The Parliament Funkadelic legend discusses his new album, World Wide Funk, his 6-foot pedalboard, and his lesser-known guitar playing.
What hasn’t been written about bassist Bootsy Collins?
In 1970, when Collins was just 18, he joined James Brown’s band and played bass on timeless classics like “Sex Machine,” “Super Bad,” and “Soul Power”—which for some people is enough to establish him as one of the instrument’s all-time greats. But Collins was just getting started, and two years later he joined Parliament Funkadelic.
Brown taught Collins how to interpret groove—he emphasized the one, which means resolving phrases on the downbeat—and Collins taught that concept to his new band. That one defined the sound of P-Funk, which in turn helped define the sound of funk, which—thanks to sampling and the popularity of hip-hop—was influential in shaping the next 40 years of popular music.
Collins is central to seminal Parliament releases like Chocolate City and Mothership Connection, and even his “solo” project, Bootsy’s Rubber Band, scored a number one R&B hit with “Bootzilla” in 1978. He’s also a frequent collaborator and since the ’80s has worked with everyone from Bill Laswell to Fatboy Slim to Herbie Hancock to Buckethead. In 1990, he was at the top of the charts as part of Deee-Lite’s mega-hit, “Groove Is in the Heart,” and in the early 2000s performed the Monday Night Football theme with Hank Williams Jr.
And that’s just part of his curriculum vitae.
Collins’ tonal wanderlust—in addition to his innovative playing—defined the sound of funk as well. Eddie Van Halen has the Phase 90. Jimi Hendrix had the Uni-Vibe. And Bootsy Collins has the Mu-Tron III envelope filter. That watery thump isn’t just a Collins’ trademark—that’s what funky music sounds like.
Collins was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame two decades ago, but he not only shows no signs of slowing down, he shows no signs of becoming a has-been. His new album, World Wide Funk, is surprisingly fresh. “I was trying to intertwine some of the young energy,” he says. “That’s kind of what I hang around now, a lot of young musicians, and being around that inspires me even more. I tried to incorporate that into the album.”
World Wide Funk features guest appearances from fellow bassists Victor Wooten, Stanley Clarke, Manou Gallo, and Alissia Benveniste; guitarists Eric Gales and Buckethead; drummer Dennis Chambers; rappers Doug E. Fresh, Chuck D, Dru Down, and the Blvck Seeds; singers Kali Uchis, Musiq Soulchild, and October London … and many others.
But this is Premier Guitar, so when we got Collins on the phone, our first order of business was gear. We got the lowdown on his early instruments and the history behind what eventually led to his iconic star-shaped basses. We also discussed his never-ending obsession with pedals, collaborating with other bassists, the recording of World Wide Funk, and—this may even be a first—we even got him to talk about his little known, yet very impressive, guitar playing.
You’re known for your distinctive star-shaped basses, but obviously, that’s not what you started with. I read that your first instrument was a guitar strung up with bass strings. Is that true?
Well, it didn’t have bass strings at first. It was a regular $29 job, a Silvertone guitar. The reason I put bass strings on it was because I wanted to play with my brother [Phelps “Catfish” Collins]. He played guitar and he was developing a good reputation. He’s about eight years older than I am. He was a teenager and I was, like, 9 years old. And from the beginning I wanted to play with him. So, I figured if I got a guitar, I could at least learn how to play and then the next step would be to play with him. When that next step came up, he didn’t need another guitar player, he needed a bass player. I didn’t have a bass, so I was like, “Okay, well, what do I do now?” I asked him if he would get me four bass strings. He got me four bass strings, I unwound the thickness of it at the end, I put them on the guitar, and voilà!—that was my bass guitar.
World Wide Funk, the latest album by Bootsy Collins, was mostly recorded in his Bootzilla Rehab home studio. It includes an intro by Iggy Pop and appearances by Victor Wooten, Stanley Clarke, Eric Gales, Buckethead, and Chuck D, just to name a few.
Did you still have that when you joined James Brown?
Yeah. He loved my playing but he was really done with that guitar. The color of it was beat and at that time Fender was the main thing on the market. Everybody had to play a Fender—either a P bass or a Jazz bass. I wanted one for the longest time, but I couldn’t afford it. He dogged me out about my little bass, man, like, “You can’t come up here on my stage anymore with that thing.” He wound up getting me a Fender Jazz bass.
Did you prefer the Jazz bass as opposed to the Precision?
Yes, especially at that time because I just loved the way the neck felt. It wasn’t wide all the way up the neck. It was just a perfect fit. And the sound of it—I loved the P-bass sound, too, but I liked the body shape of the Jazz. It fit real good.
Did you have a Vox bass with James Brown as well?
Yeah, I’ve still got that Vox bass [an Apollo IV] and I played it on one of the songs on the new album—I can’t think which one it was off the top of my head—but I played it on one of the songs and man, I mean, nothing sounds like that. It’s like a dead-string sound—those old flatwound strings on top of that hollow Vox bass guitar. It’s got a built-in fuzz on it and a built-in tuner. It was incredible. I used a lot of different things on this record to try to give me a facelift. I’m still keeping the old stuff, but I’m adding a little newness here and there. On different songs, I use different pedals as well.
Were you still playing the Jazz bass when you joined Funkadelic?
No, I went back to the P bass. That’s what everybody was into, back at that time. I was like, “I got to get myself together to play the P bass,” because the neck is different. I started playing it—and I started loving it. The first recordings I did with Parliament Funkadelic were with that P bass. And that P bass is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame now [laughs].
Bootsy Collins’ first Space Bass was made in 1975 by a guy named Larry Pless at Gus Zoppi Music in Warren, Michigan, which was an accordion shop. Bootsy’s current signature Warwick star basses have five pickups with four outputs, each wired to different amps and cabinets. Photo by Ebet Roberts
When did you get your first star-shaped “Space Bass?”
The first Space Bass was made in 1975 by a guy named Larry Pless, at a place called Gus Zoppi Music in Sterling Heights, Michigan. I took a drawing in there and he was a young and up-and-coming guitar maker. Wouldn’t nobody make it. I was up on 48th Street in New York—all up and down there—and I was telling them about this star bass that I wanted, and nobody was interested. I had to find somebody that would do it because, first of all, I didn’t have no money [laughs], and second of all, nobody was interested because it wasn’t hot on the market. Nobody had a star bass. Nobody was talking about a star bass. I was like, “I’ve got to find somebody that’s just into doing stuff.” And Gus Zoppi Music store was an accordion store—it wasn’t even a guitar store where I found this guy. I just happened to go in there, I started talking to the owner, I asked him if he had any suggestions, and he said, “Yes. I’ve got a young guy that’s working for me in the back that might be interested because he’s always been wanting to make guitars.” So that’s how I found this guy.
Is the neck modeled after the Fender P?
After the Fender, yeah.
What about the pickup configuration? It has both the Jazz bass pickups plus other things. How did you design that?
That was designed originally off the Fender Jazz. Then I added the P-bass pickups—that and a couple of other pickups as well. It had a combination of the Fender P bass and then what I threw up in there that I liked myself. But it’s been a lot of upgrading since then.
What about the multiple outputs?
That multiple output allowed me to not use so many cables. It was just one cable that went to the pedalboard and that’s where the signal got split up. When I first did it, it was just 2-way out. Then it became 3-way and until, I would say, up until the ’90s, it became 4-way out. That’s what it is now. Every pickup has an output. There is one pickup unit in there that has two on one output, which is designed like the Fender Jazz bass. So, the guitar actually has five pickups.
Those outputs go to different amps?
Yes. They go to different amps and different cabinets onstage. It’s a whole wall of different tones, different sounds. The pedals go to different amps as well. It kept growing. It started with a small, maybe 3-foot pedalboard case, and then it grew up to around 6 1/2 feet. That’s where it’s currently at.
What’s on there?
I got everything and its mother [laughs]. You got maybe four to six pedals on what I call the high end and the same thing on the midrange. They’re different pedals, but they’re the same amount of pedals. You got three rows: you got ultra-high, you got high end, you got mids, and then you got the low end that goes direct, which goes to my sub-woofers. It’s a lot of configurations. People said, “Can’t you just plug the thing in and play?” But I was hardheaded and I wanted to always be “in search of” and “let me find these different sounds,” you know? I’m glad I did. It was very confusing to the engineers that started recording me first, because nobody was used to that. All they were used to was, “Plug that thing in and let’s hit it.” And, I don’t know, that era was changing. Synthesizers were coming in—it wasn’t in yet—but it was coming in. I guess I wanted something different. I didn’t want just the same old bass sounds that everybody got. So, I took a dive for it.
In the studio, do you use that whole pedalboard or do you just isolate what you need?
When I do outside studio work, that pedalboard goes with me. Whatever is in the pedalboard pretty much stays. When I’m recording myself in my own studio, I got the pedalboard plus a gazillion pedals if I want to throw something in or take something out. It’s easy for me at my studio where I can record things the way I want to. But when I go out doing stuff in other places, I just take the main pedalboard and those are usually the sounds I usually use. But on this new album, I was reaching for different things on different songs. I had access to any and everything, which was great. It helps fuel me as well. Uplifts me. Give me different sounds—when I hear different sounds, it motivates me. Either they’re good—they do something good to you—or it’s, “I don’t like that sound, let me try this other one.” Those are the kind of things I like to deal with. It’s kind of like painting. It’s like, “I don’t like that color. Let me try another color.” That is part of my creative process and it’s been that way forever.
Do different pedals and sounds inspire different types of riffs or make you play differently?
Yes, and that goes mainly for bass. But I found out even with Bernie Worrell—who was the keyboard player—I noticed any time he would do a different sound, it would make him play different. So, I didn’t feel so bad when I saw him doing it because he was really legit [laughs]. [Editor’s note: Worrell studied at the New England Conservatory of Music in the 1960s and was awarded an honorary doctorate just before his death in 2016]. Here I was from the James Brown school and we didn’t know nothing. I didn’t know how to read. All I knew how to do was hear these sounds and I wanted to play them.
Nowadays, do you experiment with computer modeling, plug-ins, and things like that?
I don’t. But I don’t knock it. It just seems like everything is kind of “pre-” now. I like the fact of having to find my way through different things. You can compare it like this: You know how they used to tell you to get lost? Well nowadays, you can’t even get lost because you’ve got the GPS. But getting lost was part of the experience. That was the part where you had to figure out how to get back—or how to get there. That’s being taken away and, to me, that was the fun part. I don’t want to take that away. All those old pedals, the old stuff, I love it—anything you can step on.
Check out one of Bootsy’s Rubber Band’s earliest concerts from 1976.
This is the mother lode for Bootsy fans. Collins takes a film crew on a tour of his home studio and shows off his huge collection of classic instruments.
Collins is known for his colorful costumes, but it doesn’t stop there. His bass tonal colors helped define the funk genre. “It’s kind of like painting,” he says. “It’s like, ‘I don’t like that color. Let me try another color.’” He’s shown here in 1990 with
his 1969 Ampeg upright bass. Photo by Ebet Roberts
How much does that original Space Bass weigh? It looks like it weighs a ton.
Well, you know, the first one actually did weigh a ton. I don’t know exactly what it weighed, but it was all solid wood and it was heavy. I never really paid it that much attention because I guess I was so young and energetic and I didn’t care. I just wanted to play that star bass. I didn’t care what it weighed. I was really concerned with how it sounded and what it looked like—and that’s pretty much it. If I could play it, then that’s what I wanted. The one I got now that’s made by Warwick, it’s much lighter. I notice it now because I put the old one on—the 1975 one—and it’s heavy. But I never noticed that before.
People don’t know that you’re also a guitar player. I interviewed George Clinton and Blackbyrd McKnight a few years ago [“Parliament Funkadelic: A Funk Guitar Roundtable,” March 2016] and they said your guitar playing is “dangerous.”
[Laughs]. That’s pretty deep. Nah. I just play what I hear in my head and that’s usually when we’re coming up with stuff—like a track and a riff. I’m pretty good at that because those are things I just hear. That’s probably why they said it. But being amazing and dangerous and all that? No, I doubt that very seriously.
Do you play the rhythm guitar parts on the new album? Is that mostly you?
A lot of it, yeah. And then Keith Cheatham, who was playing a lot on the road with us. He took Catfish’s place. I’d never found nobody that had Catfish locked down, other than Keith. He used to play with Sun [’70s/’80s R&B group], and he plays on a lot of this new album. It’s hard—it’s almost becoming a dinosaur thing to be able to do that, because that’s not the emphasis now—but for me, it’s always about that groove, that lock, that riff, that hook. You get that going and then you space out. But of course, that’s the idea from back in the day. Now it’s like everything is outer space. But I can dig it.
Are your guitars recorded direct to the board or do you have guitar amps and effects set up in your studio as well?
I got amps and I got direct. I got the old 50-watt Ampeg with the two 12s. I mean, you name it. The old Epiphone, the old Gibson, the old Fender Twin Reverb—all that old stuff, I got it. I got the B-3 organ. I mean, fully blown. Musicians come in and have a field day. It’s like having a studio with things you can touch. These are things you can actually get on and play. And I don’t care what era a musician was brought up in, when he’s able to sit down, jam, mess around, and experiment—when he can do that—that’s when he fully gets a chance to open up with his own self-expression and beat it out of himself. I think it’s very important to be able to beat it out, because otherwise you sit there and play with yourself. And I just don’t like playing with myself like that [laughs].
Do you play guitar with a pick or do you strum with your fingers?
With a pick. Just like my older brother Catfish. I learned from him and he was the greatest at it.
You feature a lot of other bass players on the new album as well. How do you arrange that?
It was about coordinating it and putting it together in a way that doesn’t step on anybody’s toes. This was like a team kind of thing. I didn’t want to do it where it all just sounds like a whooof. You know how you can put a lot of comedians together who are all great on their own, but when you put them together it just ain’t happening? Well, that’s the same idea. I wanted it to be where you had your own space and wasn’t nobody stepping on that. That’s you. It’s your turn.
You travel with a second bass player in your live act as well.
Yes. I started doing that because it kept getting more difficult for me to perform and take care of all the crazy business. It was just nuts. I’ve always loved to play, but to play and take care of all the airports—I mean, the road is just so stupid now—and it’s like I needed somebody I could rely on. I play and sing the songs and that was getting difficult—playing, singing, and trying to entertain the people was a little bit much for me. If it was just getting up there and playing, okay, I can do that. It was a lot of pressure lifted off when I added that. It made playing and being onstage a lot more fun.
When you play bass, does he lay out or do you just have two basses going?
He drops his volume or he leaves the stage, it just depends on what song it is.
How was the album recorded?
I engineered all the analog stuff. We did about 65 to 70 percent of the album here in the Bootzilla Rehab [home studio]—and the other parts we had to send out. Iggy Pop did the intro at a studio in New York. Dennis Chambers was on the road, so this time he had to record the drums where he was at. A lot of the musicians that I used were on the road—because it was the summer time and everybody was out. I took off to do this record. I had time to do whatever I needed to do. But the people that I wanted to get, I had to see if it fit into their schedule. Some of them came in and then had to leave right out. Some I had to send the files to, and me and my engineer, Tobe Donohue, interacted with the other musicians through Pro Tools.
When you record in the studio, do you sit in the control room or do you sit with your amps and play?
I’m in the control room, because once I pretty much got my sound, it always stays set up. That’s a good thing because when I used to have to tear it down to go out on the road, it was really draining to have to set it all back up. Through this album, it was always set up. All I had to do was turn it on and if I needed to put a different pedal or different thing, it’s all sitting right there in the control room.
You didn’t slap at first. When did you start doing that?
Well, when I first started, I was playing with my thumb. Then the new thing was the fingerstyle. When I saw Marshall Jones, of the Ohio Players, doing it with the fingerstyle, I was like, “Wow, that’s the new way of playing.” I jumped on practicing like that and I got good at it. And the next thing, Larry Graham came on the scene playing the slap, and I wanted to pick that up and infiltrate that with what I was doing. And that’s where it all started.
Many years ago, I was backstage at a P-Funk show and you showed up wearing an amazing jacket that had an American flag on one side and a Soviet flag on the other. Do you still have it?
Actually, I’ve still got that jacket. I mean, I probably wouldn’t wear it right now. [Laughs.]
Bootsy Collins' Gear
Assorted Warwick Signature models (star-shaped and double-horned) that are equipped with DR Strings BZ-50 Bootzilla Signature Bass Strings (.050–.110)
Amps:
Warwick PR 40 Jonas Hellborg Preamp (3), Hughes & Kettner BassBase 600, SWR Mo’Bass, Mesa/Boogie M9 Carbine, dbx 120XP Subharmonic Synthesizer, Monster Power PRO 2500 Rack PowerCenter, Mesa/Boogie Subway D-800 with matching cabs, Ampeg Portaflex with matching cab, and assorted custom cabs with stars.
it motivates me.”
Bootsy’s Pedalboard
Electro-Harmonix H.O.G.2
Electro-Harmonix H.O.G.2 foot controller
DigiTech Bass Whammy (blue)
Eventide H9
Mesa/Boogie Flux Drive
Boss BF02 Flanger
Boss DD-7 Digital Delay
Boss DD-5 Digital Delay
Beigel Sound Lab Mu-FX Tru-Tron 3X
Darkglass Duality fuzz
Electro-Harmonix Metal Muff
Electro-Harmonix Bass Micro Synth
DOD FX25 Envelope Filter
Panda Audio Future Impact I. Bass Synth
DOD FX59 Thrash Master fuzz
Pigtronix Mothership 2 analog synthesizer
DigiTech Whammy
DigiTech Space Station XP300
Lovetone Ring Stinger
Mu-Tron III
Korg ToneWorks G5 bass synth
Amptweaker FatMetal Pro
Xotic Robotalk 2
Radial Firefly DI
Pedalboard Overflow: Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi, Stone Deaf FX Fig Fumb V1 fuzz, Darkglass MicroTubes 900, Chunk Systems Octavius Squeezer analog bass synth, DigiTech Bass Synth Wah, and Eventide PitchFactor.
“Practice Loud”! How Duane Denison Preps for a New Jesus Lizard Record
After 26 years, the seminal noisy rockers return to the studio to create Rack, a master class of pummeling, machine-like grooves, raving vocals, and knotty, dissonant, and incisive guitar mayhem.
The last time the Jesus Lizard released an album, the world was different. The year was 1998: Most people counted themselves lucky to have a cell phone, Seinfeld finished its final season, Total Request Live was just hitting MTV, and among the year’s No. 1 albums were Dave Matthews Band’s Before These Crowded Streets, Beastie Boys’ Hello Nasty, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, Korn’s Follow the Leader, and the Armageddonsoundtrack. These were the early days of mp3 culture—Napster didn’t come along until 1999—so if you wanted to hear those albums, you’d have to go to the store and buy a copy.
The Jesus Lizard’s sixth album, Blue, served as the band’s final statement from the frontlines of noisy rock for the next 26 years. By the time of their dissolution in 1999, they’d earned a reputation for extreme performances chock full of hard-hitting, machine-like grooves delivered by bassist David Wm. Sims and, at their conclusion, drummer Mac McNeilly, at times aided and at other times punctured by the frontline of guitarist Duane Denison’s incisive, dissonant riffing, and presided over by the cantankerous howl of vocalist David Yow. In the years since, performative, thrilling bands such as Pissed Jeans, METZ, and Idles have built upon the Lizard’s musical foundation.
Denison has kept himself plenty busy over the last couple decades, forming the avant-rock supergroup Tomahawk—with vocalist Mike Patton, bassist Trevor Dunn (both from Mr. Bungle), and drummer John Stanier of Helmet—and alongside various other projects including Th’ Legendary Shack Shakers and Hank Williams III. The Jesus Lizard eventually reunited, but until now have only celebrated their catalog, never releasing new jams.
The Jesus Lizard, from left: bassist David Wm. Sims, singer David Yow, drummer Mac McNeilly, and guitarist Duane Denison.
Photo by Joshua Black Wilkins
Back in 2018, Denison, hanging in a hotel room with Yow, played a riff on his unplugged electric guitar that caught the singer’s ear. That song, called “West Side,” will remain unreleased for now, but Denison explains: “He said, ‘Wow, that’s really good. What is that?’ And I said, ‘It’s just some new thing. Why don’t we do an album?’” From those unassuming beginnings, the Jesus Lizard’s creative juices started flowing.
So, how does a band—especially one who so indelibly captured the ineffable energy of live rock performance—prepare to get a new record together 26 years after their last? Back in their earlier days, the members all lived together in a band house, collectively tending to the creative fire when inspiration struck. All these years later, they reside in different cities, so their process requires sending files back and forth and only meeting up for occasional demo sessions over the course of “three or four years.”
“When the time comes to get more in performance mode, I have a practice space. I go there by myself and crank it up. I turn that amp up and turn the metronome up and play loud.” —Duane Denison
the Jesus Lizard "Alexis Feels Sick"
Distance creates an obstacle to striking while the proverbial iron is hot, but Denison has a method to keep things energized: “Practice loud.” The guitarist professes the importance of practice, in general, and especially with a metronome. “We keep very detailed records of what the beats per minute of these songs are,” he explains. “To me, the way to do it is to run it to a Bluetooth speaker and crank it, and then crank your amp. I play a little at home, but when the time comes to get more in performance mode, I have a practice space. I go there by myself and crank it up. I turn that amp up and turn the metronome up and play loud.”
It’s a proven solution. On Rack—recorded at Patrick Carney’s Audio Eagle studio with producer Paul Allen—the band sound as vigorous as ever, proving they’ve not only remained in step with their younger selves, but they may have surpassed it with faders cranked. “Duane’s approach, both as a guitarist and writer, has an angular and menacing fingerprint that is his own unique style,” explains Allen. “The conviction in his playing that he is known for from his recordings in the ’80s and ’90s is still 100-percent intact and still driving full throttle today.”
“I try to be really, really precise,” he says. “I think we all do when it comes to the basic tracks, especially the rhythm parts. The band has always been this machine-like thing.” Together, they build a tension with Yow’s careening voice. “The vocals tend to be all over the place—in and out of tune, in and out of time,” he points out. “You’ve got this very free thing moving around in the foreground, and then you’ve got this very precise, detailed band playing behind it. That’s why it works.”
Before Rack, the Jesus Lizard hadn’t released a new record since 1998’s Blue.
Denison’s guitar also serves as the foreground foil to Yow’s unhinged raving, as on “Alexis Feels Sick,” where they form a demented harmony, or on the midnight creep of “What If,” where his vibrato-laden melodies bolster the singer’s unsettled, maniacal display. As precise as his riffs might be, his playing doesn’t stay strictly on the grid. On the slow, skulking “Armistice Day,” his percussive chording goes off the rails, giving way to a solo that slices that groove like a chef’s knife through warm butter as he reorganizes rock ’n’ roll histrionics into his own cut-up vocabulary.
“During recording sessions, his first solo takes are usually what we decide to keep,” explains Allen. “Listen to Duane’s guitar solos on Jack White’s ‘Morning, Noon, and Night,’ Tomahawk’s ‘Fatback,’ and ‘Grind’ off Rack. There’s a common ‘contained chaos’ thread among them that sounds like a harmonic Rubik’s cube that could only be solved by Duane.”
“Duane’s approach, both as a guitarist and writer, has an angular and menacing fingerprint that is his own unique style.” —Rack producer Paul Allen
To encapsulate just the right amount of intensity, “I don’t over practice everything,” the guitarist says. Instead, once he’s created a part, “I set it aside and don’t wear it out.” On Rack, it’s obvious not a single kilowatt of musical energy was lost in the rehearsal process.
Denison issues his noisy masterclass with assertive, overdriven tones supporting his dissonant voicings like barbed wire on top of an electric fence. The occasional application of slapback delay adds a threatening aura to his exacting riffage. His tones were just as carefully crafted as the parts he plays, and he relied mostly on his signature Electrical Guitar Company Chessie for the sessions, though a Fender Uptown Strat also appears, as well as a Taylor T5Z, which he chose for its “cleaner, hyper-articulated sound” on “Swan the Dog.” Though he’s been spotted at recent Jesus Lizard shows with a brand-new Powers Electric—he points out he played a demo model and says, “I just couldn’t let go of it,” so he ordered his own—that wasn’t until tracking was complete.
Duane Denison's Gear
Denison wields his Powers Electric at the Blue Room in Nashville last June.
Photo by Doug Coombe
Guitars
- Electrical Guitar Company Chessie
- Fender Uptown Strat
- Taylor T5Z
- Gibson ES-135
- Powers Electric
Amps
- Hiwatt Little J
- Hiwatt 2x12 cab with Fane F75 speakers
- Fender Super-Sonic combo
- Early ’60s Fender Bassman
- Marshall 1987X Plexi Reissue
- Victory Super Sheriff head
- Blackstar HT Stage 60—2 combos in stereo with Celestion Neo Creamback speakers and Mullard tubes
Effects
- Line 6 Helix
- Mantic Flex Pro
- TC Electronic G-Force
- Menatone Red Snapper
Strings and Picks
- Stringjoy Orbiters .0105 and .011 sets
- Dunlop celluloid white medium
- Sun Studios yellow picks
He ran through various amps—Marshalls, a Fender Bassman, two Fender Super-Sonic combos, and a Hiwatt Little J—at Audio Eagle. Live, if he’s not on backline gear, you’ll catch him mostly using 60-watt Blackstar HT Stage 60s loaded with Celestion Neo Creambacks. And while some boxes were stomped, he got most of his effects from a Line 6 Helix. “All of those sounds [in the Helix] are modeled on analog sounds, and you can tweak them endlessly,” he explains. “It’s just so practical and easy.”
The tools have only changed slightly since the band’s earlier days, when he favored Travis Beans and Hiwatts. Though he’s started to prefer higher gain sounds, Allen points out that “his guitar sound has always had teeth with a slightly bright sheen, and still does.”
“Honestly, I don’t think my tone has changed much over the past 30-something years,” Denison says. “I tend to favor a brighter, sharper sound with articulation. Someone sent me a video I had never seen of myself playing in the ’80s. I had a band called Cargo Cult in Austin, Texas. What struck me about it is it didn’t sound terribly different than what I sound like right now as far as the guitar sound and the approach. I don’t know what that tells you—I’m consistent?”
YouTube It
The Jesus Lizard take off at Nashville’s Blue Room this past June with “Hide & Seek” from Rack.
PG contributor Tom Butwin takes a deep dive into LR Baggs' HiFi Duet system.
LR Baggs HiFi Duet High-fidelity Pickup and Microphone Mixing System
HiFi Duet Mic/Pickup System"When a guitar is “the one,” you know it. It feels right in your hands and delivers the sounds you hear in your head. It becomes your faithful companion, musical soulmate, and muse. It helps you express your artistic vision. We designed the Les Paul Studio to be precisely the type of guitar: the perfect musical companion, the guitar you won’t be able to put down. The one guitar you’ll be able to rely on every time and will find yourself reaching for again and again. For years, the Les Paul Studio has been the choice of countless guitarists who appreciate the combination of the essential Les Paul features–humbucking pickups, a glued-in, set neck, and a mahogany body with a maple cap–at an accessible price and without some of the flashier and more costly cosmetic features of higher-end Les Paul models."
Now, the Les Paul Studio has been reimagined. It features an Ultra-Modern weight-relieved mahogany body, making it lighter and more comfortable to play, no matter how long the gig or jam session runs. The carved, plain maple cap adds brightness and definition to the overall tone and combines perfectly with the warmth and midrange punch from the mahogany body for that legendary Les Paul sound that has been featured on countless hit recordings and on concert stages worldwide. The glued-in mahogany neck provides rock-solid coupling between the neck and body for increased resonance and sustain. The neck features a traditional heel and a fast-playing SlimTaper profile, and it is capped with an abound rosewood fretboard that is equipped with acrylic trapezoid inlays and 22 medium jumbo frets. The 12” fretboard radius makes both rhythm chording and lead string bending equally effortless, andyou’re going to love how this instrument feels in your hands. The Vintage Deluxe tuners with Keystone buttons add to the guitar’s classic visual appeal, and together with the fully adjustable aluminum Nashville Tune-O-Matic bridge, lightweight aluminum Stop Bar tailpiece, andGraph Tech® nut, help to keep the tuning stability nice and solid so you can spend more time playing and less time tuning. The Gibson Les Paul Studio is offered in an Ebony, BlueberryBurst, Wine Red, and CherrySunburst gloss nitrocellulose lacquer finishes and arrives with an included soft-shell guitar case.
It packs a pair of Gibson’s Burstbucker Pro pickups and a three-way pickup selector switch that allows you to use either pickup individually or run them together. Each of the two pickups is wired to its own volume control, so you can blend the sound from the pickups together in any amount you choose. Each volume control is equipped with a push/pull switch for coil tapping, giving you two different sounds from each pickup, and each pickup also has its own individual tone control for even more sonic options. The endless tonal possibilities, exceptional sustain, resonance, and comfortable playability make the Les Paul Studio the one guitar you can rely on for any musical genre or scenario.
For more information, please visit gibson.com.
Introducing the Reimagined Gibson Les Paul Studio - YouTube
The two pedals mark the debut of the company’s new Street Series, aimed at bringing boutique tone to the gigging musician at affordable prices.
The Phat Machine
The Phat Machine is designed to deliver the tone and responsiveness of a vintage germanium fuzz with improved temperature stability with no weird powering issues. Loaded with both a germanium and a silicon transistor, the Phat Machine offers the warmth and cleanup of a germanium fuzz but with the bite of a silicon pedal. It utilizes classic Volume and Fuzz control knobs, as well as a four-position Thickness control to dial-in any guitar and amp combo. Also included is a Bias trim pot and a Kill switch that allows battery lovers to shut off the battery without pulling the input cord.
Silk Worm Deluxe Overdrive
The Silk Worm Deluxe -- along with its standard Volume/Gain/Tone controls -- has a Bottom trim pot to dial in "just the right amount of thud with no mud at all: it’s felt more than heard." It also offers a Studio/Stage diode switch that allows you to select three levels of compression.
Both pedals offer the following features:
- 9-volt operation via standard DC external supply or internal battery compartment
- True bypass switching with LED indicator
- Pedalboard-friendly top mount jacks
- Rugged, tour-ready construction and super durable powder coated finish
- Made in the USA
Static Effectors’ Street Series pedals carry a street price of $149 each. They are available at select retailers and can also be purchased directly from the Static Effectors online store at www.staticeffectors.com.