ezbass

Welcome @gareth Nice Tele. That buttercream and maple colour scheme is floating my boat at the moment (albeit for a P bass).

I’ve used them in the past for a Bassman upgrade (master volume). They were very helpful.

Remember, Eddie Van Halen held his pick between his thumb and middle finger, so that he could used his index finger for tapping. Whatever works for your style is the right way, don’t be afraid to experiment.

I imagine it’s primary purpose is to raise the action for slide playing, without having to alter the bridge and thus be able to remove it quickly for normal playing. It would also alter the tuning, effectively raising it a semitone.

Bar chords are the bane of every new guitar player’s progression. Understandably so too, what other activity requires you to have that kind of strength in a straight index finger? As Dad says, practise bar chords further up the neck and work down to the lower positions as your finger strength progresses, that first position F bar chords will come along eventually. In the meantime, use a simpler fingering using all four fingers or a 2 string ‘mini barre’ on the first 2 strings (I prefer all 4).

In the figure for F major, the index finger bars across all the strings whilst the other three fingers make a E shape chord. This is the same as putting your capo on the first fret and fingering an E. The barred F chord is probably the hardest to master when starting out, although the barred Bb isn’t much easier TBH (index bar at the first fret and the remaining fingers making an A shape. The Bb often omits the barre to make the things easier, with the 6th & 5th strings not being played).

I tend to hold mine like you do in the op picture, but there's nothing inherently wrong with holding a pick anyway that is comfortable, secure and makes a pleasing sound. When playing electric guitar, I tend to hold my pick 'upside down', using the blunt end to hit the strings, but for acoustic, I hold it the conventional way around (both ways are for tonal reasons). One of the reasons I hold my pick like your first photo is that I like to use pick and fingers, also known as hybrid picking.

Nope, but I wasn't expecting anything.

Oh man! That sucks! Always quite liked it, I took lessons from their bass reviewer, Gareth Morgan and they published a piece on mine about my first half decent guitar (an Aria lawsuit LP). Their offices were close to where I used to live near Croydon too. Sad times.

Grovers aren’t standard these days (pun unintended) but may have been back then. Rubbing knob (sounds rude )? Just ease it up a little higher until it clears the body, or remove it completely, drop the pot out of the back, remove one of the cavity side washers and then reassemble, that will give you a bit more clearance.

Artec P90s are stupidly good value for money. I fitted them to my Epiphone Casino and they were a major upgrade tone wise.

Standard, Goldtop. Beyond that I don’t know. Nice to see a set of proper Grovers on there.

Kimbara, ah yes, I remember them. One of the better Japanese copies IIRC. Good luck with the sale.

The tailpiece looks like an Aria, so I'm guessing that it's a Japanese copy, which isn't a bad thing in itself, there is a quite a market for Japanese copies, but not a Gibson IMO.

It always does . From my own POV, a new guitar always gives me more joy than an amp, so, if both need upgrading, I’d always go guitar first. However, if my current instrument played well and I liked it, I’d probably go amp and maybe some hardware upgrades for the guitar. I’ve had some stunning guitars and amps in the past, but my needs are more modest these days and my 2 electric guitars are a heavily modded Squier CV Tele and an equally upgraded Epiphone Casino Coupé. I only have a small amp these days, but it has the ability to line out to the PA or a powered cabinet (which I have), it’s a Fender X2 Super Champ combo, not expensive, but not bargain basement. After all the upgrades to the guitars, the X2 probably cost slightly less, but they’re all in the same, low-middle ground, price bracket.

Hmm. I one of those who subscribes to the theory that, outside of the player themselves, the biggest contributors to tone are the transducers in the signal chain - the pickups and speakers. The speaker is also reliant on being in an appropriate cabinet. I can’t help but think that a sub £100 amp won’t do a well built/equipped guitar the justice it deserves. That’s not to say that you can’t get a decent sound from a small amp, it might be the very sound you’re after, but I don’t think it’s in the same league as something more conventionally sized and with more power. Just my 2 cent’s worth, others may think differently. Go and try some ‘better’ amps when and if you can.

Hope that Santa brings you something sonically interesting.

Is the 12” speaker you have the one you’re running your Carvin through, as it may not be the amp but the speaker that is giving you the harshness. If at all possible, take you guitar and speaker to a store and try a couple of amp heads and a combo. This way you can see if it’s the guitar, speaker or amp. I’ve done this in the past and if the store doesn’t like it, then they’re not worth any business you might put their way.

I've said it before and I'll say it again... Well done, that man!

Well done, that man!

It seems that you can't go wrong with either a Boss OD1 or DS1 (or clones thereof). I have a Joyo USdream (a Suhr Riot clone) which is rather nice and is nicely volume control sensitive. However, I built a Fuzz Face clone a while back and I'm amazed at how 'unfuzzy' it can be at low levels or with control coming from the guitar's volume knob.

Good of them to reply. Cedar and Mahogany is pretty standard classical guitar construction.

I went through a spate of using them on electric, they were OK, but I went to to D’Addario XLs as ever, can’t remember why. I had a set on my Epiphone EJ200, they sounded nice, but the tension was a bit high for what I wanted and they started to go a bit ratty from strumming.

Can’t help you with a comparison I’m afraid, but my old SE was a nice comfortable handful, not a massive difference for their US offerings.