The Norwegian guitarists reveal the strange pleasures of mangling modern metal.
What do Michael Jackson, Tony Hawk, and the Eagles have in common? Believe it or not, these three seemingly disparate entities are linked within the musical DNA of Norway’s Kvelertak.
In a world overrun with cookie-cutter knockoffs, Kvelertak is possibly the most authentically innovative rock band to come around in years. They were lumped into black metal when they first appeared almost a decade ago, but on their latest album, Nattesferd (Roadrunner), Kvelertak crafts a truly cohesive sound that may require adding yet another subgenre to the metal canon. The verdict is out on what that subgenre would be. But the band’s ability to effortlessly combine death-metal blast beats with ’80s hair-metal riffs on the album’s opener, “Dendrofil for Yggdrasil,” and blend growling, Cookie Monster vocals with fist-pumping, anthemic melodies on the first single, “1985,” is breaking new ground and making the metal community prick up its ears.
They also buck convention by playing in standard tuning, which is unusual in this era of drop-tuned metal guitar, and frontman Erlend Hjelvik sings in his native tongue, demonstrating that impassioned music can most certainly transcend language barriers.
The band’s three guitarists, Bjarte Lund Rolland, Maciek Ofstad, and Vidar Landa, balance brutally heavy riffs with instantly hummable harmonies reminiscent of icons like Thin Lizzy, Iron Maiden, and the aforementioned Eagles. But they’re not overly derivative. “Heksebrann” features fingerpicking that could easily fit on a country track, and it’s such moments of unexpected color that reveal the guitarists’ breadth of musical knowledge. All three manage to complement one another stylistically and sonically, with a massive wall of guitar tones that is equal parts punk and power. Metal power, that is.
Kvelertak, which translates to “stranglehold” in English, formed in Stavanger, Norway, in 2007. The sextet released a demo called Westcoast Holocaust that same year, before being picked up by End Records for their eponymous debut, which was released in 2010. Meir, the follow-up, came out in 2013 on Roadrunner and was named Rolling Stone’s No. 2 metal album of the year. They’ve also been playing live … a lot. So much so that with Nattesferd they set out to push their boundaries by recording live without a click track. The result is a refreshingly real album that captures the vibe of a band reveling in the moment, rather than some carefully orchestrated slice of perfection.
PG caught up with Rolland and Ofstad on a two-week break during a rigorous summer touring schedule. Rolland was at home in Norway; Ofstad was vacationing in Croatia. We talked about their crushing aesthetic, their gear, their influences, and making the roaring and beautiful Nattesferd.
Kvelertak’s music seems to pull from many different sources. Who were some of your early influences?
Rolland: I was a late bloomer. I’m one of the only guys in the band that didn’t really grow up with metal. As a kid, I was a big Michael Jackson fan. Then I moved on to Pink Floyd and from there to everywhere, including a lot of black metal—particularly Satyricon, Darkthrone, Stormcast, Burzum, Endstille. It’s a mix of all kinds of music, really.
Ofstad: I started playing bass guitar when I was about 12, because I was playing skateboard video games and thought the music was awesome. I found a lot of music through Tony Hawk video games. There was one really bad game—I can’t remember what it was called—but the Deftones were on it, and it was the scariest thing I’d ever heard.
Maciek Ofstad lays it out: “We’re just dudes that want to play rock ’n’ roll, and we really love playing live shows, and that’s what we’ve been doing. There hasn’t been any plan except for writing songs that we like and want to play.” Photo by Tim Bugbee/Tinnitus Photography
Were there any particular guitar players you modeled yourselves after or tried to emulate?
Ofstad: My mom is a violinist and I played violin when I was younger, but when I got into skateboarding and punk, I wanted to play guitar. I come from Sandnes, Norway, where there’s a good hardcore scene, so I started going to shows when I was 13 or 14, and I just wanted to play that music.
When I got better on guitar, I started to get influenced by guitarists. Death was the first band that got me into wanting to play good. Chuck Schuldiner was a great guitar player and a very good songwriter. But I started out just wanting to play fast. I played in hardcore and punk bands. Every Sunday I would sit in my room and learn all of the songs that I loved. I just ate everything up.
With the triple-guitar attack, one can’t help but detect a bit of Thin Lizzy—especially with the harmonies.
Rolland: Definitely, but that came later. When we got three guitarists we started experimenting more with fancy guitar licks. Iron Maiden, too, for that matter. And there’s a lot of Southern rock influence, too, like the Eagles.
How did the three-guitar line-up come about?
Rolland: It was a matter of some line-up changes that eventually led to having one more guitar player in the band. We quickly realized it sounded way more massive live. We could do the two-way harmonies without losing the extra power from the rhythm guitar. It’s a way to keep the momentum up and going. Even if you just have one guitar playing lead, you still have two guitars playing rhythm in the background, so you don’t lose the power, which is one of the big benefits of having three guitars live.
Maciek, how did you join Kvelertak?
Ofstad: I’d been playing since I was 16 and did a bunch of tours in Europe. I was pretty much over the whole band thing when I saw that Kvelertak needed a guitar player. I knew Vidar and Marvin [Nygaard, bass]. They were in the same scene as me, and they played in a death metal band that was really cool called the Rape of Lucrece. Those guys were pretty gnarly.
I saw Kvelertak live and they were awesome, so I figured I would talk to Marvin and, if they needed me, it would be cool. At the time Kvelertak was just a local band that played a couple of shows per year. I joined and we’ve been touring ever since.
Did you have any reservations about playing in a three-guitar band?
Ofstad: Yeah, I thought about it. I’d never played in a band with three guitars and to arrange three guitars is complicated. But when it works, it works. It’s a really cool songwriting process, fitting everyone into the song. And when it’s supposed to just go forward we all blast the same thing and it sounds huge. Look at Maiden.
What separates the three of you stylistically?
Rolland: None of us are virtuosos. We all come from different backgrounds. I’m the one who sticks out the most, because I don’t play with a pick. I also use single-coils, like P-90s. The other guys use humbuckers. Maciek is more of a lead guitarist and Vidar is more of a rhythm guitarist. I guess that’s the biggest difference.
Brandishing a Nik Huber Krautster II, Vidar Landa digs into the high E string while Marvin Nygaard holds down the bottom end, and a wall of Orange and Marshall amps bear loud witness. Photo by Tim Bugbee/Tinnitus Photography
What made you gravitate towards fingers rather than a pick?
Rolland: When we started Kvelertak, I played drums. I had just started playing guitar and had never played electric before. I just had an acoustic. And so, I was playing drums and running back and forth trying to explain stuff to the guitarists, so I eventually picked up the guitar myself. I never actually thought that I was going to end up playing. This was kind of a side project that just took off [laughs]. Had I known that at the time, I might’ve started playing with a pick, but it just ended up like that.
Do you use your index finger as a pick?
Rolland: All three fingers, and I use my thumb sometimes. I really like the fact that I can feel what I’m doing, and I feel like I am more in control.
When the three of you are playing tight, unison rhythms, are you conscious of a unified picking technique?
Rolland: It’s all sort of downstroke-ish. It comes down to trying to retain the rock or punk-rock grooves. Since I don’t play with a pick, everything naturally defaults to downstrokes. It’s a self-imposed limitation that keeps it simple and intricate at the same time.
Do you spend time crafting your tones so you’re not stepping on one another?
Ofstad: We’ve become a lot better with that, but that’s just recent, like over the last two years. Before, we all used Orange amps and it’s pretty much been plug and play—maybe grab some pedals you like and do your thing. But we’ve played a few hundred shows now, and we’ve become better at putting ourselves in different positions in the mix. I never thought about these things much, because I just played punk and hardcore. But now it makes sense to do things well.
How do you decide who plays what?
Rolland: It’s just something we figure out in rehearsal—whoever has the most natural feel for something. It usually falls naturally that Vidar will play the rhythm stuff and Maciek will play the more advanced lead stuff. Sometimes we switch it up a little. Sometimes Vidar and Maciek will play lead and I’ll play rhythm, or Maciek and I will play a lead and Vidal will play rhythm. It’s not really something we think a lot about when writing songs.
Ofstad: We all have very different playing styles and, on the new album, it is very clear that that’s a big part of why three guitars work. Everyone very naturally finds his place in the song—everyone has his own characteristic. And Bjarte playing with his fingers sounds way different than what I play.
Nattesferd is self-produced with Nick Terry engineering. It’s your first record without Converge’s Kurt Ballou at the helm. Was there something you were hoping to achieve producing it yourselves?
Rolland: We thought we could produce it without Kurt’s help, even though he was very instrumental, especially on the first record. He helped us tighten up arrangements. We still came prepared and had songs demoed, but it was something we really needed.
Since then we’ve evolved, having played so many live shows, that we felt we might as well just record it live: drums, bass, and three guitars at the same time. The arrangements are also simpler and more live-based. There wasn’t really that much to produce, or left to produce, by the time we got into Amper Tone Studio in Oslo.
Vidar Landa’s Gear
GuitarsNik Huber Krautster II
Danelectro 12SDC 12-string
Vox Phantom XII 12-string
Amps
1979 Marshall JMP 50-watt
Orange Rockerverb 100 MK III head
Marshall & Orange 4x12 cabs
Effects
Boss CE-5 Stereo Chorus Ensemble
Strings and Picks
Ernie Ball 2215 Skinny Top/Heavy Bottom (.010–.052)
Dunlop Nylon .73 mm
Bjarte Lund Rolland’s Gear
GuitarsGibson Les Paul Special Double Cut with Lace PS900 Soapbar pickups
Nebelung Riffmeister with P-90s
Framus Tennessee Custom with TV Jones TV Classic Pickups
Gibson SG Junior with P-90s
Peavey T-60
Fender Standard Telecaster
Fender Paramount PM-1 Dreadnought acoustic
Amps
Friedman BE-100
Orange Rockerverb 50 MKI
Orange and Marshall 4x12 cabs
Effects
Boss CE-5 Stereo Chorus Ensemble
Boss ODB-3 Bass Overdrive
Frantone Peachfuzz
Pro Co RAT 2 Distortion
Red Rooster OD clone
Strings and Picks
Ernie Ball 2221 Regular Slinky (.010–.046)
Were there problems with bleed-through because you recorded live, or was everyone isolated?
Rolland: We had everything isolated, but we regulated the spillage from the guitar amps so we could hear. The studio had a rehearsal space vibe to it. There were sliding doors so that we could regulate the bleed.
What amps did you use in the studio?
Rolland: Vidar used a really good sounding 1979 Marshall JMP 50-watt head. I used a Friedman BE-100 head and an Orange Rockerverb 50. I also used a Red Rooster copy pedal made by Kurt Ballou and Vidar, and I will use chorus occasionally.
Ofstad: I used an Orange Thunderverb 200 run at 100 watts through an Orange 4x12 cab. For guitars I used my Gibson Flying V90 with Lace Nitro Hemi pickups. I also started to use a Fender Stratocaster, which is new to me, but it works.
What made you pick up a Strat?
Ofstad: Just curiosity and, with the new material, it’s way more dynamic. On the other albums we hadn’t really thought about who uses what, but now, with the new songs, it just made sense. The Strat feels clearer to me than a Gibson, so I thought, “Let’s try it.” There are a lot of Fenders in the band now.
The album does have more of a classic-rock vibe to the overall sound, as opposed to a modern metal sound. Maybe standard tuning and the Fenders and Gibsons have something to do with that? Was it a conscious decision to defy convention in that way?
Ofstad: In the studio, definitely, but it just happened. Bjarte started playing the Telecaster for a couple of songs because he wanted the single-coil sound and it evolved into being what it is.
You both collaborated on the main guitar riff in “Nattesferd.” Can you explain?
Rolland: Maciek plays it, but I wrote the riff. That’s actually a song we didn’t get done for the last record. He’s emulating me, basically, but he plays
it better than me, so he plays it on the album.
Maciek, you play the solo on “Nattesferd.” Do you craft your solos beforehand or are you improvising in the studio?
Ofstad: On solos, it’s always been in the studio. I try not to think too much about it until we actually have to track, because then it’s just natural. I wasn’t going for anything in particular. It just happened. Originally, that was the Strat into the Thunderverb through a Thermionic Culture Vulture, but we dropped the Culture Vulture for the solo. I did use it for the main riff and the solo on “Bronsegud.”
Do you have a favorite track that best represents Kvelertak at this stage of the game?
Ofstad: I enjoy playing all of the new songs, because every track is different. But if I have to choose a favorite it would be “Heksebrann.” It really works live. We played it live at the beginning of summer on the festival gigs and it’s just a really cool song to play.
It definitely has some interesting parts and changes with some nice fingerpicking.
Ofstad: Right, there you go with the Tele—the country lick [sings lick].
It also changes keys from major to minor. What was the writing process like for the song?
Ofstad: The hook in the song, the country thing, started out as a joke at a rehearsal. It was like, “That would be stupid to do it like that.” And 20 minutes later it was like, “Wait a second, maybe that’s cool.” I think it’s good when you write music that you don’t like the first time you hear it. And then you get the “oh shit, maybe we have something here” moment. That’s a good indicator that you’re on the right track.
The Norwegian band’s line-up includes, from left to right, bassist Marvin Nygaard, guitarist Maciek Ofstad, drummer Kjetil Gjermundrød, vocalist Erlend Hjelvik, guitarist Vidar Landa, and guitarist Bjarte Lund Rolland. Photo by Paal Audestad
Critics are saying that the song “1985” has a real ’80s vibe, probably stemming from the eighth-note groove and the blues licks in the chorus. Who came up with that song?
Rolland: I wrote most of the riffs for it and we put it together in rehearsal. It was one of those riffs where you go, “Can we really get away with that?” We wanted to throw people off a little.
Ofstad: I hated that song the first five times we played it. I was like, “This is stupid.” But it’s one of my favorite songs now—especially when the video came along from Fredrik Hana. It really made the song. It gave it a face and also maybe gave it the edge that it needed—being scary and fucked up.
Despite your reservations, the reaction to “1985” seems to be overwhelmingly positive.
Rolland: If that’s the common perception, I’m fine with that, but it’s not necessarily on our Facebook comments [laughs]. Some of our more hardcore fans were a little worried, actually. But we kept telling them not to worry. They have the rest of the record. It’s certainly one of my favorites from the record.
Are you surprised by the overall success of the band so far?
Ofstad: I’ve been surprised ever since we released the first album. When I joined the band, I was pretty comfortable with the band just playing a couple of shows a year. So everything that’s come since is crazy. We’ve toured with all my favorite bands, met a lot of great people, and made a lot of great friends. We’re just dudes that want to play rock ’n’ roll, and we really love playing live shows, and that’s what we’ve been doing. There hasn’t been any plan except for writing songs that we like and want to play. I’m very, very thankful that people enjoy what we do.
Maciek Ofstad’s Gear
GuitarsGibson Flying V90 with Lace Nitro-Hemi humbuckers
Gibson SG Standard with Lace Nitro-Hemi humbuckers
Fender American Standard Stratocaster HH with Lace Nitro-Hemi humbuckers
Fender Limited Edition American Standard Telecaster HH with Lace Nitro-Hemi humbuckers
Ampeg Dan Armstrong ADAG Lucite
Amps
Orange Thunderverb 200
Orange PPC412 cabs
Effects
Dunlop Volume (X) DVP3
Dunlop CBM 95 Cry Baby Mini Wah
MXR Custom Badass Modified O.D.
MXR M109 Six Band Graphic EQ
MXR EVH90 Phase 90
MXR M169 Carbon Copy Analog Delay
MXR EP101 Echoplex Preamp
Electro-Harmonix Little Big Muff Pi
Electro-Harmonix Micro POG
TC Electronic Hall of Fame Reverb
Boss TU-3 Chromatic Tuner
Boss NS-2 Noise Suppressor
Thermionic Culture Vulture plug-in
Carl Martin Octa-Switch MKII Effects Switching System
Strings and Picks
Ernie Ball 2215 Skinny Top/Heavy Bottom (.010–.052)
Dunlop Tortex .88 mm
So, your emphasis was on the music rather than becoming famous?
Ofstad: Yeah, I always just wanted to play music—except for when I went to high school and had to play jazz. I hated that. I had a really good guitar teacher, but he didn’t understand that I just wanted to play Iron Maiden songs. I had to play Joe Pass, which is cool—you end up being a really good guitar player. But when you have ADHD it’s boring. Jazz is boring. Now that I’m older I like it. I can enjoy it. Back then I just wanted to get it done quickly and play really fast, which is a stupid approach to playing guitar [laughs].
“Svartmesse” also has a bit of an ’80s reference. The guitar intro is almost a nod to Stevie Nicks’ “Edge of Seventeen.” Rolland: Stevie Nicks? That’s purely intentional [laughs]. That song is the best example of collaboration in the band. The intro [sings the “Stevie Nicks” part] was Maciek. I came up with the verse riff. We didn’t know where to go with it, so I went out for about an hour and when I came back they had put it together with the chorus, which I believe was Maciek’s idea. The bridge and the key change came together after that.
“Bronsegud” has a punk-rock vibe, rhythmically speaking, but the guitar licks have more finesse.
Rolland: I thought we needed something that was a little faster and more punky. It’s cool to play simple three-chord punk rock, but it gets old pretty quickly. One of the fundamentals of the band in the beginning was that we set out to make fancy punk rock in a way. And then we started involving more elements of metal and other stuff. That song is definitely a throwback to the earliest ideas of what we wanted to do with the band. It ties it all together.
Do you have any advice for someone just learning to play?
Ofstad: Yeah. Just play. It’s the only way to do it, man. Just pick up the guitar. You’re probably going to suck, but just keep on doing it. A couple of years back I saw Dave Grohl talking about American Idol and he was wondering how anyone could judge a kid playing guitar when he’s 14 and he sucks—and just say, “You have nothing to do with music.” Of course, you’re going to suck for the first two or three years. Your band is going to be horrible, but then you start a new band and you’re going to be awesome, so just keep on playing. Go for it. Do what you like and don’t care what people say or do. The old cliché answer, but it’s the only answer.
YouTube It
Don’t think a three-guitar band playing in standard tuning can bring the metal? Check out Kvelertak live in London in 2013, where guitarists Bjarte Lund Rolland, Maciek Ofstad, and Vidar Landa steam ahead full bore on “Bruane Brenn” from their breakthrough album, Meir.
“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.
"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
Though it uses two EL84’s to generate 15 watts, the newest David Grissom-signature amp has as much back-panel Fender body as AC15 bite.
A great-sounding, flexible reimagining of a 15-watt, EL84 template.
No effects loop. Balancing boost and non-boosted volumes can be tricky.
Amp Head: $1,199 street.
1x12 Speaker Cabinet: $499 street.
PRS DGT 15
prsguitars.com
The individuals behind the initials “PRS” and “DGT” have, over the last two decades, very nearly become their own little gear empire. The “DG” is, of course, acclaimed Texas guitar slinger David Grissom. The other fellow founded a little guitar and amplifier company in Maryland you may have heard of. (And he’s also a PG columnist.)
Grissom and Paul Reed Smith’s first collaboration appeared in 2007 in the shape of theGrissom DGT—a signature instrument that’s seenmany iterations since. His Custom 30 amplifier followed five years later. But at 30 watts, that amp is pretty powerful for a lot of folks. So, this year PRS and their lead amp designer, Doug Sewell, unveiled the more club-friendly, tremolo-equipped DGT 15.
The basic architecture of the Indonesia-built DGT 15—single-channel, 2 x EL84 power section, 15 watts, and onboard reverb and tremolo—bears more than a little resemblance to a few important ’60s combo amps. But its 3-band EQ with presence, top-cut, and bright boost controls lends a lot of additional functionality and flexibility without cluttering the control panel or the playing experience. And, unlike some classic amps in this power class, the DGT 15 generates its wallop from a pair of output tubes in cathode bias, driven by three 12AX7s and one 12AT7 in the front end.
Feature Length
If the DGT 15’s control set were made up of just the EQ, presence, and top-cut controls, it would offer impressive tone-sculpting power. But the 3-way bright, boost, and master volume switches add exponentially more colors and gain contrasts. The bright switch is clever. It can be switched to always-on mode or set to disengage when the boost is on. The footswitchable boost, meanwhile, gives the single-channel DGT-15 the flex of a two-channel amp with a lead mode. Better still, you can set the amp up so you can activate the boost and master volume together—enabling access to the most headroom with the boost off and keeping the gain from running wild when the boost is engaged. The tremolo, too, can be activated via a mini-toggle or the included footswitch.
“While it’s basically clear, round, and full, depending on where you set the powerful EQ controls, you can reshape those tones into chunky, chiming, or sparkly variations on the clean theme.”Because the DGT-15 is cathode biased, the output tubes require no re-biasing when you change them. But the back panel includes jacks for monitoring bias levels, which is handy for matching tubes or diagnosing possible issues. The back panel is also home to the 5-pin DIN footswitch jack and three speaker outs for various combinations of 4 ohm, 8 ohm, or 16 ohm cabs. Our test unit came with the ported-back PRS DG 1x12 cabinet, which is loaded with one 60-watt Celestion Vintage 30. The DGT 15 head itself is a little bigger than lunchbox-sized (unless you’ve got a particularly hefty appetite). But it’s still an easy load at just 17.25" x 9" x 9.25" and a hair under 20 pounds. The 1x12" cab is relatively compact too, at 24" x 22.18" x 10.5", and weighs 27 pounds.
Tejas Tone!
If you read only the specs for the DGT 15 (or never had the pleasure of playing a Custom 30), you’ll probably expect a British voice. But the DGT 15’s core tonality leans as much toward the 1960s black-panel Fender camp, and it has a ready-to-rumble personality that shines through whether you match it to an ES-355 or a Telecaster.
With Fender single-coils in the mix, non-boosted settings are very clean right up to around 3 o’clock on the volume, where the amp starts to edge into breakup just a little. That’s a lot of clean room to roam. But while it’s basically clear, round, and full, depending on where you set the powerful EQ controls you can reshape those tones into chunky, chiming, or sparkly variations on the clean theme. Humbuckers push the DGT 15 to juicier, crunchier zones much sooner, of course. Even so, the amp remains crisp and taut without going muddy. With both single-coils and humbuckers, the overdrive and saturation generated by the boost avoid the sizzly sounds you hear from many modern lead channels and overdrives. It’s also very dynamic—easing into light distortion when you pick hard, and shedding its aggressive edge when you use a light touch or reduce guitar volume. Overdrive pedals (in this case, a Klon-like Wampler Tumnus Deluxe, Marshall-style Friedman Small Box, and a multi-voiced Tsakalis Six) gel with both the boost and clean modes, too. The reverb and tremolo are superb. The range of both successfully spans subtle and more radical sounds—and between these, a couple of drive pedals, and the Boost function, a gigging guitarist can wrangle a lot of flexibility out of this amp.
The Verdict
Using the single-channel, 2 x EL84/reverb/tremolo architecture as a jumping-off point, the DGT 15 scales new heights of versatility—not just via flexible switching and tone-shaping power, but by melding Vox-y edge with Fender clarity and body at a very accessible price.
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.