Category: Uncategorized

NAMM and Not NAMM 2016

How to tell holiday season is officially over: It’s time for NAMM 2016! And this will be the first time I attend not as a music magazine writer, but as a guy trying to sell guitar pedals. Or as Ray Liotta put it in Goodfellas: “Just another schnook.”

Not like I can afford a proper booth or anything. I’ll just be wandering around with a sack of goods like some frickin’ crack dealer. I’ll have a pedalboard with new four new releases (plus a couple of surprises) on display at the Vintage King booth in Hall A. But sadly, it won’t be hooked up to anything — there just isn’t enough room for live pedal demos. However, my awesome friends at Voodoo Lab will have my new Filth Fuzz in the demo pedalboard at their booth. (No business connection there — they’re just doing me a favor ’cause they’re cool.) So you can stop by and try it out while sampling Voodoo Lab’s latest and greatest.

If you’re attending NAMM and would like to check out my stuff — or just meet and say hi — drop me a note. I’ll be at the show Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday. (Sorry, I can’t help obtain passes. I had to scuffle for my own like … a regular schnook.)

But I’m skipping the show on Friday. Friday night I’ve got a gig at Taix restaurant in Los Angeles, performing my solo looping material and sharing the bill with my longtime pals, Double Naught Spy Car. I haven’t played L.A. in several years, and this is the first time playing solo. I’ll be stoked if folks stop by.

And during the day, I’m teaching a master class at LACM, where my dear pal Adam Levy oversees the guitar department. The focus is modes — or rather, my irreverent crackpot theories about the most musically profitable ways to regard and use modes. I’ve been kicking around these notions for many years, and I’ll probably adopt them into a tonefiend post soon.

I hope to see some old friends and make some new ones. So don’t be a stranger!

January 19, 2016
Instagramarama!

Name That Gear!

I just started a Tonefiend Instagram feed, ’cause I know there’s not enough junk in your inbox. If you’re an Instagram user, feel free to follow. (Or just friend me on Facebook, where all the Instagram images also appear. I’m not picky—I’ll friend anyone, at least till they start posting links to $19 Prada handbag knockoffs.)

Often I don’t post here at tonefiend.com till I’ve cobbled together a relatively substantial item, which means the site can fester for weeks without an update. But for better or worse, I plan to post a steady stream of ~~square cell phone pics~~ compelling images and ~~trivial~~ pithy thoughts on Instagram/FB/Twitter.

On Instagram, I’m starting out with two weekly posts. Both are pretty silly, but each has inspired some surprisingly cool conversations. The first series is “Name That Gear,” which is simply a close-up shot of some music gizmo, but with some telling detail that reveals its identity. Not much too it, but it can be fun.

Page vs. Wagner: Who’d Win in a Fight?

The other recurring item is “Who’d Win in a Fight?” These are deliberately absurdist: The first post matched Jimmy “Hammer of the Gods” Page against Richard “Twilight of the Gods” Wagner. But amazingly, it inspired a long, fascinating, and drop-dead funny Facebook conversation. (Thanks for my wife for suggesting both ideas.)

Naturally, I’ll also be using those feeds to shamelessly flog my music and gear. I’m going to be showing the first five Joe Gore Pedals stompboxes at the LA Amp Show in Van Nuys, California on October 3rd and 4th—just a couple of weeks from now! The product announcements aren’t quite ready yet, but trust me—I bombarding you with them very soon. 🙂

September 13, 2015
Croque-Monsieur

So much for demoing my new-fangled guitar and its new-fangled tone circuit this week.

Pro tip: Just because your cheese grater looks like a Flying V and is called “The Shredder” doesn’t make it any less dangerous! However, the croque-monsieur was delicious (once I’d scraped away the blood and bits of flesh).

March 23, 2015
Not About Music: Marvin Gore [1923-2015]

Marvin Gore, 1940

If my blog and video posts have seemed fewer and less fun in recent months, it’s not your imagination. I’ve been shuttling between San Francisco and my childhood home in the LA suburbs, spending as much time as possible with my dad in the wake of a back-to-back broken hip and terminal cancer diagnosis. He passed away on January 28th — my late mother’s birthday.

Dad was many things: an engineer, a thinker, a WWII vet, a rocket scientist, a college dean, a loving husband and father, a passionate progressive, a sci-fi/horror geek, and a world traveler who visited all seven continents.

But there’s one thing he definitely was not: a musician. (more…)

February 9, 2015
Frets in Flight, 2015

Here are the new U.S. Department of Transportation rules on flying with musical instruments. Sounds like carriers are required to check instruments.

The key passage, per the DOT site:

The rule requires that each U.S. carrier subject to this regulation allow a passenger to carry into the cabin and stow a small musical instrument, such as a violin or a guitar, in a suitable baggage compartment, such as the overhead bin or a closet, or under the seats, in accordance with FAA safety regulations and the carrier’s FAA-approved carry-on baggage program.

Carriers must allow passengers to stow their small musical instruments in an approved stowage area in the cabin if at the time the passenger boards the aircraft such stowage space is available. Under the rule, musical instruments as carry-on items are treated no differently from other carry-on items and the stowage space should be made available for all carry-on items on a “first come, first served” basis. Carriers are not required to give musical instruments priority over other carry-on baggage, therefore passengers traveling with musical instruments may want to buy the pre-boarding option offered by many carriers to ensure that space will be available for them to safely stow their instruments in the cabin.

Maybe we should do like my pal Shelley Doty recommends and carry a copy of this every time we check in for a flight.

January 5, 2015
Happy Holidays, Dear Readers!

Lookit what Elvis got for Chanukah!

I hope everyone’s holidays are splendid. And remember — even if you don’t have one of those families that you need to take a break from every 15 minutes, you can still slip into the other room, fire up Photoshop (and other stuff, if need be), and make funny pictures.

December 23, 2014
Capacitor Smackdown! Does Cap Type Matter?

Oh man, I’ve been wanting to do this test for ages! A direct comparison between capacitor types in a standard guitar tone circuit.

So who’s right? The Tone Illuminati who discern dramatic tone improvements after installing vintage/audiophile caps? Or skeptics who say those perceptions are delusional? Does cap type matter at all?

You tell me.

Anyone hear anything I don’t?

UPDATE:

[Image from BBC innit.]

December 2, 2014
Best. Stompbox. Ever.

… at least if, like me, you have the soul of a 12-year-old Japanese girl.

September 4, 2014
The 18-Watt, Bletchley-Style

How come my DIY amps never look this pretty inside?

A couple of weeks ago I posted here about a Premier Guitar project in which I built two Marshall 18-watt clone kits. Meanwhile, the magazine received a review model of Marshall’s latest iteration of the 18-watt, a high-end, hand-wired version that sells for $2,700. My new review is online at PG, if you’re curious to hear a proper Marshall as well as the clones.

My take: It’s a beautifully built, hand-wired amp that sounds as least as good as either clone. Unlike the kits with their single 12″ speakers, the Marshall has a pair of 10s, which I think I prefer in this circuit. At $2,700, though, it’s pretty darn expensive, even for a beautiful, hand-made instrument. But I’ll be sad when I send the review model back to Bletchley.

August 27, 2014
Drum Roll, Please …
The Comedy Competition Winners

The Cro-Mag Comedy Competition polls have closed. We have a winner and two runners-up tied for second.

The gold medalist is wrangle, for his touching coming-of-age tale about the day he learned there’s a reason musicians say “One two three four” before they start playing. Tied for second: Mark Spangler’s harrowing near-death experience as Jeff Beck’s hand-picked opening act, and Roel Torres’s terrifying tale of being hoisted skyward by stage machinery. (Think twice before wearing a hoodie onstage, kids!) Both are worthy of reenactment on one of my fave guilty-pleasure TV shows, I Shouldn’t Be Alive.

Winners, send me your snail mail addresses, and I’ll send you something noisy.

Thanks to everyone who submitted a story, voted in the poll, or just read the stories and spewed coffee on their computers. Thanks for holding court while I was traveling, and for giving me plenty of good laughs on the road. In the meantime, I’ve pretty much gotten over jetlag, flu, and a mountain of postponed paying work, and I’ve got some cool and intriguing posts planned for the coming days!

You can read all the entires here. Or just the finalists here. Or just the winners after the jump. (more…)

May 7, 2014