
TWO Winners! Enter below for your chance to win your preference in Pickup sets from Reverend!
Prize #1 - HA5 Humbucker Set
The Reverend HA5 bridge humbucker is a classic style humbucker, but wound slightly hotter than vintage for extra drive and punch. Warm but open tone with excellent clarity.
The Reverend HA5 neck humbucker is a vintage PAF style humbucker. Warm but open tone with slightly relaxed mids and excellent clarity. Slightly underwound for neck position.
Prize #2 - Split Brick Pickup for Bass
Strong lows and highs, open mids. Like a vintage P bass pickup but with more beef, yet retains clarity.
PG's demo master quickly (and easily) drops in an H-S-S setup into his 1994 40th Anniversary Stratocaster that needed help. Find out what happens when gets his first taste of active pickups.
EMG SL20 Steve Lukather Signature Pre-wired Pickguard with 3 Pickups - Black Pearl
SL20 Steve Lukather Pre-wired PG - Blk PearlKim Deal on Failure: āThereās a Sweetness to Seeing Somebody Get Their Ass Kicked"
While creating her new solo record, Kim Deal was drawn to exploring the idea of failure.
The veteran musician and songwriter steps into the spotlight with Nobody Loves You More, a long-in-the-making solo record driven by loss, defeat, and friendship.
While Kim Deal was making her new album, she was intrigued with the idea of failure. Deal found the work of Dutch artist Bas Jan Ader, who disappeared at sea in 1975 while attempting to sail by himself from the U.S. to England in a 13-foot sailboat. His boat was discovered wrecked off the southern coast of Ireland in April 1976, 10 months after Ader departed the Massachusetts coast. Aderās wife took one of the last photos of him as he set off on the doomed journey from Chatham Harbor: Ader, wearing a blue tracksuit and a bright orange life jacket cinched around his neck, is beaming.
Deal isnāt smiling on the cover of Nobody Loves You More, her new album, but the art bears some similarities: Deal is floating on a platform in an expanse of gentle, dark blue waves, accompanied only by a few pastel-colored amps, her guitar, a stool, and a flamingo. Itās an unmistakably lonely image, but for Deal, failure doesnāt mean loneliness. Itās not even necessarily a bad thing.
āI mean, at least something magnificent was tried, you know?ā says Deal. āAt least there was something to fail. Thatās an endearing thing. I think thereās a sweetness to seeing somebody get their ass kicked, because they were in it. It warms my heart to see that, just people getting out there. Maybe it gives me the courage and confidence to try something. Itās okay if I get my butt kicked. At least youāre trying something.ā
āI think thereās a sweetness to seeing somebody get their fucking ass kicked, because they were fucking in it.ā
Nobody Loves You More feels at least a little like Van Aderās journey: an artistic project so long in the making and so precious to its creator that theyāre willing to break from all conventions and face the abject terror of being judged by the world. That might seem like nothing new for Deal, whoās played music professionally for over 35 years, first with Pixies, then with the Breeders. But this LP marks her first proper solo album under her own nameāa thought that mortified her for a long time. (āI like rock bands,ā she says.) Even when she recorded and released what could be called āsoloā music, she released it under a pseudonym. Initially, it was to be Tammy and the Amps. āI still was so uncomfortable, so I created Tammy and the Amps,ā explains Deal. āIām Tammy, who are my band? Itās the amplifiers downstairs in my basement. But the Tammy thing sort of got on my nerves so I just dropped it, so it was called the Amps.ā She also assembled a band around that concept and released Pacer under the Ampsā name in 1995.
The cover art for Nobody Loves You More echoes the doomed last voyage of Dutch artist Bas Jan Ader.
This new record hums with the soft-loud energetic alchemy that defines much of Dealās previous works. The opening title track is a slow, romantic strummer with string arrangements, while āCoastā is faintly ska-indebted with horns and a ragged Blondie chord progression. āCrystal Breathā gets weirder, with distorted drums, synthy bass, and a detuned, spidery guitar lead. āDisobedienceā and āBig Ben Beatā continue the darker and heavier trajectories with fuzzy stompers interspersed with ambient, affective interlude tracks like āBats in the Afternoon Sky.ā Itās a patient, sensitive, and unmistakably scrappy record.
Some of the songs on Nobody Loves You More are as up-close and personal as solo records get. One in particular thatās drawn attention is āAre You Mine?,ā a sleepy-eyed, lullaby ballad. At first listen, it could be taken for a love song. (In fact, Deal encourages this interpretation.) But itās a song about her mother, for whom Deal cared in her home while she died from Alzheimerās. The song title comes from a gut-wrenching moment.
āI was in the house, she doesnāt know my name,ā explains Deal. āSheās still walking, she can form words, but she doesnāt know what a daughter is or anything. She passes me in the hallway, stops, grabs my arm and says, āAre you mine?ā She doesnāt know my name, she doesnāt know who I am, but there was a connection. I knew she was asking if I was her baby. I said, āYeah, mama, Iām yours.ā Iām sure five seconds later, she forgot that conversation even happened. It was just a flicker, but it was so sweet. To have her not see me in so long, and then for one brief second, be recognized in some capacityā¦. She was such a sweet lady.ā
Dealās mother wasnāt the only loss that went into this collection of songs. Her father passed, too, after a prolonged illness. āMy dad was this big bravado sort of personality and watching them get extinguished a little bit every dayā¦ I donāt know,ā she says. āThey both died at home. Iām very proud of that.ā But writing āAre You Mine?ā wasnāt painful for Deal; she says it was a comforting experience writing the gentle arpeggio on her Candelas nylon-string acoustic.
Deal assembled the bulk of Nobody Loves You More in her Dayton, Ohio, basement, recording with Pro Tools and a particularly pleasing Electrodyne microphone preamp. (Some of the songs date back more than a decadeāversions of āAre You Mine?ā and āWish I Wasā were initially recorded in 2011 and released as part of a series of 7" singles.) Deal recorded a good part of the recordās drums, bass, and guitar from home, but other contributions came in fits and spurts over the years, from old faces and new. Her Breeders bandmates, including Mando Lopez, Jim MacPherson, Britt Walford, and sister Kelley Deal, all pitched in, as did Fay Milton and Ayse Hassan from British post-punk band Savages, and the Raconteursā Jack Lawrence.
Kim Deal cared for her parents in their Dayton, Ohio, home until their passing, an experience that colors the music on her new solo record.
Photo by Steve Gullick
Kim Deal's Gear
Guitars
- '90s FenderĀ Stratocaster
- '70s goldtop GibsonĀ Les Paul
- Candelas nylon-string acoustic
Amps
- Marshall JCM900
- 4x12 cabinet
- Kalamazoo combo
Strings & Picks
- .011-gauge strings
- Dunlop Tortex Standard .60 mm
One day, ex-Red Hot Chili Peppers guitarist Josh Klinghoffer stopped by the studio to see what Deal was working on. He listened to āWish I Was,ā and scrambled together a lead idea. Deal kept the part and expanded it over time, leading to Klinghofferās writing credit on the record.
Deal used her trademark red ā90s Fender Stratocaster HSS along with a ā70s goldtop Gibson Les Paul for most of the electric work, pumped through either her long-time Marshall JCM900 or a tiny vintage Kalamazoo combo. Deal has never been a gearheadāat one point on our video call, she uses a tooth flosser as a pick to demonstrate some parts on her Candelas. āKelley is a pedal person,ā she says. āIām not doing leads. Iām just doing a rhythm that needs to sound good.ā
āI donāt think Iām taking it very well still, actually, or Iām a sociopath because I donāt even talk about [Steve Albini] in the past tense.āOver the years, Dealās sonic thumbprint has been tied up in the work of her good friend and frequent collaborator Steve Albini, the producer, engineer, and musician who died unexpectedly in May 2024. (Deal quips, āSteveās the lead character in my own life.ā) Albini and Deal began working together in 1988, on Pixiesā debut LP Surfer Rosa. Their friendship continued over decadesāDeal even performed at Albiniās wedding in Hawaii, for which he gifted her a ukuleleāand the final sessions for Nobody Loves You More were under Albiniās watch. His parting hasnāt been easy.
āI got a text: āCall me,āā remembers Deal. It was a mutual friend, telling Deal that Albini had passed. āHe told me and I just said, āYouāre absolutely wrong. That didnāt happen.ā I donāt think Iām taking it very well still, actually. I donāt even talk about him in the past tense. I say, āWhat he likes to do is this.ā I never think, āWhat Steve used to like to do.ā My head never goes there. I wanted to record a song that wasnāt working and I said, āI need to do it from top to bottom at Albiniās.ā Thatās not going to happen.ā
YouTube
Along with Rob Bochnik and Spencer Tweedy, Kim Deal plays two tracks from Nobody Loves You More for a holiday fundraiser in November 2024 in Chicago.
āGet It Right, Get It Fastā: Jerry Douglas on Bluegrass History and Session Secrets
The legendary Dobro player talks about how to get session work, working with Allison Kraus, and the ābaton passā involved in recording great songs.
Bluegrass music is bigger than a genre. Itās become an entire world of ideas and feelings in the popular American imagination. And musician Jerry Douglas has been a key part of its celebration and revival over the past 30 years. āIt's an old form of music that came from people in the south playing on the porch and became this juggernaut of a genre,ā says Douglas. āItās a character. It's a physical music.ā
Douglas has racked up an impressive cabinet of accolades, including Grammys, American Music Association Awards, and International Bluegrass Music Association Awards. Heās been dubbed the CMA Awardsā Musician of the Year three times, and played with everyone from Allison Krauss and Elvis Costello to Bela Fleck and John Fogerty. Heās an encyclopedic guide to contemporary American roots music, and on this episode of Wong Notes, he walks Cory Wong through the most important moments in his 50-year career.
Tune in to hear Douglasā assessment of bluegrassā demanding nature (āHonestly, there's not so many genres nowadays that require as much technical facility as something like bluegrassā), whatās required of roots players (āGet it right, get it fast, make it hookā), and why the O Brother, Where Are Thou? soundtrack connected with so many listeners. Wondering how to get involved with session work? Douglas says thereās no one-size-fits-all answer, and what worked for him might not work today. The key is to be dynamicāand know when to keep your mouth shut.
There are plenty of gems in this interview, like Douglasā thoughts on what makes a good solo, but the most significant might be Douglasā big takeaway from decades of sitting in on communal roots-music sessions. āWe can play in all genres,ā says Douglas. āWe just have to listen.ā
The perennial appeal of one of Gibsonās most accessible Les Pauls is stoked anew in this feature-rich version.
Lots of nice vintage touches and features that evoke the upmarket Les Paul Standard at a fraction of the price. Coil-splitting capability.
A thicker neck profile would be a cool option and distinguishing feature.
$1,599
Gibson Les Paul Studio
gibson.com
Effectively a no-frills version of theLes Paul Standard, the Les Paul Studio has been a fixture of Gibson product rosters since 1983, which says something about the enduring, and robust, appeal for affordable alternatives to the iconic original. The notion behind the original Les Paul Studio was that it didnāt matter how a guitar looked when you were using it in the studio. Who cares about a flamed top, binding, inlays, and other deluxe cosmetics in a session as long as it sounds and feels good?
In some respects, the newestLes Paul Studio adheres to that philosophy and shares many trademark elements with its Studio forebears. Thereās no body binding and a silkscreened, rather than inlaid mother-of-pearl headstock logo, for instance. But Gibson also carefully and cleverly threaded the needle between economy and luxury with this release, including several desirable Les Paul features that have occasionally been excluded from the budget model over the years.
Classic Contours
Most readers with a cursory knowledge of the Les Paul format will know this guitarās basic specs already: mahogany body with maple top, mahogany set neck, 24.75" scale length, 12" fingerboard radius, and dual humbuckers. The Les Paul Studio hasnāt always followed the Standardās, um, standard quite so religiously. Studios from the first few years of the modelās existence, for example, were made with alder bodies and slightly thinner than the usual Les Paul depth. The newest version, too, veers from formula a bit by using Gibsonās Ultra Modern weight relief scheme, which slims the guitarās weight to about 8 1/2 pounds. The carved maple top, however, is plain and not heavily figured, which keeps costs down. Even so, it looks good under the bright-red gloss nitrocellulose lacquer finish on our cherry sunburst example. (Wine red, ebony, and the striking blueberry burst are also available).
While the binding-free body and less-heavily figured top hint at the Studioās āaffordableā status, Gibson didnāt skimp on dressing up the neck. It has a bound rosewood fretboard with trapezoidal pearloid inlays rather than the dots many early versions featured. For many players, though, the fretboard binding is more than cosmeticāthe ever-so-slight extra width also lends a more vintage-like feel, so itās really nice to have it here. The neck itself is carved to Gibsonās familiar and ubiquitous Slim Taper profile, a shape inspired by early-ā60s necks that were generally thinner and flatter than the ā50s profiles.
āGibson carefully and cleverly threaded the needle between economy and luxury with this release.ā
Hardware largely adheres to contemporary norms for all but vintage reissue-style Les Pauls: tune-o-matic bridge, aluminum stopbar tailpiece, Kluson-style Vintage Deluxe tuners with Keystone buttons, and larger strap buttons (yay!). Another feature here that some past Studio models lack is the cream pickguard, which contributes to the ā50s-era aura. Thereās also a matching cream toggle switch washer in the included gig bag if you want to add another vintage touch.
Studio Play Date
Under the chrome pickup covers live two wax-potted, alnico 5 Gibson Burstbucker Pros, which are calibrated for their respective positions. The DC resistance for the Burstbucker Pro Rhythm is 7.8k and the Burstbucker Pro Treble 8.3k-ohms. Theyāre wired with a traditional Gibson four-knob complement and 3-way switch, but the volume knobs are push-pull controls that enable coil tapping, which broadens the tone palette considerably.
Playability is a high point. The fine setup, smooth fret work, and well-executed binding nibs lend a very visible sense of quality, but you can hear the payoff in the form of the well-balanced, resonant ring when you strum the guitar unplugged. When you turn it up, though, itās classic Les Paul. Whether I paired it with a Vox-style head and 1x12, a Fender Bassman with a 2x12 cab, or numerous presets on a Fractal FM9, the Studio didnāt yield any negative surprises, but plenty of positive ones.
The Burstbucker Pros have plenty of bite. But most impressive for a Les Paul at this price, is the excellent clarity and articulation you hear along with strong hints of PAF-descendent grit and swirling overtones that lend heft and personality in cleaner amp settings. Thereās none of the mud or mid-heavy boominess that you hear in some Les Pauls, even though the characteristically beefy Les Paul overdrive is present in abundance, helped, no doubt, by the slightly hotter-than-vintage-spec Burstbucker Pros. The Studio matches up well with a cranked amp or an overdrive. And while to some ears the Studio might not sound as creamy-complex or lush as high-end, vintage-leaning re-creations of a ā59 Standard, it will crunch, wail, and sing with aggression and civilized authority.
As for the coil-tapped tones, they donāt sound quite like genuine single-coil pickups, even though Gibson employs the nifty trick of wiring a capacitor in series with the coil tapāwhich is voiced to provide a fatter tapped-coil voice and balanced output with full-humbucking operation. It also provides hum-reducing operation when tapped and full-hum canceling operation when both are combined as they are reverse wind/reverse polarity. But generally, they will deliver the lighter jangle and chime that some humbuckers struggle with and lend a lot of versatility.The Verdict
From fit and finish, to playability, to sonic virtue and versatility, the new Les Paul Studio is a genuine Gibson USA-made Les Paul that offers a lot of value. It does just about everything a player working within this price range could want from a Les Paul Standard with a load of style to boot.