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“I’m honored not only to act as a stepping stone for current builders to model after,” says Young, “but also to provide them parts and components to aid their projects. I’m just blessed to be in position where I can work with so many close-knit builders outside my own company, within the greater resonator community. We are just honored to have so many builders put us and Dobro on a pedestal.”
After researching and interacting on several online resonator communities, we gathered a list of resoluthiers and dove head first into the resonator world. We couldn’t include everyone, so we tried to feature builders who would reveal the wide range of developments within that world. So, whether you’re looking for a metal-body resonator (Terraplane), a Dobro-influenced model (Beard), a resonator-electric (S.B. MacDonald), a resonator using Scheerhorn parts (Rayco), or just someone who’s been building resonators since before it was cool (Mark Taylor of Crafters of Tennesee), we’re willing to bet you’ll find one that resonates with you (pun intended).
Beard Guitars
Hagerstown, Maryland
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I used to play professionally in several bluegrass bands, and I just decided I wanted a better instrument than my seventies OMI Dobro. When I started to research the market, I realized you could buy a really high-end banjo or flat top guitar, but there weren’t any high-end resonator guitars. I was just disappointed with the quality of that Dobro, so I decided to make one for myself out of musical necessity.
What are some influences or ideas you pulled from to create your own resonator?
Starting with bluegrass, I always listened to Mike Auldridge and Jerry Douglas. I was after the tone of Mike, and trying to master the technical prowess of Jerry, but I was ultimately looking for an instrument that allowed me to sound like those guys on record. It was a “tone quest.”
Could you describe your “Legend Tone” construction on Auldridge’s signature guitar?
That’s a really special instrument, and it took me a long time to develop it… he would use adjectives to describe a sound or tone, and I’m perceiving what he’s saying and not always interpreting exactly what he means. Needless to say, there was a lot of experimentation and trial and error during that process. I would make a guitar and take it to him. He would say, “that sounds good, but I want something warmer.” So I’d make another guitar that I thought was warmer than the previous, but it still wouldn’t meet his expectations. It just got worse and worse, until I just threw my hands up. I departed from that construction and went to a totally different construction, which would become the “Legend Tone.” As soon as he played that first guitar he said, “There it is; that’s what I want.”
As for the “Legend Tone” construction, it’s a veneered guitar with a deeper body and bigger cavity. It also has a true bass-reflex baffle inside of it that redirects the bass portion of the sound exiting the body, and therefore the bass is very tight and large.
What do you specifically look for in tonewoods for your guitars?
Over the past 24 years, I’ve found that the resonator guitar is not a guitar. It’s a speaker cabinet. Some of my guitars are solid woods, and the others are veneered or plywood. The “Legend Tone” series guitar is plywood. It’s my best selling guitar. Both signature guitars for Jerry and Mike are veneered models, but they are very specifically designed with speaker cabinet technology in mind. All the woods used for the solid-wood models all affect the tone distinctly differently.
For example, the curly maple is very bright and loud, but mahogany is warm and rich. The veneered guitars with my bass-reflex baffle inside are crystal clear and more bell-like. That’s what Mike and Jerry heard and loved.
Why do you offer cutaway models?
Resonator guitars work better if they are a 12-fret neck joined to the body. Unfortunately, a lot of guitarists aren’t used to 12 frets clear of the body, they’re used to 14. The reason the 12 frets are so popular on resonators is that it allows the body to be a little larger and sound better. The guitars that are 14-fret necks are a smaller body, because the way the resonator is laid out on the top. They’re missing that airflow found in the 12-fret necks. The cutaway gives you a bigger body, which makes it sound good, but still gives you clearance up the neck.
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[laughs] That guitar is kind of an over-the-top departure, since I’m a very mechanical person. It allows you to put all three resonator systems in it—it comes with a 9-1/2 biscuit resonator, a 10-1/2 spider resonator, and the traditional tri-cone resonator. In the amount of time it takes to remove the coverplate screws and take the strings off, you can switch out the system. It’s really three guitars in one instrument.
What about pickups?
I recently co-designed a new pickup with Larry Fishman, and that’s the new Jerry Douglas pickup with the Fishman Aura technology. We recorded Jerry’s Beard guitar through 16 different high-end mics, and Larry applied the latest Aura technology to the resonator’s needs… for the first time you’re able to play this instrument at rock ‘n’ roll volume, but with that distinct resonator tone.
That’s pretty exciting, because resonator players have always struggled to cut through the mix and be heard.
I’ve been fighting this problem since day one. Larry and I have worked on this project for at least eight years. He told me that this project has been the hardest pickup he’s ever developed. We’ve been tweaking and improving it before taking it to the market, but Jerry has been using it for over a year now. He doesn’t even use a microphone, because he plugs right into an amp.
I notice that quite a few builders use you as a resource for their cones and other resonator parts.
When I started this business I had a lot of people calling me up saying, “I know you build these dobros, where did you get the parts?” And of course, I built them myself, so I decided I might as well make parts and sell them to other builders. So, I created Resophonic Outfitters and now distribute parts to quite a few builders.
Who are some artists that play your guitars?
Obviously Jerry Douglas and Mike Auldridge, but also John Fogerty, Robert Randolph, Timothy B. Schmidt [Eagles], Buddy Emmons, Pete Anderson, Bob Minner [Tim McGraw], Gary Morse, and the list goes on. I’m a lucky man.
What is your building philosophy?
I’m always trying to change and improve. I do a lot of experimentation—a lot that have failed, but that’s how you learn. Tone is first, and construction needs to be impeccable as far as workmanship.
Hit page 3 for our second Resonator Builder, Crafters of Tennessee...
Crafters of Tennessee
Nashville, Tennessee
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I just simply love the sound of the Dobro. I like the old pre-war style sounds from people like Oswald and Josh Graves, and of course all of the stuff that dad had done throughout the years. I was really intrigued when dad started doing a lot of the stuff with John Hartford, Norman Blake and Vassar Clements with the Aereo-Plain band. I fell in love with those sounds, and it kind of steered my building towards a lot of the old, original stuff. I had an engineering background and wanted to gain as much knowledge of what was actually producing these types of sound. So, ultimately in those days, we designed and built our own coverplates, our own cones, our own spiders. And I still do that today.
So would you consider your designs to be more traditional?
We’re still of the old school; we still do the old parallelogram soundwells. You know, the resophonic world has gotten a lot of great builders involved, and there are a lot of ideas around the acoustic side, about what makes those instruments sound and do what they do. They’ve come up with the baffle system and the soundpost, and all these different variations throughout the years, but it’s kind of funny, because we did the baffle systems back in the seventies, 15 years before a lot of these builders even thought of building instruments. We did soundposts, we did soundwells, we did no soundwells, we did parallelogram soundwells—we’ve experimented throughout the years. I love the old parallelogram soundwells and their tonal qualities. We’ve experimented, and we offer different depths and waist dimensions and all of that, but a lot of those types of things are built on custom orders.
Can you tell me a little bit about your operations in Tennessee?
We have a 3000 square foot shop located on Lebanon Pike in Nashville, and we just have three people. I like the little, small atmosphere—I’ve had as many as 25 people working for me, and that drove me into five bypasses. [laughs] Plus, we build for a lot of high-end musicians, and they like that oneon- one type of service.
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Yeah, I do a lot of the building, and my son Travis works for me now, and I taught him all of the CNC stuff. Also Jerry Laliberte, who has worked for me for about 15 years. We do everything in house. We have the big, square boards and huge logs of lumber, and we go from that, machining it all the way down. We do every bit of the woodworking, the pearl inlay, all of it.
Tell us about the tonewoods you’re using on your resophonics.
I’ve been pretty fortunate to have acquired over 35 years a large stock of old-growth Brazilian rosewood, so I do quite a few of them out of Brazilian. I also do a lot of the matched crotch walnut and burl walnut, but my standards are curly maple and mahogany. We also do some out of Indian rosewood, so we have a pretty rounded availability of wood types.
How does a walnut guitar differ in sound from a rosewood or mahogany model?
Well, walnut is kind of in-between. It has a little more softness to it, tonally, but it has a great response as far as the projection. The tonal qualities are very balanced, and walnut is an excellent choice for resophonics. A lot of people don’t end up getting walnut resos, but I think it’s a very underrated wood in the guitar market. We have a lot of resources for getting walnut in this country, and it makes for an absolute cannon of a guitar.
I also saw you offer some guitars with 24k-gold plating; do you like adding that kind of ornamentation to your instruments?
I do. I don’t like it when it gets too wild, even though I’ve done some extremely wild ones [laughs]. Just to give you an example, we did a metal body back in the nineties, and it was all engraved, and then we came back and set 6000 rhinestones into the engraving. So, it gets pretty intricate, but there’s a huge difference between being fancy and being gaudy. What we do is themes—we develop the artwork, the pearl and the engraving so it all flows together.
If there’s a resophonic player looking at your guitars and comparing them to other high-end builders, why should they buy a Crafters?
Well, I think there are two or three reasons that I would relate to, and one of them is the longetivity of what we’re doing. We’re here 40 years later. We’re still building, and a lot of instrument companies and independent builders have not been out there that long. Who knows if they’re going to be around two years, five years, ten years from now? I think being able to stand behind what you’ve done for 30 or 40 years is a big part of ordering something, because you know the people are still there, still doing it and have been for years.
I think the quality of what we’re doing rates right up there with anybody that’s out there, on the high-end side. I don’t think the competition has the knowledge of doing what we’re doing and what we’ve accomplished. We’ve built for many, many artists: 480 artists have bought instruments from us throughout all these years, from John Fogerty to Garth Brooks.
Hit page 4 for the third of our Resonator Builders, Rayco Resophonics...
Rayco Resophonics
Smithers, British Columbia, Canada
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I was in a band down in Vancouver playing electric swing and I was offered a chance to join a bluegrass band, but I didn’t have a resonator guitar. I was working at Larrivee Guitars at the time—with my current building partner Jason Friesen—and we just thought, “Why go buy a resonator when we’ve built so many guitars with Jean Larrivee?” So, we built our first resonator guitar and it was well received, so we kept building them.
What influences from other resonator guitars can be found in your shop’s work?
I think Tim Scheerhorn’s name will come up a lot. As far as resonator guitars, he brought it to a whole other level with the selection of his materials, level of craftsmanship, and the overall sound of his instruments.
I noticed on your site that you use Scheerhorn designed cones. Are there any other Scheerhorn parts you use?
We tried out the cones first on my personal instrument—as I do with all new parts and ideas—as I’m familiar with how that guitar sounds, and how the changes affect its tone. I tried the Scheerhorn cone, and it had a warm, direct punch with an emphasized mids and not washy, but clean lows. We also use a Scheerhorn coverplate because it offers a removable palm rest, which is nice for allowing a clean access to the saddles for repairs and adjustments.
Why do you use nut-serts with stainless steel bolts to fasten the coverplate? Is this an industry standard?
It’s not an industry standard, but there are some other guys out there doing it, like Paul Beard. The reason we do this is because it’s a little knurled insert into the wood, and as you screw in the stainless steel bolt, it spreads that knurl into the wood and it just wedges itself in there. You get a really nice seal on the coverplate to the body and you don’t have to worry about stripping the screw holes when cleaning or adjusting the coverplate area.
Are the tonewoods used on your resonators similar to tonewoods we associate with acoustics?
One thing that has to be said about the resonator guitar is that it’s not like an acoustic, where the wood is built lightly to resonate, so when you strum a chord the whole thing vibrates and you get that woody tone. The sound generator in a resonator guitar is the resonator, so you want to build something that allows the resonator to speak its best. The most important thing about the tonewoods used on a resonator guitar is the deflective characters— how readily it kicks back the tone that’s produced inside the cavity.
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The back is thin, like a typical acoustic guitar. Our first model that came out had a 3/16" back and top with parallel sides, so it was a really sturdy guitar. We decided to thin down the backs and arch them, just like an acoustic. From the back and profile shot of our guitars, they look like traditional acoustics—and the reason for that was to use the soundpost to activate the back to produce a tone.
Do you guys offer any particular brand of pickups for your guitars?
Because the sound of the resonator is so complex—it’s produced in two different areas—the projection of the aluminum cone out of the front and the body cavity as well, a good well-placed mic is often preferred. When a mic is not an option, we have been putting in Schertler BASIK pickups co-designed with Tim Scheerhorn. It’s a nice, warm-sounding pickup and represents the complex sound of the resonator quite nicely. We often discuss pickup options with our roundneck customers depending on the desired resulting tone.
How far are you willing to let customers design and customize their guitars?
Our key focus is to build something that people will be happy playing for a long time, so within certain parameters, we’ll listen to their ideas and recommend different woods, parts and setups. We both really enjoy working with our customers. Ultimately, our name is on the guitar, so it has to be something both the customer and we can appreciate and stand by.
Why should someone turn to Rayco for a resonator guitar?
Our sound is very unique and distinct, which goes back to how we set our braces that produce those midrange tones. Resos have inherent highs and lows—produced off the back of the cone—but it’s important to have those mids, which cut through the mix. With the strong mid-presence, our guitars are naturally very loud.
Who are some professional players using your guitars?
We have Chad Jeffers [Carrie Underwood], Chad Graves [Valerie Smith and Liberty Pike], Todd Livingston [Ralph Stanley II], Randy Kohrs, Sally Van Meter, Keith Scott (Bryan Adams), David Lafleur and Jerry Douglas.
What’s your building philosophy?
Jason and I are very thankful to have worked with Jean Larrivee, because we learned that it’s important to pay attention to the quality of materials and parts. In addition, we always have to make sure that our level of craftsmanship is impeccable. We always try to push and challenge each other, and not settle for mediocrity.
Hit page 5 for the fourth of our Resonator Builders, S.B. MacDonald...
S.B. MacDonald
Huntington, New York
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I was teaching a guitar-making class at a local college, and in every class I got to keep a guitar that I built. And my son was on the way, so I thought, “what could I do that would be a niche market and there’s not a lot of options for?” I just saw an opportunity to create what I thought would be a really superior electric resonator instrument that would be a fusion for regular electric players who want to get that reso vibe, and have it still feel like a normal electric guitar in their hands.
How long did the conception of that design take?
Not too long. There’s not a lot to it, really. It’s just a matter of finding the right flow and look. And when you make guitars, you see guitars in everything anyway. [laughs]
For readers who might not be familiar, tell us a little more about where the Resonator Electric might fit into a player’s guitar collection.
The whole thing about the electric resonator is that it really completes your arsenal of electric guitars, because it can do things that a normal electric guitar can’t. It has a twanginess and a full, deep, textured bottom end that sounds unlike any electric guitar. You can make it sound like a whole bunch of things, but with that resonator growl. So you might only use it for two or three songs out of ten or so, but it’s going to add a dimension to your instruments that you won’t have if you don’t have it. It’s a really distinctive sound that you cannot get with any other type of electric guitar.
What kind of body wood are you using for the Resonator Electric?
I’m using poplar right now—it vibrates very nicely, and it’s light, so it has a jangly quality, but it’s also very stable.
You offer a variety of neck profiles and nut widths on this guitar, but what about fretboard woods? It appears that ebony is standard on the Resonator Electric, but do you also offer maple?
I really like the tone and stiffness of the ebony. For those who like the slickness of a finished maple fingerboard, I hard buff the ebony to a super shiny gloss. The tone and sustain of the ebony is crucial for this guitar. In the 13 years I’ve offered this model, not one has ever been back for a truss rod adjustment because of the quarter-sawn grain and choice of ebony.
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I use a lot of different pickups, depending on what people want. If somebody wants a Tele pickup on the electric resonator, I only use Lindy’s because he can do custom winding for me that I’m very happy with.
What do you particularly like about Lindy’s stuff?
Lindy is the man; he’s never let me down. If I want something underwound slightly for twang, or overwound for a little more meat, he’s got it. He will custom wind pickups any way I want them, to voice the pickups to the right tone and spirit for the player.
You’re known for working very closely with your clients, can you tell us what the process is like?
Well, for people out of the country or out of state who can’t come here locally, I get to know them as well as I can. If they have recordings, I ask them to send me their records or their CDs. I even get people to send me actual-size Xeroxes of their hands and photographs of them holding guitars, because balance, the size of their hands, how they hold the guitar are all important. It’s everything from the nut width, the scale length, the string spacing to which leg do they play it on. Let’s say they put the waist on their left leg—the jack might bump into their right leg if it’s in the wrong place. It’s just a lot of ergonomic issues.
Who are your instruments designed for?
They’re built for anyone whose music really matters to them. I’ve had a couple celebrities here and they order guitars, and I have people who are working in grocery stores and on postal routes—you know, truck drivers and teachers. And I’ve said no to a great number of people, because I just wasn’t connecting with the energy. If I’m going to hand-make a guitar for somebody, I want somebody who’s really going to appreciate the guitar, care about it and use it and play it and write songs on it—somebody who will grow with it. I don’t want to make guitars for people who are going to hang them in a showcase.
The Electric Resonator is a truly original design. Have musicians responded well to it?
Well, I made one for Robert Hunter, the Grateful Dead lyricist, and Lucinda Williams has one, which she played on Saturday Night Live once, which was kind of cool. I’ve made maybe 80 of these things in the last 12 years, and I know that they get handed around and borrowed and loaned out, and I’ve heard all kinds of names of people that I know I didn’t make them for but are playing these things. Somebody saw one on Oprah, and I was like, “I don’t know who the hell it was, but they’re getting out there!”
Hit page 6 for the fifth of our Resonator Builders, Terraplane Resonator Guitar Co...
Terraplane Resonator Guitar Co.
Bridgewater, New Jersey
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I’d say not just resonator guitars, but specifically metal-bodied resonators, because that really narrows down the field and competition, which was definitely a reason I was drawn to them. I’ve built every style of guitar in my 36 years of building, but I wanted to get back into it again and I saw that market as a huge opening.
Besides the reduced competition, what else drew you to creating metal-bodied resonators?
I always loved the sound and tone of those guitars. In addition, it’s truly a challenge to work in metal rather than wood, so that keeps me on my toes. For me, it’s been a learning experience shifting to metal, and that keeps things interesting, always being a student.
Like woods, there are a variety of metals that builders can use. What metals do you work with?
I use brass and nickel-silver.
Why those particular metals?
Well, there’s a tonal difference in any type of metal used for instruments. In my experience as a total hand-builder on these, you got to be able to move the metal fairly easily. I’m not saying steel is out, but it’s definitely a lot harder to move, mold and work with.
What type of cones do you use for your resonators?
My guitars can take either a National-style cone or Dobro-style spider cone, which I believe gives my customers a choice, depending on their preferences and playing style.
Why do you offer resonators as single cutaway models?
To give players the ability to get the upper range for upright-style playing because with a body style like that you can play all the way up to the last fret. On a typical resonator, at the 12th or 14th fret, you are limited on your range, but with a single cutaway model a player can pretty much play up and down the entire neck.
Do your customers tend to play with that upright-style, or do you have players that use your instruments as a lap guitar?
Oh sure, one guy specifically that comes to mind is Arlen Roth, who plays a Terraplane model across his lap. I’m currently working on a traditional metal-body, square-neck guitar for Cindy Cashdollar, and she’ll play that across her lap, too.
Can you describe your patent-pending string anchoring system?
I always had this in mind, even before I started building the tailpieces on these resonators, to bring the strings very close to the saddle, so there isn’t much of a break angle off the bridge and not a whole lot of string tension being transferred. Of course, as the guitar gets older, the strings with a typical tailpiece could be in a direct line as it comes off the bridge, so I have a nice break angle with the right amount of tension on it, and it’s actually very simple design.
What type of advantage does this metal give a player?
It’s just as easy to change the strings on this tailpiece as any other, but what I have noticed in other metal-bodied guitars—you get rattles off the tailpiece. My current anchoring system removes all that unnecessary rattling and jangling.
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The brass offers a warmer tone than a steel or nickel-silver body.
And with the different metals you offer, what seems to be the popular choice?
All my instruments that are made of brass can be nickel-plated. You can get the shiny look of a nickel-plated guitar with the sound of brass. The plating doesn’t alter the tone of the brass at all.
What kind of pickups do you implement into your guitars?
I generally use off-the-shelf pickups made by Jason Lollar, but as you’re aware, Jason will modify them to get the exact tone I’m looking for. The pickups are fairly similar in both positions, but I believe he uses a different wire for the bridge pickup, so the tone can be darkened up a little bit.
Why should someone choose a Terraplane guitar?
Because they’re beautiful [laughs]… you plug them in and they play like a dream. They move so much air that these guitars remind me of a Hammond B3—big, beautiful thick tones that come out of my instruments.
How deep can customers get into customizing or tinkering with a guitar?
Everything is custom on these guitars. You can mix and match features, remove something or come up with a new idea. I have a pretty standardized neck, but I’ve even varied from that. And even once the guitar is built, the cones are interchangeable. I want to build them their guitar.
How much do you outsource for parts and other materials?
I pretty much hand-build everything except the cones, tuners and pickups.
Who are some current artists that play your guitars?
I’ve built guitars for Sonny Landreth, Arlen Roth, Johnny Winter and Cindy Cashdollar.
What’s your building philosophy?
It’s just like my philosophy on just about anything in life and career: give it 100 percent, and make sure the customer gets exactly what they want.
Keith Urban’s first instrument was a ukulele at age 4. When he started learning guitar two years later, he complained that it made his fingers hurt. Eventually, he came around. As did the world.
He’s in the Songwriters Hall of Fame. He’s won 13 Country Music Association Awards, nine CMT video awards, eight ARIA (Australian Recording Industry Association) Awards, four American Music Awards, and racked up BMI Country Awards for 25 different singles.
He’s been a judge on American Idol and The Voice. In conjunction with Yamaha, he has his own brand of affordably priced Urban guitars and amps, and he has posted beginner guitar lessons on YouTube. His 2014 Academy of Country Music Award-winning video for “Highways Don’t Care” featured Tim McGraw and Keith’s former opening act, Taylor Swift. Add his marriage to fellow Aussie, the actress Nicole Kidman, and he’s seen enough red carpet to cover a football field.
Significantly, his four Grammys were all for Country Male Vocal Performance. A constant refrain among newcomers is, “and he’s a really good guitar player,” as if by surprise or an afterthought. Especially onstage, his chops are in full force. There are country elements, to be sure, but rock, blues, and pop influences like Mark Knopfler are front and center.
Unafraid to push the envelope, 2020’s The Speed of Now Part 1 mixed drum machines, processed vocals, and a duet with Pink with his “ganjo”—an instrument constructed of a 6-string guitar neck on a banjo body—and even a didgeridoo. It, too, shot to No. 1 on the Billboard Country chart and climbed to No. 7 on the Pop chart.
His new release, High, is more down-to-earth, but is not without a few wrinkles. He employs an EBow on “Messed Up As Me” and, on “Wildfire,” makes use of a sequencerreminiscent of ZZ Top’s “Legs.” Background vocals in “Straight Lines” imitate a horn section, and this time out he duets on “Go Home W U” with rising country star Lainey Wilson. The video for “Heart Like a Hometown” is full of home movies and family photos of a young Urban dwarfed by even a 3/4-size Suzuki nylon-string.
Born Keith Urbahn (his surname’s original spelling) in New Zealand, his family moved to Queensland, Australia, when he was 2. He took up guitar at 6, two years after receiving his beloved ukulele. He released his self-titled debut album in 1991 for the Australian-only market, and moved to Nashville two years later. It wasn’t until ’97 that he put out a group effort, fronting the Ranch, and another self-titled album marked his American debut as a leader, in ’99. It eventually went platinum—a pattern that’s become almost routine.
The 57-year-old’s celebrity and wealth were hard-earned and certainly a far cry from his humble beginnings. “Australia is a very working-class country, certainly when I was growing up, and I definitely come from working-class parents,” he details. “My dad loved all the American country artists, like Johnny Cash, Haggard, Waylon. He didn’t play professionally, but before he got married he played drums in a band, and my grandfather and uncles all played instruments.
One of Urban’s biggest influences as a young guitar player was Mark Knopfler, but he was also mesmerized by lesser-known session musicians such as Albert Lee, Ian Bairnson, Reggie Young, and Ray Flacke. Here, he’s playing a 1950 Broadcaster once owned by Waylon Jennings that was a gift from Nicole Kidman, his wife.
“For me, it was a mix of that and Top 40 radio, which at the time was much more diverse than it is now. You would just hear way more genres, and Australia itself had its own, what they call Aussie pub rock—very blue-collar, hard-driving music for the testosterone-fueled teenager. Grimy, sweaty, kind of raw themes.”
A memorable event happened when he was 7. “My dad got tickets for the whole family to see Johnny Cash. He even bought us little Western shirts and bolo ties. It was amazing.”
But the ukulele he was gifted a few years earlier, at the age of 4, became a constant companion. “I think to some degree it was my version of the stuffed animal, something that was mine, and I felt safe with it. My dad said I would strum it in time to all the songs on the radio, and he told my mom, ‘He’s got rhythm. I wonder what a good age is for him to learn chords.’ My mom and dad ran a little corner store, and a lady named Sue McCarthy asked if she could put an ad in the window offering guitar lessons. They said, ‘If you teach our kid for free, we’ll put your ad in the window.’”
Yet, guitar didn’t come without problems. “With the guitar, my fingers hurt like hell,” he laughs, “and I started conveniently leaving the house whenever the guitar teacher would show up. Typical kid. I don’t wanna learn, I just wanna be able to do it. It didn’t feel like any fun. My dad called me in and went, ‘What the hell? The teacher comes here for lessons. What’s the problem?’ I said I didn’t want to do it anymore. He just said, ‘Okay, then don’t do it.’ Kind of reverse psychology, right? So I just stayed with it and persevered. Once I learned a few chords, it was the same feeling when any of us learn how to be moving on a bike with two wheels and nobody holding us up. That’s what those first chords felt like in my hands.”
Keith Urban's Gear
Urban has 13 Country Music Association Awards, nine CMT video awards, eight ARIA Awards, and four Grammys to his name—the last of which are all for Best Country Male Vocal Performance.
Guitars
For touring:
- Maton Diesel Special
- Maton EBG808TE Tommy Emmanuel Signature
- 1957 Gibson Les Paul Junior, TV yellow
- 1959 Gibson ES-345 (with Varitone turned into a master volume)
- Fender 40th Anniversary Tele, “Clarence”
- Two first-generation Fender Eric Clapton Stratocasters (One is black with DiMarzio Area ’67 pickups, standard tuning. The other is pewter gray, loaded with Fralin “real ’54” pickups, tuned down a half-step.)
- John Bolin Telecaster (has a Babicz bridge with a single humbucker and a single volume control. Standard tuning.)
- PRS Paul’s Guitar (with two of their narrowfield humbuckers. Standard tuning.)
- Yamaha Keith Urban Acoustic Guitar (with EMG ACS soundhole pickups)
- Deering “ganjo”
Amps
- Mid-’60s black-panel Fender Showman (modified by Chris Miller, with oversized transformers to power 6550 tubes; 130 watts)
- 100-watt Dumble Overdrive Special (built with reverb included)
- Two Pacific Woodworks 1x12 ported cabinets (Both are loaded with EV BlackLabel Zakk Wylde signature speakers and can handle 300 watts each.)
Effects
- Two Boss SD-1W Waza Craft Super Overdrives with different settings
- Mr. Black SuperMoon Chrome
- FXengineering RAF Mirage Compressor
- Ibanez TS9 with Tamura Mod
- Boss BD-2 Blues Driver
- J. Rockett Audio .45 Caliber Overdrive
- Pro Co RAT 2
- Radial Engineering JX44 (for guitar distribution)
- Fractal Audio Axe-Fx XL+ (for acoustic guitars)
- Two Fractal Audio Axe-Fx III (one for electric guitar, one for bass)
- Bricasti Design Model 7 Stereo Reverb Processor
- RJM Effect Gizmo (for pedal loops)
(Note: All delays, reverb, chorus, etc. is done post amp. The signal is captured with microphones first then processed by Axe-Fx and other gear.)
- Shure Axient Digital Wireless Microphone System
Strings & Picks
- D’Addario NYXL (.011–.049; electric)
- D’Addario EJ16 (.012–.053; acoustics)
- D’Addario EJ16, for ganjo (.012–.053; much thicker than a typical banjo strings)
- D’Addario 1.0 mm signature picks
He vividly remembers the first song he was able to play after “corny songs like ‘Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’ bread.’” He recalls, “There was a song I loved by the Stylistics, ‘You Make Me Feel Brand New.’ My guitar teacher brought in the sheet music, so not only did I have the words, but above them were the chords. I strummed the first chord, and went, [sings E to Am] ‘My love,’ and then minor, ‘I'll never find the words, my,’ back to the original chord, ‘love.’ Even now, I get covered in chills thinking what it felt like to sing and put that chord sequence together.”
After the nylon-string Suzuki, he got his first electric at 9. “It was an Ibanez copy of a Telecaster Custom—the classic dark walnut with the mother-of-pearl pickguard. My first Fender was a Stratocaster. I wanted one so badly. I’d just discovered Mark Knopfler, and I only wanted a red Strat, because that’s what Knopfler had. And he had a red Strat because of Hank Marvin. All roads lead to Hank!”
He clarifies, “Remember a short-lived run of guitar that Fender did around 1980–’81, simply called ‘the Strat’? I got talked into buying one of those, and the thing weighed a ton. Ridiculously heavy. But I was just smitten when it arrived. ‘Sultans of Swing’ was the first thing I played on it. ‘Oh my god! I sound a bit like Mark.’”
“Messed Up As Me” has some licks reminiscent of Knopfler. “I think he influenced a huge amount of my fingerpicking and melodic choices. I devoured those records more than any other guitar player. ‘Tunnel of Love,’ ‘Love over Gold,’ ‘Telegraph Road,’ the first Dire Straits album, and Communique. I was spellbound by Mark’s touch, tone, and melodic choice every time.”
Other influences are more obscure. “There were lots of session guitar players whose solos I was loving, but had no clue who they were,” he explains. “A good example was Ian Bairnson in the Scottish band Pilot and the Alan Parsons Project. It was only in the last handful of years that I stumbled upon him and did a deep dive, and realized he played the solo on ‘Wuthering Heights’ by Kate Bush, ‘Eye in the Sky’ by Alan Parsons, ‘It’s Magic’ and ‘January’ by Pilot’—all these songs that spoke to me growing up. I also feel like a lot of local-band guitar players are inspirations—they certainly were to me. They didn’t have a name, the band wasn’t famous, but when you’re 12 or 13, watching Barry Clough and guys in cover bands, it’s, ‘Man, I wish I could play like that.’”
On High, Urban keeps things song-oriented, playing short and economical solos.
In terms of country guitarists, he nods, “Again, a lot of session players whose names I didn’t know, like Reggie Young. The first names I think would be Albert Lee and Ray Flacke, whose chicken pickin’ stuff on the Ricky Skaggs records became a big influence. ‘How is he doing that?’”
Flacke played a role in a humorous juxtaposition. “I camped out to see Iron Maiden,” Urban recounts. “They’d just put out Number of the Beast, and I was a big fan. I was 15, so my hormones were raging. I’d been playing country since I was 6, 7, 8 years old. But this new heavy-metal thing is totally speaking to me. So I joined a heavy metal band called Fractured Mirror, just as their guitar player. At the same time, I also discovered Ricky Skaggs and Highways and Heartaches. What is this chicken pickin’ thing? One night I was in the metal band, doing a Judas Priest song or Saxon. They threw me a solo, and through my red Strat, plugged into a Marshall stack that belonged to the lead singer, I shredded this high-distortion, chicken pickin’ solo. The lead singer looked at me like, ‘What the fuck are you doing?’ I got fired from the band.”
Although at 15 he “floated around different kinds of music and bands,” when he was 21 he saw John Mellencamp. “He’d just put out Lonesome Jubilee. I’d been in bands covering ‘Hurts So Good,' ‘Jack & Diane,’ and all the early shit. This record had fiddle and mandolin and acoustic guitars, wall of electrics, drums—the most amazing fusion of things. I saw that concert, and this epiphany happened so profoundly. I looked at the stage and thought, ‘Whoa! I get it. You take all your influences and make your own thing. That’s what John did. I’m not gonna think about genre; I’m gonna take all the things I love and find my way.’
“Of course, getting to Nashville with that recipe wasn’t going to fly in 1993,” he laughs. “Took me another seven-plus years to really start getting some traction in that town.”
Urban’s main amp today is a Dumble Overdrive Reverb, which used to belong to John Mayer. He also owns a bass amp that Alexander Dumble built for himself.
Photo by Jim Summaria
When it comes to “crossover” in country music, one thinks of Glen Campbell, Kenny Rogers, Garth Brooks, and Dolly Parton’s more commercial singles like “Two Doors Down.” Regarding the often polarizing subject and, indeed, what constitutes country music, it’s obvious that Urban has thought a lot—and probably been asked a lot—about the syndrome. The Speed of Now Part 1 blurs so many lines, it makes Shania Twain sound like Mother Maybelle Carter. Well, almost.
“I can’t speak for any other artists, but to me, it’s always organic,” he begins. “Anybody that’s ever seen me play live would notice that I cover a huge stylistic field of music, incorporating my influences, from country, Top 40, rock, pop, soft rock, bluegrass, real country. That’s how you get songs like ‘Kiss a Girl’—maybe more ’70s influence than anything else.”
“I think [Mark Knopfler] influenced a huge amount of my fingerpicking and melodic choices. I devoured those records more than any other guitar player.”
Citing ’50s producers Chet Atkins and Owen Bradley, who moved the genre from hillbilly to the more sophisticated countrypolitan, Keith argues, “In the history of country music, this is exactly the same as it has always been. Patsy Cline doing ‘Walking After Midnight’ or ‘Crazy’; it ain’t Bob Wills. It ain’t Hank Williams. It’s a new sound, drawing on pop elements. That’s the 1950s, and it has never changed. I’ve always seen country like a lung, that expands outwards because it embraces new sounds, new artists, new fusions, to find a bigger audience. Then it feels, ‘We’ve lost our way. Holy crap, I don’t even know who we are,’ and it shrinks back down again. Because a purist in the traditional sense comes along, whether it be Ricky Skaggs or Randy Travis. The only thing that I think has changed is there’s portals now for everything, which didn’t used to exist. There isn’t one central control area that would yell at everybody, ‘You’ve got to bring it back to the center.’ I don’t know that we have that center anymore.”
Stating his position regarding the current crop of talent, he reflects, “To someone who says, ‘That’s not country music,’ I always go, “‘It’s not your country music; it’s somebody else’s country music.’ I don’t believe anybody has a right to say something’s not anything. It’s been amazing watching this generation actually say, ‘Can we get back to a bit of purity? Can we get real guitars and real storytelling?’ So you’ve seen the explosion of Zach Bryan and Tyler Childers who are way purer than the previous generation of country music.”
Seen performing here in 2003, Urban is celebrated mostly for his songwriting, but is also an excellent guitarist.
Photo by Steve Trager/Frank White Photo Agency
As for the actual recording process, he notes, “This always shocks people, but ‘Chattahoochee’ by Alan Jackson is all drum machine. I write songs on acoustic guitar and drum machine, or drum machine and banjo. Of course, you go into the studio and replace that with a drummer. But my very first official single, in 1999, was ‘It’s a Love Thing,’ and it literally opens with a drum loop and an acoustic guitar riff. Then the drummer comes in. But the loop never goes away, and you hear it crystal clear. I haven’t changed much about that approach.”
On the road, Urban utilizes different electrics “almost always because of different pickups—single-coil, humbucker, P-90. And then one that’s tuned down a half-step for a few songs in half-keys. Tele, Strat, Les Paul, a couple of others for color. I’ve got a John Bolin guitar that I love—the feel of it. It’s a Tele design with just one PAF, one volume knob, no tone control. It’s very light, beautifully balanced—every string, every fret, all the way up the neck. It doesn’t have a lot of tonal character of its own, so it lets my fingers do the coloring. You can feel the fingerprints of Billy Gibbons on this guitar. It’s very Billy.”
“I looked at the stage and thought, ‘Whoa! I get it. You take all your influences and make your own thing. I’m gonna take all the things I love and find my way.’”
Addressing his role as the collector, “or acquirer,” as he says, some pieces have quite a history. “I haven’t gone out specifically thinking, ‘I’m missing this from the collection.’ I feel really lucky to have a couple of very special guitars. I got Waylon Jennings’ guitar in an auction. It was one he had all through the ’70s, wrapped in the leather and the whole thing. In the ’80s, he gave it to Reggie Young, who owned it for 25 years or so and eventually put it up for auction. My wife wanted to give it to me for my birthday. I was trying to bid on it, and she made sure that I couldn’t get registered! When it arrived, I discovered it’s a 1950 Broadcaster—which is insane. I had no idea. I just wanted it because I’m a massive Waylon fan, and I couldn’t bear the thought of that guitar disappearing overseas under somebody’s bed, when it should be played.
“I also have a 1951 Nocaster, which used to belong to Tom Keifer in Cinderella. It’s the best Telecaster I’ve ever played, hands down. It has the loudest, most ferocious pickup, and the wood is amazing.”
YouTube
Urban plays a Gibson SG here at the 2023 CMT Music Awards. Wait until the end to see him show off his shred abilities.
Other favorites include “a first-year Strat, ’54, that I love, and a ’58 goldtop. I also own a ’58 ’burst, but prefer the goldtop; it’s just a bit more spanky and lively. I feel abundantly blessed with the guitars I’ve been able to own and play. And I think every guitar should be played, literally. There’s no guitar that’s too precious to be played.”
Speaking of precious, there are also a few Dumble amps that elicit “oohs” and “aahs.” “Around 2008, John Mayer had a few of them, and he wanted to part with this particular Overdrive Special head. When he told me the price, I said, ‘That sounds ludicrous.’ He said, ‘How much is your most expensive guitar?’ It was three times the value of the amp. He said, ‘So that’s one guitar. What amp are you plugging all these expensive guitars into?’ I was like, ‘Sold. I guess when you look at it that way.’ It’s just glorious. It actually highlighted some limitations in some guitars I never noticed before.”
“It’s just glorious. It actually highlighted some limitations in some guitars I never noticed before.”
Keith also developed a relationship with the late Alexander Dumble. “We emailed back and forth, a lot of just life stuff and the beautifully eccentric stuff he was known for. His vocabulary was as interesting as his tubes and harmonic understanding. My one regret is that he invited me out to the ranch many times, and I was never able to go. Right now, my main amp is an Overdrive Reverb that also used to belong to John when he was doing the John Mayer Trio. I got it years later. And I have an Odyssey, which was Alexander’s personal bass amp that he built for himself. I sent all the details to him, and he said, ‘Yeah, that’s my amp.’”
The gearhead in Keith doesn’t even mind minutiae like picks and strings. “I’ve never held picks with the pointy bit hitting the string. I have custom picks that D’Addario makes for me. They have little grippy ridges like on Dunlops and Hercos, but I have that section just placed in one corner. I can use a little bit of it on the string, or I can flip it over. During the pandemic, I decided to go down a couple of string gauges. I was getting comfortable on .009s, and I thought, ‘Great. I’ve lightened up my playing.’ Then the very first gig, I was bending the crap out of them. So I went to .010s, except for a couple of guitars that are .011s.”
As with his best albums, High is song-oriented; thus, solos are short and economical. “Growing up, I listened to songs where the guitar was just in support of that song,” he reasons. “If the song needs a two-bar break, and then you want to hear the next vocal section, that’s what it needs. If it sounds like it needs a longer guitar section, then that’s what it needs. There’s even a track called ‘Love Is Hard’ that doesn’t have any solo. It’s the first thing I’ve ever recorded in my life where I literally don’t play one instrument. Eren Cannata co-wrote it [with Shane McAnally and Justin Tranter], and I really loved the demo with him playing all the instruments. I loved it so much I just went with his acoustic guitar. I’m that much in service of the song.”
Built on powerful dual‑engine processing and world‑class UAD modeling, ANTI 1992 High Gain Amp gives guitarists the unmistakable sound of an original "block letter" Peavey 5150 amplifier* – the notorious 120‑watt tube amp monster that fueled more than three decades of modern metal music, from Thrash and Death Metal, to Grunge, Black Metal, and more.
"With UAFX Dream, Ruby, Woodrow, and Lion amp emulators, we recreated four of the most famous guitar amps ever made," says UA Sr. Product Manager Tore Mogensen. "Now with ANTI, we're giving rock and metal players an authentic emulation of this punishing high gain amp – with the exact mic/speaker pairings and boost/noise gate effects that were responsible for some of the most groundbreaking modern metal tones ever captured."
Key Features:
- A complete emulation of the early '90s 120‑watt tone monster that defined new genres of modern metal
- Powerful UAFX dual-engine delivers the most authentic emulation of the amp ever placed in a stompbox
- Complete album‑ready sounds with built‑in noise gate, TS‑style overdrive, and TC‑style preamp boost
- Groundbreaking Dynamic Room Modeling derived from UA's award-winning OX Amp Top Box
- Six classic mic/speaker pairings used on decades of iconic metal and hard rock records
- Professional presets designed by the guitarists of Tetrarch, Jeff Loomis, and The Black Dahlia Murder
- UAFX mobile app lets you access hidden amp tweaks and mods, choose overdrive/boost, tweak noise gate, recall and archive your presets, download artist presets, and more
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For more information, please visit uaudio.com.
- YouTube
MonoNeon, aka Dywane Thomas Jr., came up learning the bass from his father in Memphis, Tennessee, but for some reason, he decided to flip his dad’s 4-string bass around and play it with the string order inverted—E string closest to the ground and the G on top. That’s how MonoNeon still plays today, coming up through a rich, inspiring gauntlet of family and community traditions. “I guess my whole style came from just being around my grandma at an early age,” says Thomas.His path has led him to collaborate with dozens of artists, including Nas, Ne-Yo, Mac Miller, and even Prince, and MonoNeon’s solo output is dizzying—trying to count up his solo releases isn’t an easy feat. Premier Guitar’s Chris Kies caught up with the bassist before his show at Nashville’s Exit/In, where he got the scoop on his signature 5-string, Ampeg rig, and simple stomp layout, as well as some choice stories about influences, his brain-melting playing style, and how Prince changed his rig.
Brought to you by D’Addario.
Orange You Glad to See Me?
This Fender MonoNeon Jazz Bass V was created after a rep messaged Thomas on Instagram to set up the signature model, over which Thomas had complete creative control. Naturally, the bass is finished in neon yellow urethane with a neon orange headstock and pickguard, and the roasted maple neck has a 10"–14" compound radius. It’s loaded with custom-wound Fireball 5-string Bass humbuckers and an active, 18V preamp complete with 3-band EQ controls. Thomas’ own has been spruced up with some custom tape jobs, too. All of MonoNeon's connections are handled by Sorry Cables.
Fade to Black
MonoNeon’s Ampeg SVT stack isn’t a choice of passion. “That’s what they had for me, so I just plugged in,” he says. “That’s what I have on my rider. As long as it has good headroom and the cones don’t break up, I’m cool.”
Box Art
MonoNeon’s bass isn’t the only piece of kit treated to custom color jobs. Almost all of his stomps have been zhuzhed up with his eye-popping palette.
Thomas had used a pitch-shifting DigiTech Whammy for a while, but after working with Paisley Park royalty, the pedal became a bigger part of his playing. “When I started playing with Prince, he put the Whammy on my pedalboard,” Thomas explains. “After he passed, I realized how special that moment was.”
Alongside the Whammy, MonoNeon runs a Fairfield Circuitry Randy’s Revenge (for any time he wants to “feel weird”), a literal Fart Pedal (in case the ring mod isn’t weird enough, we guess), and a JAM Pedals Red Muck covers fuzz and dirt needs. A CIOKS SOL powers the whole affair.
