
Alan Harrison, E6 Boatswains Mate 1st Class, is a 21-year US Navy veteran who's taking part in the Guitars for Vets program at the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Guitars for Vets organizers Patrick Nettesheim and Dan Van Buskirk help veterans with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder find hope again through music.
In the time it takes to read this story, another US serviceman or servicewoman will lose their life. It won't be to an IED on the battlefields of Iraq or Afghanistan. It will be to suicide on the battlefield of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and depressionāright here at home. Every day, 19 soldiers take their own lives. Fifty percent of our homeless population is made up of veterans, and more than 250,000 veterans now suffer from PTSD. A 2004 Department of Defense study estimates that 17 to 20 percent of soldiers returning from Iraq āsuffer from major depression, generalized anxiety, or PTSD." And according to a 2008 report cited in Tears of a Warrior: A Family's Story of Combat and Living with PTSDāa book the Veterans Administration uses in its PTSD treatment programā roughly 40,000 troops have been diagnosed since 2003.
It's easy to slap a "Support Our Troops" magnet on the back of a vehicle to show solidarity in times of deployment, but where is that support when these men and women come home physically and emotionally broken? Where do they turn when society is not informed or empathetic enough to understand their state of mind, or when they are shamed into silence by the stigma of "mental illness"?
These are crucial questions too often left both unasked and unanswered. However, two guitarists with their hearts in the right place are doing their best to make a difference. Guitar instructor Patrick Nettesheim and guitar-playing Vietnam War veteran Dan Van Buskirk decided to take matters into their own hands by creating Guitars for Vets (G4V), a unique form of music therapy they're taking to VA medical centers.
Founded in 2008, Guitars for Vets is a nonprofit that provides six free, one-on-one guitar lessons and a new acoustic guitar to veterans in recovery. Its mission is simple: Turn the guitar into a source of healing, communication, and self-expression. Veterans enrolled in the program receive their own new Oscar Schmidt acoustic guitar at their sixth lesson, and thereafter they can continue learning through group lessons. G4V began in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, but has chapters in several other statesāas well as one in Afghanistanāand it's receiving requests from VA centers across the country. Six strings at a time, it's working miracles.
To Hell and Back Again
Van Buskirk and Nettesheim met in 2007, when Van Buskirk became Nettesheim's guitar student. It was a fortuitous step on the long road to recovery for a lifetime pacifist who joined the military to uphold family duty.
Although the Peace Corps was his first calling, Van Buskirk joined the Marine Corps and became a reconnaissance scout and sniper during a time when, he says, "We were a bunch of young men confused by John Wayne movies, masculinity, and serving your country. I was assigned to Albrook, the hottest, best team battalion. We were on patrol schedules in Laos, and it was so dangerous that all the guys left letters and valuables for their loved ones because no one expected to return alive. Because Albrook was so good, the whole team would go on patrol. Except they wouldn't let me goāI was too inexperienced. One day, the North Vietnamese set up an ambush for Albrook. They shot down the helicopter with a rocket and all the guys died."
During Van Buskirk's 1968-1969 tour, he did 40 patrols in Laos and Cambodia, lost his best friend there, and witnessed unspeakable horrors that remain with him today. Upon return, he was hospitalized for a year and told he had "shell shock," as it was called then. "They didn't know how to treat it," he says. "I was in a deep, deep depression. You feel like you are in a black tunnel that has no light on the other side. I just wanted some light, but I couldn't see it."
Van Buskirk struggled to maintain a normal life. He married, became a father, worked, and went back to school to earn degrees in sociology and anthropology. Though he attempted to become an adjusted civilian, Vietnam never left him. "I mostly had a sense that 'I just don't get it,"' he says. "It plagued me. Some people live joyously, but for veterans with PTSD, we're in survival mode." Van Buskirk still experiences flashbacks and nightmares.
In 2005, after losing two jobs, Van Buskirk was placed on full chronic disability. As part of his search for ways to deal with depression, he bought a guitar. He had tried playing years before, but lacked focus due to PTSD. Cream City Music, in Brookfield, Wisconsin, recommended Nettesheim as an instructor. The lessons became educational for both men: Van Buskirk learned to play, while Nettesheim learned about Vietnam and the struggles returning veterans faced. They realized they were on to something.
Guitars for Vets debuted in the Milwaukee VA spinal rehab unit, where Van Buskirk and Nettesheim performed for paralyzed veterans whose lives are spent in wheelchairs and on their backs. "Dan played 'Knockin' on Heaven's Door' and we saw guys who had been staring at the ceiling for 40 years just light up," says Nettesheim. "The smiles, the happinessāthey would hold the guitars while I strummed them. I knew it was magic. These men with broken bodies, broken spirits, and no way out of their situations as prisoners of their own bodiesāI saw the light in their eyes." During their next lesson, Van Buskirk and Nettesheim put a plan in action and created Guitars for Vets.
Asked to explain the source of that rekindled lightāwhy the guitar is a source of comfortā Nettesheim says, "How you hold it against your midsectionāit's a metaphoric shield. When you look at trauma as part of the human condition, in moments of sadness and weeping, you rock back and forth and hold a pillow or a teddy bear to your midsection. It's an innate trait. The guitar is a good surrogate for that. It allows you to speak without words. The cool thing with the guitar, and many instruments, is the universal language: Others get what you're feeling by what you play. It helps us communicate emotions that may be too difficult to verbalize. That's why music touches so many people deeply."
Faces of the Faceless
A group of vets from the St. Louis, Missouri, chapter of G4V gathers to socialize and support each other through song.
Photo by Glen Harris
Miami resident John Miranda understands using music in place of words. He spent a good portion of his adult years entrenched in the rock-musician lifestyle on the West Coast. In 1973, he joined the service and became a parachuter during the final stages of the Vietnam War. "Conflict and war are no picnic," he says. "Nor was the way we were treated when we came home. When I got out of the military, I began drinking heavily, jumped onboard with a band, and played my life away."
Miranda is now in his mid 50s, and not long ago he found the courage and the means to clean up his life. He went to the Miami VA for help in 2009 and met music therapist Elizabeth Stockton, whom he credits for not giving up on him during the hospital's three-month program. Through music and sobriety, he is learning to unlock emotions he believed didn't exist. "I know the power of music and what a program like this can do," says Miranda, who became the first instructor for the Miami chapter of Guitars for Vets. "There's life to music. It's very spiritual."
Guitars for Vets is staffed entirely by volunteers. Instructors must train through a strict VA program, and they're submitted to rigorous FBI background checks that require fingerprinting and official badges for admission to facilities. In addition to government protocol, G4V has three requirements. "Instructors must show gratitude toward veterans for what they have given," says Nettesheim. "They must be empathetic and sincerely able to feel these veterans' stories, and they must be nonjudgmental and throw all political thoughts out the door."
Marc DeRuiter instructs the Grand Rapids, Michigan, chapter of Guitars for Vets. A Navy veteran from 1972ā1975 who was stationed in both the Philippines and Vietnam, he discovered the organization in 2009 through a web search. Based on his experience performing for patients in Alzheimer's Disease units for seven years, he understands the therapeutic effects of music. He has been a musician since his teens, and he has a repertoire of country, bluegrass, rock, and oldies tunes. He has performed with the same musicians for 30 years, and he began teaching guitar at his church 10 years ago. After discovering G4V online, DeRuiter says he emailed Nettesheim because he thought he'd be "a good fit." He explains, "Our philosophies are right in line with each other. I'm sold on the therapeutic value of musicāyou spend an hour a day doing it, and your body treats it like a workout. It relieves your stress. You practice until you get it right, and that provides a sense of accomplishment."
Marc DeRuiter (right), a Navy vet who served in Vietnam from 1972 to 1975, instructs Richard Pierson in a Guitars for Vets class at the Grand Rapids, Michigan, VA center.
Photo by Marc DeRuiter
For that reason, DeRuiter makes a point of teaching actual songs to his students right away, helping them through "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands" and "The Ballad of Tom Dooley." "If you've got a song, you've got something," he says. "Some of these veterans have never played guitar before, and they love it. They practice on their own and get together to practice too."
Nettesheim says that camaraderie is a crucial element of Guitars for Vets. "When you talk to veteransāespecially combat veteransāthey'll tell you that they miss the teamwork and close friendships they formed while in the service. When their tour is over, they often move on and never see each other again. They fight to protect each other's lives, and there is a great sense of loss when those relationships are gone. They go from the battlefield to being thrust back into civilian life. Concentrating on playing and practicing in groups helps them to stop thinking about their grief. Working together brings them feelings of family and belonging."
Dan Van Buskirk (right), a Marines reconaissance scout during the Vietnam War, took up guitar in 2005 after years of PTSD had ravaged his personal and professional lives. In 2008, he and his instructor, Patrick Nettesheim (left), formed Guitars for Vets.
Photo by Tim Evans
Alan Harrison, another Vietnam vet involved with G4V, learned about the organization through the Milwaukee VA hospital. He had played guitar as a teenager but gave it up when he joined the Navy, where he spent 21 years. He also suffers from severe PTSD. During his time in the service, he says, "I saw a man dismembered, sucked into the intake of a jet, and that wasn't the worst thing I saw."
When Harrison returned to civilian life, he couldn't erase his memories.
PTSD and depression had set in. Two years ago, he signed on for lessons with Guitars for Vets and now he's a volunteer for the program. "When I pick up the guitar, it takes me to a simpler time when I didn't have these memories," he says. "The guitar eases the pain. Without this program, I would still be in serious therapy. It helps me cope." (Visit myspace.com/guitarsforvets to hear "Dusty Old Road," a song Harrison and Meaghan Owens wrote about his experiences as a veteran.)
Of course, Harrison, Van Buskirk, DeRuiter, and Miranda are just a few of the countless veterans of past and present armed conflicts who suffer from the debilitating effects of PTSD. Van Buskirk expresses great concern for those who have served multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. "I see a lot of men and women slip through the cracks when they come home. I see them get fired because employers aren't held accountable for dealing with soldiers with anxiety issues. I see things that sadden me," he says. "But a smiling face, a compassionate heart, a listening ear, and the vibrations of a guitar can help. I can't sit back and not be part of the solution. Medication is a useful band-aid but in no way helps the soldier get their soul back. If a soldier takes meds as the end-all be-all, they will miss out on getting their whole person back. If we take the lead with this program, maybe others will find it easier to help veteransāand maybe the VA will become more progressive and not just say, 'Increase your meds.'"
How to Help
Guitars for Vets has distributed over 600 guitar packs to date, but these instruments are purchased, not donatedāand G4V incurs significant shipping costs to send guitars to its chapters. Each guitar pack consists of an instrument, a bag, and a tuner, and it is paid for by G4V, with the Oscar Schmidt acoustics being purchased at dealer cost. To date, no manufacturer has been willing to donate any instruments, so the organization relies on monetary donations from supporters. For the price of an evening outādinner, movie, and drinksāyou can help pay for one of these packs. Stay home one night and change a veteran's life.
Before receiving their free guitar at their sixth lesson, veterans enrolled in G4V learn to play on donated practice guitars. If you have an acoustic guitar gathering dust in your closet, send it in. Even if the instrument is no longer playable, artists associated with the program can turn it into an art piece that will then be sold to raise funds for G4V. Even if you don't have an old guitar to donate, you can help raise awareness of the program and provide useful funds by purchasing Guitars for Vets merchandise on the organization's website. There are other ways to get involved, too. G4V needs instructors and coordinators to set up new chapters and help with existing groups. Visit their website guitarsforvets.org or G4V's Facebook page for more details on the program and ways you can make a difference.
[Updated 11/10/21]
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PG contributor Tom Butwin digs into seven very different boost options, from classic clean boosts to tone-sculpting EQ beasts. Whether you're chasing midrange magic, vintage character, or gig-saving utility, there's something here for every board.
VOX Amplification Tone Sculptor
The VOX Tone Sculptor graphic EQ delivers tube-driven tone shaping that adds warm distortion as you raise the level, infusing your sound with rich tube harmonics and natural compression.
$219 street
voxamps.com
SoloDallas SVDS Boost
This pedal recreates the legendary 1975 signal boost from the Schaffer-Vega Diversity System, which provided up to 30 dB of boost, shaping the tones of Angus Young, David Gilmour, and others. Unlike typical clean boosts, it enhances vintage coloration and harmonics. Built with high-quality components, itās designed for both studio and stage reliability.
$129 street
solodallas.com
Seymour Duncan Pickup Booster Mini
The Pickup Booster Mini delivers the perfect boost and features a resonance switch for multiple tonal characteristics without taking up space on your board.
$99 street
seymourduncan.com
J. Rockett Audio Designs Archer Clean
The Archer Clean is a recreation of the clean boost found in a Klon Centaur. Go from beautiful cleans to slamming the front end of your amp instantly!
$229 street
rockettpedals.com
VOX Amplification Power Burst
The VOX Power Burst offers the rich tone of a genuine tube boost, designed to enhance your tone with natural compression and tube saturation.
$199 street
voxamps.com
Rock Nā Roll Relics Stinger Boost
Not your typical boost. This single-transistor midrange booster lets you switch between a punchy silicon transistor and a warm, vintage NOS Germanium transistor. Whether placed before or after other drives, it delivers the signature midrange growl that defines classic rock ānā roll. Each pedal is aged to perfection.
$279 street
rocknrollrelics.net
MXR Micro Amp
The MXR Micro Amp slams your amp to the brinkāup to +26dBāwhile adding just a touch of honey to your tone with the twist of a single knob.
$99 street
jimdunlop.com
Learn More about these pedals:
https://voxamps.com/
https://rockettpedals.com/
https://rocknrollrelics.com/
https://www.seymourduncan.com/
https://solodallas.com/
https://www.jimdunlop.com/products/electronics/mxr/
Rafiq Bhatiaās guitar is a Flip Scipio Flippercaster with vintage Teisco and DeArmond pickups and has a strikingly original voice, even without effects or processing.
The Son Lux guitaristāand David Lynch aficionadoāsays an experimental musician needs creative uncertainty, that an artist must be curious, and should ask questions in the process of creating sound. With the release of his new EP, Each Dream, A Melting Door, he breaks down the methods and philosophies he practices in his own work.
āIt feels like a lifetime ago, but yes,ā experimental guitarist/composer Rafiq Bhatia says when I bring up that he studied neuroscience and economics in college. Today, Bhatia is far more defined by his musical careerāprimarily with his band Son Lux, which also composed the Oscar-nominated score for 2022ās Everything Everywhere All at Once. However, he shares that there is an intersection between these seemingly disparate fields.
āWhere [neuroscience and economics] intersect is the science of decision making,ā explains Bhatia. Back when he was a new student at Oberlin College, āthe lab that I was the most interested in being a part of was focused on decision making under various levels of risk and uncertainty, and trying to pick apart aspects of what happens in the brain before cognition kicks in. What are the precognitive aspects of decision making, and do they predict in any way the decisions that you will actually make?
āAnd that, I think, is part of the same underlying spirit of inquiry that making music, and especially improvised music with other people, is born of,ā he continues. āYouāre in these situations where there is uncertainty and there is also riskāand if thereās not enough risk, then itās not that compelling.ā
Bhatiaās latest solo releaseāhis first in five yearsāis the EP Each Dream, A Melting Door, made in collaboration with pianist Chris Pattishall. The duo improvise their way through the five-track record, unwinding an extended impressionistic world wherein dreamlike piano underscores a range of guitar tones that glimmer in an abstract light. Itās clear that Bhatia has no intention of conveying a traditional sonic image of a guitar, instead preferring to manipulate the instrument as a device for painting colors of sound.
Bhatiaās collaborator on his new EP is pianist and composer Chris Pattishall, at left.
Photo by Ebru Yildiz
Of course, before even getting into the methods of how he achieves those sounds, Bhatia says, āI think itās less important how I get the sounds out of the guitar than the reasons why I might choose to go looking for them. And the way I get them out of the guitar today might be drastically different than the way I get them out of the guitar tomorrow. I care deeply about the sounds that are made, but Iām so not about the perception that you have to acquire all these āthingsā to make it.ā
His prized 6-string, the Flippercaster, was designed by the reclusive-yet-storied luthier Flip Scipio, whoās built and worked on guitars and basses for Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, and many others. After coming to recognize Scipioās trademark on builds he came across in various New York studios, Bhatia sought him out in an effort he compares to the search for the legendary swordsmith, Hattori HanzÅ, in Kill Bill. āHeās the nicest dude ever; it just took me a while to find him. But if you go visit him, heāll make you either an amazing AeroPress coffee or a mug of smoky lapsang tea and then sit and talk with you,ā Bhatia adds, smiling.
The guitar is equipped with vintage Teisco and DeArmond pickups wired to a blend knob in place of a switch, which Bhatia loves. āI usually donāt want half and half; I want a little bit of one and mostly all of the other. And to me itās very dependent on what the room sounds like and what musical context Iām in,ā he explains. The Flippercaster goes into a small pedalboard, the brain of which is a custom Eventide H90. Bhatia collaborated with the pedal manufacturer on the development of the deviceās design.
The duo improvise their way through the five-track record, unwinding an extended impressionistic world wherein dreamlike piano underscores a range of guitar tones that glimmer in an abstract light.
āI was really excited,ā Bhatia shares. āI was like, āCan you make it switch other pedals in and out of the chain like one of those pedalboard controllers? And letās say Iām using one of your reverbs, but I want to put distortion on it. Can you make it only affect the wet signal?ā I thought theyād maybe do 10 percent of what I asked, and they did basically all of it,ā he concludes, laughing.
Aside from his expression and volume pedals, his pedalboard is otherwise made up of a Klon KTR and a ZVEX Fat Fuzz Factory, the latter of which he has particular fun with. āIām very jealous of saxophone players because they have breath,ā he prefaces. āBut what Iāve found is that if you play in such a way where you flirt with the edge of the [Fat Fuzz Factoryās built-in] gate, you can get the ends of notes to crackle and decay, almost like when you hear a saxophone player breathe out at the end of the note.ā
His pedalboard then goes through a Universal Audio Apollo Twin MkII interface, which connects to Ableton Live on his MacBook Pro. Bhatia then uses two MIDI controllersāone on the floor with a digital display, and one with knobs that he controls with his left handāthat are both color-coded to match the lanes of his session in the DAW. āI can then grab these little bits of things that Iām playing, and bring them in and out and manipulate them while Iām also playing the guitar and generating other ones. Iām excited about it because itās a process that is helping me erase the line between what Iāve been doing on the guitar and what Iāve been doing away from the guitar. I feel like Iām getting a little bit closer to where I can play, and the sound is saying who I am.ā
Rafiq Bhatiaās Gear
Filmmaker David Lynch has been a powerful influence on Bhatiaāa cover of āThe Voice of Love,ā from Lynchās Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, appears at the end of Each Dream, A Melting Doorāas have a number of hip-hop producers and jazz musicians.
Photo by John Klukas
Guitars
- 2018 Flip Scipio Flippercaster with vintage Teisco and DeArmond pickups
Amps
Live:
- Strymon Iridium (with replaced IRs and EQ tweaks) > Telefunken TDA-2 DI > Universal Audio Apollo Twin MkII > MacBook Pro running Ableton Live > FOH
Studio:
- Swart Atomic Space Tone Pro
- Anderson custom 1x12
- Swart Space Tone Atomic Jr.
Effects
- Ableton Live controlled by Morningstar MC6 PRO and DJ TechTools Midi Fighter Twister
- Eventide H90
- ZVEX Fat Fuzz Factory
- Klon KTR Overdrive
- Lehle Dual Expression
- Sound Sculpture Volcano Volume
Strings & Picks
- DāAddario NYXL Balanced Tension (.011ā.050)
- Bluebird 1.5 mm custom picks, handmade from vintage Galalith poker chips
Filmmaker David Lynch has been a powerful influence on Bhatiaāa cover of āThe Voice of Love,ā from Lynchās Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, appears at the end of Each Dream, A Melting Doorāas have a number of hip-hop producers and jazz musicians. Bhatia shares, āIf you listen to Madlib beats, sometimes heās doing a lot and itās a million different small elements that have been collaged together, but other times itās just a sample that he flipped and he didnāt change anything except for the loop point. But whether itās something he made while fussing over all these little ingredients, or itās just something he looped, you hear two seconds of it and itās like, āOh, thatās Madlib.āā
He mentions how that effect similarly belongs to icons such as Thelonious Monk and Jimi Hendrix. āThose are all the heroes, and they say something thatās so personal and honest to who they are and their experience that right away, you just know [snaps fingers]āitās them. To me it sounds like honesty, and it sounds like an expression in many cases of hybridity.
āI was in class in 9th grade when the planes hit the Twin Towers, and it was on our school news channel,ā he continues, emphasizing the discomfort it created for him as someone of Muslim origin, which drew unwanted speculation from his non-Muslim peers. āThat was the backdrop to how I got into playing the guitar and listening to music. So, when I would hear folks who seemed to be able to take all these different aspects of who they were and what their experience was and distill it into a way of communicating through sound, that was really inspiring. It just felt like therapy to engage in trying to figure out how to do that.ā
For the release of his last solo album, Breaking English, Bhatia performs here with a trio, showcasing his uniquely creative approach on the instrument in a more traditional context.
Duane Betts enjoys a control set modification that was preferred by his father, the late, legendary Dickey Betts.
Duane Betts and reader Steve Nowicki join the PG staff to discuss their favorite ways to customize their setups.
Question: Whatās your favorite guitar mod?
Guest Picker - Duane Betts
Bettsā 1961 ES-335 has its toggle and volume-dial positions switched.
A: My favorite mod is the one on my 1961 Gibson ES-335. The toggle switch and neck volume knob positions have been switched so the volume knob is more accessible for volume swells using your pinky finger. This is something my dad had done when he obtained the guitar in the ā90s as he loved using the volume swell effect.
A pedal primed for vintage fuzz sounds.
Obsession: My current obsession is this DanDrive Secret Machine fuzz that JD Simo gave me a few years ago. I donāt use fuzz often but Iāve loved it as a way to change things up and give the listener something fresh. My normal tone is very natural with the amp turned up. This is just a great fuzz tone that gives me a new angle that I really enjoy pursuing both live and in the studio.
Reader of the Month - Steve Nowicki
A: A push/pull knob for humbucker coil split. Itās a sneaky little mod I throw on my tone pots. You wonāt get amazing Strat tone, but the ability to instantly swap between Les Paul chunk and Fender twang during a jam opens a ton of possibilities tonally. Plus, no extra switches or routing neededāeven though itās fun to hack guitars apart.
Obsession: The EVH 5150 Iconic EL34 amp. Owning an 80-watt half-stack in a Brooklyn apartment might be overkill, but damn this amp is awesome. It delivers insane amounts of gain and distortion, yet every little nuance of your playing comes through crystal clear. I pair it with a Bugera Power Soak so I can crank the head and get that warm āBrown Soundā tone at lower volumes.
John Bohlinger - Nashville Correspondent
John Bohlinger and his Lukather-ized Strat.
A: Iāve hacked up a bunch of guitars over the years, but my favorite mod remains the highly intrusive, expensive, and quixotic B-bender install. It is the equivalent of open heart surgery, and thereās no going backābut the first time you play the Clarence White āYou Aināt Goinā Nowhereā intro right, itās totally worth it.
John at work. When it comes to mods, he know the drill!
Obsession: I recently filmed a PG video where we swapped pickups in my ā90s Strat with an EMG Lukather set. I never thought Iād go active, but what gets me is how smoothly the volume and tone work. Iām rethinking all my gear biases. Like maybe thereās been some progress since 1957.
Jon Levy - Publisher
Let it bleed: Jon dials back the treble on his Tele.
A: Installing a treble bleed on my volume pots has changed how I play electric guitar. Previously, I never dialed back my volume knob because it dulled my sound. Now I can fine-tune loudness and gain while retaining toneāitās a game changer. I still swap pickups and hardware, but one mod always comes first: the humble treble bleed.
Did you know both John Paul Jones and Jimmy Page played on Shirley Basseyās iconic recording of āGoldfinger?ā
Obsession: John Paul Jones. Iāve always loved his bass (and other instrumental contributions) with Led Zeppelin. But after seeing the Zep documentary [Becoming Led Zeppelin] I searched his session work from 1964ā1968, which includes Shirley Bassey, Lulu, Donovan and more. What an amazingly versatile and talented artist he is!
Just like guitarists, audiophiles are chasing sound. It may be a never-ending quest.
āWhat you got back home, little sister, to play your fuzzy warbles on? I bet you got, say, pitiful, portable picnic players. Come with uncle and hear all proper. Hear angel trumpets and devil trombones.āāAlexander DeLarge (Malcolm McDowell) in the film A Clockwork Orange.
We listen to recorded music for enjoyment and inspiration, but few of us expect recordings to rival the experience of live music. Most guitarists know that the average home sound system, let alone Bluetooth boomboxes, cannot reproduce the weight and depth equal to standing in a room with a full-blown concert guitar rig. Also, classical music lovers recognize that a home system wonāt reproduce the visceral envelope of a live orchestra. Still, much like guitarists, audiophiles spend huge amounts of time and money chasing the ultimate ārealisticā audio experience. I wonder if sometimes thatās misguided.
My exposure to the audio hobby came early, from my fatherās influence. My dad grew up in the revolution of home electronics, and being an amateur musician, he wanted good reproduction of the recordings he cherished. This led him to stock our home with tube components and DIY electrostatic hybrid speakers that rivaled the size and output of vintage Fender 2x12s. I thought this was normal.
Later, I discovered a small shop in my hometown that specialized in āhigh endā audiophile gear. They had a policy: No sale is final until you are completely satisfied. I became an almost weekly visitor (and paying customer) and was allowed to take equipment home to audition, which was dangerous for a young man on a low budget. It was through this program I started to understand the ins and outs of building a cohesive system that met my taste. I began to pay much more attention to the nuances of audio reproduction. Some gear revealed a whole new level of accuracy when it came to acoustic or vocal performance, while lacking the kick-ass punch I desired of my rock albums. I was seeking reproduction that would gently caress the sounds on folk, classical, and jazz recordings, but could also slay when the going got heavy. This made me a bit of an odd bird to the guys at the audio shop, but they wanted to please. With their guidance I assembled some decent systems over time, but through the decades, I lost interest in the chase.
Recently, Iāve begun perusing online audiophile boards and they seem oddly familiar, with tube versus solid-state discussions that might feel at home to guitaristsāexcept the prices are now beyond what Iād imagined. For the most part, they mirror the exchanges we see on guitar boards minus the potty-mouth language. Enthusiasts exchange information and opinions (mostly) on what gear presents the widest soundstage or most detailed high-frequency delivery, all in flowery language usually reserved for fine wines.
Speaking of whining, youāll rethink your idea of expensive cables when you hear folks comparing 18", $1,700 interconnects for their DACs. Some of the systems Iāve seen are more costly than an entire guitar, amplifier, and studio gear collection by a serious margin. Mostly, the banter is cordial and avoids the humble-bragging that might go along with the purchase of a $10,000 set of PAF humbuckers. Still, I have a lack of insight into what exactly most are trying to accomplish.
If youāve ever worked in a big-time studio, you know that the soundscape blasting out of huge monitors is not what most of us have in our homes. My experience rewiring pro-studio patchbays is that less emphasis is placed on oxygen-free, silver-plated, directional cables than the room treatment. Iāve found myself wondering if the people on those audio boardsāwho have spent many tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars on their home systemsāhave ever been in a studio control room listening to music as loud as a 28,000 horsepower traffic jam of NASCAR racers. That might be an eye-opener.
One of my takeaways is that even though music recording began as an attempt to reproduce what actually happens in a room, it hasnāt been just that for a long time. With all our effects and sonic wizardry on display, recording is like playing an instrument itself, and much more complex. This is not a new revelation to Beatles fans.
What amazes me is that both audiophiles and guitar fanatics pursue the sounds we hear on recordings for differing reasons and with subjective results. Itās a feedback-loop game, where we chase sounds mostly exclusive to the studio. So, how do we determine if our playback is accurate? Will we ever be satisfied enough to call the sale final?
Iām not convinced, but just the same, Iāll continue my own search for the holy grail of affordable, kick-ass sound that still loves a folk guitar