rockabilly69

Nice pedal. The other guitarist in our band uses one, he loves it!

I've never personally relic'd a guitar (or re-licked one). But some of the best Telecaster tones I've ever heard came from a Nachocaster which is a heavy duty relic'd guitar. This one... I think the one I played cost $6000. And up to that point, I would've never ever considered spending that much on any guitar, modern or vintage. The most I've ever spent is $4500. But that guitar had me rethinking about what a guitar is worth. It was that good. As a matter of fact one of my best friends bought a used one just like it for a $1000 more, and he thought it was the deal of the century, HE LOVES IT!!! And the fact that you could nick it, dent it, whatever, and wouldn't lose a cent of value is kind of appealing. These guitars now sell for over $8000 new, and there's a waiting list. He sells them that fast. So people pay even more than that for used ones if they want one immediately. Frankly, I don't think I'd like if the man himself, Nacho, made me one that would look new. It just felt so good, and better than any vintage Tele that I've ever played (I've played a few). A few weeks before I played this one I had a 50's whiteguard Tele at my house and this Nacho smoked it! Here's the only song that I recorded with it, a song which came out of me with less than 20 minutes of play time on it. The pickups just sang and the vibration in the wood rattled my ribs...

I'm a sucker for stingers. If I ever had a custom guitar built it would have a stinger. And that flame on that multipiece neck, it's fine! The guitars that I have that stay in tune the best and are some of the best sounding, are the ones with multipiece necks! My dragon Zemaitis guitar is multipiece and that neck rings like a tuning fork!

cool guitar!

This comes up a lot in my conversations with guitar playing friends. We all agree the amp is the biggest factor in great tone. When you've got a great amp almost any decent pickup will sound good. But... those Lollar Imperials in my Teye sound good with any amp of mine that I've plugged that guitar into. I've recorded it with both of my Boogies DC2 6V6 tubes and Fillmore 50 6L6 tubes, my Marshall EL34 tubes, and my Dirty Girl 6973 tubes. That Imperials just sound great. I also had another Teye with those pickups, and they sounded great in that one too. I wonder if Teye spec'd those Imperials specifically for his guitars. I've had mixed luck with Lollar pickups, and his P90s never really did it for me. But them Kuz sold me that H535 P90, and those sounded great.

These are Lollar Imperials in my Teye, I don't think they sound HiFi at all...

Well you've always loved Silverbursts, so there you go. Way to go on the score Brent!

Unlike most people that have posted above, I have seen the quality issues on my own Heritages, and I've heard about many quality control issues wih pre bandlab Heritages. One of my good friends was a dealer for Heitage. and he told me some stories about how many bad ones came through his store. And of my 3 H150s that I own(ed), two of them had nut and fret issues that had to be addressed before I could get the action down low enough to where I like it. And I had to sand out more than a few file marks. When I see the term "Golden Age" referring to pre bandlab Heritages, I just roll my eyes. For the people that got good pre band lab ones, that's great, but for those us who have had to deal with the issues on the older ones, it was a pain. I originally got into Heritages, because I'm a serial modder with pretty good guitar repair skills, and I figured they were so cheap at the time, if I had to do a little work on one, it was worth it. And I really liked the wood on them, they sourced some nice Honduran mahogany, Eastern flamed maple, and Indian Rosewood. And if you were patient, you could find a good one with a decent low weight. But those low prices are history now, so if I was to buy an older Heritage, I would demand a return window. That said, the H150s I have now are good to go, and with the way I modded them, they are great guitars. And he H535 P90 that Kuz sold me was set up really great, and I knew it would be a good guitar, because it was Kuz, who's a straight shooter, and he would never sell me a guitar that was sub par.

Oh yeah, a bad customer service situation can lead to sore apples, but if I had to be limited to one brand of pickups I would say Throbak are the most consistently in line with what I want to hear. The guy just seems to have that low output PAF thing down. I have heard other brands of pickups that get there, but not as consistently as Throbak, especially the SLE101. With Lollar Imperials I thnk the low winds are the closest to what I like. And I'm also a fan of Wolfetone Legends. Speaking of bad customer service, Tyson Tone Lab pickups, especially his Precious and Grace pickups, are also fantastic, BUT, that guy consistently takes forever to get you your pickups, many people have complaints about him and have cancelled orders.

Do be contrarian, I think throbak are consistently one of the best sounding pickups made. They are very similar to OG PAFs in the sense that are microphonic, and if you're going to use a high gain amp, they are going to be touchy. I've had to remove a cover and put a bid a silicone on one coild to tame a bridge pickup. But back in the 70's many people pulled real PAFs out of their guitars for the same reason. But I have never had a Lollar that sounds as good as a Throbak. And I have played way more examples than most people of Imperials and SLE101s. My number one Teye guitar has Imperials in it along with two other Teyes I've owned.

this the Sebatron...

Thanks I got a new preamp in the house, a Sebatron VMP2000VU, I use the 4 channel version of this in my studio, although my studio one doesn't have the VU meters. I don't think there's better multi-use tube preamp for home and project studio use. I love it on everything. All the drums you heard from my studio were through the Sebatron. And it sounds great on bass and guitars too. I recorded a cleaner and slightly longer version of this song with my Jaguar through the same mics and pre...

I almost sold mine, but it was too good sounding after I put the Wolfetone pickups in it (Dr Vintage neck, Marshallhead bridge), and when I changed out the switch, I put new CTS 500K pots in , Sozo .022 cap, all new cloth pushback wire, and a switchcraft jack, so it's good to go!

Frankly, it kept me from playing that guitar!

Thanks Rich, I had a big condensor mic on in the room and when I was tapping my foot I noticed it picked up a pretty good thump from the carpeted floor And... I always tap my foot when I play Blackbird!!! BTW I posted the wrong pickup combinations, this is the right combos... Left Side position 1: neck position 2: neck and bridge In Parallel / In Phase position 3: bridge Right Side position 1: neck and bridge In Series / In Phase position 2: neck and bridge In Series / Out Of Phase position 3: neck and bridge In Parallel / Out Of Phase

A few days ago I replaced the single coil Nocaster Cavalier Holy Grail pickup in the partscaster Esquire that I built with a Seymour Duncan Billy Gibbons BG-1400. I love having a great sounding single coil sized humbucker in it, especially because it's humbucker quiet! The Nocaster Holy Grail was great sounding too, but I hated dealing with the single coil noise when recording by my computer monitor. And just last night I replaced the 5-way switch in my PRS Custom 22. I never liked that switch, as I never knew what position I was in. And grasping the 5-way switch with sweating hands while under the stage lights was a pain! Fortunately there's a company "Free-Way" that makes a great 6-way toggle switch that is fairly straight forward to install. I used model Number 3X3-08 Here's the guitar with the Free-Way switch installed... The switch has 2 banks of pickup selections. There's a left and right side of three postions each... Left Side position 1: neck pickup (coils in parallel) position 2: neck and bridge in phase (coils in parallel) position 3: bridge pickup (coils in parallel) Right Side position 1: neck and bridge (in series) position 2: neck and middle (in series) Out Of Phase position 3: neck and middle (in parallel) Out Of Phase So here's a demo of the Esquire as the rhythm guitar, and my PRS with me switching through the switch positions starting with position 1. I'm also playing bass, snapping my fingers, and I mic'd the floor so you can hear me tapping to the beat:)

There are so many good companies that make pedal boards, power supplies, gig bags or hard cases for them etc. It's hard to give advice when we don't know what's floatin' up in your noggin. When I start building a new pedalboard, I think of the job that it is going to do, and then I build to that. I needed a very simple board as a backup for my main acoustic board just in case it goes down, and knowing I was going to use 4 pedals, it wouldn't need to be very big. So I figured I could make one from parts I got at the local home depot. I used some black paint, simple shelving, aluminum from the metal stock, and screws and handles from the fastener section. The only thing that didn't come from home depot was the rubber feet which I already had here. I power it with a one spot to the tuner. And the tuner powers everything wlse from it's convenience 500mv 9 volt DC outlet. It has all the pedals I need for my acoustic guitars that are equipped with magnetic pickups: volume, tuner, EQ, reverb and delay. The beauty of building your own board is that you can make it the exact size you need it. After I built mine, I did a google search and found a company that had a gig back that would fit it.

The Marv Wineburst that Kuz was kind enough to send on to me... And for you blasphemers, here it is with a proper pickguard...

Mark, right there, is why I went solo! I have a band band, and a duet, but I make most of my money as a solo! Good luck with your new drummer, and sorry to hear of your friend's passing.

...good to see things are rolling along. "New Dave" seems like a good fit!