Keeping it weird, Death Valley Girls are, from left to right, guitarist Larry Schemel, bassist Nicole "Pickle" Smith, drummer Rikki Styxx, and singer/guitarist/keyboardist Bonnie Bloomgarden.
The Death Valley Girls guitarist smashes the psychedelic button with cheap gear, mad abandon, and a finely tuned ear for the radically wild.
Larry Schemel, from the Los Angeles-based psychedelic band Death Valley Girls, has been on the scene and in and out of bands for over 30 years. He's a seasoned, grizzled professional, and quit his day job ages ago. Yet despite that, he doesn't use vintage or high-end gear, his closets aren't packed with expensive boutique devices, and the pedals he does use aren't even mounted on a board. His No. 1, and basically only, guitar is a Mexico-made '90s-era Telecaster Custom reissue, and his ampāwhere he gets most of his gritāis a $400 Ampeg GVT 1x12 tube combo. That's it. And no, he's not looking to upgrade.
āIf I was in a band with a huge budget for amps, I would just want a bunch of these," Schemel says in reference to his Ampeg GVT. āThat's the sound. I'd probably have a bunch of Ampegs on different settings. Over the years, I've gone through so many different thingsāit's that ongoing quest for your perfect sound, and it is still evolving. But as far as getting the simple tone and sound out of a guitar plugged into an amp, this is it."
Death Valley Girls started in 2013 when Schemel's sister Patty, of Hole fame, introduced him to multi-instrumentalist Bonnie Bloomgarden, and they discovered they had instant chemistry. Since then, the band has been on the road, back and forth between the U.S. and Europe. They've released four albums, including the recent Under the Spell of Joy. (The album's rhythm section is Rikki Styxx on drums and bassist Pickle, aka Nicole Smith.) And they somehow convinced Iggy Pop to recreate the short film Andy Warhol Eating a Hamburger as the video for their song āDisaster (Is What We're After)," from 2018's Darkness Rains.
Under the Spell of Joy is hypnotic and brooding, and often sits on one riff or alternating two-chord patternāĆ” lathe Stoogesāthroughout an entire song. Schemel's playing is understated and textural, although there are breakout moments, like his melodic, vocal-esque leads on āHold My Hand," or his very Keith Richard's āBitch"-style solo on ā10 Day Miracle Challenge." And speaking of Richards, that brings us back to Schemel's gear, and particularly his Tele Custom reissue and Ampeg GVT.
āIt's crazy, because I am a huge Stones fan, but I wasn't familiar with what setup Keith was using in what eras," Schemel says. āThat '72 Tele and that Ampegāthat's the Keith Richards setup, and that's my favorite Stones era. That's so cool. It wasn't intentional. It just happened, and I was like, 'This totally makes sense.'"
Serendipitous low-budget gear choices notwithstanding, we spoke with Schemel from his home in Los Angeles to discuss his idiosyncratic ear for equipment, his stint with garage legend Roky Erickson, coming of age in Seattle when grunge ruled the world, the many projects he's been involved with over the years, his unique songwriting sessions with compatriot and bandmate Bloomgarden, and the beauty of minimalist guitar playing.
Tell me about your Tele.
That's my main guitar. It's a mid-'90s Tele Custom, which is the 1972 Fender Tele Custom reissue. It's a Mexico-made Tele with a maple neck, and I got it new. The Custom is always with a humbucker and a single-coil, unlike the Deluxe, which has two humbuckers. I mainly use the single-coil bridge pickup. I'll use the humbucker occasionally live, like if I do cleaner stuff and I want a warmer sound, but for the most part, it's that bridge pickup, because I love that Tele sound, that trebly grit. I am pretty much playing that live full-on.
Even when you're playing with a lot of fuzz, your tone still has that single-coil, bolt-on-neck sound.
I landed on the Tele later. I love Fender stuff, and one of the first guitars that I hadāthat was a real guitar, other than a crappy budget guitarāwas a Fender Jaguar. From there, I used a Les Paul in one band, and I had an SG, but I was drawn toward Fender stuff.
I was once at the Chicago Music Exchange, and there was a guitar there that I'd never seen in real life, which was the Fender Esquire. I was really intrigued by it, because Syd Barrett played an Esquire on that first Pink Floyd album. That guitar sound, to me, was so out there. You could cut glass with it. The guitar at the Chicago Music Exchange was $30,000 or something like that. I played it, and it was one of those moments when you pick up a guitar and play it and it's just magic. It's playing itself. You can play a song immediately and it feels so good. If I had the money, I would have got it right then and there. It's one of those things, and it even happens with the cheaper models, where you think, āThis has got the mojo."
Is the period of Pink Floyd when Syd Barrett was in the band one of your big influences?
Oh yeah, that was big. As a teenager, as I grew up from hard rock to punk, and then going backwards to the 1950s and '60s, the psychedelic bands were a big influence. I love all the Pink Floyd records, but the first one, especially with Syd's guitar stuff on there, is really out there. It's psychedelic, but it's also heavy and driving, and his guitar playing was wild. It had a similar quality to the Velvet Underground, which was huge: that unhinged playing and the tones they get. And, of course, the 13th Floor Elevators were huge, too.
After listening to a passel of Ethiopian funk on tour, the band wed that genre's furious grooves to its own psychedelic instincts for the new Under the Spell of Joy.
There's a picture on your Facebook page with you playing with Roky Erickson and Billy Gibbons. How did that come about?
That's not photoshopped [laughs]. Death Valley Girls played a festival in Southern California with a bunch of other bands, and Roky Erickson's band played. After the showāit was an amazing showāme and Bonnie went up to the guitar player and told him āthat was amazing." He asked what band we were in. We told him, and he said, āI have your record." We stayed in touch andāfast-forward a year-and-a-half or soāwe get an email saying, āRoky Erickson's band is going to tour and we want you to come out with us." We said, āYes. Totally. Awesome." A couple weeks later, the guitar player, Eli Southardāhe was Roky's main guyāmessaged me and said, āWe need a second guitar player for the band. If that interests you, it would be cool if you could be a part of it." Without hesitation, I was likeāoh my god this is insaneāāYes, I'll do that!" Eli sent me the songs. It was 35, half of which were 13th Floor Elevators' songs and half were Roky Erickson solo stuff. I knew all the songs, but there's a difference between listening and knowing a song versus having to play the song. It messes with your mind, because some of the stuff was either way easier than I thought, or way more difficult. Especially the Elevators' stuff, where it's like, āIs that a bridge? Why does that part go seven-and-a-half times and then that other part goes three times?" They were definitely on psychedelics when they wrote that music.
I learned all the stuff. We drove to Austin, Texas, and met up with the band. I got in a couple practices with them, and we were on the road. It was awesome. Roky was super cool, and we ended up doing a couple of tours with them. At the end of one of the tours, we were playing at the Roxy in L.A. Billy Gibbons lives in L.A., and he and Roky are old friends from when Billy was in the Moving Sidewalks. Billy showed up to the show, and someone asked Billy to come onstage and play a song with us. We did āYou're Gonna Miss Me" for the encore, and so it was me, Eli, and Billy on guitar, and it was an out of body experience. I was playing this song, which is a classic psychedelic rock song, with Billy Gibbons right next to me. I thought, āThis is what it's all about." That was a mind blower. I am just glad there's pictures of it, because I am like, āDid that really happen?"
On tour as part of Roky Erickson's band, Larry Schemelāat stage rightājammed with fellow Erickson guitarist Eli Southard and the one-and-only Billy Gibbons at Los Angeles' Roxy. Gibbons and Erickson, seated, were friends from their early psychedelic rock days in Texas, in the '60s.
Was playing with Roky different from how you normally do things?
I was really flying by the seat of my pants. Eli would write the set list and it was different every night, but what was really crazy was that Roky never had a set list. Roky would know by the riff or how the song would start. He would just know. He lived inside those songs forever. Sometimes he'd go off on a tangent, and we'd just have to follow him. But it was cool.
After going through that, I realized I can't underestimate my own will to step up to the stuff. Even if I am not comfortable, or if my skills are not good enough to pull it off, it's in there. I think it's in all musicians to just do it. Don't worry about it. Even messing up ⦠that's even going to happen in my own band. That's inherently part of playing music. It's unpredictable, and there are always those weird nights where you think you had a really bad show, and someone comes up to you and says, āThat was so amazing, especially that one solo you did." I am like, āWhat?" I think a lot of us are hard on ourselves. You mess up two notes and you're like, āDamn it." But if the feeling and passion is there, it doesn't matter. It's okay if you mess up. It doesn't have to be technically precise as long as the feeling is in there.
You've been on the scene for a while. What's your backstory and how did Death Valley Girls come about?
I live in L.A. now, but I am originally from Seattle. I grew up in that whole scene up there, with the grunge bands and everything. When I first started playing guitar as a teenager, I got a little later start than some of my buddies. My friends started playing when they were 12 or 13, and by the time we were 15, I'd go to my buddy's house and he'd be like, āHey, you want to hear 'Eruption?'" I thought, āI can't do that." Those guys were so beyond, it was nuts.
But my sister, Patty, is a drummer, and she started playing early. She was getting really good. Our dad bought her a Pearl drum set, and she started playing in the garage. When Christmas rolled around, she got me an electric guitar and an amp. It was one of these budget, weird off-brand guitars, and a little amp, and I started teaching myself how to play with the Mel Bay books and stuff like that. I started playing with her, which was a huge thing that helped my confidence. She continued playing and was in bands in Seattle, and eventuallyāthis jumps forwardāshe was in Hole, with Courtney Love, in the '90s. She was on the cover of Rolling Stone and playing Saturday Night Live. Her work paid off, where she was playing the Reading Festival and doing it. She's not playing with Courtney anymore, but she still plays, and still gets work. It was a really cool thing to see.
I started a band with friends. My sister was the drummer in that band when we first started. We played parties around Seattle and eventually clubs. A friend of ours had a tiny independent record label and asked us if we wanted to put out a single. He put it out and we got a van and drove to California, did a tour, and got played on the KROQ radio station.
That band was called Sybil, and there's a footnote to that. We put out a full-length record and we had to change the name of the band to Kill Sybil. We had a review in a magazine, Alternative Press, and there was an R&B singer named Sybil who had been around for quite a few years. Her manager called our little independent label and said, āYou can't use that name." As a joke, we said, āWe could use the name if we killed Sybil," and that became the name of the band. That was my first time in a real studio. It was the Seattle studio, Reciprocal Recording, and Jack Endino, who did some Nirvana and Soundgarden recordings, he had his little protege, Phil Ek. Phil produced our first record. He went on after that to work with Elliot Smith, Modest Mouse, Death Cab for Cutie, and bigger bands. That band, like a lot of bands when you're young, disintegrated in stupid drama, but for that moment it was really cool.
My sister lived in L.A. at the time, since she was in Hole, and they were doing their thing, so as a change of scenery I decided to move to L.A., and I joined a band called the Flesh Eaters. They were a classic L.A. punk band, started in 1977. In the '90s, they were restarting again, and a friend of mine said, āI am in this band, the Flesh Eaters, and they need another guitar player. Do you want to check it out?" I auditioned and got in the Flesh Eaters, and that was another really cool experience, especially in L.A. We played one festival with X, the Bangles, the Weirdos, and even Devo. We did a record, and that was another really cool learning experience. These guys were older, and they'd been around the biz.
Guitars
1990's Fender Telecaster Custom reissue
Amps
Ampeg GVT 1x12
Effects
Boss FZ-5 Fuzz
MXR Carbon Copy
Dunlop Cry Baby Wah
Boss DD-6 Digital Delay
EarthQuaker Devices Ghost Echo
EarthQuaker Devices Data Corrupter
Strings and Picks
Ernie Ball Super Slinky (.09ā.42)
Grey Dunlop .88 mm
My next band was called Midnight Movies. We played in L.A. for a while and got signed to a label. We were going on tour with Blonde Redhead and a lot of these cool indie-type bands. I was working at Amoeba Records in L.A., and the band was really picking up. I had to leave my job, because music was becoming full time, and it was a really weird thing. It was like jumping off a cliff, I thought, āBut wait, isn't this what you want? Don't you want to do music for a living?" That was my first moment that was like, āWow, this is like the real deal." Music became my job. Midnight Movies went on for a couple of years. It was great, we did lots of great tours, made a couple records and EPs, and a lot of stuff happened during that period. That band went on for maybe six or seven years, and then it came to an end.
I was between bands, because it is hard to find the right people, and it takes time to click. It didn't click again until my sister met this girlāthey both had kids, and they were at a playdate-type situation and they were talkingāand my sister said, āMy brother plays music." And the other girl said, āMy sister plays music, too." They said, āThey should meet." And it was that simple: We met, and just immediately started writing together. That was the start of the Death Valley Girls.
Your sister's friend's sister was Bonnie Bloomgarden?
Yeah, me and Bonnie met, and there was another girl, Rocky, who was Bonnie's friend, and she was our bass player. My sister Patty said, āI am not doing anything right now. I'll sit in on drums and help you write."
Is Patty on your first album?
The first record was actually a cassette called The Street Venom, and she plays on that. She was also playing in another band, called the Upset, and doing other stuff, but she had time to be in the Death Valley Girls during that first six months or so. Things clicked, and me and Bonnie's musical tastes are that we like the exact same stuff. It was that really cool chemistry for writing songs. I would come up with ideas, and she would already have some lyrics to fit. But there was also this other way of writing songs, which I was also doing with Midnight Movies, where Bonnie will sing a song, and a melody into her phone without any musical accompaniment, just a vocal. I go home and put the guitar to it, which is a backwards way of doing it, but I really like doing it that way. If I write a riff or guitar part and give it to the singer, and she has to horseshoe it in, it's like, āHow is this going to work? It doesn't fit or this verse has to be longer." But I was doing it backwards, where she sang a melody without the music, and then I'd take it home and put the music to it.
Photo by Debi Del Grande
Is that still how you write today?
Sometimes. A lot of it now is random ⦠it'll be a jam and we take pieces out, and then I go home and write guitar riffs. Bonnie is constantly writing. She has a notebook of lyricsāshe has a keyboard at home and she also plays guitarāand she'll come up with rough ideas and give them to me. In my mind, I am drawn to the idea that it has to have a riff, but in the singer-songwriter world, it's about the lyric and word. I understand that, but as a guitar player, I think it's got to have a hook or a riff, so from my side of the writing, that's important.
The new album, Under the Spell of Joy, is riff-centric, and there's not a lot of chord motion. Often it's one theme throughout the song.
Sometimes, when I am critiquing stuff or listening back, and I am stuck on the same theme, I'll think that maybe it needs something else, and I'll nitpick at stuff. But then I go back to some of the bands and music I like, which has a lot of repetition and minimalism: bands like the Velvet Underground and the Stooges. It's all these repeating themes or two chords going back and forth, and it can be as good as any song by Yes. It is about the tension, and if the lyric and melody is strong. Or it's more about the tone, and that's cool. It's about the song. Every song doesn't need a guitar break. Sometimes I have to sit back and think, āThe song is great. It doesn't need a crazy noisy solo part. There's no need for that." It's an ego thing. I don't have to put my stamp all over certain things. You have to let go of that. On the new record there are songs that are spacey and ambient and a lot of keyboard and sax, where the guitar is there, and playing a few chords to put the bed in. It doesn't have to be front and center.
Live at Joshua Tree's Desert Daze Festival in 2017, Death Valley Girls make the most of cramped quarters by rocking big on āStreet Justice" from 2018's Darkness Rains. Note Larry Schemel's pedals are on the floor of their stage inside a van, and his Tele Custom reissue is slung over his shoulders.
This legendary vintage rack unit will inspire you to think about effects with a new perspective.
When guitarists think of effects, we usually jump straight to stompboxesātheyāre part of the culture! And besides, footswitches have real benefits when your hands are otherwise occupied. But real-time toggling isnāt always important. In the recording studio, where weāre often crafting sounds for each section of a song individually, thereās little reason to avoid rack gear and its possibilities. Enter the iconic Eventide H3000 (and its massive creative potential).
When it debuted in 1987, the H3000 was marketed as an āintelligent pitch-changerā that could generate stereo harmonies in a user-specified key. This was heady stuff in the ā80s! But while diatonic harmonizing grabbed the headlines, subtler uses of this pitch-shifter cemented its legacy. Patch 231 MICROPITCHSHIFT, for example, is a big reason the H3000 persists in racks everywhere. Itās essentially a pair of very short, single-repeat delays: The left side is pitched slightly up while the right side is pitched slightly down (default is ±9 cents). The resulting tripling/thickening effect has long been a mix-engineer staple for pop vocals, and itās also my first call when I want a stereo chorus for guitar.
The second-gen H3000S, introduced the following year, cemented the deviceās guitar bona fides. Early-adopter Steve Vai was such a proponent of the first edition that Eventide asked him to contribute 48 signature sounds for the new model (patches 700-747). Still-later revisions like the H3000B and H3000D/SE added even more functionality, but these days itās not too important which model you have. Comprehensive EPROM chips containing every patch from all generations of H3000 (plus the later H3500) are readily available for a modest cost, and are a fairly straightforward install.
In addition to pitch-shifting, there are excellent modulation effects and reverbs (like patch 211 CANYON), plus presets inspired by other classic Eventide boxes, like the patch 513 INSTANT PHASER. A comprehensive accounting of the H3000ās capabilities would be tedious, but suffice to say that even the stock presets get deliciously far afield. There are pitch-shifting reverbs that sound like fever-dream ancestors of Strymonās āshimmerā effect. There are backwards-guitar simulators, multiple extraterrestrial voices, peculiar foreshadows of the EarthQuaker Devices Arpanoid and Rainbow Machine (check out patch 208 BIZARRMONIZER), and even button-triggered Foley effects that require no input signal (including a siren, helicopter, tank, submarine, ocean waves, thunder, and wind). If youāre ever without your deck of Oblique Strategies cards, the H3000ās singular knob makes a pretty good substitute. (Spin the big wheel and find out what youāve won!)
āIf youāre ever without your deck of Oblique Strategies cards, the H3000ās singular knob makes a pretty good substitute.ā
But thereās another, more pedestrian reason I tend to reach for the H3000 and its rackmount relatives in the studio: I like to do certain types of processing after the mic. Itās easy to overlook, but guitar speakers are signal processors in their own right. They roll off high and low end, they distort when pushed, and the cabinets in which theyāre mounted introduce resonances. While this type of de facto processing often flatters the guitar itself, it isnāt always advantageous for effects.
Effects loops allow time-based effects to be placed after preamp distortion, but I like to go one further. By miking the amp first and then sending signal to effects in parallel, I can get full bandwidth from the airy reverbs and radical pitched-up effects the H3000 can offerāand I can get it in stereo, printed to its own track, allowing the wet/dry balance to be revisited later, if needed. If a sound needs to be reproduced live, thatās a problem for later. (Something evocative enough can usually be extracted from a pedal-form descendant like the Eventide H90.)
Like most vintage gear, the H3000 has some endearing quirks. Even as it knowingly preserves glitches from earlier Eventide harmonizers (patch 217 DUAL H910s), it betrays its age with a few idiosyncrasies of its own. Extreme pitch-shifting exhibits a lot of aliasing (think: bit-crusher sounds), and the analog Murata filter modules impart a hint of warmth that many plug-in versions donāt quite capture. (They also have a habit of leaking black goo all over the motherboard!) Itās all part of the charm of the unit, beloved by its adherents. (Well, maybe not the leaking goo!)
In 2025, many guitarists wonāt be eager to care for what is essentially an expensive, cranky, decades-old computer. Even the excitement of occasional tantalum capacitor explosions is unlikely to win them over! Fortunately, some great software emulations existāEventideās own plugin even models the behavior of the Murata filters. But hardware offers the full hands-on experience, so next time you spot an old H3000 in a rack somewhereāand youāve got the timeāfire it up, wait for the distinctive āclickā of its relays, spin the knob, and start digging.
The luthierās stash.
There is more to a guitar than just the details.
A guitar is not simply a collection of wood, wire, and metalāit is an act of faith. Faith that a slab of lumber can be coaxed to sing, and that magnets and copper wire can capture something as expansive as human emotion. While itās comforting to think that tone can be calculated like a tax return, the truth is far messier. A guitar is a living argument between its componentsāan uneasy alliance of materials and craftsmanship. When it works, itās glorious.
The Uncooperative Nature of Wood
For me it all starts with the wood. Not just the species, but the piece. Despite what spec sheets and tonewood debates would have you believe, no two boards are the same. One piece of ash might have a bright, airy ring, while another from the same tree might sound like it spent a hard winter in a muddy ditch.
Builders know this, which is why youāll occasionally catch one tapping on a rough blank, head cocked like a bird listening. Theyāre not crazy. Theyāre hunting for a lively, responsive quality that makes the wood feel awake in your hands. But wood is less than half the battle. So many guitarists make the mistake of buying the lumber instead of the luthier.
Pickups: Magnetic Hopes and Dreams
The engine of the guitar, pickups are the part that allegedly defines the electric guitarās voice. Sure, swapping pickups will alter the tonality, to use a color metaphor, but they can only translate whatās already there, and thereās little percentage in trying to wake the dead. Yet, pickups do matter. A PAF-style might offer more harmonic complexity, or an overwound single-coil may bring some extra snarl, but hereās the thing: Two pickups made to the same specs can still sound different. The wire tension, the winding pattern, or even the temperature on the assembly line that day all add tiny variables that the spec sheet doesnāt mention. Donāt even get me started about the unrepeatability of āhand-scatter winding,ā unless youāre a compulsive gambler.
āOne piece of ash might have a bright, airy ring, while another from the same tree might sound like it spent a hard winter in a muddy ditch.ā
Wires, Caps, and Wishful Thinking
Inside the control cavity, the pots and capacitors await, quietly shaping your tone whether you notice them or not. A potentiometer swap can make your volume taper feel like an on/off switch or smooth as an aged Tennessee whiskey. A capacitor change can make or break the tone controlās usefulness. Itās subtle, but noticeable. The kind of detail that sends people down the rabbit hole of swapping $3 capacitors for $50 āvintage-specā caps, just to see if they can āfeelā the mojo of the 1950s.
Hardware: The Unsung Saboteur
Bridges, nuts, tuners, and tailpieces are occasionally credited for their sonic contributions, but theyāre quietly running the show. A steel block reflects and resonates differently than a die-cast zinc or aluminum bridge. Sloppy threads on bridge studs can weigh in, just as plate-style bridges can couple firmly to the body. Tuning machines can influence not just tuning stability, but their weight can alter the way the headstock itself vibrates.
Itās All Connected
Then thereās the neck jointāthe place where sustain goes to die. A tight neck pocket allows the energy to transfer efficiently. A sloppy fit? Some credit it for creating the infamous cluck and twang of Fender guitars, so pick your poison. One of the most important specs is scale length. A longer scale not only creates more string tension, it also requires the frets to be further apart. This changes the feel and the sound. A shorter scale seems to diminish bright overtones, accentuating the lows and mids. Scale length has a definite effect on where the neck joins the body and the position of the bridge, where compromises must be made in a guitarās overall design. There are so many choices, and just as many opportunities to miss the mark. Itās like driving without a map unless youāve been there before.
Alchemy, Not Arithmetic
At the end of the day, a guitarās greatness doesnāt come from its spec sheet. Itās not about the wood species or the coil-wire gauge. Itās about how it all conspires to either soar or sink. Two guitars, built to identical specs, can feel like long-lost soulmates or total strangers. All of these factors are why mix-and-match mods are a long game that can eventually pay off. But thatās the mystery of it. You canāt build magic from a parts list. You canāt buy mojo by the pound. A guitar is more than the sum of its partsāitās a sometimes unpredictable collaboration of materials, choices, and human touch. And sometimes, whether in the hands of an experienced builder or a dedicated tinkerer, it just works.
Two Iconic Titans of Rock & Metal Join Forces for a Canāt-Miss North American Trek
Tickets Available Starting Wednesday, April 16 with Artist Presales
General On Sale Begins Friday, April 18 at 10AM Local on LiveNation.com
This fall, shock rock legend Alice Cooper and heavy metal trailblazers Judas Priest will share the stage for an epic co-headlining tour across North America. Produced by Live Nation, the 22-city run kicks off September 16 at Mississippi Coast Coliseum in Biloxi, MS, and stops in Toronto, Phoenix, Los Angeles, and more before wrapping October 26 at The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion in The Woodlands, TX.
Coming off the second leg of their Invincible Shield Tour and the release of their celebrated 19th studio album, Judas Priest remains a dominant force in metal. Meanwhile, Alice Cooper, the godfather of theatrical rock, wraps up his "Too Close For Comfort" tour this summer, promoting his most recent "Road" album, and will have an as-yet-unnamed all-new show for this tour. Corrosion of Conformity will join as support on select dates.
Tickets will be available starting Wednesday, April 16 at 10AM local time with Artist Presales. Additional presales will run throughout the week ahead of the general onsale beginning Friday, April 18 at 10AM local time at LiveNation.comTOUR DATES:
Tue Sep 16 ā Biloxi, MS ā Mississippi Coast Coliseum
Thu Sep 18 ā Alpharetta, GA ā Ameris Bank Amphitheatre*
Sat Sep 20 ā Charlotte, NC ā PNC Music Pavilion
Sun Sep 21 ā Franklin, TN ā FirstBank Amphitheater
Wed Sep 24 ā Virginia Beach, VA ā Veterans United Home Loans Amphitheater
Fri Sep 26 ā Holmdel, NJ ā PNC Bank Arts Center
Sat Sep 27 ā Saratoga Springs, NY ā Broadview Stage at SPAC
Mon Sep 29 ā Toronto, ON ā Budweiser Stage
Wed Oct 01 ā Burgettstown, PA ā The Pavilion at Star Lake
Thu Oct 02 ā Clarkston, MI ā Pine Knob Music Theatre
Sat Oct 04 ā Cincinnati, OH ā Riverbend Music Center
Sun Oct 05 ā Tinley Park, IL ā Credit Union 1 Amphitheatre
Fri Oct 10 ā Colorado Springs, CO ā Broadmoor World Arena
Sun Oct 12 ā Salt Lake City, UT ā Utah First Credit Union Amphitheatre
Tue Oct 14 ā Mountain View, CA ā Shoreline Amphitheatre
Wed Oct 15 ā Wheatland, CA ā Toyota Amphitheatre
Sat Oct 18 ā Chula Vista, CA ā North Island Credit Union Amphitheatre
Sun Oct 19 ā Los Angeles, CA ā Kia Forum
Wed Oct 22 ā Phoenix, AZ ā Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre
Thu Oct 23 ā Albuquerque, NM ā Isleta Amphitheater
Sat Oct 25 ā Austin, TX ā Germania Insurance Amphitheater
Sun Oct 26 ā Houston, TX ā The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion
*Without support from Corrosion of Conformity
MT 15 and Archon 50 Classic amplifiers offer fresh tones in release alongside a doubled-in-size Archon cabinet
PRS Guitars today released the updated MT 15 and the new Archon Classic amplifiers, along with a larger Archon speaker cabinet. The 15-watt, two-channel Mark Tremonti signature amp MT 15 now features a lead channel overdrive control. An addition to the Archon series, not a replacement, the 50-watt Classic offers a fresh voice by producing retro rock āclassicā tones reminiscent of sound permeating the radio four and five decades ago. Now twice the size of the first Archon cabinet, the Archon 4x12 boasts four Celestion V-Type speakers.
MT 15 Amplifier Head
Balancing aggression and articulation, this 15-watt amp supplies both heavy rhythms and clear lead tones. The MT 15 revision builds off the design of the MT 100, bringing the voice of the 100ās overdrive channel into its smaller-format sibling. Updating the model, the lead channel also features a push/pull overdrive control that removes two gain stages to produce vintage, crunchier āmid gainā tones. The clean channel still features a push/pull boost control that adds a touch of overdrive crunch. A half-power switch takes the MT to 7 watts.
āSeven years ago, we released my signature MT 15 amplifier, a compact powerhouse that quickly became a go-to for players seeking both pristine cleans and crushing high-gain tones. In 2023, we took things even further with the MT 100, delivering a full-scale amplifier that carried my signature sound to the next level. That inspired us to find a way to fit the 100's third channel into the 15's lunchbox size,ā said Mark Tremonti.
āToday, Iām beyond excited to introduce the next evolution of the MT15, now featuring a push/pull overdrive control on the Lead channel and a half-power switch, giving players even more tonal flexibility to shape their sound with a compact amp. Canāt wait for you all to plug in and experience it!ā
Archon Classic Amplifier Head
With a refined gain structure from the original Archon, the Archon Classicās lead channel offers a wider range of tones colored with gain, especially in the midrange. The clean channel goes from pristine all the way to the edge of breakup. This additional Archon version was developed to be a go-to tool for playing classic rock or pushing the envelope into modern territory. The Archon Classic still features the originalās bright switch, presence and depth controls. PRS continues to stock the Archon in retailers worldwide.
āThe Archon Classic is not a re-issue of the original Archon, but a newly voiced circuit with the lead channel excelling in '70s and '80s rock tones and a hotter clean channel able to go into breakup. This is the answer for those wanting an Archon with a hotrod vintage lead channel gain structure without changing preamp tube types, and a juiced- up clean channel without having to use a boost pedal, all wrapped up in a retro-inspired cabinet design,ā said PRS Amp Designer Doug Sewell.
Archon 4x12 Cabinet
As in the Archon 1x12 and 2x12, the mega-sized PRS Archon 4x12 speaker cabinet features Celestion V-Type speakers and a closed-back design, delivering power, punch, and tight low end. Also like its smaller brethren, the 4x12 is wrapped in durable black vinyl and adorned with a British-style black knitted-weave grill cloth. The Archon 4x12 is only the second four-speaker cabinet in the PRS lineup, next to the HDRX 4x12.
PRS Guitars continues its schedule of launching new products each month in 2025. Stay tuned to see new gear and 40 th Anniversary limited-edition guitars throughout the year. For all of the latest news, click www.prsguitars.com/40 and follow @prsguitars on Instagram, Tik Tok, Facebook, X, and YouTube.