Brian Mark - Guitaraholic

This weekend, I'm going to audition for a prog rock band. They've actually been out playing shows without a bass player, just as 2 guitars, drums and keys. The whole thing is instrumental, so it seems like it could probably use a little help on the low end. They book practice time at the local Guitar Center, so I'll be meeting them there. This brings up a couple of interesting things, though. First off, how do you just walk into a prog band and start playing? Secondly, if you don't have means for a decent recording, how do you get the songs down tight with minimal practice time at rented rehearsal space? I'll know the answers to these and other mind boggling questions soon. Should be an interesting experience in any event.

I didn't get any building done this weekend. Instead, I had a band over to get ready for their first show coming up, opening for Another Lost Year and Death Division. Should be a great overall show, but it made me realize something. Alex is a beast. Alex, the drummer I've featured here a couple of times, is the drummer in this band. He's playing to a click for this group, the guitar players are sharp, the bass player is decent, and the overall sound is amazing. They're going to be a band to watch in the upcoming months. That said, here's a little clip from their practice session. Keep rockin', Alex!

I've been a bit beat up for the past year plus, so lugging around my Ampeg (almost 100 lbs), or my Hartke with the Acoustic 4x10 and 1x15 cabs is just not what I'm looking to do. As such, the Ampeg went to church where it doesn't need to move and the Acoustic cabs are going to find a new home. That left an opening for a lightweight cab. Enter the Markbass Traveler 102p. I can actually move this one with my right arm (side the surgery was on), and the sound is actually louder than both of the other cabs together. Not only that, but it sounds a bit cleaner and pops better when I hit something hard. Now to move on to a better head. I still like the effects I have, but the Hartke is a beast to carry around. I'll have that solved soon enough, and that'll be another Gear Friday post.

While working on the electronics of El Capitan, I learned the hard way that soldering iron holders get just about as hot as the iron itself. Might take a day or two to get over that one. I now have a pretty decent burn across my thumb and middle fingers on my right hand. At least it's not on the left... I'll count my blessings... just using the other hand for now. That said, a new soldering iron stand is in order. One that will help me not burn myself during future projects.

El Capitan finally got some electronics installed. It was not without incident, though. I'll post more on that later. Seems to be something missing in a few body cavities. Ah, that's looking nicer. Selector switch soldered on and pickups installed. The two volume knobs and tone knob are also wired, but not yet poking through to the front. That'll come very shortly. Next up on this build is adding the bridge hardware and tuners so I can hear it sing. That will be a great day.

I was asked how the assembly of the X-Carve was coming along. Well, slowly. I've been pretty busy outside of the workshop lately, so it's been slowly getting assembled. At this point, I have the X-axis pretty well done. The motor can glide across the rails nice and easy. While it doesn't look like I've done much, there is quite a bit of small assembly to do on both of those end pieces, and getting the screws that were missing took some time as well. I think I'm back on track to get this assembled, though. Next up is the Y-axis, and then I can start really making it look like something rather than a fancy clothes hanger.

I enjoy going to see live music, so this week I decided to post a clip from one of the recent shows I attended. This is JRZ System performing one of their new songs at a CD release party.  So while you may be wondering why I chose this clip, I did have a reason. That guitar player on the right was my instructor nearly 20 years ago. He's since been touring with various bands and is currently in Kill Devil Hill, but he took his time between albums with them to do another album with JRZ. It was truly our gain, and it was great to see my instructor perform again.

Time for some glue on El Capitan today. I got out my clamp, a small table and my my wood glue to attach the neck finally. With a neck attached, it looks a lot more like a guitar. Oh, and since a bare headstock is one of my pet peeves, I took care of that as well. That's the gamer tag that my boys use, so we decided this would be a suitable name for our guitar building as well. A bit of gloss over that and it'll look even more finished.

I get asked quite often, "Why do you need so much gear?" Let me start with PA systems. If I were to take 4 18's, my big mains, 6 monitors, and 15,000+ watts to a small bar, not only would half of the equipment not fit in the venue, the band would be so loud nobody would stay. Add to the fact that this stuff is heavy and it's extreme overkill. So, I have 3 setups. Small, medium and large if you will. This allows me to match the system to the venue, anything from small and intimate to outdoors and loud. So some of you are saying "Sure, that makes sense, but why so many guitar amps?" Well, again, I don't need a 4x12 for every venue. In fact, I don't ever use a 4x12 when out on stage any more. They're great for looks, but heavy and overly loud on stage. I usually opt for a 1x12. However, when recording, each cabinet has different speakers and has a different sound. So, I like to keep a few options around for that, as well as a few options on ...

Since it was the vocalist that initiated the recording project I started last week, and she had the songs in mind that I didn't know, we recorded her first. This left a few interesting things. 1) Rhythm and timing. We didn't use a click or even have tempos picked out. I wanted her to just freeform sing it so her natural tempo would come out. It made getting instrumentation lined up rather interesting. 2) Pitch. While she's got great natural pitch, there are times - especially at key changes - that it came out a little funky. 3) Song length. I wasn't sure how long these songs would be, but the first one is well over 5 minutes now. I've been putting strings, organs and guitars all over the place on this and have our percussionist ready to jump in whenever the recording is ready for him, but I still feel like I need to cut some of the song to make it more listener friendly. What did I learn from this experiment? Plan on recording some framework of instruments f...

Obviously, when creating a guitar that looks as cool as El Capitan, the back side needs some attention, too. Here are a few pics of it. Gloss is on and everything is set in place. I got a great shine from it. Indoors, the shine shows up even better. I can't wait to get the neck attached and some electronics installed.

There are times where I find a guitar that's way out of my comfort zone, so I have to try it. That's what happened with today's Gear Friday guitar. This is from a company called Arbor. I didn't know much about them, so I did some research and found a connection to Yamaha and Ibanez. It has a lot of nice attributes to it, but I'll just hit the ones that matter. For starters, the pickups are decent. Not too hot, not too cool, but just about right for that bluesy and classic rock vibe. The F hole cutouts are sharp, as is the binding. The shape always looks a little funky, almost like the bottom (right side when hanging) is slightly larger than the top, but it plays quite well. I find that the neck is a bit slimmer and faster than a typical semi-hollow. It stays in tune well, has a decent balance, and overall just sounds and looks good. I don't play it nearly enough, though. I tend to grab a Gelvin, Ibanez, or something I've built for most things. How...

It's not every day that I get to talk about real talent from a vocalist. However, that's the case today. In the past, I've recorded lots of full band audio. Sometimes it was just a practice setting where we were recording to see how it sounded. Other times, it was something intended for an album (or at least a demo). However, it was always some music down first or at the same time as the vocals so there was some frame of reference. Recently, I had a vocalist come to me to record a contemporary Christian album. This sounded like a reasonable request, but none of the music was ready to go and she was. So, I told her to sing it and we'd use that as scratch vocals if it didn't work out. Totally. Blown. Away. After she left, I grabbed my acoustic and started playing the chord progression that was supposed to be under the first of the songs. The between verses was, of course, not timed properly. She would just sing one verse, wait a bit, then sing another. However...

Ok, time for another kit. This one is currently being called Castle, and the progress should reveal why in a few weeks. But, for now, it's pretty bare. A pretty basic bass body shape, 2 pickup cavities and a control cavity. Nothing too exciting. Headstock is stained to look somewhat worn and nasty. Not what most people want in a finish, but it'll match the personality of this one quite well. The back of the neck reveals more of that "worn out" look. I might have made it too smooth and gotten a gloss, but it'll play better that way while still looking generally dirty and grimy. The best part about a finish like this is that I won't need to worry about cleaning it up after playing each time. Any grime or grit I get on it will just match the finish. More to come...