Prog-metal architect Aaron Marshall shows off a pair of dazzling Mayones prototypes before he explains using a small digital footprint for tons of tones.
After the dissolution of his previous band, Speak of the Devil, Aaron Marshall forged out on his own and created Intervals in 2011. (Through the bandās existence, Marshall has remained the sole constant member and is the bandās musical pilot.)
The instrumental band is like a robust jambalaya. It uses ingredients from prog, metal, djent, jazz, and even top-40 pop to make its own cosmic stew. After two instrumental EPsāThe Space Between (2011) In Time (2012)āhe recruited vocalist Mike Semesky and released their 2014 full-length debut, A Voice Within. Aaron Marshall decided the best version of Intervals was that eschewing vocals and moved on to release two more LPs in 2015 (The Shape of Colour) and 2017 (The Way Forward). Each release has seen Marshall (and the culminating tours with various bandmates) push further through the prog glass-ceiling with a no-holds-barred approach redefining themselves, and the resulting genre.
During the bandās run opening for co-headliners Chon and Between the Buried and Me at Nashvilleās Marathon Music Works, Intervals ringleader Aaron Marshall spoke with PGās Perry Bean. The Canadian details his new custom builds from Mayones, talks about the power and freedom the Axe-Fx III gives his band, and even explains how NYSYNC, TLC, and Destinyās Child still influence him today.
Aaron Marshallās time playing axes from PRS, Suhr, and Aristides has afforded him some serious R&D time. Heās now working with Mayonesācustom builder from Polandāto hopefully design a dream sig model. The above is an early-stage prototype for Aaron that starts with Mayonesā Regius Core body. (The Core models come with a carved top while the standard Regius has a slab-style body.) The body wings are mahogany that are sandwiched between an 11-ply, neck-through design that uses primarily maple. The other wood stringers are made from mahogany and amazakoe. And because Aaron is a touring pro, they included carbon-fiber reinforcements in the necks so that baby is sturdy. The fretboard is ebony, the entire guitar is decked out with black pearloid, it has a Schaller 3-way pickup selector (bridge, inner coils, neck), a set of Bare Knuckles (Holy Diver in the bridge and Emerald in the neck), and a Gotoh 510 trem. All his guitars take DāAddario NYXL strings that are gauged .009ā.046 and he plays in standard tuning.
Hereās a spitting image of the beautiful green prototype that has a 7th string, stunning purple finish, swamp ash body wings instead of mahogany, and because Aaron Marshall doesnāt prefer trems on extended-range instruments, it has a Schaller Hannes bridge. For this one, heās using a custom hybrid set of DāAddario NYXLs that include .009-.013-.016-.030-.042-.052-.068.
Joining the band earlier this year to help out for a run of dates in India, Travis Levrier (Scale the Summit, Entheos) scored this Charvel Custom Shop USA Select DK24 HH 2PT CM with Seymour Duncan Pegasus and Sentient Humbuckers.
For 7-string songs, Travis Levrier rocks this old-school Jackson Custom Shop beast that also has Seymour Duncan Pegasus and Sentient Humbuckers.
Holding down bass onstage for Intervals since 2017, Jacob Umansky goes hard in the paint with a custom Dingwall Z3. The one-of-a-kind 6-string bass features a custom āsexy-storm-trooperā finish on the sandblasted ash body and has Dingwall pickups with Darkglass electronics under the hood.
Got 15 minutes? Then you probably have enough time to set up a Intervals show. Much of that swiftness is thanks to the processing and programming power inside the Fractal Audio Axe-Fx III. Before a given tour, Aaron spends weeks setting up not only the tones for each patch, for each portion of a song, but he has things meticulously set that he theoretically can play a full show without hitting his foot controller after the first note. The III is brought to life by a Seymour Duncan PowerStage 700.
The aforementioned ālifelineāāa Fractal FC-12 that guides the Axe-Fx III each night.
While the band all use in-ear monitors, Aaron Marshall does have a Mesa/Boogie 4x12 for stage volume and feedback manipulation.
Click below to listen wherever you get your podcasts:
D'Addario XT Strings:https://www.daddario.com/XTRR
- āAnyone Who Thinks the Death of the Electric Guitar Is Upon Us Is Very out of Touchā - Premier Guitar āŗ
- āAnyone Who Thinks the Death of the Electric Guitar Is Upon Us Is Very out of Touchā - Premier Guitar āŗ
- āAnyone Who Thinks the Death of the Electric Guitar Is Upon Us Is Very out of Touchā - Premier Guitar āŗ
PG contributor Tom Butwin demos seven direct boxes ā active and passive ā showing off sound samples, features, and real-world advice. Options from Radial, Telefunken, Hosa, Grace Design, and Palmer offer solutions for any input, setting, and budget.
Grace Design m303 Active Truly Isolated Direct Box
The Grace Design m303 is an active, fully isolated DI box, delivering gorgeous audio performance for the stage and studio. Our advanced power supply design provides unbeatable headroom and dynamic range, while the premium Lundahl transformer delivers amazing low-end clarity and high frequency detail. True elegance, built to last.
Rupert Neve Designs RNDI-M Active Transformer Direct Interface
Compact design, giant tone. The RNDI-M brings the stunning tone & clarity of its award-winning counterparts to an even more compact and pedalboard-friendly format, with the exact same custom Rupert Neve Designs transformers and discrete FET input stage as the best-selling RNDI, RNDI-S and RNDI-8.
Telefunken TDA-1 1-channel Active Instrument Direct Box
The TDA-1 phantom powered direct box uses high-quality components and classic circuitry for rich, natural sound. With discrete Class-A FET, a European-made transformer, and a rugged metal enclosure, it delivers low distortion and a broad frequency response. Assembled and tested in Connecticut, USA, for reliable performance and superior sound.
Hosa SideKick Active Direct Box
The Hosa SideKick DIB-445 Active DI delivers clear, strong signals for live and studio use. Ideal for guitars, basses, and keyboards, it minimizes interference over long runs. Features include a pad switch, ground lift, and polarity flip. With a flat frequency response and low noise, it ensures pristine audio.
Radial JDI Jensen-equipped 1-channel Passive Instrument Direct Box
The Radial JDI preserves your instrumentās natural tone with absolute clarity and zero distortion. Its Jensen transformer delivers warm, vintage sound, while its passive design eliminates hum and buzz. With a ruler-flat response (10Hzā40kHz) and no phase shift, the JDI ensures pristine sound in any setup.
Radial J48 1-channel Active 48v Direct Box
The Radial J48 delivers exceptional clarity and dynamic range, making it the go-to active DI for professionals. Its 48V phantom-powered design ensures clean, powerful signal handling without distortion. With high headroom, low noise, and innovative power optimization, the J48 captures your instrumentās true toneāperfect for studio and stage.
PalmerĀ River Series - Ilm
The Palmer ilm, an upgraded version of the legendary Palmer The Junction, delivers studio-quality, consistent guitar tones anywhere. This passive DI box features three analog speaker simulations, ensuring authentic sound reproduction. Its advanced filter switching mimics real guitar speaker behavior, making it perfect for stage, home, or studio recording sessions.
Learn more from these brands!
Delicious, dynamic fuzz tones that touch on classic themes without aping them. Excellent quality. Super-cool and useful octave effect.
Canāt mix and match gain modes.
$349
Great Eastern FX Co. Focus Fuzz Deluxe
Adding octave, drive, and boost functions to an extraordinary fuzz yields a sum greater than its already extraordinary parts.
One should never feel petty for being a musical-instrument aesthete. You can make great music with ugly stuff, but youāre more likely to get in the mood for creation when your tools look cool. Great Eastern FXās Focus Fuzz Deluxe, an evolution of their trĆØs Ć©lĆ©gantFocus Fuzz, is the sort of kit you might conspicuously keep around a studio space just because it looks classy and at home among design treasures likeRoland Space Echoes, Teletronix LA-2As, andblonde Fender piggyback amps. But beneath the FFDās warmly glowing Hammerite enclosure dwells a multifaceted fuzz and drive that is, at turns, beastly, composed, and unique. Pretty, it turns out, is merely a bonus.
Forks in the Road
Though the Cambridge, U.K.-built FFD outwardly projects luxuriousness, it derives its ādeluxeā status from the addition of boost, overdrive, and octave functions that extend an already complex sound palette. Unfortunately, a significant part of that fuzzy heart is a Soviet-era germanium transistor that is tricky to source and limited the original Focus Fuzz production to just 250 units. For now, the Focus Fuzz Deluxe will remain a rare bird. Great Eastern founder David Greaves estimates that he has enough for 400 FFDs this time out. Hopefully, the same dogged approach to transistor sourcing that yielded this batch will lead to a second release of this gem, and on his behalf we issue this plea: āTransistor hoarders, yield your troves to David Greaves!ā
The good news is that the rare components did not go to waste on compromised craft. The FFDās circuit is executed with precision on through-hole board, with the sizable Soviet transistor in question hovering conspicuously above the works like a cross between a derby hat and B-movie flying saucer. If the guts of the FFD fail to allay doubts that youāre getting what you paid for, the lovingly designed enclosure and robust pots and switchesānot to mention the pedalās considerable heftāshould take care of whatever reticence remains.
Hydra in Flight
Just as in the original Focus Fuzz, the fuzz section in the Deluxe deftly walks an ideal path between a germanium Fuzz Faceās weight and presence, a Tone Benderās lacerating ferocity, and the focus of a Dallas Rangemaster. You donāt have to strain to hear that distillate of elements. But even if you canāt easily imagine that combination, what you will hear is a fuzz that brims with attitude without drowning in saturation. Thereās lots of dynamic headroom, youāll feel the touch responsiveness, and youāll sense the extra air that makes way for individual string detail and chord overtones. It shines with many different types of guitars and amps, too. I was very surprised at the way it rounded off the sharp edges made by a Telecaster bridge pickup and AC15-style combo while adding mass and spunk. The same amp with a Gibson SG coaxed out the Tony Iommi-meets-Rangemaster side of the fuzz. In any combination, the fuzz control itself, which boosts gain while reducing bias voltage (both in very tasteful measure) enhances the vocabulary of the guitar/amp pairing. That range of color is made greater still by the fuzzās sensitivity to guitar volume and tone attenuation and touch dynamics. Lively clean tones exist in many shades depending on your guitar volume, as do rich low-gain overdrive sounds.
The drive section is similarly dynamic, and also quite unique thanks to the always versatile focus control, which adds slight amounts of gain as well as high-mid presence. At advanced focus levels, the drive takes on a fuzzy edge with hints of Fender tweed breakup and more Black Sabbath/Rangemaster snarl. Itās delicious stuff with Fender single-coils and PAFs, and, just as with the fuzz, itās easily rendered thick and clean with a reduction in guitar volume or picking intensity. The boost, meanwhile, often feels just as lively and responsiveājust less filthyālending sparkle and mass to otherwise thin and timid combo amp sounds.
Among this wealth of treats, the octave function is a star. It works with the fuzz, drive, or boost. But unlike a lot of octave-up effects, you neednāt approach it with caution. Though it adds plenty of the buzzing, fractured, and ringing overtones that make octave effects so wild and distinct, it doesnāt strip mine low end from the signal. The extra balance makes it feel more musical under the fingers and even makes many chords sound full and detailedāa trick few octave effects can manage. With the fuzz, the results are concise, burly, and articulate single notes that lend themselves to lyrical, melodic leads and power chords. In drive-plus-octave mode, there are many hues of exploding practice-amp trash to explore. The boost and the octave may be my favorite little gem among the FFDās many jewels, though. Adding the octave to boosted signals with a generous heap of focus input yields funky, eccentric electric-sitar tones that pack a punch and are charged with character in their fleeting, flowering state.
Ā The Verdict
Itās hard to imagine adding extra footswitches to the Focus Fuzz Deluxe without sacrificing its basic elegance and proportions, and without elevating its already considerable price. Certainly, there would be real utility in the ability to mix and match all three excellent gain modes. On the other hand, the output level differences between fuzz, drive, and boost are pretty uniform, meaning quick switches on the fly will shift texture and attitude dramatically without delivering an ear-frying 30 dB boost. And though itās hard not be tantalized by sounds that might have been, from combining the fuzz and/or boost and drive circuits, the myriad tones that can be sourced by blending any one of them with the superbly executed octave effect and the varied, rangeful focus and output controls will keep any curious tone spelunker busy for ages. For most of them, I would venture, real treasure awaits.
Why is Tommyās take on āDay Tripperā so hard? And what song would Adam Miller never play with him? Plus, we get Adamās list of favorite Tommy Emmanuel records.
We call guitarist Adam Miller in the middle of the night in Newcastle, Australia, to find out what itās like to play with Certified Guitar Player, Tommy Emmanuel. Miller tells us just how famous Tommy is in Australia, and what it was like hearing him play from a formative age. Eventually, Adam got to open for Emmanuel, and theyāve since shared the stage, so we get the firsthand scoop: Why is Tommyās take on āDay Tripperā so hard? And what song would Miller never play with him? Plus, we get Adamās list of favorite Tommy Emmanuel records.
Adamās newly released trio album, Timing, is out now.
Plus, weāre talking about new recordings from Billy Strings and Bryan Sutton, as well as Brooklyn Mediterranean surf party band Habbina Habbina.
Peavey Electronics announces the Decade preamp pedal. The internet and social media have been abounding with chatter about the current recording secret of the modern-day guitar gods ā the Peavey Decade practice amp.
The discontinued amp has reached unimaginable demands on the secondary markets. So much so that small pedal builders have made attempts to capitalize and duplicate the proprietary designs themselves. Tone chasers can now rejoice as the Decade preamp pedal now brings those highly sought after tones back to market in a small, compact footprint.
Guitar players will find a single input, single output preamp pedal straight forward and easy to navigate. Faithful to the original Decade circuitry (circa 1980), the control layout will be identical to the original amplifier. The GAIN section features PRE and POST controls. PREGAIN sets the gain of the input circuitry. POST GAIN sets the gain before the out. Built off the legendary Peavey Saturation patent, the new, switchable SATURATION allows tube-like sustain and overload at all volume levels, suitable for bedrooms, rehearsals, stadiums and apparently, those very expensive recording studios. The traditional BASS, MID, and HIGH equalization controls provide the tone shaping enhancements any guitar should require. Upgraded pedal features include an internal 24v supply from the standard 9v supply/battery and worldwide EMC/FCC compliance approval.
To learn more, visit online at www.Peavey.com
Street $199.99 USD