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 | Download Example 1 Bridge pickup, bridge with coil tap, neck pickup, neck with coil tap |
| Download Example 2 Large variety of tones achieved from rolling the tone knob up and down as well as pulling it out to activate the second voicing |
| Download Example 3 A couple of clean tones in a Gypsy Jazz duet configuration |
| Download Example 4 various sounds of the guitar with an overdriven tone |
The T3/B (“B” for Bigsby) is a semi-hollowbody electric constructed from sapele rather than the traditional mahogany and topped with a beautiful, quilted maple top. The body is hollowed out, but leaves a solid block in the center where the quilted, bookmatched maple piece is laid directly on top. The 21-fret sapele neck with ebony fingerboard is styled in a very comfortable and fast shallow C profile that is bolted on with Taylor’s proprietary T-Lock. Though the guitar uses a bolt-on configuration, it isn’t chunky or obtrusive in any way, and it feels rock solid, no doubt due to the design of the neck joint. Both the T3/B and T3 (stop tail piece) models incorporate a roller-style bridge, which in the case of the Bigsby is excellent for combating the tuning issues associated with that style of vibrato. It includes the standard 2-humbucker design with 3-way toggle and a master volume and tone control, but there’s a lot more than meets the eye. The pickups are not the typical PAF-style, but Taylor’s own Style 2 HD (high definition) humbuckers with coil-splitting activated by pulling up on the volume knob—and a tone control that adds a second capacitor by pulling up. The range of tones possible grows exponentially with these additions, but more on that later. Finally, the whole guitar is tastefully appointed with chrome pickup rings, knobs, strap buttons, and Taylor’s own tuners.
The T3/B I reviewed came in a Honey Sunburst finish (see page 2), but that just doesn’t do the finish justice. Not only was the quilt top the most gorgeous I’ve ever seen; the finish was so rich and deep I had a hard time figuring out if I should play it or just look at it! The good news is this guitar plays as good as it looks, which was a nice realization. The neck is instantly comfortable and fast playing, without feeling like your hand would cramp due to lack of substance. It sort of combined the best of all neck shapes into one, and lent itself to just about any style of playing—always feeling easy. The action was set up to be just a hair higher than low, which was perfect for big bends and chords that rang clean without fretting out. The neck offers good access to the 21st fret on the higher strings, but was a little more limited past the 15th fret on the fourth, fifth, and sixth strings. What I found refreshing was the way the neck joint felt seamlessly connected to the body, and low profile, unlike some traditional designs. Taylor clearly thought through these designs when coming up with the guitar, and it paid off big time. That wasn’t the only area that stood out, as even the detail of the volume and tone knobs is brilliant: they look like art deco top hats, and they feel better than any guitar I’ve played in my life. The taper of both knobs is smooth and controlled, and they exhibit a weight to them that feels fantastic and deliberate when rolling them up or down. The sum of these details adds up to a solid feeling and fun guitar to play.
If Taylor had stopped at the 2-humbucker, 3-way switch design they would’ve had a winning guitar. But they didn’t, and I’m really glad they decided to go the extra mile, because there are a lot of fantastic tones to be found. The Style 2 HD pickups have a very clean and articulate sound. I wouldn’t call them PAF-like… in fact, I don’t really have anything to compare them to. They’re incredibly versatile and worked well through every amp I played them on. But it wasn’t until I pulled the volume knob up and split the coils that the real tonal magic became apparent. Again, the coil-tap wasn’t the familiar Strat sound of a single coil, just a more articulate and less weighty sound than the humbucker. It was very useful in a variety of situations and allowed me to dial in just the right amount of heft or leanness, depending on my needs. To top it off, the tone control actually did something! Rolling back the tone all the way sounds like it shifts the mid frequency rather than the typical dark tone, and pulling up shifts the tone again by adding another cap to the control, giving more versatility to the shape. This is one of those rare guitars that doesn’t necessarily have a stock setting to it. Where I usually tend to go straight to the bridge pickup with volume and tone full-up, I ended up using every combination of pickup, coil tap and tone variation. It was amazing to hear one guitar shine in so many different ways.
The Bigsby implementation is by far the best of its kind that I’ve used. After letting the guitar settle in and adjust to my climate (Arizona is very dry—a great place to test the mettle of any guitar) I never had a tuning problem. Typical Bigsbys tend to drag the wound strings across the bridge and pull the guitar out of tune. With the roller bridge, just about all of the binding up is eliminated, and the travel of the vibrato is ultra-smooth and controlled. Even with the roller bridge, it still feels like a Bigsby but doesn’t carry any the negative side effects. These types of vibrato units are designed for a less dramatic effect that a Floyd, but they are so very effective when used properly. It’s just another example of a tasteful appointment to the T3/B that I really enjoyed. And as an extra bonus, the weight of the tailpiece and the way it was mounted made the guitar sound acoustically quite loud and surprisingly responsive. Big points for that. I rarely come across an instrument that is as beautiful as it is functional. Taylor seems to have pulled out all the stops on the T3/B, since it effortlessly excels in musical styles ranging from rock to blues to jazz, and yet never feels out of place. With all the chrome, quilted maple and flair in the design, it would be easy to create a garish and over-the-top guitar—this is anything but that. Somehow Taylor has figured out a way to incorporate style, class and functionality into the perfect package. I can’t think of a single thing I would change, except for the fact that it needs to be returned now that I’m done reviewing it. Bummer!
Buy if...
You want beauty, brains and brawn.
Skip if...
You're watching your wallet.
Rating...
MSRP $3198 - Taylor Guitars - taylorguitars.com |
Duane Denison of the Jesus Lizard, EGC Chessie in hands, coaxing some nasty tones from his Hiwatt.
The Jesus Lizard’s sixth album, Blue, served as the band’s final statement from the frontlines of noisy rock for the next 26 years. By the time of their dissolution in 1999, they’d earned a reputation for extreme performances chock full of hard-hitting, machine-like grooves delivered by bassist David Wm. Sims and, at their conclusion, drummer Mac McNeilly, at times aided and at other times punctured by the frontline of guitarist Duane Denison’s incisive, dissonant riffing, and presided over by the cantankerous howl of vocalist David Yow. In the years since, performative, thrilling bands such as Pissed Jeans, METZ, and Idles have built upon the Lizard’s musical foundation.
Denison has kept himself plenty busy over the last couple decades, forming the avant-rock supergroup Tomahawk—with vocalist Mike Patton, bassist Trevor Dunn (both from Mr. Bungle), and drummer John Stanier of Helmet—and alongside various other projects including Th’ Legendary Shack Shakers and Hank Williams III. The Jesus Lizard eventually reunited, but until now have only celebrated their catalog, never releasing new jams.
The Jesus Lizard, from left: bassist David Wm. Sims, singer David Yow, drummer Mac McNeilly, and guitarist Duane Denison.
Photo by Joshua Black Wilkins
Back in 2018, Denison, hanging in a hotel room with Yow, played a riff on his unplugged electric guitar that caught the singer’s ear. That song, called “West Side,” will remain unreleased for now, but Denison explains: “He said, ‘Wow, that’s really good. What is that?’ And I said, ‘It’s just some new thing. Why don’t we do an album?’” From those unassuming beginnings, the Jesus Lizard’s creative juices started flowing.
So, how does a band—especially one who so indelibly captured the ineffable energy of live rock performance—prepare to get a new record together 26 years after their last? Back in their earlier days, the members all lived together in a band house, collectively tending to the creative fire when inspiration struck. All these years later, they reside in different cities, so their process requires sending files back and forth and only meeting up for occasional demo sessions over the course of “three or four years.”
“When the time comes to get more in performance mode, I have a practice space. I go there by myself and crank it up. I turn that amp up and turn the metronome up and play loud.” —Duane Denison
the Jesus Lizard "Alexis Feels Sick"
Distance creates an obstacle to striking while the proverbial iron is hot, but Denison has a method to keep things energized: “Practice loud.” The guitarist professes the importance of practice, in general, and especially with a metronome. “We keep very detailed records of what the beats per minute of these songs are,” he explains. “To me, the way to do it is to run it to a Bluetooth speaker and crank it, and then crank your amp. I play a little at home, but when the time comes to get more in performance mode, I have a practice space. I go there by myself and crank it up. I turn that amp up and turn the metronome up and play loud.”
It’s a proven solution. On Rack—recorded at Patrick Carney’s Audio Eagle studio with producer Paul Allen—the band sound as vigorous as ever, proving they’ve not only remained in step with their younger selves, but they may have surpassed it with faders cranked. “Duane’s approach, both as a guitarist and writer, has an angular and menacing fingerprint that is his own unique style,” explains Allen. “The conviction in his playing that he is known for from his recordings in the ’80s and ’90s is still 100-percent intact and still driving full throttle today.”
“I try to be really, really precise,” he says. “I think we all do when it comes to the basic tracks, especially the rhythm parts. The band has always been this machine-like thing.” Together, they build a tension with Yow’s careening voice. “The vocals tend to be all over the place—in and out of tune, in and out of time,” he points out. “You’ve got this very free thing moving around in the foreground, and then you’ve got this very precise, detailed band playing behind it. That’s why it works.”
Before Rack, the Jesus Lizard hadn’t released a new record since 1998’s Blue.
Denison’s guitar also serves as the foreground foil to Yow’s unhinged raving, as on “Alexis Feels Sick,” where they form a demented harmony, or on the midnight creep of “What If,” where his vibrato-laden melodies bolster the singer’s unsettled, maniacal display. As precise as his riffs might be, his playing doesn’t stay strictly on the grid. On the slow, skulking “Armistice Day,” his percussive chording goes off the rails, giving way to a solo that slices that groove like a chef’s knife through warm butter as he reorganizes rock ’n’ roll histrionics into his own cut-up vocabulary.
“During recording sessions, his first solo takes are usually what we decide to keep,” explains Allen. “Listen to Duane’s guitar solos on Jack White’s ‘Morning, Noon, and Night,’ Tomahawk’s ‘Fatback,’ and ‘Grind’ off Rack. There’s a common ‘contained chaos’ thread among them that sounds like a harmonic Rubik’s cube that could only be solved by Duane.”
“Duane’s approach, both as a guitarist and writer, has an angular and menacing fingerprint that is his own unique style.” —Rack producer Paul Allen
To encapsulate just the right amount of intensity, “I don’t over practice everything,” the guitarist says. Instead, once he’s created a part, “I set it aside and don’t wear it out.” On Rack, it’s obvious not a single kilowatt of musical energy was lost in the rehearsal process.
Denison issues his noisy masterclass with assertive, overdriven tones supporting his dissonant voicings like barbed wire on top of an electric fence. The occasional application of slapback delay adds a threatening aura to his exacting riffage. His tones were just as carefully crafted as the parts he plays, and he relied mostly on his signature Electrical Guitar Company Chessie for the sessions, though a Fender Uptown Strat also appears, as well as a Taylor T5Z, which he chose for its “cleaner, hyper-articulated sound” on “Swan the Dog.” Though he’s been spotted at recent Jesus Lizard shows with a brand-new Powers Electric—he points out he played a demo model and says, “I just couldn’t let go of it,” so he ordered his own—that wasn’t until tracking was complete.
Duane Denison's Gear
Denison wields his Powers Electric at the Blue Room in Nashville last June.
Photo by Doug Coombe
Guitars
- Electrical Guitar Company Chessie
- Fender Uptown Strat
- Taylor T5Z
- Gibson ES-135
- Powers Electric
Amps
- Hiwatt Little J
- Hiwatt 2x12 cab with Fane F75 speakers
- Fender Super-Sonic combo
- Early ’60s Fender Bassman
- Marshall 1987X Plexi Reissue
- Victory Super Sheriff head
- Blackstar HT Stage 60—2 combos in stereo with Celestion Neo Creamback speakers and Mullard tubes
Effects
- Line 6 Helix
- Mantic Flex Pro
- TC Electronic G-Force
- Menatone Red Snapper
Strings and Picks
- Stringjoy Orbiters .0105 and .011 sets
- Dunlop celluloid white medium
- Sun Studios yellow picks
He ran through various amps—Marshalls, a Fender Bassman, two Fender Super-Sonic combos, and a Hiwatt Little J—at Audio Eagle. Live, if he’s not on backline gear, you’ll catch him mostly using 60-watt Blackstar HT Stage 60s loaded with Celestion Neo Creambacks. And while some boxes were stomped, he got most of his effects from a Line 6 Helix. “All of those sounds [in the Helix] are modeled on analog sounds, and you can tweak them endlessly,” he explains. “It’s just so practical and easy.”
The tools have only changed slightly since the band’s earlier days, when he favored Travis Beans and Hiwatts. Though he’s started to prefer higher gain sounds, Allen points out that “his guitar sound has always had teeth with a slightly bright sheen, and still does.”
“Honestly, I don’t think my tone has changed much over the past 30-something years,” Denison says. “I tend to favor a brighter, sharper sound with articulation. Someone sent me a video I had never seen of myself playing in the ’80s. I had a band called Cargo Cult in Austin, Texas. What struck me about it is it didn’t sound terribly different than what I sound like right now as far as the guitar sound and the approach. I don’t know what that tells you—I’m consistent?”
YouTube It
The Jesus Lizard take off at Nashville’s Blue Room this past June with “Hide & Seek” from Rack.
Once the news of the Oasis reunion got out, Sadler Vaden hit YouTube hard on the tour bus, driving his bandmates crazy. The Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit guitarist has been a Noel Gallagher mega-fan since he was a teenager, so he joined us to wax poetic about Oasis’ hooks, Noel’s guitar sound, and the band’s symphonic melodies. What are Sadler’s favorite Oasis jams? And if he ever shares a bill with Oasis and they ask him onstage, what song does he want to join in on?
