For our annual guitar mods issue, we asked readers to share projects from their own workbenches.
Anthony Pereira: Jackson with Warpigs
Not as elaborate as others I’ve seen, but I’ve always been a sucker for Jackson guitars, and I’m not even a shred player. I wanted to do something different to my SL2, so I installed FU-Tone Noiseless Springs, an FU-Tone Brass Block on the Floyd Rose, a trem stopper, and Bare Knuckle Warpig pickups. The kicker is that I put a P-90 Warpig in the neck position for the punchy leads. The pickups are much darker than the stock pickups, but they scream through my 1982 Marshall 2203.
Gregg Ledoux: Meet Mavis
This is Mavis. She has a Warmoth swamp-ash body, a Warmoth Goncalo Alves neck with pau ferro fretboard, and stainless-steel frets. I chose a Lollar P-90 and Seymour Duncan Pearly Gates for the pickups. I assembled this guitar in the last couple of months. She rocks!
Jin J. X: Covering Serious Ground
Hi Premier Guitar!
This may look like a “normal” Ibanez Artcore, though it has some extra goodies. This is an Ibanez AFJ85 with a Stewmac Golden Age Parson Street alnico 2 PAF-style pickup in the bridge, and a custom alnico 3 neck pickup made for me by David Magazzi out of Connecticut. Instead of a 3-way switch, it uses the middle three notches of a 5-way rotary switch with the outside positions acting as a “mute.” The “top” master volume and tone pots are dedicated to the magnetic pickups with their own input jack.
You may notice a small wire coming from the bridge—this is a Fishman Powerbridge posted to the floating posts. That wire goes to the “bottom” volume and tone and to a separate jack. Historically, I’ve not been the biggest fan of piezo pickups in solidbodies, but in a hollowbody it actually sounds more real (a trick I picked up from the mighty Gilad Hekselman). So, this guitar covers some serious ground: legitimate jazz and R&B sounds in the neck, bright twangy sounds in the bridge, and a whole separate circuit for acoustic sounds that, in the studio with EQ, sound very much like a dreadnought we all know and love.
Thank you for all you do, and I appreciate that you give readers the opportunity to get in on the fun.
Justin Lee: Smashing Pumpkins Squier
Hi Premier Guitar,
Love all your content, especially the Rig Rundowns! I’d like to share with you my quarantine guitar project. It’s my first-ever guitar that had been unassembled for the longest time. I’ve since gone on to own much better guitars but there’s still something very magical about this one.
It’s started life as a Korean Squier and I thought the white finish was a bit boring (no offense to Jimi), so I painted it, inspired by Smashing Pumpkins’ Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness album. I guess the choice of red and white was inspired by Van Halen.
During this whole period of quarantine, I decided to get it back up and running with some help from my local guitar shop. I changed the tuners and nut, and I wired in a few old pickups I had around: a Gibson pickup in the bridge and a DiMarzio Vintage Pro in the neck. I’m still not sure what to do about the space for the middle pickup. I might just leave it empty, which makes it more Frankencaster-esque. I’ve set it up with .011s and raised the action with the intention of trying to play slide (again!). I’m also waiting to get the right (free) knob for the second tone pot.
It’s probably not worth the money that I’ve just put into it, but I can’t give it up and it should be played. Also, it seems to be my kids’ favorite one of them all.
Kind regards,
Justin (currently living in Singapore but spent a lot of time in the U.K. and Canada)
Justin Motander Jones: Berto
This pine-bodied “Berto” was made from a beam from a neighbor’s 1930s patio here in the Kensington neighborhood of San Diego, California. The purpleheart fretboard pays tribute to the now-defunct historic Ken Cinema. The guitar has a TV Jones Magna’Tron, and a McNelly CC neck pickup. The anodized aluminum knobs are made locally by Forney Guitars. Berto has a Schroeder bridge and Gotoh tuners. I make guitars in San Diego and my IG handle is @justinmotanderjones, if you’d like to see some others.
Kato: Tilt-Back Banana
I put together this beautiful guitar out of some parts that were made to my specifications. It’s a Strat-style body but it’s a little bit thinner than normal. The neck is custom-made and the closest replication of the tilt-back banana headstock like George Lynch’s. The pickups are alnico 2 in the bridge, alnico 4 in middle, and alnico 5 in the neck. The neck has a slightly slimmer profile, so it’s easier to play blazing-fast leads. I had the neck plate custom-engraved with my logo and the headstock is currently out being painted to match the body and I’m having my logo applied. Hope you like it. Took me quite a while. Can’t wait to play her!
Mark Cully: Two-Fer
I have two guitar projects to share. The first is my ’90s MIM Squier Telecaster. I put a gold-foil pickup from a 1960s Teisco guitar in the neck position along with CTS pots, orange drop capacitors, and a proper Fender switch.
The second project is my Lotus guitar. It started out as a double-humbucker guitar with a Tune-o-matic bridge. I installed a Tele-style bridge and pickup, and a P-90 in the neck position. It’s now a string-through body. I handmade a hardwood shim for the neck pocket to make the neck angle suitable for the lower bridge. It has all new electronics, including CTS pots, orange drop capacitors, etc. Great mag, by the way!
Matt Dunn: Best of Both Worlds
This guitar started its life as a cheap Strat copy under the Stadium brand. I’ve always loved HSS Strats because of how versatile they are in terms of sonic possibilities. But you rarely ever see P-90s put into a Strat, let alone P-90s for an HSS configuration! So, I ordered a custom pickguard with the help of WD Music, loaded the guitar with some GFS pickups, and decided to see how a pair of P-90s and a Wide Range-style humbucker would sound. It ended up sounding wonderful, with more of a Gibson flavor than I anticipated or expected. As a Les Paul Junior fan, this guitar provided me the best of both worlds and is quite the conversation starter!
Michael Menkes: Modded Explorer
- Hipshot A Bass Bridge with string through
- Bartolini Classic Bass humbuckers
- John East Uni-Pre preamp
- Hipshot D extender tuner
- Alperious Custom pickguard, pickup covers, and truss rod cover
It took a full year to complete! Worth it.
Vox’s Valvenergy Tone Sculptor
I spent a day workshopping ideas in my studio using just the Vox Valvenergy Smooth Impact compressor and Tone Sculptor EQ, and a dash of amp tremolo and reverb to taste. In the process, I produced more arresting sounds than I had heard from my guitars in many days. There were radical direct-to-desk-style Jimmy Page/Beatles distortion tones, sun-sized, cosmic electric 12-string, Bakersfield twang that could burn through crude, and many other sweet and nasty colors. Most decent EQ and compressor combinations can achieve variations on all those themes. But the Smooth Impact and Tone Sculptor also reveal interesting personalities in unexpected places.
The individuality and energy in the Vox Valvenergy pedals is attributable, in part, to the Nutube vacuum tube used in the circuit. Though it looks little like a vacuum tube as most guitarists know them, the thin, wafer-like Nutube is, in fact, a real vacuum tube like those used in fluorescent displays. Fluorescent display tubes have limitations. A maximum operating voltage of around 40 volts means they aren’t useful for bigger power tube applications like a 6L6, which has an operating voltage of about 400 volts. But it can work quite well as a preamp tube in concert with an op amp power section, which is how the Nutube is used in the new Valvenergy pedals, as well as older Vox products like the Vox MV50 and Superbeetle amps.
Valvenergy Tone Sculptor
When you think about “cinematic” effects, you likely imagine big reverb or modulation sounds that create a vivid picture and feeling of space or motion. But narrow, hyper-focused EQ profiles can evoke very different and equally powerful images. Radical EQ settings can add aggression, claustrophobic intimacy, and stark, explosive dark-and-light contrasts more evocative of Hitchcock’s Psycho than Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner.
Any of these moods can be summoned from the Valvenergy Tone Sculptor. Six sliders cut or boost 10 dB frequency bands spanning 100 Hz to 5.6 kHz. A seventh slider cuts or boosts the master output by 12 dB. This platter of options might not sound like much. But you can use these seven controls together to very specific ends.
“Radical EQ settings can add aggression, near-claustrophobic intimacy, and stark, explosive dark-and-light contrasts.”
For example, bumping the high-midrange and the master output produces narrow cocked-wah-like filter sounds with enough push to produce extra amp overdrive—effectively turning the Tone Sculptor into a buzzy, almost fuzz-like filter effect. But unlike a wah, you can carefully scoop high end or add a spoonful of bass to blunt harsh frequencies or give the tone a bit more weight. You can also broaden the palette of an amp/guitar pairing. I matched a particularly trebly Jazzmaster bridge pickup with a very hot and toppy Vox AC15-flavored amp for this test—a recipe that can be spiky on the best days. But with the Tone Sculptor in the line, I could utilize the same sharp, fuzzy, and filtered Mick Ronson wah tones while shaving some of the most piercing frequencies.
EQ pedals exist on many points along the cost spectrum. And at $219, the Tone Sculptor lives on the high side of the affordable range. Does it offer something less expensive models can’t deliver? Well, for one thing, I found it relatively quiet, which is nice whether you’re shaping toppy high-contrast effects or performing more surgical adjustments. And the sliders feel nuanced and nicely tapered rather than like a dull axe with a few basic frequency notches. But in many situations I also liked the color imparted by the circuit—generated, presumably, by the Nutube. “Color,” in audio terms, is a broad and subjective thing, and one should not necessarily expect the warm, tube-y glow of a vintage tube Pultec. Still, the Tone Sculptor has many forgiving, flattering qualities—typical of studio EQs—that enable fine tuning and experimentation with more radical and creative applications of the effect.
Valvenergy Smooth Impact
As with the Tone Sculptor, the Smooth Impact’s use of Nutube engenders certain expectations. It’s easy to surmise that because Smooth Impact has a vacuum tube in the circuit that it will behave like a little Teletronix LA-2A leveling amplifier. That’s a big ask for a $219 stompbox. On the other hand, the Smooth Impact exhibits some appealing characteristics of studio tube compression. At lower compression levels, it works well as a thickening agent—adding mass without much additional noise. And at higher compression levels it can sound snappy, crisp, and tight without feeling like you’ve bled every trace of overtone from your signal.
The Smooth Impact’s controls aren’t totally atypical. But because it lacks some familiar features like variable attack and release, yet is more complicated than a 1-knob DynaComp, you have to trust your ear to navigate interactions among the controls. The most unfamiliar of these is the 3-way vintage/natural/sag toggle. The first two are defined by preset attack and release settings: Vintage is slow attack and long release, and natural is the opposite. The sag mode’s compression is more like what you get from tube saturation, and it’s useful for adding thickness and complexity to a thin amp tone at modest compression levels.
Though the vintage and natural modes certainly have a different feel, they don’t always sound worlds apart. And like the sag mode, the thing they have in common is the way they enrich lifeless amp output at low to medium compression, with a bit of grind from the tube gain and a little extra makeup gain from the output. At the most aggressive settings, the tube gain can get a little crispy. And really crushing the compression can flatline your tone without adding much in the way of extra sustain. These are limitations common to many compressors with similar features. But unless I was chasing very ultra-snappy Prince and Nile Rodgers fast-funk caricatures, I enjoyed the Smooth Impact most in its in-between ranges, where mass, mild, harmonious drive, and low noise showcase the pedal’s sometimes studio-like personality.
Boss’ firstWaza Tube Amp Expander, built with an integrated power amp that enables boosted signal as well as attenuated sounds, was and remains the OX’s main competition. Both products have copious merits but, at $1,299 (Boss) and $1,499 (Universal Audio), each is expensive. And while both units are relatively compact, they aren’t gear most folks casually toss in a backpack on the way out the door. The new Waza Tube Expander Core, however, just might be. And though it sacrifices some refinements for smaller size, its much-more accessible price and strong, streamlined fundamental capabilities make it a load-box alternative that could sway skeptics.
Micro Manager
The TAE Core is around 7 1/2" wide, just over 7 " long, and fewer than 4 " tall, including the rubber feet. That’s about half the width of an original TAE or OX. The practical upside of this size reduction is obvious and will probably compel a lot of players to use the unit in situations in which they’d leave a full-size TAE at home. The streamlined design is another source of comfort. With just five knobs on its face, the TAE Core has fewer controls and is easier to use than many stompboxes. In fact, the most complicated part of integrating the TAE Core to your rig might be downloading the necessary drivers and related apps.
Connectivity is straightforward, though there are some limitations. You can use TAE Core wirelessly with an iOS or Windows tablet or smartphone, as long as you have the BT-DUAL adaptor (which is not included and sets you back around 40 bucks). However, while desktop computers recognize the TAE Core as a Bluetooth-enabled device, you cannot use the unit wirelessly with those machines. Instead, you have to connect the TAE Core via USB. In a perfectly ordered world, that’s not a big problem. But if you use the TAE Core in a small studio—where one less cable is one less headache—or you prefer to interface with the TAE Core app on a desktop where you can toggle fast and easily between large, multi-track sessions and the app, the inability to work wirelessly on a desktop can be a distraction. The upside is that the TAE Core app itself is, functionally and visually, almost identical in mobile and desktop versions, enabling you to select and drag and drop virtual microphones into position, add delay, reverb, compression, and EQ effects, choose various cabinets with different speaker configurations and sizes, and introduce new rigs and impulse responses to a tone recipe in a flash. And though the TAE Core app lacks some of the photorealistic panache and configuration options in the OX app, the TAE Core’s app is just as intuitive.Less Is More
One nice thing about the TAE Core’s more approachable $699 price is that you don’t have to feel too bad on nights that you “underutilize” the unit and employ it as an attenuator alone. In this role, the TAE Core excels. Even significantly attenuated sounds retain the color and essence of the source tone. Like any attenuator-type device, you will sacrifice touch sensitivity and dynamics at a certain volume level, yielding a sense of disconnection between fingers, gut, guitar, and amp. But if you’re tracking “big” sounds in a small space, you can generate massive-sounding ones without interfacing with an amp modeler and flat-response monitors, which is a joy in my book. And again, there’s the TAE Core’s ability to “expand” as well as attenuate, which means you can use the TAE Core’s 30-watt onboard power amp to amplify the signal from, say, a 5-watt Fender Champion 600 with a 6" speaker, route it to a 2x12, 4x12, or virtual equivalent in the app, and leave your bandmate with the Twin Reverb and bad attitude utterly perplexed.
The Verdict
Opting for the simpler, thriftier TAE Core requires a few sacrifices. Power users that grew accustomed to the original TAE’s super-tunable “resonance-Z” and “presence-Z” controls, which aped signal-chain impedance relationships with sharp precision, will have to make do with the simpler but still very effective stack and combo options and the “air feel level” spatial ambience control.The DC power jack is less robust. It features only MIDI-in rather than MIDI-in/-through/-out jacks, and, significantly, 70 watts less power in the onboard power amp. But from my perspective, the Core is no less “professional” in terms of what it can achieve on a stage or in a studio of any size. Its more modest feature set and dimensions are, in my estimation, utility enhancements as much as limitations. If greater power and MIDI connectivity are essentials, then the extra 600 bones for the original TAE will be worth the price. For many of us, though, the mix of value, operational efficiencies, and the less-encumbered path to sound creation built into the TAE Core will represent a welcome sweet spot that makes dabbling in this very useful technology an appealing, practical proposition.
