The rise and fall of one of the most original guitar players to emerge from the 1960s British Invasion.
In mid-ā60s Europe, if you were hip and dug music, swinging London was the place to be. The Beatles were there, as were the Stones, the Who, the Small Faces, the Kinks, and every other great British band of the day. The British blues boom was flourishing, tooāEric Clapton and Peter Green, the Yardbirds, Alexis Korner, John Mayall. Chas Chandler brought Jimi Hendrix to London to launch his career. Youth, money, fashion, style, music, artāthe stars aligned, forces converged, and London was the epicenter of cool.
But London had its outliers, too. Timebox, a small band with a minor hit, was playing the clubs. They were known for their live shows, which were manic, unpredictable, and nothing like their radio-friendly singles. Their guitarist, Ollie Halsall, was emerging as Londonās guitaristsā guitarist. He was different. He played faster. His note choices were unusual. His phrasing was unique. He was fearless, reckless, impulsive, hysterical, and listening to him was an adventure. The people who saw those shows still recall them with awe.
Fame eluded Halsall, but his influence was enormous. XTCās Andy Partridge summed him up in an interview for PopDose in June 2009: āOnce I heard [Halsallās] guitar playing, I was, like, āOh, I need to be able to play like that.āā
Catching the Vibes
Halsall was born on March 14, 1949, in Southport, England, a small city just north of Liverpool. His given name was Peter, but everyone called him āOllie,ā a play on the pronunciation of Halsall (pronounced āAlsall).
Halsall started playing the guitar at 7, but it wasnāt long before he decided to take up the drums instead. He joined his first band, the Music Students, at 13, but that didnāt last either. Clive Griffiths, a school friend, was living in London, and he invited Halsall to join him. Griffiths wanted Halsall to join his new band, Take 5, but playing vibes, not drums.
Halsall didnāt know how to play vibes, but that didnāt stop him. āI always wanted to be a vibes player,ā he told Melody Maker in January 1972. āI used to listen to Milt Jackson all the time. Griff knew that, and he sensed I was a natural musician because I was a pretty good drummer.ā
Halsall onstage in 1975 at The Black Swan in Sheffield. Photo by Bob Beecher.
John Halsey, the drummer in Halsallās bands Timebox and Patto, remembers a different chronology, though Halsallās achievement was no less impressive. āOllie looked at a piano keyboard, cut strips of paper to match, and laid them on his bed,ā he told Terrascope in 1992. āHe bought some vibes beaters with his pocket money and learned to play like that. After a while he told his parents, āI can play them now.ā They took him to a music shop in Liverpool, and he could. He turned pro when he was 16.ā
Take 5 morphed into Timebox. Their sound was the sound of Swinging London. They wore matching outfits. Their songs were radio-friendly. They signed to Deram (a subsidiary of Decca). And their single, āBeggināāāa Four Seasons coverāpeaked at number 38 in the UK.
Kevin Fogerty, Timeboxās guitarist, quit in 1967, and Halsall took over. He wasnāt a guitarist, but that didnāt seem to matter. He practiced and got good. Fast. āOllie and I always used to share rooms,ā Halsey said in that same Terrascope interview. āHe used to sit up half the night just running [scales] up and down the neck. I'd be trying to get to sleep, and heād be doing his scales over and over.ā
Timeboxās evolution followed a similar trajectory to other British bands of this time period: They released radio-friendly singles (including the great B-side, āI Wish I Could Jerk Like My Uncle Cyrilā) but got heavier and more experimental in their live performances.
Unfortunately Timeboxās singles failed to chart, which became a problem, and they werenāt a blues band. Their music got more avant-garde, they were more open-ended and improvisational, and they played in odd time signatures. They were zany.
Keyboardist Chris Holmes quit in 1970 and the remaining members, sick of their dual identity, renamed the band āPatto,ā after lead singer Mike Patto.
This white Gibson SG Custom was made lefty for Halsall by one of his roadies. Halsall wasnāt the only guitarist to play a white lefty SG: Hendrix had one, too.
Mod Squad
As the guitarist in Patto, Halsall was a monster. He was so nimble that other musicians took notice. āIām just a simple bloke,ā he told Melody Maker in 1972. āBut I tend to freak guitarists out, put the willies up them.ā
But he wasnāt just fastāhis harmonic sense was different. He was a blues-based player, but he wasnāt limited to minor pentatonic runs. He added extra notes, goofed with the tonal center, and left tensions unresolved. And in addition to the notes he chose, he had an eccentric sense of phrasing. Halsall played repetitive figures in unexpected places, took off on tangents mid-thought, and seemed addicted to the unpredictable.
Halsall started playing guitar as a mature and working musician. He already had the skills for making music: a solid sense of time, a trained and developed ear, and an understanding of harmony, chords, melody, and phrasing. He didnāt think like a guitarist, and that made him different.
He also didnāt listen to guitarists. āThe only player I find myself listening to is Django,ā he told Melody Maker in November 1971. āI tend to listen to horn players and pianists, especially Cecil Taylor. Iād like to play guitar like Cecil plays piano.ā He admired Taylorās power, clarity, and precision, and he purposely wanted to incorporate that into his own playing. āI want to get the infinite power from guitar with his solid hand action,ā he said. āThat is what Iām working on.ā
Pattoās small but fanatical cult following was limited to London and a few towns in Northern England. They made a few radio appearances, too, until the BBC banned them. āThey didnāt show up for a radio session,ā archivist Barry Monks told Premier Guitar. āThe BBC ban was for radio and televisionāand that had serious repercussions.ā
Specifically, it meant that Patto never appeared on the Old Grey Whistle Test (the premier English program for āseriousā rock), which hampered their ability to reach a wider audience. āAn appearance on the Old Grey Whistle Test would have been a big deal for them,ā says Monks, who moderates a website devoted to the Halsall. āBut it never happened.ā
At the time, it seemed the ban was just a minor setback. From 1971 to 1973, Patto were the next big thing. The New Musical Express said in January, 1972, āIf the lip service paid to them from within the confines of the music business were sufficient, then Patto would be giving the proverbial elbow to more established purveyors of electric rock.ā
Patto signed to Vertigo (the progressive subsidiary of Phillips), released two albums, toured as the opening act for the Faces and Ten Years After, and gigged locally. Their madcap live shows were legendary, and their musicianship turned heads as well. āGuitar player Ollie Halsall is most definitely the most underrated guitar player in the country at present,ā Ray Telford wrote in Sounds in August 1972. āHe is also no slouch on any kind of keyboard.ā
Pattoās second album, Hold Your Fire, is a guitar tour de force. āThe second you hear Ollieās flash lead guitar you are made aware of the fact that this is no neo-Cream imitation or anything of that kind, but an English rock band with distinctions far beyond those of mortal Americans,ā Jon Tiven wrote in his review in Fusion in July, 1972.
Hold Your Fire oozes great guitar playing, but the solo on āGive It All Awayā is exceptional. Halsall let loose, and his solo encompasses the traits that defined his style: lightning speed, outlandish yet accessible.
It seemed success was just around the corner. Since Pattoās strength was their live shows, their third album, Roll āEm Smoke āEm Put Another Line Out, recorded for Island Records, attempted to capture the magical spontaneity and lunacy of Patto in concert. Halsall plays pianoāsans guitarāfor about half the album, but his guitar playing on āLoud Green Songā more than makes up for it. To quote a reviewer for the website Julian Cope Presents Head Heritage, āWhen the Blues had a baby and they named it Rock ānā Roll, even they, down-with-the-kids parents they were, could not have foreseen the teenage delinquency of Pattoās āLoud Green Song.ā If you havenāt heard Pattoās āLoud Green Song,ā YOU HAVE TO HEAR PATTOāS āLOUD GREEN SONG.āā
The song in question wails in sonic weirdness. From its opening riff to the lengthy breaks between verses, the twisted tonality, and the abrupt ending, āLoud Green Songā stamped Halsall as a guitarist like no other. The playing is downright nasty. It was raw, naked, unvarnished, andāfor 1972āyears ahead of its time. It took heavy metal another 10 years to catch up.
Patto toured the U.S. and Australia opening for Joe Cocker. They played the largest venues of their career and were an audience favorite. But in a case of bad timing, Island released Roll āEm Smoke āEm Put Another Line Out after the tour ended, and sales were weak. āYou know, we absolutely went down a storm on that Joe Cocker tourāplayed almost every night, some of the biggest venues in the States,ā drummer Halsey told Ralph Heibutzki in an article for Ugly Things. ā[The album] was released the week after we leftāby that time, everybodyās seen another two bands.ā
Patto returned to the same small English venues theyād played before they went on tour. The band went into the studio to record their fourth album, Monkeyās Bum, but Halsallās heart wasnāt in it. He walked out mid-session. The party was over.
Patto never found their audience. Starting as Timebox, they came from the same scene as the bands they toured with, but Patto evolved into something very different. They didnāt write hits. They werenāt a Top 40 band. They werenāt a beefed-up blues band. Patto had more in common with the Mothers of Invention and Captain Beefheart. But L.A. is far from London, and no one made that connection.
Fans familiar with Ollie Halsallās guitar work might be surprised to learn he played the āPaul McCartneyā guitar parts for the Rutles, a Beatles spoof band. Halsall is shown here jamming with Kevin Ayres at Hurrahs in New York during a 1980 tour.
Post-Patto
Halsallās next band was Tempest, where he replaced outgoing guitarist Allan Holdsworth. The split was amicable, and for a few weeks Tempest featured both Halsall and Holdsworth. The BBC promoted and recorded a concert of that lineup in London in June 1973 (you can hear it on Under the Blossom: The Anthology, a Tempest compilation).
Halsall and Holdsworth were very different musicians. As Jon Hiseman, Tempestās drummer and leader, told Dmitry Epstein in a 2004 interview, āAllan was very meticulous, very clear. He had a vision about what he was trying to do. Ollie was a lunatic.ā He meant that as a compliment. āIn any circumstance heād find a way to make it work.ā
Tempest post-Holdsworth toured as a trioālead singer Paul Williams left along with Holdsworthāwith Halsall on guitar and vocals. They toured Europe and recorded the album Living in Fear, but it didnāt last. Tempest broke up, and Halsall started doing session work. He also began working with Soft Machineās Kevin Ayers. āI was in AIR London studios, working on the Tempest album, and Kevin was there also,ā Halsall told Trouser Press in 1976. āI was just sitting around, and [producer] Gerry Bron had his pocket calculator out, fooling around. Kevin came down the corridor and asked if there was a guitarist in the house. He needed a solo put on a song (āDidnāt Feel Lonely Till I Thought of Youā) on the Dr. Dream album.ā That was his first session with Ayers. It was an association that lasted until the end of Halsallās life.
Patto reunited for three sold-out shows in 1975. The concerts were benefits to raise money for the family of a former roadie murdered in Pakistan. After that, Pattoāthe bandānever worked together again, but Halsall and Mike Patto did. Their new band, Boxer, with drummer Tony Newman (Jeff Beck, Rod Stewart, David Bowie) and bassist Keith Ellis (Van Der Graaf Generator, Juicy Lucy) signed a five-record deal with Virgin.
Boxer was a heavier band that had potential to be huge. Its members were seasoned pros with a serious work ethic and financial backing. Their songs were straight-up, in-your-face mid-ā70s rockers. The cover for their first album, Below the Belt, was designed to generate controversy and press (a naked woman, spread eagle, with a raised fist covering, well, almost nothing).
But despite the press, money, and support, Boxer didnāt last. After recording their second album, Bloodletting, Halsall was either fired or quitādifferent people tell different versions. Regardless, with Halsallās departure, Nigel Thomas, Boxerās manager, confiscated Halsallās guitars and ampsāincluding his iconic white Gibson SG Customāto cover his losses. Halsall was left with nothing. And as a tragic footnote, Mike Patto died of lymphatic leukemia in 1979.
Halsall hit hard times. He still did sessions, but he was broke. He relied on borrowed guitars. He toured the U.S. with John Otway, whoād had a huge U.K. hit, the half-spoken comedy love song, āReally Free.ā In an ironic twist, Halsallās biggest session was as the āPaul McCartneyā character for the Beatles-spoof band, the Rutles. However, Halsallās contribution was anonymous. In the film, All You Need Is Cash, Eric Idle played āMcCartney,ā lip-synching Halsallās vocals and miming his guitar parts.
Success in Spain
Despite professional setbacks, Halsall kept at it, spending the ā80s as a musical journeyman. Peers respected him as a seasoned veteran and reliable sideman. He adapted to new styles and trends. And he finally bought a guitar: a cherry red SG that he modified similarly to the white SG Custom from his Patto days.
Halsall worked a lot in the ā80s, and his biggest gigs were with Kevin Ayers and the Velvet Undergroundās John Cale. But he didnāt play with reckless abandon like he did with Pattoāhe stuck to the song. āMy style has changed,ā he told Guitar Player in April of 1989. āThere are less notes than before and the sound is clear.ā
In 1980 he toured with Bill Lovelady, an old friend from Southport with a chart hit (āOne More Reggae for the Roadā). Also in that band was vocalist/keyboardist Zanna Gregmar. When the tour ended, Halsall and Gregmar moved to Spain to be close to Ayers. Halsall was based in Spain until he died.
Halsall and Gregmar also formed a band, Cinemaspop, playing synth-heavy European techno. They were big in Spain. Their recordings didnāt feature guitar, although Halsall played guitar live. And yet, according to Monks, Halsall loved Cinemaspop. āThey were successful and made a lot of money,ā Monks says.
Ayers recorded Still Life with Guitar with Halsall in early 1992, and they performed in England that April. A month later, Halsall was found dead in his apartment in Madrid, reportedly after suffering a drug-related heart attack. His death was a shock. According to Monks, Halsall was anti-hard drugs, and substance abuse wasnāt something associated with Halsall. Even back with Pattoādespite a third album called Roll āEm Smoke āEm Put Another Line OutāOllie wasnāt a big drug user. That album title was just a joke.
A small memorial was set up in Mallorca, the Spanish island where Halsall hung out with Ayers. Except for a small group of loyal fans, most people have never heard of him. But Halsallās legacy lives onāand grows over time. Halsall rumors abound: A shred label was trying to find him to record a solo album. The Stones considered him as a replacement for Mick Taylor. Eddie Van Halen was a fan. Whatās true? Who knows?
But one certainty remains: Halsall was a great guitaristāa true original and a pleasure to listen to. As Andy Partridge told PopDose, ā[Halsallās playing was] like a beautiful gift, where youāre opening a box, and you think you know what might be in it, but then youāre, like, āOh, that is phenomenal! What a lovely little surprise!āā
Ollie Halsall Essential Listening
This clip features Halsall on vibes with Timebox. āBeggināā was their biggest hit and peaked at No. 38 in the U.K. Halsallās vibe playing is stellar. Dig the bandās matching outfits.
Ā
āGive It All Awayā is from Pattoās second album, Hold Your Fire. The guitar breaks are inventive and unusual, but the solo starting at 2:24 is exceptional (and really fast). Keep in mind, Halsall didnāt use effects during this period. His sound is just a guitar and overdriven amps (two Fender combos, usually a Princeton and a Super Reverb, one plugged into the other).
Ā
The guitar weirdness starts at 0:50 and just keeps getting better on āLoud Green Songā from Pattoās third album, Roll āEm Smoke āEm Put Another Line Out.
Ā
A mature and older Halsall plays an unconventional solo starting at 0:55. The sound quality is poor, but this video offers a taste for what Halsall was up to late in his career.
Photo by Lloyd Goodman.
Ollie Halsallās Ad Hoc Lefty SG
The guitar usually associated with Ollie Halsall was a white 1967 Gibson SG Custom. The guitar came with three humbuckers and a Vibrola tremolo unit.
Since Halsall was left-handed, Barnabus (Barney) Swain, a roadie for Patto, converted Halsallās SG from righty to lefty. Swain carved a new chamber for the electronics and moved them to the guitarās new lower bout. Halsall didnāt want the knobs to mirror a right-handed model. Rather, the knobs for the bridge positionāon the bottom on a right-handed guitarāwere on top next to the bridge. The knobs for the neck position were nearer the floor. The 3-way toggle was kept āupside-downā as well (neck down/bridge up). The original cavity was filled with wood. The new lower hornāpart of the double-cutawayāwas cut deeper for easier access to the upper frets.
Halsall let the Vibrola arm hang loose, dangling over the bridge pickup, and he dealt with tuning issues on the fly. (In the ā80s, he replaced the Vibrola on a different SG with a Kahler locking system to keep it in tune.)
The words āBlue Traffā were carved into the upper bout. The phrase reportedly paid homage to a never-released album Halsall recorded with Robert Fripp in 1972. Why blue traff? Spell Traff backwards and remove an āF.ā Got it? It makes a blue flame when you light it on fire. Boys will be boys, as they say.
Halsallās SG was found in a repair shop in 2006 and restored to its Halsall-era condition. The complete story of the guitarās restoration, as well many details provided for this edition of Forgotten Heroes, can be found at Barry Monksā website/archive for all things Halsall: www.olliehalsall.co.uk/MayFly Le Habanero Review
Great versatility in combined EQ controls. Tasty low-gain boost voice. Muscular Fuzz Face-like fuzz voice.
Can be noisy without a lot of treble attenuation. Boost and fuzz order can only be reversed with the internal DIP switch.
$171
May Fly Le Habanero
A fuzz/boost combo thatās as hot as the name suggests, but which offers plenty of smoky, subdued gain shades, too.
Generally speaking, I avoid combo effects. If I fall out of love with one thing, I donāt want to have to ditch another thatās working fine. But recent fixations with spatial economy find me rethinking that relationship. MayFlyās Le Habanero (yes, the Franco/Spanish article/noun mash-up is deliberate) consolidates boost and fuzz in a single pedal. Thatās far from an original concept. But the characteristics of both effects make it a particularly effective one here, and the relative flexibility and utility of each gives this combination a lot more potential staying power for the fickle.
āLe Habaneroās fuzz circuit has a deep switch that adds a little extra desert-rock woof.ā
The fuzz section has a familiar Fuzz Face-like tone profileāa little bit boomy and very present in that buzzy mid-ā60s, midrangey kind of way. But Le Habaneroās fuzz circuit has a deep switch that adds a little extra desert-rock woof (especially with humbuckers) and an effective filter switch that enhances the fuzzās flexibilityāespecially when used with the boost. The boost is a fairly low-gain affair. Even at maximum settings, it really seems to excite desirable high-mid harmonics more than it churns out dirt. Thatās a good thing, particularly when you introduce hotter settings from the boostās treble and bass controls, which extend the boostās voice from thick and smoky to lacerating. Together, the boost and fuzz can be pushed to screaming extremes. But the interactivity between the tone and filter controls means you can cook up many nuanced fuzz shades spanning Jimi scorch and Sabbath chug with tons of cool overtone and feedback colors.
IK Multimedia is pleased to announce the release of new premium content for all TONEX users, available today through the IK Product Manager.
The latest TONEX Factory Content v2 expands the creative arsenal with a brand-new collection of Tone Models captured at the highest quality and presets optimized for live performance. TONEX Tone Models are unique captures of rigs dialed into a specific sweet spot. TONEX presets are used for performance and recording, combining Tone Models with added TONEX FX, EQ, and compression.
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TONEX Pedal
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TONEX Mac/PC
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TONEX ONE
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Gig-ready Tones
For the TONEX Pedal, the first 30 banks deliver an expansive range of amp & cab tones, covering everything from dynamic cleans to brutal high-gain distortion. Each bank features legendary amplifiers paired with cabs such as a Marshall 1960, ENGL E412V, EVH 412ST and MESA Boogie 4x12 4FB, ensuring a diverse tonal palette. For some extremely high-gain tones, these amps have been boosted with classic pedals like the Ibanez TS9, MXR Timmy, ProCo RAT, and more, pushing them into new sonic territories.
Combined with New FX
The following 5 banks of 15 presets explore the depth of TONEX's latest effects. There's everything from the rich tremolo on a tweed amp to the surf tones of the new Spring 4 reverb. Users can also enjoy warm tape slapback with dotted 8th delays or push boundaries with LCR delay configurations for immersive, stereo-spanning echoes. Further, presets include iconic flanger sweeps, dynamic modulation, expansive chorus, stereo panning, and ambient reverbs to create cinematic soundscapes.
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The TONEX Pedal's A, B, and C footswitches make navigating these presets easy. Slot A delivers clean, smooth tones, Slot B adds crunch and drive, and Slot C pushes into high-gain or lead territory. Five dedicated amp-only banks provide a rich foundation of tones for players looking to integrate external IRs or run directly into a power amp. These amp-only captures span clean, drive, and high-gain categories, offering flexibility to sculpt the sound further with IRs or a real cab.
Must-have Stompboxes
TONEX Pedals are ideal for adding classic effects to any pedalboard. The next 5 banks focus on stompbox captures, showcasing 15 legendary overdrive, distortion, and fuzz pedals. This collection includes iconic models based on the Fulltone Full-Drive 2, Marshall DriveMaster, Maxon OD808, Klon Centaur, ProCo RAT, and more.
For Bass Players, Too
The last 5 banks are reserved for bass players, including a selection of amp & cab Tone Models alongside a few iconic pedals. Specifically, there are Tone Models based on the Ampeg SVT-2 PRO, Gallien-Krueger 800RB, and Aguilar DB750, alongside essential bass pedals based on the Tech21 SansAmp, Darkglass B7K and EHX Big Muff. Whether it's warm vintage thump, modern punch, or extreme grit, these presets ensure that bassists have the depth, clarity and power they need for any playing style.For more information and instructions on how to get the new Factory
Content v2 for TONEX, please visit:
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Darkglass Electronics unveils ANAGRAM, a flagship bass platform designed to redefine tone, flexibility, and performance. The pedalās extraordinarily deep feature set includes multiple effects and modeling, an on-board looper and tuner.
Best of all, ANAGRAM brings together these creative tools in a streamlined, rugged format thatās designed for ease of use. Onstage and in the studio, bassists can quickly access and fine-tune their sound via the ANAGRAM interface:
- 7-inch high-brightness touchscreen for clear and intuitive control.
- Three footswitches for live performance control.
- Six high-resolution endless rotary knobs for precise parameter adjustments.
- Flexible input and output configuration.
With ultra-low latency, extensive customization, and seamless integration into the Darkglass ecosystem, it supports both studio precision and stage performance. Combining 15 years of innovation with cutting-edge processing power, ANAGRAM offers a purpose-built solution for bassists seeking unparalleled sound-shaping capabilities.
Anagram
Powered by a state-of-the-art hexacore processor and 32-bit/48kHz audio processing,ANAGRAM delivers ultra-low latency, pristine clarity, and studio-grade sound. Its intuitive blocks-based architecture lets players create signal chains in series (12 blocks) or parallel (24blocks) using a high-resolution touch display. ANAGRAM features three control modesāPreset,Scene, and Stompāfor instant switching, parameter adjustments, and traditional pedalboard-style operation. With a curated collection of distinct preamps, 50+ customizable effects, a looper, tuner, and user-generated IR support, ANAGRAM delivers unmatched creative flexibility.Seamless integration with the Darkglass Suite allows for expanded control and functionality. Additionally, Neural Amp Modeler (NAM) integration provides access to thousands
of high-quality amp and effect models, expanding tonal possibilities from analog warmth to futuristic textures.
"Anagram represents the culmination of years of research and development," says Marcos Barilatti, Managing Director of Darkglass Electronics. "We set out to create a product that not only pushes the boundaries of bass tone but also inspires musicians to explore new sonic territories."
Housed in a rugged anodized aluminum chassis, ANAGRAM is road-ready, compact, and powered via 9V or USB-C (PD). With flagship features at a compelling price, ANAGRAM represents the new standard for bassists seeking a modern platform for their performance.
Street $1199.99 USD
Alongside Nicolas Jaarās electronics, Harrington creates epic sagas of sound with a team of fine-tuned pedalboards.
Guitarist Dave Harrington concedes that while there are a few mile markers in the music that he and musician Nicolas Jaar create as Darkside, improvisation has been the rule from day one. The experimental electronic trioās latest record, Nothing, which released in February on Matador, was the first to feature new percussionist Tlacael Esparza.
Taking the record on tour this year, Darkside stopped in at Nashvilleās Brooklyn Bowl, where Harrington broke down his complex signal chains for PGās Chris Kies.
Brought to you by DāAddario.
Express Yourself
Harrington bought this mid-2000s Gibson SG at 30th Street Guitars in New York, a shop he used to visit as a kid. The headstock had already been broken and repaired, and Harrington switched the neck pickup to a Seymour Duncan model used by Derek Trucks. Harrington runs it with DāAddario NYXL .010s, which he prefers for their stretch and stability.
The standout feature is a round knob installed by his tech behind the bridge, which operates like an expression pedal for the Line 6 DL4. Harrington has extras on hand in case one breaks.
Triple Threat
Harringtonās backline setup in Nashville included two Fender Twin Reverbs and one Fender Hot Rod DeVille. He likes the reissue Fender amps for their reliability and clean headroom. Each amp handles an individual signal, including loops that Harrington creates and plays over; with each amp handling just one signal rather than one handling all loops and live playing, thereās less loss of definition and competition for frequency space.
Dave Harringtonās Pedalboards
Harrington says he never gives up on a pedal, which could explain why heās got so many. Youāre going to have to tune in to the full Rundown to get the proper scoop on how Harrington conducts his three-section orchestra of stomps, but at his feet, he runs a board with a Chase Bliss Habit, Mu-Tron Micro-Tron IV, Eventide PitchFactor, Eventide H90, Hologram Microcosm, Hologram Chroma Console, Walrus Monument, Chase Bliss Thermae, Chase Bliss Brothers AM, JHS NOTAKLĆN, two HexeFX reVOLVERs, and an Amped Innovations JJJ Special Harmonics Extender. A Strymon Ojai provides power.
At hip-level sits a board with a ZVEX Mastotron, Electro-Harmonix Cathedral, EHX Pitch Fork, Xotic EP Booster, two EHX 45000 multi-track looping recorders, Walrus Slƶer, Expedition Electronics 60 Second Deluxe, and another Hologram Microcosm. A Live Wire Solutions ABY Box and MXR DC Brick are among the utility tools on deck.
Under that board rest Harringtonās beloved Line 6 DL4āhis desert-island, must-have pedalāalong with a controller for the EHX 45000, Boss FV-50H volume pedal, Dunlop expression pedal, Boss RT-20, a Radial ProD2, and another MXR DC Brick.