Name : HooVi
Type : Company
Web : www.hoovi.at
e-mail : info(a)hoovi.at
The Deeflexx Systems invented by HooVi solve the problem of the sound diffusion from guitar amps. The highly engineered Sound Deflection System is just to be placed in front of any guitar amp to enhance the sound and get rid of the shrill sound coming from the speaker cone.
Without the Deeflexx: the sound is not distributed evenly, shrill and dull zones
With the Deeflexx: spherical sound distribution, fat and clear sounding amp
The Deeflexx products
In the range of products proposed by HooVi, you will find 3 models.
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Laguz The Special from Soultool Customized Guitars – Guitar review
Thursday, 14 January 2016
The Laguz The Special guitar from Soultool Customized Guitars is an instrument which was presented by the luthier Egon Rauscher (watch his interview in this article) during the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show.
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Pedal Shootout – Wampler Plextortion, Celmo Pimento, Tanabe Dumkudo
Sunday, 27 December 2015
Here's a pedal shootout to make a comparison between the Wampler Plextortion, the Celmo Pimento and the Tanabe.tv Dumkudo. 3 very different pedals to add overdrive or distorsion (in the case of the Plextortion) to your pedalboard. Wampler comes from the US, Celmo is built in France and Tanabe.tv is built in Japan.
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Pedal Shootout: pedalboard
The cab simulation and power amp section is done by the Torpedo CAB Two-Notes.
The Heartbreaker model by luthier Christophe Grellier is a guitar with a very clean look but full of possibilities of sounds with its clever 6-position selector. Yes, there are six possibilities of sound on this selector that looks like a simple 3-position toggle switch. The 3 bottom positions are the combinations of pickups in humbucker
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Bamboo Ethiq Electric Alquier Guitars, a sustainable instrument built by a luthier
Friday, 11 December 2015
The guitar tested in this video is the electric model Ethiq range presented in Berlin during the 2nd edition of the Holy Grail Guitar Show by luthier Jean-Yves Alquier. The characteristic of this range is that it is made of bamboo from 65% to 100% as in the case of the guitar tested in this video. So this might be one of the first sustainable guitar from a luthier.
We clearly see in the photo below how the body of the guitar is composed.
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Cerbersus overdrive and Utopia delay by Anasounds – Pedal Review
Monday, 16 November 2015
In a previous gear review, The Guitar Channel had you discover the excellent Phase Lag phaser from Anasounds, now here's a double test with two pedals of the same French manufacturer boutique shop: the Utopia delay and Cerberus overdrive pedals.
Anasounds website: www.anasounds.com
Cerbersus overdrive and Utopia delay - Video review
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Overview of Utopia
The Utopia offers a very well done analog delay simulation that works great from a slapback (an echo very short often used in Rockabilly), to a
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Presentation of the 2016 Gibson acoustic guitars in Paris
Wednesday, 21 October 2015
Yesterday I had the pleasure to spend the afternoon in the private showroom of Gibson France to discover the 2016 range of acoustic guitars from Gibson. For this event two people from the US Acoustic Division were present, Josh Taborski (General Manager) and Jeremy Morton (Product Specialist), see the interview below.
The 2016 guitars in a few photos
From left to right:
A J-45 Vintage (so with the thermally processed top)
A Hummingbird (same comment as above)
A J-200
A J-100
Some others models from the 2016 range:
The Bob Dylan J-200
The signature model is truly a magnificent instrument.
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Two luthiers (re)introduce the fast pickup change electric guitar
Friday, 09 October 2015
Here's an interview with two luthiers Sébastien Gavet and Godefroy Maruejouls who collaborated to develop an electric guitar system with fast interchangeable pickup system. They came to show me the first prototype some time ago, this is the video where they explain everything.
The project continues to progress as they have recently introduced a new version of the guitar with an improved system to change the pickups:
What I think of the project
The guitar interchangeable pickup system that has been tried several times in the past.
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Amp Demo – BriceDelage rocking the Leo ’64 amp from Heptode Effects
Tuesday, 06 October 2015
Check-out the one and only French guitar player Brice Delage rocking the brand new high end solid state amp Leo '64 from Heptode Effects.
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Mooer is a Chinese brand that has caused a stir when it released her mini pedals range of guitar effects. I longed for a while to test out one to see what they were really worth.
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Anasounds is a French boutique pedal builder based in Nice in the South of France. They have a large range of pedals with fuzz, overdrive, distortion, delay and the Phase Lag pedal, a very cool phaser with some interesting hidden features.
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Chronicle #13 Spartan Project with Springer Guitars – Paint & finish
Wednesday, 05 August 2015
Here's the 13th episode of the Spartan Project video series. You will see how the luthier Mikaël Springer will do his TV white color on the guitar paint. It's quite fascinating to see how it is done.
#13 Spartan Project with @SpringerGuitars: Guitar paint & finish
A few pics from the video
Previous episodes of the Spartan Project
The goal of the Spartan Project is to document the building of a guitar for me by luthier Mikaël Springer.
Here's a video of Zane Carney trying at Guitars Addicts in Paris for John Mayer a superb 69 Les Paul Deluxe Gold Top.
Until the next interview, keep on playing the guitar!
Pierre.
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Here's the 9th episode of the Spartan Project video series. Watch Mikaël gluing the fretboard and starting the work on the frets.
Playlist of the episodes of the Spartan Project
As a reminder, the goal of the Spartan Project is to document the building of a guitar for me by luthier Mikaël Springer.
Video recorded on May 17th 2015 at Guitars Addicts in Paris, France when Nik Huber delivered the Blue Whale #6 to the owner, Didier. Etienne Prieuret, pro guitar player, improvised this demo on this superb guitar on the Rhythm channel of an Imperial amp from Tone King (above) and on the Leach channel (below).
Gear used
Guitar: Blue Whale #6
Luthier: Nik Huber
Amp: Tone King Imperial
Video and sound: Lumix GH2
The Blue Whale guitar is a 25 limited edition run. It is based on the Dolphin model from the Nik Huber catalog.
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Relish guitar review – The Jane Relish Guitars – Innovative instrument from Switzerland
Thursday, 23 April 2015
Here's a Relish guitar review, the Jane model by Relish Guitars is entirely developed and built in Switzerland with some cool innovative ideas.
Here's my video review of the Line6 JTV-59.
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More than ever there is a humongous choice of picks available nowadays. I recently received a set of Dragon's Heart Guitar Picks. I admit I was intrigued by the original shape of the model which present three different edges: a sharp one, a normal one and a round one.
What I like the most
- 3 distinct sounds in one pick
- Quality of the material
- Very durable
What I like the least
- Added complexity
- Not for everyone
Conclusion
When I use a pick I tend to use thicker and thicker one. I don't know if it's because as I aged I get better at guitar playing and need more control or just a matter of my taste evolving. Anyway, I enjoyed the thickness of the Dragon's Heart picks. As for the sound, having such a variety of type of attacks on the strings is a pretty cool feature. If you are ready to deal with the fact that you need to pay attention to how you hold your pick to choose the right edge you want to use, the Dragon's Heart offer an excellent option to get different sounds right from your finger tips. Pierre.
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Dragon’s Heart Guitar Picks (@DragonHrtPicks): a triple edge pick
Wednesday, 25 February 2015
In this Strymon Flint review, don't be fooled by the analog appearance of this pedal as there're only buttons and switches, no display. It actually hides a powerful digital processor that produces some very cool sounds.
It has 3 types of effects for tremolo and reverb as well as the usual adjustment knobs. Note that the pedal is full of dual functions for example to change the order tremolo into reverb or the opposite, you can also choose if there is a boost when you activate the effect, etc.
- Published in Gear
Below are a small selections of the 200+ photos I took during the Holy Grail Guitar Show.
On the interview above Judge Fredd presents the Money For Nothing pedal he has developed with JMB Experience to obtain the famous Mark Knopfler sound on the Dire Straits song Money For Nothing and more.
Last year Fredd introduced also with JMB a great overdrive pedal called the Riff Shooter, the Money For Nothing has some great potential to produce not only the trademark tone but also plenty of other cool tones.
- Published in Gear, Interviews, News
Here's a YouTube Playlist with all the gear reviews produced for the show.
Enjoy,
Pierre.
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The Sardine Can compressor from Celmo is a high quality pedal built in France. It sounds very musical whatever the settings you use on the pedal (watch the demo video to judge by yourself). On top of the standard compressor settings which are the compression rate and volume you can change the tone of the compressor with a three position input filter (again, watch the video to hear the different tones).
It also has a Rectifier mode which adds a touch of drive to your sound if you desire so.
- Published in Gear
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Pedal review of the Tanabe TV Dumkudo overdrive used by Robben Ford
Sunday, 31 August 2014
Toshihiko Tanabe from tanabe.tv builds boutique pedal for famous musicians like Robben Ford or Larry Carlton. You can read an interview with him in this article. In this Dumkudo review in video it's one of his overdrive pedal.
- Published in Gear
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Review of the @Line6 AMPLIFi 150 – A super cool amp full of tones
Monday, 28 July 2014
The AMPLIFi line is the latest offering from Line6 regarding guitar amps.
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Guitar Review – Spartan model from SpringerGuitars: an awesome Junior!
Wednesday, 04 June 2014
I love P90 pickups, that's a fact. When Mikaël Springer posted some pics of his Spartan guitar, his Les Paul Junior inspired beauty, on his personal Facebook profile, I immediately said I would love to review it. A couple of weeks later I received the guitar at home to spend some quality time with this awesome instrument.
Spartan guitar in video
Specifications
We are in the specifications realm of the Les Paul Junior, a mahogany body, a P90, a volume and tone.
When Derek Trucks was in town for the Tedeschi Trucs Band at the Olympia Hall, I had the opportunity to go on stage and take pics of all the stage gear.
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Review of the Patrick Rondat distortion pedal from LNA Guitar Effects
Sunday, 27 April 2014
Here's a review of a great distortion pedal built by LNA Effects in France for the great French guitar player Patrick Rondat.
The pedalboard used for the review
The LNA pedal was inserted on my regular pedalboard for the review.
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Pierre-Marie Châteauneuf, luthier for PMC, is a great guitar builder from Montpellier in France. I am reviewing here a new creation of his with the Thelonious model.
The guitar
With PMC, we are in the high class guitar area. Starting from the choice of woods to the attention to details and quality of the building, the guitar is a great job and it sounds awesome as you can judge for yourself in the video.
The look of the beauty is beautiful, simple and elegant.
UE Boom guitar amp - Nowadays you can't enter an electronic store without seeing a plethora of Bluetooth speakers. Last month I was invited to a presentation of the UE Boom from Ultimate Ears, the speakers sounds really great especially seeing the relatively small size. I wondered how it would sound to plug a guitar in one and see if it can be used as a guitar amp.
UE Boom guitar amp video
Unpacking the UE Boom
If you are familiar with the Apple unpacking experience, you won't be disappointed with the UE Boom one.
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