sure. But for a while I was on the email list where it was like such and such needs a song that sounds like some of those you know, sounds like uh the new Sabrina Carpenter single, but not quite as or whatever, yeah. Whatever, yeah, yeah, exactly. And uh what a weird but those gigs usually or they pay not what they used to. No, but they do get something. Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_02It's it's can be it, it can be pretty lucrative. People will go.
SPEAKER_00People will screw you whenever they can. Yeah, absolutely. It's hard to not take personally.
SPEAKER_02It's just money. That's the it's always the motivator, it's nothing personal.
SPEAKER_00The difference is if it was a shoe business.
SPEAKER_02I'm speaking as the guy who actually screwed you over in your licensing agreement for your commercials.
SPEAKER_00If it I mean, if if we're talking about widgets, it's one thing. Sure. But if you know, if if you if there's a song on your record that you poured yourself into, you worked, it's uh it's a it's a part of you. And then, you know, I don't know. As uh musicians, we are asked all the time to this would be great for you. This is gonna be great exposure.
SPEAKER_02Great for you, right?
SPEAKER_00Exposure box. Can't wait to pay my rent with that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. Exposure box. Anyway, welcome to another episode of Grumpy Old Men of the Ravens with beards. Of the the Riffs Beards and Gear podcast. I'm your host, Fluff. I'm your pal Mike. And we're hanging out, we're on uh episode four of the podcast. I never thought we would get here. I thought for sure I would hate you after the first one. Honestly, I don't like you very much. I don't even know why I'm here.
SPEAKER_00Fluff has been held hostage, Aries, and he hasn't left the studio in months. I'm blinking twice. I'm blinking twice, please. I'm in danger. Mike, what are we doing today? We're partying.
SPEAKER_02We are partying.
SPEAKER_00We're talking lots of shit.
SPEAKER_02We are talking lots of shit.
SPEAKER_00We're gonna talk about uh some some gear acquisitions that we may have regretted or yeah, stuff that the internet or peers told us that we should get into that we did not jive with.
SPEAKER_02That's one thing we're talking about. What else are we talking about?
SPEAKER_00We're gonna talk about bands that influence us deeply enough to change the way we play or the way we approach the instrument. Yep. Um we are gonna talk about some brands that we think are crushing it right now. I have a suggestion because we have so many friends who are in the game. Um let's talk about brands that are crushing it that we have no contact with. If we if we if we can if if you literally know it three quarters of the industry, I know. Well, yeah, I know. All right, I'll dig deep. We'll try.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'll try. We'll try. I'll try. That's it. That's I I like that. I like where your head's at. That's good.
SPEAKER_00You know, otherwise, I'm like, I'm just gonna forever talk about John Sullivan. I'm just gonna talk about Soleil Guitars forever.
SPEAKER_02I mean, rightfully so.
SPEAKER_00Um, we're gonna talk about pickups.
SPEAKER_02We are gonna talk about pickups.
SPEAKER_00Not pickup trucks like uh what I drive.
SPEAKER_02Wait, what? I'm out of here. Yeah. We're not gonna talk about Toyota Tacomas and Chevy's? No.
SPEAKER_00Oh we're not talking about uh Dodge Rams. Okay. You know? Okay. We're talking electrical guitar pickups.
SPEAKER_02Alright, very controversial. We're gonna say some controversial things.
SPEAKER_00Are we? Maybe. You don't need them.
SPEAKER_02Who cares? Just put a mic on the strings and call it good.
SPEAKER_00Um I think, you know. Oh, we're gonna talk about some expensive gear. Like everything feels expensive to me now, but some stuff is worth it, and some stuff isn't worth it. What is that? Where's the line? What what makes something worth it? Should we start there? Why not?
SPEAKER_02Let's start there. So obviously, you know, asterisk, everything is just so fucking expensive now. That aside, where in the musical world, guitar playing, or whether that is recording related, guitar-related, amp related, pedal related, whatever, as a musician, where is your money best spent? That's really the question, right? As it pertains to what you're getting the most bang for your buck. That's a lot of bucks.
SPEAKER_00Well, let's start from this baseline. A beginner does not need a private stock PRS. Of course not. Uh an app like a first year player, let's let's just start there, beginner, doesn't need a Gibson custom shop. Like you do not need to spend thousands and thousands of dollars on a hobby. Because that's what it is when you're gonna be able to do it. No sure.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh you do not need to spend thousands of dollars on a hobby that you don't know you're gonna stick with. Right. I agree. I tell people this all the time. Hey, my kid is learning how to play guitar. What should I get them? Like, no. Get them a squire jazz master or a squire strat or a an S E, a P R S E standard.
SPEAKER_02It's like those kids in high school that get like killer killer cars when they first start driving.
SPEAKER_00And get drunk and total it.
SPEAKER_02Uh, I had a gal friend um whose dad collected uh first-year Mustangs for graduate. She started driving and she'd been driving a year, I think. And for graduation, she got a baby blue 64.5 Mustang or 65 Mustang convertible. Wrapped it around a telephone pole in six months. Right. Yep.
SPEAKER_00That's it. And when you yeah. How that's relatable to guitar is like when you are a kid, or even if you just don't even like you don't even think about it because you don't have the experience. Like you'll just lean a guitar up against a couch and walk away to go pour yourself a glass of OJ or whatever. Boom! Broken headstock. Right?
SPEAKER_02So where's your money best spent? Mike, in your opinion. Give give me, give me, give me three examples of where your money is actually well spent. Not necessarily a lot, not necessarily expensive. Okay. But where's your money best spent?
SPEAKER_00Uh a good budget guitar. Period. Because here's the thing: most people have a laptop or a computer at home.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I never really count the computers because by default we're getting those pretty young now.
SPEAKER_00Sure. But that is a when you're learning and you want to make sounds, you should be using that and and stick into the headphones. When I was playing trumpet as a kid, my mom would make me go sit in the car in the driveway.
unknownIt's brutal.
SPEAKER_00It is brutal, but it's fair. That's fair. Like, I don't want to listen to you figure it out. Figuring out how to play sweet child of mine. I've spent 40 years of people figuring that out. I figured it out, but before there was tabs, I was learning all those songs. Or before before I ever saw tabs. So get a good budget guitar, something that stays in tune, and get a tuner. And but you can use your phone. There are, you know, oh man. I uh what is that? Um there's all kinds of iPhone and and Google Phone, all that stuff.
SPEAKER_02You you can you know well, it's never been a better time to get a budget guitar than right now because the the budget stuff has gotten so damn good. So it used to be somewhat early in this channel's life, you know, the the the kind of um the ground floor was eight or nine hundred dollars. Maybe around, you know, I'd say if you have a thousand dollars, you can get one hell of a guitar. And now it's like half that for really actual killer guitar that you could actually make a record with, five hundred bucks.
SPEAKER_00I feel like it was twenty years ago. Was it twenty maybe maybe it was 2005? When did Eastwood guitars launch?
SPEAKER_02Uh 2010, maybe was it?
SPEAKER_00I remember seeing them sort of start to bubble up and and think to myself back then, I bet I could do that. I bet I could do this. But I wasn't motivated to do anything.
SPEAKER_02Well, you want to make your own budget guitars?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Have them made overseas and like you know, does it?
SPEAKER_02I would never get into the guitar business. Well, the picky bastards that are like, there was this speck of dust on the bridge. I want to return this. I see them in the PRS forums and the Ernie Ball forums. Oh my god, some of the people are insufferable. Yeah. Uh I just played this guitar for an hour and it looks like I played it for an hour. How do I undo this damage?
SPEAKER_00I would buy it if it had um uh real bone nut.
SPEAKER_02I could make something for cheaper than this in my garage. You should do that. That's my favorite comment.
SPEAKER_00You should do it. I could literally make one of these for cheaper. Anyway, I never did start a guitar company. Okay. I'm glad I didn't. Anyway, I think that a budget guitar is the best place to go because as far as making sounds goes, you've already, you know, you've you've got tools at your disposal. If you have an iPhone, which most people do, like yeah, an iPhone 2 would run Garage Band. And there are loads of guitar sounds in Garage Band.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_00For $10, you can get an iOS interface cable thing that just plugs in. And if you don't have one, I think I've got five of them. Message me. I'll fucking send you. Giveaway down below in the description. Mike's giving away his stuff. I'll send you one. Like if you need one, don't bother me because you just want some free shit. Like if you, you know, if you Can I have some free shit?
SPEAKER_02I need some interfaces.
SPEAKER_00You know where the bathroom is? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Okay. So guitar. Um, for me, where your money is best spent. I mean, I would say uh some good listening sources, whether that's monitors or headphones, is up to you. But cheap monitoring and cheap headphones will steer you in the wrong direction sonically because your whole source is is skewed from the get-go and you're dialing it in a guitar tone, not even if you're mixing. If you're using something like a plug-in to dial in your tone, some really crappy headphones or or monitors are just gonna screw you over.
SPEAKER_00The starting place now.
SPEAKER_02You don't need a lot of money for those things anymore, though. Like they've gotten so good, much like the guitars, you know, monitors. Um, you need get get some Yamaha HS5s or eights. I had some of those killer monitors $2.99 for a pair or $4.99 or whatever they are for the eights. Like super killer. Those KRKs, I hate them. I hate KRKs, they're trash. Yes, he has KRKs in here. They're not good. Um, no, actually, those are okay. I don't know what those are, but those are not the um, those aren't the stereotypical KRKs. Those look like a little nicer ones, but I'm special.
SPEAKER_00You are you sure are sweetheart. Are you trying to not offend me right now? No, no, no. I mean all you do.
SPEAKER_02I will offend you all day, brother. Um no, they don't look like the guitar center special. Right. Um, but yeah, monitors or headphones, I think your money is well spent for good ones.
SPEAKER_00Learn guitar on headphones.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I like headphones. However, you know, in real life, when you're listening to monitors or even guitar cab or you know, whatever, that sound is not just isolated to your left and right ears. Right. Like there's crosstalk and there's natural, like you're hearing the right side in your left ear, whereas headphones are so so that can be a little disorienting from a mixed point of view if you're doing that. Or like I have a deficiency. I don't really talk about this ever in uh uh in my videos or any video.
SPEAKER_00I don't know if I'm you're pointing at your brain, not your ear, right?
SPEAKER_02No, I have a I have a crappy left ear. I have I have a top end roll off that's pretty nasty that I've always compensated for naturally, but um, I have a sensitive left ear as well. It's very, very sensitive and it bothers me. And whenever I'm watching TV downstairs with the lady, I usually will put earplugs in and or volume reducing earplugs just because it bothers me. The reflections in my living room.
SPEAKER_00I had a crazy experience. Can we talk about since we're on the subject of headphones?
SPEAKER_02Sure.
SPEAKER_00I'll talk about it real quick. Now, I don't know if this is I don't think it's psychological, I think it's physiological or whatever uh whatever, I guess, physiological. Um I was in the studio with Duff and the band recently, and there are three guitars going, one acoustic and two electric guitars, plus drums, plus bass, plus vocals. We're all in a room, but the amps are isolated. So we're in a room with just drums, and we've all got cans on. Okay. We've got a decent mix, but I haven't got my mix really sorted out. And I was be I was becoming like there was so there was so much happening frequency-wise in the upper mid-range, like that I couldn't um did it just all become mashed potatoes or what? I couldn't concentrate. Oh, interesting. Like I couldn't co I couldn't hear anything. Like it was it was like nothing I've ever had a flashback to Nom it seriously felt like nothing I've ever experienced before. I felt like I was maybe I was holding it together as far as everyone knew in the room, but I was having a straight up near panic attack. It was interesting, terrifying. And then uh I never quite got over it. We got in the tracking room and we listened, and I was like, let me recut the guitar. And everything stayed up in the mix that way with the the um control room mains, yeah. And it still was fucking me up really bad. Like I could my timing was like you're having a panic attack, terrible. I could like I couldn't concentrate, and I was like, okay, can you turn the bass up? And Martin was like, it's literally the loudest thing in the mix, and I was like, take the guitars, all of the guitars completely out. Just Duff's guitar, acoustic guitar in the middle.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I know the song. I knew all the pushes, all the accents, all the holds, everything. I know the song. And then I tracked to drums and vocals. And then boom, you know, we were we were done. But there was there was something happening that was not. I don't know. Is there are there any are there any hearing? Are there any he well it was not there? Like um as soon as those frequencies were gone.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. You see, Joe Bonamasa has had to go to the doctor and had to cancel one of his shows because he had acoustical shock of the of his uh eardrum basically.
SPEAKER_00Is that right?
SPEAKER_02Which I would think is just it's basically it got fatigued due to high volume over time.
SPEAKER_00That's gnarly.
SPEAKER_02He had to take a night. Apparently.
SPEAKER_00I have gnarly uh tinnitus. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Both ears?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Two different pitches. Oof. Oof. Yeah. That sucks. Where were we? Crying. Whining whining about our bitch ass experiences. Oh, you were recording with Duff and you were sad.
SPEAKER_02Where's your money best spent? Oh, budget guitar. Because here's the thing. Another one. You gotta give me another one.
SPEAKER_00Why?
SPEAKER_02Oh, okay. Well, that like the All you ever need is a guitar. You don't need anything else.
SPEAKER_00No, but here there are there are a lot of things that will just I believe everyone has the ability to play guitar in a way that they can enjoy and brings them happiness. Does that mean you're gonna headline download someday? No, you're probably not. The chances, 99, 110% chance you're not gonna play download. But that shouldn't be a reason for you to not play guitar. So that's the greatest extreme. Like a poorly set up guitar with high action and shitty rusty strings is the worst excuse, yeah, the worst barrier for someone to have to work through. Because at this time, you shouldn't for that $60 guitar over there, when you hold it, there's no fret sprout. Like you're not scratching your fingers up. Right the you can a nine-year-old could play chords on that the first time you show them. So I just feel like that is important because as a former guitar teacher, like there's the physicality of it is that's the part that you are contacting physically. Okay. A guitar.
SPEAKER_02Thank you everyone for tuning in for this episode. That's that's uh that's I'm just kidding.
SPEAKER_00Of buyagitar.com.
SPEAKER_02Buy a guitar, because Mike says, okay. Um, I like those answers. They're yeah. Go buy a guitar. Honestly.
SPEAKER_00That's how I that's how I do it.
SPEAKER_02That's how records are made now.
SPEAKER_00I don't I don't matter. The listener doesn't care. I don't have an amp at home.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_00Even when I'm come down here and rehearse and I'm learning songs for a gig or getting ready for tour, I only plug into an amp to make sure my pedal board works because I'm always fly out in backline gear. So when I'm I I plug into the Soldano pre- you know uh plug, the standalone, not in a DAW, or your fluff 5150 thing, uh and play that. Or I plug into the dark glass uh bass amp plug, same thing. Um great and that's it, and I'll I'll stand right there, and when I'm getting ready for tour and I am practicing, because let's be honest. Practicing and rehearsing are two different things. Sure. When I'm practicing, when I'm learning a song, I'm I sit down. When I'm practicing a song, I'm standing up because I'm practicing for rehearsal. And that's when you are in a room with other people. Yeah, you want to have all that you don't want to be thinking about it when you're in a room. You want to you want it to be at a place where you know the parts and you're only reacting to what's happening in the room. Okay. Good. Why were we talking about plug-ins?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. It's good. Now it's talking time to talk about the other P.
SPEAKER_00O P P? P Diddy.
SPEAKER_02Pickups. Pickups. It's time to talk about pickups, Mike. What do you know about pickups?
SPEAKER_00Who needs them?
SPEAKER_02No one needs them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, nobody needs them.
SPEAKER_02Put a mic right on your electric guitar. Done.
SPEAKER_00Youke or die.
SPEAKER_02That's right. Acoustic. Acoustic guitars or nothing. Uh do pickups matter? Euked under.
SPEAKER_00Oh my god, that's your guys' uh like mariachi Bronx?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Their side hustle? Uked under. That's going bonkers.
SPEAKER_00Do pickups matter, Mike? Yes. How so? Why? Uh, I mean, I'm not I'm no scientist. Okay. But I've used a bunch of different pickups. Sure. And I've had single coils and set necks, and I've had humbuckers and bolt-ons, and you know, like I think in the olden days, people would talk about fender style and Gibson style. And it was kind of that you know, cut and dry. And then people started putting humbuckers and fenders, right?
SPEAKER_02And single coils and Gibson's. Or P90s, rather, but same coils.
SPEAKER_00Well, that was happening from the onset.
SPEAKER_02But still, um, you know, it's weird that the debate is still you still see people trying to argue if you know pickups matter or if they're consistent from pickup to pickup or whatever. Um, ever since I had an actual NASA rocket scientist explain to me why the pickup is all of the sound, and it can't be any other thing that is contributing to the sound. Feel, we're not talking about feel, and we're not talking about the effect of you know a brake angle on a brass bridge for the string to then ring out longer. We're not talking about that, we're talking about strictly top end, low end, mid-range.
SPEAKER_00The microphone quality of a pickup. A pickup is a microphone.
SPEAKER_02That's right. And, you know, uh pickup is all of your sound. You know, people people don't want to hear that, you know, they started making guitars out of wood because wood was beautiful and cheap. That's why they started using wood. Because as we've seen now, all guitars are made out of all sorts of things. Aristides is making them out of you know plastic. And they sound killer because the pickups are killer, or you know, the electrical guitar company, their aluminum guitars and all that kind of stuff. Yes, it is contributing overall to loose sight guitars, top-endiness, right? The metal guitars. I have a solid metal guitar, bare tone, that's the craziest guitar I've ever owned, and it has a top-end zip that not no wood guitar I've ever owned has. Yes, of course, but the pickup is 90% of that tone for sure, but also sustains for five years at a time and doesn't ever go out of tune. And the neck doesn't move because it's solid aluminum.
SPEAKER_00The whole guitar?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. The neck and body's not is a is a shell, but still it's all aluminum.
SPEAKER_00I had a uh I just posted a video of me when I was doing the original couch rifts videos. I did uh whatever straight cat song. What is that? Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, straight cat strut that. Yeah. And I used this big aluminum hollow body Normandy guitar. It was made down in Oregon. It was such a cool guitar, sounded great and had mid-range focus for days. I'm sure it was great. Yeah. But that being said, I don't think that the materials of a guitar don't matter. I think they don't matter. I think they matter. Of course they do. But pickups are the predominant factor.
SPEAKER_02I think so. They are the tires of a car. Right? Like they're it's so uh so much of it has to do with that construction of the pickup. But also, you know, what's interesting is you know, going back to like I used to be a fishman artist.
SPEAKER_00I was gonna ask you about that because that's a whole other technology, right?
SPEAKER_02And that's not even using windings and and magnets, that's using, you know, stacked pieced boards, alternating magnet, copper, magnet, copper, magnet, copper, magnet, you know, 64 layers that are paper thin. Um, you know, those aren't even windings, but when you have a winding of a pickup, you know, every time a wire touches it, touches another wire or itself when it's coming around again, that's a phase relationship. And sometimes those things add up to be a good sounding pickup. Now, where makers like Seymour Duncan and Larry DeMarcio come in is they have just done it so long and done it so many times, they know what works and what doesn't work, and how that that you know the gauge of the wire affects the donut, this and the magnet makeup and all this kind of stuff. Like they have it down to a science, which is crazy. But like if you put that same pickup, you know, any given pickup will sound different in it in another guitar for a myriad of reasons.
SPEAKER_00Well, it might not it might be closer to the strings or further away or closer to the bridge. Like, what is the sound that it is getting? That's right.
SPEAKER_02It's just amplifying what the sound it's getting. That's right. So it's pretty interesting that I still see people going, oh, the big up doesn't who cares? You know, I I need older bodies. Or basswood bodies, or whatever. It's like brother.
SPEAKER_00Maybe you do. Yeah, maybe you don't.
SPEAKER_02If that helps you sleep at night, you do it.
SPEAKER_00Well, have you ever um I mean, what about uh an all-maple guitar?
SPEAKER_02I have it all maple. I have two of them. I have my 77 RDs, right? Solid maple through and through, neck, body, everything. And they are bright as hell. Actually, one of them is bright as hell. The RD artist is hilariously bright. And then the uh the standard, same wood, same materials, just without binding, is the throatiest, most low-endy guitar I have, probably.
SPEAKER_00And are they did you replace the pickups?
SPEAKER_02I did. Well, I've had to on the RD artist because it's just so bright. Are they just trying to calm it down?
SPEAKER_00And what did that do?
SPEAKER_02Depends on the pickup. But that inherent, so there is that inherent brightness or lack of body, I guess, is how I would describe it, was always there. That lack of body. So no matter what pickup I put in there, there is a lack of body. But it's again, it's amplifying whatever it's right, so it's somewhere in between.
SPEAKER_00Where is the is the pickup close to the bridge on that guitar? Like unusually close. No, Stanley Gibson stuff, yeah.
SPEAKER_02So weird guitars, but you know, it's this is Norland era, right? So the employees in '77 were literally figuring out how to make guitars. How did they do it again? Oh I don't know, do another bump. Well, it's weird because yeah, because my RD artist has the locating, so it's a three-piece body, as they were in 77.
SPEAKER_00Pancake.
SPEAKER_02No, not a pancake, it's not Les Paul, it's just a slab of maple. Oh, god, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Because it's a giant guitar. They just cut off the locating pins, the dowels, and left them in there. On the back and on the body, on the joining table. On the artist, which was the this that was more expensive than a Les Paul custom. But on my RD standard, which was the cost of like a Les Paul standard at the time, the fit and finish is perfection. Perfection. And they were made the same year within a couple of months of each other. One was a Monday guitar and one was a Friday guitar.
SPEAKER_00I we're on the dog walk the other day. I was trying, I was explaining this to my girlfriend about how five guitars off of the line. Because she was like, Well I was talking about the we had a text conversation, you and I. You said I think everyone should have a good les ball. I do. And I was like, Well, I have I have a good les pol. It's just not a Gibson. And you were gave me your usual brother. Brother. Brother. I always know I'm about to get an earful when I hear you say brother.
SPEAKER_02That's not true. That is true.
SPEAKER_00It's 100% true. Real talk. Yeah, okay. So she was like, Well, what is a good one? And I was like, I don't know.
SPEAKER_02You gotta play a lot of them.
SPEAKER_00I mean, it she's like, is there a best year? And I'm like, well, sure, 1959, if you've got $500,000, it doesn't even have to be a good one to be a good investment. Right. Like then it's is it a good investment? Then yeah, sure, it's a good one.
SPEAKER_02Uh there are certain eras that I think are very, very good. You know, the 90s were a great time at Gibson. Yeah. Those guitars consistent. Are just so consistent. They were getting really, really good wood. Um, well, it's interesting, even like I have had, I have owned probably, I don't know, 25 or 30 different Les Pauls at this point. And I have my favorite five. And even between those five, why does one feel super, super slinky? And then another one will feel really, really tight with the same gauge of string, the same action, the same tailpiece set up behind the bridge, the same headstock angle. Why is that? That just screws me up. I can't figure that out. Every single one of them feels different. We're way off on pickups, but that's okay. We're having a conversation.
SPEAKER_00Anyway, pickups, right? Am I right? Am I right?
SPEAKER_02No, it's just, you know, with any guitar, I mean, strat, stratz, same thing. Sure. Absolutely. Stratis, there are good ones and there are bad ones. Dogs. There are absolute flat tires. Amplifiers. Right. 5150s, part tolerances.
SPEAKER_00But there's nothing worse than when you pick up a guitar and you're like, oh my God. Especially if it feels good. You're like, oh my God. You look at a guitar, you fall in love with it, you're like, oh yes. Come to Papa.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You get it in your hands, you're like, oh my God, it feels great. And then you just ring out a chord. Everyone has their go-to riff or whatever the thing is that you know what it sounds like. Yep. And and you just ring it out, and it just goes, No, some guitars will ring out and they'll have a present, they'll have a full spectrum to them, not plugged in. You hear it and you're like, my God.
SPEAKER_02We did this at my house.
SPEAKER_00Some you play and they just go, so we did this at my house recently.
SPEAKER_02I gave you and handed you all of my Music Man's Stingray signature guitars. Some of them were from the first batch and some of them were from the second generation.
SPEAKER_00But none of them were dogs.
SPEAKER_02No, but it was crazy on how different they were. Right. Acoustically speaking. Sure. Some of them were really, really bitey and attacking, and like my white one was pretty warm and roundy. And then my OG tour boy was like really punchy. Like, that's the one. That's the one I'm like.
SPEAKER_00So boom. I just caught you. Because that matters. Oh, it does matter. It matters.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely, it matters. It matters to me. I never said pickups, only pickups matter. Come on, rewind the tape. Rewind it. The pickup has so much to do with the overall sound coming out of that cable. We aren't never talking, I was never talking about acoustic properties. That's a whole different ballgame. Sure. Right? Or acoustic guitars.
SPEAKER_00Oh my god. Go listen to Paul Smith ramble on about that if you want. Like he'll talk about every contact point and like and the thing is, is when you listen to him, when you listen to anyone give their TED talk on it, it's usually there's some compelling stuff to it. And I believe Paul. And I believe Paul because Paul believes Paul. Like I don't fully believe Paul.
SPEAKER_02And I love Paul.
SPEAKER_00But yeah, same.
SPEAKER_02And shout out to Paul. I love him so much. I've I have the funniest Paul story to tell you when we're not filming. Okay. The last time I saw him was hilarious. I don't know if I told you that story already.
SPEAKER_00Were you with me?
SPEAKER_02No, no, no. I was uh I was over with James and Nam. I was uh I was um at Sweetwater and he was he had just landed and come in and I was going back from dinner or I was going to dinner and he was leaving dinner and it was hilarious. Anyway, I'll tell you that off camera though. That's not for public eyes. Anyway, um no, there's there's good compelling points to both sides of like the tonewood pickup debate. Every every aspect of a guitar matters to the total package, sure. But I do think people place um misweighted amounts to different things, but again, we all have our opinions, and I'm entitled to mine.
SPEAKER_00Do you think you can pick up uh that you can get a dog guitar, one that falls off and put the right pickups in it to make it uh a show pony, make a show pony out of a dog?
SPEAKER_02You can certainly get a lot closer to that final output. So, okay, so uh a video that did really well for me back in the day was an Epiphone Firebird. Uh Firebird Studio, I think it was. Epiphone, it was a red one. I did a video for it. People loved that video and they loved to sing that guitar. And on playback, it sounded killer. Playing it, it felt like a dead piece of wood because the neck never resonated. Oh yeah. But it sounded good, right? But it felt awful. That guitar sucked.
SPEAKER_00Were you running through one of your recs?
SPEAKER_02Uh at the time I was running it through a first generation rev generator 120, which is a fantastic amp. It was a great amp. I think uh in the video, I it might be going through uh a rev-e rectifier, which was an incredible sounding rectifier, which someone I was just talking to, someone messaged me and they're the owner, they're the guy that I sold it to. He still has yeah, it's pretty cool. Um, yeah, that that guitar sucked.
SPEAKER_00So what do we so we think pickups matter a lot?
SPEAKER_02They do matter a lot.
SPEAKER_00A lot.
SPEAKER_02Do they matter solely? Absolutely not. No, no, no, lots of other things matter as well.
SPEAKER_00What if you had to break it down percentage-wise? What if it was like one of those pies?
SPEAKER_02I mean, I would give the pickup a solid 75-8%. Sure. Personally, yeah, you know, then you have nut material, um, woods, obviously, or whatever material the guitar is made out of is gonna affect it in some way, shape, or form, for sure. Um, and then electronics.
SPEAKER_00Well, that's the thing that people don't talk about when they're talking about yeah, pots will make have you ever upgraded a wiring harness and a less ball?
SPEAKER_02Yes. Oh my god. I upgrade all of mine. I don't really talk about that either. Every time I get a new less paul, I rip the guts out and put an Emerson harness in there, right? And it sounds so much better, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yes. Put like, don't put like shit pots in there. No, don't do that. Right.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, pretty good. What else were we supposed to talk about? We gotta find a tank. We're gonna where am I? I can't see through all these weeds.
SPEAKER_00That's this is this is the this is the joy. This is the joy of podcast. The joy of talking. We rambled. Um, what do we have over here? Gear regrets.
SPEAKER_02We can talk about gear regrets.
SPEAKER_00Gear regrets slash things that we bought because the internet or peers told us to.
SPEAKER_02I mean, I'm the one who tells people to buy stuff, so right. I mean, I don't tell anyone to buy anything. Like, that's been my whole shtick. It's like you decide if it's good for you. This is what I would do with it.
SPEAKER_00I would like to amend this. What is a piece of gear that we saw, like, what is a gear regret, but also that's A. B, what is a piece of gear we saw someone else using and we got and just it just didn't work for us? Because that, like, you can see someone else using something to great effect.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00I'll tell a story, please. Um, on camera, right there, here he is, Billy Gibbons. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Um, Duff played a some kind of after-a-bike ride gig, motor like a Harley ride gig with Z Z Top. And after the gig, he says to Billy, My God, what are those amps you're using? They sound amazing. And Billy's like, Oh yeah, man.
SPEAKER_02Uh oh yeah, man.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah, man. Those uh those crates, those are my crates. And Duff's like, Whoa, what ones are they? He's like, Don't worry about it, man. I'll I'll send you some. And he goes, Oh, I can reach out to him. No, no, no, no, I'm gonna send you these. So the ones that Billy used at the show. What? Billy sends them up, and they arrive. No, listen, this is a true story. He just like, yeah, I'll just send you these ones and the road cases and everything. What? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he ships them up, right? He ships them up to Seattle. They arrive at Jeff Rouse's house, and and and Duff had been telling us, oh man, these things are amazing and they're great. And we open them up and we plug into them, and every one of us sounds like dog shit. And that's because just like your boys in Fit for an Autopsy were saying the part that touches the like the parts that you touch are the parts that make the real sound. Did you know? Because I can make anything sound like shit.
SPEAKER_02That's right.
SPEAKER_00I can, yes, yes, Billy Gibbons sounds like Billy Gibbons if he's playing through a crate doesn't matter, or a 5150, or a magnetone, or an old baseman.
SPEAKER_02It's so soft. He's so good. But he's barely tickling those fucking strings. He's so he plays eights. His tech said if anyone else plugged into his rig, they would sound like they were in some heavy metal band because the amount of gain they have to put through those things, because he's just barely, just barely tickling and touching those strings. That's crazy.
SPEAKER_00Yes. That's nuts. I've sat on side of stage while they played and we played with them. It was great. That's how I got that, you know, that's it.
SPEAKER_02He has a signed card in the set list.
SPEAKER_00Um yeah.
SPEAKER_02It's does does Duff, do you guys still whatever happened to those crates?
SPEAKER_00I don't know. I think Duff sent them to SIR. Like really? Yeah. He was just like, what am I gonna do with these? That's an amazing story. None of us are Billy Gibbons. We are not going to sound like that. So that was a learning moment for Duff. That's crazy. That's a great story. In 2012, I bought a fractal. Do you know this? No. Yeah. You bought a fractal. I fucking bought a fractal. This is pretty early on, right?
SPEAKER_02It was the first gen.
SPEAKER_00I had a model. It was an ultra.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00They had the first one. Yeah. Ultra. And then three. They didn't go to uh it wasn't a two, it was an ultra. Yeah, yeah. And I had um the foot controller, the fractal foot controller. The whole thing.
SPEAKER_02I can't imagine you have a fractal.
SPEAKER_00Well, I you know, I I like the idea of course you do of sure of everything. Like I I like everything is appealing to me. So you have a power amp and all that kind of stuff with it? Well, here was the thing. Like, we were doing fly-ins and backline gear and all that, and I was just like, oh god, sometimes you just get such a dog. But all of those amps have effects loop returns. So I was like, well, what if I have this?
SPEAKER_02Oh, I see.
SPEAKER_00I have this thing, and I fly in, and I, you know, I basically do what everyone is doing now. You know? That was the dream. And um, the problem is I got that thing. Um, and God, I bought this fucking thing, and I was like, how there was no uh uh interface, like you couldn't plug it into a computer.
SPEAKER_02Nope.
SPEAKER_00There was some kind of weird MIDI mapping thing that you could look at.
SPEAKER_02Yep, that didn't have a desktop app or anything.
SPEAKER_00It just no, none of that. And I was just like, this thing is insane. You know, it's like what kind of screws do you want on the chassis? I'm like, fucking find them, man. What do you why am I changing the thickness of the kid of the grill cloth simulator? I think that might have been a thing.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I was just like So that's especially funny because you guys at home, like if you knew Mike, if it has more than four or five knobs, Mike's out.
SPEAKER_00I don't want that. Mike's like out if it's uh on one thing, if it's 10 things and each of them have five knobs, no problem. But one thing with 25 knobs, fuck off.
SPEAKER_02And 30 menus, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And it was so confusing. It's seriously, listen, I fucking hired a guy.
SPEAKER_02What?
SPEAKER_00I hired a guy to program it. I was like, here's my CDs, get the sounds from this album and this album and this album. Because I was like, well, if I have this option, sure, why not? Why not sound as much like the record as possible? And so he went through and he I, you know, he nailed it. Did you ever use it live? I well here's the here's the one thing, one of very few things that I'm smart enough to know. Try it, just make sure you try rehearsal. Make sure you can use a piece of gear before rehearsal.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So I took that down to the rehearsal room before a couple days before anyone was there. And I plugged it into the effects return on my OR50, which is the best sounding uh 800 I've ever owned. I think it's a fucking amazing amp. It's a great amount. I wouldn't call it an 800, though. It's one of my favorite amps of all time. And um, I started trying to go through it and I was just like, this sucks. And you said well, yeah. Like the next day, I was just like, fuck this. It was uh, you know, I went from having a pedal board with a WA, an EQ, an overdrive slash boost, and uh a short and a long delay, and that was it. To having all of this shit and plethora. It was too much, and the bow and and then the at least where technology was then, the feel of the of the amps weren't right. So anyway, I could have kept it and used it for recording. There were some great sounds in there, yes, for sure. It was so hard to use, and in 15 years modeling technology and interface, especially has gotten very, very good.
SPEAKER_02We we are living a blessed time.
SPEAKER_00That's right, yeah.
SPEAKER_02We really, really do.
SPEAKER_00But at that time, I was like, nope, get out of here, go damn, get out of here.
SPEAKER_02Damn, dude. Gear regrets with Mike Squires. Tune in next week for more traumatic stories. Oh the one that comes to my mind, I've I've I think I've told this on the channel before. So back in the day when Randall launched the Thrasher and the Satan, which was all in England's Sing Tramp. Um, we tried out the prototypes at Nam. Jason Frankhauser, shout out, killer tone here on YouTube. And he was showing off the Fortin design prototypes at NAM, and they were the most unbelievable sounding amplifiers anyone had ever heard. The kinds of game then the tightness plugged straight into the amp was like nothing anyone had ever heard. And this was circa this would have been 2012, I think. And so I order a thrasher and they give me a deal on one, but I still had to pay for it. Um, my YouTube channel was pretty small at the time or whatever, and I didn't know that a couple of friends had gotten some other of the amplifiers when they finally come in, because the actual production ones were imports, and they were made in China at the time. And not that there's anything wrong with anything made in China, but I'm just saying at the time they were different than the American, you know, or the or the hand wired, they weren't hand wired, right? So a bunch of us get them, and a couple of my buddies were like, our amps are broken. These these don't stand right, send them back. No, no, these they're fine. What are you talking about? So the whole time I'm trying to make the video for mine because I bought it, I put it on my credit card, I'm wanting to make this video, and I do like certain aspects of it, but under a microphone, I can't get it to translate at all. And the whole time, you know, in the video I say I love the amplifier, and I did, I liked the amplifier, but I thought the shortcoming was me the entire time I'm making this video. I'm like, I suck, what am I doing? I'm terrible, I don't actually know what guitar tone is, I don't know what hiking stuff sounds supposed to sound like. Like, I'm I am a bad person, I need to go back to school. The video comes out, and then I get a bunch of messages from my buddies who I didn't know had them as well. And they're like, that thing sounds like shit, doesn't it? And I was like, oh, wait, what? I thought it was me. And they're like, no, brother, these things sound terrible. And I was like, oh. Oh, totally, yeah. No, yeah, I heard it immediately. It was really, really apparent. I fucking sold that thing so fast. That was such a piece of shit. I hated that amp.
SPEAKER_00It's one of my favorite neural standalone plugs, other than your Fortin Nameless. Yeah, no, it's uh California or something like that.
SPEAKER_02Oh, the Cali. Cali? Yeah, this was a Randall product that was designed by Mike Fortin. Oh, okay. It wasn't a Fortin amplifier. Right. Um, but the original prototypes that Mike made were incredible sounding. But once they went off, and I know I I'm assuming I heard later that he was very, very frustrated with the production side and all this kind of stuff they cut, they ended up cutting a bunch of corners for parts and stuff like that. Right. Anyway, yeah, that was a huge, huge, huge regret.
SPEAKER_00In the industry, a lot of people design products for other people or co collaborate. It's always an interesting thing to me. Yeah. Um, in the I must have been the 90s, maybe it was the early 2000s, Mike Soldano designed an amp for Yamaha. Oh, yeah. Have you ever played one?
SPEAKER_02That was the late 80s. Really? Yeah. That was like 8990. Before that was like the ad is he's sitting on the combo, or he's standing on the combo with his leather jacket on and his black hair.
SPEAKER_00I don't remember the ad. But have you ever played one?
SPEAKER_02No. Nope, I haven't. That's like one of the few amps I've never touched.
SPEAKER_00We should try to find one. Let's see if we can borrow one to make a video.
SPEAKER_02I mean, I could text Mike, ask him if he has one. Maybe he has one. That'd be fun.
SPEAKER_00Weren't those killer though? That's I mean, that's the lore, but people say all kinds of people talk a lot of shit.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, Paul Rivera, Fender. I mean, there's a lot of history of companies hiring these boutique amp guys to make their their product line better.
SPEAKER_00There's a lot of folks in the pedal world also. Sure. You know, Dunlop ha has a lot of boutique folks uh designing stuff for them. Yeah, of course. George Strips. Wait, he's sure. Daredevil, my buddy Johnny. Um people collaborate on designs for electroharmonics as well. I I know this.
SPEAKER_02Oh, interesting. I didn't know that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's a that's science fact. Oh that's cool. JHS has some collabs with electroharmonics. I have one of them. I love electroharmonics so much.
SPEAKER_02I do and I don't. I love that they don't give a shit about parts, noise, tolerances. They just throw in whatever they need or whatever they can get. Facts. I'm not knocking them. I'm just saying they they clearly know what they're doing and they have a thing. But I'm just saying, spec wise and like, you know, noise floor-wise.
SPEAKER_00Palisades pedal is one of my favorites. Like I it's a Swiss Army knife that you can the pog. You can use. Oh, I'm talking about electroharmonics. I'm talking about Earthquaker. Oh, oh, okay. I do love uh electroharactors. I was talking about electroharmonics. I've been to the electroharmonics factory. What I said does not apply to Earthquaker. Yeah, yeah. Sorry. When I was listening to you, I was like, Jesus Christ, really? What are you talking about?
SPEAKER_02Like, I'm not saying anything groundbreaking here.
SPEAKER_00Uh I've been to the Electroharmonics uh factory a number of times, this in the location that was right on the river on the Brooklyn side. And um it was really pretty fascinating. It was cool. There was a lot of wild shit in there.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I bet. Yeah. Earthquaker, on the other hand.
SPEAKER_00Earthquakers, I love that company. Ten out of ten. Yes, absolutely. Give me that aphrodise. They make the Palisades, and the Palisades is my favorite tube screamer variant of all time because it's it's whatever. You know, it's two presets, two stages that you can engage, plus a boost and every variant and mid shifts, and it's just like it's too it's too much for every board, but it's been on almost every one of my boards. In fact, I loaned mine to someone, and it's fucking I can't locate it, I can't find it anywhere, and I'm fucking pissed. And they don't make it anymore. Great. Because I reach out to my contact there and I'm like, hey, my favorite pedal of all time. Hey, buddy. Hey, hey, hey, brother. Or gear exchange. Yeah, that's one of my um that's one of the things that I have that come up in my reverb feed.
SPEAKER_02That sucks. That's tough. Yeah. Should we get to the rest of these uh next episode? What do you think? What else do we have in here?
SPEAKER_00I think that's it. Oh well, we did have bands that we love that change the way we play, but I don't feel like talking about that. I don't either you want to tell let's tell like can we do this? What is in your reverb feed? Like, be honest.
SPEAKER_02Fuck uh vintage uh Seamor Duncan JB pickups. Because I was like going down the rabbit hole, like the the older ones in the mid 80s, like that Cantrell would have had, um, are way different than the modern JB of the last 25-ish years. Um, but they then they came out with the vintage anniversary release, and they did they Singh Duncan was nice enough to send me a set, which I have yet to install, but it they're made to the old spec because they used to use totally different wire and a slightly different magnet and all that kind of stuff. Um, so vintage MJ signed or MJ made um Duncan JB's um Pv6534 Pluses, and always I'm looking, uh I'm just always looking for uh rectifiers.
SPEAKER_00So those are the things in your saved searches.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I'm not even gonna try and guess what mine is. I'm gonna just open it up right now and I'm gonna read it to you. I'm gonna go here to the website. And what do I do? Do I click on favorites? Oh, I guess I should log in. Feed. This is great. This is great TV right here.
SPEAKER_02There are gonna be uh there's gonna be some weird pedals in there.
SPEAKER_00There's gonna be It's gonna be some weird shit, I'm guaranteed.
SPEAKER_02There's gonna be some crazy expensive Gibsons that you'll never be able to afford, and then some weirdo stuff that I've probably I've never even heard of.
SPEAKER_00Um is it favorites? Where's my feed? On the main page. Just you go you scroll down. Um let's see. Viper bass. ESP Viper Base. Okay, what else? Um watch list. That's what that's what we're looking for. Greco style uh hamer uh style explorer. So I'm like Greco. Yes. I have Greco's in my um PRS SE Mike Mushock Baritone.
SPEAKER_02Yep.
SPEAKER_00Uh Guild Jet Star Base. Okay Why I don't understand. Oh, these are things, these are things that I'm actually those are actual sales that I was watching. Okay. Where are the things that I have like you can like save a thing, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but I mean that's gonna be in your feed is is watch list. It all goes there.
SPEAKER_00Right? Orange OR 50, Gibson G A 18 amp, introducing favorites. What? Searches?
SPEAKER_02What a great episode of the podcast.
SPEAKER_00Listen. This is great. BC Rich Warlock Bass. There it is. That's what I'm talking about. Warlock bass. Who wants a warlock bass? Me. Warlock bass, viper bass, bass six. Uh Viper Bass again. Gretch Silver Falcon. Ooh. Guild bass. There's three pages here. Brian May Guitar. I'm not I'm not super out loud about this, but I have like a I have a real hard on for Brian May guitars, and I have for months and months, and I can't shake it. I almost bought one at Guitar Center last week, and I was like, I don't want to no I don't want to do it.
SPEAKER_02Cool guitars though.
SPEAKER_00Gretsch White Panther.
SPEAKER_02Cool.
SPEAKER_00Electrical Guitar Company. Fender Precision Bass 1957 to 1964. Because you're buying one of those. Never gonna afford one. But yeah, I like to get them. Nash P63 Bass. I have two of those, however. Orange OR50. PRS S2 Mires Semi-Hollow Body. That's a burner of a guitar. Yeah. I follow the Love of Fuzz. That's a um that's a store in New York that I used to go to when I lived upstate in the Hudson Valley, there in Albany. Shout out to TJ and Love of Fuzz. Miss you, buddy. Uh Made in Japan um Precision Bass.
SPEAKER_02Cool.
SPEAKER_00Magnetone Troubadour. It's such a killer app. 18-watt sort of deluxe, but without the clean headroom. Coal guitars. I wonder if I can find. I come and I look every once in a while for my old guitar and I've never find it. Gibson G18. Those are the things that are my save search. I feel like I know you know. Well, it's you know, it's not uh there's no seven string. There's no there's basically it's stuff that I'm not gonna find on Marketplace. Sure. Okay. I look for it there though, too.
SPEAKER_02If you would like to tell us and share with us what's on your reverb watch list or your feed, let us know down in the comments. You ready to get out of here? 110%. All right.
SPEAKER_00You've been wonderful. I've been fluff. I'm still your pal Mike. We'll see you next time.
