Category: Ritchie Blackmore
Is a Strat a rock instrument? Seriously. I’m talking about a Strat with a single-coil pickup at the bridge. If so, can you name five rock Strat players in 10 seconds? How about five rock Strat players whose tones you’d want to cop? I can only name two. I’m not dissing Tommy Bolin or anyone […]
Wanted a Trumpet, Drums; Settled for Guitar Fender.com recently published a short-ish interview with Ritchie Blackmore that had a couple of interesting tidbits in it, below. For the full interview, which discusses his current work with Blackmore’s Night, click here. Fender: Is it true that when your father bought you your first guitar at age […]
Here we are again, I guess – another episode of “is it true or not?” starring Edward Van Halen. Can you take him at his word, or not? Is 90% of what he said truth or was 90% misdirection? Was it more like 50/50? Who knows. I’m not in one camp or another. I just […]
New Mob CD, Super V Pickup Info, T&N Trivia Surfed around a little and picked up the following about George Lynch, for all the fellow Lynch-heads out there. The New Mob If you don’t have Lynch Mob’s first CD, Wicked Sensation – recorded after Dokken bit the dust – you should get it. The songs […]
Page Played ‘You Really Got Me?!’ Here’s part 2, the last part for now, of my deep dive into Ritchie Blackmore’s tone. Below Ritchie first talks about his technique, and then he issues opinions on everyone from Yngwie Malmsteen to Jeff Beck (all from the same sources as used in part 1).
Strat + Modded 200-Watt Marshall + Boost = Wood Before he got on his Medieval music trip, Ritchie Blackmore’s tone was all wood. I heard a Rainbow tune the other day on Internet radio, and I just sat there wondering how the heck he could get that fat tone out of a Strat’s bridge pickup. […]
Some news clips of the week: Ace’s Album/Space News From Blabbermouth.net and HardRadio.com: Ace Frehley’s new solo album, tentatively due out this spring, will be called “Anomaly.” In an early 2008 interview with Billboard, Ace said about the forthcoming CD: “Basically I’m trying to get back into the mindset I was in when I did […]
Fair Warning Tone Ain’t All the Same
Got it in my head to figure out which Van Halen song tones – not album tones – I liked the most. Started with Fair Warning, whose balls I just can’t get enough of…which doesn’t sound so good but you get what I mean. Listen to it cranked in my car because that’s the only […]
Pondering VH’s Fair Warning Tone
LOVE the first four Van Halen albums. Always have, always will. Love the rest too, including the Van Hagar years (oops, forgot about VH III…), but those first four vinyl donuts are to me and many others just the nads. The nadliest of nads. They’re a band kicking the world’s butt in every way, and […]
Recently I was ruined yet again by a good amp. This time a bud’s Bogner Shiva, EL34 version. Let’s call him Sean – because that’s his name…. He’d been talking about how awesome it was for a while, and even though I know he has good ears, wasn’t too motivated to go try it. I’d […]
The Gene-EVH-Ace-Joe Perry Connection
Have you picked up “Guitar World Presents 40 Years of Van Halen” yet? Zactly – I didn’t even know it existed until I saw it in a bookstore (remember those? lol). Anyhow, I’m always amazed at how I think I’ve memorized every word ever written about Ed and his gear and then I read something […]
More On the YMI5150 Model-A Guitar
Few weeks ago I posted a brief “review” (outdated word) of Kevin Holbrook’s YMI5150 Model-A guitar. As a brief reminder, what got my attention were the following things: > A good wood combo: swamp ash, maple/rosewood. > An interesting and unique combo of components resulting in a Strat-shaped and -scaled guitar with an ABR bridge […]
Did You Read the Esquire EVH Piece Yet?
We’re going to have to wait yet another week for the interview with Kevin Holbrook of YMI5150 guitars because we have yet another newsworthy event. This time it’s the recent Esquire interview with Edward Van Halen. Now before you EVH fans get to getting your hopes up, let’s bear in mind the same ol’s: 1. […]
Show ‘Review’: Van Halen at the Garden
Took my 10-year-old son to see Van Halen at Madison Square Garden in New York City on March 1. I think he was more excited to see them than I was – not that I wasn’t, but this was the mighty Van Halen whose tunes the both of us have copped, jammed to and listened […]
