From the folks at LA Vintage Gear comes this?eBay listing for an immaculate Fender Vibroverb from 1964!? According to the seller, a few caps and resistors on this amp have been replaced over its lifetime –perfectly normal as?capacitors are prone to leaks or drying out?after a decade?–?and a JBL swapped out for the original Oxford 15″ speaker. ?As a bonus the seller is also including the original Oxford speaker.? And every tonehound knows that a 15″ speaker is the key to that elusive Stevie Ray?sound!?? Crank up that Strat neck pickup because that 15 is going to?make your guitar sound like you went up two string gauges.? At least! Seriously, the condition of this amp is unbelievable — even the grille cloth is a perfect, just-out-of-the-factory silver and light grey.? Not bad for an amp that is 46 years old!? Originally released in 1963, the first year of production saw this amp as a ‘brownface’ — brown faceplate, brown knobs, light brown grille cloth and?a?cabinet clad in brown tolex. Fender switched to the classic blackface and silver grille cloth for the Vibroverb?in 1964 and upped the wattage to 40W from the previous 35W on the brownface with some modifications to the tube layout.? The Vibroverb was also the?first amp in the Fender line to incorporate a built in reverb.? These spring?reverb ‘tanks’?which Fender procured from Hammond?helped define the Fender sound and indeed?the guitar sounds used in?pop music in general in the 60′s.??And it still stands that if you wanted a defined,? ballsy reverb that doesn’t wash out your guitar tones at more extreme settings,?a spring reverb is still the way to go! (eBay Item #: 200475280868 ) ? Subscribe in a reader

Read the review here: Pristine 1964 Fender Vibroverb on eBay!

Here’s an eBay listing for a?Relic 1960 Fender Custom Shop Stratocaster owned by Mike Landau!? According to the seller LA Vintage Gear, this Sonic Blue beauty was specially built for Landau?by the Fender Custom Shop in 2002.???And for many big name pros that?usually means a visit to?the custom shop to hand-pick choice bodies and necks out of the batch.? A privelege for the lucky few!? And if there’s anybody that knows what he wants in?a Strat, it’s Mike. Weighing in at 7.8lbs, this axe comes with all accessories and a?Certificate of Authenticity

More here: Fender Custom Shop 1960 Relic Stratocaster Owned by Mike Landau on eBay!

Nashville is still picking up the pieces after?flash floods early this month poured about a foot of rain over the city. And not spared was Soundcheck Nashville, the town’s largest music storage warehouse, and as it turns out, the storage?facility of choice for?three quarters?of Nashville’s artists and musicians. It is estimated that 1,000 guitars and 2,000 amplifiers were damaged at Soundcheck, many of which were vintage instruments?and?irreplaceable — Chris Leuzinger’s 1952 Les Paul Gold Top (at right) was rescued from under 3 1/2 feet of water that flooded the warehouse

Continue on here: Guitar Recovery In Nashville After Floods

Here’s one for all the Dumble freaks, umm..

Read the review here: 1979 Dumble Overdrive Deluxe Demo!

Here’s a rare Schecter YM-1 Yngwie signature model on eBay.? Both Schecter and Aria were quick to sign up Yngwie when he landed in the US in the early 80′s and started making a name for himself as rock guitar’s new wunderkind. ??Both endorsements were short-lived however, and Yngwie continued to play his Fender Strats exclusively, right up until the time when Fender decided it made good commercial sense to produce an Yngwie signature model themselves. The Schecter YM-1 featured an ash body, fully scalloped rosewood fingerboard and a?two-point fulcrum-style?bridge, likely made by Trev Wilkinson.? Ash-bodied Schecters from this era are noticeably heavy — think 80′s era Les Paul-type weight in a Strat-shaped body!???The Schecter?YM-1 is also the very first example of a scalloped, production model guitar and is probably one of the reasons so few were made.??1986 was pre-CNC, and scalloping fingerboards was still an arduous, time-consuming, blister-inducing affair

Continue here: Schecter YM-1 Yngwie Malmsteen Signature on eBay

I was looking through old footage on the videocam the other day and came across a couple of clips from my Ceriatone factory visit in September 2009 — clips?which I was telling myself?to post up ages ago but never got around to. In this vid I’m playing Ceriatone’s in-house tester guitar, a Fender American Standard?Stratocaster, which I?might add, was really well set up.? I used the rhythm pickup with the?guitar straight into the amp, in this case a Ceriatone JTM45 head into a Ceriatone 1 x 12 cabinet.? The EQ was set flat,?more or less, with no reverb or additional pedals. This is all I could want in a clean tone, really.? This thing sounded really juicy with glassy overtones and the Variable Voltage Regulator (VVR)?mod?added a?natural compression?to the notes.? This amp had?a lot of ‘sponginess’ or give to the tone, and the notes seemed to get bigger after the initial pick attack.? Really easy to play through

Read the review here: Ceriatone JTM45 with VVR Mod, Demo I

Lots it seems. While my previous post on the Splato-caster featured paint in a guitar body, this one?features a guitar painted on a body.? How about that for interesting parallels..? The work of Australian body-paint artist Emma Hack, this breathtaking?work took more than?ten hours to complete and is being used to promote the 2010 Adelaide International Guitar Festival that will run from 25th – 28th November.?? Apparently, the piece will be displayed throughout the duration of the festival and will be auctioned off at the end.? Although it is not entirely clear if the winning bidder gets to take the actual work of?art home.? (Pic and story source:? www.dailymail.co.uk ) ( www.adelaidefestivalcentre.com.au/guitarfestival/ ) ? Subscribe in a reader

Continue on here: What Does Body-Painting Have to Do With The 2010 International Adelaide Guitar Festival?

If you can think it, the Fender Custom Shop can probably build it. Based on Jimmy Stout’s winning entry to Guitar World’s 2004 ‘Design Your Dream Guitar’ contest, the Splato Stratocaster was realised by Fender Custom Shop veteran builder Scott Buehl who?took up the task of creating the aluminum-framed, fluid-filled instrument.? Wait a minute.

More here: Fender Splato-caster by Scott Buehl

Whoever thinks studio guitar work?is easy had better check out this clip. And as Jeff Beck will probably readily testify, it’s hard work that stretches every fiber of the creative imagination.? And guitar god or not, there’s really?no such thing as ” I’ll leave the car engine running while I nip in and whip out 20 perfect seconds of pure guitar magic.” In this rare clip of Jeff Beck’s guitar session for Jon Bon Jovi’s song Blaze of Glory ?from the Young Gun II ?soundtrack, we see Jeff really being put through his paces.? Almost everything he plays is perfect, from a?technical standpoint.? Great tone and intonation with the notes just blooming out of the guitar, and all those?amazing Beck inflections are there.???It’s enough to make a grown man weep.

More here: Jeff Beck’s Studio Guitar Session for Jon Bon Jovi

I just came across this very cool site about a ’57 Goldtop Les Paul, serial number 7 3312. Originally owned by Duane Allman who played it?on a number of recordings including Statesboro Blues and Layla, Allman swapped?this Goldtop for a ’59 ‘plain-top’ sunburst Les Paul model?in 1970

Continue here: Duane Allman’s ’57 Goldtop Les Paul