John Bohlinger and the PG video crew visit the SoCal HQ of the revamped amp builder that has a growl for every guitarist.
Bad Cat Black Cat
The new Black Cat couldāve started with an āAmericanā channel and a āBritishā channel, promising āclassicā tones that remind you of your childhood guitar heroes, but youāve already heard that promise and youāve already played that amp. The Black Cat promise is different. Sure, weāre going to share some things in common with our forebears, like an all-tube signal path, powerful transformers, familiar controls and premium Celestion speakers, but whatās under the hood is uniquely Bad Cat.
The heart and soul of the new Black Cat is the immediate feeling of connection you get with it. Itās always lively and toneful, never feeling choked or constrained. Driven by a 20W power amp featuring a cathode bias pair of EL84s, itās remarkably loud with enough headroom to play with a live drummer yet has an effective master volume control allowing for playing at home with no loss of tone.
Specs:
- 20 Watts ā 2 x EL84 Cathode-biased
- 2 Channels ā Clean and Overdrive
- Channel-dedicated VOLUME and MASTER Controls
- Global TREBLE, BASS, and CUT Controls
- Bias-modulated Tremolo with INTENSITY and SPEED Controls
- Studio Quality Reverb
- Buffered Effects Loop
- 1 x 12ā Celestion V30 āBad Cat Customā Speaker (Combo only)
- Two Button Footswitch and Slip Cover Included
Bad Cat Cub
The Cub was among the original Bad Cat designs ā boutique and highly desired, it has been used on countless stages and recordings. Over the years, the Cubās design has been steadily refined and improved. Every iteration brings something new to the table and our newest Cub is no exception. A single channel amplifier now with two gain modes, the updated original Cub circuitry is accessed in clean mode, while the overdriven mode features a newly voiced, more aggressive side to the Cub.
Specs:
- 30W ā 2x EL34 in Cathode-Bias Class AB Configuration
- Single Channel
- Clean and OD Gain Modes
- Two Discrete, Switchable Master Volume Controls
- Global Input Volume, Bass, Mid, Treble, and Presence Controls
- Studio Quality Reverb
- Buffered Effects Loop
- 1 x 12ā Celestion V30 āBad Cat Customā Speaker (Combo Only)
- 2 Button Footswitch and Slip Cover Included
Bad Cat Hot Cat
The award winning Hot Cat amp was introduced in 2005 to great accolade. As pleased as we are with the original, the time had come for a whole new Hot Cat. We took everything we have learned over the last 20 years and applied it to this limitless reimagining of the Hot Cat. A two channel amplifier now with two gain modes per channel, the Hot Cat provides virtually limitless gain combinations as well as studio quality reverb, and an all new fully buffered effects loop.
Specs:
- 45W ā 2x EL34 in Fixed-Bias Class AB Configuration
- Two Channel
- Lo and Hi Gain Modes
- Two Discrete, Gain and Volume Controls per Channel
- Global Master, Bass, Mid, Treble, and Presence Controls
- Studio Quality Reverb
- Buffered Effects Loop
Bad Cat Lynx
Modern high gain players need tight low frequencies that punch and react quickly to staccato palm muting. They need high frequencies that cut without being harsh and grainy. They need effective midrange shaping with complexity and articulation. Finally, they need blistering gain with none of the noise. The new Lynx is designed to meet and exceed these demands. The Lynx has two distinct channels and a massive 7 gain stages. A new Lo/Hi switch allows exploration of gain stage topology not yet found in any other amplifier from Bad Cat.
Specs:
- Designed and Built in Southern California
- 50W ā 2x EL34 in fixed bias class AB configuration
- Two Channel
- Lo and Hi Gain Modes
- Channel-dedicated GAIN and VOLUME controls
- Global Master, Bass, Mid, Treble, and Presence Controls
- Adjustable noise gate circuit ā Patent Applied For
- Buffered Effects Loop
- 12ā Celestion Vintage 30 (Combo only)
- Bad Cat Black Cat Review āŗ
- First Look: Bad Cat Black Cat āŗ
- Rig Rundown: Tim Pierce āŗ
- Introducing the Bad Cat Jet Black - Premier Guitar āŗ
- Bad Cat Jet Black Demo | PG Plays - Premier Guitar āŗ
Acoustic players, this oneās for you! Win the LR Baggs Venue DI in the I Love Pedals giveaway and take full control of your live sound. Enter today and return daily for more chances!
LR Baggs Venue DI Acoustic Guitar Preamp / DI / EQ / Tuner Pedal
We created the Venue DI so you can travel light, set up fast, and sound incredible anywhere you plug in. The Venue DI gives you complete control by combining a full-isolation DI output, 5-band EQ with adjustable low & hi-mid bands, variable clean boost, and chromatic tuner all in one acoustic pedal. With its all-discrete signal path, hi-graded semiconductors, and exclusive use of audiophile grade film capacitors, the Venue DI is on par with the worldās elite preamps and provides a studio quality sound for the stage.
The National New Yorker lived at the forefront of the emerging electric guitar industry, and in Memphis Minnieās hands, it came alive.
This National electric is just the tip of the iceberg of electric guitar history.
On a summer day in 1897, a girl named Lizzie Douglas was born on a farm in the middle of nowhere in Mississippi, the first of 13 siblings. When she was seven, her family moved closer to Memphis, Tennessee, and little Lizzie took up the banjo. Banjo led to guitar, guitar led to gigs, and gigs led to dreams. She was a prodigious talent, and āKidā Douglas ran away from home to play for tips on Beale Street when she was just a teenager. She began touring around the South, adopted the moniker Memphis Minnie, and eventually joined the circus for a few years.
(Are you not totally intrigued by the story of this incredible woman? Why did she run away from home? Why did she fall in love with the guitar? We havenāt even touched on how remarkable her songwriting is. This is a singular pioneer of guitar history, and we beseech you to read Woman with Guitar: Memphis Minnieās Blues by Beth and Paul Garon.)
Following the end of World War I, Hawaiian music enjoyed a rapid rise in popularity. On their travels around the U.S., musicians like Sol Hoāopiāi became fans of Louis Armstrong and the New Orleans Rhythm Kings, leading to a great cross-pollination of Hawaiian music with jazz and blues. This potent combination proved popular and drew ever-larger audiences, which created a significant problem: How on earth would an audience of thousands hear the sound from a wimpy little acoustic guitar?
This art deco pickguard offers just a bit of pizzazz to an otherwise demure instrument.
In the late 1920s, George Beauchamp, John and Rudy Dopyera, Adolph Rickenbacker, and John Dopyeraās nephew Paul Barth endeavored to answer that question with a mechanically amplified guitar. Working together under Beauchamp and John Dopyeraās National String Instrument Corporation, they designed the first resonator guitar, which, like a Victrola, used a cone-shaped resonator built into the guitar to amplify the sound. It was definitely louder, but not quite loud enoughāespecially for the Hawaiian slide musicians. With the guitars laid on their laps, much of the sound projected straight up at the ceiling instead of toward the audience.
Barth and Beauchamp tackled this problem in the 1930s by designing a magnetic pickup, and Rickenbacker installed it in the first commercially successful electric instrument: a lap-steel guitar known affectionately as the āFrying Panā due to its distinctive shape. Suddenly, any stringed instrument could be as loud as your amplifier allowed, setting off a flurry of innovation. Electric guitars were born!
āAt the time it was positively futuristic, with its lack of f-holes and way-cool art deco design on the pickup.ā
By this time, Memphis Minnie was a bona fide star. She recorded for Columbia, Vocalion, and Decca Records. Her song āBumble Bee,ā featuring her driving guitar technique, became hugely popular and earned her a new nickname: the Queen of Country Blues. She was officially royalty, and her subjects needed to hear her game-changing playing. This is where she crossed paths with our old pals over at National.
National and other companies began adding pickups to so-called Spanish guitars, which they naturally called āElectric Spanish.ā (This term was famously abbreviated ES by the Gibson Guitar Corporation and used as a prefix on a wide variety of models.) In 1935, National made its first Electric Spanish guitar, renamed the New Yorker three years later. By todayās standards, itās modestly appointed. At the time it was positively futuristic, with its lack of f-holes and way-cool art deco design on the pickup.
Thereās buckle rash and the finish on the back of the neck is rubbed clean off in spots, but that just goes to show how well-loved this guitar has been.
Memphis Minnie had finally found an axe fit for a Queen. She was among the first blues guitarists to go electric, and the New Yorker fueled her already-upward trajectory. She recorded over 200 songs in her 25-year career, cementing her and the National New Yorkerās place in musical history.
Our National New Yorker was made in 1939 and shows perfect play wear as far as weāre concerned. Sure, thereās buckle rash and the finish on the back of the neck is rubbed clean off in spots, but structurally, this guitar is in great shape. Itās easy to imagine this guitar was lovingly wiped down each time it was put back in the case.
Thereās magic in this guitar, yāall. Every time we pick it up, we can feel Memphis Minnieās spirit enter the room. This guitar sounds fearless. Itās a survivor. This is a guitar that could inspire you to run away and join the circus, transcend genre and gender, and leave your own mark on music history. As a guitar store, watching guitars pass from musician to musician gives us a beautiful physical reminder of how history moves through generations. We canāt wait to see who joins this guitarās remarkable legacy.
SOURCES: blackpast.org, nps.gov, worldmusic.net, historylink.org, Memphis Music Hall of Fame, āMemphis Minnieās āScientific Soundā: Afro-Sonic Modernity and the Jukebox Era of the Bluesā from American Quarterly, āThe History of the Development of Electric Stringed Musical Instrumentsā by Stephen Errede, Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL.
With authentic stage-class Katana amp sounds, wireless music streaming, and advanced spatial technology, the KATANA:GO is designed to offer a premium sound experience without the need for amps or pedals.
BOSS announces the return of KATANA:GO, an ultra-compact headphone amplifier for daily jams with a guitar or bass. KATANA:GO puts authentic sounds from the stage-class BOSS Katana amp series at the instrumentās output jack, paired with wireless music streaming, sound editing, and learning tools on the userās smartphone. Advanced spatial technology provides a rich 3D audio experience, while BOSS Tone Exchange offers an infinite sound library to explore any musical style.
Offering all the features of the previous generation in a refreshed external design, KATANA:GO delivers premium sound for everyday playing without the hassle of amps, pedals, and computer interfaces. Users can simply plug it into their instrument, connect earbuds or headphones, call up a memory, and go. Onboard controls provide access to volume, memory selection, and other essential functions, while the built-in screen displays the tuner and current memory. The rechargeable battery offers up to five hours of continuous playing time, and the integrated 1/4-inch plug folds down to create a pocket-size package thatās ready to travel anywhere.
KATANA:GO drives sessions with genuine sounds from the best-selling Katana stage amp series. Guitar mode features 10 unique amp characters, including clean, crunch, the high-gain BOSS Brown type, two acoustic/electric guitar characters, and more. Thereās also a dedicated bass mode with Vintage, Modern, and Flat types directly ported from the Katana Bass amplifiers. Each mode includes a massive library of BOSS effects to explore, with deep sound customization available in the companion BOSS Tone Studio app for iOS and Android.
The innovative Stage Feel feature in KATANA:GO provides an immersive audio experience with advanced BOSS spatial technology. Presets allow the user to position the amp sound and backing music in different places in the sound field, giving the impression of playing with a backline on stage or jamming in a room with friends.
The guitar and bass modes in KATANA:GO each feature 30 memories loaded with ready-to-play sounds. BOSS Tone Studio allows the player to tweak preset memories, create sounds from scratch, or import Tone Setting memories created with stage-class Katana guitar and bass amplifiers. The app also provides integrated access to BOSS Tone Exchange, where users can download professionally curated Livesets and share sounds with the global BOSS community.
Pairing KATANA:GO with a smartphone offers a complete mobile solution to supercharge daily practice. Players can jam along with songs from their music library and tap into BOSS Tone Studioās Session feature to hone skills with YouTube learning content. Itās possible to build song lists, loop sections for focused study, and set timestamps to have KATANA:GO switch memories automatically while playing with YouTube backing tracks.
The versatile KATANA:GO functions as a USB audio interface for music production and online content creation on a computer or mobile device. External control of wah, volume, memory selection, and more are also supported via the optional EV-1-WL Wireless MIDI Expression Pedal and FS-1-WL Wireless Footswitch.
For more information, please visit boss.info.
We know Horsegirl as a band of musicians, but their friendships will always come before the music. From left to right: Nora Cheng, drummer Gigi Reece, and Penelope Lowenstein.
The Chicago-via-New York trio of best friends reinterpret the best bits of college-rock and ā90s indie on their new record, Phonetics On and On.
Horsegirl guitarists Nora Cheng and Penelope Lowenstein are back in their hometown of Chicago during winter break from New York University, where they share an apartment with drummer Gigi Reece. Theyāre both in the middle of writing papers. Cheng is working on one about Buckminster Fuller for a city planning class, and Lowenstein is untangling Austrian writer Ingeborg Bachmannās short story, āThree Paths to the Lake.ā
āIt was kind of life-changing, honestly. It changed how I thought about womanhood,ā Lowenstein says over the call, laughing a bit at the gravitas of the statement.
But the moment of levity illuminates the fact that big things are happening in their lives. When they released their debut album, 2022ās Versions of Modern Performance, the three members of Horsegirl were still teenagers in high school. Their new, sophomore record, Phonetics On and On, arrives right in the middle of numerous first experiencesātheir first time living away from home, first loves, first years of their 20s, in university. Horsegirl is going through changes. Lowenstein notes how, through moving to a new city, their friendship has grown, too, into something more familial. They rely on each other more.
āIf the friendship was ever taking a toll because of the band, the friendship would come before the band, without any doubt.āāPenelope Lowenstein
āEveryone's cooking together, you take each other to the doctor,ā Lowenstein says. āYou rely on each other for weird things. I think transitioning from being teenage friends to suddenly working together, touring together, writing together in this really intimate creative relationship, going through sort of an unusual experience together at a young age, and then also starting school togetherāI just feel like it brings this insane intimacy that we work really hard to maintain. And if the friendship was ever taking a toll because of the band, the friendship would come before the band without any doubt.ā
Horsegirl recorded their sophomore LP, Phonetics On and On, at Wilcoās The Loft studio in their hometown, Chicago.
These changes also include subtle and not-so-subtle shifts in their sophisticated and artful guitar-pop. Versions of Modern Performance created a notion of the band as ā90s college-rock torchbearers, with reverb-and-distortion-drenched numbers that recalled Yo La Tengo and the Breeders. Phonetics On and On doesnāt extinguish the flame, but itās markedly more contemporary, sacrificing none of the catchiness but opting for more space, hypnotic guitar lines, and meditative, repeated phrases. Cheng and Lowenstein credit Welsh art-pop wiz Cate Le Bonās presence as producer in the studio as essential to the sonic direction.
āOn the record, I think we were really interested in Young Marble Giantsāsuper minimal, the percussiveness of the guitar, and how you can do so much with so little.āāNora Cheng
āWe had never really let a fourth person into our writing process,ā Cheng says. āI feel like Cate really changed the way we think about how you can compose a song, and built off ideas we were already thinking about, and just created this very comfortable space for experimentation and pushed us. There are so many weird instruments and things that aren't even instruments at [Wilcoās Chicago studio] The Loft. I feel like, definitely on our first record, we were super hesitant to go into territory that wasn't just distorted guitar, bass, and drums.ā
Nora Cheng's Gear
Nora Cheng says that letting a fourth personāWelsh artist Cate Le Bonāinto the trioās songwriting changed how they thought about composition.
Photo by Braden Long
Effects
- EarthQuaker Devices Plumes
- Ibanez Tube Screamer
- TC Electronic Polytune
Picks
- Dunlop Tortex .73 mm
Phonetics On and On introduces warm synths (āJulieā), raw-sounding violin (āIn Twosā), and gamelan tilesācommon in traditional Indonesian musicāto Horsegirlās repertoire, and expands on their already deep quiver of guitar sounds as Cheng and Lowenstein branch into frenetic squonks, warped jangles, and jagged, bare-bones riffs. The result is a collection of songs simultaneously densely textured and spacious.
āI listen to these songs and I feel like it captures the raw, creative energy of being in the studio and being like, āFuck! We just exploded the song. What is about to happen?āā Lowenstein says. āThat feeling is something we didnāt have on the first record because we knew exactly what we wanted to capture and it was the songs we had written in my parentsā basement.ā
Cheng was first introduced to classical guitar as a kid by her dad, who tried to teach her, and then she was subsequently drawn back to rock by bands like Cage The Elephant and Arcade Fire. Lowenstein started playing at age 6, which covers most of her life memories and comprises a large part of her identity. āIt made me feel really powerful as a young girl to know that I was a very proficient guitarist,ā she says. The shreddy playing of Television, Pink Floydās spacey guitar solos, and Yo La Tengoās Ira Kaplan were all integral to her as Horsegirl began.
Penelope Lowenstein's Gear
Penelope Lowenstein likes looking back at the versions of herself that made older records.
Photo by Braden Long
Effects
- EarthQuaker Westwood
- EarthQuaker Bellows
- TC Electronic PolyTune
Picks
- Dunlop Tortex 1.0 mm
Recently, the two of them have found themselves influenced by guitarists both related and unrelated to the type of tunes theyāre trading in on their new album. Lowenstein got into Brazilian guitar during the pandemic and has recently been āin a Jim OāRourke, John Fahey zone.ā
āThereās something about listening to that music where you realize, about the guitar, that you can just compose an entire orchestra on one instrument,ā Lowenstein says. āAnd hearing what the bass in those guitar parts is doingāas in, the E stringāis kind of mind blowing.ā
āOn the record, I think we were really interested in Young Marble Giantsāsuper minimal, the percussiveness of the guitar, and how you can do so much with so little,ā Cheng adds. āAnd also Lizzy Mercier [Descloux], mostly on the Rosa Yemen records. That guitar playing I feel was very inspiring for the anti-solo,[a technique] which appears on [Phonetics On and On].āThis flurry of focused discovery gives the impression that Cheng and Lowensteinās sensibilities are shifting day-to-day, buoyed by the incredible expansion of creative possibilities that setting oneās life to revolve around music can afford. And, of course, the energy and exponential growth of youth. Horsegirl has already clocked major stylistic shifts in their brief lifespan, and itās exciting to have such a clear glimpse of evolution in artists who are, likely and hopefully, just beginning a long journey together.
āThereās something about listening to that music where you realize, about the guitar, that you can just compose an entire orchestra on one instrument.āāPenelope Lowenstein
āIn your 20s, life moves so fast,ā Lowenstein says. āSo much changes from the time of recording something to releasing something that even that process is so strange. You recognize yourself, and you also kind of sympathize with yourself. It's a really rewarding way of life, I think, for musicians, and it's cool that we have our teenage years captured like that, tooāon and on until we're old women.ā
YouTube It
Last summer, Horsegirl gathered at a Chicago studio space to record a sun-soaked set of new and old tunes.