Frontwoman Jessica Dobson plunges into the depths of her Benson-powered road rig.
Seattle indie rockers Deep Sea Diver released their fourth full-length record, BillboardHeart, earlier this year via Sub Pop, and their supporting cross-country tour took them to downtown Nashville’s Blue Room at Jack White’s Third Man Records.
PG’s Chris Kies connected with singer and guitarist Jessica Dobson in 2020 for a virtual Rig Rundown, but this time we get a close-up, in-person look at Dobson’s tour kit, including her signature Benson stomp box and a custom guitar.
Dobson picked up this slick Bilt S.S. Zaftig to replace her beloved but terribly heavy Fender Starcaster. This one has Lollar Regal Wide-Range humbuckers in it.
Regrets, I’ve Had a Few
Dobson purchased this used Fender Elvis Costello Jazzmaster in 2010, and has since met the person who sold it—and totally regrets it. It’s strung with D’Addario .011–.052s, and tuned to E standard.
Blue Benz
U.K.-based builder Elliott Trent modeled this custom Trent guitar for Dobson on her mother’s old blue Mercedes, and loaded it with P-90s.
Benson Boom Box
Dobson’s amp of choice, taped to perfection, is this 30-watt Benson Chimera 2x12 combo.
Jessica Dobson’s Pedalboard
Dobson runs a busy board powered by a Voodoo Labs Pedal Power 2 Plus and operated via a Boss ES-8. There’s also her signature Benson Deep Sea Diver, plus a Benson Germanium Preamp, JHS Pulp N Peel, Sarno Music Solutions Earth Drive, Benson Germanium Boost, EHX Deluxe Memory Man, Strymon blueSky, EHX POG2, Chase Bliss Brothers Analog Gainstage, and Menatone Pleasure Trem 5000, plus a TC Electronic PolyTune 2 Noir.
The doomgaze titans from Texas hit the road this year to celebrate more than two decades together, and they brought some of their favorite noisemakers for the occasion.
Post-rock/doomgaze outfit This Will Destroy You, formed in San Marcos, Texas, in 2004, are marking 21 years together, and 20 years of their self-recorded debut Young Mountain, with an anniversary tour. In late June, the band played Nashville’s Basement East, where guitarists Jeremy Galindo and Nicholas Huft and bassist Ethan Billips met up with PG’s Chris Kies to share what gear they packed for the roadtrip.
Galindo started off playing electric on his brother’s FenderTelecaster, and he’s never looked back. He’s played various models over the years, but got this Fender American Performer Telecaster two years ago. He strings it with .011–.052 strings for slightly more body and fullness, and tunes it to E-flat standard. Galindo mostly plays with his fingers, but when he picks he uses some of the thinnest picks he can find.
No Tubes? No Problems
A Music Man HD-130 is Galindo’s always-and-forever, but on the road, he likes this Roland Jazz Chorus 120 for its tubeless reliability and easy clean sounds.
Jeremy Galindo’s Pedalboard
The Boss DD-20 Giga Delay and Tech 21 Boost R.V.B. have been with Galindo since the early days, and he considers the Tech 21 to be the most essential tool of his kit. Aside from those, there’s a Walrus Canvas Tuner, Ernie Ball VP JR, Friday Club Fury 6-Six, Walrus Jupiter, Walrus Fundamental Ambient, Boss RE-20, and Mr. Black Deluxe Plus. A Walrus Aetos powers the party.
Smooth as Sandpaper
This Fender Jazzmaster, Huft’s first, was bought from Full of Hell guitarist Spencer Hazard, who equipped it with its “awful sandpaper texture” finish. Huft doesn’t use the rhythm circuit, so he’s taped it off. He plays with both pickups engaged at all times, including the humbucker rail pickup in the bridge.
United Solid-States
Huft has a soft spot for 1970s solid-state amplification, which makes this Peavey Standard Mark III series a perfect match for TWDY: It’s cheap, and it’s loud.
Nicholas Huft’s Pedalboard
Along with an ABY switcher, Huft runs a Boss TU-3, Ernie Ball VP JR, Gremlin Machine Shop Worshiper, Dead Air Portrayal of Guilt/Matt King Dual Drive, Boss DD-200, Boss RC-500, Red Panda Context, Boss DD-3T, Beautiful Noise Exploder, and Walrus Slo.
Cheap and Cheerful
Billips explains that he and his bandmates grew up on cheap instruments, and they still feel like home, so that’s why he rocks with this Marcus Miller Sire bass.
Community Cranker
Billips and his bandmates split on this Darkglass Electronics Microtubes 500 v2 head, which they share collectively.
Ethan Billips’ Pedalboard
Billips runs an Ernie Ball VP JR Tuner, a prototype bass overdrive from Mr. Black, a Death by Audio Bass War, Walrus Badwater, Danelectro Talk Back, Catalinbread Topanga, and a Radial BigShot ABY.
In this video, some of your favorite players—Marty Friedman, Jared James Nichols, Steve Reis, and Nate Garrett—share personal stories that go back to the beginning of their guitar journeys when Black Sabbath riffs constructed their musical foundation.
He’s Worked with Taylor Swift and Michael Jackson. Now, Dann Huff Steps Out on His Own.
He’s Worked with Taylor Swift and Michael Jackson. Now, Dann Huff Steps Out on His Own.
You wouldn’t expect Dann Huff, one of the most renowned studio guitarists, to feel nervous sharing his debut solo LP with a friend. But when that friend happens to be Toto’s Steve Lukather, a permanent fixture on the Mount Rushmore of L.A. session players, it’s easy to understand the butterflies.
“He said, ‘I want to hear your record,’” recalls Huff, 64, with a laugh, detailing the creation of the colorful and lovingly arranged When Words Aren’t Enough. “I said, ‘Sure, I’ll send it to you.’ Then as soon as I pressed send, I went into this almost-fetal position mentally. I thought, ‘I just sent it to one of the people I value so highly in my life.’ But it was great, the fact that I felt the fear.”
That story crystalizes the skills that propelled Huff to this moment: the confidence and curiosity it took to press that button, but also the humility it took to still feel those healthy nerves. After all, you have to be great—but also a flexible team player—to rack up the credits this guy has. And he’s had a career like few others in the business, both in the styles he’s explored and the roles he’s served: Huff rose up the ranks of the fertile ’80s session scene, where he recorded with everyone from Michael Jackson to Kenny Rogers, has played in both a contemporary Christian rock band (White Heart) and an AOR outfit (Giant), journeyed back to his hometown of Nashville and immersed himself in the pop-country world (Shania Twain, Faith Hill), ventured into marquee-level production work (most famously on Taylor Swift’s 2012 blockbuster, Red), and now—finally—released a fascinating album of his own.
“As soon as I pressed send, I went into this almost-fetal position mentally. I thought, ‘I just sent it to one of the people I value so highly in my life.’ But it was great, the fact that I felt the fear.”
When Words Aren’t Enough nods to so much of that range, moving from simmering dixie funk to cinematic orchestral rock to atmospheric and artful Americana. It sounds like the work of an artist stretching every single muscle yet never straining in the flex—a series of clean and jerks that sound awfully clean. But you can’t talk about this ambitious endeavor without exploring its true roots. “This project for me is basically a love letter to my emerging years, which is the late ’70s,” Huff says. “It’s everything that I built upon, everything that I love in guitar playing.”
The groundwork was laid when Huff was a kid. When he was around 10, his parents moved from the Chicago area to Nashville—with three sons and a whopping $800 to their name—as Dann’s dad, Ronn, pursued a career in orchestration. (“Man, he had some big cojones to do that!” Dann says, accurately.) The elder Huff’s career took off, and he found work with the Nashville Symphony, as well as occasionally in recording studios with rhythm sections. The latter intrigued his son, whose interest in the guitar started to grow around age 12. Dann had felt a sense of culture shock in Tennessee, but music became his guiding light. The more he glimpsed of his father’s work life, the clearer his path became. “My dad had a friend who was a session guitar player in Nashville named John Darnell, and he asked if [John] would come over and spend maybe 30 minutes to an hour with his 13-year-old son,” he recalls. “He came over one night, and I’ll never forget it. He taught me some scales and a couple chords. He kind of lit the fuse, and that was it.”
As an aspiring guitarist, the young Huff had the perfect entry point. His dad would offer to let him sit in the back of the room at the studio, where he’d meet “the cream of the crop” session players in Nashville—guitarists like Reggie Young, Pete Wade, and Dale Sellers. “To me, those were the rock stars,” he says. “You could go into a dark-lit studio, hear music for the first time, and make something new. I just thought that was the coolest thing. Why? I have no idea. There was no illusion that I wanted to go and be a rock star. Not even in the slightest, when I was a kid.”
When Words Aren’t Enough is rooted in the music of the ’70s—Huff’s formative listening and learning years.
“This project is a love letter to my emerging years, which is the late ’70s. It’s everything that I built upon, everything that I love in guitar playing.”
As a high-schooler in the mid ’70s, after years of practicing his chops in the basement, that dream started to become real. He played on friends’ demos at the local Belmont University, and he soaked in torrents of incredible instrumental music of that era: Larry Carlton, Lee Ritenour, Jeff Beck’sBlow by Blow, and Al Di Meola’sElegant Gypsy, as well as Steely Dan’s Aja. “The list could go on, but it was so diverse," he says. “I was inundated with all these different kinds of music, all the Motown stuff. Everything interested me. And all of the sudden I started seeing these West Coast session players.” After playing on an album by singer-songwriter Greg Guidry, he was directly connected to some of those musicians, including former Toto bassist David Hungate. He was eventually hired for an L.A. session with soul legend Lou Rawls, kicking off a period of frequent commuting.
“At the time, Steve Lukather had all but vacated his chokehold—he was simply just the very best—because he was becoming a rock star,” Huff says. “I started booking myself on sessions. Back in the early ’80s, they still used contractors for a lot of the pop sessions. I said, ‘Just book me like I live out here.’” He would go out for stretches at a time, making a name for himself in L.A., but realized that this process wasn’t sustainable: “I didn’t realize I could charge for my hotels, my rental cars,” he says. “I did my own cartage. If I booked a session, my expenses would usually surmount that by 100 percent. But I was smart enough to realize I was investing in something, and it became apparent over the course of a year that I couldn’t keep hopping on planes, playing on big records in L.A., and coming back to play on demos in Nashville.” Around age 21, he and his new wife hopped on a plane and headed west, starting the next chapter of his life.
The ’80s flew by in a stream of sessions: Michael Jackson’s Bad, Barbra Streisand’s Emotion, Chaka Khan’s I Feel for You, Bob Seger’s Like a Rock, Whitney Houston’s self-titled, Madonna’s True Blue—every situation was different, and the ever-curious Huff learned something from almost all of them. “It was one of those perfect storms,” he says of this prolific time. But after the unexpected success of Giant, his melodic rock band featuring his brother David on drums, following the release of their 1989 debut, Last of the Runaways, he decided to move his talents back to Nashville. “I felt I didn’t need to do my studio career anymore,” he recalls. “[My wife] and I had just had our first kid, a daughter, and we felt, ‘As long as I’m gonna be doing this rock thing,’ which I’d never dreamt of doing, ‘we might as well do it from the comfort of where the rest of our families are,’ so we moved back to Nashville and I left my studio career. We cut a second Giant record, and by that point, Nirvana and Pearl Jam were out, so say no more.” Rather than move back to Los Angeles, he quickly found a niche in the Nashville scene, particularly within the world of country-pop/rock, playing on a series of enormous records—including a pair of multi-platinum monsters by Shania Twain, 1995’s The Woman in Me and 1997’s Come on Over, both produced by the singer’s revered then-husband, Robert “Mutt” Lange.
Toto guitarist Steve Lukather was one of the first to hear Huff’s new collection. After Huff sent it, he was petrified—but the fear was invigorating.
Photo by Nathan Chapman
“I don’t have any illusions of what I can do on the guitar, so I have to dig deep into what I actually have roots in.”
Huff was once again ingrained in the session world—just a very different one—but Lange noticed his potential in another field. "I didn’t get into producing records because I wanted to," Huff admits. "I was lured into it, or encouraged into it, mainly by Mutt Lange. He sensed that the way I played studio guitar, I knew that it wasn’t about me. It’s about building something.” And that sense of songcraft, of having an eagle eye for arrangement and talent, served him well when he made that jump, working with artists like Swift, Rascal Flatts, and even Megadeth. It also wound up informing his first solo LP, When Words Aren’t Enough, which came about after some friendly prodding from fellow Nashville musicians Tom Bukovac and Mike Reid.
“Both challenged and embarrassed me: ‘Why don’t you play guitar anymore?’ ‘I play guitar on the records.’ ‘No, why don’t you play guitar?’” he says. “I didn’t have a good answer after saying no for dozens of years. I decided I would give it a rip. I wasn’t in tip-top form of guitar playing at this time, so it was humbling, but it felt right.” He gradually started putting together some demos, drawing on the pivotal period of teenage inspiration that first drew him to this wild life. “Runaway Gypsy” laces jazz-funk riffs with grooving Latin percussion and grand string parts—a cinematic stew that reflects the influence of Al Di Meola. The title of “Southern Synchronicity” is an overt nod to Police guitarist Andy Summers, but the song is way wilder than you’d expect, with shifting time signatures, funky drumming, and the fiery fiddle of Stuart Duncan. Meanwhile, the greasy “Colorado Creepin’” is a tightly coiled, wah-heavy highlight. (“You can probably hear a lot of my love of Jeff Beck,” notes Huff.) Every track—featuring the core of Huff, bassist Mark Hill, and drummer Jerry Roe—is virtuosic but tasteful, placing every show-stopping solo within the context of a hooky melody and satisfying musical arc.
Fellow sessions aces Tom Bukovac and Mike Reid prodded Huff into recording and releasing his own original music.
Photo by Nathan Chapman
Often utilizing large chunks of his demos, they knocked out the bulk of basic recording in a couple days—and that no-nonsense approach fits for a guy who spent decades as a quick-on-his-feet hired gun. The process made Huff “fall in love again” with his Stratocaster, which he hadn’t played for years, but the recording was intentionally bare-bones. “It wasn’t about amplifiers or all the equipment,” he says. “I used very little equipment on the record. When you’re trying to say something, just say it how you’re gonna say it.
“The gift of being older and not being, shall we say, in my ‘prime form’—my chops aren’t as fluid as they were when I was playing 10 hours a day—is that I had to define what I was interested in before I did this,” he says. “And what I’ve always been drawn to in music—and I saw a connection here—is composition. When the shape, the form, the melody, the dynamics, are correct, that allows you to improvise over it in a way that isn’t gratuitous or about you trying to prove yourself. I don’t have any illusions of what I can do on the guitar, so I have to dig deep into what I actually have roots in.”
He also wound up enormously proud of the record—but that’s not to say he didn’t feel anxious about it, illustrated by his exchange with the great Lukather.
“I went through a period after I finished this thing where I was absolutely terrified,” he admits. “I guess anybody would. It’s hard to hear yourself from another perspective. I can listen to other guitar players or musicians, and I just want to hear who they are. I’m critical, but with my music, it’s like, I know where the warts are, and I hear the limitations. It’s hard to hear it for what it is, but I thought, ‘If I don’t let go of this thing and stop trying to impress myself or everybody else, I’m never gonna do this.’ So I said, ‘Fuck it. I’m gonna put it out.’ So I let go, and that was the best decision I could have made.”
YouTube It
In this two-and-a-half-hour video courtesy of Vertex Effects, Dann Huff does a deep dive on his most recognizable guitar parts over the decades.
Tuning up for their own tour that starts this week, the loud ’n’ heavy merchants from Buffalo show PG’s Perry Bean how they apply the hot sauce.
In Better Lovers, guitarists Jordan Buckley and Will Putney, plus bassist Stephen Micciche, go heavy and strange—a combination they achieve by carefully selecting their instruments, amps, and effects. Their latest album is called Highly Irresponsible, but when it comes to nailing their riffs and sounds, this Rundown with PG’s Perry Bean, filmed recently at Nashville’s Brooklyn Bowl, makes it clear they are anything but that!
One-Eyed 6 Strings
Putney’s main guitar is a road-worn Dunable Cyclops, built especially for him by Sacha Dunable. It became the blueprint for his Dunable signature model. “The signatures are awesome, but I love this guitar. I play it to death,” he says. It‘s got an EMG 81 pickup and a master volume dial. That’s it. Putney has a backup that’s nearly identical, except for the stage rash.
Practice Makes….
Putney is using this DE version of his signature to practice new songs and the new sounds that come along with them, including those made via the onboard EHX Pitchfork circuit, with power/signal bypass, momentary on/off latching, pitch up/down/both selection, an interval selector, and a mix knob. The scale is 25.5" and it sports a Graphtech TUSQ nut along with an EMG 81. Most Better Lovers tunes are in drop D, by the way, with Ernie Ball strings.
Power Rager
This Peavey 6505 V2 arrived just in time for this night's gig, sliding in next to the two 5150s that have been in Putney’s live rig for years. It’s got 120 watts and invokes the spirit of one of Eddie Van Halen’s favorite heads. It’s got 6L6s, but he’s contemplating a swap with EL84s after the tour, just for an A/B test.
Cab Envy
How about a pair of Atlas custom 6x12 cabinets to plug your guitar and pedals into? “They’re loud,” Putney understates. And he A/Bs between that Peavey/Atlas combination and a Vox AC30 for his clean and dirty sounds. He uses a Mastermind PBC by RJM Music Technologies for switching both amps and pedals.
Set It, Don’t Sweat It
Here’s a look at where Putney’s AC30 lives.
Pedal Power
Running through that Mastermind are a fuzz pedal Putney designed with God City’s/Converge’s Kurt Ballou called the Pariah, and there’s also a Sinkhole, Astral Destiny, and Soft Focus Reverb from Catalinbread, an EQD Dispatch Master, two EHX Pitchforks, a Fortin Zuul+, a Strymon El Capistan, a Better Lovers signature Night Terror overdrive, and a Kevin Hickey Signature Chorus.
Blue Bomber
Buckley got this ’78 SG from Rochester, New York’s House of Guitars when he was a kid. It’s been through a lot of breaks but has come through triumphant, with double EMG 81s. And the Vox AC30 it’s leaning on is his, too. Listen to how it sounds with a whole lotta reverb and a slide in the Rundown! That’s his sound for the concert opener on the current tour.
Don’t Even Look at This Guitar
Here’s Buckley’s favorite ESP Eclipse, also with EMGs and lot of wear on the rear upper bout an around the picking zone. It’s got an ESP “full-thickness” body, so it’s heavier than his beloved SG.
More Dunable
This Cyclops has got its original two Dunable pickups and a tone and volume control—another stripped-down heavy-rock machine! How did Buckley acquire this one? He wanted a red guitar for a video, and Dunable, after an ask from Putney, delivered.
Effect-ive
What’s he got on the floor? A Lehle Little Dual II amp switcher, a TC Electronic Polytune, a Boss NS-2 Noise Suppressor, an EarthQuaker A/B box and Dispatch Master, an MXR Analog Chorus, a Walrus Audio Fathom Multi-Function Reverb, a Better Lovers signature Night Terror overdrive, and a Coppersound X Jack White Triplegraph Octave.
Marshall Power
Buckley says he’s been using JCM 800s for decades. This one is borrowed and “feeds back a little less than the ones I own,” he confides.
Preacher Tone
And here’s his Revv Generator 120, which he sets on channel 4.
Foam-O
Micciche’s seafoam green Deluxe PJ is a not-so-common bottom rung. It has a P body and a J neck. It boasts a pair of Seymour Duncan Quarter Pounder bass pickups.
The Ass Beater
That’s right: Micciche calls this one the Ass Beater. It’s an Ibanez with active Bartolini pickups. Strictly speaking, it’s an Iron Label SRMS625EX with a 5-piece, multi-scale walnut neck and Ebonol fretboard.
California Dreamin’
This Sandberg California model was a custom order, with active and passive pickup options.
Bass Barkers
Here’s the array of Micciche’s powerhouse bass amp line-up: an Orange AD 200 Bass Mk3 he’s had about 15 years anchors his stage left, stage right hosts an Orange Terror Bass, the AD 200 goes through an Orange cab while the Terror hits an Aguilar 8x10. Both rigs fire at once, all the time.
Dirty Half-Dozen
A modest six boxes rest on Micciche’s board: an Orange Two-Stroke, a Darkglass Microtubes B7K Ultra, an MXR Studio Compressor, a Lehle Little Dual switcher, a TC Electronic Polytune, and his wireless. A Voodoo Lab Pedal Power 4 stokes the fires.
