The death of Nashville’s Dave Roe is a reminder of the important connections we can make within the music we love, right where we live.
Last month the sound of hearts breaking reverberated across Nashville—from corporate offices to studios to indie venues—as word spread of the death of Dave Roe. Dave, who was featured on PG’s September cover, was an extraordinary artist, loved for his playing and his personality. He could be endearingly grumpy, but also had a marvelous sense of humor. And his generosity and welcoming nature were almost as well-known throughout Music City as his live and studio performances with Johnny Cash, Dwight Yoakam, Loretta Lynn, Carrie Underwood, Tony Joe White, Early James, Bonnie Prince Billy, Marcus King, T Bone Burnett, Brandy Clark, Dan Auerbach, Chrissie Hynde, Sturgill Simpson, CeeLo Green, Brian Setzer, Faith Hill, John Mellencamp, Kurt Vile, Bahamas, and so many others. As we said on our cover: “You don't know Dave Roe, but you’ve heard him play.”
I did know Dave Roe. He was one of the first musicians I saw when I came to Nashville nearly 17 years ago, annihilating his upright bass in a trio with guitarist Kenny Vaughan and drummer Jeff Clemens, playing badass, rusty swamp blues in a little beer joint, for tips. It was only later I realized I’d seen him before, supporting Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash in a spectacular performance at a big Boston club called Avalon, on the night of a blizzard that kept all but about 150 of us from hearing the then-reigning king and queen of country music. I recall that the four-block walk in shin-deep snow from the subway took almost a half hour, but it was worth every minute spent slogging along through the face-stinging precipitation.
Over the years, I’ve seen Dave play in an amazing variety of configurations, from supporting singer-songwriters to regular country gigs on the Broadway strip to his recent rock band with Vaughan, the SloBeats, who have an unreleased album in the can. One of the most exciting performances was an all-improvised one-off with the Cure’s guitarist, Reeves Gabrels, and Dave’s drummer son, Jerry. I’d call it free rock, and, after the gig that night, Reeves told Dave I’d been a friend of the last free-jazz guitarist Sonny Sharrock. I think that cemented my friendship with Dave. Sure, Dave had played with Charlie Louvin, but he loved and played entirely unbridled music, too.
“I was onstage with Dave only once, when my regular bassist couldn’t make a gig and I got up the chutzpah to ask him if he’d sub.”
I was onstage with Dave only once, when my regular bassist couldn’t make a gig and I got up the chutzpah to ask him if he’d sub. Dave said yes immediately, and he slayed. Even without time for a rehearsal, he anticipated everything I played and elevated the gig with his fat, authoritative, bull moose tone … and his humor. Some players throw in quotes or tones or brief lines—the sonic equivalent of asides in the theater—that can evoke a smile, and Dave was a master at that, too. Afterwards I was embarrassed to hand him his cut—a mere $40—but I was in, shall we say, financial straits at the time—and he just handed it back, grabbed me around the shoulders, and told me to call him to sub anytime, and that he’d had a blast. His heart was every bit as big as his sound.
Early this year, I tried to talk Dave into writing a column for Premier Guitar. Dave was a masterful storyteller, with no shortage of tales to relate. His session experiences alone, not to mention his dealings with life—and a few mercurial stars—on the road, could fill a tome. But after a few months of occasional conversations, he passed on the idea. Writing, he decided, wasn’t his thing. So, for me, our cover feature on Dave was a consolation prize, a splendid way to frame our first bass-themed issue, and a fitting tribute to an under-sung hero of the strings. Dave was incredulous when I told him he’d be on the cover. And I’d been holding some print copies for him, waiting for a break in deadlines to call Dave to set up their delivery in-person. I still hadn’t made that call when the news of his death spread on September 16.
I’m sharing this because, after that cover story, you all know Dave. Or someone like him. His surprising departure is yet another reminder that we need to value our local heroes. Dave was more than that, of course, but in recent years he’d spent most of his time in Nashville’s studios and clubs, rather than on the road. At times, he seemed ubiquitous. Almost institutional. And now he isn't. Too often, it happens that fast.
We all need to treat people like Dave the way that Dave treated people. So do more than support your local musical heroes. Tell them you value what they do, that they make your life better, that you appreciate them for who they are. If the chance comes up, be a friend. If it doesn’t, be a fan. Pay the cover, feed the tip jar, buy the album, shake their hand. No one and nothing lasts forever … except maybe for the music—in recordings, in memories, in our hearts. And in its influence. And maybe even in the air, in those special places where it’s made. By musicians like Dave Roe.
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Stompboxtober Day 23 is here! Today’s prize is a pedal from J. Rockett Audio. Enter now and come back for more daily prizes!
J. Rockett Audio Designs PXO Phil X Signature Overdrive Pedal
The PXO was created as a live or studio tool. When we sent Phil the overdrive sample he found that it saved him in backline situations and provided him a drive that plays well with others.
The PXO is an overdrive/boost where you can select pre or post giving you variety in how you want to boost, EQ and overdrive. We have provided standard controls on the overdrive side such as Volume/Gain/Overdrive and EQ but on the boost side you have a separate Tilt EQ that allows you to EQ with simplicity. You can experiment by cascading in a pre or post situation and experiment from there. The PXO has a lush, thick feel to the bottom end and a smooth top end that begs you to dig into the note.
Founding Grateful Dead bassist Phil Lesh has died at 84.
Official statement from Phil Lesh's Facebook page:
He was surrounded by his family and full of love. Phil brought immense joy to everyone around him and leaves behind a legacy of music and love. We request that you respect the Lesh family’s privacy at this time.
This is a developing story.
Vintage-style reverb, tremolo, and vibrato sounds abound in a 3-in-1 stomp that might be the only box you need.
Here’s part two of our look under the hood of the funky rhythm guitar master’s signature 6-string.
Hello and welcome back to Mod Garage. In this edition, we’re continuing our journey through the Fender Cory Wong Stratocaster wiring, bringing it all together.In the previous installment, the last feature on the funky 6-stringer’s signature axe that we discussed was the master volume pot and the corresponding treble-bleed circuit. Now, let’s continue with this guitar’s very special configuration of the tone pots.
Tone pot with Fender Greasebucket tone system:
This 250k tone pot is a standard CTS pot with a 90/10 audio taper found in all U.S.-built Fender guitars. The Cory Wong guitar uses the Fender Greasebucket system, which is added to the pot as a ready-to-solder PCB. The Greasebucket PCB is also available individually from Fender (part #7713546000), though you can use conventional electronic parts for this.
Fender introduced this feature in 2005 on some of the Highway One models and some assorted Custom Shop Strats. The Greasebucket name (which is a registered Fender trademark, by the way) is my favorite of Fender’s marketing names, but don’t let it fool you: Your tone will get cleaner with this modification, not greasy and dirty.
According to Fender, the Greasebucket tone circuit reduces high frequencies without adding bass as the tone knob is turned down. Don’t let that description confuse you. A standard Strat tone control does not add any bass frequencies! As you already know, with a passive system you can’t add anything that isn’t already there. You can reshape the tone by deemphasizing certain frequencies and making others more prominent. Removing highs makes lows more apparent and vice versa. In addition, the use of inductors (which is how a passive pickup behaves in a guitar circuit) and capacitors can create resonant peaks and valleys (band-passes and notches), further coloring the overall tone.
Cory Wong bringing the funk onstage.
This type of band-pass filter only allows certain frequencies to pass through, while others are blocked. The standard tone circuit in a Strat is called a variable low-pass filter (or a treble-cut filter), which only allows the low frequencies to pass through while the high frequencies get sent to ground via the tone cap.
The Greasebucket’s band-pass filter is a combination of a high-pass and a low-pass filter. This is supposed to cut high frequencies without “adding” bass, which has mostly to do with the resistor in series with the pot. That resistor means the control will never get to zero. You can get a similar effect by simply not turning the Strat’s standard tone control all the way down. (The additional cap on the wiper of the Greasebucket circuit complicates things a bit, though; together with the pickups it forms an RLC circuit, but I really don’t want to get into that here.)
The standard Fender Greasebucket tone system is used in the Cory Wong Strat, which includes a 0.1 μF cap and a 0.022 uF cap, along with a 4.7k-ohm resistor in series. These are the values used on the PCB, and without the PCB it looks like the illustration at the top of this column.
Push-push tone pot with preset overwriting function:
The lower tone pot assigned to the bridge pickup is a 250k audio push-push pot with a DPDT switch. The switch is used to engage a preset sound by overwriting the 5-way pickup-selector switch, no matter what switching position it is in. The preset functionality has a very long tradition in the house of Fender, dating back to the early ’50s, when Leo Fender designed a preset bass sound on position 3 (where the typical neck position is on a modern guitar) of the Broadcaster (and later the Telecaster) circuit. Wong loves the middle-and-neck-in-parallel pickup combination, so that’s the preset sound his push-push tone pot is wired for.
The neck pickup has a dedicated tone control while the middle pickup doesn’t, which is also another interesting feature. This means that when you hit the push-push switch, you will engage the neck and middle pickup together in parallel, no matter what you have dialed in on the 5-way switch. Hit the push-push switch again, and the 5-way switch is back to its normal functionality. Instead of a push-push pot, you can naturally use a push-pull pot or a DPDT toggle switch in combination with a normal 250k audio pot.
Here we go for the wiring. For a much clearer visualization, I used the international symbol for ground wherever possible instead of drawing another black wire, because we already have a ton of crossing wires in this drawing. I also simplified the treble-bleed circuit to keep things clearer; you’ll find the architecture of it with the correct values in the previous column.
Cory Wong Strat wiring
Courtesy of singlecoil.com
Wow, this really is a personalized signature guitar down to the bone, and Wong used his opportunity to create a unique instrument. Often, signature instruments deliver custom colors or very small aesthetic or functional details, so the Cory Wong Stratocaster really stands out.
That’s it! In our next column, we will continue our Stratocaster journey in the 70th year of this guitar by having a look at the famous Rory Gallagher Stratocaster, so stay tuned!
Until then ... keep on modding!