I had an Ibanez, but never had the time to practice enough to be good at it. then I sold it.

 

Yah, man... it's like golf. The more you practice... the better you get.

 

Guitar rooms are awesome. An old pic from a house I lived in when I had far too many guitars.

 

How ironic that this thread came up as I was playing one of my guitars tonight.

This is one of my favorite ones, Carvin H2 (Allan Holdsworth model)



I've been playing for many years, but more like a hobby. I'm not a pro player by any means but know enough to survive. I've played with bands too, but not at the moment.

Have another six guitars lying around and two bases....Have more money invested in guitars/basses and music guitar than what I'm willing to admit here, LOL.

Anyway, my guitar hobby is another reason why my 8 is still basically stock. It's hard to sustain too many expensive hobbies at once!!

 

That is awesome!!!! Is that a Noguchi chair?

 

I've gone through many Ibanez guitars but I do miss the custom ESP LTD EC1000 I used to have, money got tight and had to sell it. The strings are DR red devils which are 12s. I've tried just about every brand of strings and I won't use anything other than DR's now. They just sound so good and they hold up very well to age and abuse.

The Bad Monkey replaced the Wylde overdrive I used to have. Don't by the Wylde overdrive, it sucks. The tone was great but the switches didn't last and I had to send it back to MXR multiple times to get fixed and I finally said f*ck it and bought the Bad Monkey. I have also had issues with the Digitechs but they held up much better. I only use it to push the tone out of my amps distortion when I want a more classic distortion tone. My main distortion is of course from the Distortion Factory.

My current amp rig is a Crate GLX head and a Crate Blue Voodoo cab with Celestian Vintage 30's. I really would like to get a Krankenstein to go with my cab but I just don't have the budget for it. Lot's of people hate on the Crate but they have great clean tones. The on board distortion sucks for Metal though and a noise gate is a must. I do like that it has a built in tuner, 16 effects, and all the dials light up.

I'm loving the pics everyone is posting up.

 

Nope. It's a vintage Eames.

 

Played guitar a bit in my youth, mostly alt rock and heavy metal then got out of it and mellowed down a bit. Have a few acoustics, nothing fancy and got back into it last summer. Picked up a Gibson ES 339 and Vox AC15C1 for starters and wasn't long before I compiled my pedal board to search for a new sound I wanted to work with.


Image would be too large so here's the link to the post:

https://www.rx8club.com/showpost.php...ostcount=18636

 

Totally agree with you on the Dr strings. They last forever and the tone is incredibly nice.

But I disagree on your opinion about amps, LOL!!!! I guess I'm one of those 'Crate haters', hahaha.

When it comes to amps, I'm totally biased toward Mesa/Boogie and Diezel. Had a Diezel for a while but sold it because I needed the money. Currently have a Mesa/Boogie. Quite expensive but worth every penny, IMHO.

In regards to pedals, a few years ago I sold all of my digital modeling and went old-school custom made. I'm now mostly using Robert Kelley custom pedals. He modded a Tube Screamer for me, and it really sounds like the old ones when they first came out. Awesome stuff.

 

My son and my daughter plays guitar at school. My son and my daughter owns 3 guitars, and 1 is electric. My daughter plays guitar at school plays, and my son plays guitar and sings at the same time. They made some home made videos together and upload it in YouTube. I don't know where they got the talent from, because my wife and I don't even play guitar or any other musical instruments.

 

Comparing a Mesa to a Crate is like comparing a Ferrari to a Prius lol. Yes the Mesa Boogies are SWEET. The Crate was economical lol.

 

I used to play guitar, now I use my guitar for midi signals to control my synths and stuff.
I also have many dreamy amps. ( I once had a Mesa Boogie Mark Five and agree that they have a great product, totally a studio amp though )

 

15 Years, Epiphone SG.

 

I played a Yamaha FG-150 for years, then bought a Gibson J-45 last year. Used to strum the Yamaha but now play the J-45 fingerstyle exclusively.

 

the family at the moment: (L-R) Fender Stratocaster, PRS CE24, PRS Custom 24 Ten Top, PRS Custom 24 Ten Top

The only thing original about the Strat is the wood. I replaced all the hardware and electronics about 2 years ago.

I'm actually looking to sell the PRS CE24. Thinking about buying something different.

I'll have to take some new pics but the basic's of my live rig are:
-Mesa Boogie Triple Rectifier
-Mesa Boogie Oversized 4x12 (straight cab)
-Mesa Boogie Rectifier 2x12 (horizontal - usually don't use live too often)
-Furman AR-1215 Line Voltage Regulator
-GCX Switcher with Ground Control Pro Midi Controller
-TC Electronics G-Force (thinking about retiring or selling)
-Voodoo Labs Pedal Power 2
-A few pedals

Then some retired gear or gear that's only used when i get writers block / when recording.

 

Those PRS's are pure guitar ****.

 

lmao! i play too...

 

LOL!!!

The best electric guitar - in my opinion - of the last 30 years is the early 80s PRS 24 fret ones. Awesome craftsmanship. They still sell for a **** load of money!!

The CEs are 'ok', so you should definitely sell that one and keep the two Custom top tens, hehe.

And I'm totally biased about your amp selection. Mesa/boogies all the way!!!!

Too bad PRS doesn't offer a Custom 24 in a lefty version. Well, they did a short run this year for the first time. But the prices were a little beyond my reach at that point for the options I wanted. I've purchased expensive guitars in my life, but I was not ready to spend $7,000 for one of those lefties (base price was $4,000 for that run)

 

The CE sounds and feels just as good as the other two. The only major difference between the two, at least for the ones i own, is that the CE has a maple back neck verses a mahogany back the ten tops have (and the maple top shows some imperfections in the wood). The maple neck of the CE is a bit brighter/snappier in tone. I like the mahogany neck's low end response a little better for my style/genre of playing. It's a little thicker and really makes chords, especially in dropped tunings, sound extra meaty. Then just throw a Mesa into the mix, perhaps a nice overdrive to tighten up the tone a bit and a pinch of delay to really make your leads sing and you're set!

I really do love Mesa's, at least their dirty channels. The clean channel on my rectifier is pretty much useless for clean tones. The only amp that I've ever played that I can honestly say i like better than my Mesa is this 1960s Ampeg Portaflex SB-12 that i rebuilt a couple years ago. Pure tube goodness! It's an extremely basic amp with the clearest of clear tone (to my ear) but pair it up with a nice overdrive or distortion pedal and it will blow your mind. (picture of the top of it below)

 

That Ampeg is Beautiful.

 

I <3 that Ampeg too.

 

Guitar, drums, bass, keys, you name it! Sorry for the picture, awful lighting...



Now I just need me one of those RX-8's.....

 

Thanks for the review. Guitar tone is always a subjective matter. I tend to prefer 24 fret guitars mostly because I believe the location of the neck pickup is in a much better location. But again, most of these things are very subtle and most people cannot tell one way or another.

But I agree with you on the mahogany. I have guitars with both all maple and all mahogany necks and bodies and the maple ones are always brighter in tone than the others. In fact, the black Carvin guitar on the pic above has a mahogany body and neck, but with a maple top.

And you are right about the Mesas. Their clean channels usually suck!! But they are awesome for everything else.

And that ampeg you have there is awesome! A classic!!!

 

My Mesa's clean is fantastic. Of coarse mine is based off of the old Mark I/II circuits and is one of the rare EL84 powered amps. It's dirty channel is more crunch and overdrive than high gain distortion.

 

absolutely, that would make a significant difference. Those original Mark series are super awesome.

I was more referring to the modern Mesa amps, especially with the rectifiers. I don't even know why those things come with clean channels to begin with, LOL. But they kick *** when pushed hard.

So what Mesa do you have? Is it a re-issue of the original Mark series?