Here's a Tony Macalpine interview for the release of Concrete Gardens. We did a Skype call to talk about this new release. The album is excellent, the technic is stratospheric as usual but thank God the music is not forgotten! It's always a good thing to see a musician like Tony releasing new material.
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Here's a José Ramos interview. José is a luthier I met during the Salon de la Belle Guitare in Montrouge near Paris in March 2015 during the Guitars au Beffroi festival.
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Here's a Dan Macpherson interview. Dan is a luthier I met during the Salon de la Belle Guitare in Montrouge near Paris in March 2015 during the Guitars au Beffroi festival.
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In this 7th video of the Spartan Project the luthier, Mikaël Springer, continues the work on the neck of the guitar.
Previous 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.
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Interview with Kathryn Marie Dudley, author of the book “Guitar Makers”
Friday, 24 April 2015
I heard about Kathryn Marie Dudley book, Guitar Makers - The Endurance of Artisanal Values in North America, from Austrian luthier Michael Spalt. I contacted the editor and received a copy of the book soon after. Kathryn exposes a fascinating story of the North American guitar builders.
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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.
In this 6th video of the Spartan Project the luthier, Mikaël Springer, continues the work on the neck of the guitar.
Previous 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.
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Here's a double Michael Spalt interview I did during the Salon de la Belle Guitare of the festival Guitares au Beffroi (www.guitaresaubeffroi.com) which took place in Montrouge near Paris in March 2015. Austrian luthier Michael Spalt was there as an exhibitor and as the president of the European Guitar Builders (EGB). One of the main activity of the EGB is the organization of the Holy Grail Guitar Show where I went for the first edition in Berlin last year.
So we did two interviews instead of one! The one above is the one about his life as a luthier.
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Here's my video review of the Line6 JTV-59.
In this 5th video of the Spartan Project the luthier, Mikaël Springer, starts the work on the neck of the guitar. Many people consider that you are truly an electric guitar luthier when you build the necks of your instruments yourself.
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In this 4th video of the Spartan Project the luthier, Mikaël Springer, continues the work on the Spanish Cedar body.
Published videos of the Spartan Project
Stay tuned for the next update on the Spartan Project!
Pierre.
PS: for more info on this project you can read the full article here about its launch.
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Right before the Freak Kitchen concert in Paris, Mattias Eklundh was at Metal Guitar for a showcase/masterclass. The full recording is available below in 3 videos.
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While I was at the NAMM show I almost did a video interview with Adrian Belew. It did not happen because of a delayed plane so we did it via phone a couple of weeks later. I hope you will enjoy this interview with this eternal brilliant experimentator.
Adrian played with so many people and bands that it's impossible to list them all.
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In this 3rd video of the Spartan Project the luthier, Mikaël Springer, continues the work on the Spanish Cedar body.
Published videos of the Spartan Project
Stay tuned for the next update on the Spartan Project!
Pierre.
PS: for more info on this project you can read the full article here about its launch.
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Leonardo Guitar Research Project – Interview at the 2014 Holy Grail Guitar Show
Tuesday, 10 March 2015
This interview with Brian will explain you everything you need to know about the Leonardo Guitar Research Project.
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In this 2nd series of videos of the Spartan Project done with Mikaël Springer, the luthier continues with the work on the body.
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This video is part of a series of videos documenting the Spartan Project done in collaboration with luthier Mikaël Springer.
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Well, here we are, the American adventure of The Guitar Channel starts in a few hours! The NAMM show means a lot for musicians in general and especially for guitarists as it is a major event that has strong impact, especially on our respective gear fantasies! Indeed it is often during this event dedicated to the music industry in Los Angeles, California in January that are launched instruments, amps, effects, accessories, etc.
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Discover the interesting aluminium guitars from Relish Guitars
Wednesday, 03 December 2014
Relish Guitars are made out of aluminium. I had already heard about their product and thought it was interesting to learn some more about their technology.
- Published in All, Interviews, News
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First Skype Guitar Lesson with Bruno Pelletier-Bacquaert: I Loved It!
Sunday, 05 October 2014
We see more and more offers of guitar lessons via Skype, I admit I was one of the skeptics until I tried it with Bruno Pelletier-Bacquaert. Bruno is a pro Jazz guitar player based in San Francisco. He is French but is fully bilingual. In fact he teaches in a music university.
My goal for this Skype guitar lesson
My personal taste is definitely Rock so my goal in taking a lesson with Bruno was not to make me a Jazz musician but to expand my musical vocabulary through Jazz.
- Published in All, Improve your playing
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
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.
Michael Lee Firkins is not a newbie in the guitar business. Some may recall his first albums in the Mike Varney stable of shredders, Shrapnel Records. Michael provides us with Yep (on the Magna Carta label) an album very far from this era with a powerful guitar music.
It's not complicated the only thing I did not like about the album is the cover. That said, I agree, it is a matter of taste and what matters is the music inside.
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Here's one of the rare interview of Tina S. You have most likely seen recently on YouTube the video shown below where Tina (@tina_s__) covers Eruption from Eddie Van Halen. One can only be impressed by her level of virtuosity, of course I would have liked to feel more fire, more passion in her performance but no doubt this will change in the future. At 14, her technical level is pretty amazing.
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Here is a video soundseeing of my beautiful Rittenhouse Telecaster (www.rittenhouseguitars.com).
Direct link to the m4v file: LCG-111-20110702.m4v
The whole Rittenhouse Telecaster Story of this guitar is there in 5 parts:
Part 5
Part 4
Part 3
Part 2
Part 1
If you want sone more there is another video in french here and also an audio only episode with a soundseeing of the same guitar here.
Enjoy,
Pierre.
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On a glorious 2011 january morning, here it was, the parcel coming from Florida with the precious Rittenhouse Telecaster inside!
First impressions:
The guitar is very light, I need to weight it precisely but I am pretty sure it is the lightest guitar I have
The relicing job is very well done. It looks and feels old.
Well, it seems that my Rittenhouse (rittenhouseguitars.com) Telecaster is finished!
Do you remember Part 2 of my Rittenhouse Telecaster story ? Here how the body was looking before Abe started the relicing process:
Here goes another picture update with the relicing job finished:
It looks cool he?
Here is a picture update on the Telecaster I won back in December 2009 and that Abe is building for me at Rittenhouse:
As per Abe e-mail, the body is fully cured and ready for the relicing process.
Can't wait to see the next stage!
Pierre.
Note: here is the link to The Rittenhouse Telecaster Story - Part 1
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All this story began with a post on Muzicosphere about a giveaway for a Rittenhouse guitar...
Then one morning, on December 24th 2009, barely awake as I was checking my iPhone I see this Boxcar popup with this tweet:
I had WON!!! I checked, double-checked, triple-checked but it was for real I had won a free guitar. On Christmas Eve, how cool is that, he??! 🙂
As The Guitar Channel is about...
