Tim Carroll's amp "A," one of his fleet of trusty Vox Pathfinder 15Rs, miked and ready to rock.
Nashville is a land of musical shamans. And in all lands of such potent magic, there is an inner circle that includes the most respected members of that class. Typically, they're not widely known to the outside world, but among their peers they are revered. Tim Carroll is such a shaman—a songwriter of such depth that John Prine chose to cover his work, and a ferocious rock 'n' roll guitarist whose ability to improvise around his writing's chiseled backbone is seemingly limitless.
Beginning in 2008, when Carroll was off the road or outside the studio, he began a semi-regular Friday evening Rock 'n' Roll Happy Hour residency at East Nashville's indie-rock mecca, the 5 Spot. For the last eight years or so—save for the pandemic lockdown—he's taken the stage there weekly, delivering two-and-a-half hours of steamrolling rock 'n' roll … nearly all original songs and no break. And with an almost preternatural blend of intensity and joy, and a tone so bold and raw it would ring right in an arena. As Broadway Danny Rose might say, he's dynamite.
The one I bought in Portland, Oregon, to stash at my brother's house, came in the box, and on the outside it said 'Practice Amp.' And I thought, 'Oh my god! This amp is so much more than that!"
Here's the rub: Carroll's amp is a Vox Pathfinder 15R. You might not know that model, since it was discontinued seven years ago, after a dozen-year run. The 15R is, of course, 15 watts, and the R stands for reverb. It also has tremolo, with the usual speed and depth dials, plus volume, reverb, gain, treble, and bass knobs.
There's also a gain-boost button. The speaker is a 1x8 Bulldog, and the amp measures 15"x14"x7". And Carroll has used the solid-state model—he owns five of them—for solo coffeehouse-style gigs, his residency and other club shows, outdoor sheds, many Grand Ole Opry appearances, and even, as a sideman, on the Late Show with David Letterman—twice.
Besties: Tim Carroll and his Vox Pathfinder 15R during soundcheck at East Nashville's indie-music mecca, the 5 Spot.
"I leave the gain button on and the master all the way on 10, and I nudge the gain up about an eighth of an inch for a gnarlier sound, and move it back to clean it up," Carroll explains. "The treble and bass point towards each other at 10 and 2 o'clock, and I never use the reverb, because rooms have their own natural reverb and I don't want to muddy it up." Occasionally, for slower tunes with his trio or for solo gigs, he uses tremolo, with each dial turned to less than halfway, just to add character. Carroll typically plugs a 2012 Gibson Les Paul Traditional strung with D'Addario .011–.049 sets into his tiny titans, and if you want to hear exactly how titanic he sounds, check out the full-length Tim Carroll Rock 'n' Roll Happy Hour video on YouTube. Three of his Pathfinders have a mod: He's had their plastic 1/4" jacks replaced with metal ones, for obvious reasons.
Carroll fell for the Pathfinder 15R at a rehearsal for a gig where multiple artists were backed by the same band. "They had a Pathfinder there for everyone to use, and I was like, 'Oh my gosh, this is just great—so simple and perfect." He set about acquiring one, and then another, and more. "They were only $110 or $115 new, so I figured this is almost a throw-away amp. Well, not a throwaway, but I was touring a lot at the time and I figured I could buy a few and stash them in different towns, for when I flew.
For a humble 1x8, this amp has a lot of flexibility in its control set: gain, a boost button, volume, treble, bass, tremolo speed and depth, and reverb.
Sometimes, I would put one in my suitcase and pack clothes around it, and just check it as luggage. I bought one used, from Craigslist, for $55. I name all my amps something really simple, like A or B, so that one is 55. The one I bought in Portland, Oregon, to stash at my brother's house, came in the box, and on the outside it said 'Practice Amp.' And I thought, 'Oh my god! This amp is so much more than that!"
If you're still skeptical about the Vox Pathfinder 15R, consider that they're now commanding prices from $275 to $400 online. Better yet, if you can find one, plug in, turn it up, and rock the hell out.
Tim Carroll Rock'n Roll Hour
The 5 Spot on a Friday night with Tim Carroll and his rock'n roll band.
- Vox Bobcat V90: The Premier Guitar Review - Premier Guitar ›
- Vox Mini Superbeetle Review - Premier Guitar ›
- TC Electronic MojoMojo Overdrive and Dark Matter Distortion Pedal ... ›
- Vox Bobcat V90 Review - Premier Guitar ›
- 10 Best Portable Amps - Premier Guitar ›
- Gosh Problem Solver 50-Watt Guitar Amp ›
Onstage, Tommy Emmanuel executes a move that is not from the playbook of his hero, Chet Atkins.
“My biggest decision every day on tour is, ‘What do I want to start with? How do I want to come out of the gate?’” Emmanuel explains to me over a video call. “A good opener has to have everything. It has to be full of surprise, it has to have lots of good ideas, lots of light and shade, and then, hit it again,” he says, illustrating each phrase with his hands and ending with a punch.“You lift off straightaway with the first song, you get airborne, you start reaching, and then it’s time to level out and take people on a journey.”
In May 2023, Emmanuel played two shows at the Sydney Opera House, the best performances from which have been combined on his new release, Live at the Sydney Opera House. The venue’s Concert Hall, which has a capacity of 2,679, is a familiar room for Emmanuel, but I think at this point in his career he wouldn’t bring a setlist if he was playing Wembley Stadium. On the recording, Emmanuel’s mind-blowingly dexterous chops, distinctive attack and flair, and knack for culturally resonant compositions are on full display. His opening song for the shows? An original, “Countrywide,” with a segue into Chet Atkins’ “El Vaquero.”
“When I was going to high school in the ’60s, I heard ‘El Vaquero’ on Chet Atkins’ record, [1964’s My Favorite Guitars],” Emmanuel shares. “And when I wrote ‘Countrywide’ in around ’76 or ’77, I suddenly realized, ‘Ah! It’s a bit like “El Vaquero!”’ So I then worked out ‘El Vaquero’ as a solo piece, because it wasn’t recorded like that [by Atkins originally].
“The co-writer of ‘El Vaquero’ is Wayne Moss, who’s a famous Nashville session guy who played ‘da da da’ [sings the guitar riff from Roy Orbison’s ‘Pretty Woman’]. And he played on a lot of Chet’s records as a rhythm guy. So once when I played ‘El Vaquero’ live, Wayne Moss came up to me and said, ‘You know, you did my part and Chet’s at the same time. That’s not fair!’” Emmanuel says, laughing.
Atkins is the reason Emmanuel got into performing. His mother had been teaching him rhythm guitar for a couple years when he heard Atkins on the radio and, at 6, was able to immediately mimic his fingerpicking technique. His father recognized Emmanuel’s prodigious talent and got him on the road that year, which kicked off his professional career. He says, “By the time I was 6, I was already sleep-deprived, working too hard, and being forced to be educated. Because all I was interested in was playing music.”
Emmanuel talks about Atkins as if the way he viewed him as a boy hasn’t changed. The title Atkins bestowed upon him, C.G.P. (Certified Guitar Player), appears on Emmanuel’s album covers, in his record label (C.G.P. Sounds), and is inlaid at the 12th fret on his Maton Custom Shop TE Personal signature acoustic. (Atkins named only five guitarists C.G.P.s. The others are John Knowles, Steve Wariner, Jerry Reed, and Atkins himself.) For Emmanuel, even today most roads lead to Atkins.
When I ask Emmanuel about his approach to arranging for solo acoustic guitar, he says, “It was really hit home for me by my hero, Chet Atkins, when I read an interview with him a long time ago and he said, ‘Make your arrangement interesting.’ And I thought, ‘Wow!’ Because I was so keen to be true to the composer and play the song as everyone knows it. But then again, I’m recreating it like everyone else has, and I might as well get in line with the rest of them and jump off the cliff into nowhere. So it struck me: ‘How can I make my arrangements interesting?’ Well, make them full of surprises.”
When Emmanuel was invited to contribute to 2015’s Burt Bacharach: This Guitar’s in Love with You, featuring acoustic-guitar tributes to Bacharach’s classic compositions by various artists, Emmanuel expresses that nobody wanted to take “(They Long to Be) Close to You,” due to its “syrupy” nature. But for Emmanuel, this presented an entertaining challenge.
He explains, “I thought, ‘Okay, how can I reboot “Close to You?’ So even the most jaded listener will say, ‘Holy fuck—I didn’t expect that! Wow, I really like that; that is a good melody!’ So I found a good key to play the song in, which allowed me to get some open notes that sustain while I move the chords. Then what I did is, in every phrase, I made the chord unresolve, then resolve.
Tommy Emmanuel's Gear
“I’m writing music for the film that’s in my head,” Emmanuel says. “So, I don’t think, ‘I’m just the guitar,’ ever.”
Photo by Simone Cecchetti
Guitars
- Three Maton Custom Shop TE Personals, each with an AP5 PRO pickup system
Amps
- Udo Roesner Da Capo 75
Effects
- AER Pocket Tools preamp
Strings & Picks
- Martin TE Signature Phosphor Bronze (.012–.054)
- Martin SP strings
- Ernie Ball Paradigm strings
- D’Andrea Pro Plec 1.5 mm
- Dunlop medium thumbpicks
“And then to really put the nail in the coffin, at the end, ‘Close to you’ [sings melody]. I finished on a major 9 chord which had that note in it, but it wasn’t the key the song was in, which is a typical Stevie Wonder trick. All the tricks I know, the wonderful ideas that I’ve stolen, are from Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Lionel Richie, James Taylor, Carole King, Neil Diamond. All of the people who wrote really incredibly great pop songs and R&B music—I stole every idea I could, and I tried to make my little two-and-a -half minutes as interesting and entertaining as possible. Because entertainment equals: Surprise me.”
I share with Emmanuel that the performances on Live at the Sydney Opera House, which include his popular “Beatles Medley,” reminded me of another possible arrangement trick. In Harpo Marx’s autobiography, Harpo Speaks, I preface, Marx writes of a lesson he learned as a performer—to “answer the audience’s questions.” (Emmanuel says he’s a big fan of the book and read it in the early ’70s.) That happened for me while listening to the medley, when, after sampling melodies from “She’s a Woman” and “Please Please Me,” Emmanuel suddenly lands on “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.”
I say, “I’m waiting for something that hits more recognizably to me, and when ‘While My Guitar’ comes in, that’s like answering my question.”
“It’s also Paul and John, Paul and John, George,” Emmanuel replies. “You think, ‘That’s great, that’s great pop music,’ then, ‘Wow! Look at the depth of this.’”
Often Emmanuel’s flights on his acoustic guitar are seemingly superhuman—as well as supremely entertaining.
Photo by Ekaterina Gorbacheva
A trick I like to employ as a writer, I say to Emmanuel, is that when I’m describing something, I’ll provide the reader with just enough context so that they can complete the thought on their own.
“You can do that musically as well,” says Emmanuel. He explains how, in his arrangement of “What a Wonderful World,” he’ll play only the vocal melody. “When people are asking me at a workshop, ‘How come you don’t put chords behind that part?’ I say, ‘I’m drawing the melody and you’re putting in all the background in your head. I don’t need to tell you what the chords are. You already know what the chords are.’”
“Wayne Moss came up to me and said, ‘You know, you did my part and Chet’s at the same time. That’s not fair!’”
Another track featured on Live at the Sydney Opera House is a cover of Paul Simon’s “American Tune” (which Emmanuel then jumps into an adaptation of the Australian bush ballad, “Waltzing Matilda”). It’s been a while since I really spent time with There GoesRhymin’ Simon (on which “American Tune” was first released), and yet it sounded so familiar to me. A little digging revealed that its melody is based on the 17th-century Christian hymn, “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded,” which was arranged and repurposed by Bach in a few of the composer’s works. The cross-chronological and genre-lackadaisical intersections that come up in popular music sometimes is fascinating.
“I think the principle right there,” Emmanuel muses, “is people like Bach and Beethoven and Mozart found the right language to touch the heart of a human being through their ears and through their senses ... that really did something to them deep in their soul. They found a way with the right chords and the right notes, somehow. It could be as primitive as that.
Tommy Emmanuel has been on the road as a performing guitarist for 64 years. Eat your heart out, Bob Dylan.
Photo by Jan Anderson
“It’s like when you’re a young composer and someone tells you, ‘Have a listen to Elton John’s “Candle in the Wind,”’ he continues. “‘Listen to how those notes work with those chords.’ And every time you hear it, you go, ‘Why does it touch me like that? Why do I feel this way when I hear those chords—those notes against those chords?’ I say, it’s just human nature. Then you wanna go, ‘How can I do that!’” he concludes with a grin.
“You draw from such a variety of genres in your arrangements,” I posit. “Do you try to lean into the side of converting those songs to solo acoustic guitar, or the side of bridging the genre’s culture to that of your audience?”
“I stole every idea I could, and I tried to make my little two-and-a-half minutes as interesting and entertaining as possible. Because entertainment equals: Surprise me.”
“If I was a method actor,” Emmanuel explains, “what I’m doing is—I’m writing music for the film that’s in my head. So, I don’t think, ‘I’m just the guitar,’ ever. I always think it has to have that kind of orchestral, not grandeur, but … palette to it. Because of the influence of Stevie Wonder, Billy Joel, and Elton John, especially—the piano guys—I try to use piano ideas, like putting the third in the low bass a lot, because guitar players don’t necessarily do that. And I try to always do something that makes what I do different.
“I want to be different and recognizable,” he continues. “I remember when people talked about how some players—you just hear one note and you go, ‘Oh, that’s Chet Atkins.’ And it hit me like a train, the reason why a guy like Hank Marvin, the lead guitar player from the Shadows.... I can tell you: He had a tone that I hear in other players now. Everyone copied him—they just don’t know it—including Mark Knopfler, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, all those people. I got him up to play with me a few times when he moved to Australia, and even playing acoustic, he still had that sound. I don’t know how he did it, but it was him. He invented himself.”
YouTube It
Emmanuel performs his arrangement of “What a Wonderful World,” illustrating how omitting a harmonic backdrop can have a more powerful effect, especially when playing such a well-known melody.
PRS Standard 24 Satin Electric Guitar - Satin Red Apple Metallic
